Castle Mistmoore

The vampire’s house

Castle Mistmoore is the home of the ancient dark elf vampire Mayong Mistmoore and his followers, a castle of vast, mazelike corridors and secret areas. Allakhazam calls him the mighty arch vampire who later becomes as powerful as the gods. Our lore page traces that longer game: once Teir’Dal, he “no longer swears fealty to Innoruuk or any other,” and his household is his own making, from pledge familiars, dark elves he kidnapped or seduced into thralls, to the dark necromancers lured away from Neriak.

The zone’s creature lists read like that household: Mistmoore guards and glyphed familiars, gypsy dancers and musicians, ancilles of every degree of death, shadowy scribes, will sappers and thought spoilers, and grinning, sneering and jeering gargoyles. Named residents include Butler Syncall, Maid Issis, Princess Cherista, Black Dire, Garton Viswin and Mayong himself.

Sources: Allakhazam: Castle Mistmoore (zone) · Project 1999 Wiki: Castle Mistmoore · EQ Atlas (eqatlas.ca): Castle Mistmoore

Where it stands

Mistmoore is reached only through the Lesser Faydark. The Project 1999 guide and EQ Atlas both place the entrance at the western end of that forest’s southern border, where an ancient druid ring stands by the tunnel. Our lore page, following the in-game lore, sets the castle among the peaks of Ranthok Ridge off the forest’s southeastern edge. The guides describe the zone line, the lore describes the ridge beyond it, so the map draws the castle along the Lesser Faydark’s southern border.

Getting there is its own test. Most of the Lesser Faydark is safe for anyone strong enough for Mistmoore, but the guides warn travellers away from the brownie camp to the north and the shadowed men to the east, and from running along the southern edge, where powerful dark elves hold an abandoned camp.

Sources: Project 1999 Wiki: Castle Mistmoore · EQ Atlas (eqatlas.ca): Castle Mistmoore · Allakhazam: Castle Mistmoore (zone)

Day, night and trains

Mistmoore’s followers attack everyone, because their lord considers all to be his enemies. By day dark elves and other creatures walk the halls; at night the undead rise and take many of their places, so invisibility works on one shift and invisibility against undead on the other. Soloing was simply not possible: the monsters were tough and spawned fast and close together.

Its trains were notorious. With only one connection for most of its life, every train from deep in the castle headed for the same narrow corridor to the zone line, gathering everything on the way and pouring through the open ground between the tower and the lake. EQ Atlas’s author never entered with fewer than five bodies in the entry hall, and advised zoning in invisible.

Sources: EQ Atlas (eqatlas.ca): Castle Mistmoore · Project 1999 Wiki: Castle Mistmoore · Allakhazam: Castle Mistmoore (zone)

Why groups came anyway

For all that, the guides call it arguably some of the best experience in the game. Creatures of similar strength spawn near each other, so a careful group can work a small area; the dark elves drop platinum, runes and words, and gargoyle eyes sold for several platinum each. Hunt in the front, run Spirit of the Wolf, and zone at the first doubt, and nobody need die.

Faction is unusual here too. Allakhazam notes that faction work can make you non-hostile to the castle’s residents, at the cost of making enemies of the League of Antonican Bards and the Ring of Scale.

Sources: Project 1999 Wiki: Castle Mistmoore · EQ Atlas (eqatlas.ca): Castle Mistmoore · Allakhazam: Castle Mistmoore (zone)

A castle that changed

Allakhazam records that the zone was temporarily revamped on January 26, 2005 and restored to its previous state on October 12, 2005, and that a higher-level version returns during special events. Its zone list now also includes Bloodfalls, a later addition; the single-entrance castle above is the classic one.

Sources: Allakhazam: Castle Mistmoore (zone)