The Void Stares Back

The Void Stares Back is a quest that was released on 6 October 2010. It is the third Grandmaster quest released. It is also the third and final quest of the Void Knights quest series.

The plot revolves around the impending threat of a full-on invasion by the void pests. The quest also includes strong enemies and difficult puzzles.

Getting started

 * 1) Speak to Captain Korasi, who is at Falador park. She will give you a special set of Black Knight armour: Black full helm (bugged), Black platebody (bugged), and Black platelegs (bugged).
 * 2) Goto the Black Knights' Fortress. When you enter you will automatically go into a dialog with Captain Gilroy who will then teleport you to the Black Knights' headquarters in Taverley Dungeon.


 * After taking Gilroy's teleport, you cannot get teleported again from the Black Knights' Fortress to the headquarters. If you leave or are killed in the headquarters during the quest, you will have to travel to Taverley Dungeon and the headquarters there. The headquarters is deep in the dungeon, with most of the quest taking part in an even more remote set of rooms off the headquarters, so if you die it can take some time to get back to your gravestone. Accordingly, players are recommended to purchase the longest-lasting Gravestone they can afford. Also, switch one's respawn point to Falador is useful, since that city is somewhat near the dungeon's entrance.

The Weight Puzzle

 * Talk to Captain Gilroy and you will be taken to a cutscene of a black knight dying while trying to open the door.
 * Search the crates and you will find out that the labels are incorrect. Captain Gilroy will tell you that he can determine the weights' actual weight.
 * Take all the weights out of the crate, use two on him at a time, and determine the order of lightest to heaviest.
 * Speak to him again and inform of which weight is in which labelled box. After which he will tell you to correct the scales and the password of the day is fifteen in each.

The solution is:

The ambush
After you set the scales, you can open the door. Prepare for a fight first if necessary, as you are ambushed by a gang of void pests when entering the next room. Captain Gilroy and the other black knight will each fight one, while you have to fight four: a Torcher, Brawler, Shifter, Spinner. These fight as they do in Pest Control. They are capable of dealing a lot of damage (especially since you are wearing weak black armour), so consider using Protect from Melee or Deflect Melee to block most of the damage. Attack the spinner first as it will heal the other creatures.

As you kill a pest it will drop security block. Be sure to get those; there are four in total but one is broken so they stack in two piles.

Opening the second security door
After you collect the blocks, speak to Captain Gilroy. He will tell you to go fix the block at the mini-forge in the north-west room. Now exit through the first gate and head to the north-west room where the mini-forge is. You will need a limestone brick, a hammer and a piece of hard leather to fix it and then you will need a tinderbox and logs to light it. The limestone brick can be obtained from searching the crate in the same room as the forge. Now head North to the entrance room with the large banqueting tables. There is a kitchen off to the East of this main room and the logs are in one of the crates in there. The hammer and tinderbox are in another crate in the room next to (South) of the kitchen. Return to the main room and head (North-)East to the jail cell, the hard leather is in the crate beside it.

Once you have obtained all of the materials, return to the mini-forge and use your limestone brick or hard leather on it. Now, use your logs on it and then, finally, light it with your tinderbox. After you have done all this, use the broken block on the mini-forge to fix it. Now head back to the room with Captain Gilroy and place the four blocks in the wall. Open the security door and enter the next room.

(If you die or need to stock up on armour and weapons, you have to go back to the black knights in Taverley dungeon and continue on from there.)

The Control Panel
You will then encounter a control panel. Begin by searching it for magical traps. After disarming the trap, open the panel. The goal here is to create a horizontal line spanning all three control panels. Keep in mind that you will never have to line them up facing up or down, as long as you use up your horizontal lines. The puzzle will not complete until every block is placed, including the ones that are not needed.

Solution to Control Panel:

Conquest
Following the control panel, you will enter the next room. A cutscene plays revealing that Wizard Grayzag is behind the pest manipulations and plans to gain revenge against his enemies (basically, everyone) by summoning the Pest Queen. Grayzag is not quite ready and sends a force of pests to attack. The player and the NPCs take shelter in a cave while waiting for reinforcements. The cave has its exit blocked.

While the NPCs attempt to make a way out, the player plays a modified Conquest game against the AI-controlled pest force. You have a slight advantage, as the pests cannot use commands (such as battle cry, etc.) while you can. There is a slight correlation between class types, as well. While everyone may go about this in a different fashion, keep the following in mind:


 * The Spinners are similar to Champions in that they are very powerful. They do not heal their units (which is what spinners do in the Pest Control activity).
 * The Ravagers have the movement range of Scouts and the damage rate of a Soldier. They can easily decimate your party if they are not dealt with swiftly.
 * The Shifters are less of a threat than other units and can be tanked if need be; however, watch your 100 LP units!
 * The Torchers are similar to Mages/Archers.
 * The Splatters will explode and deal 100 LP of damage to any adjacent unit that is within 1 square.

The AI has a fair amount of randomness in its play and does not always make what seems to be the best move. One winning strategy against it is to line up your units near the back of the playing field (not advancing toward the enemy) and destroy the enemy units as they close to do combat. Taking out enemy units faster than they can take out your units will usually win. Only a reduced set of commands are available, but these are key to winning:
 * Use Chastise to stop the move and attack of powerful enemy units when they come close, and then destroy (or at least heavily damage) them before they can move and attack again.
 * Use Regenerate to heal powerful units that become damaged. The champion, halberdier, and mage are all worth healing.
 * Use Battle Cry to buff up the attack of your units so that they can destroy enemy units. As with regenerate, the champion, halberdier, and mage all can be worth buffing. (For example, with this command, the champion can often take out a unit in a single hit, the halberdier can hit hard from two squares away while being out of retaliation range of 1-range units, and the mage can inflict 400 points of damage at several squares range.)
 * The Charge doubles a unit's movement and is less useful but can be used to pick off a distant unit on occasion, although the charging unit will be vulnerable if other enemies are nearby.

This game is safe for if you lose, you do not take any damage or lose any items. Instead, you return to the cave and can try again.

If the AI is playing well, one tactic is to retreat from the game and start a new one, as the AI may not play well the next time.

Pest queen
Before continuing, bank and gear up for a tough fight! Fighting the pest queen can go through an entire inventory of Saradomin brews, although if you have high stats (90+) an inventory of rocktails can be enough food. If taking brews, also take enough Super restore potions to recover your stats from the brews' effect.

If you happen to die during the fight with pest queen, your gravestone will appear in front of the portal in the black knight's hideout.

While gearing, keep in mind that your primary weapon will be Korasi's sword. In particular, you will need to frequently use the sword's special attacks to prevent the queen's charge attacks, as these cause 500 points of damage to you and your archers as well as healing the queen. Because of this, you should not bring another powerful special-attack weapon such as Dragon claws or a Godsword, as you will need to use all your special attacks with Korasi's sword. You can save yourself an inventory space by not bringing another weapon, although a good weapon like a chaotic weapon or an Abyssal whip can be useful when dealing with the queen's elite defenders.

When you are geared, enter the door at the end of the Conquest room. The first thing you will notice is that Valluta is not a metaphor, but a giant turtle!

Strategy
As for fighting the Pest Queen, has two styles of attack: Melee and '''Magic. '''You will, however, take damage regardless of your prayer, as prayer only lessens the damage to around 100-130 LP.

Most importantly, when the Queen stops attack and looks upward, use your special attack to prevent her from activating hers, dealing upwards of 500 LP of damage (not only to you, but to the archers as well). This is why it is important to either bring special attack potions or not bring a special attack weapon at all, as you have no means of defending yourself if you run out of special attack energy. Also important to note is the fact that she will heal herself after using the special attack as well.

If you spoke to Valluta, you will know that in order to defeat the queen you must defeat her drones. As you can't attack them, you must rely on the archers that enter the room periodically. In order to prevent them from dying, be sure to kill the Elite Pests when they spawn in, as they will attack the archers.

Be wary, when the queen's drones are defeating she will begin swapping prayers in accordance with yours. ''This means if that she will always be dealing damage to you. ''At this point, you may choose to attack the Elite Pests once to get them on you as opposed to defeating them so as to remain attacking the queen as long as possible. After a short period, the drones will respawn. Be sure to keep the archers around so they can quickly dispatch the drones again. If you did not keep the Elite Pests off the archers, you may find her fully replenishing her health.

When you leave the queen to kill the elite defilers, switch your melee protection to magic protection to avoid taking as much damage. Also using a chaotic weapon/whip instead of Korasi's sword will quicken the battle. Just remember to switch to Korasi's sword and use the special attack when needed, and then switch back to your better weapon.

Equipment and Preparation
When gearing for the Pest Queen, try to emphasize Magic and Melee defense, as these are her two attack styles (one will always be hitting you, so bring defence against both!).

High value items can be taken, as your gravestone will appear in front of the portal. You can teleport directly there by talking to Sir Tiffy Cashien in Falador Park.

Suggest equipment is as follows (You may wish to mix and match. This is fine as long as you have decent Magic and Melee defence) :


 * Helm: Verac's Helm > Helm of Neitiznot


 * Amulet: Amulet of Fury > Amulet of Glory


 * Cape: Ardougne Cape 3/4 or Soul Wars Cape or Fire Cape. (Ardougne cape is useful as the sword has a decent stab bonus already.)


 * Plate: Karil's Top > Black D'hide Top


 * Legs: Verac's Skirt (For the combination of prayer and melee defence bonus)/dragon platelegs


 * Shield: Dragonfire Shield/Divine/Spectral > Rune Defender > Obsidian Shield > God Book


 * Gloves: Barrows Gloves > combat bracelet


 * Boots: Dragon Boots > Infinity Boots


 * Ring: Onyx Ring (i) > Warrior Ring/Berserker > Explorer's Ring (Ring Of Life - Recommended on first few attempts)

Inventory
Suggested Inventory:
 * 10+ Saradomin brews, 5+ Super restore potions (2:1 brew:restore ratio with 1-2 extra restores for prayer).
 * 1 Super attack potion or Combat potion.
 * 1-3 Recover special potions (optional; use if queen is going to use her special but you have under 15% special attack energy).
 * Empty slots filled with Sharks, Rocktails, or other high-level food.
 * Familiar: Titan (fire, ice, or moss titan) / Unicorn stallion / Spirit kyatt.
 * Familiar scrolls: Titan's constitution scroll / healing aura / ambush (in accordance with your familiar; detailed below).

Suggested Familiar/ Familiar Inventory:
 * Before leaving the bank, fill a Beast of Burden familair (Spirit terrorbird, War tortoise, or Pack yak with food.
 * Bring a titan, unicorn or kyatt and many scrolls for it your inventory.

When the food in your beast of burden is depleted, dismiss it (you will need to click quickly, as the queen will be doing continuous damage). Then summon your second familiar. If you bring a kyatt, the overall strategy is the same; however, now is when you begin spam clicking ambush scrolls.

Some players do not bother with a beast of burden.

While it is advised to bring good food like sharks, you will find that you will heal mostly by using brews/restores and a titan/unicorn familiar and its scrolls.

Additional info

 * All damage against the Queen is capped at 450 LP.


 * It is possible to attack and then quickly run away while praying against magic to avoid the swapping of attack styles; however, this is risky as you may do less damage before the drones return.


 * The Steel Titan familiar is very handy when defeating queen, as its special attacks can hit very high.

Rewards



 * 1 Quest point
 * Void guardian torso, Void justiciar torso, or Void executioner torso, depending on how you answered several psychological questions/decisions in the void quests. (leggings with the same names appear in quickchat)
 * Korasi's Sword
 * 2 Book of Equilibrium ( 50k experience each in any combat skill over 75)
 * The ability to trade your void knight armour for its elite version at the cost of 100 Void knight commendation points.
 * 20,000 experience
 * 20,000 experience
 * 20,000 experience
 * 20,000 experience
 * 20,000 experience
 * 20,000 experience

Trivia

 * The title is a reference to the famous quote by philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche "Whoever battles monsters should take care not to become a monster too, for if you stare long enough into the Abyss, the Abyss stares back into you.".
 * The quest was once to be titled "Summer Knights" but it was revealed in the October Behind the Scenes to be "The Void Stares Back".
 * The quest has the highest skill requirement so far which is 80 Magic.
 * There is a massive jump in requirements between the previous quest, A Void Dance, and this quest. A Void Dance requires around level 55 in some skills, while this quest requires multiple skills in the 70s and even a level 80.
 * The day the quest was released, the text players were given from clicking spoilers said "Sir Tiffy, Commodore Tyr and Lord Daquarius are squabbling over the rewards. This may take a while..."
 * On the Adventurer's log there is a bug where the quest is listed on the top with quotations "The Void Stares Back" when the quest name actually starts with a V rather than with quotes.
 * The popular movie quote "Say hello to my little friend", from Scarface, is used once during the quest's dialogue.
 * This quest was the first quest to have an 80+ skill requirement.
 * In the quest, Korasi says "that son of a brawler", which is a reference to "son of a ".