Pyramid of Prophecy

Spoilers

This page may contain spoilers regarding the Heroes of Hammerwatch DLC, released March 13th 2019. This DLC adds various items, drinks, as well as new mechanics. Continue on if you have already seen these bosses or do not mind spoilers.

Overview

The Pyramid of Prophecy is a challenging expansion to Heroes of Hammerwatch, where your hero must face against the unforgiving desert, a vast forbidden pyramid and the horrors waiting whithin. The Pyramid of Prophecy also requires planning and strategy, items will not come easy and staying ahead of the power curve will involve taking calculated risks preparing adequately before venturing. Using the magic Anvil to create a 'Vendor's coin' in advance allows for the easy purchase of both the map and an additional item from the trader in the desert and the 'Glass walks' buff from the fountain will allow access to some very important secret areas later on. If approached correctly the final areas of this game can allow for the most profitable runs possible in Heroes of Hammerwatch, just beware of the final boss of this DLC as it is perhaps the most dangerous of the entire game.

Statue Blueprints

From left to right: Bolgarth, Calis, Cedric, Ewran, Kyra, Ozreth, Phalarath, Wylmir

Statues and their blueprints are new with the DLC and give the player extra bonuses during their attempts at killing Thundersnow or Nerys. They cost increasing amounts of Ore to upgrade and act as an infinite ore sink so long as the player can continue to get higher and higher level blueprints to upgrade their statues. The blueprints (orange in color) appear on any act and floor in the Pyramid of Prophecy campaign, however unlike blueprints for the Magic Anvil statue blueprints don't appear for every player, nor are the blueprints the same statue or tier. They are entirely individual, so keep a look out on the map for your own blueprints when playing in multiplayer as no one can help you look for them.

The blueprints do indicate what statue they upgrade, but because of the small image, it can be difficult to tell at a glance.

Statue blueprints can generally be found up to 3 tiers above the current New Game level the player is on. While not impossible to get higher tiers, it shouldn't be relied on. This encourages the player to continue delving into the pyramid at higher difficulties.

Sarcophagi

The player will occasionally run into a sarcophagus that they can plunder. The sarcophagus acts like a "free" shop, containing 5 items no matter what and the player can pick and choose what they want from it. The game will pause in single player when interacting with a sarcophagus.

When the player picks the items they want (skipping the sarcophagus is allowed) they will be given Curse based on what items they took. the more items they pick the more curse they will get give, with Epic items being worth 51 curse, Rare 16 (2 rares are worth 51), Uncommon 4 (2 uncommmon are 11), and Common 1. The values of the curse given grow exponentially the more items the player takes, and care should be taken to manage how much curse the player contracts as it will cause problems for the player the more curse they have.

Curse

Curse is a new mechanic that was introduced with the DLC, and is exclusive to the Pyramid campaign. It increases the chance that the player will entirely miss an attack and that any damage the player takes will be a critical hit, dealing (200+curse)% damage to the player. At lower amounts, curses can be negligible as they player still hits often enough, and unless a pyramid trap (rolling boulder or falling pillar) gets crit the player rarely has to worry about the curses. The rate at which the player loses accuracy slows the more curse the player gets, but can continue all the way to 100%. The only way to reach a curse this high is to sit on a trap that gives curse or let one of the Big Mummy miniboss or Queen Iris attack the player for a long time.

Reducing Curse

The main method of reducing curse is by rousing the djinn found in Midway, and the Upper Pyramid. The djinn in Midway reduces curse by 3, on act 3 floor 1 by 5, floor 2 by 7, and floor 3 by 9. There are random numbers of djinn on the floors in act 3. More on the djinn in the Semblance section.

The next way to reduce curse are by picking up honey bottles and the Imp. These lower the player's curse by 1, and every bottle is individual like items, where if one player picks up a bottle, a different player can still pick it up, so that there is no fighting over who gets the bottles.

Another way to remove curse is with the Imp. The Imp has a chance, so long as the player has any curse (visible or not) to remove ALL of the player's curse.

The last way to lower the player's curse is by obtaining items from the Queens Radiance set. This set raises the 0 point for your curses, allowing you to have negative curses. Having curses below 0 does not grand any benefits besides having 0 curse, and ability to take extra curse at no determent until the player reaches the number of curses reduced by the set bonus.

Act 1, Desert

Before you can enter the pyramid, you have to get there first. To reach the pyramid you will have to travel through 3 large desert maps, each with a shop that you can buy a map piece and one item from. The map piece is the same for everyone in multiplayer, so only 1 person should buy it.

The map piece dictates which way is the safest to travel through. This path is the only path that will not spawn a great threat when you enter the map. Unlike in the Forsaken Tower the great threat in the desert will never end so long as you're in the map. It spawns a few sandstorms that follow the player around and will slow the player down if they get too close to it. Additionally they summmon sand elementals that charge at you and deal contact damage. In NG2(?) if they collide with the player, the player get stunned for a moment. If there are many elementals hitting the player in turn, the player can be in a state of near stun-lock.

The different desert patterns

The desert also has its own summons as the player walks through it. While moving through the desert, your footsteps occasionally rouse a group of snakes, scorpions, or sand lurkers to appear right under the player. These enemies will never stop following the player, so long as they can reach the area the player is in. If a scorpion group appears, it has a chance to contain massive scorpion that acts as the miniboss of this act. They can drop keys up to Ace, and have a chance to drop items. The sand lurkers have a chance to drop small blue diamonds and Ore when they die, and the quicksand they appear from will slow the player down if they walk into it.

The desert also contains many spawners all over the map that cannot be killed like the ones in the tower, however they will stop spawning enemies after 5 to 8 spawned enemies are killed.

Occasionally there will be a sarcophagus in the desert.

Lastly, on one of the areas in the desert there will be a pattern in the ground. This pattern should be remembered for Act 2, as it will be used there.

Boss, The Giant Crustworm

Enemy type: Beast

The Giant Crustworm is a reference to the giant sandworms from the book Dune. The crustworm continuously moves as long as it is not spitting rocks and takes significantly less damage when its body is being hit instead of the head. The long the fight goes on, the more enemies will appear to aid the worm along with quicksand spawners. As an added effect, skeletons are occasionally dug up to show that the player would not be the first person to fall victim to the crustworm.

The crustworm always starts out by circling the player one or twice before surfacing halfway. While the worm is underground it is unhittable however the segments that appear during his time above ground remain for a while before sinking back into the sand. If the player is hit by the head, bitten by the worm, significant damage will be dealt. The head in this state is much weaker than the body, but it puts the player at risk of getting bit if they attempt to hit it with a melee character. As an additional risk, the worm is able to completely surround the player with its segments, trapping them in the middle for some time until the segments sink back into the ground.

The other attack the crustworm has is that only his head will appear and he will spit out boulders that fall on the player similar to the spikes dropped by the Stone Guardian but with a smaller AoE. This is when the worm is weakest as he is not moving around and does not fight back other than the rocks he spits. After about 10 seconds he will burrow back into the ground and the fight continues. Which attack he uses is random, and he can do one or the other many times in a row.

The reward for beating the boss is found in Midway, after dropping down the hole that has now appear at the top of the area.

Midway

After dropping into the sunken pyramid, the player is in an area called Midway. They will appear back here after defeating Queen Iris as well. It is highly advantageous for the player to have the Fountain fortune "Glass Walks" active, as it allows access to the treasures in Midway.

Rarely an Ace key can appear on the left side of the bridge near the Well. This key is unreachable when you reach Midway the second time, yet can still appear.

The second time the player arrives in Midway, they will be able to go to a large pile of money and ore at the top side of the map past some cursed tiles that give 1 curse every half second the player is on an active tile. If glass walks is active they can also obtain another pile of gold and money on the south side. In that south room with the money, there is a secret room crack that will take the player to another glass walk ending with a random key up to gold. This key is not always the same one that you see when falling into midway the first time via the Old Map.

There is a fountain in Midway on your second arrival.

To leave Midway the second time, you must interact with the djinn, summoning 3 other djinn that will fight you. Enter the rift to Semblance after the djinn are dead or immediately as the summoned djinn do not have to be killed to enter the rift. All players must be next to the same rift to enter Semblance. This holds for all Upper Pyramid rifts as well.

Act 2, Lower Pyramid

The second act consists of many undead, snakes, and spiders along with rolling boulders and crushing pillars. The latter two appear only in rooms with chests in them.

The miniboss of this floor is a Big Mummy that will shoot skulls that fly back and forth similar to the medusa skulls from the Castlevania series. If these skulls hit a player, they will receive 2 curse and take no damage. The Big Mummies also have a corrupt breath attack that acts like the Wizard's flamethrower. It deals small bits of damage very quickly. On NG+1 being near the Big Mummy will cause the player to become corrupted, similar to the Spreading Corruption rare item. This effect goes away once the mummy is dead or the player gets far enough away. While corrupted the player will take twice(?) the damage they would take otherwise. On NG+2 the Big Mummies will leave behind a curse circle that will give the player 2 curse should they stand within it for too long, similar to the summoning circles found on the Archives.

While traveling around the floor, you may run into curse circles on the ground or rolling boulders in hallways that attempt to harm the player. These will be removed if the player activates the Safe Corridors Fountain fortune.

The chests in this act and the next are often hidden behind floor buttons and only appear once all of them have been pressed. Many traps consist of multiple buttons that have to all be pushed to get the chest, and the trap will expand itself as the buttons are pressed. Some of these buttons will have a trap directly next to them, and if the player isn't quick on their feet they may get hit by it. No traps in the pyramid are able to be disabled, however most do not require all players to traverse the entire trap thus it is usually unnecessary to send more than one or two people into the same trap to complete it.

Some traps have cursed tiles, and when the player steps on them while they are active they will receive 1 curse every half a second.

The rolling boulders and falling pillars do the same amount of damage: 200 Physical base. It is advised to take the Gentle Traps fortune if you don't have the utmost confidence that you will be able to dodge every boulder and pillar.

Lastly on one of the floors there will be a room to input the image found in act 1. The reward from this is random and can go all the way up to legendary. You cannot make a single mistake however or you will receive nothing. It looks like the image on the right.

Boss, Queen Iris

Enemy type: Undead

Queen iris can be troublesome if you lack the damage to take her down quickly. She is able to stomp the players near her for significant damage(150+?) and continuously summons snakes to attack the player through the fight. These snakes, a mix of Asps and Mambas. The Asps fire a poison laser at the current player position while the Mambas chase the player.

Queen Iris will occasionally fire two cursed skulls at the player. For melee characters if you are directly behind or in front of the queen while she prepares this attack they skulls will initially fly past you, but quickly turn around to hit you. Each of these skulls applies 5 curse to the player and if the fight is prolonged, without careful dodging the player can find themselves quickly racking up curses. These curses remain on the player after the fight.

If the player is too far away from Queen Iris she will charge the player, stomping the location that they were previously at. If there are cursed skulls flying around the room they usually end up right where she charged to, as both are chasing you, leading to melee characters often having difficulty reaching the queen while dodging the skulls.

Lastly, Queen Iris will fire a huge swarm of bugs at the player. These bugs are not listed in the Bestiary and appear to switch from projectile to enemy after traveling a certain distance from the player. While acting like a projectile they deal a rapid burst of small damage hits, similar to the Big Mummies faced before. If the player doesn't get hit with all of the swarms they will come back to attack the player like a bat. They block attacks just like any other enemy but can be dodged just by moving around.

Once the queen is dead, the pillars on the sides will rise and the player can pick up their reward on the left. There is never anything on the right except for some coins and pots.

Semblance

Semblance is the world that the djinn originated from, and when the player enters the world they will appear on a purple sphere, with more appearing in the background. While the player resides in Semblance djinn will appear to fight the player. The amount of djinn that appear is dependent on the number of rifts that were opened in the previous floor. The greater the number of rifts, the more djinn will spawn.

If the player has enough movement speed (around 3.0) they can walk in circles around the edge of their Semblance platform and avoid most attacks.

After about 30 seconds the player will automatically be sent out of Semblance and onto the next floor. The timer for this is denoted by radiating waves from the center of the platform. While the player is teleporting they take no damage.

Act 3, Upper Pyramid

The final act of the Pyramid of Prophecy consist of very large, ornate floors that have a lot of gold and ore scattered around. It is common to obtain well over 200k in this act alone.

One of the notable features on the floor are various number of meditating djinn around the floor. The amount ranges from 1 to over 5 and is completely random. If the player interacts with one of them, they can open a rift to Semblance This summons a great threat which is a group of 5 djinn from every opened rift. They will teleport to the player if they are too far away. Rousing a djinn will remove 5, 7, or 9 curses depending on what floor the player is on. If you have 0 curses and rouse a djinn, you do not go negative unless you have the Queens Radiance set effect, but only up to the set's maximum reduction for the pieces you have at that point. If the player takes too long (4 minutes) to reach every djinn, a great threat will be summoned, and if there are any djinn that haven't been roused yet, one of them at random will be roused without the player getting the curse reduction effect.

Every floor in the Upper Pyramid also contains a sarcophagus. The player is encouraged to take items from them as they have a readily available source of curse reduction in the form of meditating djinn.

The miniboss of this act are Sentinel High Priests and are often accompanied by other sentinels. They start out as inanimate statues and will animate after a random amount of time of the player being nearby. The regular sentinels come in a melee and ranged variety, the melee ones will charge the player like a spearman undead. The High Priests will fire off snake beams that deal magical damage, and can also fire off 12(?) beams in a circular pattern. These beams have a chance of becoming snakes themselves when they hit a wall close enough to the player. All types of sentinels are able to drop ore and small golden diamonds. If the player is min-maxing the floors, they should take the time to kill all of the sentinels on the floor for extra ore and money. All sentinels will chase the player across the floor without end like the ambushes from act 1.

The towers on this floor are Sun Prisms and fire at the current location of the player in a prolonged beam that deals very rapid magic damage. Every 4 attacks the prism will fire off 16(?) beams that persist for a few seconds and have infinite(?) range. The player can be downed very quickly by these beams and caution should be taken when engaging the tower. Toppled Towers fortune will almost completely remove these towers, with only ones activated by taking items from a sarcophagi still appearing with the fortune.

Two additional hazards on the floor are molten canals that fill with lava for some time before turning off. These will continue cycling on and off forever and the hazard deals 100(?) magical damage to the player. every half second they are on it. The other hazards are only found in the chest rooms and are sun beams from walls. They too turn on and off on cycles and deal less damage than the Sum Prism beams, but will hit the player just as rapidly.

All of the traps in this act are able to be done perfectly by any character, but significant waiting for cycles to sync up may be needed if the player seeks to not get hit at all, thus taking a hit here or there to speed up the looting process should be expected.

Boss, Nerys

Enemy type: Aberration

The final boss, Nerys, is a powerful djinn that took control of another djinn, Nimbus, long ago and was trapped at the top of the pyramid as punishment. He wields many powerful attacks and can quickly kill the player if they are not prepared for his attacks.

Nerys will always start out by attacking with his sword. When he attacks with it, fire waves will shoot out in the direction he swung. These do moderate damage, but are very fast and will boomerang back towards the player, all waves from the same swing converging at the same spot, and will leave a circle of fire on the ground. The player is lit on fire if they are hit by any part of this attack. The further into the fight the player is, the more fire waves will be summoned, with 7(?) being summoned once Nerys reaches 25% hp the first time.

Every so often Nerys will teleport to a different location in the arena, often close to an edge. This can be somewhat problematic for melee characters as the red mist around the arena will fire at the player if they get too close to the edge, applying armor and resistance break(magebane and shieldbreaker) to the player. Right after Nerys teleports, he will fire off black orbs in all directions that cause bleeding, darkness effect on NG+, and drain the player's mana similar to the Arch Lich diamond from the Chambers if they player gets hit by them and when they land they will summon an X of fire that deals magic damage and lasts for about 10(?) seconds before disappearing.

It should be noted that Nerys moves similarly to a Lich in that he will continually back away from the player, so getting between him and the edge of the room is effective in keeping him closer to the middle.

When Nerys reaches 75%, 50%, and 25% HP he will heal up to 50% of his max life if the player is not able to deal enough damage to stop further healing. During his heal he will summon other djinn to fight the player, along with creating large purple orbs in a circular wave that deal very high damage to any players within them when they burst. This wave starts with one orb directly under him, and continues to radiate outwards before repeating. There IS enough space for a melee character to be directly next to Nerys after the first orb bursts without being hit by the second circle of orbs.

Rewards

Along with the regular gold and ore the player receives, when the player defeats Nerys, Nimbus is freed and is eternally indebted to you. To show his thanks, he now resides within the player's potion and will come out for 30 seconds plus 2 for every PoP NG+ level the player has beaten on that character. Nimbus deals 60 magical damage +10 per NG+ beaten and attacks just like the Sphere Djinn. Additionally, Nimbus adds 25 HP and Mana per level to your potion.

Additionally the player will receive 10 Skill Stars for each NG level they beat the pyramid on.

While not directly from the PoP campaign, the player can also acquire statue blueprints if they are at the correct NG+ level for obtaining statue blueprints outlined at the top of the page or on the Statues page.