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Understanding Icefall 2
An overly-wordy guide by Sletch
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Icefall 2 is the longer, more involved, and more deadly counterpart to Icefall 1. There is no Normal/Hard/Extreme setting, ala IF1. There is only one difficulty- Nightmare. This epic requires 25-30+ people, ideally all with Icefall weapons and helper items from the various shops. It’s also critical that we have players who can run the minigames in the Final Boss phase- IF1 W/E leaders should expect to step up unless there are veteran IF2 runners around.
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IF2 recommended stats and prep
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As much HP as possible, Max SH stats
10k mana for ‘energize bomb’ to start Fragments - Mandatory!
Party heal, aim, rescue, push, reverse align, petrify
Scrolls of 3x party heal are hugely helpful in this epic.
Ideally: Have a mainhand and offhand icefall weapon, Drain Insulators, Mana ward.
if you’re gold-rich but IF-points-poor, you can burn 500m on a Meteor Bomb Axe, or 10m gold for the 1 day Abyssal Stormsword.
Starting room: rt icefall, 2s (Orbury)
Especially in Icefall2- watch for the calls to toggle autoassist ON/OFF, Icefall weapons ON/OFF, and calls to REGROUP for party wipes. Absolutely critical that everyone is present for the infiltrate or regroup commands in the Final Boss stages.
Boilerplate reminder: Be prepared to die in epics. These areas are designed to be difficult, the mobs hit hard and there are sometimes other environmental or mob prog factors at play. All epic area rooms are flagged ‘morgue’ so that when you die, no corpse is dropped. You will be at 1 hp, but wearing your equipment. Do not complain about deaths in epics, it’s just a part of the game.
IF2 pulls no punches. This is easily one of the highest total-death-count epics in the game. This can be somewhat mitigated with larger group size, as more people = more IF damage for shorter fights, more players phealing = easier to sponge damage. But on a run of only 25 players expect to be wiping occasionally, and throwing your body at the brick wall till it breaks.
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Goal information
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You must have completed the IF1 goal in order to run IF2. Aside from that, the goal steps will progress and complete during your first full run, just like IF1
Note: You must be around for the cutscene before Fragments to progress the goal.
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Running the epic
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Cliffnotes:
4 sections- Gather 2 emblems, Clear fragments, Pre-final boss minigames, final boss OrRuby.
West boss: Shade. Clear each wave of mobs with nasty restrictions. Autoassist off, aard weapons.
East boss: Snowman King. Multiphase boss fight, summons additional mobs, later phases will eat these mobs to heal. Autoassist on, IF weapons the whole time.
Pacman2 is similar to IF1 W, but with egg magicians renewing the ice barriers.
Statues: Push and rotate wind statues in order to reflect ice bombs back at OrRuby.
W boss OrittiHynes, N boss Asvarien, E boss Death, S boss YrelQath. Killing each one breaks an item on OrRuby. Kill OrRuby within a time limit, or…
Sudden death: If you don’t kill OrRuby in time, 4 Dark Heroes will spawn and slowly start moving towards OrRuby. Quickly blast these heroes then finish off OrRuby.
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West Boss: Shade
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Shade is a ‘waves’ boss- every 10% of shade HP, a wave of mobs will spawn.
90%: Zeros
80%: Shadow Puppets
70%: Ink dragons+Zeros
60%: Ink dragons+Zeros + No cast
50%: More Puppets
40%: Dark Hero of Icefall (wear Drain Insulator!)
30%: Lots and lots of Puppets
20%: Ink Dragons + No cast
10%: 2x Hero
Additionally, certain % waves have added restrictions, like no cast, no aim, no retreat, norecite/quaff, etc. There is also a sort of “darkness” prog during the Shadow Puppets waves that will hide and prevent look/consider/study. These restrictions end/change when Shade transitions to the next hp threshold, they are not tied to the mobs themselves.
Some of the progs and mobs have interactions with the Lost Ruby Sword’s “hoist” effect. Shadow Puppets will take damage every round due to the bright light, Ink Dragons will be distracted and ‘forget’ to blind the group, and the hoist itself will damage shade 100k, healing the hoister for half. Generally leave the hoists for the main tank.
There are two waves that spawn Heroes- these are absolute priority blast targets. They will do a hoist prog of their own that drains players and heals Shade. Wearing a Drain Insulator will block a third of the damage.
Main strategy for the fight- Keep Shade petrified, reversed, damp’d. Wear your normal weapons, autoassist OFF for this whole fight in order to control the damage done to Shade. Attack the mobs that are called out, and pheal when possible. If you get too low or need to head out to spellup during nocast rounds, retreat north at any point. Get back to Shade’s room and pheal whenever possible, for the good of the whole party. For the noretreat or noaim waves, you can recall / c word out and run back to the room as needed.
WATCH for calls to regroup if we start wiping, or to prepare for the 2x Hero wave. Retreat N from Shade, or 3swu from the center of icefall (swu from Orbury) to regroup and pheal. Do not head back into the room solo- the leader will move you back in.
Just to repeat it- Autoassist OFF for this phase. Too much damage on Shade and we will trigger the next wave, which can sometimes be difficult to recover from.
Shade will drop a bronze key, and 50% chance to drop a midnight balloon. Give the key + balloon to the leader. The balloon will be handed out via dice at the end of the run.
Once the leader makes sure everyone has returned - Pop balloon to finish section and receive Shade’s Emblem.
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East Boss: Snowman King
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Snowman King is a multi-stage boss fight, a raw “more dots more dots” blastfest. IF weapons on, autoassist ON for the whole phase. Reverse align + petrify for the main bosses will prevent a lot of damage, but expect a fair amount of pain throughout. The Meteor Bomb Axe can be used throughout this fight to deal a large chunk of damage to the boss, as well as dealing damage over time to many of the added mobs.
First phase: Nothing too fancy. The boss will spawn some extra mobs as the fight progresses. Most of the time these side mobs are ignored, as they will despawn when the boss transitions to the next phase. One exception: If Snowman King spawns an Inferno Wyrm early on in the fight, the leader may call to blast the Wyrm. Wear Mangled Inferno Horns if you have them, swap to aard weapons, and aim Wyrm. Once the Wyrm is clear, Icefall weapons, aim King.
Second phase, the boss is made of 3 mobs: Snowman King’s Torso, Left Arm, and Right Arm. There will be extra mobs as well, but the priority is to blast the arms. People in the group will often coordinate and communicate which mobs have been reversed. Typically the priority is LEFT - RIGHT - TORSO. The Icefall weapon damage will cleave to hit all 3 boss mobs, but focusing on clearing the arms first will remove the painful swatting and clapping progs.
Third phase is vs the Snowman King’s head. More mobs will spawn on this, and the boss will occasionally eat these to restore his health. Just rev, damp, blast the King.
Fourth phase is vs Snowman King’s pet rabbit. This is very similar to the head fight, but with more damaging progs and more side-mob-eating-to-restore-health tricks. (Dammit, Bupy.) Blast rabbit to victory.
Same as Shade fight, WATCH for calls to “regroup” if we wipe. This is most common during the Left/Right/Torso phase. N of the boss fight, or 3sed from the center (sed from Orbury) is a safe room to pheal in. Do not go back in alone. The leader will typically call an aim priority before going back in.
Once everything is dead and the leader makes sure everyone is present, Skin rabbit to get a Rabbit Cloak.
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Cutscene #1 - Unmasking Orbury
(prep for Fragments)
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The leader brings everyone together for a cutscene- (with the bronze key, n, open safe, get all safe, s, unmask orbury)
You must be present at this stage if you need the goal steps. If you don’t need this, you can go quest/restock pills. Two people will usually volunteer to be blockers at this point- more info on that below. Once the blockers are assigned and everyone has gathered after the cutscene, stand then be ready for energize bomb..
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Fragments
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In a 7x6 arena, waves of Energized Ruby Fragment mobs will spawn in the southmost central room and move north to damage Icefall’s core. There are 5 overall waves of frags to clear, and each wave has 10 staggered spawns of (1/2/3/4/5) frags. These staggered spawns will move independently of each other and on a set timer. They will progress north very quickly if no players are in the room, or they will stall for about a tick if a player is present to block their path.
Blockers: Current strat is to assign 2 blockers that will guard the rooms 1n/3n and 2n/4n from the tongue. Their job is to announce how many frags have leaked past the main group. Once the blocker in 1n starts announcing # of fragments as they filter into the room, the other blocker gets in position 2n. Once 2n starts announcing, the 1n blocker moves to 3n. Etc, the same, for 3n/4n.
If the fragments reach 5n, they will deal damage to Icefall’s core and reappear at the south wall. The frags will continue to move north and loop until killed, or the core reaches 0%. The core can be healed with spells, but if mobs start leaking through it’s usually an issue with the group’s DPS or coordination of the blockers.
There are also 5 minibosses in the arena. Directions below are from the landing room after energize bomb:
Time starts ticking as soon as the leader starts this section. Staying ‘ahead of the curve’ on waves spawning can make or break this phase. Be ready to energize bomb, run 2n2w as soon as the leader calls for it, and blast left Eyeball with icefall weapons. While the group fights, there will be a prog announcing the first wave- 1st blocker should split off at this point, or already be sitting at 1n.
Once the Eyeball is dead, switch back to aard weapons and the leader will bring the group to clear the first wave of frags 1n of the tongue. When clear, switch back to icefall weapons and blast down the tongue ASAP. If the 2nd wave spawns while the tongue is still alive, leader will likely call to focus on killing the tongue. If they feel the blast is too slow, they may call to retreat out and handle the second wave 1n before finishing off the tongue.
After the tongue is dead, back to aard weapons again and focus on clearing the frags as quickly as possible. Stronger players will generally AOE each wave to engage all the mobs. Watch to see who is tanking and rescue them to help soak some of the frag’s damage.
Assuming all goes well, after the 5th wave clears…
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Cutscene #2 - Kaboom
(prep for Final Boss)
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Once all waves are clear, the group is transported back to Orbury for another cutscene as Icefall explodes. Howl when appropriate, and convert fragment to get an Icefall2: Final Boss token.
The Final Boss section opens with 2 minigames. The leader will often ask for volunteers to lead these sections. Succeeding at these games will help soften up OrRuby before finally confronting him directly. Between each phase of the final fight there will be a short opportunity to rejoin the group. If you die during any part of this phase- head back to Orbury (2s) and be ready for the command to infiltrate.
If the party ever totally wipes or fails to kill OrRuby from here out, we will need to start this phase over from the beginning of these minigames.
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Final Boss - Minigames (Pacman2, Statues)
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OrRuby sits in the middle of a large arena, encased in protective magic. He cannot be attacked during this part of the fight, but successfully completing the phases of these minigames will deal big chunks of damage to him. Additionally OrRuby will drain players’ mana every time they enter the room. Wear a shield/sanc aura for the minigames, and if you own a Mana ward, wear it for the remainder of this fight to mitigate a portion (or all) of the mana drain prog.
Pacman2: Similar to clearing the ice barriers for IF1 West- collect ! and avoid $. These sentinels move more predictably than their IF1 counterparts, but the arena is much larger. Across 4 phases, the leader needs to clear all the ice barriers, then lash orruby at center to damage him. Based on the current phase, 0/2/4/4 egg magicians will spawn across the arena as well. They move quickly, renewing the ! barriers as they go. If you are not leading, spam kill egg as the leader runs the group around in order to take out these buggers. While the group is stationary fighting, there’s a good chance a sentinel $ will wander in and explode. Eat pills and stay at 100% health whenever possible. If you die during this section, head back to Orbury, spellup but don’t heal up- wait for the call to infiltrate after the 4th phase completes. There will be a full restore upon pull lever, to start the next mini game.
Statues: Slightly similar to Icefall 1 East - Across four phases, 1/2/3/4 Wind statues < > ^ v will spawn randomly in the corners of the arena. OrRuby will prepare to launch 1/2/3/4 ice bombs in specific cardinal directions out from the center. The party needs to locate and push wind statues into position in front of the bombs, while the leader operates a set of cranks to rotate the statues to face inward. Bombs properly reflected back at OrRuby will deal big damage to him. Any bombs not reflected will deal big damage to the whole group.
This game requires teamwork and communication, with VERY little time to spare before the bombs fire. If you have the stats for pushing, head out to one of the four corners of the arena. Wear a lv 1 hammer in case push fails and you aggro the statue. If you end up fighting a statue, flee ASAP so someone else can push, and try again. Autoassist OFF so you don’t accidentally ‘help’ when someone else fails a push. Do not kill a statue!
The statues spawn in random locations in the 4 quadrants NW/NE/SE/SW.
Pushers need to communicate to the leader and the other pushers the location and # of statues in each section.
“2 SW”, “NE”, etc
The leader will identify which statues need to go to which positions
“SW to S, W”. “NE to N”
Once the destinations are identified the pushers need to work together to get the statues in place. Check the map and/or scan- either be ready in the next room ahead of a push, or in the same room in case they fail a push.
Sometimes the leader will need a statue moved off of its pedestal in order to rotate them properly. Watch for calls-
“S off”, “S on”
As mentioned, the timing is extremely tight for this phase. Be active, be ready.
If you aren’t pushing or cranking, stay at full HP always- eat pills. As long as one person survives the barrage in this section, any dead players can infiltrate;run 2n to rejoin the party before the start of the final OrRuby fight. Full restore on pull lever to initiate the fight.
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Final Boss - OrRuby, The Ruby Legend
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OrRuby is surrounded on each side by Boss mobs that pay homage to other epics found in the game. Killing each boss removes one of OrRuby’s protections. The group has 7(?) minutes to handle this phase and kill OrRuby.
Current strategy is to kill the W boss, the N boss, then the E boss before attacking OrRuby. During each miniboss- Retreat AWAY from center if you get low. If too many people die, we won’t have enough DPS to kill OrRuby during the timer, and may have to go to a sudden death phase. More on that below.
West: Lord OrittiHynes and 4 annoying brats throwing stones. Aard weapons, aim brat first. Once the last brat dies, Icefall weapons on, blast oritt. Prog damage from the rocks thrown will increase as each brat dies. Killing this boss breaks OrRuby’s shield.
North: Asvarien (Not to be confused with Asvarian) has some gummy shark side mobs. Ignore these and blast Asvarien with Icefall weapons on. A deluge of water will damage OrRuby when this mob dies and the gummy sharks will despawn
East: Death is the most dangerous room. If you have a Glowing Shield of Fire Orbs helper item, you will take less prog damage from the Enraged Orc Troopers in the room. Blast Death asap with Icefall weapons on. Retreat E if you get low. Killing Death will despawn the troopers and break OrRuby’s Vest of +1337 Resists.
South: YrelQath I have never personally seen this mob. But I believe it is a nocast room (based on the helper item description), and I’ve heard that you need to type certain commands quickly in reaction to what the mob does, based on the colors it shows. Per Shaelynne, historically the group has done poorly on this mob, leading to wipes, so she skips it. I would be curious to revisit this some day.
Killing YrelQath would destroy OrRuby’s Miracle Orb, which he uses to re-sanc and heal during the fight. With the other 3 bosses killed and enough damage dealt to OrRuby during Pacman/Statues, it’s reasonable for the group to keep him damp’d and out-DPS this healing.
And finally, OrRuby. He will periodically drain your mana during the fight, healing himself. Wear mana ward if you need to, but ideally dual/tri/quad wield Icefall weapons and blast. Retreat in a direction without a boss if you need to stay alive/heal up quickly, then get back to the group.
Hopefully the group has already softened up OrRuby with all the minigame damage and boss prep work to reduce his defenses. Icefall weapons on, rev and keep him dispelled and petrified, and kill him before the timer runs out. Otherwise…
OrRuby will interrupt the fight, granting one more infiltrate opportunity to gather the whole party. A short time after this final phase begins, a Hero will spawn in each of the 4 corners of the arena and slowly move to the middle to aid OrRuby. If the boss is nearly dead (sub 10%?)- just blast and finish the section. If there’s any risk you won’t clear OrRuby in time, the leader will bring the group to each Hero and clear them ASAP, to full inbetween. Wear Drain Insulators + shield, rev, web, and blast the heroes before they get to the middle. Flee out if you get low- don’t die. Return to OrRuby to finish the fight.
Once you finally kill OrRuby for good the group is transported to a mysterious mob, IceHVH. Type regroup at Orbury to rejoin the group- once the leader ensures everyone is present, IceHVH will quiz the leader with 1 question before allowing you to pull lever and finish the run.
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Rewards
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IF2 always rewards 10 IF points, plus any point boost from the blue/red/gold rings.
After completing a run and closing the IF2 goal, Slopes passes bought at the first prize shop are now permanently 50% cheaper. Certain things in the shop are available to purchase upon S-Ranking IF2, and only until the area repops.
The Icefall shops are detailed in the IF1 guide and the Epic reward megalist:
https://tinyurl.com/aardIF1guide
https://tinyurl.com/aardEpicrewards
This page:
https://tinyurl.com/aardIF2guide
All my guides so far:
https://tinyurl.com/aardOCguide
https://tinyurl.com/aardWindsguide
https://tinyurl.com/aardIF1guide
https://tinyurl.com/IFE-Sandbox
https://tinyurl.com/aardIF2guide
https://tinyurl.com/aardGenieguide
https://tinyurl.com/aardEpicrewards