Skip to main content

DS4: Ancient Digsite

Overview:

This Dungeon is the first place you will find materials needed for the Hellstone Forge. It is highly recommended to have AT MINIMUM fully enchanted netherite armor and forge level items such as the Aether Blade, with the True Aether Blade being the best due to it's whirlwind ability to help knock enemies back. A bow will be critical in this dungeon due to some ranged battles, especially during the boss fight. Consider bringing friends with you to complete your journey as this dungeon proves to be much more challenging than the previous ones. If you attempt dungeon difficulties higher than the base difficulty, you will need Tier II or higher forge equipment to survive.

  • Difficulty: Hard
  • Lives: 3
  • Time Limit: 45 Minutes
  • Group Size: 1-4 players

Dungeon Mobs

You can expect to encounter a variety of new mobs in this dungeon.

Husk

These creatures are slightly stronger than your average zombie, however they are quite slow. When attacked, they gain a small fleeting speed boost. Just like vanilla husks, being hit by them will give you a small hunger debuff.

Mummy

Slow, high health, inflicts hunger and slowness when hit by them.

Ancient Skeleton

This enemy, like most in Ancient Digsite, is rather slow. However, they make up for this in being ranged, throwing bones at players. 

Ancient Pharaoh

Tanky miniboss that shoots tornadoes at players as well as cursed sand along the ground that seeks you out.

Fire Sprite

Fire Sprites are a lot more difficult than the Forest Sprites encountered previously. Unlike the Forest Sprites, Fire Sprites do not lose health upon hitting you. They do slowly lose health over time, but it is still very slow. Fire Sprites, upon hitting you, can set you on fire, dealing fire damage.

Hellfire Archdemon

The boss of the dungeon. This boss has 3 phases and all are ranged battles. The Archdemon deals significant damage, and some attacks can be near one-shots if not dodged. Most of time time you can tank the first hit, but your armor is weakened for 6 seconds afterwards which can result in the next hit being deadly.

Boss Loot Table: (Hellfire Archdemon)

Note: The boss tier is determined by the number of players in the dungeon. Each player increases the boss tier by half a level.

Guaranteed Drops

Item Quantity
Shard Dust 35 (100%)
UndeadFiery Essence 2 (100%)
AetherianHellstone SteelIngot 1 (100%)
Experience Points 1000-2000xp2000-3000xp

Bonus Drops

ItemQuantity (Drop Chance)
Aether Flint & Steel1 (5%)
Aether Shears1 (5%)

Loot Rolls (Amount of loot that the loot tables below will drop)

This table shows how many "rolls" you will have in each loot pool. You gain additional rolls for fighting higher tier bosses. Each roll is one instance of loot being chosen from the below table at a weighted random. More rolls mean more chances for rare loot!

Boss Tier Resource Rolls Treasure Rolls

Tier 1

40

1

Tier 2 80 2
Tier 3 120 3
Tier 4 160 4
Tier 5 200 5
Tier 6 240 6
Tier 7 280 7
Tier 8 320 8
Tier 9 360 9
Tier 10 400 10

Resource Pool (Items with a higher weight are more likely to be rolled)

The boss will pull loot drops from this table depending on the number of rolls. The weight of each item in the table determines how likely that item will be chosen during each roll. Higher boss tiers will grant you more loot rolls in this table. (Total Weights: 319)

Item Weight
Iron IngotObsidian 100
Gold Ingot 90
DiamondLapis Lazuli 5080
EmeraldDiamond 4050
Shard Dust 3045
UndeadNetherite Scrap6
Fiery Essence 5
AetherianHellstone SteelIngot 43
Netherite Ingot1

Treasure Pool (WardenHellfire Chest) 

(Items with a higher weight are more likely to be rolled)

Focus
Item Weight
StarliteInfernal AlloyRuby 1000
CloudArcane EssenceNetherite 600400
AetherMana BladeGenerator 100
Mana GeneratorCrystal 8090
ManaNether CrystalEssence 7050
Aether Wand60
AetherInfernal Focus (Green)55
Aether Focus (Blue)55
Aether Focus (Red)

55

Aether Essence

50

Aether Bow45
Aether Helmet 40
AetherInfernal ChestplateFocus (Blue) 40
AetherInfernal Leggings 40
Aether Boots(Red)

40

Warden'sHellfire CrownWand

3520

Hellstone Blade20
Hellstone Bow20
Hellstone Helmet20
Hellstone Chestplate20
Hellstone Leggings

20

Hellstone Boots

20

᛫ Approximate chance of receiving a weapon is 9.5% per roll.

᛫ Approximate chance of receiving an armor piece is 7.2% per roll.

᛫ Approximate chance of receiving Aether Essence is 2.1% per roll.

᛫ Approximate chance of receiving the Warden's Crown is 1.5% per roll.

To determine the probability of obtaining an item, you must divide that item’s weight by the sum of all other weights. Aether Essence has a weight of 50 so it would be 50/2315 or a ~1 in 46 chance, or ~2.16%. (Total Weights: 2365)

 

Dungeon Guide:

Upon starting the dungeon, you will immediately be greeted with a variety of enemies (See Dungeon Mobs above) with husks being the most prevalent. Some are found along the edges of the path and require you to be a little closer for them to spawn. There are multiple sandstone structures along the path, some containing Desert Crates or chests. Once you have traveled past the fossils, you will encounter an Ancient Pharaoh. It's tornado attack sucks you in and it can do a decent deal of damage. 

You will notice that around where the Ancient Pharaoh spawned, there is a pyramid entrance. This is the Pyramid Challenge and each party member gets one life to complete it. If you die in the Pyramid, you are booted out and cannot re-enter. Right clicking to start the challenge will warp the entire party inside, so make sure all members are ready before starting. The Pyramid is very difficult, with various turns and dead ends leading to dangerous enemies. There is also an optional parkour section for a bonus crate. The last stretch contains a large amount of mobs to defeat before you can get to the crate at the end. Upon breaking the crate, each member gets a +1 to their lives and can then go through the portal to leave.

After the Pyramid, you will run into the dig site. There are various chests and crates hidden in tents and mining pits. At the very end of the path is a large pit that looks to lead into the Nether. You will see a ward that is being protected by multiple shields around the pit that must be broken before the seal can be destroyed, triggering the boss to be summoned. Several high level enemies surround this pit so be ready for fighting. You will also find several Hellstone Ore scattered around the pit, but beware of the demons.

Guide written by: MaleahTries