It’s easy to get lost in this maze of bookshelves and side rooms warped by contact with unstable rifts into Oblivion. But the Scribes of Mora manage to find their way around due to their eons of cartographic experience.
All About Mechanics Scrivener’s Hall Guide
Scrivener’s Hall is a four-person dungeon in the game The Elder Scrolls Online. The dungeon consists of various rooms and corridors, each with its own challenges and enemies. Scrivener’s Hall can be accessed at Level 45. In this guide, I shall explain the mechanics as well as what you should and shouldn’t do while facing the dungeon’s bosses.
Table of Contents
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Scrivener’s Hall Location
Scrivener’s Hall is located in the southern central region of The Rift. Travel southwest from the Skald’s Retreat Wayshrine to reach Scrivener’s Hall. You can also access Scrivener’s Hall specifically by using the Dungeon Finder.
Inside Scrivener’s Hall
Scrivener’s Hall is a three-level dungeon with three bosses and one quest. The enemies in this dungeon include Battlescribe warriors, dremora geomancers, iron atronachs, and bull-horned magma frogs.
A War of Sribes
I agreed to help Keshargo infiltrate Scrivener’s Hall and take back leadership of the Scribes of Mora from Valinna.
Completing A War of Scribes
You will need to defeat Riftmaster Naqri, Infernium, Valinna, and recover the Itinerant Staff. Speak to Keshargo to complete this quest. Completing this quest will reward you with gold, and a skill point, and an unidentified Scrivener’s Hall armament container.
Scrivener’s Hall Boss Mechanics
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Ritemaster Naqri
This boss is one of those traps where people think they can just nuke it and move on. Most first bosses are actually NOT so simple and this one is following suit with most recent DLC dungeon first bosses, where you are taught a hard lesson very early on. Mechanics are KEY!
As for formation, the group should consider that the tank needs to always face the boss AWAY from the group while the rest of the players form a triangle behind the boss. Healer in the middle and dps either side. That way everyone is the same distance from the healer during these stages so that it is easier to manage.
This however is a MOBILE fight so the formation needs to shift from one place to another using the tank as the anchor.
Heavy attack – As you would expect, the tank has an obvious wound up heavy attack. The tank should be the only one receiving this if they have aggro. BLOCK it or die. It hits really hard. It is dodgeable but mind your movement. Moving around too much will misplace things and make AOEs difficult to avoid and/or predict.
Adds – There are multiple adds that will enter the fight, close ranged and long ranged. These need to be dealth with quickly! They have interrupt mechanics that need to be bashed/interrupted else players will take HIGH damage. Archers and mages are significantly more difficult to control since pulls are required and when you PLACE them, YOU may have to move. So as much as you can , when these are positioned by the tank, FOCUS them over the boss. You will get overwhelmed if you don’t focus the adds. SO again, pace the boss, focus the adds!
BIG POP! – During the fight the boss will run across the room and there will be a green circle placed on the floor with a spreading aoe inside of it. If this peaks it will explode and do HIGH damage to all players in the room. Potentially a one shot for most. The tank should run into the circle and hold block to suck up the damage and protect the group. Technically ANYONE can do this but it is far safer for the tank to do it. Pay VERY close attention to this mechanic as it is usually the wipe mechanic for most.
Whirlwind – During the fight the boss will channel a whirlwind attack that will spin repeatedly with multiple small aoes firing from the middle. While this mechanic is dramatic and spinning you must be very mindful of your feet. Remember this is a mobile fight. Keep your loose formation but make sure you look for gaps else you will take HIGH damage. Damage shields and consistent heal over time on the ground will help a LOT in mitigating mistakes here. If you rely on ONLY burst heals, people will die. Maintaining higher health during this will prevent a lot of issues with other ongoing mechanics that overlap!
THE BOOKS!!! – This is where people fail miserably because they OVERBURN without considering that these mechanics while simple on the surface, can overlap horrendously if you are careless! These mechanics are based on health percentages of the boss and MUST be paid attention to and dealt with before pushing the boss’s health any further! The check points for this are around 80% 50% and 30% but bear in mind of course HIGH dps can trigger this at different times because the boss may already be in the middle of another mechanic. Rest assured however, high dps or not, they ARE coming!
Basically the boss will spawn a book in the middle of the room. It will constantly do damage to the ENTIRE group while it is present. Ignoring it and pushing the boss will spawn another and another (total of 3) at this point it’s mostly going to be a wipe. So slow down. Lay off the boss and deal with the books!
The method is simple. LOOK at the book. It will be spitting TWO books in random directions into the library! FOLLOW THEM! If you find the books, activate them to take them out of the shelves. Once both are found, the book in the middle will vanish and that mechanic is over.
For this, people running to the books WILL need heals. Self heals or a healer following them is up to you but bear in mind, if the healer chases them, there is no healer with the boss. So how you play is your call, but realistically, a dps bringing a self heal and/or damage shield while they are chasing books will help a LOT.
There are THREE different books. RED, YELLOW, and GREEN, yup kinda like a traffic light! As well as their damage and spitting books mechanic, they have unique ones you need to spot. These will repeat indefinitely until the book is GONE so pay attention!
YELLOW – This book will cause a spirit to spawn by players and wind up a Heavy attack. You MUST block this!
GREEN – This spirit will cast a spreading aoe under players. When it PEAKS you must DODGE roll the pop at the end!
RED – This one will be a spirit you can physically interact with. There will be a channelled effect on players, those effected MUST INTERRUPT it!
Follow the above rules per book, and vanquish them when they appear by chasing down the smaller books in the library makes this quite a straight forward mechanic, but trying to overburn will make a HUGE mess, you can end up with ALL THREE mechanics at once and THREE lots of damage over time in the room along side other mechanics.
PACE it. Take your time, stay alive above all. Once the 3rd book is GONE, there are NO more. Slow and steady wins the race in this one unless you are VERY experienced…but let’s face it, if you are that experienced, you didn’t read this guide anyway!
HARDMODE – The hard mode adds an EXTRA level of difficulty with the boss hitting harder and having more health but the rest of the fight is almost the same. However there is ONE difference and it is a very important one. The BIG POP mechanic where one person (hopefully the tank) has to stand in it to suck up the damage while blocking now has TWO instances of it. You guessed it, ONE each for TWO players, or the group dies.
So when you see that spreading green aoe on the ground with the bubble in it, TWO people need to get in them fast!
GOOD LUCK!
Ozezan the Inferno
The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a VERY mobile fight! Lots of moving, lots of careful placement and lots of dangers all in one room! This boss has mechanics from all over the game that players familiar with Cloudrest, Dragonstar and Bloodroot Forge (and others) would recognise, but for those that don’t understand them. GET ready for one hell of a ride!
The tank should make a conscious effort to keep the boss turned AWAY from the group at all times! Back to the wall or not at all!
The Floor is LAVA! – Throughout the fight the boss will burrow under the ground and appear on the other side of the room. The tank will need to move fast to grab the boss and place it with their back against the wall in the new spot before the boss gets too wild. When the boss burrows however it leaves behind a lava pool very similar to that of the Earthgore boss in Bloodroot Forge. Standing in it would be a HUGE mistake.
The longer the fight goes on, the more of these there will be and YES the room can get VERY full. They will EVENTUALLY start to thin out, but they are present for a LONG time. So the longer the fight the harder it gets!
Heavy Attack – As with most bosses YES this has a hard hitting Heavy Attack that should be BLOCKED by the tank. Be warned, if you MISS this you are likely to die. So keep your health and resistance bonuses up!
PUKE!! – The boss will occasionally PUKE at the tank, this mechanic is a frontal cone effect that channels and does HIGH damage over time. This should be BLOCKED! Do not run around like a headless chicken, it FOLLOWS you! Suck it up and keep the boss turned away from the group at ALL times!
SQUISH the BUGS! – During the fight the boss will summon multiple tiny green bugs around the room! You would have seen these just before the boss. You need to run at them and squash them with your feet! Doing so will give you a speed buff! If you don’t kill the bugs FAST then fire fly adds will spawn! Squash ALL the bugs no matter what!
Fireflies! – These adds appear ONLY if you fail the above mechanic. The more bugs left alive the more of these will spawn. If they DO spawn it is not the end of the world, the tank can taunt them and the dps can kill them but they DO now take priority. If you don’t deal with these you will be overwhelmed FAST. As well as their light attacks they can apply channelled attacks at players. There is already enough going on, you don’t need this to continue, INTERRUPT those mechanics!
So squish the bugs to prevent the flies. If you fail, KILL the bugs and don’t be lazy on interrupts!
DEEP BREATH!? – This suck in mechanic is pretty much a combination of the suck in mechanic in Dragonstar Arena and the fire wall in Bloodroot Forge! Kind of like a HUGE Dragonknight Deep Breath. Basically the boss will travel to the middle of the room and draw players in FAST to try to get them in the middle. You need to get OUT FAST! Run to the walls and get as far away as possible. After the draw in mechanic reaches it’s max range it will EXPLODE doing HIGH fire damage.
You see this? You RUN! That’s it. If you got caught, you were not paying attention, it’s HUGE!
Lasers! – During the fight the boss will raise it’s head up and summons TWO laser beams on TWO random players. very much like the lasers in Scalecaller peak. If you are one of the targets you need to move away from it until it has finished. It’s a simple mechanic but there is a lot going on, so watch the space around you and do NOT run into other players and overlap them. It’s a GROUP effort not, “You or THEM”. Unfortunately these mechanics show the selfish side of some people, don’t KILL each other at the expense of your own survival. Focus is key!
Kite in a wide or small space but don’t cause hazards!
HARDMODE – This of course increases the health and the damage the boss does like any other hardmode but there is a slight twist to it to make it more difficult outside of that mechanically.
Instead of TWO lasers you now get FOUR! Yup that is now ONE per player so that’s EXTRA tricky with an already busy room! Kite these and avoid getting caught like before, but again watch for your friends, don’t run into each other!
And the final additional mechanic… At 40% health and 20% health the boss will spawn an Iron Atronach! These hit VERY hard and cause a lot of AOE damage as well. Get the tank to taunt these and keep them turned away from the group. These should be killed rather than pushing the boss, else they will stack on top of each other and you have more to deal with.
Adds are your primary focus in this fight!
Valinna & Lamikhai
This is the LAST boss of the dungeon and it is a tricky one! Lots of things YOU do can kill someone else! There are 3 major phases and different mechanics in each (within reason) and then as you progress they start stacking. So each stage is a learning experience!
RULE number ONE! The tank must ALWAYS turn the boss away from the group! NO EXCUSES! Make that a set in stone habit right off the bat, else people are going to get fried alive!
Phase 1 Lamikhai
Fire Rain – During the fight players will have a red circle curse symbol above their head. When this happens there will be a spreading AOE under their feet. When it fully expands it will drop fire rain on the floor and that will STAY there for a long long time.
So the trick to this is, if you spot it happening, run to the edge of the room and wait for it to finish, and drop it there! if you keep dropping these on the edges of the room, you have the middle spare for fighting. If you drop them in the middle, it will be REALLY messy!
Enrage – During the fight Lamikhai will enrage and glow bright RED! When this happens, people will be pretty much one shot unless they are extremely tanky tanks. When this phase presents itself, there will be a circle of ICE on the floor somewhere in the room. Usually on the other side of the room from where you are. This mechanic was shown as a breadcrumb mechanic on adds/trash prior to this fight, so you HAVE seen it already. However, what you need to do is simple. Get to the other side of the ice FAST and trap Lamikhai inside of it. It will freeze the room, and remove the enrage mechanic. This will happen whenever Lamikhai is present. So in BOTH of the first 2 phases/rooms.
BOOM! – When the boss hits low health in the first room, there will be a MASSIVE explosion, and a doorway will appear burning in the webs at the side. Looks like an exit right? CORRECT! This is a simple mechanic, RUUUUN!!!
If you don’t make it out of the room and through that door to the end of the corridor before the explosion goes off, you are dead. ALL of you! Don’t look back, leg it FAST! There will be spiders in the corridor, don’t try to hang around killing these they are simply a distraction. Just RUN!
Phase 2 – Valinna & Lamikhai
It’s a TRAP! – Now that you are on the second phase, you are going to see TWO new mechanics! The most dangerous of all of the mechanics in this fight is the Trip Wire mechanic.
This is very simple but also very punishing! Two individuals will have a spreading AOE under their feet. When it reaches it’s peak, it will land on the floor and stay there for 10 seconds.
As a group you need to understand 100% how this works and how serious it is. EACH player inside of their own AOE circle must STAY inside of it NO MATTER WHAT! If ONE player leaves their circle, BOTH players die.
Oh and one more thing, since this is a trip wire, they are connected by a line! So if ANYONE goes BETWEEN the circles…BOOM! Trip wire goes off and ALL involved will die.
The simple way to approach this is to note when both players have the AOE coming, and try to get close enough together near an edge or corner, so they are dropped close to one another (not overlapping) that way it is unlikely that it will be placed somewhere inconvenient and mess with boss positioning.
The last thing you want to do is block the door way, and have to run back and forth with the boss and avoid a wire across the intended path!
To simplify, spot the AOE, the two affected must move to somewhere safe, and be ready for it to be placed. Once it goes off, do NOT MOVE until it is over, and NO ONE run between them. Simple right? Good luck, this is a group wiper!
Fire RAGE! – Valinna will occasionally teleport across the room and let out a HUGE scream of rage aiming a massive cone of fire in a constant channel at the tank or whomever has aggro. This REALLY needs to be the tank at all times else people are toast, literally, TOAST!
The channel is very hard hitting so the tank needs to be on top of their resources and block the mechanic while having it faced away from the group at all times! The tricky part is if the trip wire mechanic is not applied properly, if you place them badly and the boss is behind them, the tank cannot get to the boss. SO BE CAREFUL!
Essentially, this mechanic needs to be turned and blocked. Be ready healers, a lot of tanks cannot stand up to this on their own!
Lamikhai is BACK! – I know you thought she was gone but she is NOT! When the Valinna hits around 55% health, Lamikhai will come back into the room and Valinna will exit! NOW you have all of the phase one mechanics along with the trip wire! It’s now you and her! You need to kill Lamikhai in order to get to the next phase. But she comes with an uncomfortable new mechanic. Spiders! Big ones!
When spiders come into the room you MUST primary them, they NEED to die OVER the boss (don’t worry the boss herself technically doesn’t have a dps check, so take your time). IF you don’t get rid of the spiders they will grab and web up one of your group members, and drag them across the room, rendering them useless and dying! If you kill the spider it will release them, but if you don’t manage this mechanic quickly, you will get overwhelmed with multiple!
NOTE: During Lamikhai’s return, you must be very careul to avoid the trip wires when moving her to the ice trap. BUT if you get her there, ALL adds in the room will freeze too, not just her!
RUN and DON’T FALL! – Yup you guessed it! We are running again! Once Lamikhai is 0% health, she is now officially dead and you need to look for the door way that has burnt out of the web and run like hell! BUT, instead of a nice friendly spider filled tunnel like last time, you have to run across bridges! These look simple but they are slippery! If you are not centred properly, you will slide off so watch your feet!
To simplify. Boss dead, YOU run, DON’T FALL! simples!
Phase 3 Valinna Final Encounter!
The last phase is you vs Valinna, Lamikhai is dead and all spiders are gone but you DO have previous mechanics in here, a dnew mechanic and limited SPACE, yup you can fall to your death! Watch your feet!
This time Valinna has trip wire mechanics, fire rain mechanics, fire rage mechanics and one more! The Meteor!
Meteor! – This is exactly like the one in the Bahsei fight in Rcokgrove with a twist! Basically the boss will drop down a meteor into the room, with a 10second timer on it.
You need to kill this fast! If you don’t kill it, you will be hit incredibly hard (can be blocked) However, if will throw you across the room! So if you DO live, it’s extremely likely that you will be thrown into the ditch! Make this your priority target! The boss no official dps check as such, but that meteor most certainly does. It’s really squashy so won’t take much effort but it’s easy to miss!
Keep your buff and debuff timers on and keep an eye on the right hand side of your effects. If there is a black circle on fire in your timers, it’s in the room, get rid of it!
HARDMODE! – Generally speaking the fight is not THAT different. The mechanics are mostly the same but the boss hits harder and has more health, however! On the FINAL phase, the fire rain STAYS in the room! SO you need to be very careful where you place them else the room will be full of fire and you will have NO WHERE to go.
Technically the boss doesn’t have a DPS CHECK but of course the faster it dies, the less fire you get in the room. One could argue that the check is when you have no room left, which is technically true but that also depends on how well you place the fire.
If you overlap them in clusters a lot, then you can double up on the placements and make twice as much use of the space in the room, but that will take some co-ordination. Simpley put, be careful where you drop fire, you are going to need that space :)
Cartokelpt – Secrets!
These are pretty simple, little secret minions that you have to find throughout the dungeon in order to pick up KEYS for the secret room at the entrance of the instance itself. If you have enough keys to open enough chests, you will trigger the SECRET boss CartoQueen.
These will basically act as trove scamps. You need to kill them before they Escape. If they do get away they can be found elsewhere but it makes your job trickier!
So once you find these, nail them fast and pick up the keys.
You will need multiple runs to have enough keys to spawn the secret boss between you and the group but once you have enough you can spawn her.
These scamps can be found in TWO places. The first one where the tunnels for the caterpillar are before the second boss.
And the second one can be found in the mephala tunnels in Mephala’s realm before the last boss.
You can of course unlock a map as you progress through your completions to be able to spot these on your map, but to start with you will have to search in THOSE places.
Cartoqueen
After opening 20 chests in the treasure room, the Cartoqueen will spawn in the middle as a special secret end boss!
This Scamp is FAR more dangerous than the run away ones you have killed for keys, this is a legit boss with some rough mechanics if you are not paying enough attention or underestimate it.
As per most fights, this needs to be aggressed/taunted by the tank and as much as possible , held still as and when possible! Of course it goes without saying that NO ONE apart from the tank should be in front of the boss. That’s where the teeth are!
Claws – The boss occasionally swipes at the tank with her claws. Simply block this, a dps/healer character does not want to get hit by this however, so mind your face!
Flame waves – During the fight the boss will channel and fire 3 waves of fire across the room much like that of a Flame Titan. Stay out of this! You can block and heal through it, but the damage is pretty high. So be careful!
Fireballs go boom! – the boss will occasionally fire out up to 6 fireballs that land on the ground leaving damage over time AOEs on the floor. Avoid these at all costs, they will make short work of a squishy!
Portals – During the fight the boss will spawn portals, these will create huge rocks which cause knockdown/stun effects and do HIGH damage so be sure to avoid and/or block these when they happen!
Shaman Totem – These totems are quite common mechanics in the Elder Scrolls Online and most players should be familiar with them even if they casually play in overland. However these when present continuously fire fireballs at the group, and should be destroyed quickly!
Protection wall – The boss summons pillars like the ones in The Cauldron dungeon around her, protecting her from damage. Break the pillars in order to damage her.
Teleport – Just to make things annoying for the tank, the boss WILL teleport from time to time around the room, to keep you on your toes. Simply follow her to her new location and reapply your previous formation (tank up front, dps behind of course).
EARTHQUAKE! – The boss will cause the room to quake making spikes fall from the ceiling, crashing to the ground causing AOE damage. Watch your feet!
These special chests can reward you with various items including this dungeon’s armor sets and a special treasure map that grants you the Cartoklept Map tool. Each instance of Sriverner’s Hall offers two hiding Cartoklepts. Successfully defeating each one will reward you with a key. Normal difficulty cartoklepts will earn you a small key while Veteran difficulty dungeons cartoklepts will earn you a large key. The Cartoklept Map Tool is found in The Rift in the area marked on the map.
The Cartoklept Map Tool is an old relic with the power to pinpoint the location of Cartoklepts and reveal their coordinates on your map. To reveal Cartoklept locations, the relic must be used in Scrivener’s Hall and the Cartoklept must be in the same realm at the time of use.
Scrivener’s Hall Dungeon Loot
Below is a list of all the loot you can expect to find in Scrivener’s Hall.
On normal the loot is blue and the boss does NOT drop a monster helmet, but on veteran difficulty all of the loot is purple and the main boss DOES drop a special monster helmet.
Note: in dungeons some individual bosses can drop a unique item but generally, the weapons and jewelry (non-named items) come from the last boss. HOWEVER the entire loot table can also drop from trash and chests, so loot everything! Got the gear in the wrong traits? Don’t worry! You can alter the traits by either transmuting or reconstruct the piece with a trait of your choice. For more information see the Introduction to Transmuting and Reconstructing article.
If you are looking for a matching shoulder monster piece, visit the Undaunted Pledge Master Urgarlag Chief-Bane at the nearest Undaunted enclave. She sells a 50/50 chance at the shoulder piece as part of the Scribes of Fate Coffer or it could be in her mystery coffer. You can learn more about the Undaunted in the Undaunted Guide.
- Abyssal Brace
- Apocryphal Inspiration
- Runecarer’s Blaze
- Ozezan the Inferno (monster helm from vet only)
Scrivener’s Hall Achievements
Battlescribe Slayer
Defeat 200 Battlescribes in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Critical Review
Destroy 20 of Riftmaster Naqri’s codices in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Dousing Exterminator
Defeat Ozezan the Inferno after raising the Challenge Banner in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Familiar Slayer
Defeat 50 Familiars in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall. This includes Hollow Armor Sentinels, Hollow Armor Duelists, Magma Bears and Storm Atronachs.
Fate’s Secrets
Complete optional content in Bal Sunnar and Scrivener’s Hall.
Harsh Edit
Defeat Riftmaster Naqri after placing the Challenge Banner and burning Riftmaster Naqri’s memoirs in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Iced Enemies
Freeze 60 hostile creatures using Mazandi’s Freeze Circle in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Inflammable
Defeat Valinna after raising the Challenge Banner in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Keeper of the Keys
Collect 10 Vault Keys in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Liberate Combatant
Freeze 60 hostile creatures using Mazandi’s Freeze Circle in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Magnastylus in the Making
Defeat all encounters in addition to Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna after raising the Challenge Banner in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall within 25 minutes without suffering a group member death. Your timer starts when you engage the first hostiles.
Pest Control
Defeat all encounters in addition to Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna after raising the Challenge Banner in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall within 25 minutes without suffering a group member death. Your timer starts when you engage the first hostiles.
Reinfyr’s Hero
Complete optional content in Scrivener’s Hall by finding and defeating 10 Cartoklepts, looting 10 treasure chests in Scrivener’s Hall Vault, and obtaining Reinfyr’s lost Cartoklept Map.
Scribes of Fate Delver
Complete both Bal Sunnar and Scrivener’s Hall on Veteran.
Scribes of Fate Scout
Complete both Bal Sunnar and Scrivener’s Hall on Normal.
Scrivener’s Hall Challenger
Complete the listed achievements for Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Scriverner’s Hall Champion
Complete the listed achievements for Scrivener’s Hall.
Scriverner’s Hall Conqueror
Defeat Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Scriverner’s Hall Vanquisher
Defeat Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna in Scrivener’s Hall.
Speed Reader
Defeat all encounters in addition to Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna within 25 minutes of entering Veteran Scrivener’s Hall. Your timer starts when you engage the first hostiles.
Too Hot To Trot
Defeat Ozezan the Inferno without a single party member being damaged by her Firestorm in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Unburnt Footwork
Defeat Valinna and Lamikhai without a single party member setting off an Immolation Trap in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall.
Unstilled Quill
Defeat all encounters in addition to Riftmaster Naqri, Ozezan the Inferno, and Valinna in Veteran Scrivener’s Hall without suffering a group member death.
Scivener’s Hall Leads
There are currently no leads located in Scrivener’s Hall.
Final Note
Thank you for taking the time to watch the content and read this guide. Be sure on your travels to remember, although once you get very experienced you may make these dungeons much easier and faster… it starts from the ground up and it’s…
