The Outer Lands, sometimes referred to as the Eldritch Dimension, is an end-game structure dimension. It is a large, inescapable dungeon with walls, monsters, and treasures.
The Outer Lands are known as one of the most dangerous and inhospitable places in Thaumcraft. There are countless blocks which apply negative effects or deal damage, and the Eldritch Guardians are extremely dangerous.
The Outer Lands are accessed through an eldritch portal opened by performing the Apertis Oculis ritual at an eldritch ring. The research for the ritual is one of the few researches in the entirety of the mod with "Taboo" level warp. This ritual will create a vortex which resembles a miniature black hole with a purple vortex around it.
The dimension starts as an empty void. Each opened Eldritch Portal will spawn a new dungeon in the dimension, though spawning portals too close to each other may lead to them sharing the same dungeon.
Related Research:[]
Revelations in the Outer Lands
Opening The Eye (Prequel research)
Mobs:[]
Shambling Husk - a zombie-like mob that is covered in armor. Has good defense but is otherwise very easy to deal with due to its low speed. Drops nothing, but spawns an Eldritch Crab (implied to be the husk's head) upon death.
Eldritch Crab - a crab-like mob with an Ender Pearl as its eye. Moves relatively fast and can latch onto players' heads, at which point they will deal constant damage to the player. If they are doing so, looking up and swinging a sword will kill them quickly, otherwise they can be treated as normal melee mobs. Drops Ender Pearls.
Eldritch Guardians - Easily the most dangerous of the mobs in the Outer Lands, these mobs are far more dangerous in the Outer Lands than they are in the Overworld. When the player is far they shoot accurate balls of magic that ignore normal armor and may inflict the Wither effect. They also have Runic Shielding that nullifies the damage from initial strikes against them.
In tainted portions of the maze Taintacles and Taint Tendrils may appear. Occasionally there will be a Mind Spider spawner surrounded by Cobwebs.
Blocks:[]
- Portal to Nothing - a starry void block that resembles an End Portal. Deals 8 hearts of damage (unaffected by armor) to any entity that touches it. Destroys items that touch it, and is unbreakable. Spawns throughout the maze and is always behind the Ancient Stone walls, below the floors, and above the ceiling (and is even visible in some places). Because of this the player must take extreme caution when digging out the floor.
- Bedrock - spawns outside the Portal to Nothing layer to provide even further protection against players teleporting out of the maze.
- Ancient Stone - a block that resembles Arcane Stone, but with a shade of ancient brown instead of dark gray. Drops itself. Comes in slab and stair variants that also occur throughout the dungeon and drop themselves when mined, but cannot be crafted with Ancient Stone.
- Glyphed Stone - a stone that appears to have notes inscribed in it. Drops a Knowledge Fragment and some experience.
- Crusted Stone - a stone block that is somewhat similar in appearance to Gravel, or meteor craters. Drops itself.
- Glowing Crusted Stone - a version of Crusted Stone with a yellow light in it. Not as large as a full block. Emits light and drops itself.
- Strange Crystals - a cluster of white crystals that appear on the ceilings and walls of the dungeon. Drops a Balanced Shard when mined.
- Runed Stone - Ancient Stone with a rune on it. Periodically zaps any players nearby and gives them temporary Warp for each zap. Can be dangerous when fighting Eldritch Guardians. Drops experience when broken.
- Ancient Rock - a rare decorative block found in the tablet room and boss room. Drops itself.
There are also some treasure urns and crates scattered throughout the dungeon.
Fibrous Taint occurs in some areas of the dungeon, as do vanilla Cobwebs (which spawn guarding a Mind Spider spawner).
Structure:[]
An eldritch ring. These structures act as the gateways to the Outer Lands.
Upon entering the dimension, the player will spawn in a 7 by 7 by 7 room next to an exit portal. This portal will look similar to the portal used to get in, but the capstone and obelisk will be textured to look like ancient stone. The player can leave at any time by walking through this portal the same way they came in.
The room has corners which are small pits full of starry void blocks, known as "Portal to Nothing." This is the main non-mob hazard of the maze, as they do huge damage (8 points/hit) against anything they touch, killing an Eldritch Guardian in about 3 seconds. This damage is not reduced by armor, and the block destroys items that land on top of it. As such, falling into Portal to Nothing is almost always a death sentence for the player and any items they may be carrying. Portal to Nothing takes the appearance of a purple background of the sky with many stars and small dots on it, very much like the end portal.
Portal to Nothing generates one block behind the Ancient Stone walls of the entire maze, including the floor, ceiling, and walls. Take extreme caution when breaking blocks nearby and never break blocks directly below you, as you risk falling in.
This room is the center of a large and complex dungeon within the Eldritch dimension. The walls and floor are made of Ancient Stone, which resembles Arcane Stone. Embedded in the walls are two types of blocks, which are Glyphed Stone and Glowing Crusted Stone. Glyphed Stone drops knowledge fragments whilst Glowing Crusted Stone stone drops itself. Both blocks are vertically lower than normal blocks. Sometimes "strange crystals" can be found on the floor which can be mined and drop balanced shards. These blocks can spawn on the ground sometimes but again, be careful when mining them as you risk falling into Portal to Nothing.
The dungeon is primarily made of corridors 5 blocks high and 5 blocks wide with corner pieces, with 7 by 7 "corner rooms" appearing at some intersections and dead-ends. Many other special rooms also appear. Sometimes Crusted Openings (which look like small grey mounds of Crusted Stone with a large black hole in the middle) appear. These spawn Eldritch Crabs. Treasure is found in loot urns and abandoned crates, each of which has a tag "common", "uncommon", or "rare". When broken by any tool or just right-clicked, they drop several of the corresponding treasure bags.
The corridors have various hazards, including patches of taint and web-shrouded mind-spider spawners. The rooms offer varied contents as well, including:
- Loot urns, as above
- A single block of "rune stone" which is a piece of ancient stone with grey runes carved into it. If the player stands near it, floating purple glyphs will appear in the air. After 5 seconds it will attack the player with wisp-like arcs of electricity, which also give the player warp.
- One rare room is full of crusted openings and made of crusted stone. It is full of up to 10 Eldritch Crabs and contains many abandoned crates and loot urns.
- A large room with a pedestal bearing a runed tablet, which can be taken and used to open the ancient gateway.
- The boss rooms are massive rooms sealed by an ancient gateway, which must be opened with a runed tablet. This will spawn one of the Champions: Master Eldritch Guardian, Crimson Portal, Giant Taintacles and an Eldritch Construct.
Rooms and Dangers Within the Outer Lands:[]
There are many assorted objects that occur within the outer lands. Here are a few.
A mind spider spawner.
A patch of cobwebs conceals a mind spider spawner.
A patch of taint. The image has been brightened.
Patches of taint appear often within the corridors.
A room of eldritch crabs and urns.
Crab rooms are common, made of crusted stone, full of Eldritch Crabs and treasure urns.
A room with a runed tablet within.
In the outer lands, there will always be runed tablets spawned in the dungeon. They are contained within a large room and rest upon a pedestal.
An ancient gateway.
By far the most important and exciting discovery someone can make within The Outer Lands is the ancient doorway. To open it, right click with a runed tablet on the middle block. This will make the door slowly unlock., to reveal one of four different boss rooms.
The Boss Rooms[]
The room containing an Eldritch Warden.
Each of the Eldritch Champions has their own distinctive boss room. Each boss will have a distinctive ability, hinted at by their epithet; see the Champions page for more details. In addition to any other treasure they may drop, defeating them rewards the player with a primordial pearl.
Eldritch Warden[]
"Black energy bubbles on the distant pedestal. Something is coming..."
The boss will teleport to the middle of the room when its runic shield is broken and will cover much of the floor with damaging and slowing thunder. There are 4 pedestals which will fire lightning at the player, causing warp.
Two eldritch obelisks will also spawn in the room (both of which will be made of ancient stone) and will float black particles towards the Eldritch Guardian Boss and other more generic eldritch guardians. This effect is purely aesthetic.
The room that forms when a crimson portal appears.
Crimson Portal[]
"A ruby portal opens nearby heralding the arrival of the Crimson Cult. You must close the portal quickly!"
The portal is immobile, but can be damaged like a mob, and it will have its own epithet which may even be relevant. It will lose health over time, eventually closing even if not attacked. While it lasts, it will spawn hordes of Crimson Cultists, sometimes including a miniboss Praetor (with its own epithet and power).
The taintacle boss room.
Giant Taintacle[]
"The sound of organic rustling comes from the room beyond. The sound of something wrong... Something growing..."
The taintacle room is an extremely dangerous and undesirable room as it is full of taint and will slowly replace blocks within the room with liquid or crusted taint, and cover the entire room with taint fibers. Naturally, the region will become Tainted Lands biome. It will spawn 1-5 giant taintacles, which will attack all comers including other tainted mobs. Giant taintacles check for nearby Giant taintacles in regards of loot drop so that only one pearl can ever be rewarded, from the last Giant taintacle.
Eldritch Construct[]
The room containing the Eldritch Construct
"A lone sentinel stands frozen in this room, but as energy starts crackling through its ancient frame you know it will not stay frozen for long."
This giant golem is immune to most wand foci. The room contains 3 eldritch obelisks made of ancient stone that will emit black particles that float towards the Eldritch Construct and other eldritch guardians but they serve no purpose other than for decoration.
Forcing the Locks[]
For creative-mode experimenters:
The creative-mode "spawn obelisk" item only produces the central floating pillar. To "properly" generate a gate you'll need to build the altar below it yourself, or you can place the portal block directly into the obelisk. A new portal placed too close to an existing obelisk (especially world-spawned ones), is likely to drop the player into the void, or possibly into the prior obelisk's dungeon.
At the other end of the Outer Lands: The block in the centre of the ancient gateway, is called the Ancient Locking Mechanism and it can be obtained with a creative-mode "pick block". When placed anywhere else in the world, it will create a short pillar that resembles one of the pillars of the door. When a runed tablet is inserted into this block in any dimension other than the Outer Lands, the world will crash and will be irretrievable! If it is inserted in the Outer Lands, it will place a new boss room (randomised) where the original room was. If the door is not opened and the room is entered, it will be empty. No matter where the locking mechanism is placed in the Outer Lands, the new boss room will always appear where the original room was.
If you are in creative mode, or have a method of teleportation to coordinates such as minimap waypoints or VoxelMap's Teleport To Feature), it is possible to break or bypass through the Portal To Nothing layers and leave the dungeon you are in, allowing you to (theoretically) go between the dungeons that have been created in the world or server you are on.