Shroud of the Apocrea (Mission)
From SpiralKnights
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Shroud of the Apocrea is an event-exclusive prestige mission available during Shroud of the Apocrea.
Overview
Description:
Several capable knights have gone missing in a seemingly normal area of the Clockwork Tunnels. Spiral HQ suspects foul play and has assigned you to investigate the level.
Objective:
Investigate the area of the Clockworks where several knights have gone missing.
Gate Map
Depth: 0
Level Link: This mission's lobby is standard.
Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: This floor is composed of random Clockwork Tunnels: Haunted Passage segments. Special: It has a unique party button...
Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: The Obsidian Nexus is unique to this mission.
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Name: ???
Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: This floor rotates between these levels. The level encountered cannot be predicted by using the Gate Map.
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Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: This floor rotates between these levels. The level encountered cannot be predicted by using the Gate Map.
, 
, , Name: ???
Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: This floor rotates between these levels. The level encountered cannot be predicted by using the Gate Map.
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Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: This floor is composed of random The Grasping Plateau segments unique to this mission.
Depth: Depends on rank
Level Link: Departure is unique to this mission.
Notes
This mission was introduced with release 2013-10-23.
Apocrean Sigils obtained from activities in The Grasping Plateau can be exchanged with Lost Soul (Apocrean Item Trader).
This mission's maximum depth is 30, making it the deepest in the game.
The Grasping Plateau is notorious for crashing the game or otherwise causing issues due to the large area the map takes up and the amount of monsters that can appear.
Recommendations
Strategy
Strategy DisclaimerThe general goal of this mission is to collect Apocrean Sigils. This is accomplished by breaking tombstones, randomly releasing purple souls, and breaking the chains off the souls. Breaking their chains by attacking them rewards sigils. Players can also earn sigils by solving puzzles. All this is done in The Grasping Plateau, with the other combat floors offering standard clockworks loot.
This event is enjoyed by the playerbase for a variety of reasons - it's something different and presents a decent challenge for many players. Not only does it provide tokens required to make Obsidian items at the Mysterious Alchemy Machine (or Obelisk of Creation), it also brings arenas that are deep enough to have a decent chance of dropping Radiant Fire Crystals from their treasure boxes. As such, there are several "goals" that players may have, so it's important to establish what everyone wants to do before starting this mission.
Successfully completing Shroud of the Apocrea solo can be difficult due to the nature of the plateau and its inhabitants.
Your party will lock after using the elevator in the Mission Lobby, so plan ahead and make sure everyone knows what to do. The Grasping Plateau does not have an arsenal station, so whatever gear you had the previous floor is the gear you will take to the plateau.
Goal:
Usually plans fall into one or a combination of the below:
- Arena Farm
- Sigil Farm
Loadout
Loadout DisclaimerRemember, the plateau does not have an arsenal station. Gear up in the previous floor if the party plans to farm here.
See the Apocrean Harvester page for details about its behavior and how to deal with it.
Electron Vortex and/or 
Shivermist Buster
- Plant a bomb next to a tombstone, one tombstone at a time. The detonation will break the tombstone, and any souls that come out will be trapped in the vortex or mist and take some damage. The shock of the vortex can help slow things down and works for anything that comes out of a tombstone - just don't let monsters inflicted with shock wander off and break other tombstones. Shivermist buster works well with souls, but not Freezing Bombies or Pale Scarabs. Take care of whatever spawns before breaking the next tombstone.
Blitz Needle and/or 
Glacius
- Charge up and let loose when scarabs or souls come out of a tombstone (do not attack if Freezing Bombies spawn-just get close enough to trigger them and walk away). The freeze potential of the glacius charge helps keep souls from wandering off, while its damage helps with all things released from the tombstone. The Blitz Needle should be able to take care of spawns, just make sure stray bullets don't break nearby tombstones before the current spawns are dealt with. For the initial charge vs. souls, use whichever is most comfortable for you and your team. In general, the blitz is best, assuming the charge lands. The glacius could be used to "chase after" any loose targets if the blitz's charge fails.
- Use this sprite to cloak if things get too hairy. The damage boost of the Deadly Shadow Cloak can also help free souls every once in a while.
Each person on the team should have these tools to help farm sigils. Roles might have to change depending on how events unfold during the mission, so if everyone has these tools, everyone can be flexible. Establish who bombs, who damages, and who distracts the Harvester. Two people can break soul chains if there are 4 in the squad, but if there's only two people, then the player with the "farmer" role must both bomb and damage while the other kites the harvester. Whomever kites the harvester should be on the other side of the plateau from the players searching for souls. Go up and down the columns, or side to side along the rows (agree on what to do as a team), popping each tombstone on the way. The process is slow but steady and reliably yields a large number of sigils in a reasonable amount of time. It is important to not deviate from the plan, as the true enemy in this mission is the persistent nagging feeling of time lost.
If your role is to bomb and/or free souls, consider wearing (chaos for the bomber):
Defenses: Shields:
- This shield will not save your skin as often as other shields, but it will significantly increase your attack speed. If you can dodge and avoid getting hit in general, this shield will certainly help you defeat monsters quickly.
- Increases sword power. This may help if you're using swords with the Chaos Set (to max out the sword damage bonus) and rely less on attack speed, plus it has more defense than Swiftstrike Buckler.
Armor and Helmets:
- Black Kat set:
Black Kat Cowl
Black Kat Raiment
- Chaos set:
- Using one of these sets, or combining one item from each of these "glass cannon" sets will let you deal a lot of damage. Chaos will help with Charge Time Reduction, so wearing it as a bomber is ideal. Black Kat will increase your movement speed, allowing you to get out of the way quickly, even without dashing. Both increase damage output significantly. Since the Black Kat items can be difficult to obtain, chaos is generally preferred for economic reasons.
