Conan Exiles Klael's Stronghold Guide: Making It Through Warmaker's Sanctuary - Conan Fanatics (2024)

A Conan Exiles Klael’s Stronghold guide will help you through the most challenging dungeon in the game. The location contains a lot of lore, but what is inside Klael’s Stronghold is important.

The previous inhabitant of Klael’s Stronghold is Klael, who you can talk to by heading to the Citadel of the Triumvirate in The Unnamed City. He’s the last living leader of the Giant-Kings, and he has a lot to say.

However, when you visit his Stronghold, you’ll find a dungeon called Warmaker’s Sanctuary, the hardest dungeon in Conan Exiles. It took me a few tries to beat it. So you’re going to need all the help you can get.

Overview of Klael’s Stronghold

• I recommend level 60s only to enter the dungeon at Klael’s Stronghold.
• Top-tier T4 thralls can make the dungeon much easier.
• Having at least one other player is a good bet.
• You can rush through many rooms, but taking it slow is safer.
• The Arena Champion is the hardest boss in the game, but she is optional.
• Armor Scraps (exclusive to the dungeon) can make both armor sets in the dungeon, and both sets are extremely good.

Before You Enter the Warmaker’s Sanctuary

Warmaker’s Sanctuary is the primary purpose of Klael’s Stronghold, but that doesn’t mean you should rush right in without paying attention to your surroundings. If you’re prepared, that’s half the fight.

Gear Up

To get through the Warmaker’s Sanctuary, you need good gear. You can skip the hardest boss the first time and run through to get materials for the best armor in the game. But you need gear to do that.

There are so many options for weapons that I won’t list them. Anything Legendary is going to be good, but the ones from bosses are usually better than the Legendary Chest ones.

I suggest one of these armor sets:

• Cimmerian Steel (Epic) – learned in knowledge; requires top-tier thrall and Improved Armorer’s Workbench.
• Pride of the Silent Legion – learned at stele in The Black Keep.
• Commander’s Set (Epic) – looted from Unnamed City bosses.

Getting There

Klael’s Stronghold is on the line of B-7 and B-8 to the east. You can see it from far away because of the large building with stairs leading up to it. It’s easy to get to from Sepermeru because you head north after you leave the city.

Get the Obelisk

The obelisk is east of Klael’s Stronghold and south of the Shattered Springs. If you already have a Map-Room, getting the Obelisk can make coming back easy and can save heartache if you die before you can spawn back in at the dungeon.

Warmaker’s Sanctuary Walkthrough

The Warmaker’s Sanctuary is not a simple dungeon. Multiple stages make it feel more like five dungeons stacked together than one long dungeon, which makes it even more interesting.

The Gate

The Gate is the first area you’ll see after entering the dungeon. There are skeletons all around that are easy to take down. But at the end, there’s a Gate guardian, a tanky wight, and a note warning you of traps in the dungeon.

The Gate Guardian is no one to be messed with. He’s a standard wight but has extra high HP. You used to have to fight him, but now it’s optional. He drops Fragments of Power, Legendary Armor Patch Kit, and Axe of the Guardian. If you don’t have a good weapon, fight him because his axe is good.

The Inner Sanctum

The Inner Sanctum is a map room with multiple doors. You have to collect three statuettes from bosses beyond the doors to move on from this room. The placemat of the statuettes matters, but the punishment for getting the wrong placements is weak.

Once you correctly place a statuette, you get a key fragment. Combine them to get an Inner Sanctum Key, which can be used to unlock the door on the right. The same player must have all of the pieces.

Warmaker’s Adjutant – Statutte of the Warmaker (place on Sanctuary)

Past the green door is the Warmaker’s Adjutant. Fighting him isn’t tough as he’s easy to dodge and is less tanky than the wight from the previous room. Once defeated, he will drop a legendary weapon with corruption damage, all with at least 55 damage.

• Ranissan – two-handed mace.
• Nortis – one-handed mace.
• Mordlun – two-handed spear.
• Balias – one-handed sword.

Archivist’s Assistant – Statuette of the Archivist (place on Unnamed City)

The Archivist’s Assistant has similar stats to the Adjutant. But he doesn’t drop a weapon when slain. Instead, he drops a book that grants a temporary (one hour) buff that can help you defeat the dungeon bosses.

• Blood-stained Nails – Health +60
• Denizens of the Dark Well – Follower Damage +12%
• Prince of the Black shores – Concussive Damage +30%
• Prophecy of the Borne Witch – Stamina +21
• The Daughter of Ymir – Agility Weapon Damage +15%
• The Mastodont’s Tower – Strength Weapon Damage +15%
• Time of the Scaled Lizard – Carry Capacity +45

Servant of the Priest King – Statuette of the Priest King (upper right of the Unnamed City)

Another simple battle against a giant-king awaits behind this door. Like his brother, he drops weapons that are connected to the deities of Conan Exiles, but your religion doesn’t affect them.

• Crom’s Hammer – two-handed mace; grants +5 Strength and +5 Grit when equipped
• Derketo’s Voice – bow; grants +5 Accuracy when equipped
• Jhebbal Sag’s Prowl – daggers; apply double stacks of bleed
• Mitra’s Justice – one-handed mace; cures poison and sunders even with light attacks
• Set’s Tongue – daggers; removes buffs from enemies and cures poisons from the wielder.
• Ymir’s Targe – shield; adds cold resistance.
• Yog’s Touch – one-handed axe; bleed, corruption, cripple, and shieldsmash.

The “Dungeon”

Now, this is the technical dungeon part of the Warmaker’s Sanctuary. Watch the floor closely for traps. There will be spikes and mines that cause explosions and poison, all of which can kill you.

To get to the next area, you need to get the Key to the Arena, which can be looted from He-Who-walks-Below who is at the intersection after the first hall. Find him first but remember to avoid traps.

He-Who-Walks Below

He-Who-Walks-Below is another white nearly identical to the first one in the dungeon. He always drops a Key to the Arena and one of two legendary weapons. He either drops a two-handed sword called Annihilator or a two-handed mace called World Breaker.

Optional Chests

Throughout this area, there are chests you can open that have rusted keys you can use later. The locations are easy to miss, especially if you have tunnel vision and leave stones unturned. But they’re easy to find whenever you know what you’re looking for.

• Turn to the left after the staircase and launch yourself up in the empty cell with the launchpad. There’s a chest with a Rusted Key at the top of the back wall.
• After the intersection where you fight the wight, turn right and climb the stairs. There’s a back room with beds; one bed has a chest.
• Now, turn to the left after the intersection to find another launchpad that leads to a chest.
• Go back to the intersection, and at the top of the stairs straight ahead, there is a chest on shelves hidden behind crates.
• At the intersection, turn left again and find the cell at the top of the stairs. On the left, there is a chest behind some rubble.

The Arena Champion’s Arena

Once you use the key you got from the wight, you can open the door to the first arena. This is where the Arena Champion awaits you. While you’re here, grab the Arena Champion’s Armor stele, which will teach you the best armor in the game. Then, get ready for fight or flight.

The Arena Champion

Feel free to skip her for now, but if you kill her, she’ll drop a handful of Armor Scraps you can use to make some of her armor. She’s super strong and fast with high health, so she has no weakness.

There isn’t a tried and true trick to defeating her. Your best bet is to have a strong thrall or tank friend to distract her while you damage her. But you do need to be super geared up, or she will one-shot you.

The Ice Halls

The Ice Halls are crowded with Black Ice, so stock up here, and you’ll never have to again. You can skip everything in the Ice Halls, but if you want to take them all on, you can, though it will take a while.

Each room has a unique enemy that you can access without a key. There are chests in many of them that give you gear, gold, and more. The enemies include but are not limited to spiders, mammoths, and dragons.

The freakiest part of the halls is the wall at the end, where you can see a Black Yeti but cannot reach him. I tried for a while to break through but to no avail. So enjoy the jumpscare if I didn’t spoil it and move on.

The Warmaker’s Arena

The final area of the sanctuary is the Warmaker’s Arena. He’s easier to defeat than the Arena Champion but can still hold his own. Once you pass through the gateway, there’s no turning back, so you must fight him.

The Warmaker Fight

The Champion of the Warmaker has high armor but is otherwise not an issue. He is easy to dodge because he charges all of his attacks. However, he does get stronger after each 25% chunk of his HP is taken.

Once you defeat the Warmaker of the Arena, he drops twice as many Armor Scraps as the Arena Champion and can drop one of two weapons – the Destroyer and Carnage.

They are good but do give you corruption. Remember to grab the steles in the room to get the Godbreaker Armor, which is almost as good as the Arena Champion’s armor.

The Other Doors

You can open the other doors in the room by using your Rusted Keys. In each room, there is good loot but nothing unique. However, the best loot in the rooms is the 1-2 armor scraps, which adds up to 5-10.

That doesn’t sound like much, but it’s enough to make a piece of Godbreaker armor or, if you’re lucky, half of what you need for a piece of Arena Champion’s armor. You got that right; this won’t be your first run-through, you’ll need 100 pieces to make the full set, but it’s well worth it.

FAQs

Skipping Klael’s Stronghold

Klael’s Stronghold is a critical location that I don’t recommend skipping. If you do, you won’t get the recipe for the best armor in the game nor be able to say you defeated the hardest boss.

It’s unlikely you’ll complete it in full the first time around. My favorite strategy is to go through and collect Armor Scraps from the Champion of the Warmaker a few times so I can make the Arena Champion’s Armor.

Then I go through with a couple of maxed-out thralls from the best Fighter thralls list. Once you go through it a few times, collecting the statuettes and defeating the first bosses will be such a breeze that you’ll have the confidence to take on the Arena Champion.

Related Read

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• Conan Exiles Bosses Guide
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