Shalidor's Maze is located in the same map icon as Labyrinthian, just to the northeast of the icon on the map (if you're standing on the mound where the Wooden Mask is found, face due east); traversing this maze results in a fight with a Dremora.

Contents 1 Background 2 Walkthrough 3 Monsters and Loot 4 Trivia 5 Bugs 6 References

BackgroundEdit

Shalidor's Maze was constructed by Arch-Mage Shalidor during the First Era in the ruins of ancient Nordic city Bromjunaar as testing grounds for new Archmages. The test consisted of navigating the ruins in order to reach the labyrinth and the labyrinth itself, if the journey was survived. ^[1]

WalkthroughEdit

Upon entering, there is a charred corpse holding a Soul Gem and Tattered Note. Upon nearing the corpse, four staves rise out of slots in the ground. The note reads:

"Enter Twice - Exit Only Once. Alteration will lead you to Destruction. Only Illusion shows the way to Restoration. Conjure not, but be conjured instead"

Once you possess all four staffs, walk straight forward. Here there is a sigil of Alteration. Use the Staff of Magelight or cast any ranged Alteration spell (Magelight, Paralyze, etc) on the Sigil to lower the gate. Inside the corridors are Shutters that act as chests in this area, and allow the player to see through the maze.

Using the shutters inside the maze as "markers", to tell what areas have been explored by opening and closing them is not necessary.

After running through a few corridors, opening the shutters in the corners on the way, there will be a Destruction Sigil. Cast any ranged destruction spell on it (i.e. not runes or cloaks) or use the Staff of Firebolts to open the trap door below to continue.

At the bottom of the trap door, a Sigil of Conjuration is to the left. For now, it cannot be activated. Continue forward. A staircase will slide down like an elevator - taking it will result in placing the player back outside near where the four staves appeared. Follow either side of the maze to get to the back. In the back there will be a dragon word wall for the dragon shout Dismay.

Turn around and enter the back exit

of the maze, to find the sigil for Illusion. Cast a ranged illusion spell or use the Staff of Fear to open this gate. Follow the corridors, opening the shutters in the corners, until the Sigil of Restoration has been reached. Cast a ranged Restoration spell (but not Healing Hands or Heal Other) or use the Staff of Repulsion to open the trap door.

Here there is a portal to the "Trials of Conjuration" if all of the sigils in the maze have been activated. Dremora Kynval is waiting on the other side and attacks the player on arrival. Upon attacking the player is teleported back to where the staves were, and is attacked by the Kynval and two Atronachs. After defeating them, the player may loot the Diadem of the Savant from the Dremora's corpse.

Monsters and LootEdit

The Maze contains Skeevers, one Ice Wraith and a Dremora as foes.

Some of the loot in the maze is:

• Liminal Bridges (Conjuration skill book)
• Various Gems
• Centurion Dynamo Core
• Spell Tome: Heal Other
• The Dremora will almost always have a Diadem of the Savant, which is a crown that makes all spells in all magic schools cost less magicka to cast. (All spells cost 5% less magicka to to cast)

Afterwards, the Dragonborn is free to roam around and pick the Deathbell, Nightshade, Red Mountain Flower, Dragon's Tongue and Blue Mountain Flower.

It is possible to jump onto the top of the structure surrounding the area to the west. There is a chest and, on the other side, a skeleton.

Also, on the farthest side of the room away from the entrance is a Word Wall for the Dragon shout Dismay.

TriviaEdit

• It is not necessary to use the spells enchanted in the staffs to activate the sigils. E.g. Calm can be used on the Illusion sigil instead of Fear, and presumably any targeted spell from the proper school will work except for Restoration. For Restoration, "Healing Hands" and "Heal Other" don't work - "Repel Lesser Undead", however, will (what is at stake is that the spell fires a projectile, which is the case for the latter spell, but not the former ones).
• A destruction spell may also open the restoration sigil.
• Even though Shalidor's Maze was constructed as a test for Archmages, completing it doesn't require any previous magical abilities or knowledge, as spells required for it are given in form of staffs.

BugsEdit

•  PC    PS3   If the Dragonborn uses non-bound weapons on the Dremora upon entering the loaded area and is successful in killing it in one or two hits will result in locking the player in the loaded area, making it impossible to leave.
  • A possible fix for the bug above is to hit the corpse of the Dremora again, that should teleport you back out
• Upon entering Shalidor's Maze, occasionally the tattered note cannot be found near the burnt corpse. You may need to reload the auto save from when you first enter the maze, then go to the top of the stairs on the left side (so that the staffs won't appear until you are done getting the note) and then using telekinesis to move the note and take it without "activating" the staves. 
• Attempting to use the Staff of Repulsion or Heal Other spell on the Sigil of Restoration may not work. However, using a Destruction spell (e.g. Ice Spike) appears to work.
•  PC   360   PS3  Followers can become trapped inside of the loaded area of Shalidor's Maze. Once they become stuck in the area there is no way to get them to follow you out. They will remain in the area indefinitely.
  •  PC   360   PS3  Fix: Fast-traveling from near the door outside could bring the follower back.
  •  PC   360   PS3  Fix: Trap your follower behind the bars of the maze by pulling the chain. Leave the maze and enter the Labyrinth, fast travel to another point and your follower should be next to you.
  •  360    PS3   Fix: Sometimes fast traveling to Labyrithian will bring them back with you, fully functional if they do get stuck in this maze.
  • Fix: Enter the maze again with follower inside, close both bars with the chains next to them (you'll have to do the maze again from both sides). This way your follower gets trapped, so when you get close to him/her the game just teleports him/her to the other side of the bars.
  • Fix: If your follower is a candidate for marriage you could do the marriage ceremony to force them out of Shalidor's Maze.
  • Sometimes entering the blades sanctuary with the follower as a follower will cause the follower to appear inside, without necessarily having to sign them up for the blades.
• Paralyzing, as well as killing the Dremora in the Trials of Conjuration will teleport the player back to the maze as normal, but the Dremora will not appear. Therefore, high level players are advised to avoid hitting the Dremora with power strikes before teleporting back.
•  PC    360   Upon entering the "Trials of Conjuration" if the player successfully kills Dremora with a single charged attack it is possible that the player will not be able to exit the Trials area. A reload of the last save is needed to fix this glitch.
  •  PC   Fix: Conjuring a bound sword, and hitting Dremora with it immediately upon conjure, can cause you to be warped out, back to the beginning with the conjured Atronachs. It's also possible that this may have happened from waiting long enough. It has also been reported that hitting the dead Dremora with non-bound weapons may fix the bug.
•  PC   It is possible to fall through the bottom of the world here. After leaving the elevator, get back inside before it falls back into the floor. At the bottom, leaving the elevator will take you out of the map and you will fall to your death.
•  PC   Using a shout will also cause the elevator to descend, leaving you to fall to your death or to jump to the waterfall and 'swim' back up to the surface.
•  PC   360   PS3  You may want to leave your follower and/or dog waiting outside. They might not follow you out upon exiting the maze.
• In the Czech, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Polish and Russian versions of the game, a bug prevents you from finishing this quest. Even if you cast the right spell on the right sigil, nothing happens. Change the game's language to English to by-pass that bug. You can also use the console command TCL, which toggles collisions with environment off and on. This will allow you to pass through the floor then use it again to toggle collision back on.
•  360    PS3   Once approaching the raised step outside the maze where the staffs rise from the holes, sometimes only 3 to 0 staffs came up (tested several times). Simply using own spells or reloading will fix this.
• PC. The word wall (Dismay) at the end of the area may not actually teach a word of power after activating and announcing the new word.
• Fix: The wall only seems to teach the last word of the shout Dismay (Maar:Terror) and it will not register as learned unless the first two words of the shout (Faas:Fear, Ru:Run) are known. The first two can be learned from either word walls or console commands.

ReferencesEdit

1. ↑ A Minor Maze

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