Acquisition[]
This quest is available once the party has reached the Hidden Refuge and will affect the amount of experience received during the companion quest Neera's Hidden Refuge.
If this cat retrieving quest is not completed prior to finding Daxus Taralom then Barad Ding won't survive the later capture by the Red Wizards and thus the party will not receive the 5,000 XP for rescuing him.
Walkthrough[]
Initiate dialogue Barad Ding to start his quest and agree to locate his eight missing cats. They are all located in the Wild Forest and he will give you Cat Food to lure them into your inventory which must be used in a "quick item" slot. If the quest is accepted, then this journal entry will register:
- Journal entry: Barad Ding's eight cats
- The wild mage Barad Ding has lost his cats Abby, Connie, Alter, Divine, Chanticleer, Eevo, Lucy, and Nector. I'll search for them in the Wild Forest, using a bag of cat food as a lure. The cats are feral, so they might not be easy to handle. When I've found them, I'll return to the Hidden Refuge.
It is a good idea to have cleared the traps from the forest prior to luring any cats.
The cats have a 5% chance to escape from your inventory every two rounds, which means that once you have a cat in a party member's inventory you should head for the nearest map edge and travel to the Hidden Refuge.
Each tabby cat will automatically leave the party's inventory once transported back into the compound (actually just the general area map is fine too), and the party can immediately travel back to find the remaining cats. The cats also cannot be moved from the inventory space they occupy, so one cannot put them in a container such as Dragomir's Respite to hold onto them.
If the party runs out of cat food, return to Barad Ding and ask for more. Barad says he does not have an unlimited supply. His script says different though. If the party has got three refills of cat food and still not been able to find all the cats, consider bailing out of the quest and finding an easier one, like slaying a Dragon - this is just some humor to illustrate that this quest can be frustrating due to the random escaping of cats that can (will) occur. The mighty bhaalspawn isn't uniquely trained in the capture of the elusive tabby.
When all eight cats are running about the compound, speak with Barad, and he'll reward you with a Collar Bell, and offer a cat named Dings to a mage or sorcerer, which can be accepted or refused. Dings isn't some kind of special familiar creature with hidden powers; Dings is a tabby cat that will sort of follow the party around. That also means that when it's time to gather the party, that will include Dings.
After speaking with Barad and all the cats are found, a journal entry registers, resolving the questline:
- Journal entry: Barad Ding's eight cats
- I have found and returned all Barad Ding's cats. I think I got them all, anyway. He has a lot of cats.
If the party takes on Dings, the new journal entry instead displays:
- Journal entry: Barad Ding's eight cats
- As a reward for finding his cats, Barad Ding has given me one named Dings. If Dings proves too much of a handful, I can always return him.
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