Scrying and Excavation are two of the World Skills available in include all necessary expansions.
To begin hunting for Antiquities, players will need to complete the quest "The Antiquarian Circle" found in Western Skyrim. Head to Solitude to find the Antiquarian Circle building, located just out front of the Blue Palace. "The Antiquarian's Art" is the next quest in this line, and will automatically begin after completing the first quest. Completing the second quest is highly recommended as it will provide players a tutorial of both of the new skill lines, Scrying and Excavation.
Antiquity Leads are the items players of Elder Scrolls Online will need to hunt down to scry for an Antiquity's location. These leads can be found in a wide variety of ways, with some having prerequisite tasks to be completed before they will spawn. Leads have an expiration date of 30 days, but can always be reclaimed in the same way each time, as each lead has a fixed location. Antiquity Leads have 5 levels of difficulty which correlate to the difficulty of that Antiquity's Scrying and Excavation minigame.
Scrying In The Elder Scrolls Online
Players can begin the Scrying minigame by selecting the desired lead from their journal in Elder Scrolls Online, though Scrying is only possible when in the correct zone. This will bring up a board covered with patterned tiles called 'facets', and one or more swirling voids referred to as 'foci'. Players will begin at the very bottom tile, above the teardrop-shaped crystal which is used to gauge the number of moves left available. Only selecting adjacent facets, players must reach each foci on the board. Any further adjacent facets that are identically marked will also be claimed. Successfully collecting all the foci on the board will ensure players don't receive any false-positive locations for dig zones on their Elder Scrolls Online map. Less than perfect tries can always be attempted again to avoid having to dig for the Antiquity multiple times. Advancing in the Scrying skill line will give players a much easier win.
Once one possible placement for the Antiquity is circled on the map, players can begin searching for its hidden location in Elder Scrolls Online. The Antiquarian Eye can be quick-slotted from the collections menu and used to help find dig sites within the indicated zones. It will cast a bright orb with a tail pointing the players in the right direction, though it can't indicate the Antiquity's elevation. Dig sites appear as a sparkling pile of dirt that seems to have been recently disturbed.
Excavation In The Elder Scrolls Online
Dig sites are where the Excavation minigame is played inside of Elder Scrolls Online. A 10 x 10 grid of dirt will appear with the Antiquity buried somewhere inside, assuming players have eliminated all possible false-positive dig zones when Scrying. The bronze bar at the top of the screen shows the number of actions the player can perform, initially allowing 12 hours of dig time or 40 actions. After fully uncovering the Antiquity, players can use their remaining time to search for bonus loot. The amount of Elder Scrolls Online bonus loot available at each dig site is determined by the difficulty of the Antiquity Lead, both increasing in conjunction. Advancing in the Excavation skill line can give players more time to dig and unlock more efficient tools.
Using the Antiquarian's Eye while excavating will allow the player to see how close they are to the Antiquity with a color scale. Red indicates it's at least 5 spaces away, orange indicates 3-4 spaces, yellow is 1-2 spaces, and green means the Antiquity is directly below. The Antiquarian's Eye will have a limited number of uses depending on the difficulty of the Antiquity Lead, and at higher difficulty levels, players will need to remove some layers of dirt before they can get an accurate reading. The brush will remove one layer of soil from the chosen space and also charges up the player's intuition, which is required to utilize the two advanced Excavation tools. The trowel will unlock at Excavation Rank 2 and requires two charges of intuition to use. This tool removes three layers of dirt from a single space and doesn't cost the player any time to use. The shovel will unlock at Excavation Rank 4 and requires two charges of intuition to use. It will remove one layer of dirt from a 3 x 3 square, but can only remove layers of the same depth as the space selected.
It is possible to break the Antiquity while excavating in Elder Scrolls Online, its 'health' will be reflected by the red bar at the top of the screen. Hitting the Antiquity with the trowel, shovel, or exploding any fissures will damage it. Emptying the Antiquity's health meter will cause the player to fail the Excavation and force them to search for the hidden items at another dig site. Fissures are indicated by plumes of smoke coming from the dirt that will begin spawning at Advanced difficulty Excavation sites, they will explode if players dig directly above them.
The Elder Scrolls Online is available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
