The Dank Crypt is an area in the first Act located in secret doorways in the Chapel Entrance region. If you manage to enter this area, there are plenty of secrets to uncover, granting some great gear and other forms of rewards. However, the Dank Crypt has a few secrets and things you need to do before you can access it. Here is everything you need to know about the Baldur’s Gate 3 Dank Crypt, how to open the locked door, and deal with Withers.

Dank Crypt Complete Walkthrough¶

When you enter the underground chapel from the Chapel Entrance, you must first deal with the few guards. There are two things you can do. The first is either enter via the crack in the floor, using a ranged move to break the rope and create a hole you can jump through. Alternatively, you can go through the front door and enter, and get in a fight with some pesky bandits. Either way, you’re getting into a fight. It is just which method you prefer. Additionally you can enter via the Ancient Door at the back (See below for more information).

Once the enemies are dealt with, you want to look for a room with an underground library. Inside the room, you will come across a switch towards the back end of it. Interacting with the switch will unlock the Cellar door, leading you into BG3’s Dank Crypt.

Now you’re inside, you will find one door that is locked, and another open one. If you intend to open the second one, you must get the key from the first room. Now, be warned, as the room you can enter is booby-trapped. There are many traps on the floor, followed by traps on the wall too. The traps on the wall will activate if you loot the Sarcophagus and grab the key from its contents.

So, you have two methods to prepare for this.

1. One is to use a Disarm Tool Kit if you have one, as that will allow you to turn off the Gargoyle head traps, which hurl fireballs, and coat the ground in fire. They also repeatedly launch their firey rounds, so, the room is always on fire. It will allow you safe leave to escape the booby trapped room.
2. The other option is to have your party at the door on the far end of the room, which leads to a way out of the chapel. You will need to have some Thieves Tools on you, which you can use to unlock the Ancient Door. If you have a Rogue, or Astarian in your party, you should have the Thieves Tools, alongside enough Sleight of Hand and Dexterity roll bonuses to meet the 15 requirements to unlock the door.

If you unlock the door, then you have an escape plan ready. So, have our party at the door, and then one character grabs the items from the central Sarcophagus, including the key, and then the party bails through the door before the fire kills them all.

Exiting through the door should bring you to the front of the Chapel, which you see once you escape the ship debris at the very start of Act 1. Now, all you need to do is return to the chapel, head back into the Dank Crypt, and you can enter the locked door.

Entering the Dank Crypt through the Ancient Door¶

If you have a high-dex character, you can bypass the battle at the Overgrown Ruins. Head back to the beach you crash-landed onto, and head north to find the Ancient Door. This requires you to have two things, one, a character capable of overcoming the DC 20 Dexterity check, and two, some Thieve’s Tools. Fortunately, the latter can be found in one of the wooden barrels floating in the sea to the right of the door. Simply interact with it, and pick it up. The former unfortunately requires a character with decent-to-high Dexterity. Make a quicksave, choose your highest dex character (Rogue, Warlock, Bard etc.), and add Shadowheart’s Guidance spell to add another 1d4 to the score. Now click the die, and hope you get higher than a 20, if not, reload, and try again.

Once you’ve opened the Ancient Door, you’ll be in the “firetrap” room where you’ll need a disarm kit to open the sarcophagus in the center without setting off the traps to get the Engraved Key. If you’ve come this way first, you most likely won’t have one, so separate the party with , and place one of them near the door to the north, now switch to the other, and open the sarcophagus. This will set off the traps, so quickly move the person next to the sarcophagus toward your other party member, and you’ll be safe. The rest of the dungeon will go the same way as all you’re doing here is entering from the back of the dungeon instead.

The Locked Room of the Dank Crypt¶

Now you’re back inside the Dank Crypt in BG3 and can enter the other locked room. Inside here, you’ll find plenty of treasure and loot in the and with some role-play opportunities with an Old God book. In the main room with the giant crack, you’ll find a larger room at the back of the Dank Crypt. When you approach it, you can find another switch on the wall. Activating it opens the locked room, but spawns several undead threats.

You will need to fight these foes to progress through the room. One tip is to get your party inside that final room, which will line-of-sight the mage undead threats, forcing them all to funnel towards the room for you to engage the threats with your melee characters safely. Alternatively, if you have a Cleric or Paladin in your party, you can now get some use from those Turn Undead type spells and get a great amount of control in the fight, making it fairly simple.

Once all the undead are defeated, you now loot the final room. Inside the room is another large sarcophagus you can interact with. This opens up another undead creature. However, this one is conscious and will engage in conversation with you.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Withers’ Question¶

When the undead rises from its tomb and begins to converse with you, it has a very important question for you. It will ask, what is the value of life in some form or another. The best answer to Withers’ Question is to select the answer that depends on who you ask. This will give Withers the idea that you are intellectual and answer something rhetorical by his rhetorical question. At least that’s the answer we chose and it seemed to work fine. Some have reported you to say whatever, and it’s mainly a role-play decision that affects how Withers speaks from that point onwards to you.

Once you have answered Withers’ Question, you will now see the friendly ghost walk around the place. However, once you return to your camp when your Long Rest, Withers will be on the outskirts of the camp. Here you have an NPC you can encounter that will be able to bring a party member back from the dead for the fee of 200 gold each. So, by solving the Baldur’s Gate 3 Dank Crypt puzzle, you can revive any fallen companion for a fairly moderate sum of gold.