7 articlesThe Introducing NuCaloric contract is your first introduction to the NuCaloric faction in Marathon, and it starts with retrieving an Employee ID from a spider-infested building in Columns. The building itself is not that hard to miss once you are nearby, but actually getting inside and locating the ID is where most players lose time.
In this guide, I cover everything like where the building is, how to get inside, how to deal with the spiders and where to find the Employee ID so you can get in, grab it, and get out in a single clean run.
How to Acquire NuCal Employee ID from Infested Building in Columns in Marathon
Before dropping in, make sure to bring good gear and ammo with you as you will need to engage in combat. Once you are ready, drop in Perimeter and make your way to the location that I have marked below. It is Columns which is located between Overflow and South Relay.
Once you get there, you will find a building with 2 drawn on it along with an orange spider. Now this entire building is infested with spiders. No matter how many you kill, they will keep respawning. To effectively deal with them, take out the red clusters (like the one marked in the image below). Those red clusters are basically spider spawners. You can destroy them by shooting at them.
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Clear out the clusters outside the building and then kill all the spiders. Afterwards, climb the ladder to get to the roof of the building. On the roof, you will find a hatch. Use your melee attack to destroy the hatch and get inside the building. Once inside the building, interact with panel near the door to activate power.
Make sure you are ready as you will be jumped by spiders as soon as the door opens. Clear out all the clusters and spiders inside the room. Once that is done, make your way inside the room on the right. Inside this room, you will find another spider cluster. Take care of that cluster along with the spiders. Afterwards, grab the NuCal Employee ID from the shelf and put it in the nearby terminal to complete the contract.
Summing Up!
That is everything you need to complete the first step of the Introducing NuCaloric contract. The building in Columns is more involved than a typical loot run given the constant spider respawns, but once you know to target the red clusters first, the whole thing becomes a lot more manageable.
It is one of the more chaotic early objectives in Marathon but it is far from impossible once you know what you are walking into. Just make sure to drop in prepared!
