Talk: Assault on the Stronghold

lol got a bug, which made the mission a lot easier, my hero/hench party got wiped and I was ressed inside the camp, so I could do the mission without opening the gates ;) 145.99.177.157 14:21, 2 September 2007 (CDT)

This happened to me too. dominique 14:40, 2 September 2007 (CDT)

Me too. At least it compensated for the Siege Devourers not doing their job. I went up on the ramparts and wiped out the Charr up there, they stopped spawning after a few respawns. Then I went back and got the Charr allies, who respawned when I came in range and told me to charge. They stopped at the gate anyhow. I shouldn't have bothered going back. Eddycurrents 22:30, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

It wasn't a bug. If you didn't activate the rez shrine at the beginning of the quest and died near the gate, the closest shrine was the place where you rezzed. ANet just changed the location of the first rez shrine so you start the mission with it active. Exploit over :( -Valkor the Confused 03:20, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

"Invariably lose"

The charr will invariably lose to the Destroyers in normal mode it says.. however, when I watched in amusement at the carnage, the Charr won.

Merge!

This page shall be merged with this one? [1] That one provides more details!

Attacking their own gods...

After breaking the gate and coming up to the last part, I tried to take out a small group of Charr at the top of the staris. Unbeknown to me the other Charr's were patrolling and so i got mobbed by all groups except the left hand side Destroyers. I flagged/ran down the stairs, and waited awhile. I watched the Charr's for awhile and noticed that the Destroyers were killed by the Charr....Why would you attack your own gods?!

Self defense I guess? Like the Titans, I doubt the Destroyers care one bit about the Charr and see them as a nuisance at best. A tasty nuisance. Other Charr also had no problem with attacking their own gods for NF. (T/C) 02:16, 21 September 2007 (CDT)

Charr douche: Quickly kill our enemies Destroyer muther:i have a better idea Charr: NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

you:well that was anti climatic

It's actually in the dialogue... or at least it WAS. I didn't notice it the last time around, but it might have been because I was too busy fighting... or maybe its another case of the story-filler being broken like the Raisu Palace end cinematic for long enough that there are plenty of people that never got to see it properly. In short, Burntsoul didn't actually have any form of control over or alliance with the Destroyers - it isn't properly explained, but it looks more like he's managed to capture a few and is now trying to pass them off as 'gods' offering a similar alliance to that offered by the Titans. When you break into the fortress, he has them released as a form of mutually assured destruction - he's going to go down, but at least these pesky humans and rebels will go down with him. The problem with this idea is that if you're careful you can basically let them fight it out and mop up the remains, possibly with some light intervention to keep the mopping up duty to a minimum. But Pyre pointed out that he was an idiot (although not in so many words) at the start of the mission. Draxynnic 02:15, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I used this method on normal mode, it made the fight incredibly EASY! It destroyed (no pun intended) all other Charr groups, and even killed the boss, all I was left to do was kill small groups of 2-3 destryers and I beat the mission. All you have to do is flag hero/hench far away, arggro the char at top of stairs, back away, then watch as the destroyers kill all the Charr. Maybe it was meant to be like this?

Note Contradiction

What's the deal with the notes? It says it's no problem to let the armored saurus die because it respawns, then it says the armored saurus won't make it to the gate without good team coordination and the only way to get it back is to restart. So which is it? Does the armored saurus die permanently or does it respawn?

Read what it says: "Sometimes, the siege devourers will not damage the charr." I sounds like it's saying IF the siege devourers aren't damaging the charr, you need to reset the mission otherwise the saurus will never survive long enough to reach the gates. In other words, the saurus will keep dying over and over, never surviving long enough to achieve its objective. The text has no contradiction; you just need to read more carefully. --Malagra 23:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

You need to take down the charr rangers to allow the saurus to bash down the walls. However if the siege devos don't do their job, you get outflanked by axe charr and the charr rangers keep killing the saurus. You can't win... unless you get lucky and spawn behind the wall. That's what happened to me. Eddycurrents 22:30, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

If you have any siege devourers that aren't responding and hurting charr, just wait 10 minutes i've had that twice now and it seems to fix itself--Marth Reynolds 11:01, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I've had it happen too - but only on one side, so by completely clearing the other (setting the devourer that worked to attack the Seekers on teh gate and the party elementalists to hit the ones on the bluff) I was able to at least have the Saurus make some progress until the other devourer started working. Draxynnic 02:03, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I actually was helping my friend out with the mission, and the seekers wouldnt die. So i walked in for the saurus and used my A?D death blossom farmer and barely took damage. Eventually my parry got wiped when the wall fell, but the seekers still lived.

Hard Mode Difficulty

I consider myself to be a fairly good play, I have all the skill hunters, I'm a guardian of tyria, and I know my way around. However, this mission is IMPOSSIBLE. I can hold the Warriors at bay indefinitely but the seekers keep respawning and eventually I have to make a move for the door. You don't see the monk's health bars go down. They dissapear in an instant under the barrage from six seekers. I have made it to the gate but when I do, I manage to knock off 1/2 it's health max and there's no going back. BY that time three or four trios of warriors have spawned at the bottom and you will be insta-popped walking anywhere near it. Has anyone mananaged to even make it INTO the stronghold? 65.30.20.38 01:09, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Bring Winds, prot the crap out of itm use yourself and teammates as meatshields. Zeek Aran 02:47, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I have to agree with the 1st comment. this IS imposable We had 3 very good people and the rest where a good mix of heroes. We could'nt get inside the fort either. Aslo winds does NOT help with the constantly respawing seekers. Did anyone else get only 1 drop and ZERO xp from mobs here.

I also noticed the lack of loot and xp from spawned Charr even in normal mode. The first wave dropped a couple of loot items, but none of the spawned monsters gave anything at all. I suppose this is to prevent spawn farming, but it's a pretty crappy reward for people who are just trying to fight their way through a difficult mission.-Valkor the Confused 17:12, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Just did this in Hard Mode with a Hero/Hench team. I was a W/E with Stoneflesh and took an MM and SS hero and Tahlkora with Shield of Deflection and Aegis, then for hench I had Mhenlo, Herta, Zho, and Eve. Clear the right siege with the NPC's then the left and then move back to the right, ignore the melee on the left unless it gets to close and just defend until the Saurus comes up. Move your party up and let them take damage while protecting the Saurus. Don't get to close to the gate or you will activate the internal res shrine and be unable to finish. It may take 2 or 3 attempts to get the gate down but it should fall eventually, once it does head inside. Don't go up the middle instead cut to the right and up the hill where you can take out 2 groups of 3 and work back to the center stairs. Send one person up to activate the update and get the destroyers to attack, then back off and let the enemies kill each other. I only had to kill Burntsoul and his guards and one other full group of Charr to finish the mission. Kaden Astrid 02:05, 17 October 2007 (EDT)

I actually beat this in HM by activating the internal rez shrine. We hugged the north wall under the seekers and took them out. The newly spawned charr wars annialated my H/H team and we rezed inside the base. First of all, the charr just inside the door will not react as you kill them (although the seekers will). Clear out the imediate inside and then go to the seekers on the north bluff and kill them. camp there with a MM (I played a Curses necro) and kill the seekers as them come up. When the Saurus marches up to the door, the Charr wars will be on it like glue, take 3 but no more out. This will keep more from spawning. While keeping the charr on the north bluff down (they only spawn one at a time, so no prob), take out the charr north of the gate. With this the Saurus should make it in a few tries. Once the gate is down proceed as normal. Be sure to wait for the destroyers and charr to go at each other (the charr will win). Kill the winner. Bladeturner 13:32, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Even better, after rezzing in (see above) forget the wall, and just go after the Hierophant--you don't need to break down the gate to complete the mission!! The chief annoyance is that the Hierophant and his guards will not pull and buzz around like flies making it so you have to take them one at a time until you are left with just one group (when you can then go into the attack). I suggest, if you can, take out a few charr when they and the destroyers go at each other. A MM is very useful!

Another variation on above, take Necrotic Traversal or Consume Corpse, kill seeker on right side of gauntlet and get as near internal shrine as you can. You will need to turn rezzes off, and be prepared for some death penalty. This method still works, even after the updates (as of Nov 25, 2008) GW-Susan 21:34, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Did this in hard mode with hench/hero the other night. Flagged an MM hero over by the Fierces' devourer, as they couldn't hold the spot on their own. Took the rest, including a second MM hero, over by the north wall, between the warrior spawn and the wall. The MM hero would make minions from the corpses of the outer set of seekers (the ones the devourer fires on), and they would go distract the inner set of seekers. Only took about 5 mins for the saurus chain to take down the gate once I was in position. --Shattered Self 03:09, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Did this in HM w/ H/H; 1MM,1SS, 1N/RT(restoration); both healer hench; cynn; herta. I play a BHA ranger. Took me 15 minutes the first time, about 10-15 the second. First, take out the charr around the right side -- provides some mm. then, move to the left (the folks on the right cannot hold, I clear those out after the left) clear the charr and then set the seige devourer to work on the seekers. Moved team and flagged them close to the spot where the charr warriors will spawn, but back a little--else one volley from the seekers = a dead h/h. Then, using the vanguard sin skill and apply poison, I slowly worked my way up taking out the rangers; the h/h r more than able to take care of the spawning warriors. Once three seekers on the left are down, the saurus -- the second spawn -- can survive to take down the gate. I then move to the right side, clear out the charr and set that devourer to clear that side. Then move forward and take out the small charr groups on the left and right inside the fortress. Then move forward enough to set off the conversation. The first time I was not very lucky. There were several large groups of both charr and destroyer left to deal with. The last time, the destroyers took out all but the boss and one other small group.

Made it if hench and heros with my monk(hard mode of course). tried to protect the sauros myself using a 600hp/smite but it didn't work. so I boned the sauros!u get plenty of energy because theres lots of attacks on him so you can also back-up help you're party with bonds(took sf ele,MM and SS who really helped with br) as long as the sauros is in range and the bonds on him it will take ages until they kill him and he breaks the gate. try to avoid the destroyer groups and let the charr kill them because the destroyer of thoughts use mirror of disenchantment which removes all bonds at once. rest of charr are easy. A real tank(or a tank hero) is recomended. Ts healer 22:29, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I must agree with first post. i've tryed this many and many times, but i can't break the gate! This is impossible in Hard Mode. Charrs spawn too fast!

I have done it in HM with the trick running near the inside sanctuary to resurrect there after being wiped. Nevertheless, then, I wanted to find out if there was a more conventional manner to do it, and I could with a bonder hero: Life Bond, Life Barrier, Mending, Watchful Spirit, on the saurius to keep the saurius alive enough time to "bite" the gate a bit and to break the gate after bonding several saurius. --mariano 15:33, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I didn't have much problem getting the gate down in HM. I changed my secondary to Monk and brought Mark of Protection, Spirit Bond, and Great Dwarf Armor. I also brought enfeebling blood and reckless haste to help with defense. I brought MM, restoration, and channeling heroes, healer hench, fighter hench, earth hench, and archer hench. I moved in and took the two siege devourers and got them started firing. When the armored saurus got close to the gate, I slapped great dwarf armor and spirit bond on him, followed by mark of protection when spirit bond was off. I left my H/H killing charr near the siege devourers. Once the saurus started taking damage again, I ran up and slapped him with spirit bonds and kept up GDA and mark of protetion when available. The healing from mark of protection was enough to get him back most of the health that was lost. I only needed that one saurus to break down the gate. I had some bad luck with the charr - the pretty much wiped out the destroyers with very little loss, but with careful pulling and minion meat shields I was able to come through. Pain inverter works great on the charr boss. 216.167.150.194 17:34, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Guess I was just lucky, did this with my warrior with a Rt/N MM, SS, N/Rt restoration, both monk hench, the warder and the mesmer. Tried the ress trick at first but didn't work. Then I just killed both groups near those siege devourers and ran as fast as possible to the gate (with my group), only had ~4 firing on us and believe most arrows hit the ceiling above, either way that battle standard of honor (edit: it is of courage) (the one that gives +48 to charr @ rank8 ebon) made it possible to survive easily and kill a few seekers. The saurus came, bit through the gate, we went on, destroyers broke free etc. Then it was just a bit of pulling (which I found easy as a warrior) and then the mission was over in like 10 minutes (and yes all on HM else I wouldn't post here) Shai Meliamne 17:03, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

I gave this a few tries until going with Me, a conditions ranger with epidemic, Vekk with Blinding surge and some wards, an MM, and the henchies in last comment. My monk (hero) bonded the saurus. Broke the first time through. The rest is easy Gorbachev116 22:11, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Confirmed 9/28/08: Spawning inside the gate does NOT work anymore.139.147.16.77 08:23, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

• Necrotic Traversal still does, however. Once you stand right on top of the res shrine, it will activate. 83.160.184.108 11:14, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Hard Mode Without difficulty

Completed this mission in HM with a Hero/Hench party. I was a Warrior. Reading the hints on the main page, I brought a Monk hero with Life Barrier, Life Bond, and Vital Blessing, all disabled. My other Heros included a MM Necro and N/Rt Restoration healer. The henchies were Eve, Herta, Cynn, and Mhenlo. All I did was fight in-between the two Siege Devourers. As Charr spawned, the Minions and/or myself would aggro them and they'd come to the fight in the center between the two Siege Devourers. Once the Saurus came running through, I triggered my Monk Hero to cast Life Barrier, Life Bond, and Vital Blessing on it as it ran by. The first Saurus nearly took down the gate on it's first try. The second Saurus finished the job in the same way. Then I just cleaned up the remaining Charr and invaded the Stronghold. ImperialMike 07:30, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I didn't have too much trouble my first time. My party did get whiped once while trying to protect the Saurus... But as soon as i found out how to use the seige and protect them for a minute while they take out some char, then run to the gate with the saurus, and keep him healed.. we got the gate down, died again, res'd up and killed all the remaining char... after that is was no problem finishing the mission. I'm sure 2nd time around it will be alot easier. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.89.253.1 (contribs) 14:29, February 12, 2008.

That map

Is incredibly detailed. --Macros 20:53, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I know. The amount of detail in is staggering, isn't it? --Gimmethegepgun 22:58, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Now that I'm home, I replaced the map with a low-res, incredibly obscured map. --Macros 23:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Augh! Such low quality cannot be tolerated! REVERT! --Gimmethegepgun 23:35, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Completely alternate method for the gate

I don't know if this belongs in the actual page, nor that anyone cares at this late date (when everyone and his brother seems to be fully in "wait for GW2" mode, but what the heck. I'm not the world's greatest player and this mission was frustrating the hell out of me, either with another human player and their heroes or just me and all H/H. The Devourers don't manage to kill the archers fast enough to make a bit of difference, and if you keep fighting the meleers as they respawn, eventually you get swamped. Meanwhile many sauruses die without making a dent in the gate.

So one day I got frustrated and just ignored the devourers completely. Once I killed the initial set of enemies (to trigger the sauruses) I ran my whole party up to the gate, where the gate (not the bluff) archers are. We were all ranged and started taking down gate archers as they respawned. Seems like the gate archers do far more damage to the saurus than the bluff archers do. Most importantly, I found out that if you allow the Charr meleers to "retake" the devourers, *they stop respawning*. Three sauruses was enough to take down the gate. The rest of the mission is cake if you don't charge in too fast.

Later tests confirmed this was not a fluke. I've done it this way three times since then, including once with another human player. Just bring ranged and healers. EccentricFlower 19:30, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

FYI its way easier to bring henchmen and hero healers. Then have your hero heal the saurus while it whacks at the gate. Have devourers attacking gate charr and flag your heros at the left portal so they take out charr. I cleared this in 4 minutes using this method. My ign is Rask of Shadows96.25.102.72 00:50, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

note not on the page

Necrotic Traversal/Consume Corpse lets your whole party get inside the fortress without breaking down the gate - use it when the Seekers die. Having a Warrior/Derv up on the bluffs also makes taking out Seekers much easier.

Also - don't know for HM - having the Devourers target the Gate groups seems to be the most effective. That's the way I have always done it, and it varies from either a few Saurus to sometimes just one. It seems that if the Saurus advances all the way to the gate while the Gate groups are dead, and they respawn, they won't aggro it or something. Which makes the mission really easy.

Finally, Life Bond + Life Barrier is always (95%) good enough to get the gate down in one Saurus in NM, as long as you get one set of Seekers dead. Shield of Absorption also works well. So does Shield of Judgment under Blessed Aura, if you happen to be running Smite. (T/C) 05:52, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I always just camp the Saurus with Ward-Harm/Ward-Elements, and sometimes a Guardian or a Blessed Light (I love B Light on Smiters. They only need Smite and Div and very little Energy) --- -- (s)talkpage 07:21, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Location at End of Mission

The Notes section of the article says "After successfully completing the quest, you will find yourself in Doomlore Shrine" - but I just completed the mission (HM, H/H) and found myself in Grothmar Wardowns, right outside Longeye's Ledge. Captain Langmar was standing there, with the quest marker for The Missing Vanguard pointing to her. Is the note about ending in Doomlore Shrine wrong, or was my ending up where I did an anomaly? ManxomeFoe 02:52, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

You're quite right; I have completed Assault a dozen times and never ended up in Doomlore. I'll fix. 02:55, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

When you have already completed the Vanguard storyline, do you still end up next to Langmar? (ie. doing a new book) I can't remember. (T/C) 04:12, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

-- Yes, just did it. GW-Susan 21:38, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Who wins fight

I've never seen the Charr win, ever. (in easy mode) (T/C) 22:19, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

That's been my experience as well. The one time I did it in HM, though, the Charr won easily. —Dr Ishmael 22:35, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Although I have no screen shots, I have seen both win in both easy mode and HM, but it does seem the Destroyers most often hold on. However, I always get in by not breaking down the gate (i.e., get in via the internal shrine), and this may make a difference. GW-Susan 16:55, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

In Hard Mode the Charr nearly always win because they have healers. In normal mode, it can go either way, depending on where Burntsoul's group goes after they beat the first Destroyer group. 17:13, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

That doesn't mean it's somewhat easier to do it in HM, doesn't it? The dino still needs bigbig prots or redbarring.--Alc ^^ 17:41, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Healing Seed+WoH keeps it alive--Relyk 03:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Hero's Handbook

I've done this mission a couple of times now. The funny thing is that the completion didn't show up in my hero's handbook on hard mode. I've done this mission 6 times in a row now, and still it didn't show up. Does anyone else have this problem? --Maxxbrazuca 21:41, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

If you do it in normal mode, it only shows up in the normal handbook, and if you do it in hardmode, it only shows up in the hardmode handbook...other than that, sounds like a strange bug. (T/C) 00:54, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Need to kill Destroyers to finish the mission?

I just did this on my ranger. Used a generic approach I suppose, but we almost wiped at the end. I'm able to get a decent damage and we managed to take down a lot of the Charr but were forced to retreat (through wiping). There were four Destroyers left and we took out one, but we almost wiped - only myself and Gwen were alive. We ran out to the front to drop the Destroyer aggro and a Charr ran at Bonwar & co. He was killed and the mission was won!

Unless Gwen managed to take out the other two Destroyers while she was running after me (something which I wouldn't put past her), one does not have to kill the Destroyers. Metalmiser 14:07, July 27, 2011 (UTC)

• It's possible some of Pyre's warband were killed back there, ressurrected off-screen and killed them for you; that's the only explanation I see. GW-Kuku 06:39, July 29, 2011 (UTC)