Gaerlan's Citadel

Difficulty:  Survivable at minimum with at least half a fellowship
Level Restriction:  20-39, 40-59, 60-79, 80+
Timer:  7 Days
Can be Solo'd?  No
Rewards:  Elemental Master Robe (Black for Killer), Iasparailaun (decoration or Experience), and a skill-based reward

Gaerlan was a mad Empyrean who had a burning hatred of Asheron, whom he blamed for the death of his brother.  He used Martine, who accidentally freed him from his exile in Portal Space, as a tool to kill Asheron and exterminate us.  The combined powers of Martine, Asheron, Nuhmudira, and many brave adventurers proved too much for Gaerlan, and now he remains trapped inside a Phylactery in his own citadel.  You can relive the battle by fighting an elemental aspect of Gaerlan.  Beware!  He is quite dangerous and will require a good team of adventurers (especially mages!) to take him down

Step 1:  Guardian Lairs.  Gather your group, making sure everyone is within the level restrictions of the quest.  *If you have a lower level group or less than two archers, you will need to equip your team with bows.  Store-bought bows and arrows will work fine.*  Your first test will be the Elemental Guardian Lairs, which are located at the remains of the old Magic Essences.  20-39s will need to head for 52.8N, 62.4E, which can be reached easily by heading to Arwic's Sennon Valley Retreat settlement.  40-59s will head for 73.4N, 3W.  Unfortunately, the closest settlements to this dungeon are in Crater's settlement community, so you might have a long run.  60-79s will have the worst run though - all the way to 30.5S, 74.3W in the mid-Dires.  The fastest way might be to use the Lesser Direlands portal device until you reach the Renegade Fortress and then run from there.  80+s will have a simple run to 86.7S, 10.4E via the Artifice Cottages portal out of Arwic.  If your team knows what they are doing, you can do this quest in a single buff, so buff up before heading out.  You will be fighting various elementals and golems, depending on level.  Protect everything, but characters without melee defense should bane all damage types.  Melees can get away with just baning fire and bludgeon.  Each portal is surrounded by a small army of elementals, so run inside when you arrive.  Each Guardian Lair is a small dungeon filled with Elementals and a few Golems and each level group's dungeon is identical.  Your main reason for going here is to find and kill a Golem Lord.  As soon as the Lord dies, he will summon a portal to the remains of Gaerlan's Citadel.  Make sure your group knows to get in the portal as soon as it shows up, or they will be left behind.

Step 2:  Ziggurats.  You will appear facing the remains of Gaerlan's citadel.  Head down and to the left to find Asheron's Platinum Golem at 57.7N, 48.4E.  Form a line and greet the Golem one at a time to avoid miscues.  The golem will blather on and eventually give you a Pyreal Nugget.  When everyone has their nuggets, run to approximately 57N 48E, where you will find 4 portals.  Enter the one appropriate to your level.  You will arrive in Gaerlan's inverted Ziggurat.  Inside are more Golems and Elementals with the stray wisp around too.  The wisps in these dungeons hit for the dreaded Typeless damage, so be careful!  Hugging the left wall will get you through most of the dungeon without much trouble, but as soon as you come to a pair of gates, stop.  Take the right one and be sure everyone stays with you.  Take your first left, followed by a quick right.  You will know you're going the right way when you pass a section with small windows on to the floor you were just on.  Turn left at the next two intersections and you will return to an area of big rooms with small connecting halls like the rest of the dungeon.  Again hug the left wall and you will come to a ramp leading up to the final floor.  Take two lefts and you will be facing another larger room.  Don't go in - stay in the hallway and again, hug the left wall.  You will arrive in the final room, where you will find a Platinum Golem NPC.  Line up and give it the Nugget.  As soon as you hear Asheron's voice, you should take the nearby portal into the Trials.

Step 3:  The Trials.  Now for the fun part!  Before you can fight Gaerlan, you have to prove to the Citadel itself that you are worthy.   The first trial is a riddle.  In front of you is a giant stone head.  Use it and it will ask you a riddle.  I'm not going to go into detail with the answers - if you are confused, ask your group.  Failing that, check out Maggie's Site!  When you know the answer, find the smaller statue along the walls of the room with the correct answer and use it.  If you are right, you will get a piece of a seal and be teleported into the next section.  If you are wrong three times, you will be ejected unceremoniously.  Trial 2 is the infamous Rolling Balls o' Death room.  In this section, great balls of fire (and other elements will roll down the hall at set intervals, killing you instantly should you get in its way.  There are numerous safe spots in the corners of each hall.  Take your time and move down the hall to the last safe spots.  Your archers (or you - hopefully you brought along extra bows if you are in a small group!) will now have the privilege of destroying the door blocking the way out.  The door regenerates quickly but has no missile defense, allowing one high level archer can take it out without difficulty by setting his speed/accuracy slider all the way to speed.  Don't rush ahead the second the door goes down!  The balls will continue to roll, so carefully make your way to the end, where you will find several chests.  Make sure everyone loots a piece, which you can combine with the first piece you received from the riddle test.  *If someone dies, they can rejoin your team by heading to Eastham and taking the correct Trials portal, located around 17.5N 61.5E.*  Trial 3 requires you to follow a pattern on the floor.  The exact pattern is found on the floor of the small hallway behind the large stone head, but you can just refer to the map to find where you can't step.  Move slowly through this section, as you can lag easily and be sent back to the start.  At the far side is a room with more chests and seals.  Each person should take one.  Stop your group before you go into the next section!  It's very important that you go out of combat mode and remain absolutely silent in the next part.  Casting, talking, or going into combat mode will trigger a spawn of Golems at the end and will return the offending person to the start.  The golems can be quite deadly to mages, since they won't be able to cast healing spells or fight them in any way.  Take the portal and make your way (silently!) to the end, where you will find the final piece of the seal in a chest.  Grab one and get out.  Assemble your completed seal and return it (one at a time again!) to the Platinum Golem.  He will give you a portal gem and an imbued seal.  Pop the portal gem as soon as you have it and give your seal to the pillar in front of you, which will teleport you into Gaerlan's Library.

Step 4:  Gaerlan in the Flesh.  The Library itself has no monsters and is just a big staircase.  You'll find the staircase that leads to the top just to your left as you enter.  Follow it up and you will reach 4 portals, one to each level-restricted Gaerlan.  If your buffs are below 10 minutes or so, take the time to rebuff here.  Be sure you've baned Flame or you will die a quick death.  When you are set, hit the portal.  Unfortunately, only the 20-39 Gaerlan's dungeon map exists and each dungeon is laid out differently.  Fortunately, the dungeon is pretty linear.  There are some more Golems, Elementals, and Wisps inside, so be careful.  When you reach Gaerlan, set up your team.  Designate one lure and 2 melees for the meat wall.  The melees will form a wall inside one of the small corridors near Gaerlan.  When they are ready, the lure will run down, annoy Gaerlan, and run back safely behind the wall.  Everyone else will then begin attacking Gaerlan.  Slashing damage works best, although pierce and bludgeoning work reasonably well too.  Make sure you vuln and fester him properly.  Creature debuffs to his defenses and sword skill won't hurt either.  As soon as he dies, a portal will appear where he spawns, so quickly run and enter it.

Step 5:  Rewards.  You are safe now, so you can take your equipment off.  From the drop, run up the ramps, and take one of the two paths.  Now take the first turn you see and then pick either right or left.  You will run through an acid or fire pit, so jump down to the lower level quickly.  You will see a large blue object with a small Gaerlan floating inside it.  Greet it and you will receive 3 items:  a copy of Gaerlan's Robe (black if you killed him, red if you did not), a copy of Gaerlan's sword Iasparailaun, and another item.  The final item is determined by how many skill credits you have spent on various skills and which rewards you have already received.  For instance, a mage will get a War wand first, followed by the life wand.   There are rewards for almost all the skills, so it will take you several runs through before you get everything.  All the rewards are tradeable, so you can swap if you get an item you don't want.  Near the Phylactery is a portal to the Citadel Apex, where you can find Martine's Mask and Robe.  The mask talks to you when you wear it and the Robe casts Item Mastery VI.  Last, but not least, take Iasparailaun to any Agent of the Arcanum and trade it in for 2 MM notes, 5% of your level (or 15M for 126ers), and a title token you can use to become a 'Gaerlan Slayer'.  The specific rewards are, by order of expense:

A couple notes on the items:  the melee and missile weapons are garbage.  Their damage is way too low to be useful.  The wands, however, are very useful against the Olthoi Queen.  The ring, bracelet, and necklace are all very useful items and are hard to come by, given the time it takes to get them.  The Circlet of Supremacy is only useful for activating rank requirement items and cannot be used to change your rank title or in buying a mansion.