Venta Cemetery

This article is about a mission. This name is also used for an outpost and a Zaishen mission quest. For the explorable area, see Sunward Marches.

Venta Cemetery
Campaign	Nightfall
Region	Kourna
Type	Cooperative
Party size	8
Required hero	Koss
Duration	Short (medium if doing bonus)
Preceded by	And a Hero Shall Lead Them
Followed by	The Council is Called A Little Recon A Prescription for Conscription Undead Defenders

After rescuing Sunspears captured and imprisoned by the Kournan forces it becomes important to evacuate them to the relative safety of Istan and get news of the rout to the Istani Council.

In this mission, you and Koss escort the Sunspear troops to the coast while trying to avoid the attention of the Kournan defenses in the area.

Mission information

Requirements

• All party members must have accepted the reward for And a Hero Shall Lead Them.
• Koss must be present in the party.

Objectives

Lead the Sunspear Evacuees to Dajkah Inlet without being discovered by the garrison.

• Kill all the guards at the garrison posts before they sound an alert and blow your cover.
• Disarm the sentry traps before they discharge.
• Start negotiations with Margrid the Sly.
• *BONUS* Neutralize all guard posts.
• [0...12] of 12 guard posts neutralized!

Reward

Normal mode	Guard posts neutralized	Rewards
Standard	0 - 7	1,000 XP	100	1	15
Expert's	8 - 11	1,500 XP	150	1	15
Master's	12	2,000 XP	200	1	15
Hard mode	Guard posts neutralized	Rewards
Standard	0 - 7	1,000 XP	200	1	60
Expert's	8 - 11	2,000 XP	300	1	60
Master's	12	3,000 XP	500	1	60

Walkthrough

Your goal is simple: bring at least one of the eight Sunspear Evacuees to the coast at the opposite side of the map for evacuation. You can do this by avoiding or removing threats along the way. Since each of the evacuees is a monk, they are generally capable of healing themselves, although you should keep an eye on their health.

Objective

Your task is complicated by four factors: patrols, Sentry Traps, guard posts, and the garrison:

• Patrols: The area is littered with Kournan military patrols. Avoid over-aggroing them, especially in hard mode.

• Sentry Traps dot the area (there is one close to nearly every guard post). As you approach, a bar timer appears to indicate a 5-second window within which you can use the Disarm Trap skill to disable it. If it activates, it will inflict 100 damage to all your allies in its area. Since the skill is easily interrupted, make sure that the Kournan rangers are targeted other members of the party before attempting to activate it. Anybody in the party - not just a player - can activate it. Activating the Disarm Trap skill while the timer is still running is enough to successfully deactivate the trap, unless Disarm Trap is interrupted.

• Twelve guard posts are located throughout this mission; they are marked on the map by a red flag if active and gray one if neutralized. If you approach and do not kill the guards quickly enough, you will be targeted by siege attacks. A progress bar indicates the amount of time you have, with different colors to indicate how rapidly they expire — from fastest to slowest, they are: red, blue, teal, green and gray.

• Morzek Garrison is the fort in the middle of the area; it is marked on the map by a red door. Moving too close will prompt a warning to avoid moving closer; if ignored, your team will be targeted by a massive siege attack, resulting in at least 600 area of effect (AoE) damage and almost certain loss of your evacuees (and consequently, mission failure). (You will not receive a warning if you have turned off Mission Progress via the Interface tab of the options panel.) The rest of the mission is fairly straight-forward. It is this mechanism that can cause players to have to repeatedly restart the mission as the warning does not give enough time to leave the attack range.

Routes

Main

The fastest and safest route is to go along the the northern wall of the area and proceed west until you cannot go any farther, reaching the northwest corner of the map. From there, head south until you find Margrid the Sly. Talk to her to complete the mission.

Skipping the bonus reduces the length of the mission by 66% (e.g. less than ten minutes instead of 30 minutes).

Bonus

The bonus is straight-forward but time-consuming: follow the suggested route to neutralize each of the 12 guard posts, periodically reviewing the mission map (default key: [U]) to ensure that each post's flag has turned gray. You get credit for the bonus regardless of whether you neutralize a post before or after they call for a siege attack, although obviously it is safer to avoid the extra AoE damage.

Hard mode

The only difference for hard mode is that it can be fatal to over-aggro, especially near the guard towers. Be sure to avoid or destroy nearby patrols before approaching the towers.

Skill recommendations

• Area damage over time against guard posts, as mobs tend to stay bunched together.
• Enchantment-based builds are vulnerable to enchantment removal by Kournan Oppressors and Seers.
• Hex removal skills could be unnecessary; the only hex spells your party will encounter are Enchanter's Conundrum (the hex that is applied has no impact if your party does not use enchantments) and Life Siphon (ends when its caster dies).
• There are enough corpses for 3 (or more) minion masters.

Foes

• Kournan Bowmen use Infuriating Heat and Whirling Defense; bring stance-removal skills, skills that bypass blocking, or skills that punish blocking. You are unlikely to need Skills that increase adrenaline gain.

Evacuees

• The evacuees are all minor healers; consider bringing less healing and more damage, control, or utility skills.
• Since the evacuees all wield staves, their attacks will trigger the many Kournan Bowmen's Whirling Defense, potentially causing heavy damage to melee attackers on your team.
• Speed boosts reduce the amount of time spent wandering, especially when keeping evacuees out of harm's way.

NPCs

Allies

Humans

• 18 (20) Margrid the Sly
• 20 (20) Sunspear Evacuee
• 20 (20) Rojis

Foes

Humans (Kournan military)

• 20 (26) Kournan Guard (axe)
• 20 (26) Kournan Bowman
• 20 (26) Kournan Spotter
• 20 (26) Kournan Priest
• 20 (26) Kournan Oppressor
• 20 (26) Kournan Seer
• 20 (26) Kournan Scribe
• 20 (26) Guard Post Commander
• 20 (26) Kournan Phalanx
• 20 (26) Kournan Zealot

Objects

• Sentry Trap
• Guard Post

Dialogue

Opening cinematic

Koss: "Okay, listen up!"

Koss: "We lost the fleet at the Battle of Gandara, but we're not stuck here."

Koss: "I've arranged passage back to Istan."

Koss: "There's one hitch. There's a Kournan garrison between us and the ship that'll take us home."

Koss: "Maybe you'd better explain the plan."

<party leader>: "We're going to lead you to the ships, but we're going to have to move quickly."

<party leader>: "The longer we're out in the open, the more likely the Kournans will come down on us."

Koss: "Most of you are in no shape to fight. Just stick close, and we'll get you home safe."

Koss: "Be sure to check with Rojis about the sentry traps. Other than that, we're ready to go."

Initial dialogue

Rojis: "The situation just got a bit more interesting. Our Kournan friends thought we might be coming this way and they were kind enough to leave sentry traps in our path."

Rojis: "Talk to me when you're ready to learn how to disable one of these things."

Intermediate dialogue

When speaking with Rojis.

Rojis

"Do you wish to learn the Disarm Sentry Trap skill?"

Yes. The more skills at our disposal, the better our chances at success.

I don't need any more skills. Let's go.

Rojis: "To disable a sentry trap, first you must approach it. It will activate and you have a short window of time to shut it down using the Disable Sentry Trap skill."

Rojis: "Get these troops home safely. They've endured enough nightmares to last a lifetime. Go, you're wasting precious time!"

After disabling the first Sentry Trap.

Rojis: "Be careful out there."

Ending cinematic

Koss: "Margrid! Got my boat?"

Margrid: "That all depends, my friend. Got my money?"

Koss: "You sure you want the money? My friendship is worth more than mere gold, isn't it?"

Margrid: "You're charming, Koss, but I can't spend charming. The money, please."

Margrid: "It's always a pleasure doing business with honest people. Welcome aboard."

<party leader>: "Koss, She's a corsair. Can we trust her?"

Koss: "Only for as long as the money lasts. But for the moment, you can relax. We're going home."

Meanwhile...

(Morzek Garrison, Sunward Marches)

Bayel: "You let those Sunspears escape?"

Kournan Captain 1: "There were only a few of them, sir! We've already captured and killed most of their forces!"

Bayel: "Only a few? You idiot!"

Bayel: "Captain!"

Kournan Captain 2: "Yes Sir!"

Bayel: "Increase the patrols! Burn the villages that help these traitors! Send word to the Warmarshal!"

Kournan Captain 2: "Yes Sir. What should I tell her?"

Bayel: "Tell her to send me...The Hunger."

Notes

The Guild Wars 2 Wiki has an article on Venta Pass.

• Since it's not necessary to clear the guard posts, you can complete the mission without any fighting, and only receive a Standard reward.
• It is possible to clear the guard posts without starting the detection timer. Just set your melee Heroes to avoid combat, or flag them away and pull the Kournans with a Longbow.
• Talk to Dockmaster Ahlaro for your next primary quest.
• After the completion of this mission, you can arrive at Kamadan, Jewel of Istan with a party larger than that allowed in that outpost (i.e. 4). See Kamadan, Jewel of Istan notes for details.
• Completion of this mission will fill in page #2 in the Night Falls storybook.

Bug.If you fail to neutralize a guard post before your position is given away, the map marker will not change color. However, your quest log will still count it as neutralized.

Bug.Guard Post Commanders may fail to spawn at guard posts. When all other enemies are slain it still counts as neutralized, but the timer will run out and incoming siege attacks strike the area after a short delay.

Bug.Players have reported losing progress towards the Survivor title after dying due to a siege attack (from the fort), even though this type of death is not supposed to count.

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