GW2. Dungeon Guide Ascalonian Catacombs. A complete guide on how to complete Ascalonian Catacombs Dungeon. Story and Explorable mode. All paths.

Contents hide

2 Story Mode

3 Explorable Mode

3.1 Path 1: Hodgins’s Plan

3.2 Path 2: Detha’s Plan

3.3 Path 3: Tzark’s Plan

Getting There

Enter Ascalonian Catacombs from the dungeon entrance at Ascalonian Catacombs Waypoint – [&BIYBAAA=] in Plains of Ashford or by talking to the Dungeon Transportation NPC south of Fort Marriner Waypoint – [&BDAEAAA=] in Lion’s Arch.

While this dungeon is soloable by a well-geared level 80, it can be quite a challenge and it is recommended to bring at least 2-3 players for this.

Story Mode

Ascalonian Catacombs Story Mode is for players level 30 and up. Completing this will unlock Explorable mode which is for players level 35 and up. You can do explorable mode without having done Story Mode, but at least one person in the group must have completed Story Mode to open an Explorable Path.
To begin the dungeon you must interact with the coffins until you find the Champion Gate Guardian and defeat his ghost.
Afterwards progress through by avoiding the red circles on the ground, these traps will take a lot of your life, so be careful. To get through the gate after the traps, find a boulder on the ground and pick it up then place it on the pedestal next to the gate.
Keep progressing through until you defeat the boss at the Foefire’s Heart. From here you can go three paths. All three bosses must be defeated to spawn the final boss.
Ralena and Vassar in the southeast are more powerful when next to each other, but CC or splitting them can make them more vulnerable.
Kasha Blackblood can be reached by using another stone on the pedestal next to the gate in Ralena and Vassar’s room to open the gate.
Master Ranger Nente is in the middle of a pillar to the west that you can reach by carefully walking up a wood plank that connects to it.
King Adelbern spawns afterwards in the center of the dungeon and you can survive him by constantly moving out of the fire.

Gameplay Complete Run:

Explorable Mode

Better rewards are offered in explorable mode, and each path gives an extra bit of liquid gold once per day, so doing more difficult or longer paths may be worth it if it pays more.

Also doing 8 different unique paths will complete the Dungeon Frequenter repeatable achievement to earn a which contains 150 Tales of Dungeon Delving and 5 Gold.

All explorable paths provide 20 Tales of Dungeon Delving after completion, but the first time each day you will get 80 Tales of Dungeon Delving as a bonus, for a total of 100 daily. This currency can be used to redeem other rewards like weapons and armor skins with exotic stats, runes, sigils, and other materials.

Complete map:

Path 1: Hodgins’s Plan

Length: Medium
Difficulty: Easy
Reward: 50 Silver

Start by selecting Path 1 at the Priory Camp
Travel through the traps to make it to the Spider Room
Clear the Spiders and Gargoyle Heads to minimize the pressure you take during the Spider Queen fight. Bring condition cleanse to remove immobilize and poison.
Lure the Gravelings out of the traps and behind a wall to group them together. Stability and stun breaks can help when they burrow.
Wait for the red circles of the traps to disappear before running to the end of the hallway and pulling the chain to disable the traps. Bring mobility skills.
Enter the south chamber, once again waiting for the fire of the gargoyle heads before running through.
Hodgins Defense Event
- Hodgins must not be killed by gravelings which spawn constantly from the burrows
- Destroy 6 burrows to complete the event, but they can only be damaged from power or strike damage, not conditions
- Split up and destroy the burrows fast to prevent gravelings from spawning or have some players dedicated to protecting Hodgins
- Revive Hodgins if you fail and start the event again
Find the scepter piece in the coffin at the top of the ramp
Make your way to the northwest, killing Kohler optionally and speaking to Hodgins once he reaches his destination
Retrieve the five scepter pieces in the large room with gravelings. No need to kill the gravelings just look for the pieces by using the Show Interactable Objects keybind (default keybind Left Alt) and run by the gravelings.
After returning the pieces to Hodgins, enter through the passage that opened in the ruins and bring stability and mobility. The gravelings can’t be killed and will stun lock you, just run through to the final boss.
The Howling King
- Don’t stand in front them when they scream.
- Lure the extra gravelings and boss into the rings of fire to burn them and deal extra damage.

Gameplay Complete Run:

Path 2: Detha’s Plan

Length: Medium
Difficulty: Easy
Reward: 50 Silver

Start by selecting Path 2 at the Priory Camp
Travel through the traps to make it to the Spider Room
Clear the Spiders and Gargoyle Heads to minimize the pressure you take during the Spider Queen fight. Bring condition cleanse to remove immobilize and poison.
Lure the Gravelings out of the traps and behind a wall to group them together. Stability and stun breaks can help when they burrow.
Wait for the red circles of the traps to disappear before running to the end of the hallway and pulling the chain to disable the traps. Bring mobility skills.
Make your way to the southeast, killing Kohler optionally and speaking to Detha once ready for the fight.
Detha Defense Event
- Keep Detha alive long enough for her to finish her preparations
- Pull the chains on the pillars along the walls to trigger the spike traps to deal heavy damage to the gravelings
- Split up to lure gravelings inside the traps for other players to trigger, or group up to hold the line and protect Detha
- Kill the Champion graveling quickly
Head to the north chamber to defend Detha while she sets up the weapons. Kill the ghosts before they reach her. Line of sight using the pillars can help organize the ghosts. Progress is not lost if she dies, just revive Detha. Prepare for the final boss and talk to Detha after she has prepared all of the traps.
Ghost Eater
- Bring projectile reflects and condition cleanse
- Cannot damage the boss until you have charged the traps
- Lure the boss next to one of the traps and use the Anti-Spectral Ordinance (a ghost buster gun) on the boss. The 1 skill will spawn ectoplasms out of the boss.
- Use the 1 skill to raise ectoplasms, and the 2 skill to make already raised ectoplasms come toward you, but you can only do one at a time. You want to raise them into the trap to charge it. Team work between players with multiple guns can make things go smoothly.
- If an ectoplasm is on top of the trap already, you only need to raise it with the 1 skill to charge the trap. Spawn the ectoplasms on the trap by luring the boss on top of the trap.
- After fully charged the trap will make the boss vulnerable. Do as much damage as possible to it during this time.
- If the boss is not dead, go to another trap and repeat.

Gameplay Complete Run:

Path 3: Tzark’s Plan

Length: Medium
Difficulty: Easy
Reward: 50 Silver

Start by selecting Path 3 at the Priory Camp
Travel through the traps to make it to the Spider Room
Clear the Spiders and Gargoyle Heads to minimize the pressure you take during the Spider Queen fight. Bring condition cleanse to remove immobilize and poison.
Lure the Gravelings out of the traps and behind a wall to group them together. Stability and stun breaks can help when they burrow.
Wait for the red circles of the traps to disappear before running to the end of the hallway and pulling the chain to disable the traps. Bring mobility skills.
Make your way to the east, killing Kohler optionally and speaking to Tzark in the crypt of Ralena and Vassar.
Graveling Defense Event
- Defend the Essence Collectors from gravelings
- Kill the burrows first to stop more from spawning then kill any that are attacking the Essence Collectors
- Only power or strike damage works on the burrows
- The burrow locations are the same every time.
- Repeat the event by speaking to Tzark if you fail to defend an Essence Collector
Use the gate north of this room to reach the northern chamber where you must kill graveling burrows. Only power or strike damage works on these.
After destroying all of the burrows, enter through the passage that opened in the ruins to the west and bring stability and mobility. The gravelings can’t be killed and will stun lock you, just run through to the final boss.
Colossus Rumblus
- Don’t stand in front them when they scream.
- Lure the boss away from the large open area to avoid standing under the falling ceiling.
- Dodge or stun break out if you get caught underneath the ceiling

Gameplay Complete Run:

Rewards

South of Fort Marriner Waypoint – [&BDAEAAA=] in Lion’s Arch, you can find the Dungeon Merchant that offers several rewards in exchange for your Tales of Dungeon Delving. You will need to complete the dungeon in story or explorable mode to unlock most of the rewards. Some will require you to complete explorable path a few times (between 1 to 7 times depending on the piece).

Additionally, completing the dungeon story mode will unlock a reward track for PvP and World vs World that you can use to gain currency and unlock skins while playing those game modes. However, unlocking a skin through the reward track won’t necessarily unlock it on the Dungeon Merchant.

Armor Sets

You can obtain three unique armor sets from Ascalonian Catacombs. These are exotic pieces with three different stat variants (Soldier’s – Rampager’s – Magi’s). However, the main appeal of the Dungeon Armor Sets are the unique skins that you will unlock in your wardrobe.

Ascalonian Performer (Light)
Ascalonian Sentry (Medium)
Ascalonian Protector (Heavy)

Each set will cost a total of 1380 Tales of Dungeon Delving.

If you want to preview the skins for your character, use these chat codes in-game:

	Light	Medium	Heavy
Helmet	[&CnACAAA=]	[&Cm8CAAA=]	[&CnECAAA=]
Shoulder	[&CmsCAAA=]	[&CmkCAAA=]	[&Cm0CAAA=]
Coat	[&CmUCAAA=]	[&CmMCAAA=]	[&CmcCAAA=]
Gloves	[&CnMCAAA=]	[&CnICAAA=]	[&CnQCAAA=]
Leggings	[&CmYCAAA=]	[&CmQCAAA=]	[&CmgCAAA=]
Boots	[&CmwCAAA=]	[&CmoCAAA=]	[&Cm4CAAA=]

Weapons

You can obtain 19 unique weapons from Ascalonian Catacombs. These are exotic pieces with three different stat variants (Soldier’s – Rampager’s – Magi’s). However, the main appeal of the Dungeon Weapons are the unique skins that you will unlock in your wardrobe.

The Royal Ascalonian Weapon Set has an extra unique effect, these weapons glow during night time. Each weapon has a different cost. All the weapons will cost a total of 6150 Tales of Dungeon Delving.

If you want to preview all the skins for your character, copy and paste these chat codes into in-game chat. They will appear in game with their names and tooltips, so just copy them all and pick the one you want to see.

[&CggRAAA=] [&ChURAAA=] [&CgkRAAA=] [&CmkRAAA=] [&CgURAAA=] [&CiwRAAA=] [&CgQRAAA=] [&ChIRAAA=] [&CiARAAA=] [&CjMRAAA=] [&ChQRAAA=] [&CiERAAA=] [&CgsRAAA=] [&CpIRAAA=] [&CiYRAAA=] [&CjARAAA=] [&Ck8RAAA=] [&Co0RAAA=] [&CkURAAA=]

Extras

Besides the other things that you can purchase, like rare equipment, sigils, recipes, and tonics, these are the three most important things to mention:

Dungeon Rune:
- 120 Tales of Dungeon Delving
Legendary Gift:
- 500 Tales of Dungeon Delving
Achievement Collection:
- Unlock all 37 skins in your wardrobe
- Rewards unique ascended accessory