Villany of Galrath...

...has probably the worst quest reward in the entire game. Let me expand on this.

The quest recived in Lion's Arch ask's you to kill Galrath before he unlocks some secrets in a wizard's tower. Most people choose to leave from bergen hot springs, though you can leave from Temple of Ages if you choose but have more undead to contend with (as you travel the length of the black curtain, plus most people at the temp want to do UW or fissure). Most people conducting this quest are around 17-20 (you would hope) and leave from bergen. You cannot get hench at temple as well and the hench at bergen are only level 12 and will not be helpful at all past cursed lands, when the mobs are much higher than they are, you also only get 6 in a group from bergen, 8 from temple if you are lucky getting a group there.

The path is usually bergen hot springs -> nebo terrace (easy mobs) -> cursed lands (easy mobs too) -> The black curtain -> Kessex peak (where Galrath is)

Both black curtain and kessex peak are dificult area's with multiple patrolling mobs of lvl 20 or so. Good groupiung and tactics plus pulling mobs is required to make it through unscathed. Black curtain crawls with undead, phantoms (17) and necrid horsemen (18) make life a pain with chain lightning desecrate enchantment and summon bone minions, the entire area is also dotted with poisonous swamps. Kessex peak is crawling with lvl 20 minotaur patrols at the start, the odd fen troll group and random oak heart but again with tactics and coordination you can survive that.

Finally you make it to where Galrath is hiding (for comparison Galrath is level 20 with lvl 11 bandits surrounding him). But in the way are 2 groups of lvl 20 verata's everything (mesmer,ranger,necro) lead by 2 lvl 24 boss mob Tachi Forvents. If you agro anyone of the verata's group they will all agro and you will have a huge painful fight on your hand of around 10 + angry verata students with the evil mob ai of knowing exactly when to do bad stuff to you with precision coordination. If you gain 60% DP you will probably fail miserably at this point. If you somehow suceed you can easily run up to Galrath and knock him over.

You return to receive a quest reward of....

500xp.

For the amount of time and coordination you need to place into this quest to complete it it is a totally paltry sum, the reward needs to be changed to reflect the amount of work and coordination required to complete this quest. For 500xp a lot of people in my guild do not bother with doing it as the time and pain needed is not worth the reward. Something like a 1000 or 2000 much like Althea's Ashes (plus being a lot harder than Althea's) would be a good sum and enticing for higher level players to complete the quest as well.

Yes, I agree the quest is a little under rewarding. I attempted it one time when I was a lvl 17 with nothing bunch henchies, and I almost did it. When I finally did complete the quest it was with 3 lvl 20's adn 2 lvl 15's. It is definately a challenge and those 500exp are well earned.

Aye this quest should be be at least 1000-3000XP reward... many would say seeing the wizard's tower is worthwhile. But really its not in my eyes.

I hated this quest... its elite and yet it doesn't give any just rewards... in the end getting to the temple of ages to get a 8 player partywas the only way to complete it.

yep. it's totally and utterly broken. To put things into perspective "blood and stone" gives you 2500xp and 2 skills. and it's a cake walk compared to this one. Galrath quest is just totally not worth the effort to do it as it is right now.

You forgot to mention the two monks that, if you run and lose aggro, will cast a group-res and revive all the monsters.

Aye, that's a pain.

I think the worst part is when your healer henchmen does the Superman and the next thing you know you have to start all... over... again...

That is why I just gave up trying on that quest after Alesia did that. Never had any luck with recruiting Monks (or decent players, for that matter) at Temple of Ages.

Villainy of Galrath was my first mission that introduced me to the ever popular "Delayed Fuse Kamikaze" TM..
We made it all the way past the minotaurs when suddenly he reverted to his natural lemming state (there were cliffsides and water nearby after all) and simply "rushed" Galrath. The obvious conclusion quickly ensued.
I reviewed the quest, and its ultra-uber 500xp reward; reconsidered crossing the Black curtain again...and deleted it.
As has been said; entice me with a reward equal to the task and I'd try it again. 500xp?
Fuggedaboudit!

Talesin

Maybe a good weapon, or rune, or something. I got to Galrath, then killed the first mob of Students, only to get killed by the second.

I dont think I have ran into one person on that mission (have done it 3 times), that hasnt complained about the low value vs difficulty of that mission.

the ONLY cool thing about that quest is to see that floating wizards tower... that is pimp. i think if it was at least a skill quest u would see many more groups doing it. some UBER skillz or something.

GALRATH MUST DIE!!!!

This miserable bastard has already caused me great grief and at this point I would continue to attempt to kill him were it for 0 xp. However, that being said, a higher reward is definately in order... I mean shit, 2 hours trudging south followed by 200 Vereta worshippers followed by Alesia and Thom hiding inside the mountain causing me to map out...

*grumble*

managed to finally beat this one a few weeks ago with my level 20 protection monk and a half-way decent group... got to the last area and my group decided to do some stupid stuff with the large group of trolls, minotars, and trees that are just a bit after the swampy area (you know what i'm talking about... that wall of baddies) that included a ne/mo rezzing someone in the middle of a mob with a normal rez after i used rebirth on him (he stayed dead until we cleared the area after that ****), and keeping the last war/nec alive while three (well, two after pacifism :P) minotars were beating on him and everyone was dead, we walked in, slapped around galrath, and left with our 500xp. He's such a pansy after all the work to get there.

quest reward should be 3k+ comparing to other quests in the 2k+ range

and to the original poster, you can grab henches in the ToA, I went to Galrath from ToA w/henches from there...granted I dided in the huge mobs right before him...

This quest should give you a uber elite skill that can only be obtained by doing it. Plus give you a superior rune of vigor x10, a sword that does 500-10000000 dmg. Then it would be worth your time, otherwise you shoudl ditch this or not even let it enter your quest log.

Yes I know bout the henches in ToA, lvl 15 I believe, was thinking that there were none for some reason when i made the post >_>

If you don't like the payout, don't do the quest. And a tip to doing it:
Start in Temple of Ages.
Get a group of 8 instead of 6.
Smite everything.
Be happy.
Get 500 XP.
End of story.

The game in no way forces you to complete every quest, and if you're going to fight back with the argument that you're a completist(not to original post maker, just to anyone with this same kind of gripe), then you should be able to defend the fact that a completist would not only do the quests without whining, they would explore the areas completely.

Sorry if it seems cruel, I've just seen too many posts like this before and it gets old.

I'm a "completist" (never heard that before ) and I'm not really whining but I do think the reward should be higher. However, my desire to do this mission isn't just because i want all missions, it's because, as I've said, I now have a full burning grudge against this character Galrath, and if I can ditch my henchies I'm going to kill him long and slowly...

This is the only quest which doesn't seem to reward correctly... sure the XP it gives it a typo and should be 5000, not 500XP no matter what anyone says.

If you examine all the other quests in the game and work out a time / effort (this includes finding a good team , skill setup, tactics) comparison vs reward you will find for your level the quests are appropriately rewarded, the harder low lvl quests yield 1000-2000 xp the highest end one's yield 2000-3000 + skill points. This is the reward you receive for working together and spending time to complete a quest. I gave Villany a good bash and noticed the discrepency in the reward and so I brought it up with the suggestion to increase the reward to match other quests of similar calibre.

Guess that is the mercenary adventurer in me talking :P

I dunno, when I managed to assemble a decent party, I (being the caller) and the rest of the group found it a breeze. Trust me, it's all in getting a decent group instead of the usual morons, and that's what GW is about I suppose, teamwork to complete the game.