The Dark Citadel Guide - Diablo 4 Guide - IGN (2024)

The Dark Citadel is Diablo 4’s newest raid-like multiplayer endgame activity. Getting through this your very first time, unless you’ve wildly overleveled yourself, will be a bit of a doozy - so let’s get right into it.

To get started, head to the Western most area of the Ancient Nexus and head through the door.

Enclave of Strife

Starting out, you’ll enter a room with corridors and an objective to find the Crystalline Chamber and be accompanied by a bonus meter underneath the quest tracker. This will keep track of how many Treasury Wardens are killed throughout the Wing.

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As you find and slay Treasury Wardens (marked by this icon on the minimap), your reward tier will increase, maxing out at four total.

Killing Wardens is not one-to-one with reward tier increases. So make sure you’re killing every Warden you see, as it will take some exploring to fill the bar completely.

Travel through the Path of the Initiate until you find a doorway, marked by a door icon on the minimap.

In the center of this next room, there’s a large circle with two Soul Siphons on either side. Interact with both of them and stand within the circle that spawns shortly after and as you do that, a meter will begin to fill as noted by the icons on the minimap.

After each Soul Siphon is complete, a Ward Guardian will spawn. Killing these will drop a Ward stone that, when picked up, can be inserted into Sealing Ward at the top of the room on either side of the door. Both Wards are needed to unlock the door to the next area.

Halls of Judgment

The Halls of Judgment is a similar room to Path of the Initiate. It serves as a passage to the next encounter. Here you can look around for more Treasury Wardens to finish off your Khazra Treasury reward tier.

When you reach the end, there will be a room with two pathways, each with a colored barrier blocking it. On the ground is a yellow switch.

Step on this switch to open the passageway and have another player step on the green switch. Both barriers will be permanently down. Split your team in half here and each team heads down their respective passageways.

Both teams will be in similar rooms with the same goals; kill enemies until a Ward Guardian appears. You’ll need to find which barrier they’re behind and stand on the switch to let it out.

There are two total guardians here, one for each team. After each team kills their Ward Guardian and picks up the Ward Stone, take it to the door at the top of the room and insert into the Sealing Ward to take down the barriers for both teams.

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Head up to the next room where there’s another Soul Siphon. Activate it and stand within the circle until completion. When finished, another Ward Guardian spawns in one of the rooms behind the barriers. Step on the switch to let it out, kill it, then insert the Ward Stone into the Sealing Ward.

Impending Doom will accumulate as you do the last two rooms. Failing to complete both before the meter fills all the way up will result in a failure, wipe the team, and start the encounter from the beginning. (Not the entire wing, just the start of this particular encounter.)

Continue through until you find a gateway on the ground marked by this icon on your minimap. As you get near this gateway, Realm Guardians will spawn and drop Realm Shards upon their defeat. Pick these up and take them to the gateway to charge it.

When the meter is full, it can be used by only two players at a time. If four players are standing in it, two random players will be teleported to the next room. Interact with it again to send the remaining players over.

Realm of Oblivion

This next room, called the Realm of Oblivion, will spawn you near a light green bubble shield, called Soul Dampeners. Standing in this will reset the debuff icon that’s floating above your character's head.

When you are not inside this shield, the icon will begin to fill red. If it fills completely, your character can be stun locked and eventually mean death, sending you back to the start of the room.

To avoid this, simply follow the green wisps that are being ejected from the Soul Dampener. These wisps will lead you to the next one, and the next one, before finally reaching the next gateway.

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As with the last room, slay Real Guardians as they appear and take their dropped Realm Shards to the gateway. Once charged, take the portal to the next room and kill Treasury Guardians as you see them. Reaching the next room will land you in a room with Kubal, the Dark Citadel’s first boss. There isn’t much to this boss but once slain you can head through the next room to kill more Treasury Wardens.

The final room in this wing of the Dark Citadel is a large arena. Near the back, kill the Kazara Breathtakers to summon Gorschak, the First Ascendant. Deal damage until the boss goes immune.

You can still be damaged by the boss here so avoid hits as you can while you take out the Realm Guardians that are now spawning. Pick up their realm shards they drop to charge the gateway.

Notice Impending Doom has come back, wiping the team and starting the fight over if the meter becomes fully charged.

When the gateway is charged, have two players take the portal to the mirrored realm. The two players who teleported must kill the two Ward Guardians to obtain Ward Stones and place them into the Sealing Wards to summon an elite by the same name as the boss.

Killing this elite drops a Soul Essence to be picked up.

Players who did not teleport must kill Realm Guardians where the immune boss still is to activate the gateway.

Once the gateway is charged again, the players who did teleport and have the Soul Essence take the portal back to the room with the room and place the soul essence into the Conduit at the back of the room. Doing so will weaken Gorschak again, allowing you to attack. Rinse and repeat until dead.

The Labyrinth of Souls

Wing two, The Labyrinth of Souls, begins similarly as the first. Run through killing Treasury Wardens. When you reach the Astral Gateway, you’ll see a shield covering a portal.

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Have two players stand on the switches at the same time to take it down and go through.

Clear the Soul Siphon in the middle of the room to unlock four more soul siphons in each corner.

After all Siphons are complete, portals will spawn that take you to a new area to fight a Ritual Guardian.

Defeating it drops a Sigil Stone that needs to be picked up, taken through the portal back to the original room you were in, and placed into the Ritual Sigils at the top of the room.

Keep track of Impending Doom to prevent encounter failure.

The next room brings you to another Realm of Oblivion where you hop from Soul Dampener to Soul Dampener to keep the debuff from filling up. At the end, step on the switches and the portal to the next area where you’ll fight Faeroch, The Incinerator.

Faeroch, The Incinerator

Start by activating the Barrier Ward in front of the boss to spawn a safety shield that protects you from the blast the boss first sends out. From here the boss can be killed in one phase if you have enough damage. Activate more Barrier Wards for protection as needed should the boss trigger more explosions.

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Periodically, Impending Doom will appear and the Boss can spawn a maze that makes it difficult to find a safety bubble. When this happens, prioritize finding a way to the nearest bubble you can and activate it before the blast.

The next encounter has you taking on Lorzuul, The Gorger.

Lorzuul, The Gorger

When the encounter begins, the boss will be immune and Barrier Guardians will begin spawning in the corner of the rooms. Head to the barrier that was dispelled by the guardian, take the Ward Stone from this room, and place it into the Soulbound Ward in the middle.

Note the portal in the room with the Ward Stone is only necessary if you get stuck in this small room.

Placing two Ward Stones will make the boss damageable. After taking its health down, it’ll become immune and Souls Consumed will appear next to the mini map. If souls consumed reaches max, Impending Doom will appear.

You’ll also see three icons in the middle of the room noting what sigils need to be placed. Spread out to find barrier guardians and take them down. This will allow you to open rooms around the arena to find Ward Stones. Pick them up, take the portal next to them, and place the stones in the pedestal.

Placing all three will make the boss damageable again and all players should head back to the original room for damage.

Next there will be more Ward Stones needed. So kill all five Barrier Guardians around the arena and place all stones back in the middle of the room to finish off the boss.

Dominion of Zagraal

As with the last two wings, kill Treasury Wardens until you reach the Experimental Gateway. Activate the switches on either side of the shield, split the team in half and each group takes a portal.

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Step on the switches you see near the Ward Guardians to take down the shield covering them, slay ‘em, then take their Ward Stones to the pedestals. A new portal will appear, taking you to the next encounter.

This next room teaches you a mechanic you’ll need to remember later on. Kill the spell guardian and pick up the Counterspell Essence that it drops. This allows you to deflect the blast that comes from the statue in the middle after stepping on the switch. Have the player that picked up the Essence use an attack on the ball to deflect it back to the statue.

This opens up a portal for all players to take.

In this next room, there’s two mini bosses here. After they go immune, kill the Spell Guardian that spawns to deflect the orbs the bosses spawn.

Deflecting the orbs spawns another portal where the boss is vulnerable to damage. When enough damage is done, a new portal spawns taking you back to the main room but now with only one boss. Repeat the above steps until the fight is over.

Zagraal, the Eternal

The final encounter here will be Zagraal, the Eternal. Begin the encounter by killing the Khazra Breathtakers in front of the boss. The boss will immediately open a portal to a room where you can damage it.

Note the icon above your head will begin to fill up. Damage the boss until it goes immune then have two players step on the switches at the top of the room and activate the Conduit.

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The boss will open a portal sending you back to the main room.

The four Soul Siphons in the middle will activate and each player will have an icon above their head.

When a Soul Siphon is completed, a Ritual Guardian will spawn and drop a stone on death.

The player with the corresponding icon above their head must pick up the matching stone that each guardian drops.

When done correctly, a Spell Guardian will spawn that drops the Counterspell Essence.

Pick this up to deflect the orb the boss spews out, which will open the portal to the realm where the boss can be damaged.

The above steps are repeated until the boss has been killed.

Congrats! You’ve now beat Diablo 4’s first raid, the Dark Citadel. We’ve got loads of coverage for Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred. For more, check out our Spiritborn build guides, and how to complete the Undercity.

Up Next: Kurast Undercity Guide

PreviousDiablo 4 Vessel of Hatred ExpansionNextKurast Undercity Guide

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The Dark Citadel Guide - Diablo 4 Guide - IGN (1)

Diablo IV

Blizzard

ESRB: Mature
PCPlayStation 4Xbox Series X|SXbox OnePlayStation 5

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OverviewBeginner's Guide - Tips for Getting StartedWalkthroughDiablo 4 New Difficulties and Tiers Explained

The Dark Citadel Guide - Diablo 4 Guide - IGN (2024)

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