for those posting its not possible to get gatekeeper without premium you are very wrong. while i had to repeat the wave 33 times, its not exactly "hard" just time consuming. what you do is this: play through, with +5 waves and +20% units.(when you unlock them). gem bomb the boss wave (to start with g1 then g2) till you get the 200 giant achievement, use ONLY one type of gem till you hit the 60k spent on it. WHILE going for that gem, use spare mana to unlock/get the 3k achievement on all other gem types. get the beginner quests for building a tower, trap, 2 color gem, 3 color gem. once you have hit a "max" xp on a level(do not gem bomb) you should have about a 1.65 multiplier + your other multipliers. taht you can unlock, do NOT worry about getting the 30% extra bonus xp from not letting them hit your base. purpousley under build so that some of the fast/weak monsters get through each time for 200-300 mana per level (i find using 5 g2 yellow allows for enough to get through without hurting mana much).
after you have let that first set of fast/weak monsters through use the left over mana to unlock/spend the rest on that unlocked gem, when the boss wave gets near your base use your gems as gem bombs to ensure victory. While i messed up a few times while doing this my total play through was maybe 40-50 times total but remember losses do not record your stats, dont use grade 2 gem bombs on giant waves till around level 6-7 or you can have serious issues killing them. anyway just track which achievements you get(like when you get giants, dont keep dropping gem bombs on the wave its a waste of resources, use the extra 200+ mana on an unlocked gem)
anyway you dont have to do it this EXACT way, just find achievements you want for xp that are relatively "quick" to get too and use those to get to level 9, not worrying about what level xp you get, as i DONT think its possible to do it that way without premium.
For Master Explorer I used the 1MM on E2 and 1.5MM on M5. I had tried M5 a couple of different ways and it was only by building a mana farm at the intersection that it finally worked. I had a mana gem trap with 4 amps using lime+orange. For my killing assembly I had lime+yellow with 6 amps. I only got my gems at a high enough level by leveling up the mana farm gems and gem bombing the stones so that the mobs were only a little higher hp than my main killing gem. Ended up with 1.9MM on that field.
Did Gatekeeper right off the bat - there are a few key points to remember:
1) Boost the wave XP as high as you can each time with the settings (when available), battle amulets, and a bit of summoning - when I hit level 9 I had my best at about 1300 XP, enough for a couple levels all on its own.
2) KILL EVERY APPARITION YOU SEE. The extra skill points allow you to get more mana, which lets you finish the journey amulets faster. When one appears, stop what you are doing and kill it - the first couple you almost certainly will need to use gem bombs on, but that's fine, it shouldn't take more than a couple to kill the first couple apparitions.
3) Get the 7 Novice amulets as soon as you can. While each is only worth a little XP each, they are worth 300 XP total if you get all 7 - almost as much an another journey amulet.
4) You are pretty much required to get the "Spend 3000 Mana on XXX Gem" Journey Amulets to get level 9. You shouldn't need the 60,000 Mana ones, I didn't.
5) When boosting towards the XXX Mana gems - if you by a gem and sell it, it STILL COUNTS as spending that mana on the gem type. This lets you spend 70% more each time towards the amulet than you would by just buying the gem. You ought to be able to almost get each 3000 mana amulet in 1 round, 2 at most.
With the novice amulets, 1300 XP, the 3000 mana amulets, the 'reach 3000 mana in a battle' amulet, and the 'win 20 battles' amulet, I hit level 9 easily, at 26 battles won. Didn't even need one of the 60k mana amulets.
Walkthrough strategy for getting the '30 giants in one field', with NON-PREMIUM:
1) Get about wizard level 100 (I did it at 110, you could easily do it around 70 or 80 probably). Had about 30 apparition kills at the time as well, giving me 90 extra skill points.
2) Max out Forge, Construction, Wild Gem, Bloodbound, Triple Damage, Dual Gem Mastery, and Recharge, spread the rest in Focus, Replenish and Resonance, I had about 30 in Focus, 60 in Replenish, and 40 in Resonance when I did it.
3) Choose field D10, the first Pylon field.
4) For settings choose Double monsters and Random waves.
5) Upgrade your mana twice and sell the Wild Gem so you don't lose mana - should give you around 8k mana to spend.
6) Put 2 walls down - 2 blocks right and 1 block down of the West entrance, and 3 blocks right and 2 blocks up from the West entrance, This will channel them all through the top right corner, where you will be building.
7) Place one tower two blocks down and two blocks left of the top right path corner.
8) Unlock and build a level 6 Bloodbound gem and put it in the tower.
9) Spend all remaining mana on mana upgrades - should be able to get about 7 or 8 more.
10) Start the waves - you should be able to send 3 or 4 early to get a little extra mana.
11) As you get mana, build 3 amplifiers on the right side of that tower (should be adjacent to both the tower and the path). Buy and put level 3 Bloodbound gems in each tower as you build them.
12) Build a single trap 1 block down from the top right path corner (should be adjacent to your 3 amplifiers already built).
13) If you have 2 swarm waves in a row, you may need to build a couple more amplifiers next to the tower and put level 3 bloodbound gems in them as well to increase firing speed.
14) When you have the mana, build a level 6 Triple Damage gem and merge it with the level 6 Bloodbound gem.
15) Put 3 more amplifiers on the right side of the path, adjacent to the trap. This should make 6 amplifiers affecting the trap.
16) Fill the other 3 amplifiers with level 3 or 4 Triple Damage gems.
17) Put your gem in the trap. At this point, in the trap, with the bloodbound kills and amplifiers, it should have several hundred base damage (will vary up or down depending on how many swarm waves you have cleared), even in the trap, have a 100% 3x damage multiplier, and around a 11.0 firing rate.
18) The next Giant wave that comes, bomb it enough times with level 1 gems to make 30 giants spawn (I think it's 6 times).
19) Collect your achievement - you do not actually have to win the field at that point, the achievement shows up as soon as you kill the last giant.
20) If you are having trouble pulling it off in one wave, then just bomb a giant wave 3 or 4 times to get 16 to spawn, then wait for another Giant wave and bomb that to 16 as well, or upgrade your level 7 dual gem to a level 8.
That's it. I got the achievement around wave 35 with this exact strategy on non-premium, and you can too.
I got onto this forum to see how people were doing with the "Ready for Anything" (seven +3 gems before wave 3) quest, which I had thought should be "hard" rather than "medium." So, no mention of that quest, but lots of "Gatekeeper" and "Red Mist," which I thought weren't too bad.
I must be doing something wrong. How are people doing "Ready for Anything"? Do I just have to wait until I have enough skills points or something?
@bakkart - Not necessarily, you ought to be able to do it right now easily.
As long as you have 30 points in Forge and 20 points in Flexibility, on a level that starts you with 2 gem types, you only need 4800 mana to unlock 5 more gem types and 695 mana to buy level 7 level 1 gems and combine them.
So all you need is 5495 mana in any level. I think I did it around level 35.
If you're having trouble, replay a level, wait until the last wave, unlocking a few types as you go, then sell all your gems and buy level 1's and combine them.
You don't have to actually win the wave for the achievement to register, as soon as you make the gem it unlocks.
Not sure why gem TYPE matters for this quest; all it says is that you need seven gems of grade 3 or higher before Wave Three starts. The best I can do is six if I really try hard.
I start with a level that doesn't need any tower building (like M3), put all skill points into Focus, Forge, and Wild ... and it just looks like I need another 50 or so skill points before I can do this quest.
Nobody mentions the 7 3+ gems because it is stupidly easy, most people get it without even noticing. All it requires is you to have 2618 mana before the 3rd wave for 7 level 3 gems.
You ought to be able to do that with just a couple levels in Wild Gem. Sell the Wild Gem and buy level 3s of whatever type you start with.
These are not AG-quests... but i can answer your question:
A 1: Kill 7.000 monsters on L9 (means in one try, only possible if have you have premium) A 13: Kill 12 apparitions (possible without premium) M1 : Complete 100 waves on K9 (premium only) M 13: Kill 200.000 Monsters (possible without premium)