Quest: Aid for Bruma

This is a multi-objective quest. Your goal is to speak to the leaders of each of the other major cities in Cyrodiil, as well as the Elder Council in the Imperial City, and ask them to aid Bruma with extra troops so that they can withstand more Daedric assaults. Obviously enough, most of the leaders of the cities have their own problems, so you shouldn't expect this to be a simple matter of just talking to different people and having that be that.

Elder Council

Speaking to the lead counsellor (Orato?) doesn't actually lead anywhere; he explains that the Imperial army is tied up in the provinces, and asks you to go to the cities and gain their aid directly. Since you've already been doing that, resist the urge to strike him down and simply walk away.

If you go to the leaders of Anvil, Skingrad, Chorrol, Bravil, Leyawiin, and Cheydinhal, they'll all tell you the same thing: they'd like to help, but they've got their own Oblivion Gates right outside of town. In order to win their support for Bruma, you'll have to head into each of the gates, grab the Sigil Stones, and shut them down. You should've done this a few times by now, so just get into the central towers (which can sometimes be a tall task), scale them, and shut the gates down, then return to the various Counts and Countesses to enlist their aid for Bruma.

Some of these planes are a bit more difficult than the others; we've described them below.

Cheydinhal: The Wayward Knight

Cheydinhal's gate has a subquest that goes along with it, so we'll go ahead and discuss it here. If you speak to Amminus Gregori outside the Oblivion Gate, he'll tell you that the Count's son passed through the gate with a group of wannabe adventurers and hasn't returned. If you're heading into the gate anyway, maybe you could keep an eye out for the kid?

Inside the gate here, you'll pass through two sets of Daedra caves, lovingly called "The Bowels", before you reach Farwil and his much more sensible friend Bremman, all that remain of the Knights of the Thorn. Farwil won't hear any talk of retreat, and insists that you lead the way to the citadel of the plane so that you can capture the sigil stone and shut the gate down. There are a lot of Dremora in the citadel here, so you'll probably need their help; just try to rest every so often to let Farwil and Bremman get their health back. The goal is to keep them alive, so save often and reload if they happen to bite it. Both of your wards can move quite quickly, though, so be careful not to hit them in the back when they run past you towards an enemy.

So all your friends are dead...why are you smiling?

After you rescue Farwil, speak to the Count again, and he'll offer you either a sword or a staff as a reward. If Farwil dies, you can bring back his signet ring to the Count as proof of his death, but presumably you won't be rewarded for doing so. Regardless, you've shut the gate, and that's all that really matters.

Chorrol

Your goal in Chorrol is to close the Oblivion Gate that's popped up outside of town. Note that the central tower in this plane of Oblivion can be kind of weird; apparently you are supposed to enter one of the smaller sub-towers surrounding the main citadel, then use those towers to open a bunch of gates that'll let you access the central citadel's lower level, but we found it easier to scale one of the minitowers, head across to the citadel, then jump over the railing of the platform you're on and drop down to the platform below you. This will place you on the path to the citadel's rooftop, via the Rending Halls.

Note that immediately after you enter this Plane of Oblivion, though, there'll be a large tower half-melted in the lavapit behind you. If you head northwest from the Oblivion Gate and find the fallen gate that spans the lava pit, you'll eventually be able to reach the Fume Vaults, which will let you access the fallen citadel, which has some nice loot if you explore it a bit.

Skingrad

Find Mercator Hosidus in the Skingrad County Hall and speak to him; the Count of Skingrad will be inaccessible to you behind some difficult locked doors, but if you speak to Hosidus, he'll alert the Count and grant you an audience. Again, your task here is to exit the city, look for the Oblivion Gate, and shut it down.

Now, these planes could be random, so don't fret if the advice here seems misleading, but for us, the Skingrad Plane of Oblivion had one large tower that was initially inaccessible, and two slightly smaller towers with broken bridges leading to it. If you unlock the switches at the top of the two smaller towers, the bridges about halfway down the smaller towers will extend to the larger tower, allowing you to head outside and reach the top of the tower directly to shut down the Gate.

Kvatch: The Battle for Castle Kvatch

Now, this is odd: while you have Aid for Bruma as your active quest, Kvatch will be marked on your map, indicating that you have something to do there. The Battle for Castle Kvatch quest will still be active, if you didn't perform it after rescuing Martin from the Chapel of Akatosh earlier, so we'll cover it now.

After clearing out a few of the enemies from the courtyard in front of the castle, you'll be tasked by Savlian to head back to the chapel and find a key to the Guard House from Berich Inian. Inian has the key, but he doesn't give it to you; instead, he offers to take you to the Guard House himself. You'll have to head through the Chapel Undercroft to get there. (There may also be some Imperial guardsman in the chapel by this point, so feel free to invite them along for the ride, if you wish.)

You'll have plenty of help in the battle for Castle Kvatch.

Fight your way through the Undercroft and Kvatch to reach the guard tower; there's some heavy resistance, so be sure to wait for an hour whenever possible to let the guardsmen regain their health. Feel free to look around the city if you like, but there's very little in the way of loot until you reach the passageway into the Castle, which Inian unlocks for you. Head through the small underground passageway, take the ladder up to the guardhouse, then open the gates to let Savlian and his men head into the castle courtyard. Clean it out, rest, then head into the castle proper.

Castle Great Hall

After defeating the enemies in the Great Hall, speak to Savlian again. He very courageously offers to hold the area while you go and track down the Count. Big of him.

Head into the Great Hall itself to start clearing out some of the enemies. (One of the books near the entrance, on the table to your right, is A Dance In Fire, which adds to your Acrobatics score.) There isn't much to see in either the Dining Hall or Sleeping Quarters, but check them out if you wish before heading into the Count's Quarters. Unfortunately, the Count is dead, so all you'll be able to do is grab his Signet Ring and return it to Savlian. In exchange for your help, he'll give you some magical armor, and you'll also be able to talk him into sending aid to Bruma.

With all of the cities on your side, speak to Jauffre in Cloud Ruler Temple to finish this quest. It'll be an anticlimactic ending, but you should be able to speak to Martin to learn about Miscarcand.