Barbarian Assault: A Guide

Barbarian Assault: A Guide

Barbarian Assault is an extremely entertaining and engaging minigame located at the Barbarian Outpost, north-east of the Grand Tree and directly north of the Baxtorian Falls. You can teleport the using a Games Necklace. Alternatively, use Gnome Tree teleports, Gnome gliders, or walk from Ardougne or Seers Village. Note that the Grand Tree route requires an agility level of 37.

Because this minigame requires a degree of skill to play efficiently, many 'Scapers avoid it. Lord knows they're not playing anything that might need a conscious thought! This guide is designed to enable you to get the most out of your Barbarian Assault games. I also highly recommend that you talk to Captain Cain and watch the tutorial the first time you play and re-watch the relevant sections every time you switch to a role you have never played before. Tip.it also has a guide to Barbarian Assault which can be found here.

Table of Contents

I. Materials & Levels Needed

II. Collector Strategy

III. Attacker Strategy

IV. Healer Strategy

V. Defender Strategy

VI. The Egg Cannon

VII. The Horn of Glory

VIII. Wave 10

IX. Rewards

X. Miscellaneous

XI. Credits

[hide=I. Materials & Levels Needed]Because Barbarian Assault is a combat-oriented minigame, a high combat, hit points, and defense level is advised. By Wave 9, you will be facing multiple level 77 melee'rs and level 72 rangers in multi-combat, so be warned!

Example Outfit for All Roles:

Helmet Slot-Helm of Neitiznot>any other

Torso Slot-Fighter Torso>Granite Body>Rune Plate body

Legs Slot-Dragon Skirt=Dragon Legs>Rune Legs

Boots Slot-Dragon Boots>Rune Boots>Climbing Boots

Gloves Slot-Barrows Gloves>any other RFD gloves>other

Weapon Slot-Dragon Scimitar>Whip+DDS/any Scimitar

Shield Slot-Spirit Shield(def)/Rune Defender(str)>Dragonfire>D Sq>Obby Shield

Amulet Slot-Amulet of Fury>Amulet of Glory>Amulet of Power

Ring Slot-Waterbirth Ring>any other

Cape Slot-NEVER WEAR A CAPE TO BARBARIAN ASSAULT

Barrows and God Wars armours are also viable, however, you really don't need to spend that much money to play this game.

This outfit focuses on strength bonus over defense. If you find you are taking too much damage, feel free to switch it up. Bear in mind, however, that the more the healers heal, the more points they score. The Dragon Scimitar is placed above the whip because the attacker is required to use all styles, including aggressive, which the whip is incapable of performing.

Your inventory should be empty, to leave plenty of room for the supplies you will receive in-game. There is a bank deposit box near the ladder, in case you accidentally bring a cape or a pet or similar.

I strongly advise against maging or ranging in Barbarian Assault, because the armour just is not as effective.[/hide]

[hide=II. Collector Strategy]The job of collector is one of the easier in this game. The collectors sole job is to pick up the eggs that the Penance drop when they are killed, and put them in the hopper for the egg launcher. The only catch is, you can only pick up a certain color of egg at any one time. If you pick up the wrong egg, it will explode, dealing you five damage.

The above is the key to insuring you pick up the right egg. This will display in the top right corner of your screen. (This particular picture comes from when I was playing as a healer, but the concept is the same.) The top tells you which wave you are currently in. The next, with the ear, is what your teammate is telling you to do.

If you were a collector, it would say red, blue, or green. The one beside the mouth is which option you should pick on the horn in your inventory. This will change every thirty seconds or so. Whenever it does, IMMEDIATELY pick that option on your horn. If you dont, your partners wont have any idea what to do, and they will lose points until they know the correct course of action to take.

The horn at the bottom reminds you who you are shouting instructions to. Collectors tell Attackers what to do.

As a Collector, the only other thing you will start out with in your inventory besides the horn is an egg bag. When you pick eggs up, they go in the egg bag until it is full, then they start filling up your inventory. When your inventory is full, you should click on the egg hopper to deposit eggs in there. The hopper can hold up to five of each egg type. If the hopper is full, use the yellow collector machine in the back of the cavern where you start each game. The collector machine will convert blue eggs to green eggs and green eggs to red eggs, destroying some in the process.[/hide]

[hide=III. Attacker Strategy]The Attacker role is fairly straightforward. As an attacker, your job is to kill the Penance Fighters and Rangers.

Sounds easy, you say. Well yes, but there is always a catch. In this case, the Penance are only vulnerable to one attack style at a time. If you are not using the right style, you will do no damage AND be hit two damage every incorrect attack you make. You will also lose points.

The level of your Penance opponents will go up with each wave you successfully complete, peaking at 77 for the Fighters and 72 for the Rangers, so take that into account.

My strategy is to call for the Collector, change styles, then switch back to the inventory screen, ready to call again. Using the horn will interrupt your attacks, but switching styles will not, so doing it in this order will minimize points lost due to wrong attack styles.

Sometimes in the earlier waves, it is helpful to have two attackers, but it is not necessary. Attackers call for collectors.[/hide]

[hide=IV. Healer Strategy]Ah, healers. One of my favorite roles. (Actually, I love them all). Healing is more difficult to master than collecting or attacking.

A healer's role is twofold. First, use poison packs obtained from the healer machine near where you start to kill Penance Healers. The Penance are tricky, though, and will only accept one kind of pack at a time, either poison worms, poison tofu, or poison meat. If you use the wrong pack, you will lose points. Packs can only be used on Penance Healers. The amount of hitpoints a healer has goes up with each wave successfully completed, peaking at Wave 9. Use two or three poison packs per Healer to insure a swift kill.

Second, fill the vial you receive at the start from the Healer Spring and use it to restore your teammates' hitpoints.

This bar at the bottom of your screen keeps you up to date with your teammates hitpoints. It shows their name, their role, and current hp/max hp. A healer can heal themselves by drinking from the Healer Spring.

It is helpful in the later waves to have two healers, but I have solo'ed them before. If you do have two healers, you might want to assign the higher level one to heal, and the other just to kill the Penance Healers.

Healers call for defenders.[/hide]

[hide=V. Defender Strategy]Defending is possibly the hardest role in this game, because you are not actively attacking the Penance you must kill. Instead, the defender must lure the Penance Runners to a trap with bait.

There are three types of bait: tofu, crackers, and worms. You get the bait from the defender machine in the back of the cavern near where you start. The trick to this is to drop the right bait at the right time in the right spots.

The yellow dots show where I like to lay out my bait. Put two pieces in front of the trap, and one on the other dots. As you level up, you can space the bait out more.

After you put out the initial bait, run up and grab the hammer and two logs laying in the north of the cavern. If you're lucky, some Runners will be following your trail to their deaths. After the trap has claimed two runners, you will need to rebuild it using the hammer and logs you picked up earlier.

The key is speed. Call, get the bait, and get up to the trap as quickly as you can. If you're fast, you can catch the first Runner just as it reaches the level of the cannon platform.

Focus on just one trap. If you try to do both, you'll just end up confusing yourself. I like the eastern trap because it's closer to the cave the Runners come out of.

The defender calls for the healer.[/hide]

[hide=VI. The Egg Cannon]The cannon. This is the key to defeating the Queen in Wave 10, but it has its uses in the other waves too. Many people will say not to use the cannon, but I say ignore them.

The cannon is useful, and will NOT, repeat NOT, lose you points. The most effective way to use a cannon is to kill Runners. Runners have five hitpoints, and two shots with a red egg will kill them.

Try to let the defender do his job first, but if the game has been going on for 10 minutes, you have to go eat dinner, and the def has let five runners go already, cannon away.

This is the cannon interface. Simply look for the image of the Penance you would like to shoot at, then select the egg you would like to shoot on the image. The cannon will automatically target the nearest Penance of the type you chose.[/hide]

[hide=VII. The Horn of Glory]The Horn of Glory is located in the southeastern corner of the cavern. It lets one person call for all the roles. This is useful if you have a teammate who just cannot get the concept of right clicking the horn and persists in calling only red eggs for the collector.

This is the interface for the Horn of Glory. The column on the left tells you what to call, the one on the right is where you pick what to say.[/hide]

[hide=VIII. Wave 10]At last, after battling through nine grueling waves of assault by Penance, you have reached the pinnacle of Barbarian Assault. Wave 10. The Queen Wave. In this, you will not only have to face the usual assortment of Penance, but you will be confronted with two new types: the Penance Queen and her Spawn. In the Wave 10 waiting room, there is a handy little book that provides a basic overview of this wave.

The layout of this room is also a little different. There are [bleep]y mushrooms, lava pools, and poison pools scattered around the edge of the cavern. There is also only one cannon, to make room for the giant trapdoor in the middle of the room.

In this wave, there are no penalties, so attackers, healers, and collectors can experiment with different attack styles, baits, and eggs with no lost points. Note that incorrect attacks and eggs will steal deal two or five damage, respectively.

Start by dealing with the Penance as you normally would. Defenders can lay bait straight out west from the eastern trap because the cannon platform is no longer there. You have approximately three minutes before the Penance Queen appears. After the attacker has finished, it would be wise for him to gather eight [bleep]es off the [bleep]y mushrooms before the Queen comes.

The Queen appears through the big trapdoor in the middle of the room. When she does, you will receive a message in your chatbox stating that she has arrived and you can no longer use the Horn of Glory. If you have not already, quickly finish off any Penance left, and make sure you have eight empty inventory spaces.

Eight is the number of Omega Eggs you must shoot at the Queen to kill her. Omega eggs are made from the yellow eggs that only the Queen drops. The collector should start picking up yellow eggs as soon as they start dropping. After he gets eight, he should give them to the healer, who should use them with the poison pit, then give them to the attacker. The attacker should use the [bleep]es with the eggs and give them to the defender. The defender then dips them in the lava and gives them back to the collector. The collector can then load the hopper and fire the Omega Eggs.

Confused? Well, try reading it again, and focus on your role. To remember the order, Jagex suggests using the acronym CHAD-collector, healer, attacker, defender. This is actually quite useful to say if you get stressed out and forget who to give the eggs to.

Between the time you finish killing your Penance and the time you need to deal with the eggs, it is easier for the healers if you congregate near the Healer Spring. You can amuse yourself by killing the Queen Spawn. Also, the Queen attacks all players at once, but she focuses on one at a time. If you notice she's focused on you, you can run underneath her and make her dance, which will stop her attacks temporarily.

When the collector has all eight Omega Eggs, everyone should move to the cannon platform. Not everyone needs to operate the cannon, though. Some of you should block the Spawn from attacking the cannon operators and canceling the launch screen. Healers, healing will interrupt the launch screen to, so be judicious about when to heal an operator.[/hide]

[hide=IX. Rewards]For each wave you successfully complete, you will be awarded a certain amount of points. This is based on the performance of each member in your team. Healers killed, Fighters killed, Rangers killed, Runners killed, hitpoints healed, and eggs picked up (minus destroyed) all contribute to the positive score.

Runners that got through, number of wrong poison packs, and number of incorrect attacks all contribute to the negative score. The maximum penalty is -10.

Each part of the score for your role counts twice, so both your positives and negatives will be doubled. After Wave 10, you will receive 80 points for the role you were, and five points for all the others. So if you really hate a role, it's possible to get points for it without actually doing it (not recommended).

You can have up to 500 points per role. These points can be traded in for rewards with Commander Conrad upstairs. These rewards include level-ups for your roles, various Penance-themed gear, and a chance to gamble points for a random reward.

The level-ups are purchased for one role at a time. Level one costs 100 points, level two 200, and so on to level 5. Attacker level-ups grant an increase in the base damage you will inflict on the Penance, on top of your regular hit. Collector level-ups improve the capacity of your egg bag, so you can carry more. Defender level-ups increase the distance Runners will go between baits. Healer level ups increase the amount of health you heal per dose of potion.

The Penance gear includes amusing hats, a handy pair of weight reducing gloves, and the ever popular Fighter Torso, formerly the only chest armour with a strength bonus.

The Points Gamble is only good if you gamble 500 points. You can get anything from a couple steel arrows to a dragon chain. Some of my recent gambles include 103 raw swordfish (noted), 22 tuna potatoes (noted), and 31k (cash).[/hide]

[hide=X. Miscellaneous]There is also a room where the game will make a team automatically. When you enter, indicate the role you wish to play, and you will be matched up with four others and start the highest wave common to you all.

Captain Cain can reassign your wave to 1, if you wish.

The maximum health healed that counts to your score is 512. This translates to something like 28 points.

In the waiting room, to indicate your availability to join a team, the accepted method is to say ____ here. Fill in the blank with att, def, coll, heal, any, any but heal, etc.

To be the leader of a team, take a scroll from the table in the waiting room and use it on people to recruit them. To pick your own role, choose the Write Role option.

The collector can follow the attacker for easy access to the first eggs of the game.

- If the collector gets an early call of red eggs, he should fill the hopper with them as soon as possible, to make life easier for the defender.

 

- A level 4 or 5 healer can easily solo heal, leaving room for 2 attackers.

 

- At the 10th wave, the collector should operate the horn of glory until the queen comes, since you get 80/5/5/5 points regardless.

 

- I find the 10th wave to be the easiest wave for the defender, since the trap is almost directly south of the runner spawn, it doesn't really matter if the runners get past, and they tend to get 'cought' in the stalatites south of the trap.

 

- If you want to use a whip as an attacker, you have to bring a strength-training weapon as well. I prefer a dragon scimitiar since a saradomin sword means I have to reequip my shield once the style changes.

 

- After defeating a wave, having a team member go out-and-in the doorway then readding him lets you continue to the next wave without having to wait for 30 seconds.

 

- Having the 'Wave victory' or 'Advanced breakdown' screen open stops the 30 second timer from starting for the whole team, so don't doddle.

 

- Making the defender the last player on the scroll will make him spawn closest to the vending machines.

 

- The defender and healer should get items THEN call, since you can call while running north but calling before you get supplies wastes precious time for the defender.

 

- Like many of the animations in runescape, operating the vending machine takes much shorter then it appears, so clicking in the minimap while your character is halfway done getting supplies will cause you to fly across the screen once it is finished.

[hide=XI. Credits]Myself- writing the guide, pictures

Tip.it- Forums to host this guide, generally being nice

Jagex- Runescape

You- reading this guide[/hide]

Very good guide, especially the strategy part. I hope that this reduces the amount of people that dont know how to play the game, they can get really annoying while getting a torso :P

As a member of the tip.it crew, I'll have to say: nice guide, but everything has already been covered in our official guide (it only has a bit different defending strategy). A very nice effort though. =D> =D>

- If the collector gets an early call of red eggs, he should fill the hopper with them as soon as possible, to make life easier for the defender.

- A level 4 or 5 healer can easily solo heal, leaving room for 2 attackers.

- At the 10th wave, the collector should operate the horn of glory until the queen comes, since you get 80/5/5/5 points regardless.

- I find the 10th wave to be the easiest wave for the defender, since the trap is almost directly south of the runner spawn, it doesn't really matter if the runners get past, and they tend to get 'cought' in the stalatites south of the trap.

- If you want to use a whip as an attacker, you have to bring a strength-training weapon as well. I prefer a dragon scimitiar since a saradomin sword means I have to reequip my shield once the style changes.

- After defeating a wave, having a team member go out-and-in the doorway then readding him lets you continue to the next wave without having to wait for 30 seconds.

- Having the 'Wave victory' or 'Advanced breakdown' screen open stops the 30 second timer from starting for the whole team, so don't doddle.

- Making the defender the last player on the scroll will make him spawn closest to the vending machines.

- The defender and healer should get items THEN call, since you can call while running north but calling before you get supplies wastes precious time for the defender.

- Like many of the animations in runescape, operating the vending machine takes much shorter then it appears, so clicking in the minimap while your character is halfway done getting supplies will cause you to fly across the screen once it is finished.

You may want to provide pictures and stats for the rewards, or provide links to the appropriate items in tip.it's item db.

Barbarian Assault: A Guide

 

The cannon is useful, and will NOT, repeat NOT, lose you points. The most effective way to use a cannon is to kill Runners. Runners have five hitpoints, and two shots with a red egg will kill them.

Just wanted to quote this since people keep on telling me not to fire the egg launcher.

I have a question about the Horn of Glory. Is it possible to call what you need? The item/attack style/egg color changes when I tried to do this.

Sorry I haven't responded earlier, I haven't been able to get on for a few days.

Thanks all for good feedback.

mister_moocky, it sounds like your a BA expert also. I hope you don't mind if I quote you in my guide.

Eaubbster, you might want to try calling a little earlier. Everything changes about every 30 seconds, so try it in the beginning of that period.

Also, I am working on getting more pics. They'll be here when I get them.

A very good and easy to follow guide. I myself enjoy the BA mingame very much and I think it's sad that so few players try it out. It really is fun if you just give it a try :).

Thank you for writing this guide, I learnt a lot of new stuff I could use to make BA even more fun! :thumbsup:

Good start...but I think it is simply too basic without much strategy. Things to add.

Helmet Slot-Helm of Neitiznot>any other

Torso Slot-Bandos Chestplate>Fighter Torso>Granite Body>Rune Plate body

Legs Slot-Bandos Tassets>Dragon Skirt=Dragon Legs>Rune Legs

Boots Slot-Dragon Boots>Rune Boots>Climbing Boots

Gloves Slot-Barrows Gloves>any other RFD gloves>other

Weapon Slot-Whip>Godsword>Dragon Scim

Shield Slot-Spirit Dragonfire Shield>Rune Defender>Obby Shield

Amulet Slot-Amulet of Fury>Amulet of Glory>Amulet of Power

Ring Slot-Waterbirth Ring>any other

Putting wrong food at the runner cave is good for pushing them "up."

Collector should have their coll level at 2. Any experianced player would understand. It lets you destroy more eggs, thus letting you collect more eggs.