The Firemaker's Curse

The Firemaker's Curse is a members only quest developed by Mod Ana.

Starting out
To start this quest one must travel to the starting location south of Eagle's Peak, talking to the Phoenix.The fastest ways to achieve this would be by using the Spirit tree system at the Gnome Stronghold and running south then west to the starting location. Using the Gnome glider system and also running south and west, or using the Eagle transport system to Eagle's Peak and running south to the start location would also be quick. Using Ardougne Teleport would also be relatively quick, as a player would need to run north and west to reach the starting location. You could also use a Phoenix Lair teleport scroll.

Once you arrive, talking to any of the Firemakers will begin the quest. A cutscene will ensue where you will be introduced to Emmett, Flint, Isis, Lina, Phoenix, Sera, and Twig. They will explain to you their belief of finding long lost Firemaking knowledge in the caves next to the entrance they are surrounding, that came to them in a dream. They will ask you to protect them as they go through the caves. You will agree and formally begin the quest.

Inside the Caves
Upon entering the caves you will enter a room with several red fires, Flint will give you a pitch can which allows you to create fires in front of you without logs. However, unlike regular fires you cannot stand on or walk over these fires. Your first order of business is to light fires so that you create an arrow out of fire pointing out of the cave, once this is done, a cutscene will occur where the characters will join you in the middle of the room, and the ground will begin to shake, and everyone will fall through the floor into the next room.



Second room
The second room will be dark, so you will have to light the logs next to you to illuminate everything. The Firemakers will lament being trapped, and scared of some monster attacking them. In the center of the room is Firemaking journal: Chapter 1, and after taking it you will have Firemaking journal compilation (1) in your inventory. After doing so, another cutscene will occur with a spirit, Char, confronting you and the group and again turning off the lights, once you relight the fire you will see that Phoenix has been killed, as Emmett becomes possessed. The spirit says this is part of her game, and she will allow you to pass through to the next camp, but you must identify who she has possessed to prevent any more deaths. Now continue down the open tunnel.

Third room
The third room contains yet more red fires, in another pattern that is in the journal. The journal contains guide images to complete the shapes as you advance through caves. Complete the pattern to trigger another event where Char will begin dropping large boulders around the room whilst dimming the lights, avoid the boulders as they fall or you will be hit for around +100 damage, and collect them and add them to the rock pile at the end of the room to create a pile you can climb on to the next exit. Char will be dimming the lights, so you have limited time to do this.

Fourth room
Now you will be in the fourth room and you need to light the fire to illuminate everything again. The Firemakers will rejoin you. You can grab the Firemaking journal: Chapter 2 in the middle of the room, which will turn your journal compilation into Firemaking journal compilation (2). This will trigger another set of dialogue where you can get more information out of Char by going through various dialogue options. You can then pick a Firemaker who you think has been possessed, and tie them to a pillar. If you pick correctly, when Char next dims the lights no one will die. The first person to be possessed is Twig, which he gives away by not being cowardly anymore. Relight the fire and proceed to the next room.

Fifth room
The fifth room contains two different colored fires, red and yellow, arranged in the pattern of a fire, with the red on the outside layer and yellow on the inside, the room also contains Red powder and Yellow powder which will allow you to change your fire's colors. Start by lighting the yellow fires, and mind that the fire in the top left part needs to be lit from the square next to it to prevent getting trapped. Upon completing this puzzle, Char will summon a wall of fire. Run for the gaps in the wall so you do not take damage. After surviving two different walls of fire from random directions (could be two different directions), proceed to the next room. Fill out the fire completely on both the inside and outside, the painting isn't complete. In order to do the red fire that is very close to the wall you need to select the "light fire here" option on your fire making can.

Sixth room
The sixth room is an agility-labirinth puzzle. You need to push pillars and light fires to guide you way through. Go to the west, jump as far as you can, light the patch there and push the pillar. It will show you that the pit to the east of it can now be lit. While you're there, push that pillar. Then, go to the west pit again, but just before reaching that, go north and jump to the pillar that just appeared. Push the pillar there, and go to the east to light that pit and push the pillar there. Go to the pillar you pushed before this, and go to the pit just west of that. Light it, and push the pillar, and then push the pillar on the platform east of it. After that, you get access to the last line of fire pits. There are weak floors on some parts, so make sure you don't stand on any ledges that don't have ground below them. Go to the northwestern pit, light it and push the pillar, and then the way is free to go to the exit in the northeast corner of the room.

There are small cutscenes of what happens when pushing a pillar, which makes it quite clear what to do next, so following that usually helps out a lot. Note that you can be hit high amounts of damage, so be prepared to lose a lot of health.

Seventh room
In the seventh room there is the Firemaking journal: chapter 3, which will turn your journal into Firemaking journal compilation (3). After picking it up, you will have another conversation with Char, and you will again have to decide who is possessed. The second person possessed is Sera which is made clear by mentioning Ignatius Vulcan once during the time in the room, in addition to suddenly not being very irritable at all. Tie her up to the pillar, and move to the next room.

Eighth room
In room eight all you need is red and yellow, you just have to follow the color and match them up, the tricky part being that on opposite sides there is the opposite color. Here's what you need to do: on the red side if there is a yellow fire, lay a yellow fire next to it; the same goes for the yellow side with the red fire.

After finishing the pattern, you will be immediately accosted by a large, complete line of flame, due to Char's regaining strength. You must run to either side and stand against the walls in order to let the fires slip past while you hide in the small gap. Afterwards, the tunnel opens up again.

Ninth room
In the ninth room, you'll see a grid like the pattern puzzle showed you. On the walls are nodes which will create temporary walls of flame that will help you survive, but prevent your own movement across them. Char will put you through a "tutorial" of sorts, demonstrating the various flames she will send at you, but since she's feeling a bit cruel, you can still take damage during this time. Red balls will drift slowly towards you and hit you for light damage if they get somewhat close; white balls move a bit faster and will explode for moderate damage should they catch up to you. Orange balls can set any line they touch on fire, same as your own walls, but if you happen to be standing on the line, it'll hurt you when it goes up. Blue balls will lazily float about, creating a trail of flames that will constantly damage you if you stand on them. All balls of flame eventually vanish if they haven't hit you directly, but orange and blue balls will leave behind the same type of fires that blue flames leave; orange balls leaving an "X" pattern that stretches across the entire board originating at the time they vanished, and blue balls leaving a 3x3 grid where they went out. These balls will spawn in four waves, with each wave containing more of them at the same time than the previous one.

The idea here is to use the flame walls you set to prevent the balls from reaching you. However, if you aren't fast enough, or are on the wrong side of a node when you light it up, you may accidentally trap the ball on the same side as you. A few general tips are as follows: you should stay near the middle of the walls most of the time since the balls always spawn at four corners between the walls and the center of the room, and they will not hesitate to go off if you're on top of the spawn, and you do not want to be surrounded. Balls that are on top of a line when it is set off will become stuck in that wall, except for orange balls since they're usually the ones that set the wall down in the first place. Try to avoid the orange flame's walls, since they'll end up trapping you if you're at the short end of the room when they set fires, and always be aware of when the wave nears the end as the residual flames they drop when they leave spawn immediately. When you're hiding behind a wall, lure the balls over to one side, then create a wall perpendicular to the one you are using to block them so that when the first wall goes out, you'll still have something protecting you. Lastly, the balls that try to chase you will still hurt you even if they're behind a wall, if they get close enough.

Tenth room
Room Ten is another party room where the rest of the Firemakers will rejoin you and you will again have to decide who is possessed. The person possessed this time is Twig again.(He gives it away when he says that he was born with the name Twig but Twig is actually the nickname he gave himself which he mentions if you spoke to him before entering the cave for the first time.). If you decide incorrectly Lina will be killed.



Eleventh room
You may want to make your screen size smaller to make this next part easier if you are playing in full screen format.

This time, the pattern is in the shape of a torch. You won't need yellow at all, just complete the blue surrounding it and patch the red all around the pattern. But before you finish, take note of the firepit nearby. Instead of throwing firewalls at you, Char will just shut the lights off entirely.

Immediately light the firepit in order to avoid taking too much damage. Then take a torch from the pile, and proceed down the tunnel.

You'll be forced to walk the entire way. During this time, dark tendrils will claw their way out of all sides of your screen. This is why smaller screen formats are recommended, since if you use widescreen, it will be near impossible to make out some of the tendrils against the pitch black of the area outside of the walls. You have to ward them off by right clicking them and selecting the command which will make your avatar swing their torch; just left clicking won't actually do anything. Failing to shake one of them off in time will result in moderate damage. Don't forget to keep walking while this is happening, and escape through the open door as soon as possible.

Twelfth Room
After lighting the fire quickly, take the last journal. The person possessed this time is Emmett. During the interviews, you'll notice that Emmett is suspiciously levelheaded when you talk to him, as opposed to earlier, when he lit himself on fire just by talking about flames, making it a dead giveaway.

Char will warn you to prepare yourself, so don't be lazy. Head back to the surface to resupply on food, and to take a fast hitting weapon with you, like knives or claws. It doesn't matter what type of metal you use, since you will only require speed. Don't bother with armor, use weight reducing gear to conserve energy and bring a few energy potions just in case.

Char
In the last room you will meet Char, she is standing in a somewhat lowered part in the cave. Now is the time to get some food, energy potions (about 2) and weight-reducing clothing. Since no armour has any effect, it's best to be as light as possible, because the battle involves lots of running. Alternatively, the salt-water spring at Oo'glog may be used to provide unlimited run energy for about 15-20 minutes.

Probably the best way to defeat the boss is using ranged (only bring the ranged weapon you like, no ranged armour) so you can hit her from a distance and won't be hit yourself. The damage she takes depends entirely on how many fires are lit, it is best to bring bronze knives or darts to fight her. The best way to kill her is this: Run around the room lighting fires, and hit Char when you have more than 6/7 fire lit (A counter in the left of your screen shows how many fires are lit). You will do 101 damage for every fire that is lit when you hit, so keep enough fires lit to do some serious damage. But watch out, when Char starts glowing, don't try hitting her and never come close, because she is invulnerable and does over 500 damage. (You can cool her by luring her onto the water, but this is not advisable. Just light as many fires as possible, and when she stops glowing try attacking again.)

Warning: When she is around half health, fire walls with only a few openings, much like the ones encountered in the previous rooms, will start appearing. Try not to get hit by them because you will suffer moderate to heavy damage (200-450). Drink energy potions and food when needed. There is currently a glitch which enables you to occasionally avoid taking damage from the fire walls; simply run through them and light a fire.

An effective method of killing Char for those with at least level 92 Prayer is by lighting 9+ fires, luring her to the water, and using throwing knives (on rapid stance) in tandem with Soul Split to deal massive damage at a fast rate without having to worry about healing. This is notably effective at first, but requires constant attention, as Char can stamp out any fires within a certain distance of her.

If ancient ice spells work against her these could be used to freeze her in place while running to the other end of the chamber and setting lots of fires, running back to the water and proceed with the above method.

Knives and darts work well on rapid stance due to damage being based off the amount of fires you have just be sure to stand back.

A dark bow is also a great weapon. It can fire from far away and it hits double. With 10+ fires lit, it can hit over 2000 (1000+1000), but is extremely slow, and it is considerably difficult to maintain more than 9 fires at once.

Summoning creatures can be used when fighting Char. A Unicorn may be helpful. Also, you do not lose your items upon death. You will spawn inside Char's cave, in a safe area.

Finishing Up...
Once Char has been defeated, she will tell the player to exit back the rear tunnel. Once outside, speak to Sera or Emmett to get your rewards.

Rewards

 * 2 Quest points
 * 80,000 Firemaking experience
 * 30,000 Agility experience
 * 76,000 Constitution experience
 * The Book of Char, when activated on the off-hand slot provided it is wielded, causes fiery orbs to spin around the player, simultaneously igniting any log the player walks/runs over.
 * Access to two new events and a new set of firemaker's outfit in Balthazar Beauregard's Big Top Bonanza.


 * The ability to unlock Char's training cave.
 * Also, when you enter Char's Training Cave, you can pick one of the four fire creatures: Warming Flame, Twisted Firestarter, Glowing ember, and Searing Flame (with 91 Firemaking) flying in the room as a pet. (You can have all four pets if you walk all of them to the menagerie.)

Music

 * The Firemakers' Theme
 * Charred Remains

Trivia

 * A guaranteed content poll was held on the RuneScape forums to choose the personality of a female character involved in the quest. The winner was Sera, a self-professed jealous rival of Ignatius Vulcan, whose goal in life is to create a blaze that will trump those of Vulcan himself.
 * The original Firemaking requirement announced for this quest was 90. The lowered requirement was announced in a stickied thread by Mod Mark in the Future Updates forum, and the January 2012 BTS was changed to reflect the new requirement of 74 Firemaking.
 * After you completed the quest, the adventure's logs will say: "I guided the firemakers through Char's caves and managed to recover her ancient Firemaking secrets."