Barrows



Barrows is an area-based activity, released on 9 May 2005, that involves defeating the spirits of the six Barrows Brothers and plundering their tombs. The brothers are fought one at a time and are very strong, with very high Defence, so only powerful players should attempt the Barrows game (although lower-levelled players can still do it with the right equipment). Among the possible rewards from the game are pieces of the powerful Barrows equipment.

This activity is Dangerous. All three parts of the combat triangle are used within Barrows, and Verac the Defiled can occasionally hit hard through Armour and Prayer, so damage can be taken even when using the safest tactics.

The Brothers

 * For strategies for defeating the Barrows brothers, consult Barrows Strategies page.

The six Barrows brothers are buried in six different tombs. Players have to enter each brother's tomb by digging atop the mound with a spade.

Each tomb contains a specific brother, as shown in the right thumb:
 * Dharok the Wretched (uses Melee:Use Magic against Dharok and it is recommended to use Protect from Melee)
 * Karil the Tainted (uses Ranged:Use Melee or possibly magic depending on which spells you are using. Magic is very effective against Karil. Both are effective against Karil and recommended to use Protect from Missiles)
 * Ahrim the Blighted (uses Magic:Use Range against Ahrim and recommended to use Protect from Magic)
 * Verac the Defiled (uses Melee:Use Magic against Verac and it is recommended to use Piety or some other prayer with a high defence bonus)
 * Guthan the Infested (uses Melee:Use Magic against Guthan)
 * Torag the Corrupted (uses Melee:Use Magic against Torag)

Five of the tombs contain their assigned brothers as normal. The sixth tomb, chosen at random, instead contains an entrance to an underground series of tunnels. The sixth brother can be found in those tunnels. See below for more information about the tunnels.

Attack Plan

 * When you start a Barrows run always start with Dharok ; as he must always be killed with prayer due to the potential to KO should you run out of prayer. Never let your prayer run out, especially if he is low on life points. If you are comfortable using Ancient Magicks use your prayer on Karil then Ahrim.
 * Next brother should be Karil, if you have leftover prayer points from your fight with Dharok. If you don't have any leftover prayer points, it is advised that you drink a sip of your prayer potion. Some magic attacks will work perfectly fine with him, although lower levels may miss a fair few. Karil is highly accurate, and can hit in the mid 200s consistently. He should not be fought without prayer, even with 99 defence and barrows armour.
 * Next should be Ahrim. He can be killed quite easily, but is also very accurate and can hit 200s. It is recommended to use prayer unless you have dragonhide, karils, or armadyl as well as high magic and defence levels.
 * Next should be Verac, this brother would cause the most problems to people who have a low defence level, since he can damage through prayer. Melee prayer would reduce the max hit to approx. 155, but watch your health.
 * Then the next should be Guthan. Again, if your Defence is low, you may have a hard time against Guthan, because he will heal quite often with his special attack, prolonging the fight. 70+ defence players can fight toe to toe with him without use of prayer, provided you are wearing melee armour, but be wary if you choose to not pray.
 * Then next should be Torag. He does nothing special, but do not underestimate him. Players can really get a big smack from him sometimes and you should be careful while fighting him. He also has higher defence than the other brothers.

Keep in mind that one of these brothers will be your "tunnel", so for example if Karil is your tunnel, take a logical choice and move on to, perhaps, Guthan,as he is considered tougher then Torag. Also if you get one brother in the tunnel for your first time you will probably get it for a second time the round after!

Prayer Drain
The vengeful spirits of the Barrows brothers will drain Prayer at a set rate as long as a player is in a tomb or the underground tunnels. The drain rate is  points every 10 seconds, where   is the "brothers slain" visible in the bottom-right corner of the screen. Thusly, as players progress through the activity and kill more brothers, the drain rate of Prayer increases. If a player is fighting Dharok the Wretched, they should watch their prayer at all times since he hits higher when his life points are low. If a player runs out of prayer while Dharok the Wretched is at low life points it could result in very high hits and possible 1 hit deaths. It is advised to kill Dharok the Wretched first so that your prayer does not drain too quickly when fighting him. Some players have reported that the brothers do not drain prayer any more after they completed the Barrows section of The Temple at Senntisten quest. This isn't true as since the icon has been there after so long, its draining affect has remained permament and therefore the prayer drain continues on.

Entering the Tunnels
The underground tunnel is a small series of interconnected rooms separated by doors and hallways. Monsters roam the tunnels and one will generally spawn whenever a player opens a door. The monsters that appear are:

Each defeated monster adds 1 to the "kill count." The room in the centre of the maze always contains a chest, inside of which are the rewards. Not all of the doors, however, are always unlocked; some doors are randomly locked shut. Of the four doors leading to the centre room, only one is open. Players must navigate the passageways while fending off the monsters and locate the door that gives access to the chest. The remaining brother/brothers that you haven't fought in the tombs will appear at some point, while waiting for this you will have your prayer drained in the tunnels, to save on prayer potions do not drink them while wandering the tunnels unless the remaining brother appears and attacks, when this happens drink one dose and put the protect prayer on straight away before drinking any more, when the appropriate protection prayer is activated drink another dose of potion as prayer will get drained quite quickly. When the fight is over let your prayer run down again. Remember the brothers can appear at any time while you are in the tunnels.
 * Crypt Rats (level 43)
 * Bloodworms (level 52)
 * Crypt Spiders (level 56)Giant crypt spider.gif
 * Giant Crypt Rats (level 76)
 * Skeletons (level 77)
 * Giant Crypt Spiders (level 79)

Entering The Chest Room
Once the player locates the operational door that leads to the chest, they will have to solve a simple puzzle in order to open the door. Choosing the correct answer opens the door; choosing a wrong answer resets the tunnels and changes which doors are locked and which are open.(Due to a recent update the monsters no longer attack you when you are solving the puzzle). The possible outcomes are shown below:

Please note that the position of the correct answer is not the same each time that particular puzzle is presented; however, the shape itself will always be correct.

The sixth brother
The sixth brother can spawn either when the player opens the chest in the centre of the maze or he can randomly appear when a player opens a door to another room. This can give an advantage to rangers or mages as there are rocks in the hallways which can be used as safespots as shown in the map above.

Note that if a player enters the tunnels before killing five brothers, any other unkilled brothers may spawn when a door is opened.

Once the sixth brother is dead and the chest room found, players will be able to search the chest, take the loot, and leave the tunnels as soon as possible, either through running out or teleporting. When taking the loot, you should check the ground around you before you leave. If your inventory is full or fills up when the chest is opened, rewards will appear on the ground instead. If you leave, these rewards will not be there when you return!

Players who stay in the tunnels are hit repeatedly by falling rocks, which will cause harm and can kill players with low life points. Some players prefer to teleport out. One favoured method is used by players with a Player-owned house that has an altar and Portal Chamber with a Kharyrll Teleport portal. They use Teleport to House to go to the house, recharge prayer there, and use the portal for quick access back to Canifis for banking and another run through the activity. Some players also use a Ring of duelling to teleport to the Duel Arena to recharge prayer and life points. An Ardougne cloak 3 can also be used, as covered in a previous section.

Rewards
If you have not killed all the Barrows brothers by the time you reach the chest, when you click the chest one will appear and attack you. However, you can search the chest and get the loot without having to kill him. (It is recommended in this case to turn on the proper protection prayer to prevent the brother from killing you.)

Extract from RuneScape site: "If you have killed the 6 brothers you stand the best chance of receiving a Barrows item from the chest. Most people believe that a high number of monster kills makes the player have a better chance at getting a barrows item, but this has been proved to be wrong. Only the killing of the 6 brothers adds to the chance of getting a barrows item however, the killing of the monsters adds to the chance of getting runes, bolt racks, or coins. The ideal kill count for one to obtain is 6-13.

Possible rewards are:
 * Mind runes - 0-1430 per chest.
 * Chaos runes - 0-687 per chest.
 * Death runes - 0-391 per chest.
 * Blood runes - 0-159 per chest.
 * Bolt racks - 0-188 per chest.
 * Coins - 0-4162 per chest.
 * Dragon medium helmet
 * Half keys
 * Various Barrows equipment
 * Barrows icon (only during The Temple at Senntisten quest; the chance of receiving it is based on how many brothers are killed, with a 100% chance if all 6 are killed.)

An item of Barrows equipment is not a guaranteed reward, even if all six brothers are slain, although receiving an item is fairly common, thus making the activity profitable. The average ratio is one Barrows item to approximately 30-60 of 'junk' (mix of runes and coins) or one in about sixteen chest loots. Although very rare, it is also possible to receive 2 or 3 Barrows items from one chest.

Music
The following music tracks are unlocked here:
 * Dance of the Undead - In the mound area
 * Dangerous Way - In the tombs and tunnels

Trivia



 * Barrows is another word for a tumulus, which is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves, which is probably where the name of the activity comes from (tumulus is Latin for mound, small hill).
 * The maximum possible kill count in the tunnels is 9,999. If any monsters are killed after that the counter will simply list "Too Many!" instead of a number.
 * While playing Barrows the minimap screen is blacked out, but the minimap is briefly visible when a player teleports.
 * Guthan, Torag and Dharok seem to be wearing capes similar to the cape of legends, implying that they may have been members of the Legends' Guild. However, it is possible this is just the cape worn by the skeletons in the tunnels.
 * To the west of Barrows, there seems to be a small abandoned village. The village has 3-4 buildings, but all the doors are locked. A water pump is located in the centre of the village. It is unknown why this village is here, but it was most likely a town where all the people were forced to flee because of Lord Lowerniel Vergidiyad Drakan. It is also likely that this is where the soldiers camped while making the burial mounds for the brothers.
 * Pet cats will not attack the rats in the tunnels. Trying to order a cat to catch a rat results in a message similar to "Your cat is too afraid to attack it." This is understandable as the rats in the tunnels are much stronger than the level 1 rats that cats commonly catch.
 * If you do not kill five of the brothers before you go into your tunnel you will have to fight the ones you missed as well as your boss brother guarding the chest room, but if you click the chest and get the items and run you are more likely to survive and save money on food it is a good method
 * When fighting Guthan, if in his last attack just before he dies he hits more than one using his healing effect, he will still die but you will get a message saying "we'll finish this later" as if you teleported or ran away during the battle. This happens because there is a delay between Guthan's healing hits and him being healed.
 * If your prayer is drained to 0 with the crypt prayer drain while you aren't praying, it will not make a noise.
 * When in the tunnels, you can look beyond them to see metal doors. These doors are part of the dungeon from the Shades of Mort'ton activity.
 * You don't have to kill all the brothers at the same time, if you run out of food or potions go and get more than come back. You can also get a friend to come along with you and you can get them to hold some food and pots for you for a later time.
 * After the RuneTek5 update, safespotting any of the Barrows brothers has become impossible, because they just move and continue to attack after a few hits (About 2-3). However, they can still be frozen by the Ancient Magicks Ice spells or the Zamorak godsword special attack, and then attacked diagonally with Magic or Range (this includes Black Salamanders and Halberds).
 * There is also a bug in the tunnel whereby if you walk in and out a door in the tunnel, it is possible to have two or more Barrows brother's spawned. This bug still is not fixed.
 * A game of Barrows is part of The Temple at Senntisten quest. You need to kill all six brothers and loot the chest for a Barrows icon.
 * Due to the quest The Temple at Senntisten, there were changes to the graphics of the Barrows Brothers's heads that pop up when a player's Prayer is drained.
 * All Barrows weapons are 2 handed, so a shield can not be worn while wielding the weapons.
 * While in the tombs of the non-tunnel brothers, the faces that haunt you are purple. While in the tunnels, however, the faces of the brothers seem to drain of colour, with parts of their faces turning pale.
 * It is possible to bring a Dwarf Multicannon in the Barrows.
 * The Before The Fall wallpaper (image not found 6/20/10) would suggest the Barrows Brothers used green equipment but the gained equipment is all brown. Also the Armies of Gielinor, Saradomin Strikes campaign shows that the equipment was originally brown.
 * On the 13th of May 2010 Barrows received an update where standing in the area in front of a puzzle door will prevent a player from being attacked, making it easier to solve the puzzles. However, players will still continue being attacked by anything they were fighting beforehand.
 * It has been seen that rarely when many players open the chest at the same time, some do not have to face the boss and immediately get the reward.Satanic Symbol.png
 * The Myreque might have been the soldiers who have camped out at the site. This is left unconfirmed.
 * If you lose connection in the tunnel and then connect back, your minimap will work for 2 seconds.
 * Towards the North-East of the lowest floor, there seems to be a Satanic Symbol shown in the floor outline.
 * The Barrows may be based on the barrow wights, from Lord of the Rings.
 * Karil the tainted's skirt looks like a verac's plateskirt.