Barbarian Assault Guide

This is a guide for one of my favourite minigames, Barbarian Assault. A game that requires a lot of teamwork and co-operation. Whether you have never heard of the game, or want some tips on how to improve your strategies look no further. (Please note that this is a P2P minigame)

Starting off

Where is it?

Barbarian Assault is kind of a pain to get to if you don't have the means to teleport there.
-The easiest way to get there, would be to simply use a games necklace to teleport strait there
-If you have 75 magic, and the lunar spell book, you can teleport there using the appropriate spell.
-You could get a friend (or just some nice guy) to teleport you there using the tele-group spell (They must have 76 magic)

What do I bring?

Bring your best melee armour, as you will be under a constant bombardment of melee and range attacks. Note that you cannot wear a cape in this game
If you’re going to be an attacker bring the following depending on the combat style you wish to use.
Melee- Bring a weapon (or multiple weapons) that can use all 4 attack styles (Controlled, Accurate, Aggressive, Defensive)
Magic- MUST be on REGULAR spellbook (or can cast spellbook swap, but it would be inefficient, runes provided)
Range- Bring at least a willow shortbow or longbow (arrows provided)

What level should I be?

Well regardless of your role, having a high defence and hitpoints level will be necessary to survive. (I'd say around 60+). Having a high agility level will also help because you will running around constantly (though not really that important)
If you’re going to be an attacker obviously having higher stats in your preferred combat style (60+ in the relevant skill)
REMEMBER – Prayer and Summoning cannot be used in this minigame

Other notes

Accept Aid MUST be turned on in order to play this game, and I would highly recommend turning auto-retaliate OFF

The Basics

Concept

In this minigame your goal is to kill the all Penance in 10 separate waves, each getting more difficult until you eventually face of with the Penance Queen in wave 10. There are 4 different roles to play in this game. They are as follows:

Attacker - This is the person that goes around and kills the penance fighters, and the penance rangers (who use attack using melee and range respectively)

Defender - This person has to lure the penance runners (who can't actually hurt you in any way) with food until they get killed by one of the traps

Collector - These people go around and collect the eggs dropped by the penance and load them into the cannons

Healer - These people heal their teammates, and poison the penance healers (who can poison you)

Each team is made up of 5 people; there must be at least 1 person in each role, which means there will be 2 people with the same role. Here are my recommendations on which role should have 2 people.
Attacker - Only if you have an attacker who is weak
Defender - Only if you have a defender who does not really know how to do their role
Collector - Only if you have an elite team, all of who are very good at this game as this will allow you to get more points
Healer - Probably the most common setup and the one I would recommend the most (unless your team is very professional at the game) as one can focus on healing the team, and the other can focus on killing the healers

General Rules

These are things that you must do no matter which role you choose.

Calling - This is probably THE most important thing for you to do. Whenever a wave starts, you will have a horn in the first available space in your inventory. In the top right corner of your screen there will be two important things for you to take note. The ear and the mouth. You must right click your horn and select whatever word is currently next to the mouth. Likewise you must acknowledge what is next to the ear and react accordingly (explained more in detailed look of each role). The attacker and collector call to each other, and the defender and healer call to each other. REMEMBER – what you must call WILL CHANGE every minute, so make sure when it changes you call again. If you don’t call you’re letting the whole team down. If someone doesn’t call then just go up to them and ask them to call nicely chances are, they just didn’t notice the change (or they have no idea how to play the game)

If you need to be healed - Select the Medic option if you are running low on hitpoints, this will alert the healer(s) that you are low on hitpoints, then wait either on one of the raised platforms (with the cannons on them), or near the healer spring (the green pool near the starting point)

The cannon – First I want to clear up a VERY common misconception. The cannon does NOT make you lose points. Some people think that if the cannon kills a penance, you do not score points because the person who was supposed to kill it wasn’t the one who killed it. This is wrong, points are scored when penance are killed it is irrelevant how they died you still get points regardless (more detail on that later).
Now then, since that is dealt with I will now actually to begin how the cannon actually works. When the collector puts eggs into the cannon, anyone can fire it. You can put up to 5 eggs of each type into cannon at any one time. When using the cannon, you must click on the type of egg you want to shoot that’s on the type of penance you want to shoot. Note however, the cannon cant shoot a penance if it is not in sight, and if there are multiple penance of the type you want to soot that are in range then the particular one it does shoot will be chosen at random (at least from as far as I know). Here is what each colour egg does
Red – These eggs should have top priority, as they explode and cause 3 damage to the target, as well as any penance right next to the target
Green – These eggs just cause 1 damage
Blue – These eggs are pretty much worthless, all they do is ‘stun’ the penance but I don’t really see that since the time they are stunned seems minimal. Don’t bother shooting these eggs.
I only recommend shooting the cannon once you have finished killing the penance you’re required to kill. Don’t rely on the cannon to kill your penance. I recommend only shooting at the runners (and maybe the healers) as runners only take 2 red eggs to kill( or 5 green eggs), all other penance take much more and its very tedious to do so.

Horn of Glory – In the south east corner of the cave, you will find a giant horn. By using it you can call out to everyone on your team. Though the horn of glory is only necessary if one of your team mates does not know how to call.

Levelling up - Each role can be levelled up, to make you more efficient at each role. You start off at level 1 for each role, when you get enough points you can choose to level up the role you are currently in. You may also choose to level up your roles in the rewards menu.
200 points for Level 2
300 points for Level 3
400 points for Level 4
500 points for Level 5
Note that levelling up a role does spend your points, so if you level up to level 2, you must get another 300 points in that role to level up to 3.

Attacker

Points
Gain – When a penance fighter or ranger is killed
Lose – When you attack with the wrong attack style

Levels
1. Do 1 extra damage
2. Do 2 extra damage
3. Do 3 extra damage
4. Do 4 extra damage
5. Do 5 extra damage

The attacker role is very simple and easy to understand. Just attack the penance fighters and rangers like you would any other monster and kill them. You must also change the way you attack when the call changes
If your attacking with melee, you must change your attack style (Controlled, Accurate, Aggressive, Defensive), magic users must change their element (wind, water, earth, fire), and rangers must change what type of arrow they are using (bronze, iron, steel, mithril)
If you are a mage or ranger, you must get your runes/arrows from the red dispenser at the start of each wave. I recommend melee if you are going to be an attacker, because the other combat styles armour, does not fare as well in barbarian assault as melee armour, and melee armour decreases the accuracy of range/mage attacks.

Some extra tips – Remember, as long as you are using the right attack style, you will always hit at least a 1. If you hit a 0, that means you are using the wrong attack style.
Make sure that you are using the right attack style, as soon as the style changes (the words next to the mouth go blank) STOP attacking, and wait for the collector to call.
It may a good idea to attack with a slow weapon (like a godsword), so the chance of you accidentally attacking when the style changes goes down.

Defender

Points
Gain – When a penance runner is killed
Lose – Whenever a penance runner goes through the cave

Levels
1. Lure from 4 spaces away
2. Lure from 5 spaces away
3. Lure from 6 spaces away
4. Lure from 8 spaces away
5. Lure from 10 spaces away

The defender role can be a little difficult to get the hang of. You must drop different types of food to lure the penance runners to 1 of the 2 traps in the cave. One is on the east side the other on the west side, I recommend focusing on the east trap, as the spawn cave for the runners is closer to the east trap. You must first get your supplies from the blue dispenser, from there I lay a trail of random food from the dispenser to the east trap. This makes it very difficult for a runner to get through. While it does not matter which food you use to lure a runner, you must use the correct food (the one that has been called) to finish a runner off. You must also remember to get the hammer and some logs from the north side of the cave, to repair the trap after every 2 runners killed. You can also use the logs to make a barricade that prevents any more penance from coming out, but I find this pointless as it only slows the game down.

Some things to remember – Make the line of food at the start of a wave to make an almost impenetrable barrier stopping the runners from getting through, if the line is starting to fade away, put some more food down.
It doesn't matter what type of food you use to lure a runner, you only have to use the correct food to finish them off
If you are really struggling, the cannon can be used to kill runners easily.

Collector

Points
Gain – When you collect an egg
Lose – Whenever an egg explodes

Levels
1. Bag can hold 2 eggs
2. Can use egg converter with 20% chance, bag can hold 4 eggs
3. Convert eggs with 40% chance, bag can hold 6 eggs
4. Convert eggs with 60% chance, bag can hold 7 eggs
5. Convert eggs with 80% chance, bag can hold 8 eggs

The collector is quite different from other roles. You are not required to kill anything as a collector. Therefore it would be possible for you to do nothing (but still call) and still beat the waves. You might as well do something, which is collect the eggs that the penance drop. Every penance drops 2 of each colour egg when killed, it’s your job to pick them up. Once you pick an egg up, it will automatically go into your bag (which appears in your inventory at the start of each wave) unless it is full. Then it will go into your inventory. When your inventory is full, load up the cannon with the eggs you have (eggs in your bag will be loaded automatically, so don't bother. Remember that if you try to pick up an egg when your inventory is full, it will explode and you will take damage emptying it).
If your collector level is 2 or higher, then you can use the egg converter. This converts eggs into a different colour. It converts red to green, green to blue and blue to red. Depending on your collector level, the chance of converting eggs will vary. Infact at level 2 or 3 it’s more of an egg destroyer. You can choose to convert each egg individually or convert every egg in your possession.

Extra tips - The more eggs you collect, the more points your team gets, try to keep collecting eggs to the very end.
It may not be such a bad idea to keep your collector level at 2, so you can easily dispose of eggs. Then again, having level 5 collector can be useful, so you have a very high chance of converting eggs successfully.

Healer

Points
Gain – When a healer is killed and when hitpoints are healed
Lose – Whenever you use the wrong type of poison

Levels
1. You can heal 10 hitpoints
2. You can heal 15 hitpoints
3. You can heal 20 hitpoints
4. You can heal 25 hitpoints
5. You can heal 35 hitpoints

The healer probably has one of the most important roles in this game. You must pay attention and heal your teammates when they are getting weak. You will be able to see how many hitpoints each one of your teammates has just above the textbox, make sure you pay close attention to this. At the start, stock up at the green dispenser, you will get a vial and some poisoned food. Make sure you fill up your vial with healing water, either by using the vial on the spring, or right clicking the spring and selecting, ‘fill vial’.
To heal someone, use the vial on the person you want to heal, the vial has 4 heals in it before you need to refill it. To heal yourself, click on the healing spring. To poison a penance healer, use the correct poisoned food on it. The poison damage will start at 3, I recommend using 2 or 3 pieces of food on the penance healers just to make sure they die. After the initial 2 or 3 don’t bother poisoning that healer again as it will die eventually. Do this for all the healers in each wave.
Heal a teammate when their hitpoints are below half (usually around 30 or 40). When a flashing cross symbol appears next to someone’s name, find that person (most likely on one of the platforms) and heal them, even if they call “Heal me” or something similar, make sure you heal them. After all it’s your job to make sure everyone stays alive.

Extra tips – If a penance healer doesn’t have a health bar above it, then is isn’t poisoned
Near the end of the wave, heal whatever minor damage your teammates have. The more hitpoints you heal the more points the team gets
Don’t forget to heal yourself!

Scoring

Ok this is how your actions translate into points. Each role has ways of gaining and losing points (explained in their respective sections). When you gain (or lose) points, it gets added to the teams total, then for every point you scored (or lost) you get 1 extra (or 1 less) point. This may a bit difficult to understand, but look at the “Advanced Breakdown” and it should make sense.

The Penance Queen

Ok, so once you’re up to wave 10, be prepared to take on the Penance Queen. I would definitely recommend having 2 healers for this wave who are both decent and above level 1. One thing I would like to say now, is that your reward for completing this wave is always the same. So therefore you don’t really have to worry about screwing up and losing points this wave.
You may notice that the area looks slightly different this time, and there is only 1 platform and cannon. Start the wave as normal. In terms of regular penance this wave is probably the equivalent of about wave 7, so don’t worry to much about the regular penance. You MUST however make sure that they are ALL dead, BEFORE you worry about taking on the queen.
The queen will appear 5 minutes in, and you will no longer be able to use the horn of glory (though you shouldn’t have needed it anyway) .When it appears, gather near the healing spring so the healers can heal you easily. All the other penance should be dead at this point, if they aren’t kill them now. The queen uses what appears to be magical attacks, though wearing magic defence armour doesn’t help much so don’t bother. The queen causes level 63 queen spawns to appear and try to whittle you down. Anyone can attack these with any style of attacking, but it is pointless as you don’t get anything for it, and they tend to try and lure you away from your team. If you are a an attacker, get 8 spikes from the mushrooms. If you are a defender, collector or healer empty your inventory so you have at least 8 spaces free.
To kill the queen the collector must collect the yellow eggs that the queen drops every so often. You will need 8 eggs. Then pass them to a healer (to pass the eggs, just use them on the appropriate person). The healer must dunk them into a poison crater. Then the healer must pass on the eggs to the attacker, who will attach the spikes to the eggs. Then the attacker must pass the eggs to the defender, who will dunk them into the lava. Then the defender must pass the eggs back to the collector who will load them into the cannon for anyone to fire. If you have trouble remembering which order they have to go in remember the acronym CHAD:
Collector
Healer
Attacker
Defender

You will always receive 80 points in the role you are in, and 5 points in all other roles for beating the queen. You will also gain the ability to buy the some of the better rewards

This guide is pretty much done now (still have to add rewards), feel free to post what you think of this guide and how it may be improved