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Fortis Colosseum pillars

This article is compiled from the videos of GnomonkeyRS. It records what Gnomonkey said, with sources, not verified game fact. See About.

Fortis Colosseum pillars

Fortis Colosseum pillars
Type Mechanic
Location Fortis Colosseum
Preferred pillar Southwest pillar (South Pillar)12
Avoided pillar North pillar23
Speedrun start Northeast pillar4
Key tiles Mage block, Minotaur drag, Minotaur heal block, Roy tiles556
Videos 6 (first 2024-03-26, latest 2025-03-21)
Main source Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS)

The Fortis Colosseum pillars are the pillars Gnomonkey uses as cover in the Fortis Colosseum, and the choice of which pillar to fight from decides how many wave spawns are solvable. His position is that the Southwest pillar (also called the South Pillar) is the correct pillar for almost everyone, and that the commonly taught approach of starting on the B5 tile and running to the Northwest pillar should be abandoned.12

He prefers it because stacks (several monsters attacking on the same tick) can be solved on both sides of the pillar and the pillar can be rotated both ways, so every stack is guaranteed solvable and the player controls the wave instead of the wave controlling the player.378 The North pillar allows only one direction, cannot be rotated, and is described as having unsolvable double stacks.238

Contents

Choosing a pillar

Southwest pillar

In March 2024 he already called the southwest pillar the absolute best position.9 By June 2024 he recommended learners start at the South Pillar, either on the B5 tile or on his own speed tile.2 In July 2024 he went further and told players to stop using the Northwest pillar altogether.1 He gives these reasons for the Southwest pillar:

  • Reinforcement spawns on the Northwest pillar centre around a tile randomly within a large area, while the Southwest pillar's gate spawn centre is one tile closer to the gate, which he says solves many problems.10
  • In the very late waves reinforcements spawn with a Minotaur and a shaman, which is what usually gets people killed.11
  • At the Southwest pillar's mage block tile a shaman can see the player from any spawn location and stops moving, while the Minotaur keeps walking in, so the shaman never needs to be off-ticked from that position.12
  • The tile pushes monsters to the side, so two monsters can never be side by side.13
  • There is always a way to solve a bad wave if the player is quick, including by mage blocking.14
  • Range switches are unnecessary: the player can rotate around the pillar and off-tick enemies, melee everything, gain about five more restores and avoid needing a range potion or a minimum four-way Twisted bow.15
  • Overall it gives more supplies, fewer bad spawns and lets the player solve everything, though not literally everything (a Z-stack is the exception).16
  • It is also better for reinforcements.17

By March 2025 he describes the mage block as working consistently only on this side, with the Minotaur and shaman.8 He has run multiple teaching streams covering this pillar.18

North and Northwest pillars

He calls suggesting the North pillar to learners a "noob trap": the player loses safety and pillar rotation options and the shaman stacking behind Minotaurs becomes a coin flip.2 On the Northwest pillar a javelin colossus and a manticore attacking on the same tick kills the player unless the off-tick is obtained at the start, whereas the same stack at the Southwest pillar is survivable by praying both and going to the correct side.1920 Some stacks occur only there, such as two mage monsters in front and two ranged in the back, which he says is solvable only by tanking damage.13 A shaman can also spawn in front of the Minotaur, which prevents putting it behind and forces an off-tick.11 A bad wave 10 spawn on the North pillar "just kills you".14

Mage block works only about half the time on the North pillar because enemies spawn further out from the door than at the other pillar.821 He says he tells people who post unsolvable stacks from the Northwest pillar in Coliseum chat to move to the Southwest pillar, and told another streamer that a posted stack was unsolvable.22

Speedrun start

For speedrun waves he starts at the Northeast pillar, which he calls by far the most dangerous starting position, because it does not trap any melee enemies and produces the most Venator bow setups for maximum DPS.4 A 1x1 Serpent Mage spawns in waves 1 through 6, which lets him create specific setups so the Venator bow triple ricochets.4

Start tile

His personal start tile is not the typical B5 tile. He starts a couple of tiles out so that something can spawn right next to him, letting him pray against it behind the pillar and often avoid damage; he thinks this is better than B5 even for learners.23

Solving stacks

Execution speed matters: he recommends practising the first stack repeatedly, because stacks must be done quickly or the player dies, and the solve only works from the correct corner of the pillar.24

  • Normal stack (ranged in back, mage in front): from the middle of the pillar, click to the corner tile. The back enemy sees the player first and the front enemy a tick later, lining them up on the same tick. The start tile matters, so the player must begin from the middle of the pillar; this works because the further-out tile gives line of sight before the front enemy is unblocked.242525 Standing two tiles out and stepping to the corner is the same idea: pray against the back enemy first, then the front.24
  • Reversed stack: when something is hanging over the edge of the pillar, he goes three tiles back, so the front enemy sees the player before the back one and the order is reversed.2627 The three-tiles-back tile works regardless of where the player starts, because of the size of the NPCs.9
  • Mage in front: a mage in the front is small enough to change the line of sight. He died on one such stack and had to approach from the other side of the pillar.28
  • Z-stack (manticore, mage, javelin): he solved it by stepping to a tile so the manticore saw him, then stepping to make the shockwave and then the javelin see him, lining attacks up as ranged, mage, melee, mage, ranged with two ticks of downtime for off-ticks. A manticore has an effective five-tick attack cooldown, so there are three ticks of manticore attacks and two for other monsters. He calls the Z-stack the worst stack, but very rare.2929
  • Reading manticores: the style of the first manticore shows what a second one will attack with before its orbs appear, which reveals when something is off-ticked.30 Monsters that attack one or two ticks before or after the manticore are off-ticked, and killing a manticore can ruin a stack.31

Key tiles

Tile Purpose Cites
Mage block tile Three tiles down from the pillar; lets the mage see the player so it can be blocked and placed behind the Minotaur 56
Minotaur drag tile Pulls a Minotaur from behind other monsters down to the player 5
Minotaur heal block Five down from the pillar, behind it; reaching it before the Minotaur arrives denies line of sight so it does not heal its target 56
Roy tiles Five down from the pillar on the other side 6
Corner tile One out from the pillar 6

The Minotaur only heals if there is line of sight from its centre tile to the other NPC's centre tile: with the other monster two tiles behind the pillar it will not heal, but with both two tiles out it will.32 He says only five tiles matter, and really only two plus the Roy tiles.33 The tiles are line markers rather than tile markers, so a line marker plugin is needed, and the Sol tiles in the middle of the arena are available with the !soltiles chat command per the video description.3433

Revision history

Date Video Change
2025-03-21 GOLDEN GNOME vs SOL HEREDIT (OSRS) Added that the pillar makes every stack solvable and that mage block works only about 50% of the time on the North pillar.
2024-07-26 Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS) Changed advice from the B5-to-Northwest route to the Southwest pillar; added reinforcement spawn reasoning, Z-stack solve and the reduced need for range switches.
2024-06-15 Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS) Added the South Pillar recommendation for learners, the case against the North Pillar and his personal start tile.
2024-03-28 FIST ONLY COLOSSEUM (OSRS) Added the tile list: mage block, Minotaur drag, heal block and Roy tiles.
2024-03-27 NO BREW COLOSSEUM (OSRS) Added the Northeast pillar speedrun start and Serpent Mage setups for the Venator bow.
2024-03-26 BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS) Page created: corner stepping for common stacks, reversed stacks, Minotaur heal line of sight and the Southwest pillar as best position.
## See also

References

  1. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 5:00 ↩↩↩

  2. Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS), 2024-06-15. ▶ 0:00 ↩↩↩↩↩↩

  3. Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS), 2024-06-15. ▶ 5:28 ↩↩↩

  4. NO BREW COLOSSEUM (OSRS), 2024-03-27. ▶ 0:58 ↩↩↩

  5. FIST ONLY COLOSSEUM (OSRS), 2024-03-28. ▶ 1:51 ↩↩↩↩↩

  6. FIST ONLY COLOSSEUM (OSRS), 2024-03-28. ▶ 2:20 ↩↩↩↩↩

  7. GOLDEN GNOME vs SOL HEREDIT (OSRS), 2025-03-21. ▶ 27:33 ↩

  8. GOLDEN GNOME vs SOL HEREDIT (OSRS), 2025-03-21. ▶ 28:06 ↩↩↩↩

  9. BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS), 2024-03-26. ▶ 31:40 ↩↩

  10. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 6:34 ↩

  11. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 7:21 ↩↩

  12. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 9:55 ↩

  13. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 11:00 ↩↩

  14. Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS), 2024-06-15. ▶ 19:50 ↩↩

  15. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 13:04 ↩

  16. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 14:35 ↩

  17. Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS), 2024-06-15. ▶ 5:56 ↩

  18. GOLDEN GNOME vs SOL HEREDIT (OSRS), 2025-03-21. ▶ 29:09 ↩

  19. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 7:52 ↩

  20. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 9:24 ↩

  21. GOLDEN GNOME vs SOL HEREDIT (OSRS), 2025-03-21. ▶ 28:37 ↩

  22. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 12:04 ↩

  23. Soulreaper Axe Colosseum Guide (OSRS), 2024-06-15. ▶ 14:00 ↩

  24. BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS), 2024-03-26. ▶ 14:28 ↩↩↩

  25. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 30:57 ↩↩

  26. BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS), 2024-03-26. ▶ 25:45 ↩

  27. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 37:14 ↩

  28. BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS), 2024-03-26. ▶ 17:09 ↩

  29. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 32:30 ↩↩

  30. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 36:43 ↩

  31. Colosseum SW Pillar Master Guide (OSRS), 2024-07-26. ▶ 42:55 ↩

  32. BUDGET COLOSSEUM GUIDE (OSRS), 2024-03-26. ▶ 37:11 ↩

  33. FIST ONLY COLOSSEUM (OSRS), 2024-03-28. ▶ 23:43 ↩↩

  34. FIST ONLY COLOSSEUM (OSRS), 2024-03-28. ▶ 0:20 ↩

Mechanics

Colosseum invocations • Yama contracts • Invocations (Tombs of Amascut) • Jal-ImKot • Inferno pillars • Jal-Ak • Alt account • Thralls • Nex gear setup • Tempoross • Turael • Inferno waves • Jal-Nib • Doom of Mokhaiotl: rock block method • Monkey Room • Fortis Colosseum pillars • Phantom barrage • Awakened bosses • Melee gear progression • Demonic Brutus • Jal-MejRah • Prayer flicking • Butterfly Tech • Fortis Colosseum setup • Doom of Mokhaiotl: melee punish • Sulliuscep • Botting • Off-ticking • Corner trapping • Doom of Mokhaiotl: car attack • Combat Achievements • Doom of Mokhaiotl: shield phase • Pest Control • Blood Barrage • Nylocas • Great Olm 4-1 method • Nex reset • Triple Jad • RuneScape 3 combat • Tightrope skip

Category: Mechanics