No More Bofa Rush! (OSRS)


Date	2025-02-22
Type	guide
Video	youtu.be/NxfbgWY3ZQk

Summary

Gnomonkey argues the Atlatl, a strength-scaling dart thrower from Perilous Moons, is OSRS's most underrated mid-game weapon: with the Eclipse armour set's burn effect it lands within about 5-10% of the Bow of Faerdhinen in most cases for a fraction of the price. He runs DPS calcs across Tombs of Amascut, Chambers of Xeric and other bosses and explains where the Bofa is still needed.

Outline

0:00 Introduction: why the Atlatl is underrated and how it works
1:04 Sponsor segment (Boot.dev)
2:00 Atlatl mechanics and the Eclipse armour set effect
3:49 Comparing the Atlatl to the Bofa: defence, range and levels
5:00 Gear setups and budgeting: strength amulet, cost comparison
6:40 Raid applications: fewer switches and more supplies
7:47 Tombs of Amascut DPS analysis and how to add burn damage to calculators
10:34 Tombs of Amascut situational testing: P1, P2, P3 and max stats
12:38 Chambers of Xeric testing: shamans, Vespula portal, Vasa
14:12 Olm head analysis and burn immunity caveats
16:40 Zulrah and Muspah testing
17:42 Tormented demon analysis
19:06 Final thoughts: where the Bofa is still needed and why mains and irons should skip the rush

Topics covered

Atlatl

(0:00) Gnomonkey considers the Atlatl an incredibly underrated weapon that mains rarely use, and thinks it comes very close to the Bow of Faerdhinen for a fraction of the price.
(0:26) The Atlatl is a drop from Eclipse Moon at the Perilous Moons, and is a three-tick dart-throwing weapon somewhat similar to a blowpipe but slightly slower.
(0:54) Gnomonkey says to use the Atlatl with strength gear that does not have a lot of negative ranged, and to pray the ranged prayer rather than Piety, maximising strength bonus.
(3:19) Gnomonkey says the potion to use with the Atlatl is a super strength potion, not a ranging potion, because the weapon's damage comes from strength.
(3:49) Gnomonkey says the Atlatl is best against lower defence targets but punches through defence better than a blowpipe, putting it in between those weapons, though its low range means a Bofa is needed for targets that are far away.
(4:20) Gnomonkey says the Atlatl typically does about five percent less damage than the Bofa when used with the Eclipse set.
(4:47) Gnomonkey says strength levels are easier to train than ranged levels, for example by training on nagas for very high strength XP, so at some account stages the Atlatl beats the Bofa.
(4:47) Gnomonkey says a Berserker ring boosts the Atlatl's damage and that using an Anguish with the Atlatl is not helpful.
(5:17) Gnomonkey says a plain strength amulet is a very good Atlatl amulet because it has the same strength bonus as a torture amulet (10) and costs about 2K.
(9:45) Gnomonkey says the Atlatl suffers against Mystics and the Bofa is about 20% better there, but in Chambers the rest of the time the Atlatl is almost the same.
(19:06) Gnomonkey concludes the Atlatl is incredibly good early for both mains and irons and costs a fraction of the price of the Bofa.
(24:30) Gnomonkey says it is criminal that the Atlatl setup costs only about six million and considers the Eclipse set about as useful as the full Blood Moon set, which is quite expensive.

Eclipse armour

(0:56) Eclipse armour is the other drop from Eclipse Moon; the helmet and chest have three strength bonus each and the legs one, and it has decent ranged accuracy slightly below Karil's according to Gnomonkey.
(2:23) The full Eclipse set effect gives a 20% chance when you hit something to proc one burn damage, which Gnomonkey says means one in five hits adds an extra 10 damage.
(2:54) Gnomonkey says the Eclipse burn proc adds up to roughly 1.1 DPS assuming 100% accuracy, since it does not work on a miss, which is slightly under two thralls' worth of DPS.
(3:19) Gnomonkey notes the Eclipse set effect is not included in Gearscape or, as far as he knows, the OSRS Wiki DPS calculator, so those under-report the Atlatl's DPS.
(6:04) Gnomonkey says each piece of the Eclipse set costs under 1.3 million gp, with the helmet under a million.
(6:40) Gnomonkey says in raids the Atlatl's strength-based melee gear means the Eclipse set can double as melee gear, reducing switches: his melee switch in Chambers of Xeric is two items (maybe three with a defender).
(8:38) To add the burn damage to a calculator result, Gnomonkey multiplies 10/9 (1.1 repeating) by the Atlatl's accuracy against the target and adds that to the displayed DPS.
(16:52) Gnomonkey says the Eclipse burn effect does not apply to everything: targets such as Vasa (once it reaches the crystal) and Zulrah (whenever she goes underwater) lose it.

Bow of Faerdhinen

(5:16) According to Gnomonkey, the Bow of Faerdhinen costs about 160 million on its own, and a full Bofa set with crystal armour costs about 240 million versus about 11 million for the Atlatl set.
(5:16) Gnomonkey says the Bofa requires crystal armour to be any good, since the armour gives a huge amount of damage and accuracy.
(5:44) Gnomonkey says the Bofa's helmet alone costs about eight and a half million.
(7:40) Gnomonkey says getting a Bofa takes an average of about 400 kills at the Gauntlet (Corrupted Gauntlet), which he describes as everybody hating the Red Prison on an iron.
(14:13) Gnomonkey says Bofa is better for far targets, since it has 10-tile range versus six tiles for the Atlatl and attacks more slowly, and it can safespot.
(19:06) Gnomonkey says the Bofa remains necessary for the Vespula portal in Chambers and for Mystics, and calls Vespula portal one of the Bofa's best uses.
(19:12) Gnomonkey says the Bofa's most important use case is the Inferno, where trying to get a first cape with anything else is almost impossible.
(20:04) Gnomonkey says the Bofa is better at God Wars but that the Atlatl cannot be used there, and that the Scorching bow annihilates other weapons at Zamorak, so he would not grind the Bofa early.
(20:29) Gnomonkey says Leviathan's last part favours the Bofa over a crossbow, but a crossbow is plenty good thanks to Leviathan's crossbow weakness.

Tombs of Amascut

(8:41) In Gnomonkey's Gearscape calcs for the Tombs of Amascut with his hardcore stats, Atlatl DPS was 5.69 versus 6.81 for the Bofa, a 16% difference without burn damage and about 6% once the burn is added.
(10:08) In Gnomonkey's Tombs of Amascut calcs, using a Fury instead of a strength amulet with the Atlatl made it about 4% behind the Bofa, which he calls marginal considering the Bofa costs about 20 times more.
(10:32) Gnomonkey says burn works properly on basically everything in Tombs of Amascut, including P2.
(11:13) At the Tombs of Amascut obelisk with 30 Bandos godsword damage, Gnomonkey found the Atlatl about 2.8% behind the Bofa when using a Fury.
(12:15) With max stats, Gnomonkey found the Bofa about 17% better than the Atlatl at Tombs of Amascut P2 and about 5.3% better at P3, with typical differences of five to ten percent across the raid.
(12:53) Gnomonkey says draining defence first with a bone dagger, Bandos godsword or warhammer helps the Atlatl, and that a warhammer is quite good early in Tombs of Amascut.
(12:53) Gnomonkey says that with max stats the Bofa pulls ahead more, around 20% in one calc and about 10% in another, and that at max stats the overall gap is around 10%.
(21:58) Gnomonkey says you can do Tombs of Amascut with an Atlatl rather than saving about 250 million for a Bofa, and that a raid setup can be assembled for around 50 million.

Chambers of Xeric

(14:12) In Chambers of Xeric on paper DPS against shamans, Gnomonkey found 8.99 for the Bofa versus 8.75 for the Atlatl, about 3% better.
(14:34) Gnomonkey says the Vespula portal is a case where range matters a lot because the Atlatl cannot reach it, making it one of the Bofa's best uses in the game.
(15:04) Gnomonkey says a hammer special attack is quite good on Vasa, since the quality-of-life changes Vasa no longer regains defence quickly, so you can drain it.
(15:04) At Vasa, Gnomonkey found the Bofa about 7% better than the Atlatl, though the Atlatl loses its burn effect when Vasa reaches the crystal.
(15:35) At Olm head with max stats, Gnomonkey found the Bofa about 8% better than the Atlatl; he says it is awkward and takes more damage with the Atlatl but he does it on stream all the time.
(19:42) Gnomonkey says the Bofa is exceptionally good on Mystics, around 20% better than the Atlatl in his figure.

Zulrah

(16:10) Gnomonkey says the Atlatl is about 14% worse than the Bofa at Zulrah, and the burn effect is lost whenever she goes underwater, making it perhaps 20% effective and overall around 12% worse.
(16:10) Gnomonkey says that although people say you need a Bofa for Zulrah, it costs about 12 million and still does well enough that you can kill it with the Atlatl without a Bofa.
(16:40) Gnomonkey says that since a player uses mage about half the time at Zulrah anyway, you can still kill Zulrah with the Atlatl without a Bofa.

Tormented Demon

(17:42) Against Tormented demons, Gnomonkey says the Atlatl just beats a blowpipe with adamant darts on paper even before burn damage, and with the burn added the Atlatl is about 18% better.
(18:07) According to Gnomonkey, the Atlatl has about 41% accuracy versus 35% for the blowpipe against Tormented demons, because it punches through defence better.
(18:07) Gnomonkey says the blowpipe needs dragon darts to just barely beat the Atlatl on paper at Tormented demons (about 1.8% better), and that rune darts would be about 7% worse than the Atlatl.

Corrupted Gauntlet

(7:40) Gnomonkey says an average of about 400 Corrupted Gauntlet kills is needed to get the Bow of Faerdhinen, a grind many irons dislike.
(22:24) Gnomonkey says irons do not need to rush the Corrupted Gauntlet for the Bofa or its GP, since there are other sources such as Giants, Muspah, Vorkath, Hydra, Colosseum, and Revenants for non-hardcore accounts.
(22:24) Gnomonkey says the Colosseum gives far more GP than the Corrupted Gauntlet.

Perilous Moons

(0:00) Gnomonkey says that after starting his hardcore ironman he grinded Moons and did calculations, concluding the Atlatl is Old School's most underrated mid-game weapon and he will pass on the Bofa grind.
(7:40) Gnomonkey says Moons is extremely easy to kill compared to the Corrupted Gauntlet and far less KC is needed to get the Eclipse set than a Bofa.

Opinion: Stat requirements for content

(24:12) Gnomonkey says there is no strict stat cutoff for doing any content: the higher your stats the easier it is, and he is not saying you must max before doing raids.