Desert Treasure

Desert Treasure is currently one of the most challenging and dangerous quests in RuneScape. Do not underestimate this quest, as several high level players (combat 100+) have been known to die while completing Desert Treasure. In most quests you can use prayer to get through the fights; in this quest, you will have to use that and a whole lot more.

It is strongly recommended that you have a high Magic level before attempting this quest, at least enough to cast snare at level 50. 60 Attack would be a significant help as well so that you can use Dragon weapons, and 43 or higher Prayer is essential.

Walkthrough
Do not underestimate this quest, if the walkthrough calls for restore potions, use them!

Enchanting the mirrors



 * Travel through the Shantay Pass south of Al-Kharid and then travel west either via the flying carpet or just run to the Bedabin camp. Talk to the archaeologist who is near the small water pool, he will give you a tablet to take to someone at the Digsite.
 * Travel to the Digsite east of Varrock and talk to the expert inside the building at the south end of the site. He will take the tablet, talk to him again to gain the notes to take back to the archaeologist.
 * Go back to the archaeologist in the desert, taking some cash with you, 650 coins is enough.
 * Go south to the bandit camp - it's not far and talk to the barman there, buy a beer for 650 coins and find out about the four Diamonds of Azzandra.
 * Talk to Eblis in the same camp, he will tell you that he needs various items to enchant some mirrors.
 * 1) Ashes
 * 2) Blood rune
 * 3) Bones
 * 4) Charcoal
 * 5) 6 Molten glass
 * 6) 12 Magic logs
 * 7) 6 Steel bars
 * Go back to the bank, and withdraw or collect necessary items, and then return to Eblis and give him the items he needs. Use the items on Eblis and he will take them.  You can give him the items noted.
 * Eblis will disappear and appear a little to the south-east on top of a hill. Go to him there and you will see 6 mirrors - look in all of them to try and find the location of the diamonds.  The mirrors aren't perfect, however, as they show where the diamonds have been at one time.  Because of this, two of the mirrors show other locations - the Bedabin camp and the Pyramid itself, but you need to acquire the diamonds from the other locations first.  You may attempt the diamonds in any order.
 * Note: At some point in the quest, you may be attacked by a level 95 Stranger who carries a Dragon dagger. This is random and does not happen to everyone. Carry a teleport and have some prayer points until you finish the quest.  In general though, he's easy.

Blood Diamond
Items needed for this section: Garlic, Silver bar, Spice, Pestle and mortar, lobsters or better food, Prayer potions, Druid pouches, runes to cast magic (fire bolt will suffice), magic armour.


 * Travel to Canifis and talk to Malak in the pub. He tells you that he'll give you the diamond if you kill Dessous, and give you a list of items that you need.
 * Travel to, get garlic if you need it upstairs in a cupboard from one of the houses and take the garlic and a silver bar into the small dungeon just northwest of the bank. Talk to Ruantan in the dungeon and he will make you a silver pot
 * Take the pot to and get it blessed by the High Priest in the church.
 * Back to and talk to Malak again, he will fill the pot with blood (your blood!), you need to use a pestle and mortar with the garlic and add it to the pot, along with some spice - spice stall is the best place to get this. (Note that if you forgot to bless your pots, the High Priest will still bless it when it is full of blood - although he will be slightly shocked!)
 * Travel through the swamps to the graveyard. You should take with you:
 * 1) Magic armour
 * 2) Runes to cast the spell you are using
 * 3) 10-20 Druid pouches - see Nature Spirit quest.
 * 4) 3-4 Prayer potions
 * 5) Super set (optional)
 * 6) Emergency escape such as the Ectophial
 * 7) Sharks or better food.
 * Travel via the Myreque short cut, across the bridge, then run east around the pools in the swamp, zig-zagging south and north.
 * Once you arrive at the graveyard, pour the blood on the tomb and Dessous will appear.
 * Use protect from melee and cast magic on him up close. Eat food as necessary.  The objective is to defeat him as quickly as possible. A common mistake made by players while fight Dessous is to get into a panic and attempt to either devour large amounts of food or run around attempting to find a better spot, this can be a critical mistake and could cost you the battle or even your life.
 * An alternative tactic is to use a halberd to range him around the fence whilst using protect from magic prayer. As soon as Dessous teleports through run around the other side of the fence and use the halberd on him again.
 * Return to Malak in Canifis to claim the Blood Diamond.

Ice Diamond
Items needed for this section: Chocolate cake, Spiked boots, 3-5 Super restore potions or stat restore and prayer potions, lobsters or better food, runes to cast a fire-based magic spell significantly below your level (fire bolt is recommended since your stats decrease in the area. If you have them, use chaos gaultlets to increase your maximum hit), and an Ectophial or teleport tablet for a quick teleport out that doesn't have a magic requirement.

Because your Magic level will be drained slowly by a snowstorm whilst in the ice area, you do not want your spells to stop casting because your level has been drained below the level required to cast your active spell. If your Magic level drops below 25, you brought prayer potions instead of super restores, or you brought law runes as a teleport out instead of the ectophial, you're dead. Cast a fire spell with a Magic requirement significantly below your normal level, and you'll find it easy. Well, easier maybe. The most commonly chosen spell is Fire Bolt, as its level 35 Magic requirement is much more manageable than the level 59 Magic requirement of Fire Blast and with Family Crest gauntlets its max hit is only 1 lower. It is recommended that you use Fire Bolt instead of Fire Blast unless your Magic level is over 70, as otherwise the Magic drain will quickly leave you unable to cast the spell. If this occurs, you will be unable to both eat food and drink restore potions fast enough, and will probably either die before you can heal, or be forced to teleport away having wasted valuable supplies.
 * Teleport to Trollheim (if completed Eadgar's Ruse, otherwise use the passage taken in Death Plateau) then climb down the hill and travel towards the thrower trolls. Before you get to them you should see a passage on your left.  Go down this passage until you see a small child standing by an ice gate.  It should start to snow as you walk down the passage.
 * Talk to the child and he will start crying, give him the chocolate cake. He will then tell you that his mum and dad have been captured by a bad man.
 * BEFORE entering the ice gate, you should have the following: Super restore potions, runes to cast fire magic, and food.  Whilst you are in the icy area beyond the gate you will not be able to run, and every single stat will be reduced by 1 every few seconds, including Hitpoints, Magic and Prayer.
 * Enter the ice gate and kill 5 level 124 trolls by casting fire magic up close. Sip from a restore potion when your magic falls below the required level and eat as required.  Once you have killed 5 trolls at the gate, the cave at the back should open.  Return to the bank and wait for your stats to recover, or simply suicide to get them restored quickly.
 * Now you have to go and kill Kamil. He uses the ice spells section of Ancient Magicks which freeze you when trying to attack.  For this, have
 * 1) Several super restore potions or stat and prayer restores(4 or 5 is enough)
 * 2) The ectophial. or a teleport tablet as a fast escape
 * 3) Lobsters or better food
 * 4) Spiked boots - see the Death Plateau quest. Also bring some regular climbing boots if you aren't using Trollheim teleport.
 * 5) Magic armour and staff, and runes to cast a fire spell that is significantly below your magic level.
 * Go back to Trollheim and back to the ice gate. This time, go through the cave at the back and follow the path round until you come to an open area, where you will find Kamil.  Attack him with fire spells up close and have protect from melee prayer on at all times.  He drops fairly fast, but watch your health, your prayer points and your Magic level.
 * Once he is dead, you need to follow a very hard to see path - on low detail it is all-but invisible. Travel west a little then north.  Then east, and north again until you can go no further, then west and south until you reach the edge of the ice ledge.
 * Put on your spiked boots and climb up the ledge. You will fall as you walk along the ice path and take damage.  Sipping a little super restore might help here, because you fall less often if your Agility level is higher.  Follow the ice path all the way to the top until you see the Troll's parents encased in ice.  Attack the cases with melee or magic (they have 10 Hitpoints each and are easier to melt with magic) and free the trolls.  Bring a extra super restore or two, othwerwise it's very hard to break. A runeless teleport is also essential.  Otherwise, your magic might be too low to teleport away.  After freeing the troll parents, they will take you back outside the gate and give you the ice diamond.

Smoke Diamond
Items needed for this section: Facemask (buy from any Slayer master), Ice gloves (see Heroes Quest), 5-10 Energy or super energy potions, Armour (dragonhide armour or other armour resistant to magic is recommended), Weapon, Tinderbox, and a small amount of food and prayer potions may be needed.
 * Take all of the items listed above and travel to the smoke well. It is marked on the world map; hug the cliffs on the west side of Pollnivneach and head south to find it.
 * Enter the well, in each of the four corners of this dungeon there are torches that you need to light using your tinderbox. Plan your route through the dungeon first, but then run and light all the torches, sipping energy potions as you run, and when all four are lit, go to the centre of the dungeon and open the Burnt chest that contains a key.
 * Once you have the key, there's no need to run any more. Stroll to the east part of the dungeon where there is a gate.  Use the key with the gate and Fareed will appear.
 * WARNING: WEAR ICE GLOVES NO MATTER WHAT TYPE OF COMBAT YOU ARE USING. If you do not, you will not be able to wield any sort of weapon or shield.
 * Fareed is ridiculously easy compared to the other 3 diamonds. It is unlikely you will need prayer potions at all against him.  Just use protect from melee prayer on him and kill him in whatever way you choose.   Protect from Melee is extremely important, however, because his Melee attacks can hit in the high 30s.  Although melee is very efficient, you can also use magic and water spells and watch him drop fast.  Magic resistant armour, such as studded leather will almost completely block out his magic attack.  He is weak enough against melee, but if you're planning on ranging, use ice arrows.
 * Once he is dead, he will drop the smoke diamond.

Shadow Diamond
Items needed for this section: 5-50 Lockpicks, Anti-poison potion, Sharks or better Food, Prayer potions, Runes to cast spells such as Entangle and Fire Wave, optional: Dragon dagger.


 * Travel west of the Fishing Guild to where there are several Moss Giants, just to the north of there is an fenced area and an NPC called Rasolo walking around this area. Talk to him and he says he will give you a ring of visibility if you get a gilded cross.
 * Take several lockpicks, an anti-poison potion, and some food to the Bandit camp in the desert south of Al-Kharid. In the southern tent is a Secure Chest, use your picklocks on it until you manage to open it and get a gilded cross.  There are three locks which you must get through, all of which reset themselves if any attempt should fail.  Each failure will use up a lockpick and will deal damage.  There is also a chance you may be poisoned, so do not underestimate the value of an anti-poison potion or food.  Pickpocketing the Bandits will sometimes give you lockpicks and antipoisons, so bring lots and pickpocket more when you run out.
 * Return to Rasolo and exchange the gilded cross for the visibility ring.
 * Go back to the bank and prepare for a hard fight. You should take
 * 1) Fire, Earth or preferably Lava Battlestaff (wielded)
 * 2) Death or blood runes.
 * 3) Air runes
 * 4) Nature runes, Earth runes and Water runes to cast Entangle or Snare spells.
 * 5) 6-8 Sharks or better Food.
 * 6) Ectophial
 * 7) Visibility ring (worn)
 * 8) Magical armour (worn), preferably Splitbark armour, but Mystic robes are fine. Anything with reasonably high melee defence and good magic bonuses will do.
 * 9) Optionally, a poisoned Dragon dagger or a dragon scimitar.
 * 10) The rest of your inventory should be full of four dose Prayer potions.
 * Back to where Rasolo is, and now that you're wearing the ring, you'll see a ladder in the fenced-off area. Go down the ladder and find your way through the dungeon from west to east to the chamber that contains Damis.  The best route is to travel east as far as you can, then north all the way, then east a short distance, then south all the way, then east to the chamber.  You will be attacked by level 80 Skeletons there, as well as Shadow hounds. It is a multi combat area, so all of them will attack you when you're spotted.
 * Use Earth Wave or Earth Blast. Damis is very weak to earth spells.
 * The chamber is large, but in the northwest corner is a safe-room, where you can hide from Damis and recover a little. You will be attacked by one of the Shadow hounds there. It is possible for skeletons or other shadow hounds to follow you in.  As soon as you enter the chamber, Damis should appear and attack you.
 * In his first form, Damis is extremely easy, just pray on him and cast spells until he drops.
 * In his second form, Damis drains prayer EXTREMELY FAST. Fast as in "50 prayer to 0 prayer in less than 10 seconds fast."  This is not a good situation to have, when you're in a multi-combat area being hit by level 80 Skeletons and level 63 Shadow hounds at the same time.  He will only drain your prayer if he is able to attack you so snaring him multiple times is quite effective.  Your prayer will be gone in literally seconds, and Damis hits in the high 20s regularly, making this extremely dangerous. Blocking him off with his own minions is a good idea to use, then range or mage him. The torches block neither the skeletons or the shadow dogs, or Damis for that matter! No matter what anyone says they do not work!
 * Use the safe room to recover whenever necessary. make sure not to use it for to long or else Damis may disapear.
 * Method one: Wield a dragon dagger (super poisoned) and use all of your special attack energy to land four special attacks on Damis whilst using a super attack and super strength potion. This is convenient as your prayer points will run out just after you have used your special attacks (based on a Prayer level of 50). Now, you can simply wait for Damis to die from the poison. Please be sure to attack him now and then or else he will get bored and leave. Then you would have to fight him all over!! Keep watching him; if the poison damage gets as low as 2, you will have to re-poison him as his healing rate now matches the poison damage. Once Damis dies and drops the smoke dimond, take it and teleport out using the Ectophial.




 * Method two: If you are familiar with Magic player killing, you will have no problems with this strategy. Essentially, you need to have protect from melee prayer on all the time to protect yourself from the Skeletons and Shadow Hounds. Entangle or Snare Damis, then cast the best offensive spell you can at him - the arena spells are good as well as earth wave and other spells.  Do not let Damis melee you at any time.  Run away, entangle, earth wave, and repeat.  Keep a close eye on your prayer points, health, etc.  Remember that you can always go into the safe-room to the north-west to recover.
 * Do not hesitate to teleport out if the fight is not going well. The entangle strategy, if done correctly, will mean you use around 2 prayer pots and no food.  However, if you're not experienced at magic pking, it may consume a lot more supplies.
 * Damis can walk through skeletons and shadow hounds but cannot pass through bats. If you can angle yourself correctly you can mage him from behind one.
 * If possible you can bring along a friend and they can attempt to block Damis. This is a commonly used strategy and is successful many times, although many people frown upon it.
 * Pick up the shadow diamond off his corpse when he drops and get out of there!
 * The NPC Rasolo can now sell you an odd assortment of items, and you can start the mini-quest to obtain the Ghostly robes here as well.

Pyramid
Items needed for this section: Strange fruit (Heal Poison, and restores energy by 30%), Food (sharks prefered), the 4 diamonds obtained in the previous sections. Optional: Prayer potions, Waterskin (4).


 * Go back to Eblis near the mirrors in the desert.
 * Go to the pyramid south of Eblis and place each of the four diamonds at the corners of the pyramid.
 * Enter at the top of the pyramid, you have to run down 4 floors, through Mummies and Scarab swarms which can poison.
 * At any point, you may be "trapped" and re-appear outside the base of the pyramid. This can get very annoying - most people make it through in 2-5 attempts, but it has been known to take over 30.  Having a high Agility level appears to lower the probability of being trapped and thrown outside the pyramid.
 * After making it all the way through, you will reach the pyramid altar. Speak to the spirit Azzanadra and complete the quest!!!
 * At any time you can pray at the altar and change between the standard and Ancient Magicks spellbooks. After completing the pyramid the first time, you may enter via the back-door of the pyramid to gain a short cut to the altar.
 * You can also buy an Ancient staff from Eblis once for 80,000 Coins. If you lose the staff, you will have to kill Mummies inside the pyramid to get another one.  The staff is tradeable.

Reward

 * 3 Quest Points
 * 20000 Magic experience
 * Ability to use Ancient Magicks.

Behind the Scenes

 * If one talks to the Archaeologist after the quest, he will tell one a story very similar to 'Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark''