Section 1: Overview
This is the most challenging area of the God Wars Dungeon. Before even considering visiting this section, I’d recommend you read the above sections, and attempt a few other bosses in the God Wars Dungeon.
Commander Zilyana (Lvel-596) attacks with both melee and magic. Similar to General Graardor, her secondary attack, a lightning bolt resembling the Saradomin Sword’s special attack strikes everyone in the room. However, it is devastatingly more accurate, and you can not possibly muster enough magic defense to halt it, so everyone will be using protection from magic. Commander Zilyana’s melee attack is the most powerful of any GWD boss’s attacks. While it’s max hit is 31, versus every other boss being able to hit over 40 damage with their melee attacks, it is devastatingly accurate. Whilst with +350 more defense and 99 defense combined, Graardor’s melee attack usually misses at least half the time, Commander Zilyana will still usually hit you 3 out of 4 times. Also, Zilyana is ridiculously fast. Her attack rate is approximately equivalent to that of darts. Finally, due to the fancy graphics for her two attacks, you often can not see where she is really standing (more on this later.)
Before making your actual attempt, it is recommended you visit the God Wars Dungeon wearing a Saradomin item, and bringing 2 ropes. Head southeast, where you will find a place to attach the rope. Climb down the rope, run south, and you will find another spot for a rope. Attach the second one and teleport. This way, for your trip later, you will not need to waste 2 inventory spaces. You will need 70 agility to do this. Agility potions, Spicy Stew, and Summer Pie DO NOT WORK.
Here is a sample inventory and setup to fight Zilyana.
Sample Inventory
There are many, many good arrangements for fighting Commander Zilyana. When designing your own, keep these points in mind:
- You want a slower weapon. If you do not have a Godsword, use full Veracs.
- Ranging does work, but I highly recommend using diamond bolts
- You want to maximize your attack bonus, your slash defense bonus, and your prayer bonus.
- By now you should have an idea of the gear expected. If you can’t use, say, barrow gloves or a torags plate, then you should really go to another boss, or earn some more money and level up more before attempting this
- This REQUIRES a Saradomin and Zamorak item. If you are ranging, blessed Dragonhide works well.
Skillwise, I recommend:
For Warriors
90+ Attack
80+ Strength
90+ Defense
90+ Hitpoints
70+ Prayer
For Rangers
90+ Range
90+ Defense
90+ Hitpoints
70+ Prayer
Your inventory should always include either 2 super attacks and strengths or 3 ranging potions. Also, purple sweets come in very handy. Buy them off the grand exchange if you can’t get enough from clue scrolls. You want 5-6 Super Restore Potions depending on your prayer level, and at least 8 Saradomin Brew. The rest of your inventory should be food.
Good Saradomin Items
Saradomin Stole, Saradomin Blessed D’Hide, Saradomin Cloak, Saradomin Cape, Holy Symbol, Saradomin God sword if you are a Warrior.
Good Zamorak Items
Zamorak Stole, Zamorak Blessed D’hide, Zamorak Cloak, Zamorak Cape, Unholy Symbol, Unholy Book for Rangers
Section 2: The Killcount… Again
Hopefully you know the routine by now. The first barrier for this boss requires 70 agility + 2 ropes. However, the ropes only need to be brought once. Afterwards you will no longer need items. The second barrier will require you to kill 40 Saradomin soldiers. Unlike Bandos and Zamorak, there are no weak Saradomin minions for you to kill. The map below shows the three best spots to kill the minions. Attack them ONLY when they are attacking a Zamorak minion. Spiritual Mages are particularly good as they drop dragon boots, and only do 1 damage max to the Zamorak monsters. If you do not have 83 slayer, kill Priests and Warriors. Do not, on any account, try to kill a Spiritual Ranger. They do a ridiculous amount of damage, meaning they will likely kill it’s Zamorak enemy, before making you waste several pieces of food.
The two blue dots indicate the locations of the ropes.
Good KC Locations
Like any other boss, procure your 40 kills in a timely and efficient fashion, and proceed to the next portion of the guide.
Section 3: The Final Battle
Here it is again. This is your last chance to turn back, if you get cold feet, a team mate leaves, etc. If you don’t back out, it’s time for the plunge. Everyone turn on protect magic, activate your buffs (Piety, super sets or range potion), and enter.
As I mentioned earlier in the guide, you simply can not stand toe to toe with Commander Zilyana. Even with maximum melee defense and defense level, her melee attacks will shred you. If you go with maximum magical defense and magic and defense levels with protection from melee, her lighting bolts will incinerate you. They still hit a good 80% of the time through all that defense.
Understanding that, it’s time for some strategy. The idea is to keep a good distance between yourself and Commander Zilyana if you are her target. The way the AI works, if you run from her, and Zilyana can not attack you for about 5 seconds (because she can’t catch up) she will turn around and attack the next person to hit her.
When she is targeting someone else, you have roughly 6-8 seconds to do damage, more if your team mate messes up and gets attacked. However, be ready at any second to run if she turns towards you. If you’re even half a second too slow, she can carve 50-70 hitpoints off of you before you start moving.
When Your Ally is the Target…
And when it’s your turn…
This boss takes a lot of attention, can be a bit stressful, and is very, very dangerous. Of all the GWD Bosses, she is the only one who has ever killed me, and she has done so twice. Do not underestimate her, and do not, on any account, throw caution to the winds and try to stand still for a few blows to finish her.
Remember I mentioned graphic lag earlier? Well, I’ll explain how it works really quick. Basically, whenever an action is taken, the game responds by displaying a certain graphic: For example, enchant jewelry. When the actual spell is finished, the graphic may still be in effect. That’s why if you click somewhere while casting the spell, your character will run really fast after. If you cast high level alchemy, you will notice your character continues walking while casting it. That’s because a graphic has been added for the spell while moving.
Zilyana’s melee attacks have a movement graphic. Her magic attacks do not. That means, every time she uses her magic attack, while she doesn’t actually stop moving, she appears to do so. The result of this is that you often can’t tell where she really is just by looking at her. If this is the case, look at the people attacking her:
Graphic Lag
It can get a LOT worst than that, and occasionally, it self corrects by teleporting Zilyana. Don’t be caught by surprise.
It is common to run out of energy halfway through the fight in later rounds. That’s what purple sweets are for, the heal 10% energy, a couple hitpoints, and only take up one space. VERY effective. In addition, Zilyana’s minions also drops summer pies which heal 22 hitpoints as well as restoring some energy.
If all goes well, after a couple minutes, you should be able to bring Zilyana down. Once this happens, like with any other boss, all the minions will target whoever dealt the last hit. However, there is a trick here to assist with that situation. Running to the southern wall will cause Bree the Centaur (Range) to stop attacking you. Running to the north wall will cause Starlight the Unicorn (Melee) to stop attacking you. Growler the Lion (Mage) will attack you no matter what. After shaking off Bree or Starlight, proceed to kill the other one since he is still doing damage to you (You should still be using protection from magic). After that, help your teammates kill the one you shook off, then finish off Growler.
Go Away Bree!
After all is said and done, stand along the south wall to await Zilyana’s return.
Loading, Please Wait
Congratulations. You have defeated arguably the hardest and most dangerous boss in Runescape.
Of course, it might not go that well.
Like I said before, this is DANGEROUS. Go in only if you accept the fact you will probably die once or twice fighting her in your career. If you do die, hopefully, your team will be able to bless your grave. If this is the case:
Step 1: Quickly withdraw a quick, powerful weapon for fighting monsters. Abyssal whip is the best of the best for this.
Step 2: Bring plenty of super attack, super strength, and prayer potions. You will need to get your 40 kills quickly, and you will not have time to wait for a Spiritual mage to decide to kill a werewolf; your items are at stake!
Step 3: Get brews so you can actually get your items without dying. Also, if your team teleported out after, hopefully one of them will be able to come with you.
Step 4: Kill the monsters. If you have a friend with you, leave them after you remove 2/3 of a monsters hp and let your friend finish it.
If you are helping a friend save his stuff, be careful not to steal his kills!
Step 5: Go in, and grab your items. Keep protect magic on, and use your brews liberally. If Zilyana catches up, run to a corner, then run straight north or south to create a gap so you have more time to retrieve your items.
Step 6: Teleport out. USE A TABLET. Saradomin Brews will drain your magic level.
A Few Extra Tips and Tricks
- Don’t bother with special weapons. If your using a god sword, fine. But a DDS or Dragon Halberd is a waste of space.
- Peaches and Guthan’s do not work very well here. Zilyana simply does too much damage, too quickly and it’s unsafe to rely on inconsistent or low healing items.
- If you can’t afford sweets, look at the other various guides on the Tip.It forums for clue guides. Clues give a good amount of sweets, and you usually don’t use very many.
- If Jagex does not make allowances for supply sharing, remember to bring 20k-25k in cash so you can trade the monkfish and summer pie drops. Also, Zilyana herself drops 3 Saradomin Brews (3) + 3 Super Restore Potion (4). The perfect monster hunting combination. She also drops prayer potions.
- If your team is well experienced and you think you can afford it, exchange a brew for a combat potion. It will increase the speed you kill her after you use up your super attacks and strengths.
- Remember that Black Dragonhide has better melee defense than Karil’s. Use Blessed D’hide or Armadyl, not Karil’s.
- Keep your hitpoints above 60. Always. Zilyana will demolish you in mere seconds if you don’t. Keep energy above 40%, and keep prayer at 40+ points. Follow these three rules and you should be able to stay among the living.
- Remember that you can only leave 3k worth of drops on the ground that your team mates can see, and that super restore + prayer potions are both worth more. Pick them up and trade them.
- Use a slow spawning world for your first few trips.
- You can bring someone specifically to use guthans and bones to peaches, combined with heal other and energy transfer. If you do this, make sure he or she stays on the south wall until Zilyana has chosen a target. As long as he or she uses protection from magic and never attacks Zilyana, they're safe.