Weapon Special attack

The Old School RuneScape Wiki also has an article on: osrsw:Special attacks

"Spec" redirects here. For the shield, see Spectral spirit shield.

This article is about special attacks as they are today. For the historical attacks, see Special attacks (historical).

Weapon Special attack
Release date	14 July 2014 (Update)
Members	Yes
Skill	Constitution
Level	10
Type	Special
Target	Varies
Adrenaline	Varies%
Equipment	Special attacks
Cooldown	0 seconds (0 ticks)
Description
Some of the most powerful weapons grant you unique special attacks.
Infobox • Talk page

Weapon Special attack is a Constitution ability that can only be used when specific weapons that have a special attack are equipped. It requires level 10 Constitution to use. The effect and adrenaline cost vary from weapon to weapon.

Essence of Finality, which requires the Essence of Finality amulet, is a more powerful version of this ability, allowing special attacks of the weapon stored in the amulet to be used with any weapon of the same style.

Normal combat mode

To activate Weapon Special attack, a weapon that possesses a special attack must be equipped. The ability is found in the Powers interface in the Constitution abilities tab. When wielding a weapon that has a special attack, the name of the ability changes to the name of the special attack for that weapon; however, the icon will always be the same. The player can also click on the adrenaline bar on the Action bar to activate a special attack. It is also possible to designate a keybind for Weapon Special attack in the options menu, which does not occupy any slot on any action bar. Special Attacks cannot be automatically activated by Revolution.

Each special attack requires a certain amount of adrenaline to use, which is also consumed on use. For example, the Korasi's sword's special attack, Disrupt, may only be used at 60% adrenaline, and once it is used, 60% adrenaline is drained. Unless stated otherwise, there are no cooldowns for using special attacks; the current exceptions that do have cooldowns between uses of special attacks are the special attacks of:

• Dark Shard of Leng (60 seconds)
• Ek-ZekKil (60 seconds)
• Fractured Staff of Armadyl (60 seconds)
• Seren godbow (30 seconds)
• Staff of darkness (90 seconds)
• Zaros godsword (60 seconds)

The Ring of vigour reduces both the adrenaline needed to perform a special attack and the final amount of adrenaline that is drained by 10%, and the Asylum surgeon's ring has a chance to reduce a special attack's adrenaline cost by 25%.

All special attacks that directly damage the opponent receive a hit chance boost. When using a special attack, your base hit chance is multiplied by $\left(1+{\frac {L-W}{100}}\right)$, where $L$ is the player's visible attack/range/magic level, and $W$ is the tier of the weapon the special attack is cast with. For example, if a player with level 99 magic is wielding a Guthix staff and has 50% hit chance on a target using normal abilities, the special attack's hit chance would be $50\%\times \left(1+{\frac {99-60}{100}}\right)=69.5\%$.

Some special attacks, like the Dragon dagger's "Puncture", have further effects on hit chance that happen after the above calculation. In the case of Puncture, it provides a 15% (multiplicative) increase. It is worth noting that special attacks can also have a negative impact on hit chance too, such as Magic shortbow's "Snap-Shot", which decreases hit chance by 30%.

Legacy combat mode

To use the special attack in Legacy combat mode, you can either click the adrenaline bar (Note: This refers to the bar itself rather than the sword icon which toggles auto-retaliate) or enable the Legacy interface mode; from there, the special attack bar can be found at the bottom of the Combat Settings menu.

The adrenaline bar restores at a rate of 10% every 30 seconds or 5 minutes for 100%.

Each special attack requires a certain amount of special attack energy to use, which is also consumed on use. For example, the Korasi's sword special attack, Disrupt, requires 60% special attack energy, and once it is used, 60% energy is drained.

Ability damage in Legacy combat mode

Because ability damage does not exist in Legacy combat, such a number is calculated and used with special attacks. This value is calculated as follows:

$D=1.166ad\times sm$

Where:

• $D$ is the result, worth 100% ability damage when using special attacks in Legacy
• $ad$ is the player's auto-attack damage with their main-hand or off-hand, as seen in the Loadout screen
• $sm$ is a multiplier that localises damage from weapons of different speeds:

  $s={\begin{cases}{\frac {96}{149}}\approx 0.644295&{\text{Average}}\\{\frac {960}{1225}}\approx 0.783673&{\text{Fast}}\\1&{\text{Fastest}}\\\end{cases}}$

If dual-wielding, the results from main-hand and off-hand are added together. Hence off-hands will increase the damage of main-hand special attacks, as they do in the modern combat system.

Important notice when comparing damages

When comparing damages between different special attack weapons, their tiers must be taken into consideration. For instance, even though the dragon halberd may have a higher average damage than the dragon dagger, it cannot be upgraded to its superior variant like a dragon dagger could be. Also, main-handed special attack weapons have a much larger advantage over two-handed special attack weapons, because an off-hand weapon can be a much higher tier than your main-hand. For instance, if a player used Korasi's sword (main-hand, tier 75) and an off-hand drygore mace (tier 90), that will deal much more damage than a Saradomin sword (tier 75), because the average tier of both weapons is greater than the Saradomin sword.

Another very important point is to consider the augmentability of the weapon. If the weapon is not augmentable, but is main-handed, then a suitable off-hand that is augmentable allows for powerful perks, such as Precise, to apply to the special attack. But for two-handed weapons (and dragon claws) which are not augmentable, they miss out on such perk benefits.

Additionally, special attacks which take longer than one game tick (0.6 seconds) to perform (such as dragon dagger, dragon claws, or dragon halberd), will either have to sacrifice some damage-enhancing perk on their augmentable offhand for an Aftershock switch, or in the case of dragon claws and the dragon halberd, forego the use of Aftershock completely.

Weapons that have a special attack

Melee weapons

Weapon	Name	Adrenaline	Max %	Min %	Avg %	Description	Animation
Abyssal vine whip	Vine Call	60%	430%	65%	247%	Strike the opponent for 20-100% damage, and summon a vine that hits the opponent 10 times for 125% of the user's accuracy, and deals 6.5-33% ability damage each hit. The attack can hit up to 3 enemies at once, so long as they are within range of the vine. The player is able to activate the vine whip special attack approximately 50 tiles away from the target. It is unknown if this is intentional.
Abyssal whip Lucky abyssal whip	Energy Drain	50%	100%	20%	60%	Cripple your opponent, stealing all your opponent's run energy.
Ancient mace Superior ancient mace	Favour of the War God	100%	200%	40%	120%	Attack ignores protection prayers and will recharge Prayer points by 10% of the weapon damage while draining your opponent's Prayer points the same amount.
Annihilation	Gravitate	60%	0%	0%	0%	For 30 seconds all successful attacks on your opponent(s) adds a stack (one stack per ability, or two stacks per Legacy Mode auto-attack), which increases your damage by 1% per stack (capping at 20%). All styled damage, such as Godbooks or Crackling will increase the amount of stacks, while non-styled damage such as Weapon poison will not increase stacks.
Armadyl godsword Lucky Armadyl godsword Golden Armadyl godsword	Armadyl's Judgement	50%	375%	95%	235%	Unleash the power of Armadyl, dealing one large powerful strike.
Bandos godsword Lucky Bandos godsword Golden Bandos godsword Superior honourable kyzaj Superior bloodied kyzaj	Warstrike	100%	350%	90%	220%	The enemy's Defence level is drained visibly according to the damage dealt, and their Defence rating is also drained like saps from the Ancient Curses. The Defence level drain appears to range from 0.5%-1% of the damage dealt (or 5%-10% of the damage dealt in Legacy), with lower damage draining closer to 1% (or 10% in Legacy). There seems to be a cap of 39 Defence levels drained in one special attack. Successive use of the special attack will result in drains of diminishing returns to any stats already drained but also drains to other combat skills such as Attack, Ranged and Magic and even prayer points.
Barrelchest anchor	Sunder	50%	150%	75%	112%	Swing the anchor with increased accuracy, randomly reduce your target's Defence, Attack, Ranged or Magic level. If defence is reduced, it also applies a debuff that increases the target's Affinity values by 4 for one minute.
Bone dagger	Backstab	75%	200%	80%	140%	Lowers your target defence proportional to the damage dealt, and applies a debuff that increases the target's Affinity values by 2 for one minute. Hitchance is increased by 100% when hitting unsuspecting targets.
Brackish blade	Rum'ify	75%	100%	20%	60%	Strike your opponent with double accuracy. Successful attacks will add 1.25% of the damage dealt to the wielder's Strength, Attack and Defence. For example if you hit 400, this means your Strength, Attack and Defence would all get a visible 5 level boost (1.25*400/100). The level boost caps at 3 + 10% of the stat's original level.
Brine sabre	Liquefy	75%	100%	20%	60%	Strike your opponent with double accuracy. Successful attacks will add 1.25% of the damage dealt to the wielder's Strength, Attack and Defence. For example if you hit 400, this means your Strength, Attack and Defence would all get a visible 5 level boost (1.25*400/100). The level boost caps at 3 + 10% of the stat's original level. Can only be used underwater.
Dark Shard of Leng	Icy Tempest	20%	0%	0%	0%	Imbue your weapon with the power of primordial ice. For 30s your hitcap is increased by 30%. 60s cooldown.
Darklight	Weaken	50%	Variable	Variable	Variable	Strike your target reducing their Attack, Strength and Defence by 5%. Against demons, this is twice as effective. See a much more in depth explanation on the Darklight's page.
Dragon 2h sword	Powerstab	50%	350%	230%	290%	Hit enemies surrounding you in 5x5 square.
Dragon battleaxe	Rampage	100%	0%	0%	0%	Do 20% more melee damage and boost your melee stats by a substantial amount, but reduce your hit chance and defence by 10% for a minute. For more information on the specifics of the dragon battleaxe special attack, visit its main page: Dragon battleaxe
Dragon claw & Off-hand dragon claw	Slice & Dice	50%	600%	184%	392%	Unleash four brutal claw slashes upon your opponent, dealing between 184%-600% ability damage in total. The value of the first hit determines what values the follow-up hits will deal. More information on the Dragon claw's page.
Dragon dagger	Puncture	25%	330%	170%	250%	Two quick slashes with increased accuracy and damage. The first slash hits 1 tick after activation, and the second slash hits 2 ticks after activation. Each slash deals 85 - 165% damage each.
Dragon halberd	Sweep	30%	380%	100%	240%	Swipe all targets in front of you (similar to Cleave, but with a larger area) twice, dealing 50-190% damage each hit, or 100-380% total per target.
Dragon hatchet Crystal hatchet	Clobber	30%	70%	0%	Variable	On hit apply a debuff that raises the affinity of the target by 3 for one minute, while lowering their defence and magic level by 10%. The minimum hit is 1. Note that the dragon hatchet has a tier rating of 30 when calculating for damage.
Dragon longsword	Draconic Cleave	25%	410%	90%	250%	An attack deals 90 to 410% ability damage. Features a raised hit-cap.
Dragon mace	Shatter	20%	310%	150%	230%	Deals a massive blow with 25% increased accuracy.
Dragon scimitar	Sever	25%	210%	50%	130%	On hit increases hit chance with slash attacks by 25% for 1 minute.
Dragon spear Zamorakian spear Lucky Zamorakian spear	Shove	25%	0%	0%	0%	Push back your opponent and stun them for 1.2 seconds, and binding them in place for 4.8 seconds.
Ek-ZekKil	Igneous Cleave	50%	190% (initial hit) 105% (initial bleed)	62% (initial hit) 30% (initial bleed)	126% (initial hit) 67.5% (initial bleed)	Slash at your target with fire and stone causing them to bleed. 60s cooldown. 62%-190% initial ability damage. Followed by 6 hits of 30%-105% ability damage every 2.4s over 14.4s. Damage from this effect increases by 5% with each hit. If the target is hit by a bleed or burn ability while affected by Igneous Cleave, they suffer an additional hit. (Max 5).
Granite maul	Quick Smash	50%	176%	35%	105%	Deal an instant strike, capable of being used mutiple times in 1 tick, ignoring the global cooldown. However, it does reset the global cooldown.
Keenblade	Critical Strike	75%	150%	100%	125%	Strike the enemy with 25% increased accuracy.
Korasi's sword	Disrupt	60%	320%	120%	220%	Damage all targets in a 3x3 square around you. The special attack is boosted by non-bleed modifiers such as void knight melee and berserk, and style-wide magic modifiers such as scrimshaw of the elements and metamorphosis boost the damage. This means that style-wide melee modifiers such as the berserker aura will not boost the damage done.
Lava whip	Get over Here!	75%	0%	0%	0%	Stuns and binds an NPC for 6 seconds. When used on a player, it will drag them to an adjacent tile near the user. This attack will work over blocked terrain (e.g a pool of water), but will not work if the user cannot see the target (e.g a wall). If a player is pulled from single way zone into a multiway zone in the wilderness then the multiway effect will be delayed by 10 seconds.
Noxious scythe	Mirrorback	100%	0%	0%	0%	Summon a mirrorback spider to take 50% of the damage directed to you for 10 seconds, up to a total of 10,000 damage. The mirrorback spider also reflects this damage back to your opponent.
Rune claws & Rune off hand claws	Impale	25%	150%	90%	120%	Impale your target. Note that even though the in-game description lists the range as 25 - 135%, the range is actually 90 - 150%.
Saradomin godsword Lucky Saradomin godsword Golden Saradomin godsword	Healing Blade	50%	275%	75%	175%	Heal 50% of the damage you deal and restores your prayer points by 2.5% of the damage you deal.
Saradomin sword Lucky Saradomin sword	Saradomin's Lightning	100%	350%	70%	212%	Smite your opponent with two hits: 30% - 175% melee damage and 30% - 175% magic damage. The magic hit is boosted by non-bleed modifiers such as void knight melee and berserk, and style-wide magic modifiers such as scrimshaw of the elements and metamorphosis boost the magic hit's damage. This means that style-wide melee modifiers such as the berserker aura will not boost damage from the magic attack.
Statius's warhammer Superior Statius's warhammer	Smash	35%	207%	83%	145%	Smash your opponent, lowering your opponent's Defence level by 30%. It also applies a debuff that increases the target's Affinity values by 5 for one minute. Simillar to the vesta's longsword special attack, Feint, Statius's warhammer clusters its damage near its mean, 145%.
Vesta's longsword Superior Vesta's longsword	Feint	25%	300%	50%	175%	Stab your target with a 25% higher chance to hit. This attack has variable minimum and maximum hits; the minimum between 50%-83% and maximum 150%-217% above said minimum. Overall it can hit between 50%-300%, but because of this players are less likely to hit spectacularly high or low.
Vesta's spear Superior Vesta's spear	Spear Wall	50%	75%	15%	50%	Damages all targets in a 3x3 square around you for 15-75% ability damage, and reflects 50% of any damage you receive back at attackers for 5 seconds.
Zamorak godsword Lucky Zamorak godsword Golden Zamorak godsword	Ice Cleave	60%	275%	75%	175%	Binds the target for 10 seconds.
Zaros godsword	Blackhole	50%	550%	275%	412%	Create a 7x7 black hole on the player's location that lasts for 21 seconds (35 game ticks). When the player stands in the black hole, their melee damage is increased by 25% (excluding bleeds like Dismember and Slaughter), and if their target enters the black hole, it takes 25 to 50% ability damage every 1.8 seconds, with a total of 11 hits if the target is in the black hole for the whole duration. Berserk overrides the special attack; they do not stack, and this special attack has a 60 second cooldown.

Ranged weapons

Weapon	Name	Adrenaline	Description	Animation
Bow of the Last Guardian	Balance by Force	30%	Hits for 175-375% damage and decreases the number of stacks you need to trigger the passive to 4 for 30 seconds.
Dark bow	Descent of Darkness	65%	A powerful double attack that hits twice for 148-338% ability damage each, or 296-676% total.
Decimation	Locate	50%	All of your attacks hit all available targets in the 3x3 area around your main target (i.e. all of your attacks become area-of-effect attacks) for 10 seconds.
Eldritch crossbow	Split Soul	25%	Causes the Soul Split curse to, instead of healing the player, damage the player's target for 4 times the amount of life points it would have healed.
Guthix bow	Balanced Shot	55%	Deals 150% weapon damage to your opponent and heals the same amount of damage you would have dealt over time. When Guthix arrows are equipped, a random chance of dealing 100% in earth damage.
Hand cannon	Aimed Shot	50%	Fire a shot which deals 30-200% weapon damage and has 75% greater accuracy, but takes longer to aim. There is a chance that the hand cannon will explode and be destroyed.
Magic composite bow Magic shieldbow	Powershot	35%	A powerful attack with 20% increased weapon damage and accuracy.
Magic shortbow	Snap-Shot	55%	A quick double attack that reduces your accuracy by 30% but deals 20-200% weapon damage each shot.
Morrigan's javelin Superior Morrigan's javelin	Phantom strike	50%	Inflicts a bleed on the opposing player that will deal 100% of the damage dealt. Against non-player opponents this will deal 20% extra damage.
Morrigan's throwing axe Superior Morrigan's throwing axe	Hamstring	50%	Deal 20% extra damage and increase the enemies run energy drain rate for a minute.
Noxious longbow	Mirrorback	100%	Summon a mirrorback spider to lower and reflect damage by 50% for 10 seconds (up to 10,000 lifepoints worth).
Quickbow	Twin Shot	75%	Fire two arrows with 25% increased accuracy for 100-150% weapon damage.
Rune throwing axe	Chain-hit	10%	Throw an axe which hits its target then bounces up to 3 nearby targets for up to 100% weapon damage each.
Saradomin bow	Restorative Shot	55%	Deal 100% weapon damage to your opponent and heals twice the amount of damage over time. When Saradomin arrows are equipped, a random chance of dealing 100% in water damage.
Seercull	Soulshot	60%	Lowers your target's magic level based on damage dealt.
Seren godbow	Crystal Rain	30%	Five arrows are launched into the air with the first arrow always landing and dealing damage one tick before the remaining arrows. If the first arrow splashes, then all five arrows will splash. The first arrow always has an opportunity to land; the others may not have this opportunity as they need to land on a game square occupied by the target.
Strykebow	Deep Burn	25%	12.5% of stored damage will be released in the form of a rapid damage over time attack that will last for 4.8 seconds.
Zanik's crossbow	Defiance	50%	Deals 70-150% weapon damage.
Zamorak bow	Twin Shot	55%	Fire your bow, dealing 200% weapon damage against your opponent. When Zamorak arrows are equipped, a random chance of dealing 100% in fire damage.

Magic weapons

Weapon	Name	Adrenaline	Description	Animation
Armadyl battlestaff	Tempest of Armadyl	50%	Perform a barrage of magical attacks at your opponent.
Fractured Staff of Armadyl	Instability	50%	Launch an unstable blast at your target for 50-200% weapon damage. For 30 seconds, each time you land a critical strike against your opponent, your staff will fire off an extra spell.
Guthix staff	Claws of Guthix	25%	Call upon the divine energy of Guthix to perform a powerful magical attack, on a successful hit it deals 140%-300%(220% on average) ability damage and lowers your opponents Defence by 5%.
Iban's staff	Iban Blast	25%	A powerful attack dealing 100-250% spell damage.
Mindspike	Rune Flame	75%	Blast your target with 25% increased accuracy for 100-150% weapon damage.
Noxious staff	Mirrorback	100%	Summon a mirrorback spider to lower and reflect damage by 50% for 10 seconds (up to 10,000 lifepoints worth).
Obliteration	Devour	100%	For 10 seconds, when your opponent heals themselves, it will only heal for 50% of the amount it normally would.
Penance trident Penance master trident	Reap	50%	Strike your target for 25-200% active spell damage. (However, it actually deals 60%-200% of the player's ability damage.)
Saradomin staff	Saradomin strike	25%	Call upon the power of Saradomin to perform a powerful magical attack, on a successful hit it deals 140%-300%(220% on average) ability damage and lowers the target's Prayer points.
Staff of darkness	Power of Darkness	100%	Absorbs and reflects 25% of all incoming damage for the next 20 seconds.
Staff of light	Power of Light	100%	Reduce all melee damage by 50% for the next minute.
Staff of Sliske	From the Shadows	50%	A shadow clone is summoned from the Shadow Realm that attacks your target five times, dealing 20-100% ability damage each attack.
Zamorak staff	Flames of Zamorak	25%	Call upon the power of Zamorak to perform a powerful magical attack, on a successful hit it deals 140%-300%(220% on average) ability damage and lowers your opponents Magic by 5%.
Zuriel's staff Superior Zuriel's staff	Miasmic Barrage	100%	Deal a powerful 200% 3x3 area of effect attack and slow your opponent's' attack speed down for 15 seconds. Also halves their adrenaline gain for 15 seconds.

Update history

This information has been compiled as part of the update history project. Some updates may not be included—see here for how to help out!

• ninja 31 October 2022 (Update):
  • Some special attack tooltips that were not accurate to their effects have been updated to better reflect their use.

• patch 3 October 2022 (Update):
  • Special attacks no longer have an internal cooldown matching the player's attack speed. This allows special attacks to be cast back-to-back when using slow weapons.

• patch 19 July 2021 (Update):
  • Special Attack energy will no longer be decreased by 5% when leaving combat while in Legacy Combat mode.

• patch 17 May 2021 (Update):
  • Fixed an issue where the Seren Godbow's special attack debuff was cleared too quickly.

• patch 30 November 2020 (Update):
  • Using a Special Attack from the action bar without a weapon equipped will no longer cause players to disconnect.

• ninja 23 November 2020 (Update):
  • Special attacks that require no target can now be activated using the Constitution special attack ability from both the Ability Book and the Action Bar.
  • The Zaros Godsword and the Eldritch Crossbow have been added to the list of weapons that can be activated without a target. The full list is as follows:
    • Staff of Light
    • Staff of Darkness
    • Dragon Battleaxe
    • Zaros Godsword
    • Eldritch Crossbow

• hotfix 24 August 2020 (Update):
  • Players can no longer use an Essence of Finality to cast a channelled weapon special attack, then switch to another Essence of Finality with a different weapon's special attack to trigger that on the same global cooldown cycle.

• patch 3 April 2018 (Update):
  • The special attacks refund will no longer be affected by adrenaline boosts.

• hotfix 10 April 2017 (Update):
  • Fixed an issue with performing melee weapon special attacks for no adrenaline cost.

• patch 7 April 2015 (Update):
  • Players are no longer able to perform higher-cost special attacks at a lower cost by switching weapons in PvP combat.

• patch 16 March 2015 (Update):
  • Resolved an issue in which borrowed dragon daggers would only deal one hit - rather than two - when using the Puncture special attack.

• patch 5 January 2015 (Update):
  • The magic shortbow special attack is no longer accessible on free-to-play worlds.

• patch 28 July 2014 (Update):
  • Lent items now use the relevant special attack correctly.
  • Special attack energy now restores correctly within certain areas in Legacy mode.
  • The special attack bar no longer drains if target is too far away.
  • The Enhanced Excalibur special attack no longer persists in duels where the option is disabled.
  • The ancient mace special attack now correctly drains prayer again.

• patch 22 July 2014 (Update):
  • The Staff of Light special attack will no longer give the berserk effect when it runs out in legacy mode.
  • Using the Unicorn Stallion scroll (Healing Aura) will no longer drain special attack in legacy mode.

• update 14 July 2014 (Update):
  • Constitution ability "Weapon Special attack" added to game.

• patch 11 April 2012 (Update):
  • The "Special attack" button no longer appears to switch off when selected and the bar recharges.

• patch 12 October 2011 (Update):
  • The special attack tool tip now disappears correctly when switching weapons.

• patch 2 November 2010 (Update):
  • The dwarf handcannon now has a sound effect for its special attack.