OSRS Nechryaels and Greater Nechryaels Guide

OSRS / By / / 17 minutes of reading
Table of Contents

Nechryaels are a pretty strange kind of monster. They are, as far as I know, the only regular non-boss mob that can spawn other monsters to fight for them. The death spawn is pretty weak, but can still kill distracted adventurers if they are not careful. 

They are 1×1 size, and you need to have level 80 slayer to fight them. They do not have any immunities or a strange mechanic like the Gargoyle where you can’t kill them without a certain item. There are safe spots wherever you choose to kill them.

If you are going to kill them for your drops, you are going to be pretty disappointed. The only drop really worth it, are the rune boots if you are playing as an IronMan. There are however the Greater Nechryaels you can kill in the catacombs of Kourend. These drop a lot more stuff that is worth making the trip. While you won´t get rich killing these, you will make some decent money in the long run if you are grinding these. 

Where Can I find Nechryaels?

There are two kinds of Nechryaels that you can kill. These are the regular ones and the greater Nechryaels. I am going to split this chapter up into two parts, so you do not get confused or misread where the ones you want to kill are. 

Regular Nechryaels

There is only one spot where you can kill the regular version. You can find them in the Slayer Tower. If you have achieved level 80 slayer, I am sure you know where it is. If you do not, open up your map and look at the River Salve, to the north you will find the tower. 

There are a couple of ways to get there fast. There is a teleport tab you can use from the Arceuus Spellbook which is the easiest method without a lot of requirements. You can also get your dramen or lunar staff and use the nearby fairy ring to teleport there. 

The fastest way of all, is using a slayer ring. This will get you straight at the entrance. You will need to have a decent crafting level and the slayer ring perk unlocked. Buying the rings straight up with slayer points is not worth it in my opinion. 

When you get to the tower, there are two spots you can kill them. The first spot is the spot everyone knows, the top floor. This is a bit far if your agility is not high enough to take the shortcuts to get to there.

My favorite spot when I go and kill them and I want to do normal Nechryaels is in the basement. There are 12 spots where they spawn down there, and it is never crowded. 

The cold hard facts about regular Nechryaels is, they are not worth it. The Greater Nechryaels have much better drops and can be killed much easier with magic, but more on that later. 

Greater Nechryaels

The Catacombs of Kourend is my favorite spot to kill these Nechryaels. The ones you find here are the greater variant. You will need to do a short quest to get here. There are 2 chambers in the Dungeon where you can kill them. There are 14 of them in total there. However, since this is such a great spot, it is often pretty crowded here. Killing them here with magic is going to be a great idea, as you will make a profit and get some decent money. 

Another option is the Iorwerth Dungeon. If you aren’t familiar with this dungeon, that is because it is relatively new. It was released in 2019, and you can access it after the Song of the Elves quest. This is one of the hardest – and longest  by a very wide margin – in Old School RuneScape. I have not killed many great Nechryaels here, since I prefer the catacombs. The good thing about this spot is if you want crystal shards, you will get plenty this way. 

What Do Regular and Greater Nechryaels Drop That Are Worth Picking Up?

Again, I am going to split this into the two variants. All the drops that you should pick up at the regular Nechryaels you should also consider picking up at the Greater Nechryaels. Make sure you have your high alchemy runes with you when killing them, no matter the variant. They have quite some drops that can add up and are worth alching on the spot for maximum profits. 

Regular Nechryaels

An average Nechryael kill is worth about 5K, which is pretty good. So you won´t leave empty-handed if you have a large task ahead. 

Malicious Ashes – These are a pretty new drop, they replace the regular ashes demons used to drop. They give some prayer experience if you scatter them, and can really add up if you pick them all up and scatter them. 

Rune 2H sword – They drop rune 2h swords at a rate of one in 29 on average. That is pretty good. These are very worthwhile picking up and alching them. You will get 37k or more when you alch them. 

Rune Full Helm – This is a good drop to get if you want to add to your cash pile. They are worth 20k each and alch for that much, so picking them up is a must!

Adamant kiteshield – These have pretty low priority on the pickup list, but are still worth it. They alch for about 3k each, and make you a bit of money in the long run. However, I wouldn’t start juggling with your inventory. 

Rune boots – These are worth only 7k to regular players, but for an IronMan account these are extremely important. It is the best footwear you will be able to get for melee until you unlock spectral mages at level 83 for dragon boots. If you have a pair already, or if you 

Runes – They drop quite some runes that are worth it to pick up. They drop 37 chaos runes with a one in 14.5 chance per kill. They also drop a good amount of death runes, 5 or 10 at a time in about one out of 20 kills. Furthermore, they also drop law runes and blood runes pretty often in high numbers. You can get 35 law runes and 20 blood runes at once, which is quite a lot and really adds up pretty fast. 

Seeds – The regular Nechryaels drop quite a lot of seeds. There are a few that can really give the loot you take back to your bank a nice boost. The ones you need to look out for are Torstol seeds; these are worth up to 43k, and you can get two drops at once. Another good seed drop is Snapdragon Seed. They can drop two at a time, and they are worth up to 60k each, depending on market prices. Another seed that they sometimes drop is the Snape Grass Seed. These are worth about 2 to 3k each, and there are 3 to 6 in a single drop. 

Clue scroll – They also drop hard clue scrolls. I really enjoy solving them, so I make sure I do not have one on my bank before I go to the nechs. 

Greater Nechryaels 

The drops that the Greater Nechryaels have been a bit better than the regular variant. While they are much harder to kill with melee, they are pretty easy to kill with magic. The most important thing to bring if you are using ancient magic, is nothing! Your item should be as empty as possible, this way you will be able to pick up as much as you can. 

A greater Nechryael kill is worth on average 6100 GP and 7600 GP on a Konar slayer task. This is around 20% more than a regular Nechryael. Considering that the average task is somewhere around 180 and 230 monsters to kill, you will make about a mil per task. 

Rune axe – If you are killing greater Nechryaels you are going to get quite a lot of these as a drop. You should pick them up if you have the inventory space for them. It will get you 7k a piece. This really adds up over a while. 

Rune square shield – This is one of the better drops you can get, and you get them very consistently. In a slayer task of about 200 Greater Nechryaels it isn’t uncommon to get 15 of these. They are worth 22k each, so definitely pick these up. 

Rune medium helm – A very decent drop that you should pick up. They are 11k each and they drop quite often. 

Mystic air staff – These are pretty nice to have as a drop. They are worth 25k each a piece, and you will get 4 or 5 in a task. Pick them up. 

Rune chain body – A very solid armor drop, but you won’t get them very often. They are worth the most, as the greater Nechryaels do not drop Rune 2H swords. You should definitely make room in your inventory for those. 

Runes – The best thing about Greater Nechryaels is that they drop a lot of runes, even more so than their regular version. They also have a soul rune drop to their drop table. 

Wine of Zamorak – They drop 3 noted wines of Zamorak quite often. It isn’t a special drop, but since they are noted and thus only take a single inventory spot you can pick them up if you have the space for it. 

Greater Nechryaels Tertiary Drops 

These are drops that are pretty useful in the end game and another strong argument why you should kill greater Nechryaels and not the regular ones. 

Ancient shard – The ancient shard is very useful for the Arclight which is strong against demons. It is one of the best weapons to use against the Catacombs mighty end boss Skotizo, the Zamorakian general. 

Totem pieces – If you kill them in the catacombs, you have a 1 out of 295 change of getting a totem piece. There are 3 in total, and you need to combine all three of them to get access to the hidden boss of the Catacomb of Kourend dungeon, Skotizo. This boss has very nice drops, so definitely collect them! 

How to Kill These Monsters

It is kind of getting a trend in this guide, but I have split them up once again. While the monsters are pretty similar, due to their location and defensive stats there is a fundamentally different approach needed in killing them. I am of the opinion that the Greater Nechryaels are almost always going to be a better pick to kill than the regular once. However, if you really insist on killing them with melee, and you have the hard or elite diary completed for the slayer exp bonus in the slayer tower, they can be kind of worth it. 

How to Kill Regular Nechryaels

If you are going to kill the regular once, I suggest you use melee. Range is pretty slow, and a magic spell that only hits one Nechryael is going to be too slow and too expensive. There are two ways you can kill them, either you bring out your best prayer armor – Proselyte is a great choice – or bring a very defensive armor. 

If you are going to go kill them with prayer, I suggest you bring about 15 prayer potions. You do not need any defense bonus, but you should bring something that can heal you. Nechryaels spawn creatures which hit through your prayer.  The best thing you could bring is a Saradomin Godsword. When you hit damage, you will heal 50% of the damage you deal and gain 25% of the damage in prayer points. A full special attack bar can do a special attack twice. However, it is possible that this is not enough, it is advised to bring some decent food that you can munch on just in case. At least sharks are needed. 

The other way to kill them with melee is to prioritize defense. I suggest you get out your Guthans barrow armor set and wear the plate skirt and plate body. The helm and spear should be in your inventory. Killing them this way will require you to bring some food, a few prayer potions and a super combat potion. If you have the money, make sure you have a Saradomin Godsword in your inventory. The special attack is going to come in very handy, and might prolong your trip enough to stay for your entire task. 

Here too, you are going to need to bring sharks or better. If you bring monks, you are not going to be able to stay the whole task. While the difference between 16 hp and 20 hp is not a lot, it does add up to over 80 hp if you bring 20 sharks instead of 20 monks. 

For both melee styles, your best weapon should be your main DPS. This can be a rapier, a whip, or something similar. do not bring your DFS, a dragon or avernic defender is going to be better because killing monsters faster than they kill you is the best defense strategy in OSRS. 

How to Kill Greater Nechryaels

There is only one really viable way to kill Greater Nechryaels in Old School. You have to use ancient magic like Ice Burst and Ice Barrage. These two moves can attack 8 greater Nechryaels at once. You will often see exp drops of over 400 exp by killing them with magic. 

The gear you should wear should be focussed on dealing magic damage and increase your prayer bonus. You can wear proselyte armor due to their very weak magic defense. Your accuracy will not suffer if you have a negative or near negative magic bonus. 

Your inventory should have 3 prayer potions and a house tab to go to your house if your inventory has been filled up. You will get a lot of rune drops, as you have seen from the drop table. They are worth it to pick up and store in your bank. You aren’t going to be able to alch them since you are in the ancient magic spellbook. 

This method only has advantages in my opinion. This is why I advise you to use this method over killing the slightly weaker

The first major advantage is that since you can kill and attack up to 8 monsters at once, this task flies by. The Nechryael task in the slayer tower is very slow, so if you want to add some extra slayer points to your tally in a fast manner, this works very well. 

The second advantage is how much exp an hour this method is. It is one of the fastest ways to train your magic, slayer and hitpoints in the game. The only slayer monster that is faster is the smoke devil. The amount of exp you can get in one hour varies depending on your concentration, and if you are using ice barrage or ice burst. I think ice barrage is worth it. You can get up to 300k magic exp an hour and over 70k of slayer exp. 

The third advantage is that despite you using pretty expensive spells that cost a lot of runes, it is completely free and you even make a small profit if you use barrages. This is due to their very generous and consistent drop table. You do need to pick up most of the drops I mentioned in the beginning of the guide to make sure you walk away with a profit. You won’t get rich using this method, as you will only net about 100 to 120k per hour using magic. 

Conclusion: You Should Kill Great Nechryaels Over Normal Ones

If you can not decide if you should kill the normal version or the greater version of these monsters, I strongly advise you to pick the greater ones. The regular ones are fine if you want to train your melee and want to pick up the slayer bonus in the slayer tower you get after completing the hard and elite diary. 

Killing the greater version of them in the catacombs is going to be a lot more effective and is going to save you a lot of hours. If you kill them with ancient magic, and use the ice barrage spell, you are going to kill them 5 times faster than if you are using melee. That is a massive time save. Yes, you will get less profit out of your task, but the hours you save can be used for much better monsters that have a much higher GP an hour if you kill them consistently. 

The final thing I want to say about these monsters is that they are great to get shards and totem pieces. Make sure you pick those up, because they are going to add up very fast. Since the totem gives you access to Skotizo, you are going to make a bit more money from the drops you get from him to ensure you at least break even. 

Frequently Asked Questions About Nechryaels in Old School Runescape

Question: Can I use ice burst or ice barrage on Nechryaels in the slayer tower?

Answer: Yes, you can burst them. However, I would strongly advise you to save your money and runes for something else. The slayer tower is single combat, so despite those spells being multi combat spells that can hit multiple targets at once, you can only fight one nechryael at a time. The slayer tower is much better if you are going to kill Nechryaels with melee. 
This is going to be a lot slower than using melee. If you want to burst these monsters, you will have a much better time just going to the catacombs of Kourend and fight them there with ancient magic. This is a multi combat zone, and you can attack up to 8 at a time there. 
The drops there are also very good. If you burst them with ice burst, you will almost always have a pretty decent profit at the end of your task. If you barrage them you might have a slight loss or you will break even depending on how concentrated you are and which drops you pick up. 

Question: What are nechryarch and how should you fight them? 

Answer: If you have unlocked the slayer perk, Bigger and Badder, you are going to come across superior slayer monsters on some tasks. One of these monsters that spawn superior slayer monsters are Nechryaels. They spawn Nechryarch. This is a pretty strong superior, who has the backup of 3 chaotic death spawns that each attack with a different combat style. If you aren’t paying attention or if you do not have a lot of hit points left, you can easily get sent back to Lumbridge in under a minute. 
The best way to kill them in my opinion is by using ancient magic. If you do not have some good food on you, you will need to use a blood burst or blood barrage spell. If you hit them, the spawns, and any other Nechryaels around, you can out heal the damage you get dealt pretty easily. It is advisable that you bring at least a single shark in case you have bad luck with your hits. 
You can kill them with melee, but you are going to have to use quite a lot of food. If you do not have food with you and one spawns, I am going to suggest to you that you just run away or try to bank as soon as possible and try to make it back with food. If you are fighting without food, you are going to die, even at maxed combat.  
I advise you to not attack the chaotic death spawns at all. Focus everything you have on the Nechryarch and kill it as soon as possible. The death spawns will despawn automatically once you have killed the superior slayer monster.

Question: What mage armor should I wear when I am bursting Nechryaels?

Answer: If you are going to burst these monsters, and you have a lot of money, I suggest you wear ancient robes or the kodai mage armor. The damage boost the skirt and the robe top give you add up quite nicely, and since you are attacking 8 at one you will see a decent increase in experience an hour. These robes are very expensive however, so for some people it is better to bring an alternative.
Do not bring mystic or Ahrims if you can not afford Kodai mage armor. Due to the very low defense bonus these monsters have, you will not gain any significant accuracy when using magic to kill them. It is a much better idea to bring a prayer boosting armor. This way, you do not have to bring as many prayer potions for your protected melee, and you will be able to save an inventory spot for drops. 

Question: What spells should I bring when going to the Catacomb of Kourend Nechryaels

Answer: You will have to bring two types of spells to make sure you are going to survive. Both of these are in the ancient magicks spellbook. You will need ice and blood spells. These will have to be either ice burst, ice barrage, blood burst or blood barrage. 
Your ice spells will be needed to deal the majority of your damage. The spells deal a little more damage and are cheaper to cast. The blood spells are going to be necessary to make sure you do not die. While your protected melee spells will cover the damage Nechryaels do, their spawns can hit through it.
While they only hit 1 or 2 at a time, it quickly adds up. Using a blood spell every few casts will make sure you can stay the entire trip and will save you inventory spaces that would have been used for food otherwise. 

References:

Looking for more interesting things? Check out:

Latest posts by Tom Goemaere (see all)

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top