The Fractured Archive OSRS Guide: Bosses, Drop Rates & Loot

The Fractured Archive is Old School's fourth raid. It opened on 20 October 2026 and sits below Lumbridge, behind a cliff face near the Guthixian Temple. It is a group raid for 2 to 8 players, with Jagex recommending 3 to 5.

This guide covers what you need to enter, how the raid is structured, what kills you, and what you can walk away with. It does not teach individual boss mechanics, because those are still being learned and will change as players settle on routes.

Requirements and How to Get There

Requirement	Detail
Quest	While Guthix Sleeps completed
Players	2 to 8, with 3 to 5 recommended
Entrance	Cliff face near the Guthixian Temple, below Lumbridge
Teleport	Archivist's Folio, charged with Ascension shards
Death	Unsafe. HCIM and HCGIM lose status

After login with While Guthix Sleeps complete, a messenger gives you a note pointing to the entrance. The lobby is open before the raid itself, so you can bank and group up first.

The Archivist's Folio is an untradeable drop from the raid. Once you have it, charge it with Ascension shards and you can return without walking back through Lumbridge.

The Lobby and Grouping

The lobby has everything you need before a run:

• Bank chest on the eastern side.
• Grouping board to create a party and accept applicants. Use the eye icon to allow or block spectators.
• Record keeper, used for Zeal and score tracking.
• Strategy board on the western side, run by General Montoya. You can spectate listed parties and watch recent runs.
• Ascension rocks in the south-west, which you can mine for Ascension shards between raids. Sprites that appear on the rocks also convert into shards.

The spectate system now lets you click party orbs to view a teammate's POV, including their inventory. Party members can ping inventory slots for a dead teammate.

Raid Layout and Boss Choices

The raid has eight possible encounters across five rooms. The first and last are fixed, and the middle three are a choice between two doors that award the same contribution points, so neither path improves your unique chance.

Order	Encounter	Choice
1	The Archive Guardian	Fixed
2	Bork and the Smorks	or Ezekiel, a Saradominist justiciar
3	Dreadnoth the Jellied	or Moia, a necromancer
4	Xarth, a Tormented Demon	or the Dagon'hai Trio
5	Ocellus, the hooded final boss	Fixed

The layout is not random and you do not need to scout. Jagex balanced each pair to be similar in intensity and equal in points. Pick based on your group's gear and comfort, not on a hidden bonus.

A points-based resupply sits mid-raid, similar to the Helpful Spirit in Tombs of Amascut. Your performance before it affects how many supplies you get. There is no Overload and no banking inside the raid, so plan your inventory before you enter.

Boss Strategies

These are the mechanics that decide whether a room is a clean kill or a wipe. They assume you have read the layout above and know which door your group is taking.

Archive Guardian

• Starts flying, so use ranged, magic or a halberd until the first shield bar is gone. It crashes to the ground and can then be meleed.
• Mushrooms poison and inflict weary, which slows attacks and stops running. Run adjacent to a mushroom, then two tiles away, to pop it without taking damage.
• While grounded, tendrils spawn every 3 ticks on the side opposite the boss and swipe a 3x3 area. Move one tile toward the boss to avoid them.
• Four inert guardians around the room can be charged by attacking them. The south-east one damages the boss's health, not just its shield.
• At 30% health it flies again and starts a laser that can kill a random player in groups of three or more. Line the beam up with an inert guardian to reduce the damage.

Ezekiel

• His melee cleaves around him, leaving a safe spot directly behind him, opposite the tank. Stand there.
• If he cannot reach the tank, he casts lightning on every player.
• Perfectly dodging his attacks, by standing in the path and stepping out on the same tick, gives 3% special attack energy.
• After every two melee attacks he creates a cross-shaped lightning burst. Flying swords then cross the arena; charging them with air spells increases their damage to both Ezekiel and you.
• Let a sword hit Ezekiel to stun him. If it misses, he heals.
• At 33% he enrages, traps the team in a 3x3 and runs a lightning dodge pattern. Watch the two lit swords and stand in the safe shape.

Bork and the Smorks

• Bork has 8 flat armour and 2 magic resistance. Every 25% damage dealt to the Smorks adds 2 flat armour, up to 14.
• Bork chases the first player who enters. The Smorks attack everyone else with ranged and magic, plus incendiary and heavy cannonballs.
• Incendiary oil burns for 6-7 damage per tick. Heavy cannonballs stun Bork and remove his flat armour, so lure him into them.
• After a heavy cannonball, hide behind the Smorks' cart to avoid Bork's stomps.
• Kill Bork first. If the Smorks die first, Bork's stomps cover the whole arena.

Moia

• She starts out of melee range, so bring ranged or magic.
• Undead binders shuffle around the arena and melee anyone within two tiles. Kill them to open space.
• Her blue magic projectile is slower than her ranged attack, even when cast second. Do not switch to Protect from Magic until after the ranged hit, then switch immediately.
• Her cough spreads between players and binders. The player infected should move away from the group. A Serpentine helm reduces the damage.
• At 33% she forms the binders into a diamond and starts a charge. Kill every binder before it completes or the team takes massive damage.

Dreadnoth the Jellied

• He moves slowly and melees everything around him, so range or mage from a distance.
• He is a demon with low demonbane values, 85% weak to fire spells and 40% freeze resistant. The Scorching bow spec can root him.
• At 85%, 65% and 45% health he slams the arena, then fires three ranged attacks. Protect Melee for the slam, then Protect Range for the projectiles.
• Each slam spawns jellies that drain prayer even through protection. Kill them with Ice Barrage, Blood Barrage or a Venator bow.
• At 25% he jumps at a random player and heals 30-40 if he lands. Keep Protect Melee up and keep moving. On death he spawns around ten more jellies.

Xarth

• Phase 1 is magic only. His burns stack, and he targets the closest player.
• At roughly 80%, 65% and 50% health he binds the team and charges a blast. Everyone must hide behind the same pillar and path the same way, or you destroy your own cover.
• At 50% he swaps to ranged and melee and reanimates corpses. Freeze them or douse them with water spells. Fire spells make him summon more.
• If the corpses heal him for 200, he blasts the arena. Stack behind the first player to reduce the damage.
• Xarth has 170 Defence and a 60% reduction cap, so his floor is 102. His final phase is intended to be meleed after the defence hotfix.

Dagon'hai Trio

• The elder and two monks share a health pool, so there is no benefit to focusing one target.
• The elder attacks with ranged and magic. Spread out so his attacks do not splash onto the group.
• The ritual bar fills when the monks channel. Interrupt the matching element: fire, water, air or earth spell on the channeller.
• During tome empowerment, stand in the air gusts to block the incoming projectile. A blocked hit still hurts, but an unblocked one empowers the cauldron.
• Each time you break their shield, it restores and the ritual drops 20%. Portals spawn imps; stand on the portals to close them, then kill the imps.
• After the fifth shield break the cauldron explodes. Finish the remaining enemies, which are left on 7 HP.

Ocellus

• Phase 1: he moves between corners with Protect from Melee, using ranged and magic. Stand on his tendrils as they channel; the seventh triggers a 2-tile slam. At 66% and 25% shield he teleports to the centre and runs a clockwise tendril pattern. Mitigate enough or he hits the team for 80+.
• Phase 2: his shield breaks and the arena splits into four quadrants with purple and orange portals. Dodge the barrage and use the orange portal to move. The Blade stores damage dealt in this phase and transfers half of it to his phase 3 health.
• Phase 3: four diagonal quadrants. Stack on one tile to control void pool placement, then spread for the wave attacks. After two waves he charges a blade attack: turn off your overhead and use Protect from Melee.
• Break void vines on rooted players, kill rifts, augmenters and siphons, and jump the gaps when he starts Obliteration.
• During Untether, stand under him inside the purple lines and leave on the final glow.
• Use the four censers for melee damage, ranged damage, 50% special attack or 50 HP and prayer.
• Phase 4: one quadrant, Ancient Curses and Deflect prayers. He takes half your current HP and drops a healing orb, then runs void explosions you must move out of every two ticks. Pray the correct style for his Soul Split blast, then repeat until he dies.

Death, Wipes and Practice Mode

If your team wipes, everyone is removed to the lobby with a gravestone nearby. The system is close to Theatre of Blood, but uses normal gravestones instead of Death Storage. Gravestone fees are reduced by 75% until you have five completions, which softens the learning period.

Practice Mode was not available at launch. Jagex plans to enable it later, at which point you can practise any boss or phase you have already reached, with supplies refunded and friends allowed. You cannot skip ahead to a boss you have never seen.

Deaths are not safe. If you are a Hardcore Ironman or Hardcore Group Ironman, you lose your status on death inside the archive. Do not enter blind on a hardcore account.

The Defence Reduction Hotfix

On release, several bosses allowed Defence to be drained below the intended floor. That made the Twisted Bow far stronger than intended, especially in larger groups, and pushed teams toward low-effort ranged strategies.

Jagex hotfixed the caps on 20 October:

Defence reduction cap	NPCs
No cap, can reach 0	Dreadnoth, the Smorks, the Dagon'hai Trio, The Blade (Ocellus phase 2)
60% cap	Archive Guardian, Bork, Ezekiel, Moia, Xarth, Ocellus

Ocellus also no longer restores Defence when moving between quadrants in phase 3. You can drain him to 60% once and then use damaging special attacks for the rest of the fight.

The practical effect: Defence-draining specs such as the Dragon Warhammer, Bandos Godsword and Tonalztics of Ralos still matter, but you cannot delete a boss's Defence entirely. Melee against Xarth is now the intended route rather than a ranged cheese.

Loot and Unique Rewards

Regular loot is pitched just below Theatre of Blood. Uniques are the reason to run it. All eight rewards are tradeable unless stated.

Reward	Slot	Key stats and use
The Obligator	2h crush	85 Attack. +120 crush, +40 Strength, +3 Prayer. 5-tick thrust with multi-hit and line damage, or 3-tick smash
Rondache	Shield	80 Defence. +35 stab, +41 slash, +38 crush, +55 ranged defence, +8 Strength. +2 flat armour and magic resistance, stored as Shield Bash charges
Zorya's Tome	2h magic	85 Magic. +45 magic attack, +15% magic damage, +2 Prayer. 3-tick powered staff, base max 18. Spec gives 150% accuracy and 60% damage, then three buffed 2-tick attacks
Ascension crossbows	2h ranged	80 Ranged. +34 ranged attack, 3-tick, 2-tick on rapid, 6-tile range. Fires Ascension bolts only
Ascension bolts	Ammo	+53 ranged Strength. Diamond and onyx variants give +58. Made from Ascension shards at 86 Fletching, 10 bolts per shard
Elemental Fragments	Consumable	Untradeable. +2 base max hit for the matching element, multiplied by magic damage and elemental weakness. Dupe protection
Archivist's Folio	Teleport	Untradeable. Charges with Ascension shards for fast returns
Orion	Pet	Untradeable pet, a smaller version of Ocellus's final form
Zeal	Prayer	84 Prayer, 75 Attack, 75 Strength. +25% Attack, +28% Strength, +25% Defence. Unlocked with the tradeable Horn of Bran at Camelot

The Obligator is charged with 1 Ascension shard, 20 nature runes and 20 death runes per 10 charges. It is only tradeable when fully uncharged. The Rondache, Zorya's Tome and Ascension crossbows follow the same tradeable-when-uncharged pattern.

Unique Drop Rates

A special chest appears when the braziers burn purple. Its unique probabilities are conditional: they assume a unique has already dropped and show the split between items. The overall unique chance per raid has not been published.

Reward	Share of unique drops
Rondache	5/15
Zorya's Tome	4/15
Horn of Bran	3/15
Ascension crossbows	2/15
Obligator	1/15

The Obligator is the rarest unique in the split. The Rondache is the most common.

Other Notable Drops

• Standard loot is rolled three times. Each roll has a 1/51 chance to give five times the usual quantity.
• Archivist's Folio: 1/16, and only if you do not already own one.
• Elemental Fragments: 1/80 each, with dupe protection across the four elements.
• Elite clue: 1/12.
• Orion pet: rate not published.

These figures come from the OSRS Wiki drop table, not a Jagex blog. The unique split is reliable; the overall unique rate is not public.

What to Bring

There is no single setup, but the raid rewards map cleanly onto the three combat styles:

• Melee: crush weapons for the Obligator's niche, and Defence-draining specs for Xarth and the Archive Guardian. Bring a shield switch if you use the Rondache.
• Ranged: the Ascension crossbows are a direct upgrade path from the Toxic Blowpipe. Twisted Bow is still strong but no longer ignores the Defence cap.
• Magic: Zorya's Tome is a spec weapon, not a camp weapon. Use it for the burst window, then swap back.
• Supplies: no Overload and no banking. Bring enough food and restores for a full run, plus a teleport out if the team wipes.

Use the DPS Calculator to compare the new weapons against your current setup, and the Best-in-Slot Finder to check the new gear in each slot.

Is It Worth Running?

Yes, if you have a group. The Obligator is the first true crush megarare, Zeal is a permanent account upgrade, and the Elemental Fragments are a long-term magic buff. Duke, solo and duo runs are possible but sit closer to solo Theatre of Blood than solo Chambers of Xeric in difficulty.

If you are still working toward access, finish While Guthix Sleeps first. It is a Grandmaster quest with several prerequisite quests, and the raid will not open without it.

FAQ

What quest do I need for The Fractured Archive?

You need While Guthix Sleeps completed. The raid entrance is near the Guthixian Temple below Lumbridge.

How many players can do The Fractured Archive?

The raid scales from 2 to 8 players. Jagex recommends 3 to 5. Duo is tough but manageable, and solo is possible but aimed at experienced players.

Is The Fractured Archive safe for Hardcore Ironmen?

No. Deaths inside the raid are unsafe, and HCIM and HCGIM lose their status. There is no safe death exception.

What is the Fractured Archive megarare?

The Obligator, a two-handed crush weapon requiring 85 Attack. It rolls damage multiple times against crush-weak targets and has a fast 3-tick smash stance.

Can you solo The Fractured Archive?

Yes, but it scales to a two-player baseline rather than one, so it is closer to solo Theatre of Blood in difficulty. Jagex designed it as group content and does not expect solo to be comfortable.

What are the Fractured Archive drop rates?

The overall unique rate is not published. Once a unique drops, the split is Rondache 5/15, Zorya's Tome 4/15, Horn of Bran 3/15, Ascension crossbows 2/15 and Obligator 1/15.

What pet does The Fractured Archive drop?

Orion, a smaller version of Ocellus's final form. Its drop rate is not published.

Which Fractured Archive bosses are weak to crush?

Most of the raid is crush-friendly. The final boss, Ocellus, is extremely weak to crush, and the Archive Guardian, Ezekiel, Bork and Xarth are also vulnerable to it.