Cave Horror Best in Slot Gear & Strategy Guide

Cave horrors are aggressive members-only Slayer monsters released alongside Trouble Brewing on 4 July 2006. They sit at combat level 80 with 55 Hitpoints and a max hit of 9, attacking with a magical melee style at attack speed 4. The Wiki examines them as “a horrible, emaciated ape like creature with beady red eyes.”

They live in the Mos Le'Harmless Cave, which you reach after sailing to Mos Le'Harmless — for example by drinking rum bought from Honest Jimmy for 20 pieces of eight, by talking to Bill Teach after using the ectophial to reach Port Phasmatys, or via a charter ship. Killing one also counts toward the Hard Morytania Diary.

There are five variants — worker, young worker, guard, small guard, and alpha — but they are functionally identical, differing only in size and appearance, so you can treat any spawn the same way.

To kill cave horrors you need four things: completion of the Cabin Fever quest, level 58 Slayer, a witchwood icon, and a light source (unless a fire of eternal light is lit). The light source is required simply to navigate the dark cave.

The witchwood icon matters because of the scream attack (covered below). If you intend to rely on Protect from Melee instead, you still carry the icon — the Wiki advises keeping it in case of a close-combat encounter while safespotting, or in case you run out of Prayer points.

Cave horror tasks are handed out by Chaeldar, Nieve, and Duradel, and each kill awards 55 Slayer experience. Because the monsters are aggressive, they will attack you on sight, which is convenient for stacking kills but means you cannot wander away from a safespot carelessly.

The Wiki's recommended method is fast-firing Ranged. Cave horrors have low Hitpoints and their spawns are fairly spread apart, so a quick ranged weapon clears them efficiently — a toxic blowpipe is the standout example the Wiki gives, with other fast options also viable. For your ranged loadout, lean on a high-attack-speed weapon and let our Boss Gear Finder above pick the exact items for your budget; you can browse the full ranged gear families there too.

If you are not using Protect from Melee, your armour choice changes: the Wiki recommends gear with a high Magic Defence bonus, such as dragonhide armour, to reduce the magic-based melee and scream damage while the witchwood icon does its job.

Melee is a valid alternative. The Wiki suggests pairing it with high-Prayer-bonus equipment such as proselyte armour and always running Protect from Melee, which frees you to wear a stronger amulet in place of the icon. As a property worth knowing, cave horrors carry a 30% elemental weakness to fire spells — useful context, though it is not the recommended killing style here.

Keep the kit lean and built around what actually helps at this task:

• Witchwood icon — mandatory unless you fully commit to Protect from Melee, and worth carrying even then.
• Light source — required to navigate the cave (unless a fire of eternal light is lit).
• Dwarf multicannon — can be set up to speed kills along.
• Bonecrusher necklace — when cannoning, this comfortably maintains Protect from Melee without using any supplies, since cave horrors drop big bones.
• Log basket or plank sack (with Plank Make) — to store the unnoted mahogany logs they frequently drop in a single inventory slot.
• Arceuus spellbook runes for Adept Reanimation — cave horrors frequently drop ensouled horror heads, giving passive Prayer training.
• Telekinetic Grab — handy for grabbing loot from a safespot without stepping into the aggressive monsters.

Standard magical melee attack. In normal combat a cave horror hits with a magical melee style at attack speed 4 for a max hit of 9. While wearing a witchwood icon, the monster alternates randomly between kicking every 4 ticks and screaming every 5.

The scream special attack. This is the defining mechanic. The scream always deals damage equal to 10% of your base Hitpoints level, rounded down — for example 9 damage at 96 Hitpoints — and it bypasses armour. A witchwood icon only partially avoids it; Protect from Melee nullifies it completely. If you have neither, the special damage stacks up heavily over time, which is why the icon is required without prayer. Per the Wiki's trivia, it is the black mask the horrors wear that makes the scream's damage type magical, so ordinary earmuffs or helmets will not block it.

AoE in single-way combat. Unusually, the scream behaves as an area-of-effect attack even in a single-way combat area, hitting any nearby players who are not already in combat with that horror. Bear this in mind if you are sharing the cave.

Pick one of two damage-control routes and stick to it. Route A — Protect from Melee: run the overhead the whole time, which negates both the magical melee and the scream entirely, and lets you swap the witchwood icon for a better necklace. This is the cleanest approach if your Prayer can sustain it. Route B — witchwood icon plus magic-defence armour: wear the icon and dragonhide-class armour to blunt the special, no prayer required.

For the kills themselves, fast-firing ranged is the default — the spread-out, low-HP spawns reward rapid single-target clears. A dwarf multicannon stacks on top to accelerate things. Many players instead safespot using the mushrooms, stalagmites, and boulders inside the cave, such as the area by the swamp near the entrance; if you do, take care leaving the safespot to loot, because the aggressive horrors may turn on you — Telekinetic Grab sidesteps that risk.

If you cannon, pair the bonecrusher necklace with Protect from Melee for a self-sustaining setup, and bring an Arceuus runes for Adept Reanimation to bank passive Prayer XP from the ensouled horror heads.

Cave horrors always drop big bones. The marquee reason to kill them is the black mask (10) at a rate of 1/512, the same black mask that powers a Slayer helmet. They also drop hard clue scrolls at 1/128, making them a solid clue source, and ensouled horror head tertiaries at 1/30 for passive Prayer training via reanimation. The full drop table — including weapons, armour, runes, herbs, seeds, and gems — is shown above; this guide only names the highlights.

• Skipping the witchwood icon. Without it and without Protect from Melee, the scream special chips away at you relentlessly. Always bring the icon.
• Forgetting a light source. You cannot navigate the cave without one (unless a fire of eternal light is lit) — pack it before you sail out.
• Looting carelessly from a safespot. The horrors are aggressive; stepping out to grab loot can pull them onto you. Use Telekinetic Grab when in doubt.
• Chasing the fire weakness. The 30% fire weakness is real, but the recommended and most efficient method here is ranged, not magic. Don't build a magic setup expecting it to be optimal.