The Horn of Magnus

The Horn of Magnus is a mission in Vermintide.

Synopis
The Horn of Magnus is the first level in Vermintide and the only level to make up the prologue section of the game. The heroes must make their way to the Magnus Tower and blow the Horn of Magnus to alert Ubersreik to the Skaven invasion.

The Waterfront, River Teufel
The heroes' starting point and the setting of the opening cinematic to Vermintide. Exit the alley and turn right, moving along the waterfront and to the town watch.

You may find supplies scattered along the edges of the docks and along the perimeter of the waterfront before entering the barracks. At higher difficulties this may prove vital as supplies will be scarce.

New Watch Barracks
Reaching this area will generally mark the start of special skaven spawns, hordes, and the possibility of a rat ogre. Proceed through the barracks and down the wooden platform.

 Point of No Return:  Once you drop to the ground below, you will not be able to return to collect any loot from the previous areas.

The Hog Pit
Supplies are scattered about the entire area, providing some ammo and other supplies at random. There is a split into 2 routes. Going left allows players to move along wooden plank bridges and travel along an elevated path while going right navigates them through or around a hog pen on the ground level. Players on the elevated path can overlook the lower one and drop down as desired/needed be it looting or saving teammates but eventually the elevated path ends and players are at a second divide.

At the second divide, going left will navigate players under a stone bridge and bring them to the right entrance to Ranaldstrasse while going right will take them up to another plaza, across the stone bridge, and to the left entrance to Ranaldstrasse.

Ranaldstrasse
A town street that leads into the market. You can either Navigate down the center street and climb over the carriage/barricade to proceed or explore the right side for some underground basements (first skaven grimoire and tome) and the left side for a chapel interior (another tome).

 Point of No Return:  Once you cross the barricade, you will not be able to return to collect consumables loot from the previous areas. If you have not collected the 2 tomes and grimoire, they will no longer be accessible.

Strohmann Market
The first event of the mission. Players must pick up a gunpowder barrel, carry it across the plaza, and place it against the large gate three times. Once the third barrel has been placed correctly, all the barrels will ignite and explode, opening the way to the larger market.

You need not set the barrel down softly next to the gate, throwing it at the top of the gate will do, as the barrel will orient itself correctly once close enough to the placement indicators. This should expedite barrel placement and minimize risk of being attacked.

 Warning:  Taking damage while holding a gunpowder barrel will ignite it, lighting a fuse for several seconds and ultimately detonating. An ignited barrel is usable on the gate, the fuse will unlight when in position, but if it goes off first, players caught in the blast will take damage.

Healing supplies, ammunition, and bombs are often scattered about the market stalls in this area. The second skaven grimoire is also here, sitting on the side of a rooftop to the far left. Continue across the market and either to the left through a large arch or right through a smaller arch. Both will lead to the next area.

Von Jungfreud Platz
Typically there are a few consumables lying about but otherwise there's nothing noteworthy about this area. Proceed up the staircase and be wary of special skaven dropping in from above.

Oliver's Inn
The house on the right may have a few consumables and there may be a healing item and ammunition cache near the tables to the left. Proceed into the Inn for more consumables on tables and shelves of the ground floor, up the steps, and over the barricade on the second floor doorway.

Point of No Return: Once you cross the barricade, you will not be able to return to collect consumables and loot from the previous areas. If you have not collected the second grimoire, it will no longer be accessible.

On the other end of the barricade is the location of the third tome, provided you solve the chest/candle puzzle to unlock the room it lies in.

Rooftops, Blucherweg
Make your way across the rooftop and before crossing the wooden plank bridge to the other rooftop, head left and into the building for some possible supplies. When you cross the plank bridge, there should be some supplies scattered about the room exposed by destroyed walls. Once fully stocked, head over into the hole in the castle tower.

 Point of No Return:  This is the Magnus tower entrance. Once you cross the second bridge and drop into it, you will be unable to backtrack and collect loot/consumables from previous areas. If you have not collected the third tome, it will no longer be accessible.

Once inside the tower make your way across the door and through to the elevator. To operate the elevator, interact with the lever once all player-controlled heroes are inside it.

Magnus Tower
This is the home stretch and primary event of the mission. Make your way up the tower along the counter-clock spiral staircase and at the top, climb over the rubble to an elevator room.

Point of No Return: Once you cross over the stone rubble, you cannot backtrack to the lower levels of the tower. All loot/consumables missed will be inaccessible.

Past the elevator room, the next room has an ammunition cache on the left. To the right and up the stairs leads to the Horn of Magnus. There should be several healing supplies at the end of the platform, which combined with the ammunition cache from earlier will allow players to heal up and restock ammunition for the final event.

Warning: Once you drop from the platform, consumables/loot left behind up to the elevator room will be inaccessible until after the end of event two, where a new entrance opens up into the elevator room. You may leave tomes behind to carry healing items for the following defensive battle and retrieve said tomes later.

Interact with the horn and then prepare to defend against a few hordes of skaven (and specials as they appear). Once the event is complete, a pile of bricks dislodges and destroys the wood flooring, opening a hole to the elevator room from earlier and opening the elevator to use.

Point of No Return: Once the elevator gets moving, you will not be able to retrieve anything else from the previous areas (and the rest of the map for that matter). If you left behind tomes where the healing items were, be sure to retrieve them.

Elevator Warning: Several seconds into its descent, the elevator enters a stage of free-fall. Jumping while on the elevator at this point comes with a risk of fall damage varying from lightly harmful to instant death. Refrain from jumping.

At the bottom, proceed to Olesya's carriage. Once all player-controlled heroes enter the carriage and the door is closed, the mission ends.

Tomes
The first Tome is before dropping into the area where you add barrels of gunpowder to the gate. It is on the right side of the street when progressing forward, in a cellar. The Tome is in a hidden room to the right when you enter the cellar.

The second Tome is located in a chest in the church before dropping into the area where you add barrels of gunpowder to the gate. While getting the first Grimoire is to the right of the map, the church is behind a half fallen fence on the left side of the area, through a small courtyard.

The third Tome can be found inside a hidden room at the tavern. To open the secret door, all three chests in the upper part of the tavern need to be opened. The room of the second chest then opens up to unveil the third tome. Many people are under the impression that it is necessary to extinguish a candle in order for the secret door to open -- this is an easy mistake to make (see video below) but not in fact the case.

Grimoires
The first Grimoire is located in the same cellar as the first Tome. It is before dropping into the area where you add barrels of gunpowder to the gate. It can be found on the right side of the street when progressing forward, in a cellar. The Grimoire is hidden on a wooden beam to the top right of the cellar entrance. Jumping onto the opened chest makes it easier to gain reach.

The second Grimoire is located on the town square right after destroying the gate with barrels of gunpowder. In the left corner of the square when looking from the broken gate, there is a box half covered by a green sheet, jump onto it from another close by box. Next jump onto the wooden beam protruding from the building next to you, then from there onto the roof. At the end of that roof, look to the left and there is another smaller "roof" you must jump to. Then at the end of that roof there is a lower platform that you must carefully drop onto, this is where the Grimoire is located.

Guide
Horn of Magnus is much beloved by the Vermintide community, as well as the map that *everyone* has at least some familiarity with because it's the first one you can play. Because of this, the current strategies are fairly consistent across the player base.

During the first phase, as you make your way along a waterside boardwalk, there are two chests and several loot drops to pillage to prepare for the combat ahead. Notably, there are two loot locations at water-level when you drop down the stairs to the left after exiting the alley you start it. There is also a loot location located to the far right of the Guard Tower, just to the right of a large closed gate.

You'll typically hit your first special and horde spawn as you enter the Guard Tower, which offers several good funnels (the main doors at either end, or the jail cells) for easy rat slaying. Dropping down from the guard tower you'll proceed into the streets of Ubersreik on your way to the town square. The first grimoire and two tomes are available in this area.

Event One: Demolish the Door
After a no-return dropdown, an event will begin that has the heroes shuttling one explosive barrel at a time from a raised platform at one end of a large courtyard to a large locked gate that bars the way to the town square at the other end. Hordes and specials will spawn constantly until the door has fallen, and specials will spawn immediately after the explosion. To proceed through this event smoothly, normally two players will head to the barrel spawn platform while other two prepare to receive the barrel once it is tossed down. The two barrel runners will fight and push their way to the target door, sink the barrel, and then the two spawn-campers will immediately toss down the second barrel to repeat the same process, having slain all spawned rats at their end of the map. When the third barrel spawns it can either be tossed down or carried straight to the door, with all four players reunited for the last fight to the door and horde defense. While there is a loot spawn location through a pair of doors adjacent to the barrel spawn, it is rarely worth the side-trip (and risk of team separation) unless a possible healing item could bring the team out of grey health.

If your team goes down during this event, clutch-soloing this event is feasible. If you are better equipped to hold out, you can defend the doors to the loot item location or the corner areas near the chest or to the left of the door. If you have a more mobile build, you can whittle away the hordes while backing your way around the open area, using the two raised areas at either end of the map to slow the rats down as they go into their drop-down animations. There is enough time between hordes to make the barrel runs.

Event Two: The Horn Bloweth
Once the heroes reach the top of the tower, they must blow the Horn of Magnus to alert the region to the Skaven invasion. Several waves of Skaven will attack the players and then a section of the floor under the horn will collapse allowing the heroes to escape down an elevator to the cart. Before dropping down into the Horn area, there are always several guaranteed heals. If the players wish to improve their margin of safety, they may take this opportunity to swap any carried tomes for healing items. If this is done, the tomes can be easily retrieved from below the drop down platform by looking up and spamming the "use" key after the finale is complete.

The consensus safest place to hold out against the rats during this finale is with all four players tucked into the small nook at the base of the stairs up to the Horn. Melee specialists should concentrate on controlling and killing the rat hordes (watch out for Stormvermin wading through the crowds) while a sniper class or two should be on high alert for both ratling gunners and gasrats. Gasrats in particular can spawn on some platforms in the upper left part of the area (as seen from the nook) and have a direct line of fire into the nook. If necessary, the team can relocate to the corner immediately to the right of the nook if under fire from a hidden gunner or being gassed.

Once the floor falls through, the team can either proceed directly to the elevator to proceed to the cart, or wait for one more small horde to attack and then proceed to recover any tomes that might have been swapped for healing items before the finale began.