War tortoise

The War tortoise is a Summoning familiar that a player is able to summon at level 67 Summoning. The war tortoise has the capability of holding up to 18 items for a player, with a value up to 5 million gp. It is the second best general-use Beast of Burden and a common choice for mid-high level summoners who can't summon the Pack Yak yet.

Note that the Spirit Terrorbird pouch is significantly cheaper than the War tortoise. One spirit terrorbird pouch costs coins, which is  coins cheaper per pouch. Less wealthy players should opt for the spirit terrorbird for general use activities, such as Slayer, and use the War tortoise only for power training such as Prayer training.

War tortoise pouch
A war tortoise pouch is made by using a Summoning pouch on a Summoning obelisk with 1 spirit shard, a gold charm and a tortoise shell in the player's inventory. Using the pouch to summon a war tortoise costs 7 summoning points. If players exchange their war tortoise pouches at Bogrog, they will receive 1 spirit shard per pouch. Players must also have 72 Summoning to be able to exchange this pouch.

A perfect shell may not be used in place of a regular tortoise shell.

Testudo scroll
The testudo scroll enables the use of the testudo special ability for a war tortoise. Using a war tortoise pouch on a Summoning obelisk creates ten testudo scrolls.

Testudo
Testudo is a special move of the war tortoise, activated by a testudo scroll. When activated, it temporarily boosts Defence by 9 points. Each use of a Testudo scroll requires 20 special move points.

When used in conjunction with potions and more scrolls, this effect will NOT stack on top of what has already been boosted. Because of this, even players with a war tortoise following them will typically prefer a defence potion, super defence potion or saradomin brew for raising their defence.

Trivia

 * Testudo is the Latin word for "tortoise", and is a genus of tortoises found in North Africa, Western Asia, and Europe. It is also a battle formation used in Ancient Roman Warfare. Soldiers would use their shields to cover the front and top of the unit to increase defence against incoming arrows.
 * The examine text refers to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
 * War Tortoise may also be a reference to the Pokemon, Wartortle.

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