The Barns

"Final evacuation is in the stadium."

- Nick

The Barns is the fourth chapter in the Dark Carnival campaign of Left 4 Dead 2. After getting through the roller coaster, the Survivors must now make their way through some more of the park's grounds and across the rooftops of the barns before finding a way to get into The Peach Pit stadium.

Walkthrough
Thanks to its Gauntlet Crescendo event, this chapter is widely regarded as one of the most difficult in the game. The importance of keeping at least one Pipe Bomb or Bile Jar in reserve for this event cannot be over-emphasized: refer the following walk through narrative.



Start off by making your way with the generated path given to the team. Occasionally the fence near the two stalls will be omitted, allowing players a shortcut through a small section of the map. Teams should still search the picnic area as it contains various supplies. The area also contains the level's only two Rescue Closets.

The high striker game Stronger than Moustachio can be found here. Hitting the pad with a melee weapon causes the game to activate. Should a player hit the pad while under the effects of adrenaline, the game will be broken and send out an alarm to cause a Horde to descend down on the team.

Make your way to the bumper car area and leave through a door at the corner, leading to an employee-only area and the second appearance of the rescue vehicle seen from before. The Director is often fond of spawning Tanks and Witches here, so players should eliminate them if they appear.



The Whac-A-Mole game Stache Whacker can be found in this area. Players obtain points by hitting the small Moustachio figures that pop up from the holes. Games last for 30 seconds and players can "chain" their score if they continue within 10 seconds of the game ending. Once 42 points have been obtained, the game breaks, sends out an alarm and calls a Horde down much like Stache Whacker.

Head into the barns and make your way across. The last segment of the barn contains two lines of tables containing various items and two one-spawn only weapons in the event that the team is running low on ammo. Only grab them if necessary, since an ammo pile can be found in the upcoming Gauntlet Crescendo.



Make your way up the rooftops and run back across to the gauntlet crescendo area. Players should be careful at all times, as the Charger and Smoker can often cause the team to backtrack should they manage to pin a Survivor. Once players jump off the rooftop at the final area, players cannot get back up to rescue anyone if they are incapacitated crossing it.

Clear the surrounding area; the Director is often fond of placing a few gas cans, healing kits or both here, along with an ammo pile on the scaffolding. Head to the lever and push it to start the Gauntlet Crescendo.



This Gauntlet Crescendo Event is one of the most difficult Crescendo Events in Left 4 Dead 2, namely for the following reasons:


 * Unlike the other Gauntlet Crescendos, the alarm for this particular event rings for the remainder of this level, meaning that hordes will continually spawn and there is no way to stop it.
 * The Director places hordes based on the lead player's location; it is often notorious for spawning large hordes right outside the saferoom.
 * The Director often sends them almost immediately as soon as the previous horde is killed.
 * Special Infected can still harass the players as they move to the safe room.
 * This event is notorious for spawning two Smokers or two Hunters at the same time.

During the first stage of the gauntlet crescendo, teams can glitch jump onto the normally inaccessible second tier of scaffolding by standing on the metal bars and waiting for a Common Infected to strike. Jump on top of it and quickly jump onto the scaffolding. This is particularly useful for solo runs as the Common Infected are unable to climb up to the second level, making the Special Infected the only threat during this stage.

Once the gates open, quickly move your way down the alleyway. Resistance here is typically mild since the horde is funneled into a single entrance. However, it gradually increases as the team moves around the bend, with incessant hordes spawning, often with very little delay between them.

For this reason, a player should be prepared to have multiple throwables on hand to deal with the horde. They should only be used when the team reaches the stadium entrance, since resistance is the most fierce there. A Molotov should be thrown at the furthest entrance along with a pipe bomb if possible to burn the spawning Common Infected as soon as they appear. Once a Survivor is right in front of the safe room door, the Director replaces the horde spawn to the area surrounding the stadium, making it much more manageable for any straggling Survivors.