Combat Finesse
UPDATE:10 JAN 06
RSN:Pretorian V
UPDATE:10 JAN 06
RSN:Pretorian V
When it comes to combat I'm pretty sure we're all familiar with the basics; "the combat triangle", food, routes to escape, amushing and so on. Though mastery of the basics means success in the wild against single opponents, the basics don't cover how to maximize damage against multiple opponents which is were this guide comes into play. I'll cover advanced tactics such as usage of the element of suprise, stealth, and the "The Crush Tactic". Don't just take my word for it, check out the "Rune Tips: Combat Guide" and related reasources for the maximum edge in any fight.
Stealth
Hiding in runescape is an extremely difficult task being that your position is broadcasted on the mini-map in the upper right corner whenever another player is close enough, so the trick is finding something white on the map to match your indicator on the map. Walls are perfect for this especially if you position yourself properly. Standing at the ending tip of the wall will help you confuse others at first glance for a quick ranger, or mage to get the element of suprise. However for a warrior to be deadly with stealth they must wait till they get much closer. Corners are best for this, they help mask the wide dot and lead many in close to investigate, giving you the opportunity to spring on them.
Using other players is also an extremely effective method of stealth, with multiple methods of application. The first method is simply riding out with a bunch of your equal lvl pals then all standing in the same corner or wall tip (this can be accomplished by using the right click "walk here" option). When the unsuspecting player comes in range thinking there's only one guy, you send him on an express flight to Lumbridge with empty pockets. The other method is to find a low lvl guy who's willing to stand around for a while. Stand in position and then have the low lvl stand over you, unless an approaching player right clicks, he'll never know your there. Using stealth properly, you'll be buring bones in no time.
The Element Of Suprise
Once you know how to properly place yourself, the element of suprise will help you maximize damage dealt to your opponent. Unfortunately warriors are less inclined to use this tactic, and the greatest advantage goes to rangers and wizards.
For a warrior to gain the element of suprise he must lie in wait, then when his target shows up on screen immediately drink a strength potion, use the lvl 31 strength prayer and charge in with his weapons best attack. This will maximize damage but only for a short time, but then again that's all you'll need to down your foe.
For a ranger, accuracy is the name of the game; you don't need to hit em hard if you can hit em alot. Again lie in wait for a good target to roll by, then use the lvl 34 attack prayer, then attack with the best bow and arrows you've got. If you're at a good enough distance/elevation from your enemy you'll drop em before they can return fire/charge you.
Finally for mages, your prey is warriors, period. Don't ever attack a ranger or another mage ever, you will not get much of an element of suprise. There is one cardinal rule when it comes to magic, "Lead with your best trick", so the best spells you have you hit them with first. Now after the first strike, a warrior will either run at you or run away; the smart one will run away. Don't neglect that low lvl Bind spell, it'll stop them in their tracks and it's the most powerful spell that most mages don't use. Now remember bind only lasts for 5 seconds so make sure to pop another bind before the last one wares off, and keep pegging them with your most damaging spell. With this tactic you'll drop them before they even take a swipe at you. The mage is the master of the element of suprise.
"The Crush Tactic"
A commonly unnoticed fact about heavy armors is that they are weaker against crush attacks than any other form of attack. Now that I've got your attention to that fact, another commonly unoticed fact is that one of the cheapest of the rune weapons is a rune mace (easily bought for around 14k). Do you see where I'm going with this yet? The rune mace's highest attack bonus is, you guessed it, Crush; the weakness of heavy armor wearers everywhere. Using crush attacks will help you do more damage against heavy armors and if you party up with a bunch of pals equipped with rune maces, you could thump down an unsuspecting warrior in no time. Other weapons, such as the two-handers and the battle axe have crush attacks but the mace has the highest crush bonus of them all (second only to it's slower, harder hitting cousin, the warhammer). This tactic is more of a tip than a tactic, but it's effective in any form you take it.
Baiting and Trapping
Often a player will head for the nearest white dot on their map to take it out, and normally wont pay attention to their surroundings. This bad habbit of players is great to take advantage of by useing it against them. Though something to take note of is that teleportation can only be used inside lvl 20 wild, making the best place to bait and trap in lvl 21+ wild.
Baiting is the simple tactic of placing someone in plain sight to lure prey whilst standing at a distance. Keep their white indicator barely on your radar, and once the prey closes in on the bait you rush/range/cast him for the take down.
Trapping is a similar tactic, but doesn't require "Live Bait". Think of how you set traps for lobster or crab when fishing; you put something in the trap that they like and they just waltz right in mindlessly. Now if your going to trap a player the ideal is the same, use something you know the player wants. If you're out trapping for Mages drop out a death or chaos rune, Ranger treats are adamant arrows(5), and Warriors love food, though useing food is universal for trapping all three classes. Keep the item in view at the edge of your radar, and if it takes a while for someone to show up, run out to it and re-drop it to keep it from automatically dissapearing (note:when you drop an item only you have access to it for roughly 60sec. untill it shows up on screen for everyone else). Just like baiting, once the unsuspecting player rolls in to pick up the item(s) you spring on him with everything you got.
- Baiting For Multiple Players
If you're really out for blood, and you want to bait out multiple charcters, or your just afraid of being anihilated by higher level PK parties, use a stealth combo with your live bait. Basically occupy the same spot with multiple charcters, and utilize the same tactics outlined in the standard "Baiting and Trapping" tactic.
Many times, to accomblish an objective, you need solid team work. Good team work comes from working together effectivly through learning the strengths and weakness' of those on your team. The following are the tips to make an effective team:
- -Identification:
Any team that has ever been, has had a method of differentiating between team members and opponents. This can be accomplished by somthing like matching gloves, helmets, legs, capes, or even weapons to name just a few. However this is done, it makes combat easier to comprehend amdist the choas.
- -Command:
Never argue over who is going to take Command, and the one that does take Command ensure he/she knows what their doing. Commanding troops in runescape requires the Commander to be out of harms way in the non-wilderness areas. The Commander is essential when information needs to be passed from player to player and said player may not have time to relay this information themselves. Certain key words or phrases should be established in order to expedite the process. For instance, you find yourself separated from your team members and you see a PK closing in on you. PM your Commander your location (such as 24 for wilderness level 24) and your status ("S.O.S" for help, "Low" for food, etc.) which may look somthing like "24 S.O.S". Your Commander will then relay the info to the team leader(s) with more detail and send help your way. The Commander has many applications, from sending in reinforcements to organizing strategic sweeps, he is an extremely handy ally, but only if you listen to his orders.
Sample Command Codes:
- I need Help at __: S.O.S. (wilderness number)
- I need Food at __: Low HP (wilderness number)
- I need runes at __: Low M (wilderness number)
- I need to pull out: Esc
- Where is __ team?: Loc __ (red team= R, yellow team= Y, green = G, etc.)
- I am patroling __: Pat (wilderness number)
- I am lost: ? Loc
- Area clear: Green (wilderness number)
- Area unsecured: Yellow (wilderness number)
- Area dangerous: Red (wilderness number)
- __ type PK at __: (ranger= R, fighter/warrior= F, mage= M) (wilderness number)
- Mission Abort/ Full Retreat: Out
When fighting against an enemy and along side five allies, don't fight the enemy alone. "Tag-out" Combat is self explanitory; you fight the opponent for a short time, then tag-out with an ally (though many areas are multi-attack areas, be prepared for when they aren't). Rotate with your allies frequently so no one person is taking alot of damage, and make sure to eat food and regain health while your waiting to re-enter combat. A good way to speed up this process it the "4 hit quit" technique and a combat order. This envolves 4 strikes then immediately switching out (regardless of wether or not you actually hit the opponent) and doing so in turn, so each player already knows who goes next.
Optimizing for Stylized Combat:
Playing to your strengths in runescape starts from the first day you play. The specifics required to create an optimized combatant takes a bit of time, but this guide will help you learn how to best create a character with the combat style you desire:
- -The Optimal Mage
The ways of magic can be extremely powerful (arguably the most powerful in the game), however they can also be extremely expensive. Starting off you want to get your hands on a full set of blue Mage's Robes, and Amulet of Magic, and a Staff of Wind. Once you obtain these things, loads of Mind runes are your goal to obtain. Complete any and all quests that give you a bonus to magic as a reward (click here for quest guides), the most important of which is "Rune Mysteries". Being able to mine rune essence and being able to craft the majority of your runes is a necessity as a mage (unless you're filthy rich, in which case you can just buy all your runes).
Once you have plenty of Mind runes (roughly 2-5k), begin your leveling into All Powerfull Magedom. Start in Varrock, just outside the west enterance where the guards hang out waiting for someone to kill them. Position yourself behind the fence and prepare for combat; select the defensive attack style, and select wind strike as your attack spell. You'll want a high defense to help you avoid damage as you level, which wont take much time if you've got the prescribed amount of runes. You'll have to right click to attack the guards due to your low lvl compared to theirs, but begin unloading on guard after guard untill you lvl your magic to 13.
Now you need to get your hands on a boat load of wind runes, so get to mining the essence and get to runecrafting (again, if your rich just go buy about 5k). Once you have roughly 2-5k worth of wind runes, go get your hands on a Staff of Fire. Now head back and repeat the smack down process with your Fire Strike spell (remember to put your attack style on defensive and your default spell to Fire Strike). Use this method to level higher untill you can use your higher lvl attack spells (Wind Blot your way to Fire Bolt, don't mess with the Bolt spells between), and once your at Fire Bolt keep using it untill you hit level 40 Magic. Once there, you are an official "Pure Mage", and have learned all the skills needed to carry on. If done right this takes less than a week to accomplish.
Need Chaos Runes to start blasting things with your bolts? Here's how to get them:
- Get plenty of Rune Essence and you'll need Chaos Talisman(s) (dropped by Giants, Chaos Dwarves, Ice Warriors, and Lesser Demons)or a Chaos Tiara. Get your Runecrafting skill to 35, and start crafting them (though you'll only be able to craft two at a time with a Talisman). Repeat this process untill you have the number of chaos runes you want.
OR
- Buy loads of chaos runes, either from the rune shops or from players (the cheapest way to buy them is to buy 50 at a time from shops with 250 in stock, then switch worlds and repeat)
- -The Optimal Fighter
The fighter is both strong, heavilly armored, and a potentially powerful base for a hybrid combat style. Starting out you'll have junk for equipment so the first thing you'll want to get your hands on is a set of full iron because it's the best armor that doesn't have a minimum defense level requirement to be worn. Your weapon of choice is completely up to you, personally I'd go with a iron sword or dagger to start out with. This is primarilly because, no matter what weapon you use at first, it will only do 1 point of damage per hit, and speedy attacks will help you do damage faster.
The three vital stats of the fighter are Attack, Strength, and Defense all of which have a different advantage. Attack determines how often you can hit your opponent calculated against your opponents defense. Strength determines how much damage you can do to your opponent per attack calculated with the max damage ability of your weapon. Defense determines how often you can be hit by your opponent caculated against their attack. Balance is key to success as a fighter; if you have a lvl 60 strength an a lvl 1 attack you'll never hit anything even though you can do massive amounts of damage. Do not ignore defense; with a low defense every one in the game can kill you. Though good armor lowers the amount of damage you take, you will get hit frequently and spend more time eating food in combat than hitting back.
The first place to head to start leveling is just south of Falador inside a chicken coop. Kill the chickens, picking up everything they drop due to their usefullness at such a low level. Bury the bones to gain prayer levels, build up the feathers to sell later to feltchers, and cook the chicken to build up what I call the three "Survival" skills (Wood Cutting, Firemaking, and Cooking). As you level each of your vital fighter stats, switch to a attack style that will allow you to level a different stat. If you keep them even you wont out grow killing chickens, meaning when it's time to move on to tougher enemies all of your stats will be even just as they were even when you started with the chickens. Once you've gotten each vital stat to 10 move on to Goblins, once you reach level 20 in each vital stat the world is pretty open to choice. Complete quests to boost your stats, pick up a good money making strategy to buy better and better armor and weapons, and generally focus on building up those 3 vital stats.
When the vitals are at 10th level gear up with full Steel equipment (about 6k), at 20th gear up with full Mithril equipment (about 13k), at 30th get full Adamant equipment (about 40k), and at 40th complete Dragons Quest, and get yourself full Rune equipment (about 300k).
- The Optimal Ranger
Woe are they who find themselves the target of the experienced ranger. Through the use of speed and long range a ranger can down an opponent before it gets into position to strike back. The primary skills of being a powerful ranger are of course the Range skill and the Defense skill. These skills must be built independantly, so any range should grab hold of a quick hitting weapon and level with the defensive style before really digging in deep with the ranged combat (the best way to do this is to start with chickens and move on to goblins similar to "The Optimal Fighter" leveling process, but only working defense). Once your defense is 20, load up with about 1k iron arrows and a shortbow to start pegging gaurds at the west enterance to varrock from behind the fence (similar to "The Optimal Mage" leveling process). The best thing about being a ranger is that the armor is cheap (Full Green Dragon Armor can be aquired for 15-20k) and it's based off of your ranged skill instead of defense. The only important thing, as far as attacking is concerned, is the difference between the Shortbow and the Longbow. The Shortbow fire's very quickly and, when used with the rapid shot attack method, can put about 4-5 arrows on a mage before he/she can fire a spell. The Longbow fires slower than the shortbow but has a longer range and hits much harder, combined with the long range attack style it can put 3-4 arrows on the target before he/she gets in range to strike with a spell, or nearly 6 arrows if they're closing for melee. If you have a low defense skill, the longbow is the route to take, simply because it keeps you further from the action. If you have a high defense skill, it's all about the shortbow which maximizes damage through speed. You may be asking, "What about the crossbow?". The answer is simple, don't use it, ever. It doesn't fire fast, deal good damage, or have a respectable range making it an all in all worthless P.O.S., so stick to the bows. As you level, make sure to equip an Oak bow (long or short) at level 10, and buy 1k steel arrows by level 20 to maximize damage and speed up the leveling process, and concordantly get a willow bow and level appropriate arrows. Once you get that range to 40, you will need to get your defense to 40 for the sheer fact that if you don't you will have an extremely hard time taking down the Dragon, in the "Dragon Slayer" quest so you can wear that Full Green Dragon Armor. The only other (and as a matter of fact the easiest) method to down the Dragon is a maple short bow and plenty of adamant arrows, making sure to equip your anti-dragon sheild if you see that fire breath coming.
LINKS
Runescape -- Wilderness Map -- Swift Switch -- Sal's Realm Of Runescape -- Combat Guide -- World Atlas -- Equipment Guide
Runescape -- Wilderness Map -- Swift Switch -- Sal's Realm Of Runescape -- Combat Guide -- World Atlas -- Equipment Guide
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