sevenphotos

Statistically speaking, you never have more than 100%. That is the flaw in your argument. I completely agree that you can win more than 50% if you are one of the people at the *top* of the pyramid scheme - that's why those schemes work - but if you are not, you will be one of those in the lose 51%+ loss ratio. This isn't a dig at the enjoyment of pking. I can understand it completely. I'm just pointing out that it's a false hope that pking is profitable for anybody other than the people at the top of the pk chain, or for the resource sellers at the edge of the pk chain. The only reason that more than a few "top" pkers make any sort of cash is because of non-pkers and noobs who enter the wilderness for any variety of reasons. Basically, all those people who somehow ruin the wilderness are also the only the only reason the middle-rung pkers ever have even a slight chance at making more money than they consume.

Something that has been bothering me lately is the assertion that you can make a profit pking. This is usually brought up as the reason for having "honor rules" while pking in the wilderness. That if you don't have the rules, there would be no way to make a profit. But I cannot see, for the life of me, how you actually do generate a profit as a pker, unless you are at the top echelons of what is essentially a pyramid scheme. PKing does not involve resource collecting at any point. You bring what equipment you have into it, pots, food, and battle it out. The victor will get some of the items, the loser loses some items. During that process, food, potions, runes, will all be consumed. So say there is a total value to both PKers before the battle, afterwards the value will always decrease, no matter what, thanks to food/items that are consumed during the battle. And simple odds say that 100% of the time somebody loses. So no matter what, 50% of pkers are destined to lose the shirt off their back. And of the 50% that win, an even smaller percentage of them will win more than they lose. A very small percentage. PKing looks to be a very big pay to play scheme to me. And if you do not add in new blood constantly (an inherent part of a pyramid scheme), eventually the money runs out for the majority of the pkers, while a few at the top become very wealthy. So all those "noobs" going into the wilderness who don't pk much, don't know the rules, are not that good, etc., are vital to keeping the entire pyramid running. In fact, pkers may not realize this, but if they were slightly more social about it, they'd attract more customers. Most people say they stop going into wilderness not because of the pk itself, but the poor service during the encounter. "pwnt noob!" Just like any service industry, your livelihood depends on regular paying customers - a bit of service may go a long way. ;) I was thinking about this while selling resources to pkers. I fish monks, make potions. There is a lot of money that goes into pking that doesn't come back out of it. I get 400k every 1k monks, and they sell so fast, I'm sure my prices are too low. I get 10k per prayer pot (3). I feel sorry for RC pkers - any profit they allegedly make is gone after they buy only 5 prayer potions. By any means, I'm not suggesting that people should not pk. Who else is going to keep buying all of those potions and food? But I do think that people *should* consider that it is very unlikely that you will make that much money pking...

Sorry, but a simple mathematical point in regards to the "profit" of pking. Since pking only uses up resources, and involves no effort in gathering resources, for the majority of the participants, it is, indeed, a money-losing venture. For example, you have 100 people pk each other. 50 win, 50 lose. So only half would gain a profit. But out of the 50 that won, a small few are much better than the rest. Those small few would eventually gather up the resources of the rest of that 50. So right there, whatever "rules" you try to implement, in the end the minority would gain, majority would lose. On top of all that, those 100 would be consuming resources during those battles. So if you started with a total amount of cash/items amongst all those pkers, the balance at the end would be smaller than at the start. So, yes, a small few make a profit from PKing. But the majority of players will not. PKing is, in general, a money-losing proposition. If you want to make money, RC. Chop wood. Fish. Nearly anything else that involves gathering resources (and often, selling them to pkers) will make you money. Pking is where you spend it.

If you do the fremmick isles quest(s), you can slay Ice Trolls for troll tasks. Their drops easily pay for food, as they drop warhammers up to rune, shields up to rune kite, granite shields, noted raw shark, and host of other items. And they drop pretty regularly. Trolls do hit hard and often even with 75 defense, but you can range the ice trolls from safe spots. Combat bracelets will update your slayer kill list every 10 kills, saving you one inventory spot.

Buy a bunch of duel rings. Load up with ess, telly to al kharid, run north to the fire altar and craft, telly to castlewars, bank, and then repeat. This is ridiculously fast rc experience and duel rings aren't that expensive. More expensive in the short run, and cheaper in the long run, is to buy several Glory necklaces, and instead of using the duel ring to teleport to Castlewars, teleport to edgeville with the glory. You will halve the amount of duel rings used (which are usually 5k ea). So 1 glory = 10 duel rings, and the glory is rechargeable. I went through about 15-20 duel rings doing fires before I realized that. Luckily, I make my own duel rings... Plus, if you do the Abyss method later, you will need 8-10 glories anyways. That way you can do about 1400-1700 nats before needing to recharge the glories. And if you ever tire of it all, you can sell the glories for what you paid for them. Essentially, they are free teleports if you can afford the initial payment.

Infernal mages are a pain, to be honest, and I have to say I've only gotten one or two decent drops total from them over several slayer assignments. And those two were Mystic Hats, not exactly big money. I barely made back the money spent on food - and I've got black dhide, 68 mage, so decent defense. Point blank, they hit far too often for their level. For actual money making, go down the hall to the Aberrent spectors, pray, and keep picking up all the ranarrs and lava battlestaffs. You have to pray the entire time, but you usually end up with more ranarr than you use, and the lava battlestaffs sell well.

About 400 an hour is the max you will catch of either red or grey chins at lvl 99. You simply won't be able to empty and lay traps any faster than that. At lvl 63, you'll catch about 150 red chins an hour *if* you are efficient about it. You can only lay 4 traps at that level. At lvl 69, I'm getting about 180-200 red chins an hour when being most efficient. I've also tried smoking the traps, and while you catch them more often per trap laid, the time spent smoking the traps negates the efficiency gain. So you simply double your clicks for the same net gain. Until you can lay 5 traps at lvl 80, I imagine you'll simply max out at arouind 240-260 red or grey chins an hour after lvl 70. Catching grey chinchompas is not very efficient in terms of money or exp - I level every hour spent as is at red chinchompas, and I've already earned 770k. I wouldn't even have made half that at greys, and I'm not sure I would get exp any faster. Cheers, 7ven

I have had about 3-4 mask drops so far, 2 when I camped with about 2000 steel arrows. Thats when I first qualified to kill cave horrors and couldn't afford to buy a mask. I'd say I've killed about 1000 total, but not sure. It is a fairly rare drop - it wouldn't be 500k if it wasn't. That said, between the lvl 3 clue scrolls, ranarr and snapdragon seeds, noted teak logs, and a good rate of nats being dropped, they are fairly good money. My last slayer task I did not get any masks, but made 700k from seeds and clue rewards. Bonuses do stack, Im hitting 28 with a whip, mask, and combat pot at 74 str.

I think somebody mentioned in another rant on this subject an interesting point. That possibly one of the most essential skill of a pker is to have the ability to convince you that you should die and leave your stuff to them out of honor, to not be a safer, to not be a noob, etc. You see, if they can convince you to play anything by their rules, they win. So all this talk of honor, rules of the wilderness, etc., are simply attempts to keep it from being equal. They claim it's an attempt to keep it more equal, but when a person trains and equips within a certain limited set of rules and conditions, they'll always have more advantage over somebody that has not done that. It is also an attempt to move the responsibility for your characters death (and their sudden wealth) onto you. The reality is that it is their responsibility to kill you for your pixels, and if they cannot accomplish that for any reason, it's their own fault. There is countermeasures for every defensive tactic. Snare, teleblock, smite, the list goes on. So if they chose not to level up their skills to use those countermeasures, if they didn't choose to lvl up agility to run you down - well, the truth is it's *their* fault.

I've seen several all the way up to Dragon at the hunting grounds near Piscatoris. Specifically a little to the left of the falcon area.

Charged or uncharged, the black mask adds a constant 15% attk and str bonus during melee with Slayer Tasks only. It does not add any bonus to range or maging. And there is no bonus for any combat that is not a slayer task.

Trolls and I believe Ogres drop seeds fairly often - but both can be difficult to fight if you are not at least a medium combat lvl. The easiest place to find seeds is in draynor at a busy world - somebody is always theiving the master farmers and dropping the low lvl seeds on the ground.

Just finished a 160 cave horror assignment. Got a black mask in the first 10 kills, 4 snapdragon seeds, a couple of Ranaar weeds, and about 12k in alchs. Plus one lvl 3 clue scroll. Total haul was about 600k in cash (sold the mask for 500k in seconds, the 4 snapdragons in minutes), rune platelegs and black dhide chaps, sara page 3 and guthix page 2. The black masks are rare drops, so if you are unlucky, you are unlucky. I've had 3 or 4 drop on me total so far. Kept one, sold the others. I only did the quests for cave horrors to get my own mask, now I like the assignment as it is easy (if you range) and makes some good cash if you are lucky. First slayer beast that really starts paying back on the skill for me.

Just buy an uncharged slayer mask for 400k, the charges are next to useless given the large amount of animals you have to slay. The pro of the slayer mask is that it is useful during all slayer tasks that you melee, significantly those in the slayer tower and dungeon. And once you are done with it, you can sell it for 400k. So you are not out any money, and you gain a 15% attack/str bonus while slaying. OTOH, the cannon is going to cost you 200gp a shot, unless you spend the time making your own cannonballs. And the time spent making cannonballs could be spent slaying, which is what the cannon is for, speeding up slayer tasks. Finally, you cannot use the cannon in a lot of areas, such as the slayer tower/dungeon. It'd be mainly useful during troll and dagganath tasks. I personally think the mask is a must have slayer item, while the cannon is a useful slayer item if you have the extra cash.

keep it once you get it, that particular clue requirement comes up fairly often.

Thing is, its easier to get the herbs than the secondary ingredients. So finding the easiest available secondary ingredient is the key. Because of the demand for prayer potions, there is snape grass gatherers/sellers. Hang out in seers bank and catherby for herbs (farm nearbye).

It will probably increase the amount of people willing to use the Abyss for RC, though. Even if it is just a placebo in a way, it'll help more people get over that initial worry created by all the RC pk stories they keep hearing. I am curious if it uses the charges up if you have it in inventory when you enter the abyss, however. If you just carried it but did not wear it, you could put it on only when you see pk'ers hanging around, and possibly save on charges then?

You do need to do the Dwarf Cannon quest first, just in case that has not been mentioned. The dwarf won't sell the molds otherwise.

Some additional information that I found while following this guide. 1) You do not need to finish the Fremminick Isles quest to start killing Ice Trolls. You merely need to start the quest to get transport to the island. Actually, I did not check, but you may even be able to skip starting the quest. 2) Once you are there, there *is* a range safespot outside the caves. Head north over the bridge, keep going straight north and then to the east a little bit, to the end of the peninsula there. It is the one east of the mining spot. There are two rocks there, and a single adult Ice Troll (lvl 82) spawn that is not aggressive, or become non-aggressive very quickly. You can safespot behind those rocks. This area is just out of the range of the rock throwing females - if one does follow you there, if you go to the absolute end of the peninsula, they will quit attacking and hopefully wander away. If it doesn't wander away, shoot it once and it will retreat. There is one more adult ice troll that can and will wander over from the mining rocks. Be careful to not get trapped on one side of the rocks with it. Of course, with timing you can use it to increase the speed of killing. I killed 130 ice trolls with this method, and got 3 rune kite shields, about 20 addy full helms, several types of hammer (but not rune), and one granite shield. Plus the raw shark and balls of wool. It may be just me, but the runts drop the rune kiteshield the most often. Maybe the granite shield as well. It is hard to get a runt over to the safe area, though. What I did try and do was wait near the edge of the big battle area until they were occupied with the guards, and sniped them for a hit or two to get the drop. I got a rune kite and the granite shield drop this way. But be very careful of the females! Melee is possible at several locations, but they can gang up on you, and they hit *very* hard and very often. It's a good way to use up your excess food supplies if you are not going to pray. However, melee may become possible when you stay in the middle fight area long enough for them to stop being aggressive, and then use the guards to absorb the majority of the hits.

Mmm, probably fire giants, blue dragons, and cave horrors when you get another level of slayer.

At what level? A lvl 126 has far different options available than a lvl 40. And if you are a slayer (and what lvl) has a big impact as well. How they made Slayer viable as a separate skill was by giving the slayer specific monsters some of the best drop ratios.

Except that you have to be lvl 50 crafter and lvl 49 magic to even think of that....

Stick with killing cows - cowhides - tan leather - leather items. Kill or pick up about 100 cowhides before you tan the leather and craft. You'll be lvl 20 - 30 within 4-5 hours max, I think. On a lot of worlds, people are killing the cows for combat exp or meat, and dont pick up the cowhides. So you'll probably only need to kill about 10 cows and pick up the rest for a full load.

If the wilderness was *only* for pking, I'd agree with all the recent whinging towards 3-itemers, safers, etc. The problem is that there is a few other things that are necessary to do in the wilderness that have nothing to do with pking. Killing green dragons for slayer tasks is one of them - I had to go through 4 pk attempts while I was simply trying to kill 50 greens. And then there is the lvl 3 treasure trails, half of which are spread throughout the wilderness, I swear. Over the course of two clue scrolls I had to hit 6 different locations in the wilderness. Did I 3 item them? Of course! 1 DDS, one dhide body, and the clue scroll, along with shovel or other bits. Don't feel the slightest bit sorry to the PK'ers for doing so, either. As for the autoers and gold farmers at the green dragons... Well, what did you expect? A free ride forever? People that can figure out how to program such a macro can figure out how to minimize their losses eventually. Ditto to gold farmers, or even just legitimate people trying to make money off of greens.

Search in player-made guides for Axe_manJack, or Axeman_Jack, or something like that. It's about 3-4 pages back there. For lesser demons, you have a choice of the taverly dungeon or Karamja volcano. Taverly dungeon is less crowded, however. Karamja has a little better safe spots if you are going to range, which I suggest - lessers hit fairly often and fairly hard.