Armour

[Shadow MC]

I have recently started playing RuneScape again after quite a long break, probably around two years. Anyway, I've also started slaying again and the only armour I have at the moment is Guthan's so, I was wondering if there is some newer and better armour I should be using now or is Guthan's good enough? Keep in mind that I have the stats to wear any armour but not a great deal of cash to spend. Also, just so people know, I am aware of certain familiars from the Summoning skill that can heal me and I also wear a slayer helmet on my tasks to boost my stats.

[JeRambo]

Welcome back. :P.

 

Bandos is the best all-around armour. Replace bandos chestplate with fighter torso if you have it and want to save money. Torag's for the big defence boost if you can't afford bandos. Guthan's healing effect doesn't work while wearing the slayer helm.

[Quyneax]

Guthan's platebody is good for tanking, Verac's skirt is a bit better for legs (because of the +4 prayer bonus and only a slight drop in ranged defence). Barrows weapons and helmets are useless for slayer.

 

Still better is Bandos as Jeremy said, more strength bonus and it also doesn't degrade.

 

[hide=Slayer guide]The base slayer gear is as follows (alternatives in brackets):

• [For all slayer monsters except those mentioned under other weapons] Chaotic rapier (whip)
  
• Bandos body + legs (Verac's skirt with either fighter torso or proselyte top)
  
• [Depending on prayer/accuracy needs] Fire cape/Soul Wars cape/Ardougne cloak 3
  
• Barrows gloves (your best rfd gloves, at least rune)
  
• Steadfast/Dragon boots (rune boots)
  
• Amulet of fury (glory)
  
• Dragon defender (rune defender)
  
• Berserker ring (i)/ferocious ring if slaying in Kuradal's Dungeon (berserker ring, warrior ring)
  
• [Most important] Full slayer helmet (Slayer helmet, black mask)
  
• [For magic defence on waterfiends/aquanites] Karil's top and elite void skirt (black dragonhide body and chaps)
  
• [Crush attacks to use on waterfiends] Goliath gloves, Chaotic maul (Saradomin sword, Zamorakian spear)
  
• [stab attacks for higher-levelled dragons, when not using rapier] Korasi's sword (Zamorakian spear, leaf-bladed sword)
  
• Task-specific items such as mirror shields, antifire shields/potions, elemental shields, rock hammers, crystal chimes
  
• Cannon (optional, up to personal preference)
  

Slayer setups generally emphasise strength bonus, which increases the average damage of each succesful hit (slayer monsters usually having rather low defence, hitting is not a problem). Secondly, prayer bonus is important to keep the cost of prayer potions down (as you slay with piety on, to increase the speed of your kills. This is cost-effective and highly recommended). As a rule of thumb, +10 prayer bonus or above is good, but don't overdo it (anything above +20 is a waste). Defence and accuracy bonus are usually not fretted over (any defence bonus over 200 will do; if you get hit too often you should be using a protection prayer). Dagganoth, black demon, black dragon, lesser demon, hellhound, bloodveld and spectre tasks should be cannoned, as it dramatically increases xp rates (although it costs a bit).

 

Some notes on gear: You'll want a fury and a berserker ring before you get bandos plate, and get that before tassets. You'll want accuracy bonus on higher-levelled dragons; if using stab attacks (which you should) you can use the Ardougne cloak 3 which provides you with +6 stab and +6 prayer bonus. Torso + sw cape and fire cape + proselyte are common cheap top/cape combinations; the former is better.

 

Some levels to get for slayer (in approximate order but I'm not sure on the summoning):

• 70 prayer and King's Ransom - piety
  
• 68 summoning - bunyip
  
• 81 dungeoneering (you need 2 million xp, which takes you to level 80, but allowing some tokens for the scroll of life) - rapier
  
• 89 herblore (85 with a +4 stew boost) - extreme potions, superantifires
  
• 95 prayer - turmoil and soul split
  
• 88 summoning - unicorn
  
• 96 herblore (91 with a +5 stew boost) - overload
  
• 99 summoning - steel titan
  

I'm sure I missed something but this is most of it.[/hide]

[Shadow MC]

Welcome back. :P.

 

Bandos is the best all-around armour. Replace bandos chestplate with fighter torso if you have it and want to save money. Torag's for the big defence boost if you can't afford bandos. Guthan's healing effect doesn't work while wearing the slayer helm.

 

Ah I see, so there hasn't been a great deal of new armour introduced to the game since I stopped playing. I could afford Bando's but seeing as it has been dropping in price recently I might wait a while until I buy it. Also, I'm aware that Guthan's healing effect doesn't work when you haven't got the full set equipped, I take the slayer helmet off when I need to heal :wink:.

 

Thanks for the tips and the warm welcome :smile:.

 

Guthan's platebody is good for tanking, Verac's skirt is a bit better for legs (because of the +4 prayer bonus and only a slight drop in ranged defence). Barrows weapons and helmets are useless for slayer.

 

Still better is Bandos as Jeremy said, more strength bonus and it also doesn't degrade.

 

[hide=Slayer guide]The base slayer gear is as follows (alternatives in brackets):

 

• [For all slayer monsters except those mentioned under other weapons] Chaotic rapier (whip)
  
• Bandos body + legs (Verac's skirt with either fighter torso or proselyte top)
  
• [Depending on prayer/accuracy needs] Fire cape/Soul Wars cape/Ardougne cloak 3
  
• Barrows gloves (your best rfd gloves, at least rune)
  
• Steadfast/Dragon boots (rune boots)
  
• Amulet of fury (glory)
  
• Dragon defender (rune defender)
  
• Berserker ring (i)/ferocious ring if slaying in Kuradal's Dungeon (berserker ring, warrior ring)
  
• [Most important] Full slayer helmet (Slayer helmet, black mask)
  
• [For magic defence on waterfiends/aquanites] Karil's top and elite void skirt (black dragonhide body and chaps)
  
• [Crush attacks to use on waterfiends] Goliath gloves, Chaotic maul (Saradomin sword, Zamorakian spear)
  
• [stab attacks for higher-levelled dragons, when not using rapier] Korasi's sword (Zamorakian spear, leaf-bladed sword)
  
• Task-specific items such as mirror shields, antifire shields/potions, elemental shields, rock hammers, crystal chimes
  
• Cannon (optional, up to personal preference)
  

Slayer setups generally emphasise strength bonus, which increases the average damage of each succesful hit (slayer monsters usually having rather low defence, hitting is not a problem). Secondly, prayer bonus is important to keep the cost of prayer potions down (as you slay with piety on, to increase the speed of your kills. This is cost-effective and highly recommended). As a rule of thumb, +10 prayer bonus or above is good, but don't overdo it (anything above +20 is a waste). Defence and accuracy bonus are usually not fretted over (any defence bonus over 200 will do; if you get hit too often you should be using a protection prayer). Dagganoth, black demon, black dragon, lesser demon, hellhound, bloodveld and spectre tasks should be cannoned, as it dramatically increases xp rates (although it costs a bit).

 

Some notes on gear: You'll want a fury and a berserker ring before you get bandos plate, and get that before tassets. You'll want accuracy bonus on higher-levelled dragons; if using stab attacks (which you should) you can use the Ardougne cloak 3 which provides you with +6 stab and +6 prayer bonus. Torso + sw cape and fire cape + proselyte are common cheap top/cape combinations; the former is better.

 

Some levels to get for slayer (in approximate order but I'm not sure on the summoning):

• 70 prayer and King's Ransom - piety
  
• 68 summoning - bunyip
  
• 81 dungeoneering (you need 2 million xp, which takes you to level 80, but allowing some tokens for the scroll of life) - rapier
  
• 89 herblore (85 with a +4 stew boost) - extreme potions, superantifires
  
• 95 prayer - turmoil and soul split
  
• 88 summoning - unicorn
  
• 96 herblore (91 with a +5 stew boost) - overload
  
• 99 summoning - steel titan
  

I'm sure I missed something but this is most of it.[/hide]

 

I think I have at least half of the things you've listed, the other half I don't have due to money/level requirements. There are a few things on that list I'm not sure I'll ever have access to e.g. Steel Titan's and extreme potions or overloads. I don't think I would play the game enough to make going for those levels worthwhile either so for now I'll just have to get used to the idea I won't be using the best training methods.

 

One other thing, could you explain to me how using Piety on every slayer task, implying the constant use of prayer potions, is cost effective please?

 

 

Thanks.

[Deletion]

Using a regular set up, and praying Piety (constantly) you will use around 20 prayer potions and hour. A cost of ~60k.

 

Piety will increase your kill speed by ~25%.

 

Therefore, you need to value your time at less than 240k/hour for Piety to not be worth using.

 

Obviously this is a simplification and Piety won't actually speed up your task by 25%. But even at a 5% increase (Piety will increase task speed more than this) you only need to value your time at 1.2m/hour for Piety to be worth it.

[Shadow MC]

Using a regular set up, and praying Piety (constantly) you will use around 20 prayer potions and hour. A cost of ~60k.

 

Piety will increase your kill speed by ~25%.

 

Therefore, you need to value your time at less than 240k/hour for Piety to not be worth using.

 

Obviously this is a simplification and Piety won't actually speed up your task by 25%. But even at a 5% increase (Piety will increase task speed more than this) you only need to value your time at 1.2m/hour for Piety to be worth it.

 

Ah, I think I undertstand now, thanks.

 

The following is my current set-up (I'll add to it later if I left something out):

 

Full Slayer Helmet

Amulet of Fury

Bandos Chestplate

Bandos Tassets

Barrows Gloves

Dragon Boots

Berserker Ring

Dragon Defender

Abyssal Whip (haven't got the level for chaotic weapons yet)

Fire Cape/ Ardougne Cloak 3

 

When just taking the equipment into account, how should I decide when to prioritise prayer bonus over strength bonus? If I recall the prayer bonus I get from using the above set-up with a Fire Cape is +9, under the recommended number.

[Quyneax]

Strength is pretty much always better, I put the recommendation in because some tasks can't be finished in one trip if your prayer bonus is too low (for example dark beasts/abyss, especially at lower levels). So unless you need to carry so many potions that you need to bank, you don't need to worry about prayer bonus.

[Shadow MC]

Strength is pretty much always better, I put the recommendation in because some tasks can't be finished in one trip if your prayer bonus is too low (for example dark beasts/abyss, especially at lower levels). So unless you need to carry so many potions that you need to bank, you don't need to worry about prayer bonus.

 

Ah I see, so I would always prioritise strength over prayer unless I'm on a particularly long/difficult task.

 

Thanks for the tips, I should be ready to start back up now :)

[Cow]

Swap out your Fury for a Saradomin's whisper for 4 more strength bonus. However, it has 2 less accuracy (doesn't matter much), no defence (shouldn't matter at all) and only +1 prayer (kind of irritating but still worth it).

If you sold your fury and tassets (8 and 2 strength respectively) you could afford the new amulet (12 strength)

[Deletion]

^ Should mention that you're swapping the Tassets out for Verac Plateskirt. In which case you don't lose any defence (difference is negligible) at all and are basically trading 2+ for each melee attack bonus and 1+ prayer for 2+ strength.

[AHappySeeker]

What are you prayer and herb levels?

[Shadow MC]

Swap out your Fury for a Saradomin's whisper for 4 more strength bonus. However, it has 2 less accuracy (doesn't matter much), no defence (shouldn't matter at all) and only +1 prayer (kind of irritating but still worth it).

If you sold your fury and tassets (8 and 2 strength respectively) you could afford the new amulet (12 strength)

 

^ Should mention that you're swapping the Tassets out for Verac Plateskirt. In which case you don't lose any defence (difference is negligible) at all and are basically trading 2+ for each melee attack bonus and 1+ prayer for 2+ strength.

 

I can afford to buy Saradomin's Whisper without having to sell the Tassets but, how much of a difference would an extra +2 to strength really make? I ask this because 19mil+ is a lot to ask for an amulet that is only slightly better than a Fury in one aspect, and for something like that I want to know I'm getting my money's worth especially if it ends up going down in price relatively quickly.

 

What are you prayer and herb levels?

 

My Herblore is level 66 and my Prayer is level 74. I don't have enough cash to get either of these skills to the point where I can use Turmoil/Soul Split and create Extreme potions/Overloads.

[Deletion]

It's really up to you, it WILL speed up your training by a percent or two but in my personal opinion I would wait till the price of Saradomins Whisper stabilize before I purchased one.

 

When you are able to you should sell your Bandos to get extremes as they increase your DPS by much more than Bandos.

[Cow]

It's 4 more strength, not two.

Yes, the difference will be slight, but its cheaper strength bonus to money.

Selling fury/buying whisper gives you 4 strength bonus at a cost of 16m or so (5 from fury and 21ish cost of whisper) or around 4m per strength bonus

Tassets are 13m for 2 strength bonus. It'd make more sense to buy saradomin's whisper before tassets (I believe tassets are the least effective purchase in terms of strength/cost)

 

However, Deletion is right that turmoil (not so much in the eoc update down the road) and extremes are far, far more powerful than bandos. If you have full bandos and cash for a saradomin whisper you can probably approach the levels for extremes.

[Shadow MC]

It's 4 more strength, not two.

Yes, the difference will be slight, but its cheaper strength bonus to money.

Selling fury/buying whisper gives you 4 strength bonus at a cost of 16m or so (5 from fury and 21ish cost of whisper) or around 4m per strength bonus

Tassets are 13m for 2 strength bonus. It'd make more sense to buy saradomin's whisper before tassets (I believe tassets are the least effective purchase in terms of strength/cost)

 

However, Deletion is right that turmoil (not so much in the eoc update down the road) and extremes are far, far more powerful than bandos. If you have full bandos and cash for a saradomin whisper you can probably approach the levels for extremes.

 

I seem to remember Herblore being quite an expensive skill to level up effectively and I didn't think I would have enough cash to level it up to the point where I can use extremes. How much do you think it would cost me to get to 85 from 66 and what potions would I make?