Being a Wandering Vagabond in Runescape

Hanging with the StykeWyrms on my beautiful island retreat

 After all this time, working towards one major goal, then another...
First it was 99 Summoning so I could max my combat.  Then, I had to get 99 Prayer, for the same goal.  Once I got 138 combat, it was time to get 99 Construction.  Got that, though I'm still saving up to max out the house.  Can't believe it's 25 million just for one simple little demon throne!
Somewhere in there, the achievement diaries came out, then they became the Task System.  I wanted the Elite level for all tasks.  The armor, the teleports, the special rewards... the Taskmaster Emote!  Killing Jad, which was part of the elite tasks for Karamja.

Now that I'm retired, I can relax and go fishing

I recently got the Taskmaster emote, and while there are plenty of things I want to do, for a change I don't have any obsessively driven things to do.  Sure, I want to get all the new spells and rewards from Livid Farm.  And I want to get at least 90 Agility.  And 99 Slayer.
As an aside, I keep going to Kuradal (spelling?) hoping she'll assign Fight Caves.  It's funny, how I hated Jad and the Fight Cave so much.  But by the time I'd figured out a way I could beat Jad, I kind of enjoyed it.  I don't want to go back for no reason, but I keep hoping I'll get him as a slayer boosted assignment.

I'm at 96 Fishing, and currently am relaxing at the Fishing Guild while I do a little one-handed Barbarian Shark Fishing.  It's kind of fun to be able to do it, though I don't really see a huge speed increase.  I think for normal fishing, I'll stick with Rocktails.
I've been Slaying for the last few days.  Sometimes I'll go over to the Gnome Advanced Agility Course.  I'll flip an  hour or two at the Grand Exchange.  Now maybe I can even explore Dungeoneering - finally!

In all honesty, it's kind of nice just doing what I want to.  I've been driven to reach those difficult goals for so long now, Runescape's almost become like work.  Finally, I'm relaxing.  Whatever the mood is, that's how I play.  I really enjoy combat, so Slayer's been getting a lot of my time.  But I'm not obsessing over it.

Goals are good.  It really gives you a sense of accomplishment to set a hard goal, and after lots of work, actually achieve it.  But wow... just wandering aimlessly has a lot going for it.  I drive hard when I'm going for a goal.  Now, I'm enjoying Runescape.  My biggest goal is to save up enough gold to finish my house.  Let's see, 2 thrones, there's 50 million.  A few dragons in the dungeon, at about 10 million each, that's probably another 50 million.  Maxing the odds and ends of each room in the house, I'm guessing I'll need between 125 million and 150 million.  I'm about a third of the way right now, but I don't want to spend all my seed money.  I use maybe 50 million for trading when I'm flipping.  It fluctuates a lot, based on what I'm trading at the moment, but usually it's commodities.  Essence, Runes, Food, Wood... The stuff that's always in demand.

When I get close to enough money, I'll probably start obsessing like usual.  But for now, I'm just the happy wanderer.  Check out the pubs in Falador, Varrock, Brimhaven, etc... you'll probably find me knocking back a few beers with the local rednecks!

Runescape Fight Cave Jad Defeated Fire Cape Mine!

Jad Defeated at last - I finally won the Fire Cape at the Fight Cave!!

If you've read nearly any of my other posts, you know I've been hung up with beating the Fight Cave for a long time now.  Really didn't want to take on Jad at all, but my goal of getting all the Elite Tasks meant I had to sooner or later.
I'd try, get tired of it, do something else.  Then go again.  It's been a couple of months this way, and I just couldn't get the hang of it.  Yes, my hand-to-eye coordination is really bad.  I'm a hard-learner. 
But last weekend, I left work knowing in my heart this was going to be the weekend I did it.  I've been working very hard at learning how, and what to do.  I've learned a technique that simplifies killing Jad, and finally even someone like me can beat him!!  And yes, I'm writing it up as a guide, should have it posted in the next few days, maybe this weekend.  I know, there's tons of guides out there, but this is more for my sake- after finally finding a way that works for me, I just have to write about it!  Most of the writing is done, but I need to go back for pictures.  My computer's not fast enough to take video and play the game at the same time, but I'm at least going to provide my own pictures for the guide.  I wasn't about to worry with pics for my real try, but I'll go back now that I've beat him, just to get the pictures.

But wow, when old TzTok-Jad finally roared and keeled over on his side, you wouldn't believe how excited I got.  In 50 years, I've always been the quiet type.  But I had so much adrenaline, it just had to come out.  Threw back my head, and let out a wild rebel whoop that brought Monique on the run, half afraid I'd had a heart attack!

So, now I've got a Fire Cape.  I may not have wanted to fight Jad for it, but since I have it now, I'm going to enjoy it.  Best of all, now I'm clear to get the Karamja Elite Tasks reward.  All I have to do is a few more slayer tasks, and I'll have it.

Okay, these guys weren't so much fun

My tasks have been pretty fun so far... mostly.  Wasn't too thrilled with the Skeletal Wyverns.  Loved getting the Abyssal Demons.  Got two Abyssal Whips during that task, about 2 minutes apart!  Then there was the Nechryaels, which go by quickly at least.  So far, 2 Dark Beast assignments, those are fun.  I knew they dropped the Dark Bow, and assorted mildly interesting items.  But the big surprise was the 1,000 noted Raw Swordfish!  That was pretty neat.
 In case you didn't know, Raw Swordfish currently sells for 278 gold.  So 1,000 noted swordfish is worth 278,000 gold!  Add that to the nearly 1/2 million gold a Dark Bow is worth, and it was a profitable trip!

I especially like the Dark Beasts because they're so easy, if you've got a little strategy going.  Dress for Prayer, use Ancient Curses.  Set for Deflect Melee, and Leech Attack.  When you're out of prayer, use Ardougne Tasks cape to teleport to the Kandarin Monastery, recharge prayer. 

Use an Elf Crystal with a Temple teleport to get back to the Dark Beasts.  When you need a quick bank trip, use the Ring of Kinship for infinite free teleports to a bank.  I usually kill 6 or 7 per prayer recharge. Dark Beasts never quit being aggressive, no matter how long you've been there.  So it's very easy to get there, set up, and then just monitor it now and then to make sure you're not out of prayer. 

In the meantime, I can do something else... like write this blog!  I'm fortunate enough to have a desktop computer, and a netbook.  While Runescape's playing on the top monitor, I'm typing away at this guide.  And taking pictures for the blog in real-time as I type...

I know the description of how I fight Dark Beasts is very abbreviated.  If you're interested in more detail, leave me a comment.  If there's any interest, I'll post a blog with a better step by step to the method.  But I kept it short, because I kind of figured if you have the things I mentioned, you'll know what I mean.  And if you don't have them, or know what I'm talking about, chances are, the guide wouldn't do you any good for a long time.

Always on the run!

As of this moment, I've got about 111 more Dark Beasts, then one more assignment berfore I can get the Elite Karamja Gloves!

It's good to have Runescape goals

Well, I've been laying low recently.  I just got back into my writing
after the last long break, when I decided maybe it was time to get
some things done in Runescape.  Firstly, to level up all skills
necessary for every Elite Achievement Task.  So I started making
Decorated Fishing Urns, then Decorated Cooking Urns, until my
Crafting was high enough for the Relleka requirements, if I take a
skill-boosting potion with it.  Once Crafting was high enough, that
left me with a stock of Cooking Urns in the bank.  I also had several
thousand uncooked Rocktail in the bank, so decided to cook them up
before continuing with the skills.
In the process of cooking the Rocktails, I made it to level 98
Cooking, then about 1/4 of the way to 99.  Figured, what the heck,
let's get the Cooking 99.  So I bought something like 4,000 raw
Rocktail, while at the same time selling 4000 from my stock of cooked
Rocktail.  By the time the new ones were cooked, my stocks were
replenished, and a small profit of a nearly 200k had been made.  It
was kind of an accidental 99, but I'll take it any way I can!
At that point, the only skills that still didn't meet the Elite
Achievement requirements were Agility and Slayer.  Slayer only needs
about 3 levels, no big deal.  It's fun, so I don't mind working on
it.  Agility, on the other hand, needed around 10 levels...  That's
going to be a LOT of running around the Ape Atoll course.  I'm
sticking with it because once you hit level 75, you quit falling. 
Otherwise I'd go do the Dorgesh-kun circuit.
Looking at all the agility running, I decided this might be a good
time to focus on Jad for the Fire Cape.  I truly, deeply, suck at
prayer switching.  If I didn't want the Elite Achievement rewards so
much, I just wouldn't mess with him.  But, I really want the Elite,
so Jad's been seeing me a lot recently.  I got him down to the
healers time before last.  Then the next time, he killed me before I
could even find him.
I've combed the net looking for ways to beat him.  With very high
combat stats, and a lot of luck, I might be able to dragon claw,
vengeance, and ancient curse him to death.  Maybe.  On the other
hand, if I get really good at prayer switching, Jad can be beat
entirely by Deflect prayers from the Ancient Curses.
In the meantime, it's Runescape's Extra Experience Weekend (their third one).  Monique and I have been grinding away at those skills that we hate.  For me, that's agility.

No pics right now, this is just a quick update.  I want to spend all the time I can getting my bonus experience from Runescape.  Even though at this point I'm down to the 1.1% bonus, it's still extra.
After the weekend's over, I'll update, with some pics too.  Hope you're making the best of it, too!

Runescape Bonus Experience Weekend Coming Up Again

Dinner should be ready in a moment

If you haven't heard yet, it's true... Runescape will be hosting a Bonus XP Weekend from the 11th to the 13th of March.  Last time we had one, I used it to get my 99 in Construction.  Monique used it on a multitude of skills, but she played consistently all weekend and really maxed out her bonus points!
     If you don't remember how it went, you generally get a 2.7x experience bonus the first 30 minutes.  The next 30 minutes nets you 2.55x exp.  Every thirty minutes, the XP bonus reduces a bit, until you get to 10 hours.  After that, you get a constant modifier of 1.1x until the weekend is over.
     Some skills don't get any improvement.  For instance, if you're using a player owned house, or the ectofuntus to work on Prayer, the skill bonus won't apply.  That's a downer, because Prayer is the main skill Monique is trying to raise.  In lieu of raising Prayer, she's going to work on Herblore.  She's always enjoyed it, and wants her next 99 to be Herblore.  Though she might spend some time working on other skills.  In particular, Agility.  We both need to raise that a lot.

Crafting...I'm Urning this experience (bad pun)

     I'm going to be working on Smithing and Crafting.  Smithing is easy, I'm smelting gold ore for that.  But Crafting is a weak spot for me.  I don't like messing around with it, and as a result, I'm pretty low on Crafting.  On the good side, now that Urns have come out, I can make Urns to raise my crafting level fairly cheaply.  But it's still slow and boring.  So I'll spend most of my XP Bonus Weekend on Crafting.  I need nearly ten levels for my Elite Achievements. 
     I think it makes a lot of sense to use the extra experience on skills you hate, so you can knock them out of the way faster... or expensive skills, so you can afford to level up more.  I'll save the free and fun skills for normal times.  Though like Monique, I may spend some of that time on Agility.  It's free, but tends to be boring.
     Regardless of how you plan to spend your Bonus XP Weekend, I'm sure Runescape has something to offer for at least some of your skills.  Even if it's not the one you most want. 
     Believe it or not, there are a small group of immature whiners (name-calling, yeah, I really shouldn't, I know) who like to complain about everything.  They figure since they had to walk to school uphill, in the snow, both ways, every day of the year, then nobody else should get to ride the school bus.  Or, in Runescape terms, since they earned their 99's the hard way (whatever way that was) then it cheapens the skill for someone else to have it easier.
     Speaking as someone with several 99's, and several skills close to 99, I don't mind.  Sure, maybe I got some of mine the hard/expensive/long way.  But that's okay, because... I was a) having fun and b) playing a game.  If someone is not enjoying the game, maybe it's time to find a new game.  If they're truly upset that someone else gets to play and have more fun than they did, maybe it's time to turn off the computer and play in the real world for a while. 
     Seriously, it's just a game.  If it quits being fun, I'll find something else to do.  I play Runescape to get away from working, jobs, responsibilities... for a while.  If it starts feeling too much like work, why the heck would I keep playing?
   
     I thought very hard about not expressing my opinions here... but decided to let it stand.  Those of us who simply enjoy the game often get shouted out and flamed by those who can't tolerate other opinions.  So, there's my opinion.  Comments are welcome, even opposing comments... as long as we can keep it civil and express our thoughts coherently.  So if you disagree, and can say so nicely, I would be happy to discuss it, and share our thoughts.

Runescape: Soloing the King Black Dragon... and Getting the King Black Dragon Heads!

I've played Runescape all these years, yet never fought the King Black Dragon.  Mainly because I don't like team combat.  I'd rather fight by myself.  And I'd been under the impression the King Black Dragon needs a team to defeat.  Then Runescape mentioned the King Black Dragon recently. 

On a whim, I Googled for a guide to Soloing the King Black Dragon.  Found several.  Decided to try him.  Put on all my prayer gear... Proselyte armor, the cape from Nomad's Requiem, etc.  Grabbed a whip, a Dragonfire Shield, and a Fury.  Stocked up my inventory.  Summoned a Steel Titan.
Once I was as prepared as I could be, took a Games Necklace to the Wilderness Volcano, zipped across to the Lava Maze, and climbed down the ladder.  Then, with great trepidation, I tiptoed into the King's lair, prepared to do an emergency evacuation if he turned out too dangerous.

Not so tough any more, are you?

Ummm... okay, you're probably laughing at me right now.  Yeah, he turned out to be no big deal.  I used protect from Melee (actually, the Ancient Curses version).  Boosted my stats with Turmoil, and killed him somewhere between 8 and 10 times before having to head back to the bank.
So, the King Black Dragon turned out okay.  Couldn't ignore him while I read the forums... he could be fatal if you're not paying attention... but not too bad.  I wound up enjoying fighting him.  And he gave me some decent drops.  I got 200 Yew logs, which is handy since I'm trying to raise my firemaking.  Picked up a fair number of Fire and Air Runes.  Odds and ends.  Nothing great, but not a waste of time, either.
All in all, I should have tried him a lot sooner.  Now maybe I can get a mounted King Black Dragon head for my Player Owned Home!

Update:   The above blog was written after my first trip to the King.  Before I even posted it, I went back and fought the King again.  Mainly to get a picture or two for this blog.  Much to my surprise, he dropped the KBD head!  According to the Wiki page, the King Black Dragon heads are supposed to be extremely rare.  I know about rare...  it's taken weeks sometimes to get a whip drop sometimes.  And I spent more than 2 months doing nothing but dragons to get a Draconic Visage.  So, expected to be doing the King Black Dragon for a long time before getting the head... or heads?  Anyway, got the heads.  Fast. 
Went to Canifis, got it stuffed.

Had to remove the Abyssal Demon Head first.  I kind of hated to, but the KBD head is much cooler.

Once the Abyssal Head was gone, up went the King's heads.  They look really awesome, and can talk to you.  The whole conversation is kind of long, and very funny. 

While I was snapping shots of the wall mount, one of my baby black dragons wandered into the shot.  So you'll see him below as well:

I don't know if it's usually that easy to get the heads or not, having never heard any numbers, but for me?  It took a grand total of 3 trips, slightly less than 30 kills.  I'm pretty tickled!

Marking time and making money on Runescape... Jad and the Fight Caves

The last few days have been focused mainly on trying to recover some gold.  After buying the Armadyl Chestplate, it had left me pretty strapped for cash.  So I'm still flipping investments on the Grand Exchange, and actually have done pretty well.  I'm not a high-level investor, I just flip a few things when they're buying/selling well.  Like Pure Essence, that's always done pretty well.  As of tonight, I'm back up to about 8 million.  I've been supplementing my flips with trips to the Aviansies.  They may not be the fastest cash I could do, but they're reasonably fast cash, and fun.  If I really wanted fast, I'd make double natures.  I think that's probably the fastest skill I have for making money. 
Regardless, I'm working toward buying back my Armadyl armor.  It was sold to help level up a skill, and I want it back now because I'm going to do Jad at the fight caves.  I've never cared about the Fire Cape, and didn't want to be tied down for hours without being able to stop at my leisure.  Plus, I'm not very good at multi-tasking.  I think Jad will kill me many many times, because I don't think I'll be very good at prayer switching and keeping everything going all at once. 
But it's time to try.  All my combat skills, including ranging and magic, are maxed.  I've done all the quests.  My character has the levels to get me there, but I lack the real-time fighting skills.  If it weren't for the Elite Acheivement Diaries, I'd be happy just to let Jad live.  But I want all of the Elite rewards.  Not so much because they're cool, though some of them are.  But just because that's a goal I set for myself.  I got the Ardougne Elite Cape back when it first became available.  Then I got the Seers Village Elite, which gave me the double-enhanced sword Excalibur.  I really wanted that sword... healing 400 points and getting 15 extra defense every few minutes is a huge plus!  Then I got the Falador Elite Shield.  Now, I have all the required skills to get the Karamja Elite reward, but I have to actually beat Jad in the fight caves to get it.  Which leaves me where I am now, scrambling to get enough money to buy the gear I want to use. 
This is going to be tough, because I'm so bad at that kind of fighting.  Usually, I just bulldoze my way through things and hope for the best.  This time, it's going to take finesse.  I'll probably be down in the fight caves for months.  Wish me luck.  Oh, if you've got any advice, please share it with me!

Runescape Grand Exchange: Bad flip makes money after all... and experience!

Recently I made a bad decision with my Runescape investments.  I'm a low-budget investor who likes to flip commodities.  Usually make between one million and three million profit a day.  Problem is, outside of the gold I have tied up in flipping my investments, I keep spending as fast as I'm making.  It started when I decided to go for 99 Construction.  I nickeled and dimed my construction skill, until Jagex started hinting about their 2nd extra-experience-weekend.  At that point, I decided to jump into merchanting.  Took a 10 million startup, and began flipping.  By the time the weekend arrived, I had over 100 million gold (this is Runescape now, not real cash!)
That was just barely enough to buy all the oak planks I needed to dungeon-door my way to 99 Construction.  After that, I was too broke to build my dream home, so I kept investing in the grand exchange.  But before I got very far, they announced the Elite Achievement Diaries.  Well, I think of myself as a high-level player.  At least, my character is level 138 and most skills are decent.  So as a point of pride, I want to get ALL the Elite achievement rewards.  I had the Ardougne elite already, and decided the next thing I wanted was the super-enhanced Excalibur from the Seers Village elite tasks.  Problem was, my herblore level was abysmal. (Not abyssal... abysmal!)
It took weeks to make enough money to raise my herblore.  And even then, I Evil-Daved a skill-boosting stew for the last 5 levels worth.  Then back to home-building.  Still flipping on the G.E., and I'd started fishing and cooking Rocktails. 
It was the Rocktails that did me in.  I saw how well they sold.  Decided to take my current spending money of 20 million, and buy 10,000 Rocktail to flip.  Everything went well, right up till the time to sell them.  They sat for days, then the price starting tanking.  I didn't want to lose that much money.  So I pulled them out of the GE, and started cooking.
By the time I'd cooked 10,000 Rocktail, I wound up making a small profit, using some money to invest in Death Runes for flipping, keeping a few Rocktail for myself.  And with my current gold of 14 million, today I bought back the Armadyl Chestplate I sold for Herblore money. 
Yay!... I'm broke again.  Okay, so starting over. 
Oh, and cooking 10k Rocktail?  My cooking skill went from 95 to 97!  I guess it worked out okay after all. 
Bit of quick advice... for a small and steady profit, without a lot of risk, flip Maple logs.  I buy 25,000 at 2 gold below median, and sell it at 2 gold above median.  I make 100k Runescape money every buy/sell flip.  It may not be much, but it's an easy way to get started.  The risk is low, and they usually sell quickly for me (bearing in mind the GE 4-hour buying and selling delay.)