More Goals Reached

The biggest news to report today is:



Yes, I now have 99 Firemaking, and the coveted (by me at least) Firemaking Skillcape!

While I had last reported that I was going to do beacons to get it, I learned through trial and error that simply burning logs was a lot quicker, but beacons gave better experience per log. Since availability of logs was nowhere close to an issue for me, I opted for the former.

Other News:

Hiscores:  I've recently broken into the top 50,000 players in Runescape!

Ardougne Achievement Diary: A new achievement diary was released for the Ardougne area. I completed Easy, Medium and Hard diaries...only to learn that there is an "Elite" achievement list.

I've always been one of those "do it all in the first day" kind of guys, but these Elite tasks really smacked me down. Hard. I've got 2 serious sticking points: 91 Smithing and 93 Summoning. That's going to be fun.

New Goals:

One of the things I haven't liked about my character is his inability to use the Giant Pouch when runecrafting. While I'm not 100% sure, I believe that 75 Runecrafting is one of the requirements for an Ardougne diary Elite task. So I've decided to get 75 Runecrafting.

I plan to do it by crafting Death runes (about 5k at a time) to get money to buy pure essence to use at the ZMI Runecrafting Altar.

Runecrafting is a skill I don't really like because of the time it takes. But after I get it to 75, this will trigger the start of my next set of goals: all skills 75+.

This will not affect my current goal of 80 Summoning.

The Science of Firemaking

It didn't take me long to get bored with burning shades.  It's a very, very labor intensive way to make money, and as a source of Firemaking xp, it's even more labor intensive.  But while looking at a skill calculator, I noticed that a full run in the All Fired Up minigame was 39,990.5 xp.  This could be a shortcut, but it'll take some planning.  I already have my course set up for lighting from when I got the Inferno Adze, so all I need to do is come up with an efficient way of loading them.

As you can see (click to to see it bigger), some of the beacons are a bit far from the bank, in particular:  12, 13 and 14.  12 isn't horribly far from the Trollheim teleport, that's God Wars dungeon...and that place does horrible things to your skills.

The Science, Thus Far:

You dress for success, so that's where I started.

First thing you'll notice is the red pirate clothes.  Well...stop noticing it.  I'm only wearing it because it's my trademark.  Instead, notice the bracelet and sword:  Forinthry Bracelet and Enchanted Excalabur.  The equipment changes will be discussed a little later.

The lighting route remains the same, but my inventory has changed slightly.  Before I head to Oo'glog, This is what my inventory looks like:

The Lunar Staff is just for getting to Oo'glog.  I usually dip in the thermal bath (to ensure that I have full hp), the sulphur bath (for the Prayer boost), and finally in the salt water bath (for the unlimited run).  After I dip, I summon the familiar and load it with logs, head to the bank, deposit the Lunar staff, and fill the rest of my inventory with logs.  Notice the addition of the Super-Anti Poison.  I start my trip by using the Slayer Ring to teleport to the Mortiana Slayer Tower instead of using the fairy ring.

The bank trip in Edgeville differs too.  After I light the beacon (giving the tender logs), I bank:

The familiar gets all the food, and as many logs as it can carry, then I fill my inventory with logs.

Why the changes?

The various equipment changes were spurred by a serious issue I ran into at the end of the run:  escaping deep wildy with my life.  After God Wars, the trip is all deep wildy and riddled with dangers for someone not ready for them.  There was one close call where I was down to 4 hp and had no way to cut the webs into either Mage Arena or the Ardy lever.  I got lucky, and someone came along...but I don't like relying on luck.

Revenants are a constant problem in wilderness (as they were designed to be), so the food and Anti Poison are to help me survive as I run past them.  Once I'm done, I can't use the levers if I'm teleblocked, so I added the Forinthy Bracelet to prevent it.  Enchanted Excalabur is a slashing weapon, so I can use it to cut any webs I need to in order to get to the lever...with a side benefit of healing 2 hp every second for a total of 20 hp with it's special.

The Loading Dilemia:

Loading was still an issue for me because it took so long.  But with a little trial and error I came up with a workable plan  (the plan listed assumes I'm starting right after a finished run, hence the Terrorbird.  Initial starts without a Terrorbird take longer).

Beacons 1 and 2:  I fill both my inventory and the bird's inventory with logs.  I teleport to the Slayer Tower and load both beacons.  Teleport to Edgeville and bank.

Beacons 4 and 5:  I fill both my inventory and the birds inventory with logs.  I run to the 5th beacon and fill it, then run to the 4th beacon to fill it.  Run south to Varrock East bank.

Beacons 3 and 6:  I run to the 3rd beacon and fill it, then teleport to Edgeville and fill the beacon there.  Bank.

The Terrorbird isn't much use from here on out (I usually need something else in my inventory so I won't have enough for 2 beacons and if I'm following a run it's getting close to expiring), so I grab Tireless Run scrolls to use until it dies.

Beacon 12:  The God Wars beacon is next because the cold in the area lowers all of your stats.  This gives my Firemaking skill time to get back to normal.  I grab Trollheim teleport runes and a full inventory of logs.  I head to the beacon and fill it, and teleport to Edgeville.

Beacon 7:  I grab a full inventory of logs and head to the beacon at Black Knight Fortress.  After I fill it, I teleport back to Edgeville.  I change out the Glory with a Games Necklace.

Beacon 8 and 9:  If the bird is still alive, I fill both of our inventories with logs and teleport to Burthorpe Games Room.  From there I head to beacon 9, then walk to beacon 8.  If the bird is not, I bank in the Rogue's Den before I go to Goblin Village.

Beacon 10 and 11:  While I do these separately, the procedure is the same.  I teleport to Trollheim, fill beacon 11, teleport to the Wilderness Volcaon to bank, then teleport back to Trollheim, down the agility shortcut, then fill beacon 10.  Teleport to Wilderness Volcaon.

Beacon 13 and 14:  I grab Trollheim teleport runes, a hatchet and logs.  I head down the shortcut by beacon 11 and run north to fill beacon 13.  I head back down the ladder and continue north to the area around the 14th beacon.  Here, I cut 20 regular logs to fill the beacon (it gets lit last, so it only matters that it gets lit).  I head to mage arena to start the run.

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On a small side note:  cavefish heal 20 hp of damage, which makes them as good as sharks.

Completed Goals

Big news today.

First of all, I completed half of the goal I mentioned in my last post:



Dragon Full Helm: 15,600,000 gp

This fulfills a long standing dream I've had since I started: Full Dragon Armor. As usual, it was up 1 million from when I last checked the price. Typical. But I still like it, and that's all that matters.

Next, I've finally acquired something I had been hunting for a while:



Full Lumberjack!

The Woodcutting bonus is small, but every little bit helps. I found some advice on the forums to stay to the easy path and avoid encounters (fewer combats means faster trips, faster trips means more trips, more trips means more chances to get it).

I am still working on the Firemaking cape, and I'm still doing Shades of Mort'ton in order to get it. My current plan is to use the money to train up Construction, and to do Summoning when I have the charms for it. I currently have a bunch right now, so I'll be doing some soon. As of this moment, I have 500 Sacred Oil (4), and I'm cutting the logs for them now.

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Other News: They opened up a new cavern in the Dwarven Mines under Ice Mountain called the Living Rock Caverns. New monsters with ok drops from what I've seen so far. In my Full Dragon, they don't hit me often, but they are quite easy to hit. Doing this I managed to get an Attack level, a Strength level and a Combat level.

I'm now 110 Combat level.

With this new cavern, they introduced new fish which require a high Fishing level. The lowest of these are Cavefish, which require an 85 Fishing. I spent the night before I went fishing Monkfish in order to get the level for it.

I don't know how they are as food yet, as I'm not currently working on combat and haven't even cooked any of the one's I've acquired so far.

The new Dwarf quest (Forgiveness of a Chaos Dwarf) is also done, keeping me eligiable to wear my Quest cape...even though I'm still wearing my cooking cape. This opened up a new area with monsters that drop a new handheld cannon and the long awaited Dragon Pickaxe. I haven't been to the cavern yet (I'm assuming it's going to be busy for a while), nor have I price checked handheld cannons or pickaxes. I'm assuming they're going to be expensive, so it'll be a bit before I got one of either.

Combining Goals

While doing the various things I do to make money, I got a little bored and went out to do the Temple Trekking/Burgh de Rott Ramble minigame for a bit. While I didn't get a Lumberjack shirt (much to my continued annoyance), I did stockpile some shade remains. So, once I got tired of trekking, I decided to burn some shades.

I, of course, didn't just burn the small number I got from trekking: I decided to make a day of it. I stockpiled 250 sacred oil (4), 250 magic logs, and 250 shades. I ended up making about 1.2M gp. I also got somewhere in the neighborhood of 120k firemaking xp.

This got me to thinking...instead of just wasting time burning maple logs for weeks to get 99 firemaking, why not burn shades? It might take the same amount of time (or a bit more), but I'll have a whole lot of money when all is said and done.

Now, I've never played for money. But (much like in the real world) money does help. I am going to get the firemaking skillcape anyways, so why not do it in a way that I end up ahead financially? Plus, I'll also get a decent amount of crafting and prayer xp, too. Finally, the minigame is rather easy (although it is a bit labor intensive) and I enjoy it.

As a result, my firemaking skillcape goal and my Dragon Full Helm goal have met unexpectedly at a bizarre crossroads out in the middle of nowhere and became unlikely travelling partners.

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In other news: All of my melee stats are now 79. With 80's across the board in combat, I'm temted to try to get all my combat stats 80+. It would give me an excuse to do some work on my prayer. I already have a goal to get summoning to 80, and I could train range and prayer at the same time by killing dragons. These are only thoughts, however, as I still have a long way to go for 80 in my melee stats.

I am also just a stone's throw from 74 summoning.

New Goals Added!

After getting 92 Cooking (which gave me 2 skills beyond the half way mark), I was somewhat coersed by my friends into the persuit of a skill cape. Then independently thought "Untrimmed skill capes suck. Let's make it 2." Firemaking was the obvious choice for two very important reasons: 1) It's 1 of the 2 closest skills to 99, and 2) I already have everything I need to get it...I just have to do it.

A friend of mine has been trading raw monkfish for cooked with me for a little bit (it will be over 6k when all is said and done). I'm also still getting tuna and swordfish from Miscelania, which is good for about 1k-2k fish every week.

I just recently got 95 Cooking, so I can now make Summer Pies. Most of the ingredients I can get from either farming, the RFD chest in Lumbridge basement or my house, so I plan to assemble the pies as I get the materials and cook them using the Lunar Spellbook when I make my glass for orbs (you don't burn them using the "make pie" spell). This will help out my Farming level goal as well.

I was also told by a friend of mine that it was possible to buy raw manta rays, cook them, and sell them for a profit...and at 96 cooking you don't burn any with the cooking gauntlets. Prices on food has changed remarkably recently, so I don't know if that still stands, but it's worth looking into.

Speaking of changing food prices: cooked sharks are currently going for 1,262 gp (at the time of the writing). Now that I don't burn sharks, I'm even considering fishing some to sell.


Firemaking, my plan is to burn 1k to 2k logs every day, plus do my 2 Evil Trees per day. Should take a month or less.

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Other than that, nothing really new. I've done some Slayer, but haven't really got much in the way of good charm droppers. There were also a few new quests, but nothing really hard-core. More fun than difficult, which I don't mind at all.

I do have a desire to hit God Wars for a bit when all is said and done, in a desire to upgrade my uniform a bit, and to buy a few new toys. These wants include (but are not exclusive to): Dragon Plate Body and full helm, Bandos armor (of some kind, preferably body), and a Dragonfire Shield. It's a big shopping list, but there's big money to be made at GWD. And besides...it's not like I couldn't use the Range experience. Even to get one or two of the above items would be a good break from power-training.

The Inferno Adze

Finally.

The quest for the Adze was definately a trying experience, let me tell you. While the single Agility level I needed wasn't much of a problem, the 11 Firemaking levels I needed were. It required me to reduce 23k maple logs to ashes, and at about 1.5k-2k per day (a couple of days I managed 3k), this took a couple of weeks. I literally did nothing (other than my dailys) but burn logs. And this was just getting the skills to get it.

To actually acquire the Inferno Adze, one needs to light all 14 of the All Fired Up beacons, and have them all burning simultaneously. These beacons are stretched from Paterdomus (the temple passageway to Canifis) to Ice Plateau in the Wilderness. While the Wilderness isn't as hazardous as it used to be, it still has it's dangers when you aren't combat prepared. A Revenant Ork managed to have it's way with me between the beacon at God Wars Dungeon and Ice Plateau when I was loading the beacons.

And now to the cost. Better logs burn longer, so to get the Adze you want the best logs you can get your hands on: Magic logs. Each beacon takes 20 logs to load it, and the assistant at the beacon holds 5 for you. This is 25 logs per beacon, except the last 3, which don't have assistants. This is a grand total of 335 Magic logs, and at 1.3k gp each: 435.5k gp. And I lost about 20 and had to buy more which put me up to about 461k gp. I could have tried to cut them myself, but the trees are usually over populated and this would have taken considerable time (I had already spent enough time getting 92 Firemaking in the first place).

The trip itself went smoothly. I'm documenting how I did it here, so if someone asks me how I did it, I can refer them here.





Getting Ready: Obviously, the first thing I did was load all the logs. This gave me the opportunity to make any necessary repairs and talk to the assistants. Talking to the assistants is an important step, because several of them require something before they'll help you. Check out the Minigame guide on Tip It to see what you'll need.

The Process: I wore nothing but the Ring and Gloves of Fire (previous rewards from this minigame) Amulet of Glory and a Combat Bracelet. I took a tinderbox, a Teleport to House tablet, a Spirit Terrorbird familiar and 25 Magic logs from the bank. The first thing I did was go to Oo'glog and bathe in the salt-water spring to quicken my run. This gives me unlimited run for a decent amount of time (one less thing to be concerned with). Once I got out, I hit my tab and used the portal in my house and used my Kharill portal. From the Canifis bar, I went through the temple to the first beacon. From here I lit beacons 1-5, running the entire trip. After lighting the 5th, I teleported to Edgeville.

At Edgeville, I summoned my familiar and reloaded my inventory. I then took the following: Tinderbox (obviously), 4 law runes, 4 fire runes, Goblin Village teleport orb (from Dorgesh-Kaan), Games Necklace, Super-Restore Potion and the rest of the logs (12 of which I gave to my familiar). I ran up and lit the 6th, and used my combat bracelet to teleport to the Monestary. From here I ran to the 7th and lit it. I used the Goblin Village orb and lit the 8th. I took the logs from my familiar and then teleported to Burthorpe via the Games necklace and lit the 9th. From here I didn't go directly to the 10th, but instead teleported to Trollheim and lit the 11th beacon, climbed down the ladder and backtracked to the 10th (I would have had to walk south from Burthorpe, head east and then back north to get to #10 in order). From the 10th beacon, I teleported to Trollheim again, this time going north past God Wars Dungeon to get to the 12th (your levels decline steadily in the harsh cold, thus the super-restore potion). I climbed down the agility shortcut into the Wilderness, and headed to the 13th beacon, just north of the temple. Then on to Ice Plateau for #14.

I finally return to King Roland for my very own Infernal Adze!

The actual lighting of the beacons took maybe 15 minutes. Setting up to light the beacons took several hours. But it was worth all the hard work.





In Other News:

The Evil Chicken (as well as all the combat randoms) are gone. We will miss you.

I have also broken combat level 100, and have completed the Karamja and Seer's Village achievement diary. This leaves one more to finish: Falador.

Finally, I also acquired enough Slayer points to learn to make slayer helms!

New Goals

With my biggest goal met, it's time to come up with something else to do. While there are many things I'd like to acomplish, there is only one thing that really stands out: getting an Inferno Adze. For those who don't yet know, this is a combination woodcutting axe and pickaxe that is rumored to be better than even a dragon hatchet. To get one, you need several skill levels...the biggest being a 92 Firemaking.

I wanted a few Firemaking levels to begin with, so I could use Magic Pyre logs in the Shades of Mort'ton minigame. Of course, the easiest way to get Firemaking levels is to set things on fire. My current Firemaking level is 65, so I'm going to need to do a lot of burning.

I start out by cutting and selling Yew logs, and using the money to buy Maple logs. Maple logs give decent enough experience, and I can buy more than ten times the number of Yew logs I sell. I'll do this until it's no longer worth doing.

Another thing I'd like to get is an 80 Cooking. I still have all that salmon left, and my plan with that is to fish and cook tuna and use it all to make Admiral pies using the "Make Pie" Lunar spell (so I don't burn any). This probably won't get me the whole way, but it'll help.

I also set out to the All Fired Up minigame to get a Ring of Fire. Since I'm burning maple logs, I get 3718 xp per inventory (which is about 3 xp more than without, or 10% more).

The minigame isn't that difficult, but it's easier to just burn the logs with a tinderbox for experience. The trick is to fill all the beacons with the best logs you can use, then you head to the ogre spa and bathe in the salt water spring (for unlimited run for a time), and return to light the beacons after run is no longer a concern. It also helps to know where the beacons are, and take teleport runes with you for both bank runs and fast transporation to the next beacon.

Another thing I'd like to get done is to unlock the Air Guitar emote. I may just head to Bounty Hunter (and a couple other minigames) in order to unlock what I need (which is somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 songs).

Chapter 1-Episode 12: The Final Grind

This stands to be my last power levelling session in a free world, and I have some high goals to meet before I pay my membership (actually, I have some time to kill before payday). My list of things to do include:

Buy a rune platebody
30 Woodcutting (9 levels)
38 Fishing (8 levels)
35 Cooking (1 level)
27 Runecrafting (26 levels)

I'm also going to need about 20k-30k gp to buy food, potions, and other supplies for the fight. So I need a lot of levels, and about 70k gp. I make a base plan:

I will cut and burn oaks until 30 Woodcutting. I will then fly fish until level 38 (buying feathers, as I'm getting more and more concerned with my Hit Point experience level), and cook trout until I get 35 Cooking. I will sell the rest of the fish. I will then mine rune essence in Varrock (in lots of 500) and make the best runes I can until I get 27 Runecrafting. I will save these runes for when I train magic. Finally I will manufacture steel bars to get the money I need for the plate and the quest supplies.

The woodcutting, fishing and cooking go way faster than I expected, so I have plenty of time to devote to runecrafting and making money. I sell the fish, and only get about 6k for all of them, so I still have a ways to go yet. I head to Arbury's shop to start mining essence. I start off with 200, since that will get me to 9 Runecrafting. Making earth runes will bring me back to Varrock, so I can mine more essence then.

I finally get to 14, and start planning the runes I'm going to make to get to 27 Runecrafting. I plan on using these runes to train Magic after I do the Dragon Slayer quest, so I decide to make 500 mind runes. These will be the main rune of all my spellcasting until at least 17 Magic, so I want a lot of these. I mine 250 essence (since I make 2 mind runes per essence at this level), and start crafting.

Once I get the 500 mind runes made, I set a goal of 300 essence worth of all the elemental runes. The number is arbitrary for the most part: I just want to ensure I have enough elemental runes to be able to use up most of the mind runes, with a bit of a reserve stockpile. I set off to Varrock to get started. I start with mining 300 essence for earth runes. I craft those, then mine 600 essence for the water and fire runes. I wait until last to make the air runes in order to get my runecrafting skill higher, because once it's past 22 I get 3 air runes per essence. By the time I get to the air runes, my Runecrafting level is 26. Making 73 essence into air runes will give me my goal, but I'm going to want a lot of airs so I mine 200 essence (which will give me 600 more). It doesn't take long to finish those, which gives me a 27 Runecrafting (and close to 28).

Now there's still a little matter of a rune platebody that I need to buy, and decide that mining has always worked out best for me as far as making cash, so I head over to the Grand Exchange to buy some coal. My plan is the same as it was the last time: mine enough iron to use up the coal making steel bars while mining the bits of silver as they are available, sell, and buy more coal. Here's the financial report:

Starting cash: 13,325 gp
1st run: 35 steel bars, 13 silver bars = 23,403 gp (bought 120 coal)
2nd run: 60 steel bars, 23 silver bars = 40,031 gp (bought 200 coal, 5k left over)
3rd run: 100 steel bars, 0 silver bars, 1 sapphire, 5 cut sapphires = 66,958 gp

This is more than enough for a rune platebody. I have 26k left for other quest related expenses, with plenty of room for rapid capital expansion (making my money grow).

Tomorrow is payday. Tomorrow is members. I can hardly wait!!!

Chapter 1-Episode 7: Legends don't walk

I'm finding that, thanks to the Grand Exchange, I'm making far more trips to Varrock these days than I did in my previous noobcarnations. Since I've sworn off Magic untill after Dragon Slayer, teleporting is a ways away for me. That leaves Lumbridge's favorite water ride: the log canoes. At a 12, it would take 3 canoe rides to get outside the Grand Exchange. At 27, it'll only take 2 from Lumbridge (I'm only using Lumby as a starting point because of the Home Tele spell). At 42, however, it's one trip. 42 is currently ideal, but I'm going to shoot for 27 right now.

The easiest way to power train woodcutting (especially in free worlds) is the "cut and burn" method. You take a wood cutting axe (equipped is ideal) and a tinderbox, and find a long, uninterrupted stretch of open ground (a road for example) with a lot of the trees you're cutting. You cut the trees until your inventory is full, then you use the tinderbox to set all the logs on fire in a straight line. After a while, you can find a rhythem that lets you light logs without initiating the "striking the tinderbox" animation. This lets you burn logs at an incredible rate.

While the Grand Exchange is a great area to use if you already have the logs to burn, if you're cutting and burning, there's no better place to go (especially at starting levels) than the east-west road between Falador and Port Sarim (just below the cabbage farm). Plenty of regular and oak trees, and more than enough area to clear your inventory (you can eventually work your way down to the Crafting Guild if you don't run back). This is where I'm going.

Woodcutting goal: 27
Logs cut: 93 regular logs/71 oak logs
Firemaking level: 24

I kind of laugh when I get to 21 Woodcutting as I head back to Lumbridge and discover that canoes are a Members only thing. Continuing to 27, while not pointless, is no longer a priority. Thus, I abandon my current goal.

Notes on woodcutting axes: don't run out and buy a new axe every time you can use it. Skip every other one to save money. The axes after bronze that I'd buy would be steel, mithril, and then rune. In fact, if you're starting from level 1, take a steel axe with you and drop the bronze one at 6 Woodcutting.