Fist of Guthix

Fist of Guthix is a minigame that was released on 9 April 2008. The game employs tactics and strategy, offering a substantial range of rewards to players. To begin playing Fist of Guthix, players must first speak to Fiara or Coulson. Please note that this is a Safe minigame. You will not lose any items if you die in the minigame.

Fist of Guthix happens to be one of the few minigames which you can have a highscore rank in. The current number rating needed to be on the minigame high scores is 500, and there are about 88,134 players ranked.

Fist of Guthix is a great way to train Magic because runes are provided for free. As of Combat Improvements Beta release to live game, the minigame usually has enough players to start the game at any time.

Location
The entrance to Fist of Guthix is located in the Gamers' grotto just north of Falador.

A ring of duelling has a teleport that leads directly to the arena. The Games Necklace has a teleport to the Gamer's Grotto. From Gamer's Grotto the Southern portal will take you to the Fist of Guthix arena.

Lobby
After players enter the cave, they enter the main lobby. Here, the players can talk to Fiara or Coulson, depending upon the outcome of The World Wakes, to learn the rules of the game, access their bank, talk to Reggie who runs the shop, talk to some of the druids like Alran, Getorix and Pontimer to learn more about the history of this place and finally enter the waiting room for the minigame. New players must talk to Fiara first before they are allowed to play the game. She is a giant earwig like creature, a Guardian of Guthix. There can only be 250 players in the minigame at once. If the game is full, players in the lobby will not be able to access the waiting room until the game has cleared out a bit. Players can simply wait a few minutes until the waiting room is open, or they may wish to switch worlds if the current world is exceptionally busy. Once inside the waiting room, players need only to wait until the game matches them with an opponent and they will then be teleported into the main Fist of Guthix arena, as long as there are a minimum of 8 players in the room.

At the corner of the waiting lobby, there is an entrance that players can see but cannot click on it. The examine text is "I need an opponent first." This is probably the physical doorway that your player goes through when they are paired up in order to access the arena, rather than an update hint.

Before the Bonfire Update, many people chose to train firemaking here because of the long strip of land and the relatively convenient bank.

Gameplay
The minigame consists of two rounds and is 1 vs 1. In each round, one player is classified as the "hunted," and the other player is classified as the "hunter." In the first round, the roles are determined randomly. In the second round, the roles are swapped and all stats are restored. Therefore both players will have a chance to play each role; afterwards a winner is determined based upon number of charges you were able to collect during your turn as "hunted."

Some items cannot be brought into the game arena. Any food, runes (including essence), skilling supplies that cannot be equipped (such as a tinderbox, logs, etc.), all afros, holiday items (except for clothing), potions, and any form of noted items cannot be brought in. There will be a warning if you attempt to bring an item that you cannot use.



The following items are supplied to each player when a player goes into the waiting area, and taken away if they leave it:

Playing Fist of Guthix was a common way for players to level their magic level without paying for runes, because they provide you with runes to use while playing.

Hunter
As the hunter, players must hunt down the other player and kill them as fast as possible in order to prevent them from collecting charges. Hunters can use melee, range, or magic to attack their opponent. Hunters typically use a combination of attack styles in order to deal maximum damage against their opponent, and counteract any prayers or armour.

Hunted
Being the hunted player is usually considered much more challenging, and is the only role in which the player can collect charges. The basic objective is to gather as many charges from the "Fist of Guthix", a large energy well in the centre of the field, as possible before time runs out or the player dies.

To gather charges, the player must first pick up a stone of power from a stone dispenser, and then wield the stone to gather charges, the maximum number of charges being 5000. The stone is two-handed, and can only gather charges when it is wielded (not just in the inventory), meaning that the hunted player will be unable to fight back whilst wielding the Stone. Players can gather charges anywhere in the arena, although the closer to the centre (the "Fist of Guthix") they are, the faster they will gather charges. (If you are the hunted and you click around the centre of the field randomly on your mini map where all the players cluster, it is hard for the hunter to right click on you.) Players wielding the stone will not gain charges individually, but will instead gain a number of them at a time. The hunted can attack the hunter, but no spells can be used and the hunted can only rely on melee or range. If the hunted kills the hunter, the hunter respawns in a random location.

Hunted players do have an advantage, however, in that they can use the teleport houses located around the centre. Hunters cannot access these houses, nor see players inside them. Automatic lock-on is also cancelled, so the hunted player is safe while inside them. There are portals inside to teleport the player to other houses circled around the centre. When the player teleports he/she will lose 20 charges. Note that the player will have some lifepoints drained when they enter a house, and often take 30-40 damage while they are in the house. Players cannot gather any charges while in the house. If a player has recently exited a teleport house, they will not be able to enter another house again for about 20 seconds. A hunted player with less than 20 charges cannot use the portals in the houses. When teleporting there is a chance that the teleport will fail, returning you near the house or at the centre of the arena.

Round end
A round will end under any of the following circumstances:


 * Time runs out
 * The hunted player gets killed
 * The hunted player gets the maximum number of charges (5,000)
 * Either player logs out or leaves the arena (If your opponent logs out and you have not had a turn to be the hunted yet, you will have 500 or 150 points and your opponent will have 0, resulting in a win for you)



When the first round ends, both players will swap roles, stat effects will be reset, and the second round will begin. After the second round, the player with the most energy charges (or the only player left in the event of a log out or forfeit) wins.

If both players got the exact same amount of charges (e.g. 647-647), BOTH players will lose.

At the end of the game, most of the arrows on the ground will be returned to their original owners, so there is no need to pick them up while in the game (Similar to the Duel Arena).

Facilities of the fighting area
The fighting area is composed of a large circular area, with teleport houses and ruins surrounding the centre. At the edges of the arena, there are stone dispensers for hunted players to grab a stone of power. The stone must be equipped to gather charges. The teleport houses near the centre, or Fist, of the arena, protect the hunted when entered. It makes the hunted invisible to everyone else and it disables any "locking on" effects but also drains the hunted's life points initially, causing your life points to decrease by thirty every five seconds. There is also a portal in these houses, but it takes 20 charges to activate, and has about a 90% chance of teleporting you to another house. The other 10% of the time, a player will be teleported to the outside ground in between houses. Any player standing on the Fist of Guthix will have their run energy rapidly restored. The centre also provides a good hiding place, as long as you stand atop other players. Although your opponent will see a yellow indicator above you, the combination of lag and necessity of right-clicking often slows the hunter down somewhat. The stone of power will gain faster and more charges the closer it is brought to the centre. The stone of power does not charge unless the player is wielding it.

Rewards
At the end of a match, players are rewarded as follows.

Rating points
Used to keep track of your progress on the high score tables. Rating goes up or down based on how many charges by which the game was won or lost.

Fist of guthix tokens
Currency for Reggie's shop, which can be used to buy the items listed below.

Win: Winner's tokens depends on
 * How many energy charges you managed to collect in the game. The more energy charges, the more tokens.
 * Your total level. Guthix favours those players who are skilled in many areas, so your winnings will increase as your total level increases.

Loss: Loser receives 1-3 tokens for good effort.

Tie: If both players get the same amount of charges, both will lose and receive 1-3 tokens. This is designed to thwart cooperative play.

Forfeit: Players who forfeit by leaving the game early are flagged as a forfeiter, receive 0 tokens from that game, and will receive fewer tokens from the next game.

Some players choose to make Fist of Guthix a money-making option by purchasing tradeable rewards from Reggie, having him uncharge them (only uncharged items are tradeable), then selling at the Grand Exchange. The effectiveness of this is determined by the rate at which one can acquire tokens.

Shop
Inside the main lobby, Reggie owns a shop where you can spend the Fist of Guthix tokens you have earned. The items here consist of various types of gloves that can increase your experience while training certain skills, magical robes which may supply certain runes for you or increase the potency of certain spells, and special types of armour that can give you strength or ranging bonuses.

All items listed here will degrade over time (with the exception of gloves and gauntlets - see below). The items will also be untradeable until the item has completely degraded. To repair/recharge any degraded item, use the item with the shop-keeper Reggie, and he will recharge the item for you a specific cost of tokens. To completely degrade an item, allowing you to trade it, simply use the item with Reggie and he will deplete the item for free. Rather than degrading, gloves will simply crumble into dust after 1,000 uses. There is no way to repair these gloves - A new pair must be bought from Reggie after you have lost the old pair.

Gauntlets bought at the Fist of Guthix do not degrade over time, but simply degrade completely when the player dies. This does not apply when the player dies while participating in a safe minigame. You can restore the gauntlets power if you pay a small price. You can also sell your degraded gauntlets on the Grand Exchange.

Lag
Many players have complained about the massive amounts of lag in this minigame, and being logged out of the game due to lag is quite common. Therefore, players are advised to not play this minigame with High Detail on - This will help reduce lag and lower chances of being logged out. Sometimes, big amounts of lag will cause the arrow to stay in the position where the hunted player was before, but the hunted player wouldn't be there.

Death dotting (DDing) and screen spamming
A common technique among the "hunted" (especially with high level "hunted") is to group together on a single spot in the centre of the stage. These players can often be seen shouting "Dd here!" or "dd!". The purpose of this is to prevent "hunters" from killing players so easily, as all the hunted players are grouped together on a single tile, the hunters will have to scroll through a huge list to find the player they need to attack, with the name of the hunted being "lost" under floods of "Trade", "Follow", "Req assist" and "Walk here" (known to some as a screen spam). This has caused much strife throughout the official Jagex forums and from players in-game. The reason this happens as a player can only attack through the right click menu in this game, but the chances of being lost have been reduced due to the Right-Click update, which makes tabs of players or items and you can manually scroll down to either walk there, attack, or trade with player.

House hugging
A method that causes a lot of complaints from hunters, is the practice of hiding in the houses until the hunter is out of sight, and then going outside until the hunter is near, and then repeating this until the round is over, or the hunter forfeits in frustration. A recent update to the houses prevents immediate re-entry after exiting a house, although it is still possible to house hug. House hugging also refers to running around a house so that Mages and Rangers will get stuck on the other side, which frustrates the other player.

Combat level difference
This has caused criticism among players with lower combat levels because players are paired randomly, regardless of combat skills, and can often put those players at a large disadvantage. For example, even if a level 30 player is waiting to play and there are many other players around their level, they could likely be paired with someone at a much higher level; even as high as level 138 and vice versa. Unlike most other PvP minigames, this gives higher-levelled players a large advantage of being able to more easily kill lower levelled players. A good way of reducing your chances of playing against a high level is to avoid less crowded worlds, as many high levels tend to play in these worlds. In addition, while some low level Fist of Guthix players may be experienced enough to take on high levels (such as experienced runners), for the majority of players, it's better to just intentionally lose (go to the centre and let your opponent kill you) and hope that you'll get an easier opponent next time. DO NOT forfeit as you will lose a lot of ranking and receive fewer tokens in your next game.

This has sparked many suggestion threads in the "Suggestions" part of the Official Forums, saying that there should be a level difference cap, or that pairs should just be more equal in combat level.

Opponents running
This common method has made many players frustrated and angry. The "hunted" runs around the game arena, hoping to not get attacked. They sometimes go to the Fist of Guthix to collect charges and recharge their run energy. Hunters in the first round may threaten to do the same in the next round, as a way to fight fire with fire, so to speak. However, this tactic is often ineffective, since the hunted can gain as little as 3 charges a time, compared to 28 charges when standing on the Fist of Guthix.

Pures (outdated)
Fist of Guthix was a popular minigame for Magic pures, since the minigame offers free magic runes that could be used only during the minigame, and decent rewards for the tokens. This was especially effective for Magic training, as there was no cost to cast combat spells because of the free runes. However, the downside to this was that only half the normal experience was gained.

Trivia

 * Near the Forfeit Caves, players can see symbols similar to Saradomin Symbols. A Postbag from the Hedge has cleared this up and states that the symbols were caused by Saradominists attempting to make the place their temple. Fiara forced them to flee, but they carved the symbols before leaving.
 * Lately, Fist of Guthix is not very popular for Free-to-Play players. This may be because the robes, which you can get as rewards, are worth very little any more, with batwing being introduced and because it can longer be used to train Magic for free since the Evolution of Combat.
 * The Charge Centre in the middle of Fist of Guthix is the imprint of where the Stone of Jas used to be. It was revealed in Ritual of the Mahjarrat to be where Saradomin hid the stone during the God Wars.
 * Before 1 February 2011, the entrance was in level 7 Wilderness, north of Varrock.
 * There appears to be some crates with a Farseer Helm on top near the Rewards Trader.
 * When attempting to "Join" a player (via the Friends List) who is located inside the lobby, the joining player will teleport to the Wilderness Volcano Lodestone. This suggests that the cavern is still located underground in the Wilderness.

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