Spirit shards

Spirit shards are used in the Summoning skill along with charms to create pouches to summon Familiars. Players can purchase spirit shards from Pikkupstix in Taverley (at the starting point of the Wolf Whistle quest) for 25 coins each, and at the other Summoning Shops (including the Pet shops). 65,000 spirit shards are in stock. Players who desire large numbers of shards may also buy Spirit shard packs from Pikkupstix, each of which contains 5000 spirit shards at a cost of 125,000 gp. 65,000 spirit shard packs are in stock, effectively giving the stores infinite stocks of spirit shards, as they restock about 3 shards per second.

The High Level Alchemy value of Summoning pouches is directly related to the number of spirit shards required:

$$Alch Value=(Shards*15)+254$$

During the weekend of 25 January 2013, Spirit shards replaced gold prizes on the Squeal of Fortune, with the exception of the 200M jackpot prize, the shards that could be won were worth double the value of the gold prizes they replaced.

History
Long before Summoning was released, in the time of RuneScape Classic, Jagex developed the Life rune, but never released it. It was meant for Summoning, as by then it was meant to be a part of the Magic skill. This changed afterwards, because magic was getting big enough with the other spellbooks, like ancients. As Summoning isn't part of magic, runes couldn't be used. That way, they had to think of something else: Spirit shards.

When Summoning was released, spirit shards were 50 coins each. This high price stirred a lot of criticism from players who felt they were too expensive. Players also complained that familiars were not very useful. Jagex initially countered that the price of shards and the number needed for each pouch type was carefully considered and meant to balance the true worth of the summoned familiar. However, in the face of continuing complaints - and possibly as economic changes resulting from the game modifications interrupting Real-World Trading and Unbalanced Trade became apparent - Jagex made several changes trying to address the concerns of players regarding the Summoning skill.

In the Summoning Changes update of the 17 January 2008 (just two days after Summoning was released), they decreased the shard price from 50 to 25 coins each. In the Summoning 2 update of the 31 March 2008, they made several changes to make the familiars themselves more cost-effective and useful.

Until September 2009, spirit shards were a "junk" item that were rarely bought for 25 coins each. Players often sold spirit shards for 20 coins or lower each, plus junk, on the forums. It was also possible to buy pouches and swap to Bogrog to obtain shards cheaper than 25 coins each without junk. For example, a granite lobster pouch worth about 2700 coins on the Grand Exchange gave 117 shards (2925 coins at 25 each), which is under 23.1 coins per shard.

Originally, spirit shards could not be traded on the Grand Exchange, but in September 2008, Jagex made it so players can buy spirit shards on the Grand Exchange, with a median price of 25 coins, and a buy limit of 10,000 per four hours.

In September 2009, Jagex removed the infinite stock of spirit shards from the shops, instead giving them a personalized stock of 65,000. Many players complained that this was too low of a stock, especially combined with the "Buy-500" instead of "Buy-X". In response, Jagex created Spirit shards packs, effectively returning infinite stock of Spirit shards. An option to sell spirit shards to pet store owners (such as the one in Yanille) was also added. Due to the Free Trade/Wilderness Update on the 1st of February, pet shops no longer have a 50,000 shard maximum sell limit per transaction; you can now just enter the amount of spirit shards you'd like to sell.

Spirit shards may be used to replace money due to their guaranteed buy and sell price of 25 coins each. This is useful for players who have over the cash limit of 2,147,483,647 coins.

Swapping
An ogre, called Bogrog, has the ability to exchange shards for completed pouches. Bogrog is at the obelisk and Summoning shop near the entrance to the ogre city of Gu'Tanoth. He will swap out summoning pouches for 70% of the shards it took to make it, rounded up to the nearest whole shard. He will only return about 30% of the shards for summoning scrolls.

However, players need minimum Summoning levels, which begin at 21 and increases for higher summoning pouches. For example, a spirit terrorbird pouch requires level 52 Summoning and 12 spirit shards to make. Trading it to Bogrog requires level 58 Summoning, and yields 9 spirit shards in return.

How many shards do you need to buy?
With the use of Bogrog, you can turn the pouches you make back into spirit shards; the amount of shards you get is usually 70% of the required shard number for the pouch. Utilising this, the amount of shards you need to initially buy can be drastically reduced, however the effectiveness of this varies greatly with number of shards you initially have and the amount of times you are willing to exchange your pouches.

Bogrog will accept noted pouches.

The formula which calculates the effective amount of shards you own is:

$$\sum_{i=1}^{n}S\times0.7^{\ i-1}$$

S = initial amount of shards

n = number of trips done to Bogrog

i = parameter

However, it becomes tedious to recalculate this continuously to find the required number of shards you need initially. It is much easier to first decide how many trips to Bogrog you are willing to do as the amount of trips dictates what percentage increase you will ultimately get (regardless of initial count). The increases can be seen below:

Let's say you needed 55,000 shards to attain a certain level, the first thing you do need to decide upon is how many times you would be willing to visit Bogrog which will usually be 10 times, any more than this the gain in shards is minimal; for example doing 20 trips instead of 10 when having an initial starting shard count of 100,000 only yields an extra 6,405 shards. The amount of trips you are willing to do is something you have to decide.

At 10 trips, the increase is 227% so the effective amount will be 327% of the initial amount, or 3.27 times the initial amount. You then divide 55,000 by 3.27 to get 16,820 (rounded up). Therefore, to effectively have 55,000 shards whilst willing to do 10 trips to Bogrog you only initially need to have 16,820 Spirit shards.

Note: The division can easily be done on your computers calculator.