Poison (historical)

Poison is a detriment that players and monsters suffer when they are attacked by a poisoned weapon. Also, the Smoke-type spells from the Ancient Magicks may poison targets. Many non-player characters are also able to poison. The damage can range from 1 to 16.

When a player or monster is poisoned, a number appears with a green splat instead of a red or blue one, indicating the amount of damage the poison has dealt to their hitpoints (for example, a player who suffers 6 poison damage will lose 6 hitpoints). Poison wears off over time, decreasing by a value of one for every three times it strikes.

For instance, if a player is hit by another player wielding a poisoned dagger, they would be hit for 4 damage every minute (four times), then 3 damage every minute (four times), then 2 damage every minute (four times), then 1 damage every minute (four times), and then the poison would be gone - for a total of 40 damage over 16 minutes.

It is worth noting that an attack with a poisoned weapon does not actually need to score damage to inflict poison. Whether this is a programming oversight or intentional is not known. This could possibly be that poison does not need a cut (i.e. dealing 1 damage) but just a graze which deals no damage to the player, but enough to get the poison into their bloodstream. Some monsters must inflict damage (Protect prayers do not negate this, and even if they hit zeros due to the prayer's effect, you are still poisoned) in order to poison a player.

It is also interesting to note that being afflicted by poison does not disrupt Woodcutting.

Tripwires in Tirannwn cause 2 poison damage.

Some players will deliberately subject themselves to poison, and then travel to heavily visited areas to commit suicide.

Weapon poisoning
Clean, unpoisoned weapons can be poisoned by weapon poisons made through the Herblore skill. There are several types of weapon poisons which deal progressively more damage. Only spears, arrows, bolts, darts, throwing knives, javelins, daggers, and hastae can be poisoned.
 * Weapon poison - poisoning deals 4 damage initially with melee weapons, 2 damage with ranged. Weapons with this poisoning have the suffix (p) on the end of their names (for example, Dragon dagger(p)).
 * Extra strong weapon poison - hits for 5 damage with melee, 3 with ranged. Suffix (p+).
 * Super strong weapon poison - hits for 6 damage with melee, 4 with ranged. Suffix (p++).
 * Karambwan paste - hits for 6 damage, cannot be cured by normal Anti-poison potion. This poison can only be applied to spears and hastae. Suffix (kp).

Also, if a monster you are fighting gets poisoned by you, you will not receive experience from the poison damage.

Poison can be removed from weapons with a cleaning cloth, obtained by using Karamja rum with Silk. A new poison can then be applied to the weapon. If you attempt to apply poison to an already poisoned weapon nothing interesting happens. This is the case of all poisoned weapons except when you use an poisoned karambwan paste on an spear or hasta. For example, you have an dragon spear p++ and you also have poisoned karambwan paste, you can use the paste on the dragon spear p++ without needing to wipe off the p++ with an cleaning cloth.

Strangely enough, if you poison an enemy such as a cow it is still possible to cook and eat the meat it drops with no repercussions.

Curing poison
Poison can be cured through antidotes in the form of anti-poison potions. Anti-poison potions come in various levels which provide progressively longer immunity to poisoning. All poisons except for Karambwan paste can be cured by regular antipoison, even that inflicted upon players by K'ril Tsutsaroth, which hits 16 to start.
 * Anti-poison potion;
 * Super anti-poison potion;
 * Extra strong anti-poison potion;
 * Super strong anti-poison potion;
 * Prayer book;
 * Strange fruit;
 * Guthix rest;
 * Sanfew Serum;
 * Oo'glog thermal spa;
 * Cure Me Lunar Spell;
 * Cure Other Lunar Spell;
 * Cure Group Lunar Spell.