Giant mole



The Giant mole (Talpidae Wysonian) is found in the Falador Mole Lair, just under Falador Park. Upon release, on 7 March 2006, "a slight accident involving a bottle of Malignius-Mortifer's-Super-Ultra-Flora-Growth-Potion" is the origin of the creation of the Giant mole.

Players will need both a spade and light source to access the location. Players are advised to be careful while fighting this monster as it may put out your light source. A Seer's Headband is recommended to have on your person, however a lantern and a tinderbox can also be used. To get into the lair you have to dig in any one of the 'mole hills' near Sir Tiffy Cashien in the Falador Garden.

Currently, the giant mole is the 9th highest non-quest monster in Runescape. Players often kill the mole for its Mole claws and Mole skin, each of which Wyson the gardener will exchange for Bird's nests, A valuable item that is often highly in demand by players training Herblore.

One giant mole can be present per world. When killed, it will respawn in about 2 minutes (or 200 Game ticks). Players often use the respawn time to restore food and prayer from the previous fight.

Giant mole strategies
The giant mole is weak against Ranged and Stab attacks but it is also vulnerable to poison. Even though the mole is weak to stab and ranged attacks, most players use an Abyssal Whip or a dragon weapon as these provide sufficient damage. The mole, when poisoned, will surface to die and leave its drops so there is no risk of missing out on a drop. Sometimes when the mole digs it throws up balls of mud. The direction these go is the direction it will appear at when it surfaces.

Using Poison
A common tactic is using poisoned weapons. This tactic can help kill the mole because it will deal poison damage even when a player is not attacking it. When the mole is underground it cannot be damaged by the poison.

Using Stab Weapons
For stab weapons, a Zamorakian spear is extremely useful, as is the combination of a Leaf-bladed sword or Korasi's sword combined with a Dragon defender. A Dragon longsword can be used if players cannot afford better stabbing weapons. Dragon Claws may also prove useful here, as their special attack can do a significant amount of damage. A Dragon halberd is also practical because of its high stab-bonus special attack (a double hit on the mole) and the fact that it can be used from a Safe spot so that the player can avoid taking any damage at all. The most efficient weapon is the Chaotic Rapier providing one can afford the maintenance costs.

Using Ranged Weapons
For ranged weapons, rune or better are effective. A Crystal bow is very effective, as is a Dark bow although it is debatable whether using dragon arrows is cost effective. A Rune crossbow with enchanted Diamond bolts (e) or Ruby bolts (e) is also a good choice. Another cheap but effective way of killing the mole is Emerald bolts (e) because they deal 58 damage of poison when the special effect activates. The advantage of using emerald bolts (e) is that it would make the mole aggressive to the player who dealt the poison damage. A Dwarf multicannon is useful, although it isn't cost effective unless the player makes the cannonballs instead of buying them. Also note that the cannon will need to be set up and taken down multiple times in the course of killing one mole, which can waste a lot of time once the mole starts burrowing.

The Hand cannon is a good ranged weapon because it hits high and is quite accurate. It is much cheaper, however, to use a Rune crossbow and at least Mithril bolts with a God book in the shield slot. The book gives a prayer bonus as well as a stats boost. The Unholy book with its +8 ranged bonus is often used.

The giant mole is nearly immune to magic, so using magic is not a good idea.

At random stages, the giant mole starts digging around the cavern to escape. There are several different locations that the mole can resurface around the cave. These are the resurfacing locations. There is one in the centre, one in the top left of the cave, one in the top right, one on the hill, one below the hill, and two on the far right of the cave.

An excellent way to fight the mole is to be able to run almost constantly. The mole lair is quite large, so run Energy is easily depleted once the mole starts burrowing (if not even finding the mole in the first place). So having high Agility, using the spas at Oo'glog, and/or using Tireless run scrolls with a Spirit terrorbird are very useful. A player can also use the familiar, Bull ant, and its Unburden scroll to store items, auto-attack the mole, and restore run energy based on Agility level.

Offensive familiars that are attacking the giant mole will walk towards the mole when it runs away from you, and give you a general direction of where the mole's new location is.

Once the mole is reduced to less than half health, it burrows more frequently to get away. When it burrows, it raised a huge cloud of dust that can extinguish an unprotected light source (so bring a tinderbox when using a candle or torch). Covered light sources such as the Bullseye lantern and Candle lantern are not affected. When it burrows, it can re-appear in many places in the mole lair. The team or player needs to find and attack it again.

Some players believe that the mole faces the way it is going to dig, so they can usually find it just by seeing which way it faces before digging. However, this is often incorrect, as the mole can be seen digging directly towards an area that is obviously outside the mole lair. Also, anyone can use a combat Summoning familiar to help find where the mole emerges. The familiar needs to have targeted the mole for an attack. Once it has, the familiar will usually face (and often try to walk toward) the area the place the mole burrowed to. For example, if a Mithril minotaur attacks the mole, when the mole digs, the minotaur will try to move to where the mole surfaced. Please note that you cannot see the mole using the Orb of Oculus.

Teams
The mole lair is a Multicombat area, so teams of players can easily coordinate their activities to slay giant moles. Given its weaknesses, a team with at least one melee player with a stabbing weapon and another as a ranger is very useful.

The value of teams, especially larger ones, is that team members can stay at locations where the mole can surface after burrowing away, allowing the team to find the mole again very quickly.

Solo
Players should be careful when using poison while soloing, because the mole might burrow and then die from poison far away. This potentially can mean the player loses the drops, if it takes too long for the player to find where the mole actually died. Using a familiar (as described above) and being able to run constantly minimizes this risk.

A good strategy is for the player to bring an Explorer's ring 3 and equip good Prayer armour, a Zamorakian spear or other good stabbing weapon, a Spirit terrorbird familiar, and Protect from Melee activated. The player's inventory should include the necessities as well as Tireless run scrolls and a Falador shield 3 (players do not actually wield the shield, as the spear is a two-handed weapon. Shields 1 and 2 work as well but less efficiently.) A high prayer level is recommended. The shield can be used to recharge prayer once. The ring allows the player to teleport to the farm south of Falador, where the player can run to bank, recharge prayer, and return to the lair fairly quickly.

Using a set of Verac's armour is highly effective. The weapon can be set to stab, and the set effect will often hit through the giant mole's high defence. The armour also has a good prayer bonus, making this gear a good choice.

Players may find using full Penance armour useful, because it recharges prayer over time.

Players may also find that completing the Elite Falador Tasks and using the shield's powers to locate the Mole will go much quicker. The shield will also recharge your prayer twice a day.

Player should fight the mole as usual, making sure that the terrorbird familiar is attacking the mole as well so it will follow the mole when it digs. Once the player runs out of prayer points (which should take around 5-10 kills, depending on the player's Prayer level) they may utilise the following options to recharge their prayer:
 * A particularly effective method to recharge prayer is to use the Kandarin Teleport on the Ardougne cloak, which teleports a player very close to an altar. After recharging, the player can use a teleport tab or runes to return to Falador, which at that point the player can bank items and return to the Falador Mole Lair. The cloak also has the added benefit of a prayer bonus, allowing for prayers to last longer before needing to recharge.
 * Use Prayer potions (restocking at the bank as necessary).
 * Activate the Falador shield to restore prayer points.
 * Use the Cabbage teleport of the (Explorer's ring 3) and run north to the altar in Falador or south to the altar south-west of Port Sarim to recharge.
 * Teleport to your house if you have an altar or can teleport from there if you have a Falador Portal or teleport runes.
 * Use teleport spells, or other means of transport, to get as near an altar as you can and run to it.
 * Leave the dungeon and run to the Falador altar.

After recharging prayer points via the above methods, the player should teleport to the cabbage patch or Falador, and run back to the giant mole to continue killing it. By this time, the mole should have respawned.

Players may also find it useful to use the mole's bulk against it by trapping it in one of the many corners of the lair's erratically shaped walls, to range or halberd it from a safe distance. If the player has powerful armour, they are able to survive with just using food, as a recent update seems to have lowered the speed and accuracy of the mole's attack, but increased its maximum hit to compensate. However, if the player has low defence, or can't afford stronger armour (although Dragon armour should provide the necessary protection), prayer may be required.

Drops
Note that the Giant Mole's drops are fairly similar to that of the King Black Dragon, although it does not drop the draconic visage, dragon bones, or black dragonhide. Also, the King Black Dragon drops 4 charms at a time as opposed to the Giant Mole's 2.

100% drops

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Runes and Ammunition

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Weapons

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Armour

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Gems, ores, and bars

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Other

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Mechanics
When the giant mole makes an escape, its animation hides the appearance of the mole until its dig-from-ground animation is played. The mole dust cloud and escape animation are played. Four Game ticks pass then the mole's location changes and plays its dig-from-ground animation.

Trivia

 * The giant mole, when first released, had an attack speed of 6 (same as an Abyssal whip) and could hit a maximum of 210 (21 hitpoints). A hidden update has lowered it's speed to 4 (same as the Godswords), but increased its maximum hit to around 290.

Giant Mole