Magic



Magic is a versatile skill that is used in combat, to enchant crafted items, to transport quickly around the world via teleports, and to gain money via alchemy. It is probably the largest source of coins in the game, through the use of the spell High Level Alchemy, though it can be costly to start the skill. While it is possible to play the game without being skilled in Magic, it is a considerable advantage to be able to use many spells, especially high level alchemy and the teleports. Magic can also be used by many different monsters in the game.

As with all guides in the Skills section, members-only items are in italics.

Spells
Magic is used almost exclusively through casting spells on another player, on oneself (reflexively), or on an item.

Runes


All spells (with the exception of Home Teleport) require the use of runes as a consumed resource. Runes are stackable, commonly traded items which are obtained by various methods. For hints on obtaining runes, see Runes: Obtaining runes.

Elemental staves
The requirement for certain runes in a spell can be removed if the player wields an Elemental staff corresponding to an elemental rune. As an example, wielding a Fire staff allows a player to cast High Level Alchemy using only one Nature rune.

Players who are lucky enough may obtain a combination staff. This is a staff with more than one rune's power. So far, the only existing combination staffs are the lava battlestaff (which is fire and earth), mud battlestaff (which is water and earth), and the steam battlestaff (which is water and fire).

Spellbooks
There are three divisions of Magic in RuneScape - standard (commonly called "modern"), Ancient Magicks, and Lunar Spells. Each has a different spellbook and typically only one can be used at once (for an exception to this rule, see Spell Book Swap). The special spellbooks are only available on member worlds.

To cast a spell, a player must choose the wanted spell from their spellbook. To access the activated spellbook, click on the Spellbook icon in the game's interface.

Standard spells
This article only covers the standard spells. The standard spells are activated on any new character's account and they are available on all worlds. There is no prerequisite to using the standard spellbook, although some spells are only available on member worlds and others require completion of certain quests or tasks. As with other skills, new capabilities require higher skill levels.

Ancient Magicks


The Ancient Magicks contain some of the most dangerous offensive spells. These spells can only be used after completing the fiendish Desert Treasure quest. These consist of the following types of spells: Ice, Smoke, Blood, Shadow, Miasmic and Teleportation.

Ancient Magick spells are capable of bringing in some of the best Experience for Magic, however the high price of Runes used in Ancient Magick spells makes this a very expensive way to train. Comparable to using Chinchompa for Ranged.

Lunar spells
The Lunar Spells are mostly helpful spells unrelated to combat, and require the Lunar Diplomacy quest before being usable. A spellbook extension becomes available after completion of the Dream Mentor quest.

Many of these spells make other skills easier to raise or "train" as most people call it, for example the plank make spell, which provides an alternate, faster way of making planks rather than using the Sawmill. Lunar Spells also allow the reduction of the player's own hitpoints to restore others', and teleportation of multiple people at one time.

Standard spellbook
In the standard spellbook, spells fall into one of several categories: Combat, Curse, Teleportation, Alchemy and Enchantment. All spells yield their associated amount of experience when cast. Combat spells additionally give experience related to the amount of damage caused to the opponent(s).

Teleportation spells
Teleportation spells are very popular with all players—free-to-players and members alike, as teleportation spells save lots of time when travelling around the world. Note that using a teleport spell is not possible north of level 20 wilderness, nor in any of the combat based minigames such as Castle Wars and Pest Control.





Combat spells
All combat spells result in a spell related amount of experience when cast, but also give experience depending on the amount of damage caused to the opponent. Each damage point caused by a combat spell yields 2 magic experience points and 1.33 hitpoint experience points. Generally, most combat spells use some Air runes in combination with some other "Combat" runes, though there are exceptions with the special spells such as Magic Dart.

Combat spells and will occasionally splash upon contact with a target (i.e. they will do no damage). When splashing, the caster will receive only the base experience for that spell and no additional experience. As a result, there is no physical difference between splashing with a spell and hitting a 0 with the same spell. The splash rate depends on five things:
 * The caster's Magic level
 * The Magic attack bonus of the equipment the caster is wearing
 * The target's Magic level
 * The target's Defence level
 * The Magic defence bonus of the equipment the target is wearing

Stronger spells can do greater damage but are less accurate than their weaker spell counterparts. To maximize accuracy, especially in training and player killing, players are advised to equip magic boosting equipment, unequip magic lowering equipment, drink Wizard's mind bomb, and raise magic levels.

Some monsters are more vulnerable to certain elemental spells. For an example, ice/water monsters are generally more vulnerable to fire spells.

Curses
A curse spell is any spell that causes a negative effect to its target other than damage. Curses are an underused part of Magic, mainly because spellcasters have little time to waste in casting damage spells. In prolonged fights, using a curse spell or two at the beginning may be a very good idea. Curses also are useful when competing for a monster respawn, as the curse immediately engages the monster.

Alchemy
All alchemy spells use nature runes to convert an object into a different object. Particularly note High Alchemy in this section, as it is probably the most widely used spell in the game.

Enchantments
Enchant spells all use cosmic runes to make an item magical. For the enchant orb group of spells, a player needs to travel to the appropriate obelisk and cast the spell on that. Similarly with the jewellery spells, the player must have a piece of jewellery to cast the spell on. The only spells of this type that are availible to Free players are the gem enchant spells (up to level 4) when used on amulets.

Enchanted gold jewellery
Gold jewellery is made with the Crafting skill.

How to successfully fight as a mage
A player who is a mage is weak against Ranged and strong against Melee fighters. When attacking others, a mage should use a combination of curse spells (Bind, Snare, Entangle, Ice spells in Ancient Magicks) and highly damaging combat spells such as Fire Wave, or the Mage Arena spells. Curses tend to be underused, but do not underestimate them. When fighting monsters, using battle tactics helps, such as staying in a safe spot. Most undead creatures and demons are weak to magic attack. This will provide an advantage over these creatures. One should take note of a monster's weakness to a particular element (wind, water, earth, or fire).

A little known fact about Magic is that as a player's Magic skill level increases, so does their defence against magical attacks. Magical defence is calculated from 70% of a player's Magic level and 30% of their defence level. Thus, even if a player doesn't care to use Magic too often, having a high Magic skill can help to protect them.

Magical staves
Various magical staves are available in RuneScape. In the list below are all the free-to-play staves, which can all be obtained at Zaff's Superior Staffs! store in Varrock. The main effect of a staff or magic staff is to boost magic attack and defence, while elemental staves provide unlimited amounts of their elementary rune in addition to the boosts provided by a magic staff. There are many members-only staves such as battlestaves, mystic staves, the Slayer staff, the Lunar staff, the Ancient staff, and God staves.

Magic armour and robes
Main article: Armour

Most mages wear robes, although some light armour is available that is made from special material and does not hinder the wearer's ability to perform magic attacks. For the different sets of armour and detailed information on each piece, see the Armour: Magic armor article.

A player's maximum magic attack bonus is +148, and the maximum magic defence bonus is +196.

Training magic
Generally, the fastest way to obtain runes is to buy them. If money is tight, it is recommended that a player uses the Runecrafting skill to make runes for magic training. Alternatively, a player can play Fist of Guthix for free runes.

Certain locations such as the prison in Port Sarim and the demon's cage in the Wizards' Tower can prove to be useful when training magic because of the enclosed space that the enemies are in, unable to retaliate.

Temporary boosts


A Magic potion temporarily boosts a player's magic level by 4. Alternatively, a Magic essence potion boosts Magic by 3.

Three Prayers can boost Magic. These are Mystic Will, Mystic Lore and Mystic Might, which boost magic by 5%, 10%, or 15% respectively for as long as they are active. These boosts do not increase damage, nor do they affect the player's actual level. Jagex has confirmed that these prayers only help your magical accuracy and magical defence.

Wizard's mind bomb is a type of beer that increases magic by 3 or 2 (if the player's Magic level is below 50). Players can brew it themselves at level 34 Cooking, or buy it at the pub in the Burthorpe Games Room or the Rising Sun Inn in Falador.

Red spicy stew can boost magic by up to 6 (although it can decrease it by up to 6).

Trivia

 * The Magic Skill Cape is the only skill cape to have gold under the shoulder pads and on the back. On all the rest of the skill capes, it is coloured grey.


 * In early 2001, there were two magic skills, Good Magic and Evil Magic. However, with the introduction of a new magic system, the two skills were merged into Magic and the player kept the level of the skill they were higher in. For example, if the player had level 50 Good Magic and level 40 Evil Magic, he would keep level 50 Magic and the experience for the Evil Magic was discarded. Because of this, some players were upset that they lost money for training their lower magic skill and that the experience was thrown away instead of being added. The evil magic spells were Confuse, Thick Skin, Shock Bolt, Elemental Bolt and Fear, and the good magic spells were Chill Bolt, Burst of Strength, Camouflage, Rock Skin and Wind bolt.


 * In RuneScape Classic, spells are universally represented by a simple, flying blue star, which proved difficult to distinguish from arrows, which were green stars. Also, in the original RuneScape, players were fully capable of casting magic spells while wearing full Rune armour without hindrance, leading to a massive imbalance in favour of high-level mages.


 * Also in RuneScape Classic, magic spells could not be cast for long unless the target was occupied by a fight; the magic attack was automatically abandoned as melee combat began. Prior to the advent of multi-combat areas in RuneScape 2, high-level mages (as well as archers) would frequently steal the kills of lesser warriors by attacking while a melee fighter engaged the NPC in direct combat, leading to all experience and loot being taken by the mage.  The mage remained safe the entire combat, and quickly moved on to the next fight without respect for the players whose battles they commandeered.  Thus came part of the motivation behind making the experience gained based on the damage dealt in RS2, rather than on all experience going to the player who killed the NPC.


 * In RuneScape Classic, each spell gave the fixed experience using the formula 2 * spell level + 20. Jagex explains that the reduction of Magic experience in RuneScape 2 was due to the fact that runes were easier to obtain on the new version.
 * The magical dummies in Lumbridge can be trained on without gaining any Hitpoints Experience.
 * Fist Of Guthix can be used to train magic to higher levels because of free runes, but the experience is cut in half.
 * All spells cast to moving characters other than the caster will actually chase them, with speed lower than ranged attacks.
 * There is a glitch since the Runescape HD update, such that sometimes failed combat spells would fly to the sky upon hitting the target.
 * If the caster is default-casting and the enemy is killed by his missile, often the caster will waste an additional missile by casting it on the already dead character. This happens when the attack does not reach the target before another attack is launched, so it is more frequent when spells are casted from long range. The experience is equal to a spell failure.
 * All default-casting by players have attack speed of 5 and 6 for NPCs. Seemingly the attack speed is reduced by distance between the caster and target.
 * If a player fails a spell in RuneScape Classic, they would be unable to cast any spell for 20 seconds. They would gain no experience, although they would keep the runes. This was changed with the release of RuneScape 2.