Shooting Star



Shooting Star is a Mining Distractions and Diversion, introduced with the 2 September 2008 gaming update. It is Pay-to-play only. Stars can be mined for experience in addition to a daily reward.

A fast guide for solo star hunters can be found here.

Introduction
Shooting Stars fall from the sky every two hours or so. They generally fall across all members worlds within fifteen minutes of each other. If players reach the core of the star before the next star falls on that world, a Star sprite appears and gives rewards.

To mine a Shooting Star you need to know what size it is. The required mining level is ten times that size. For example, you need a mining level of 80 to mine a size 8 star. However, the star will reduce in size as it is mined, so the mining requirement for the same star will change as it is mined.

Seconds before the star lands, a shadow is cast which players can examine to read: The shadow of a shooting star. There is also a sound while the shadow is visible and when the star lands. If the shooting star lands on top of the player, you will walk out of the star, then begin mining.

Note: Finding stars does not need to be up to you, as there are many clans that dedicate their very existence to finding stars

Requirements

 * Any pickaxe or an inferno adze.
 * The required Mining level is 10 times the star's current size, as explained above.
 * This requirement does not apply to the first-miner bonus, however (see the section Mining).
 * A minimum mining level of 10 is required to mine the lowest size of star.

Locating

 * Use a telescope in a study room in a player-owned house to find the approximate area and time of the next landing. It is possible to use telescopes in another player's house.
 * Note: If the telescope is blocked by another room in the house, it will not work.
 * Better telescopes provide a more accurate time:
 * Wooden telescope - 24-minute window
 * Teak telescope - 9-minute window
 * Mahogany telescope - 2-minute window
 * The location given for each star will be one of the following:
 * Asgarnia
 * Crandor or Karamja
 * Fremennik lands or Lunar Isle
 * Kandarin
 * Kharidian Desert
 * Misthalin
 * Morytania or Mos Le'Harmless
 * Piscatoris, Gnome Stronghold or Tirannwn
 * Wilderness
 * Shooting stars land roughly once every two hours.
 * Stars may land in a different location in each world.

Star crash sites
Use of a telescope will reveal the area in which the star will fall. In each area, there are a number of predetermined locations in which the star may actually land. These are generally a mine or bank within the given area.

The only way to locate the actual crash site is to search each possible crash site in the given area until the star is found.

Mining
Shooting stars come in sizes from 1 to 9. Players can find out how large the star is by examining it or prospecting it. Additionally, prospecting it will reveal the progress to the next level. (See Star sizes below for a list of level requirements and experience for each star size.)

The first person to attempt to mine the star (even if they do not have the required mining level) will be rewarded with Mining experience in the amount of 75 times your mining level. This is called a tag. You do not need a pickaxe to get the tag, though you cannot mine the star further without a pickaxe. This player's name will also be added to the Shooting Star Noticeboard in the house north of the Observatory.

Each layer of the star is mined from 0% to 100%, at which point the outermost layer sloughs off and the star's size is reduced by one. The amount left to mine of the current layer can be determined by prospecting while mining. More people mining the star will get through these layers faster.

Players will receive stardust as they mine the star, receiving experience every time a piece of stardust is mined. Players can only own a maximum of 200 stardust at a time. Stardust can be banked, but the 200 maximum counts stardust in your bank as well. If 200 stardust has been reached, experience will still be received for mining in exactly the same manner as with lower amounts stardust.

Once the final layer (when the star is size one) is fully mined, a star sprite will be released, and players will not be able to mine any more. The star sprite in the remains of its star can be spoken to in order to exchange stardust for a reward (See Rewards, below). Star sprites will reward only once per day; a day is the 24 hour period beginning at 00:00 (UTC). The star sprite will stay for ten minutes before eventually disappearing.

If the star is not fully mined and the sprite not released by time the next star falls, the rock vanishes without an opportunity to exchange star dust. However, stardust need not be exchanged at the star at which it was received, meaning that if a player mines some dust but didn't manage to break open the star, they could still exchange it with the star sprite in the next star.

Star sizes
The following table lists the star sizes, with the Mining level required to mine it. The Mining experience is gained per stardust.

The amount of stardust per star size is indicated in the table below. There is a precise amount of stardust in each size of the star. Once this amount has been received between the players mining it, the size will reduce (assuming potential dust is removed when players with 200 dust receive experience). Therefore, the time it takes to lower a star size depends upon the number of miners mining it and their respective mining levels; the more miners, the faster the star gets to the star sprite level.

Higher star sizes will give less total stardust than at lower sizes, so for the same number of miners, a high star size reduces to the next size faster than for a low star size.


 * {|class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"

!Star size !Mining level !XP/stardust !XP/stardust with Sacred clay pickaxe !Number of stardust/star size !Total XP per size !Cumulative XP
 * 9
 * 90
 * 210
 * 420
 * 15
 * 3150
 * 80271
 * 8
 * 80
 * 145
 * 290
 * 40
 * 3625
 * 77121
 * 7
 * 70
 * 114
 * 228
 * 40
 * 4560
 * 73496
 * 6
 * 60
 * 71
 * 142
 * 80
 * 5680
 * 68936
 * 5
 * 50
 * 47
 * 94
 * 175
 * 8225
 * 63256
 * 4
 * 40
 * 32
 * 64
 * 250
 * 8000
 * 55031
 * 3
 * 30
 * 29
 * 58
 * 439
 * 12731
 * 47031
 * 2
 * 20
 * 25
 * 50
 * 700
 * 17500
 * 34300
 * 1
 * 10
 * 14
 * 28
 * 1200
 * 16800
 * 16800
 * }
 * 1
 * 10
 * 14
 * 28
 * 1200
 * 16800
 * 16800
 * }
 * }

Rewards

 * The first person who attempts to mine the star will receive experience equal to 75 times their Mining level.
 * Stardust can be exchanged with a star sprite in a fully mined star for a reward determined by how much dust the player had with them, up to (for 200 stardust):
 * 152 Cosmic runes
 * 52 Astral runes
 * 20 Gold ores (noted)
 * 50,002 Coins
 * The GE values for these items currently add up to: coins.
 * The ability to randomly receive additional ore when mining for up to 15 minutes of in-game time(The timer on the bonus pauses when logged out). The chance of getting an additional ore is 25% and even works on runite, as well as special ores such as red sandstone and bane ore.
 * The extra ore bonus stacks with the Varrock armour or Golden mining suit, so it is possible to mine three ores from one rock (only up to Adamantite ore).
 * It is possible to receive 4 ores at once while mining in Living Rock Caverns, having the extra ore bonus active and wearing the Varrock armour.
 * There is a chance that you mine gems (sapphire-diamond) from various layers of the star. Wearing a charged amulet of glory increases this chance. Wearing a Ring of Wealth occasionally doubles the gem yield.
 * For example, when the message in the chat box is "You just found an emerald! Your ring of wealth shines more brightly!" two emeralds appear in the player's inventory. Oddly, it can be that nothing is found - let alone double - despite the fact that the player receives the message "Your ring of wealth shines more brightly!". This is when the gem randomizer hits a 'blank' and gives no gem, and the ring of wealth doubles this - effectively giving two nothings.
 * Onyx and Dragonstone are not mined from stars, but players often claim to receive them at stars as a joke or hoax.



Squeal of Fortune spins
On 2 April 2012 the Squeal of Fortune was updated to allow players to receive a Spin Ticket from the Shooting Star D&D. However, a ticket can only be obtained from this D&D when it is the designated Distraction and Diversion of the week.

In addition to obtaining extra spin tickets for the Squeal of Fortune, players can receive D&amp;D tickets for shooting stars, allowing them to exchange stardust with the sprite once more on top of the daily limit. Each ticket can be used once and players may only use one ticket per day, meaning the player can only exchange stardust with the star sprite up to a maximum of twice per day.

Scoreboard
In the Observatory professor's house is a noticeboard which lists the last five stars to be discovered on that world, how long ago they were, and who discovered them.

Trivia

 * Stars used to land in bounty hunter worlds, but they would always land in the wilderness.
 * On 27 October 2011, as part of celebrations for measures against botting, the experience received for mining a star was tripled for the day, and the reward for exchanging stardust was improved – near doubled – giving 100,002 coins, 302 cosmic runes, 102 astral runes and 40 noted gold ore for 200 dust. The experience received for finding a star was tripled, but the chance of receiving double ores was the same. There was a bug where stars would sometimes be invisible to some players which still remains unfixed.
 * With the Dominion Tower (2 November 2011) update, the Uzer mine's location was moved but the Uzer star's landing location was not, leaving it in an unreachable location east of the desert strykewyrms. This was fixed a week later.
 * You cannot obtain Strange Rocks from mining stars.