The Pit

The Pit is a Distraction and Diversion released on 12 October 2011. It is Agility-based and gives Agility experience and a Gorilla mask if successfully completed.

By completing a lap on an agility course, players may attract the attention of a Talent scout. It doesn't matter if you fail obstacles (like the Death Slide in the Werewolf Agility Course), there is always a chance to be attracted after completing a full lap. If a greenish arrow is flashing above the Scout's head, talk to him to be offered the chance to go to The Pit. You will also receive a coloured infobox message when he is interested in you. If he is not spoken to within a minute or so, he will lose interest, and the opportunity will be missed.

Players with 99 Agility can speak to the Talent scout while wearing an Agility cape, Max cape or Completionist cape for free shots at the events. After completing an event, a small amount of experience will be received, but the experience cannot be gambled. The gorilla mask can be attained by talking to the Talent scout after removing the Agility cape.

Once at the pit, players will be set one of the challenges to complete, chosen at random. Completion of the task will give the player a large amount of experience, the chance to gamble it all, and a Gorilla mask. Failure will result in the player being granted experience similar to completion of a lap of the course they were previously on.

Note: The time a player has to complete each event is limited. As such, it may not be beneficial to skip the dialogue at the beginning by clicking on the minimap as you will not know what event you are about to do. The timer starts when you swing into the center of the area.

After getting noticed by the talent scout, you cannot get noticed again for one hour.

The courses that the talent scout recruits from are:
 * Gnome Stronghold agility course (basic and advanced)
 * Agility Pyramid
 * Barbarian Outpost (basic and advanced)
 * Ape Atoll Agility Course
 * Wilderness Agility Course
 * Werewolf Agility Course
 * Dorgesh-Kaan agility course

Crate Expectations
Players must find a key by opening the numerous crates in the arena. However, only five crates can be opened. Once five crates have been opened and no key is found, players fails the event. There are 16 crates arranged in a 4x4 grid. Some crates may also contain chickens.

Given player's capacity to choose only five of the crates, they have a 31.25% chance of completing this task successfully. Players should take care that they do not box themselves in, as Jagex has employed an underhanded trick with this game: the chickens that come out of crates that don't contain a key block the players path, do not move, and cannot be moved or killed.

The Floor is Lava
The player must cross from one side of the arena to the other by jumping on the crates. However, some of the crates are weak and will break if you jump on them. If you jump on one of the weak crates, the player fails the event.

If you look closely at the crates, the tops have two kinds of grains, North/South, and East/West. The East/West grains seem to be the correct crates to land on.

It is currently unknown exactly how many of the crates in each game are weak, and so there is no accurate statistic of how often this game may be completed. There are three current suggestions for possible odds here:


 * If we assumed that two crates from each layer were weak (and there was only one safe path), the player's chances of success would 1.36%. This kind of low number makes this scenario unlikely.
 * If we assumed that only one crate from each layer was weak, the player's chances of success would be roughly 5.45%. This also seems like an unusually low chance compared to other The Pit tasks.
 * If we assumed that one crate from each layer was weak and that the first crate is always a guaranteed success, the player's chances of successfully completing this task would be (again, roughly) 10.89%.
 * Note that the first crate in reality is not a guranteed success and this has been confirmed.

In addition, success is not affected by the Surefooted aura.

High-low There
The player is shown a number between 1 and 10. The player must then guess whether the next number is higher or lower than the number being shown. The player must guess correctly 6 times to win.

If the player guessed completely randomly with no regard for the number presented, they could only expect a 2.94% chance of winning this game. However, assuming the player guesses 'Higher' for 1-5 and 'Lower' for 6-10, this shifts the odds significantly in the player's favour and so an expected minimum 22.13% of games can be completed successfully.

Karaoke
The player must avoid falling rocks for approximately 40 seconds. As with most of the other minigames, this is mostly a game of chance, although there is a small amount of time to run away from falling rocks just before the larger rocks fall.

Punch the Hungry Sheeps
A sheep has eaten a key. The player must find the key by punching the numerous sheep in the arena. However, only five of the fourteen sheep can be punched. If the player punches five sheep and no key is found, the player fails the event; otherwise, the player succeeds.

Given the player's capacity to choose only five of the sheep, they have a 35.71% chance of completing this task successfully.

Put the Thing in the Other Thing
The player must fit three different blocks into each of the three indentations on the ground so that the block matches the indentation. If the time runs out, the player fails the event.

When a block is clicked, you pick it up and hold it above your head, and so only one can be held at any given time. This is the only game that can be completed successfully if done correctly, as it is based on skill rather than pure chance like the others. However, since the event is timed and since the picking up and dropping of pieces takes time, it is strongly suggested 'you should only pick up a block that you intend to use'. Look at the indentations first to know which blocks to pick up. The blocks on the floor may be rotated, so be sure to look carefully if you can't find the right block for any of the indentations.

Time runs down very quickly in this event, so you will have to be fast and accurate.

Rewards
Players will receive experience based on the agility course they were training at and the event they received.

Success
The first successful completion of a game will reward a gorilla mask. Additionally, experience will be rewarded, generally in the range of 1000-7000 experience. Success will also give the option to gamble (See the gambling section).

The experience for succeeding, before gambling, for each game at each course is as follows (Some values may not yet have been updated are are therefore inaccurate):

Failure
Players failing a game will also receive experience, but this will be much reduced from that received when succeeding. The experience is approximately how much would have been received by running the course in the time it took to take part. However, the amount received is fixed and not dependent on the actual time taken. This is generally in the range of 100-1500 experience.

The experience for failing for each game at each course is as follows (Some values may not yet have been updated are are therefore inaccurate):

Skillcape
Players with an Agility skillcape can access the pit by at any time by talking to a Talent Scout. Doing this will still give a gorilla mask upon succeeding, in addition to reduced experience as follows:

Gambling
Upon completing the event you have a chance to gamble for double experience, normal experience or half experience - each has an equal chance of occurring. Accessing the pit with the use of an Agility skillcape will not give the option to gamble.

The expected value of gambling is 7/6 x the experience without gambling. That means that in the long term, you'll get 17% more points if you gamble than if you don't.

Trivia

 * With the update on the 7th of February 2012 XP rewards for losing got increased by 100% and winning by 50%.