Soul Split

Soul Split is a curse in the Ancient Curses prayer book which requires level 92 Prayer to use. If this curse is active when a player is in combat, the opponent will lose 1 Prayer point (against players) and the player will gain 20% of the damage done in life points against monsters or 40% against players. This curse drain effect isn't affected by the victim's protection prayers. For example, hitting a 200 on a monster or 100 on a player results in gaining 40 life points.

As it is an overhead prayer, Soul Split cannot be used in conjunction with Wrath or any of the Deflect Curses.

Damage done by familiars does NOT count towards Soul Split and will not restore your life points. Also, damage performed by the Ruby bolts (e) special will also not heal LP. If your hit kills the monster/player you are fighting, unlike the 20% of your hit you are supposed to heal, it will be 25% of your hit. Using Dwarven Cannon will also not heal you when it hits.

This prayer has great potential for PVP combat. If someone were to hit a 500 with a Godsword, they would be able to heal themselves 200 LP without eating any food. The downside to this is that, unlike food, Soul Split uses Prayer points. A good strategy would be to only use this prayer when you are just above the point where you normally eat, so you would be able to heal some life points before you had to eat. Blood Burst and Barrage spells from the Ancient Spellbook combined with Soul Split may heal up to half (or more) of the caster's life points if cast on the optimum amount of targets.

This prayer is also practical for non-PVP situations, such as Slayer tasks. This prayer can be utilised for easier tasks such as Dust Devils and Fire Giants, and also tasks that have more than one attack style, such as Waterfiends. It is further complemented by Saradomin Godsword and its Healing Blade special attack which restores both Life and Prayer points.

A popular way of using this curse is by flashing in combination with the Turmoil curse. To achieve this players must set both Turmoil and Soul Split as their quick Prayers. Upon fighting monsters, players may quickly flash both prayers using the quick prayer button, resulting in brief high hits that will heal the player. This method drains little prayer and, if done successfully, can sustain a player on easier Slayer tasks without any other healing source. However, while prayer flashing with both Turmoil and Soul Split, the player does not gain the extra bonuses from the monster with Turmoil, they receive the base bonus only. This can be countered by striking once and holding the curses on until one prayer point is lost. From there, Turmoil will gain the full boost and can be flashed at full, continuously, until the target is dead.



Trivia

 * This is an enhanced version of Smite; it does not drain the opponent's prayer as much, however, as Smite drains 1 prayer point per 40 life points damage dealt as opposed to Soul Split's 1 per 50.
 * Previous to 11 January 2010, the scrollover definition of the prayer said it gave the player 1/4th of the hit and removed 1/4th of the opponents prayer. However the prayer was observed by many to heal 1/5th of the damage, not 1/4th. On 11 January, the prayer's description was changed to say the correct value of 1/5th, not 1/4th. The Knowledge Base still states that "for every four points of damage you do to another player, they will lose 1 Prayer point".
 * Soul Split can be used in the Freaky Forester random event when killing pheasants to heal the player, however the prayer's symbol will not appear overhead.
 * The Zaros boss Nex uses this prayer upon reaching 1/5th of her Health, making her the first boss monster to use an overhead prayer other than a protection prayer and the first boss to use the soul split prayer.
 * According to the ancient hymnal, Soul Split's verbal incantation is "Advoco insaniam haerecticorum in pectus meus et animam meam." (I call to my heart and soul the madness of heretics.)

Soul Split