Duelling
For more information, see Duel Arena. This article is about one-on-one fighting in the Duel Arena. For the enchanted emerald ring, see Ring of duelling.
Duelling is a way for players to fight each other (with certain agreements). In RuneScape Classic, players can duel each other anywhere. Many players used this as a cheap method of "teleporting" to Lumbridge without losing any items or using any runes (Lumbridge Home Teleport largely replaces its role now). However, they often had to be aware of scammers who would duel them to low health and hope that they die in a dangerous area.
In modern-day RuneScape, players can only duel in the Duel Arena in Al-Kharid, now with the option to change the rules of the fight (for example: no ranged, no armour etc.).
Members can stake unlimited items while duelling while non-members can stake up to 40,000 gp while duelling; the player that loses the fight will lose their staked items. Free players who want to stake sometimes resort to "trust staking" (i.e., using a middleman), although the risk of being scammed is high.
From November 2007 to January 2011, there was a limit, determined by the number of quest points, on how much a player was able to stake.
The Duel Arena is one of the most popular activities in RuneScape to date, it is often used by players to fight their friends or try out their maximum hit. Staking can also be used to make (or lose) huge amounts of cash in a short period of time.
Details of a duel
A player can choose to have an empty arena or an arena with "obstacles", this is more popular amongst rangers and mages, who can fire over the obstacles to hit their opponent from afar. Players can also choose to disable the following for the length of the duel:
- Prayer
- Special attacks
- Potions
- Food
- Movement
- Ranged attacks
- Magic attacks
- Melee attacks
- Forfeit
- Obstacles
More complex options are available, enabling a player to prevent certain items of armour or weaponry being used in the duel, or if the player chooses they can fight their opponent without any armour or weapons being used at all. There is also a "fun weapons" option can be used where the only weapons allowed are the Rubber chicken, flowers and the scythe, as well as other weapons that usually have a negative combat bonus.
Players often use the Duel Arena to settle disputes, and use it to earn money by staking items or money. At the end of the duel, players are teleported out of the arena and have all their stats restored. Ammunition that would normally appear on the ground is returned to the player after the fight. The winner of the fight will receive both his own staked items and the staked items of his opponent. The special bar is also restored. If the player who won had boosted his stats with a potion, or with the dragon battleaxe special, then those stats will remain boosted after the fight. However, the player who lost will get his stats returned to normal.
At the entrance and near the hospital are two scoreboards where players can see the last 50 duels to take place in the world, including the players levels, and the result.
Boxing Traps
Whip Battles
Players offering to do whip battles and have a low combat level, are often traps, they have 99 magic and instead of using a whip, they will use a Polypore staff due to the fact it doesn't use any runes, so players can easily win.
Obstacles Trap
players using the Obstacles in boxing are warned, players use them to get the player stuck and then can hit and win without being harmed, it advised not to do Obstacles in boxing.
Titan Trap
Be sure to check your staking properly as some low levels can enable summoning and then use steel titan to cheat to win the fight.
Mage boxing
Mage boxing is a common type of stake that occurs in the Duel Arena. The typical rules that are used are: no ranged, no melee, no drinks, no food, no prayer, no movement and no special attacks. Only experienced duellers should enable "Obstacles" as it would easily allow the opponent to cast freezing spells preventing their opponent from attacking and thus not taking any damage.
Tactics
It is common that the opponent will be using Blood Barrage. People use Blood Barrage because one quarter of the damage that is done to the opponent is added to your health. For example, if the player hits the opponent for 200 LP of damage, the player will gain 50 LP.
When the duel begins, one may be interested in casting Smoke Barrage as it poisons the victim. Although in the majority of the duels the poison effect may not seem to be particularly useful, it may be worthwhile as some people have been known to make 'comebacks' when they have under 60 life points. Before the duel starts, the player should already set Blood Barrage to be autocasted. To autocast a spell, right-click on it in the spell book and choose 'Autocast.' Also, it is recommended to have Auto Retaliate enabled.
Since the release of Ritual of the Mahjarrat, a new spell has been released into the game called, Storm of Armadyl. This spell is highly effective in staking, due to the fact that it always hits well over 100. Consider this fact when duelling an opponent that is able to use the spell.
When the opponent is at low health do not consider the duel a 'win' yet. Due to the nature of staking, many people are known to make 'comebacks.' A comeback is basically when the 'obvious winner' in the duel starts being hit by the losing opponent and then the 'winner' ends up losing. One way of preventing comebacks is to cast a lower-level spell upon the opponent. Spells that require a higher level to cast have a higher chance of splashing. By casting a lower-level spell, such as Blood Blitz, there is a smaller chance to splash, so there is a bigger chance to finish off the opponent.
Staking Strategy
There are a few rules that everyone should follow while staking. First and most important of them all is: do not stake more than 10% of your bank's value in one duel. Also, one may be interested in using the Martingale betting system. Basically, if you lose 100,000 gold pieces, you would want to stake 200,000 gold pieces for the next duel in order to make up for what you lost the previous duel. There is no mathematical benefit of using this system as you could lose everything that you have made, but it may benefit a player who is trying to make some quick money and is confident in their skills/stats.