OSRS 1 - 99 Melee Combat Guide

How Does Melee Stats Work and Why Should You Train Them ?

There are 3 skills in Old School Runescape that make up the melee combat: Attack, Strength and Defence. This guide will go over all the best ways to train your melee stats as well as which melee stat you should train first and the best melee armour and weapons to do this training with.

Throughout Old School Runescape there are many quests, monsters and challenges that can only be effectively completed with melee combat. Each one of the melee stats have a unique passive effect that scales with level. 

As you increase your strength level, your max hit will increase. This will allow you to kill monsters faster and gain more experience since you gain more experience, the more damage you deal.

As you increase your attack level, your accuracy with melee weapons will increase. This will allow you to hit more consistently, again increasing your experience per hour.

Lastly as for defence, it will allow you to avoid damage the more defence levels you have. Avoiding does not mean reducing damage. It makes it so that players and monsters are more likely to hit a 0 on you. This effect however is only 30% effective against magic attacks, the rest of your magic avoidance comes from your magic level. Higher defence makes it so that you can AFK lower level monsters, it also unlocks the best prayers in the game.

A large portion of Old School Runescape is dependent on melee combat but if that's not enough of a reason for you to train your attack, strength and defence here are a few more:

There are some quests in the game which requires a certain attack, strength or defence level, those quests are:

Attack Quests

• Another Slice of H.A.M - Attack Level 15
• Holy Grail - Attack Level 20
• A Taste of Hope - Attack Level 40
• Sins of Father - Attack Level 50

Strength Quests

• Tale of Righteous - Strength Level 16
• Darkness of Hallowvale - Strength Level 40 (boostable)
• Legends' Quest - Strength Level 50 (boostable)

Defence Quests

• Rag and Bone Man 2 - Defence Level 20
• Between a Rock... - Defence Level 30 (boostable)
• Lunar Diplomacy - Defence Level 40
• King's Ransom - Defence Level 65

Combat Level Quest

There is one quest in the game which requires a certain combat level to complete. Since melee stats make up most of the combat stats, they are the fastest way to level up your overall combat level.

• Dream Mentor - Combat Level 85

If you are looking to complete all the quests in the game to achieve a quest cape, you will need at least 65 defence, 50 strength, 40 attack and 85 combat level.

There are also achievement diaries that require melee stats. If you are looking to complete all the achievement diaries you will be needing at least level 50 attack, level 76 strength, level 70 defence alongside combat level 100.

Aside from the original achievement diaries, a recent addition to the game known as the “Combat Achievements” also indirectly requires high or max melee stats to be able to be completed.

1 - 99 Melee Training

1. Levels 1 - 40/45 Early Quests: To start your melee training journey it's highly recommended to complete some quests. These quests will speedrun you through early levels, allowing you to skip the monotonous, slow levels. There are a lot of quests that you can complete, aside from a few essential ones pick and choose whichever you want to complete.

Essential Quests

1. Waterfall Quest is a great and must complete quest. You can complete this quest as a level 3 and it will shoot your attack and strength levels all the way up to level 30.
2. Witch's House is another must complete early level quest which rewards 6,325 hitpoints experience. Only thing you need for this quest is the fire strike spell. This is especially useful since a higher hitpoint level will help you complete quests and traverse around the game more easily.
3. Fight Arena is a great easy quest that yields 12,175 attack experience. Just like Witch's House the only thing you will need for this quest is fire strikes.
4. Death Plateau is another quick, easy to do quest that yields 3,000 attack experience.
5. Vampyre Slayer is an easy quest that yields 4,825 attack experience. This quest is also an f2p quest. Also you should complete this quest after at least the Waterfall Quest and the Witch's House quest since you will be fighting a vampire and having some stats makes it much easier to defeat it.
6. Tree Gnome Village is another one that yields 11,450 attack experience. Using magic is recommended for this quest as you will be killing a level 112 Khazard warlord. 
7. The Grand Tree is the only quest in the essential quest list that has an annoying requirement which is 25 agility. This quest is great to complete as it rewards 18,400 attack experience. It's doable with fire strike however it's recommended to have at least fire bolt since the black demon has high health and can despawn if not killed quickly.
8. Holy Grail is the last quest on this list. This is a great quest to boost your defence level. It requires 20 attack and the completion of Merlin's Crystal to do so and rewards 15,300 defence experience.

Optional Quests

1. Scorpion Catcher is a great quest if you are looking to earn a little bit more strength experience. It requires 31 prayer and the completion of Alfred Grimhand's Barcrawl to do and rewards 6,625 strength experience.
2. Mountain Daughter This quest rewards more than just experience. Alongside its 1000 attack experience it also rewards the player with a bearhead, which can come in handy during early level training. Also after this quest you will be able to fight Kendal in the Nightmare Zone which is one of the best monsters to kill in there.
3. Horror From the Deep Another great quest to complete not only for its experience but its unlocks as well. This quest requires level 35 agility and completion of Alfred Grimhand's Barcrawl. Also it's highly recommended to have 40 prayer to be able to use protect from missiles. This quest rewards 4,662 strength experience and god books, which are a great offensive off-hand slot before defenders.
4. Tai Bwo Wannai Trio This quest requires level 15 agility, 30 cooking and 5 fishing to complete, alongside the completion of the quest “Jungle Potion”. It rewards 2,500 attack and strength experience.

Additional Quests

These quests have mid to high requirements and can be completed for additional melee experience and item unlocks.

1. Dragon Slayer 1 requires 32 quest points to complete. It rewards the player with 18,650 strength and defence experience. It also unlocks the ability to use rune platebody and unlocks all dragon tasks for slayer.
2. Heroes' Quest another great quest to complete, especially if you are going to train your defence, this quest is a prerequisite for Legends' Quest which makes it a prerequisite for recipe for disaster. It requires 55 quest points, 53 cooking, fishing, 50 mining and 25 herblore to complete. It rewards the player with 3,075 experience in attack, strength and defence.
3. The Fremennik Trials require level 25 fletching and 40 woodcutting, crafting. This quest is a must complete quest, since it unlocks Fremennik helmets which are really good for combat. This quest also rewards the player with 2,812 experience in strength, attack and defence.
4. The Fremennik Isles require level 40 agility and 20 construction to complete. This is another really fantastic quest to complete as it allows players to equip and use the helm of Neitzinot. Also it rewards the player with two lots of 10,000 experience which players can choose to spend on one of the 4 skills (attack, strength, defence, hitpoints).
5. Olaf's Quest is another great quest to do if you are going to train your defence. It only requires level 40 firemaking and 50 woodcutting and rewards the player with 12,000 defence experience.
6. Underground Pass is a very annoying quest to complete but it rewards the player with 3,000 attack experience.
7. Nature Spirit is a pretty easy and quick quest to complete and rewards the player with 2,000 defence experience.
8. Fairytale 1 - Growing Pains is another easy quest to knock out rewarding the player with 2,000 attack experience.
9. King's Ransom is a late game quest but it is absolutely worth doing as it rewards the player with a ton of combat experience alongside the best prayers in the game. The requirements for the quest are 45 magic and 65 defence. It rewards the player with 33,000 defence experience and 5,000 magic experience. It also gives access to the knight waves training grounds which is a quick minigame that rewards the players with 20,000 experience in attack, strength, defence and hitpoints.

2. Levels 40 - 70 AFKing Crabs: The easiest and the most afk way to train your early stats is to AFK crabs. They are a great monster to camp since they can't hit you if you have defence and they have no defence but have high health. There are few crabs to choose from:

• Rock Crabs: Rock crabs are the OG crabs that reside in Relleka but nowadays it is not recommended to use them since they only have 50 health. The only reason why you would ever want to AFK on rock crabs is if the other crabs are absolutely full which most of the time they are not.
• Swamp Crabs: These creatures reside in the Haunted Woods and are better than rock crabs since they have 75 health instead of 50. However it's still recommended to use either sand crabs or ammonite crabs.
• Sand Crabs: Sand crabs are the most popular crabs that players use to train their early stats. This is due to the fact that there are triple crab spawns which you can camp out and AFK 10 minutes at a time. They reside in Kourend and have 60 health.
• Ammonite Crabs: These are the best crabs to train at since they have 100 health, triple spawns and drops unidentified fossils. To access these crabs, you will be required to complete the quest “Bone Voyage”. Unidentified fossils are a great drop from these monsters as they can be converted into xp lamps in the Varrock museum.

3. Levels 60/70 - 99 Nightmare Zone: Nightmare zone is a great place to AFK your combat stats with good weapons. There are few benefits for doing this:

First of all monsters in the nightmare zone won't stop attacking you so you can just turn on your auto-retaliate and come back every once in a while to interact with your inventory and that's it. Secondly the nightmare zone has a buff that can randomly spawn which gives the player infinite special attack energy for a short period of time. This buff combined with a dragon claws or granite maul will greatly increase your exp rates. Lastly the nightmare zone rewards you with points as you kill monsters. Those points can be spent on the reward chest to purchase a variety of things. The most important one among them all is the ability to imbue your rings, amulets and slayer helmets. Imbuing these items either adds an effect or doubles the existing effects of the said items which is really useful for combat.

How To Setup Nightmare Zone

Setting it up is pretty simple but has some requirements. You will be needing to complete some quests before you can access the nightmare zone. The bosses you defeat on those quests can be fought within the nightmare zone. The bosses you would want to have are:

• Count Draynor - Vampyre Slayer
• The Kendal - Mountain Daughter
• Me - Lunar Diplomacy
• Ice Troll King - The Fremennik Isles
• Black Demon - The Grand Tree
• Tree Spirit - Lost City

You can add more creatures if you like to however all of the monsters above are pretty easy to kill and have relatively low defence. They also only attack with melee meaning you can do your first run with prayer potions pretty easily.

After your first run you can invest your points into absorption potions and overloads which allows you to add more creatures to your roaster. Always keep in mind that some creatures have special attacks that make them annoying to kill so never pick those creatures. Also whenever you complete a quest that has a boss that can be added it will be automatically turned on, make sure to turn them off.

Absorption Potions

After acquiring absorption potions the way you do nightmare zone will change. To use the absorption potion correctly, you will need either a locator orb (from Dragon Slayer 2) or a rock cake (RFD - Freeing Dwarf). These items can lower your health without killing you and the less health you have the less damage the absorption potion has to soak, making it last longer.

This is a great combo with the Dharok armour set since wearing the full set increases your max hit the lower the health you have.

Also keep in mind that drinking an overload potion requires at least 51 health so never lower your health below 51 before drinking an overload dose.

4. Levels 60/70 - 99 Slayer: Another good pathway to take is just doing slayer tasks all the way up to 99 for all combat skills. Slayer can make the otherwise monotonous journey to max more fun and profitable. It is a great way to train and make money and it will also unlock all sorts of bosses and creatures to kill throughout the game. Another reason why doing slayer is a good idea is the fact that you can use a Slayer Helmet to kill creatures while on a slayer task. This helmet increases your damage and accuracy by 16.67%. 

If you want to maximise your exp rates by taking a risk, wilderness slayer is the way to go. Since you can use the Viggora's chain mace (which boosts your damage and accuracy in wilderness by 50%) alongside your slayer helmet you will be killing monsters at an insanely fast rate. However do keep in mind that you can get killed by other players while doing this.

Best Armour/Weapons to Use

The order of items will be listed from best to worse. The most important thing about deciding what to use is its offensive stats.

1. Head Slot

• Torva full helm / Slayer helm (if on a slayer task)
• Neitiznot faceguard
• Serpentine Helmet
• Helm of Neitiznot
• Berserker helm
• Obsidian helmet

2. Cape Slot

• Infernal cape
• Fire cape
• Mythical cape

3. Neck Slot

• Amulet of Torture / Salve Amulet (e) (if fighting against undead)
• Amulet of fury
• Amulet of glory
• Amulet of power
• Amulet of strength

4. Body Slot

• Torva platebody
• Bandos chestplate
• Inquisitor's hauberk
• Fighter torso
• Obsidian platebody

5. Shield Slot

• Avernic defender
• Dragon defender
• Rune defender
• Adamant defender
• Dragonfire shield
• Toktz-ket-xil
• Book of war

6. Legs Slot

• Torva platelegs
• Bandos tassets
• Obsidian platelegs
• Fremennik kilt

7. Hands Slot

• Ferocious gloves
• Barrows gloves
• Dragon gloves
• Rune gloves
• Regen bracelet
• Adamant gloves
• Granite gloves
• Combat bracelet
• Mithril gloves

8. Feet Slot

• Primordial boots
• Dragon boots
• Spiked Manacles
• Guardian boots
• Granite boots
• Rune boots
• Climbing boots

9. Ring Slot

• Berserker ring (i)
• Brimstone Ring
• Warrior ring (i)
• Tyrannical ring (i)
• Treasonous ring (i)

10. Weapon Slot

For weapons you would usually want to go for speed. As faster weapons always have higher exp rates but you can change to use different weapons depending on where you are training and the monsters you are killing.

• Osmuten's Fang/Ghrazi rapier/Inquisitor's mace/Blade of saeldor/Viggora's chainmace (if in wilderness)
• Abyssal tentacle
• Abyssal whip
• Saradomin's blessed sword
• Abyssal bludgeon
• Zamorakian hasta
• Abyssal dagger
• Staff of the dead
• Saradomin sword
• Sarachnis cudgel
• Dragon scimitar
• Dragon sword
• Leaf-bladed battleaxe
• Dragon longsword
• Leaf-bladed sword
• Granite hammer
• Brine Saber
• Rune scimitar
• Granite sword
• Other scimitars for people below level 30 attack

11. Set Effects

There are some item sets in the game when used produces special passive effects those sets are:

• Obsidian Equipment + Berserker Necklace: Wearing the full obsidian set alongside an obsidian weapon provides a 10% damage and accuracy bonus. Wearing the necklace provides an additional 20% damage bonus to obsidian weapons. This is a great set to use if you are killing low defence monsters and you only have 60 defence.
• Elite/Regular Void: Wearing the full void set alongside the melee helm provides a 10% accuracy and damage boost making it an amazing set for players that don't have high stats or money. Also if you complete the hard Western Provinces diary, you can upgrade to elite void which have prayer bonus and 12.5% accuracy and damage boost instead of 10%.
• Dharok the Wretched's Equipment: Wearing full Dharoks activates a passive effect where low health increases your damage. This armour set is amazing for some slayer tasks and best in slot for nightmare zone training.
• Guthan the Infested's Equipment: Wearing full Guthans has a set effect that has a 25% chance to heal you for the damage you deal. This set is useful for AFKing monsters like gargoyles.

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