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Chaos Druids (Level 13) Banshees (Level 23, Slayer Level 15)

Cave crawlers are oversized lizards that live in the first room of the Fremennik Slayer cave. They are the most overlooked and underrated of herb-dropping monsters, capable of providing herbs in large quantities, along with many other desirable drops. They are easy to get to, easy to kill, and definitely worth your consideration.

Cave crawlers are so cute. No, really, I think they’re cute! I like the way they wiggle as they walk on their six legs. J They’re a buff color with green patches and a prominent set of spines along their backs; see Figure 178. They require a nominal Slayer level of 10 to fight, but have no special Slayer requirements (i.e., no Slayer equipment is needed, and they have no special attacks.)

Cave crawlers are poisonous, and in fact have a very deadly poison for their level: it hits for 8 HP at first before slowly diminishing. This is enough to kill even a high-level player in a few minutes, so don’t go without antipoisons. However, the cave crawlers only poison upon a successful hit, and high-level players wearing decent armor will get hit very infrequently. (Contrast that to cave slimes, which have a contact poison.)

Here’s a brief summary of cave crawlers’ essential combat-related information:

• Name: Cave Crawler
  
  
• Combat Level: 23
  
  
• Slayer Level: 10
  
  
• Hitpoints: 22
  
  
• Attack Style: Melee
  
  
• Maximum Hit: 3
  
  
• Combat Zone: Single
  
  
• Aggressive: No
  
  
• Special Attacks: Poison on successful attack, maximum 8 HP damage
  
  
• Special Defences: None
  
  
• Special Equipment Required: None
  
  
• High-Level Player Kill Rate: 425 per hour
  
  
• Herb Drop Rate: 140 per hour

The primary location for cave crawlers is in the first room of the Slayer Dungeon in Fremennik province. There’s a fairy ring right next to the cave entrance, which I strongly recommend using; its code is “A J R”. Using this ring allows you to quickly get to the crawlers, fight until your inventory is full, and then bank in Zanaris before returning again.

You can also find cave crawlers in a central room in the Lumbridge Swamp Caves, and in Dorgesh-Kaan South Dungeon. These areas both have the crawlers mixed in with other monsters, they both require light sources, and are further from banks. Stick to the primary location.

Like most low-level monsters, these are quite easy and quick to kill with standard melee gear. You can mage them or range them as well, but this is slower, increases costs, and requires you to take super antipoisons (because you’ll get hit more often if not wearing melee armor).

Take a good weapon for faster kills, and wear decent armor; rune, granite or dragon are fine, you don’t really need Barrows.

If you are a high-level player who won’t get hit very often, bring 3 or 4 regular antipoison potions, so you can take a dose when you get hit (and poisoned). If you’re a lower-level player who will be hit frequently, it is much more efficient to take with super antipoisons, which give you 6 minutes of poison immunity per dose.

As with all combat, you can bring with a super attack and super strength potion to let you get faster kills; super attacks are particularly recommended since they are so cheap. I recommend bringing an appropriate Summoning pouch as well.

You may wish to bring with swamp tar and a pestle and mortar to make harralander tar, and ashes for making Serum 207 (the crawlers drop water vials).

Cave crawlers drop nice quantities of herbs, of course, but go well beyond that with an impressive selection of additional drops: runes, Herblore seconds, vials of water, allotment seeds and even Summoning charms. They can also drop two herbs at once, or an herb with another item.

Here’s what I got in a sample 30 minute session using a whip and rune defender, standard armor, and no potions (other than antipoisons), summons or other enhancers:

• 100% Drops: None
  
  
• Herbs: 22 guam, 12 marrentill, 6 tarromin, 7 harralander, 8 ranarr, 3 irit, 4 avantoe, 5 kwuarm, 2 cadantine, 3 lantadyme, 0 dwarf weed.
  
  
• Runes: 72 fire, 45 earth, 39 nature.
  
  
• Gold: 335 coins.
  
  
• Herblore Seconds: 1 snape grass, 2 red spiders’ eggs, 3 unicorn horn dust, 8 white berries, 2 limpwurt roots, 3 eyes of newt.
  
  
• Allotment Seeds: 31 potato, 14 onion, 16 cabbage, 2 tomato, 1 strawberry, 1 watermelon. (They also drop evil turnip seeds but they’re very rare.)
  
  
• Charms: 20 gold, 1 green, 1 crimson, 0 blue.
  
  
• Other: 23 vials of water (unnoted), 1 bronze boots.

The vial and secondary item drops mean that it is easy to make whole potions while fighting cave crawlers, which allows you to effectively store three items in one spot.

Here are a few extra tips:

• Bronze boots may seem useless, but low-level players and “pures” will pay a lot for a pair, so take them.
  
  
• Amusingly, Jagex put a small Summoning obelisk literally right in the cave crawlers room, so don’t forget to recharge if needed before you leave.
  
  
• If you run out of antipoisons but otherwise feel you can stay longer, you may be able to make a regular or super antipoison from your drops. Otherwise, I recommend leaving—the poison these guys have is not worth messing around with.

Chaos Druids (Level 13) Banshees (Level 23, Slayer Level 15)