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Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Melee Technique Using Veracs Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Ranging Technique

Aside from using Veracs, the only melee method I’ve found that works well against the giant mole is using the Dharoks set from Barrows. As you probably know, the great benefit of Dharoks is the ability to get huge hits, which can be very useful when fighting a monster that runs away quickly after being attacked. Unfortunately, the trade-off with Dharoks is that its accuracy is lower than Veracs, so you also hit a lot of zeros—and Dharoks doesn’t have a stab attack style. The big hits and lower accuracy make this method less predictable than Veracs, so it can potentially be faster, but can also be slower if you are unlucky.

Using Dharoks to best advantage requires stat boosting prayers. To conserve prayer points for this, I use a slightly different method than classic Dharoking, where you get your hit points down very low and use protection prayers. The method I’ve devised works well and is also safer than typical Dharok techniques.

Perhaps the most compelling reason to use Dharoks, actually, is that it can be a lot of fun to go for those really big hits on the mole! J Figure 391 shows the best I have been able to do so far.

Here’s a summary of the key information about this technique:

• Technique: Melee using Dharoks
  
  
• Risk Level: Moderate to High. With care you won’t die, but any time you are using Dharoks there is a risk of death. The risk level depends on how low you are willing to let your health drop, the quality of your Internet connection, and how long you are willing to melee without protection to keep stat-boosting prayers active.
  
  
• Risk Level Relative to Other Techniques: High. This method is more dangerous than the other two.
  
  
• Kills Per Trip: Usually 6.
  
  
• Kills Per Hour: Approximately 12 to 16, depending greatly on your luck in getting big hits.
  
  
• Cost Per Kill: Approximately 3.5k.

Note that the estimates above are based on using the recommended equipment and skills of about the following levels: 95 Attack; 95 Strength; 95 Defence; 98 Hitpoints; and 80 Prayer.

Your equipment will include the full Dharoks set, but you will start out with the great axe in your inventory while wielding a dd(p++) and rune defender for poisoning. The Dharoks set has greater ranged attack penalties so I prefer the dd(p++) here over the emerald bolt method, though you can certainly try that as well. (See the “Methods of Poisoning” section on the page discussing challenges and strategy for details.)

Table 87 and Figure 392 show my recommended equipment for Dharoks.

Inventory Items

You can find my recommended inventory items for this method in Table 88 (as well as Figure 392).

You will also need some cheap food to heal up between runs.

I don’t usually use Sara brews before trips with Dharoks, but that’s an option. If you do, you’ll need:

• One dose of Saradomin brew
  
  
• One dose of regular restore potion

A note about the food. Classic Dharoking technique is to let the monster drop your hitpoints down to a low level and then use protection prayers, so you don’t need food. There are two problems with this when fighting the giant mole, however. First, you really need stat boosting prayers to kill it most efficiently, and using those and protection from melee at the same time drains prayer ridiculously quickly. Second, unlike typical combat where you put on protection and fight until the monster dies, you will be constantly starting and stopping combat, and wandering around the lair with 8 hitpoints or whatever is dangerous.

In my testing, I found that it was more effective to use food to heal up after each kill, and then fight with prayer off as long as possible. You’ll take damage mostly while using your dagger to poison, then switch to the great axe when injured so you get better hits. I discuss this in more detail in the method subsection below. Even if you don’t get the absolute biggest hits this way, you will end up with faster kills than if you must use all your prayer points on Protection from Melee.

Do the following to get yourself ready for the first trip or between trips:

1. Use cheap food (trout, salmon, cakes, etc.) to heal up completely.
   
   
2. Put on or check all your equipment to make sure it is correct.
   
   
3. Take out more teleport tablets from the bank if necessary. (You should only need to do this after several trips.)
   
   
4. If you want a defence and hit points boost, take out all of your inventory items except for the food. Also take out a Saradomin brew and regular restore, and take a sip of each in that order. Then put the pots back in and take out your food.
   
   
5. If you are not using Sara brews, just take out everything in your inventory list at once.

To explain all the details more easily, I’ve broken the kill down into four phases: starting and poisoning; the first half of the kill; the second half of the kill; and completing the kill.

If you’ve just arrived at the lair, or if you’ve killed the mole twice since your last took your combat potions, take one sip of the super attack and (super) strength potions.

The first stage of the kill will be to poison the mole. Ensure your dd(p++) is wielded, and then proceed in the most efficient way possible, depending on your health level, food and prayer status:

• If you have reasonably high health and a decent prayer level, turn on Incredible Reflexes (+15% attack) before attacking.
  
  
• If your health is around 50-75% and you have good prayer, use Piety (+20% attack, +23% strength, +25% defence) if you can. This drains prayer faster but with a better chance of doing damage, and increases defence so you put off needing your protection prayer.
  
  
• If your health is low but prayer is high, use Protection from Melee and Incredible Reflexes together.
  
  
• If your health and prayer are both low (but high enough to complete a kill) then just use Protection from Melee to start.

Use as many specs as possible, and keep hitting with the dagger until you see the green “splat” indicating poison. Switch on Protection from Melee as necessary, and turn off the stat boosting prayers if you are draining prayer points too fast.

Note that it may take some time to be sure the mole is poisoned, and you may get impatient and be tempted to switch to your axe. Try to resist this urge, because the poison is really very helpful with Dharoks.

Once the mole is poisoned, switch to your Dharoks Greataxe and start hoping for a big hit! (If your inventory is full you may need to temporarily drop an item on the ground first.) If you still have enogh hitpoints and prayer, then keep using either Incredible Reflexes or Piety. If you want to conserve prayer, or turn them off until you get to the second half of the kill. Of course, if you are low on hitpoints, you need to put on Protection from Melee before attacking.

As soon as the mole gets near 50% health I recommend using Incredible Reflexes even if you need to do so with Protection from Melee for a short time, unless very low on prayer. Don’t use Piety with Protection from Melee with Dharoks as your prayer level will drop like a stone.

It is not unusual to kill the mole in its original spot with Dharoks, if you get a couple of lucky big hits. Usually, though, it will dig away sometime after it falls below 50% health.

As soon as the mole digs away, turn off your prayers. If you used emerald bolts to poison, pick up any emerald bolts that are on the ground and return them to your quiver.

WARNING: Usually the mole becomes unaggressive after it digs, but on rare occasions it will attack unprovoked when you come near it even after it digs away. For this reason, I strongly advise against letting your hitpoints get too low when using Dharoks on the mole. Try to keep your points above 25 when walking around the lair, unless you really like taking chances.

Hunt down the mole using the method described in the section “Searching for the Mole Efficiently” in the topic on challenges and strategy. Once you track it down, assuming it is poisoned, check its health bar; it is near death, then proceed to “Completing the Kill”. Otherwise, I recommend that you do the following:

1. If your health is over 50%, put on Piety; otherwise, put on Incredible Reflexes and Protection from Melee.
   
   
2. Attack the mole and fight until it dies or digs again. Be sure to watch your health if you have Protection from Melee off, and also watch your prayer level.
   
   
3. Turn off your prayer(s), heal if necessary, and look for the mole again.

Using Piety is more important here than in the first half of the kill, as you want to do everything possible to ensure a hit before the mole digs; if you get lucky you can kill it even when it has a lot of points left (see Figure 393). The +25% defence bonus will usually prevent the mole from hitting you much, if at all. If you have plenty of food and health and want to save prayer points, though, just use Incredible Reflexes instead.

Try to watch your run energy, and sip energy pot doses while running around the lair to keep it above 50%.

Once the mole is near death, you want to make sure it dies near you, to get the drops without losing them or wasting run energy trying to get the drop pile. If it is “red-barred” and poisoned then do not attack it—just wait a few seconds and it will die from the poison. If it is not poisoned or the poison has mostly worn off, then I recommend switching back to your dd(p++), turning on Piety and using your specials to increase the chances of getting a hit: the dagger has low strength but decent accuracy, and since the beast is nearly dead, going for a “big hit” with your greataxe is pointless.

Once the mole is dead (Figure 397), do the following to prepare for the next kill:

• Equip your dd(p++) and rune defender; this will free up a slot for more drops.
  
  
• Drop any empty vials or other items you don’t need, to make room for drops.
  
  
• Take a sip of prayer potion if necessary.
  
  
• Eat food to get your health level up a bit higher, though not necessarily until all the way healed. It is usually best to try to spread out your food over your planned six kills, unless you are very low on health. If you are low on prayer though, heal as much as possible.
  
  
• Pick up the mole’s drops. If you cannot carry them all, just leave the bones behind, or consider topping up with more food or energy pots.
  
  
• Switch from run to walk and go back to the center of the lair, where the mole’s respawn is. Then switch back to run.

You are now ready for the next kill.

You should be able to get six kills per trip with this method, taking anywhere from 20 to 27 minutes, depending mostly on luck and your skill with turning prayers off and on. If you find that you are running low on prayer points/pots, energy pots or food, then leave early and just come back, since it is easy to do so.

To leave, either use your teleport tablets, or you can also use the level 0 home teleport spell (every 30 minutes). This saves you a tablet. Assuming you are on regular spells, you will land in Lumbridge. Recharge in the chapel nearby, and then use the bank in Lumbridge to store drops, teleport to Falador, and prepare for the next trip in one of the banks there.

Here are a few additional notes and tips for success using this method:

• If it takes you a really long time to kill the mole, the poison may start to wear off. If you brought a dd(p++), then if it is near death, you can try to use specs to either get it poisoned or kill it with a lucky shot. If it has a lot of points left just try for a big hit with your greataxe. If you have a crossbow, you may be able to poison it again.
  
  
• If you are near the end of a kill and run out of food and prayer, let the poison kill the mole even if you have to wait a minute or two. If it isn’t poisoned but is near death, here’s a gimmick you can use. Attack the mole trying to kill it; if it digs, go find it, but if it comes after you, run away. Hide in a safe spot and after 10 seconds log out. When you log back in the mole will usually no longer be aggressive. Keep doing this until it’s dead—but be careful. As an alternative, you can leave and come back fast, but you risk another player “stealing” your kill.
  
  
• If you get arrows as a drop, remember that you can save an inventory slot by putting them in your quiver (assuming you didn’t bring emerald bolts.)
  
  
• You can either trade your claws and skins for nests each time you come back to Falador for a fresh trip, or save them up and trade them all in 28 at a time, which is somewhat more efficient.
  
  
• Mole claws and skins are tradeable, though it is rare to see any for sale. Nests with seeds or rings in them are not tradeable.
  
  
• The interface allows you right click the mole and select to attack it, then put on prayers as you run up to it. This can save you a few prayer points, but do not try it if you are Dharoking very low on hit points!
  
  
• If you don’t have room to pick up all your drops but you have extra food or energy pots left over, drop them and take the mole drops. Teleport out and bank quickly, and there’s a good chance the food and pots will still be on the ground when you get back to the lair.

Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Melee Technique Using Veracs Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Ranging Technique