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Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Location, Access, World Selection and Dealing with Other Players Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Melee Technique Using Dharoks

After trying many methods, I determined that meleeing using the Veracs Barrows set is the most efficient and cost-effective way of killing the giant mole. This is likely due to that set’s combination of accuracy (more hits and less digging by the mole), its special that hits through armor and defence, and the useful prayer bonuses it provides. Several hours of testing allowed me to further refine the method, eventually settling on a technique that uses stat-boosting prayers to speed up kills and enchanted emerald bolts for poisoning.

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

• Technique: Melee using Veracs
  
  
• Risk Level: Low to Moderate. You are in melee range but with decent defence, and you shouldn’t die as long as you are careful. The risk level depends on how long you are willing to melee without protection to conserve prayer.
  
  
• Risk Level Relative to Other Techniques: Moderate. This method is safer than meleeing with Dharoks, but less safe than ranging.
  
  
• Kills Per Trip: Usually 6.
  
  
• Kills Per Hour: Approximately 13 to 15.
  
  
• Cost Per Kill: Approximately 3k, sometimes even less if you are able to kill it faster and save a prayer pot dose.

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 Veracs set, but you will start out with the flail in your inventory while wielding a rune crossbow for poisoning—I prefer this for Veracs since its set has fewer ranging attack penalties than Dharoks (see the “Methods of Poisoning” section on the page discussing challenges and strategy for details.) See Table 85 for my recommended equipment, which is also illustrated in Figure 388.

Table 86 lists my recommended inventory items for this method (also shown in Figure 388).

I also recommend using the following items at the bank for preparation:

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

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

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 bolts and 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.
   
   
6. Make sure your attack style is set to “Slash” (lower left corner). This will ensure that when you switch to your flail, it will be set to “Spike” for stab damage, which really makes a difference.

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. With your crossbow armed, turn on the Eagle Eye prayer and attack the mole from a distance. Once it starts towards you, get into a safe spot; there’s one in the southern part of the central chamber that I use when ranging. (See this same section in the discussion of my ranging method for more details.) Watch closely for the “poison cloud” that indicates that the mole has been poisoned; as soon as you see it, switch to your flail and be ready to change prayers as described below.

You have the mole’s “undivided attention” until it gets down 50% of its hits. Once it is poisoned, you have several choices of how to proceed, depending on how aggressive you want to be, and how many hitpoints you have left.

If you have lots of hitpoints, then use either Incredible Reflexes (+15% attack) or Piety if you have it (+20% attack, +23% strength, +25% defence). Piety will help you avoid taking hits while increasing accuracy and damage; Incredible Reflexes only increases attack but drains prayer more slowly. With Veracs you have high prayer bonuses so use Piety as much as you can, making sure to save enough prayer points for the second half of the kill. (In Figure 389 you can see me using Piety with Veracs to attack the mole.)

If you are low on hitpoints, you need to put on Protection from Melee before attacking with your flail. You can then choose to put on either Incredible Reflexes or Piety, depending on how you are doing with your prayer points and potion doses. Bear in mind that even with Veracs, having Piety and melee protection on at once will drain prayer fast, and the 25% defence bonus is useless anyway; I recommend just Incredible Reflexes while protection praying.

If you didn’t bring a prayer potion or are trying to avoid using them, don’t use any stat boosting prayers during the first half of the kill.

If you are very lucky, the mole won’t dig at all before you kill it; I’ve done this a few times. 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 are very low on health heal up a bit. Pick up any emerald bolts that are on the ground and return them to your quiver.

Now try to find 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. If the bar is all red it is near death; proceed to the next subsection (“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.
   
   
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. The +25% defence bonus will usually prevent the mole from hitting you much, if at all. If you have plenty of food 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, your goal should be to ensure that it dies near you so you can quickly get the drops without losing them or wasting run energy trying to get the drop pile. Again, if the mole is “red-barred” (or very close) and poisoned, then do not attack it! Just wait a few seconds and it will die from the poison (see Figure 390. If it is not poisoned or the poison has mostly worn off, then I recommend switching back to your crossbow and using Eagle Eye to hopefully kill it fast, or at least get it poisoned again.

Eventually you will kill the mole; it lifts its front left claw in the air (shown in Figure 397) and then falls down and fades from sight, leaving its drops behind. Do the following to prepare for the next kill:

• Drop any empty vials or other items you don’t need, to make room for drops.
  
  
• Take a sip of prayer potion if necessary. Remember that if you brought a mix potion, each dose heals 6 points, so try not to waste them.
  
  
• Eat until you are healed or close to healed.
  
  
• 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.
  
  
• Equip your crossbow (or dagger).
  
  
• 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 roughly 22 to 25 minutes. If you find that you are running low on prayer points/pots, energy pots or food, then leave early; it’s not hard to get back to the lair, after all.

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. On regular spells you will land in Lumbridge, so you can 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. Re-poison the mole using your crossbow, hiding from it by trapping it along one of the many walls in the lair. If it digs, just keep trying.
  
  If you brought a dd(p++) instead of the crossbow, I don’t recommend trying to re-poison the mole if it is more than half dead.
  
  
• If you are near the end of a kill and out of food and prayer, just switch back to the crossbow and finish the mole from a safe spot. It will be slow, but you’ll get it eventually.
  
  
• 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.
  
  
• If you are using an unholy book in your shield slot with your crossbow (or poisoned dagger) then you need at least one inventory slot before you start a kill so you can switch to your flail.
  
  
• 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 it is risky to try if you are low on hitpoints!
  
  
• 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 - Location, Access, World Selection and Dealing with Other Players Giant Mole Exterminator’s Handbook - Melee Technique Using Dharoks