Giant Ant Worker - Access and Combat Recommendations

Access Directions

The primary location for these ants is in the maze accessed during the quest Back to My Roots, but that area is not recommended. It's a pain to get to, the maze is confusing, there are few of the ants, they are spread out, and other monsters will attack you. Since these monsters retreat and it's single combat there, you'll rarely get a kill.

In contrast, they are very easy to get to in the Chaos Tunnels, assuming you've completed the mini-quest Hunt for Surok. Bank in Varrock East bank and then head east out of town and then north to the statue of Saradomin. Enter the statue and run northwest to the portal that leads to the Chaos Tunnels; the first room you enter has giant ant workers and soldiers in it. If you go north and take the portal there, you end up in a larger room that has many more ants. The first room is better for workers, though.

Equipment

As described in detail in the combat notes below, the main challenge with these isn't the workers, it's the Giant Ant Soldiers, which are aggressive and hit up to 15.

Most players will want to simply wear prayer gear and use Protection from Melee (or Deflect Melee) the entire time. An alternative is to wear Veracs, which provides both good melee defence and prayer bonuses. Then use prayer while the soldiers are aggressive, and switch it off when fighting the monsters individually.

Very high-level players can get by using Guthans without prayer, healing as needed until the soldiers become unaggressive. Be warned, though, that this can be very dangerous!

Dharoks is also effective here because the monsters have few life points, but prayer must be constantly used.

If you have the new Soul Wars cape, use it here, especially if praying.

Supplies

If fighting entirely with prayer, I suggest bringing with two each of 4-dose Zamorak brew and super strength for an hour of combat, plus 5 to 8 4-dose prayer potions, depending on your Prayer level and the bonuses of your equipment.

If fighting partially with prayer and partially with food, you'll want some prayer potions and of course, some food. Some experimentation may be required; I recommend at first to bring plenty of prayer pots.

If using Guthans without prayer, bring a full load of good food so you don't have to use the warspear too often. You may want to augment with a healing familiar or bring with extra food in a beast of burden, also useful for drops.

No alching runes are needed (the soldiers drop the occasional mith chainbody, but they also drop nats and fires.)

Familiar

A beast of burden is very useful here for carrying drops; no alching runes are needed (the soldiers drop the occasional mith chainbody, but they also drop nats and fires.) You can also use a combat familiar if you plan to kill a lot of the soldiers, but one is not useful for fighting the workers (they die too quickly and you have to chase them around.)

Combat Notes

The giant ant workers themselves are easy to kill and don't do a lot of damage -- the problem is the Giant Ant Soldiers, which despite their level, hit up to 150! Combine that with multicombat and you have a bit of a challenge on your hands.

There are two basic ways to go here -- fight just the workers or fight the workers and soldiers together. Each requires a rather different approach.

Either way, you are going to have a swarm of soldiers on you for the first 10 minutes after you enter the Tunnels, and another 10 minutes each time you venture too far away from your initial spot, or if you get kidnapped by a random. The workers retreat, so if you end up chasing them too far, the soldiers will get aggressive again. The best way to avoid this is to try to circle around the entire perimeter of the small room once, then try to stay near the middle.

To fight both monster types combined, I recommend focusing on the soldiers until they stop being aggressive, then fighting whichever monster type you prefer or whatever is closest when you finish your prior kill. This is best done in the smaller room you first enter from the Dagon'hai tunnels. You will probably want to use prayer when the soldiers are aggressive, and thereafter can try switching to using food.

If you are trying to fight entirely without prayer, perhaps using Guthans, be sure to use the terrain of the room to maneouver so you don't have three or four soldiers attacking at once! You may at times need to briefly turn on prayer anyway.

If you want to fight only the workers, you must plan on the soldiers being on your back the entire time, which also means using prayer the whole time. You'll want to go to the second, larger room, as the first has only three workers where there are 8 to 10 in the bigger room. Keep prayer on and just ignore the soldiers. Remember that you can duck back out of the Chaos Tunnels or teleport to Varrock for banking quite easily.

Drop Notes

The giant ant workers have generally poorer drops than the soldiers, especially now that the latter drop grimy wergali and wergali seeds. Count on getting a decent number of runes (including lots of natures), the occasional herb, a few allotment seeds (mostly junk) and some noted coal.

The workers do not drop charms.