Method Description, Instructions and Tips for Success

General Description

Red dragons are easily the least popular of the "regular" color-coded dragons in RuneScape, because they are only found deep in Brimhaven Dungeon and deep in the Wilderness. Neither location is particularly easy to get to, and since you need to bank frequently, this is a bit of a turn off. An added annoyance is that in Brimhaven there are aggressive wild dogs in their area, which will distract anyone who has a combat level below 127.

The flip side of these disadvantages is easy to guess: none of the crowds at the red dragons that plague their green, blue and black counterparts. And since the addition of Summoning, you can use beasts of burden to dramatically cut down on the amount of time wasted running to and from the bank.

You are guaranteed about 7k worth of drops per kill, so these are a good moneymaker. But note that red dragons have very poor secondary drops -- they are arguably worse than blue dragons and even green dragons.

With level 70 skills, red dragons are fairly slow to kill. With level 90 skills you can kill them much more quickly.

At extremely high levels, I like to switch gears and take advantage of a couple of advanced abilities. I use super antifire potions (level 85 Herblore required) to allow me to make use of two-handed weapons, and then fight the dragons using Dharoks. This is somewhat dangerous, but you can get a lot of kills very quickly. I combine this with the pack yak's Winter Storage scrolls to let me stay for a full hour per trip rather than having to run back and forth to the bank constantly. This is a trade-off, because the scrolls themselves are worth about 400 gp each. However, in my tests, I have found that the scrolls allow me to make more money, especially given the long run to the red dragon area. This method also has some other advantages, including more Combat XP, more Summoning charms, and even a little bit of Summoning XP from the scrolls.

I tested this method using both food and prayer. While prayer is slightly more expensive, it is much safer, more enjoyable, and lets you get more kills per hour because you can let your HP level get lower (for bigger Dharok's whallops) and you don't have to spend so much time eating and juggling inventory.

Specific Method Details

Teleport to Ardougne and head to the south bank. Put on your Dharoks set and the other items described above. (Use a skillcape if you don't have a Soul Wars cape.)

Take out of the bank six 4-dose Zamorak brews, four 4-dose and one 2-dose prayer potions, two 4-dose and one 2-dose super antifire potions, a bronze hatchet, 905 coins, a pack yak familiar, 110 Winter Storage scrolls, eight or so sets of alching runes and your holy wrench.

Sail to Brimhaven from Ardougne and run south to the dungeon. Pay Saniboch his fee, head west and chop the vines, then take the second passage heading north (the one not blocked by more vines.)

Go to the end of this passage, and hop the stones across the lava. Run south and you'll find passages leading southeast and south; take the south one, which brings you to a chamber with fire giants. Run due east to get to a small anteroom with a log balance; when you cross that, you'll be in a large room that contains red dragons, baby red dragons and wild dogs. Drop the axe, as you are now done with it.

Unless you are already low on Hitpoints, start fighting a red dragon immediately, without prayer or taking any potions -- a couple of good firebreaths will knock you down in HP quickly. Don't go too far -- take the first super antifire dose when you are below half health. Then fight with prayer off until you are at the HP level you feel comfortable Dharoking at. For reference, the red dragons can hit up to 14, so be sure you put on Protection from Melee no later than that!

Take your first Zamorak brew dose when you are down about 10 prayer points, and take more regularly -- about every three minutes. This will keep your Attack and Strength topped up, and save you on prayer potions. As you fight, pick up bones and hides, alch lesser weapon and armor items, and be sure to watch carefully for the message saying your super antifire is about to wear off. You are depending on that potion's effects, so do not wait until the second message appears saying it has in fact worn off, or a bit of bad timing may lead to your untimely demise!

Use the Winter Storage scrolls to bank bones and hides remotely. If your special move bar gets a bit low, you can also store 30 items in the yak -- this is easiest done by "using" a dragonhide on the yak, if you are in combat. Keep an eye on your yak's timer, aiming to finish combat with about two minutes of time remaining. Use home teleport to go to Lumbridge, recharge prayer, then run to the bank before the timer expires.

Oh, and if you plan to do any normal combat after this, use a regular restore potion, because after six Zammy brews your Defence level will be close to zero. :)