Method Description, Instructions and Tips for Success

General Description

Astral runes are an essential ingredient in Lunar Magicks spells, while flax is a key ingredient in Crafting to make bowstrings for Fletching. Astrals are normally crafted by running from the bank on Moonclan Island to the altar, making the runes and then teleporting back to the bank again. A somewhat different option for those looking to make money, though, is to modify the conventional Runecrafting method to include picking flax at the field that lies between the bank and the altar. Naturally this slows down the Runecrafting quite a bit, but when flax is valuable it can be a better moneymaker, especially before you can make double astrals. It might also be just a bit less boring, since you're doing two activities. :)

At high levels you can only get one astral per essence, so you can make more money by using a beast of burden to carry extra flax. Due to the high cost of war tortoise pouches, that should be a spirit terrorbird. At very high levels you get two astrals per essence and so using an abyssal lurker is a wiser choice.

Specific Method Details

Start by getting to the Moonclan Island bank, by teleporting directly (if already on Lunar Magicks), traveling via Rellekka, or using an astral altar teleport tablet obtained from the Great Orb Project minigame.

At the bank put on weight reducing gear, and Varrock armor 3 from the Varrock Achievement Diary (to provide some lightweight protection against suqah attacks). Take out your four Runecrafting pouches and an abyssal lurker pouch; summon the familiar. Take out a load of essence and fill three pouches. Take out more and fill the fourth pouch and the familiar. Fill your inventory with essence.

Exit the bank and run southeast towards the astral altar. You'll pass through the flax field you'll return to later, and go by one or more suqahs -- try to go quickly past those so they don't get too many shots at you. When you get to the altar, craft the essence in your inventory, empty three pouches and craft again, then empty the fourth pouch and familiar and craft once more. Run northwest back to the flax field, pick 23 flax and run back to the bank. Count on about 25 trips per hour.

Once in a while you will also need to make a trip to the Abyss to repair your pouches. If you want to play it safe you can do this while leaving the pouches in your bank (oddly enough). If you don't mind a small risk, then take your full pouches with essence to the Abyss, get them repaired, then go through one of the rifts (such as nature or cosmic) to craft some runes there. This actually takes about the same amount of time so it doesn't slow you much at all in terms of making money.