RuneScoop.com - Mithril Dragon Guide - Introduction, Prerequisites and Recommendations

As you’ll learn in this guide, mithril dragons are extremely dangerous, difficult to kill, impossible to prevent from damaging you no matter what equipment or techniques you use, and moderately to very risky. They can also be expensive to kill, depending on your levels and how you want to kill them. Their main special drop—the dragon full helm—is very rare and likely will take months to get.

So why bother? Well, that d full is certainly an attraction, but there are other reasons to fight the miths too. They are the only way to get chewed bones, which are necessary to complete the Barbarian Training pyre boat minigame. One would also presume that they would give the best chance of getting a draconic visage, since they are the highest level dragon in the game. Furthermore, they occasionally drop other valuable items, and even their regular drops are quite good: in addition to 3 mithril bars and 1 set of dragon bones for each kill, they drop lots of goodies like 27 bloods at a time, rune battleaxes like they are going out of style, rune spears, runite bolts, prayer pot mix potions and more.

If done properly, you can get enough in drops to pay for the cost of killing the dragons, even if you don’t get one of the super-rare items. And doing it right is what this guide is all about! But first, let’s find out what the prerequisites are to fighting mithril dragons.

Mithril dragons were introduced to the game as part of the Barbarian Training feature, and are thus connected to it. To begin Barbarian Training you speak to Otto Godblessed in his house near Baxtorian Falls, southwest of the Barbarian Outpost. Once you have proceeded far enough in the training, Otto will give you access to the Ancient Cavern below the lake nearby, which is where the mith dragon lair can be found.

As it turns out, you don’t actually have to complete very much of the training to be allowed into the cavern. After speaking with Otto begin working on the Barbarian Firemaking training. After the first task—in which you learn to start a fire with a bow—Otto will ask you to retrieve some chewed bones from the Ancient Cavern and build a pyre ship with them. Since the only way to get chewed bones is by killing mithril dragons, that’s as far as you have to go in order to access their lair.

Note that starting the Firemaking training requires a Firemaking level of at least 35.

Mithril dragons are difficult, high-level foes, and as with most such challenging monsters you need high levels in most combat skills. What constitutes “high” is of course a matter of opinion; you can find mine in Table 173. These requirements don’t mean you cannot kill mithril dragons with lower levels, but they are what I feel is necessary to have reasonable success using my methods.

**Table 173: Recommended Combat Skill Levels for Fighting Mithril Dragons**
Skill	Minimum Level	Recommended Level	Notes
Attack	90	95	Only relevant if meleeing.
Defence	90	95	Necessary for all methods; the higher, the better.
Strength	80	85	Only for melee.
Constitution	90	95	Again, the higher, the better.
Ranged	85	90	This is of course only necessary if ranging. Ranging is no longer the best method of killing mith dragons, but it is a good option for those who cannot use the higher level Herblore potions. Still, due to their high defence, it becomes very time-consuming and expensive to range them without a high Ranged level.
Prayer	80	95	Higher Prayer levels let you get more points from prayer restore potions and stay in combat longer. It also enables the use of higher level prayers and curses. All of my methods use the new ancient curses, because they are better suited to killing high level monsters. For ranging or maging, you need at least level 80 Prayer to be able to use the various Leech curses. For meleeing, level 95 Prayer for Turmoil is recommended.
Magic	80	90	You need a high Magic score to provide defence against the magic attack of mithril dragons, which is important for both ranging and maging methods. If maging, a very high level (90+) is mandatory to avoid lots of “splashes”. This is less important if meleeing.
Herblore	--	90 / 91 / 92	See below for more details.

Jagex has, unfortunately, made Herblore into a combat skill. They may deny this, but by introducing high level combat potions that are untradeable, they have forced high level players who want the most efficient methods to have high Herblore levels. In fact, when it comes to mithril dragons, having a high Herblore level is probably more important than your specific levels in the “real” combat skills!

The first Herblore milestone is level 85, which allows you to make super antifire potions. These are extremely useful for mithril dragons, because they mean you can use two-handed weapons (for meleeing) or proper enhancing equipment in the shield slot (for ranging or maging). I strongly recommend at least level 85 Herblore for mithril dragons. You can also get by with level 84 (or even 83) using temporary boosters.

Beyond level 85 you get access to the various “extreme” potions, which help you kill mithril dragons faster. Meleers will want level 90 to be able to make the full complement of extreme melee potions: extreme attack, strength and defence. Mages will want level 91 for extreme magic potions, and rangers level 92 for extreme ranging potions. All of these have a significant beneficial impact on combat.

Non-combat skill levels aren’t really that important for killing mith dragons, but the ones in Table 174 can be advantageous.

**Table 174: Recommended Non-Combat Skill Levels for Fighting Mithril Dragons**
Skill	Recommended Level	Notes
Crafting + Firemaking	55, 60 or 85	Lets you get more rewards when you build pyre boats using chewed bones.
Fishing + Cooking	62/62 or 76/80	Again, you’ll be using lots of food, so you might as well do it yourself and get the benefit of the experience. The values shown are for fishing/cooking monkfish and sharks respectively.
Summoning	52, 67 or 96	You will be using a beast of burden here, and you should ideally have at least a spirit terrorbird for its 12 inventory slots. A war tortoise (level 67) lets you carry six more items in and out, but the pouches are expensive. A pack yak (level 96) is ideal, providing a whopping 30 extra slots for supplies and drops.

You do not need completely “maxed” stats to kill mithril dragons, but the higher your level, the better off you are. For reference, I have shown in Figure 9 my stats both at the time I wrote this guide originally back in 2007, and as they were when I rewrote it in early 2010.

**Figure 9: Qeltar’s Statistics During Mith Dragon Hunting - 2007 versus 2010**
On the left, my skill levels when I first wrote this guide in mid-2007; on the right, my skills as of this early 2010 rewrite. I had pretty good success with killing mithril dragons with my older stats; a few extra levels in Attack and Strength don’t matter that much. The higher Prayer is definitely helpful now, though, and high Herblore is essential to the fastest dragon kills today.

Like most high-level activities on RuneScape, success requires that you use the best equipment possible. This is probably even more true for mith dragons than other high-level monsters—using the “second-best” equipment instead of the best equipment can mean the difference between getting several kills per trip and getting only a couple. Lesser grade equipment can also cost you in the long run, because you constantly use prayer when fighting, and slower kills mean more prayer potions. If reading any of this section makes you balk at the cost of the equipment or supplies involved, then mith killing is probably not for you!

The specific equipment required for killing miths depends entirely on the method chosen; obviously, using a crossbow means you need good ranging armor, using melee a good melee weapon and so forth. Here are a few general notes, though, on what you should expect to need:

In terms of consumables, expect to use up lots of potions and food fighting these dragons. You will need antire or super antifire potions, super or extreme defence potions for all methods, and then super/extreme attack, strength, magic or ranging, depending on method. And you’ll need prayer restore potions too.

For healing, I use a selection of different foods chosen for maximum benefit at minimum cost. My current choice involves the use of strawberry baskets, monkfish and salmon, which I will explain in more detail later on. You can also use the new “mix” potions made possible by Barbarian Training, as they provide small amounts of healing as you drink them. For example, two prayer pot mix (2) potions provides 4 doses of prayer pot and 24 points of healing, which is better than a 4-dose prayer pot and a shark.

Please Whitelist This Site?