• Stake Duels - This involves staking an item or multiple items. If you lose the duel, you lose what you staked and if you win the duel, you will receive what the other person staked.
• Boxing - This is when you fight with no weapons or armour. These types of duels are mainly for fun, although staking is quite common for boxing. Prayer may be turned on or off for these matches.
• Ticket to Lumby - This is when somebody asks somebody else to kill them so they can go to Lumbridge. Usually, the person who dies will take off all his/her armour and weapons and then challenge somebody of a higher combat level to a duel so they can kill them. They will usually ask to be killed beforehand.
• Mage Duels - This is when no weapons are allowed, and magic is allowed. The mages will compete in a boxing round, whilst constantly using magic spells against each other. The strongest mage will usually win.
• Friendly Duels - When 2 people just wish to compete against each other and anything goes. They don't stake any items and they choose which dueling options to turn off and leave on.

How to duel:

Dueling is simple. Simply right click on another person and choose to duel them. If the person accepts your challenge, you will then be taken to the dueling screen. Here you select your different dueling options (magic on/off, retreat on/off, prayer on/off, weapons allowed) and whether or not you wish to stake any items.

Some people make pure characters which have been designed for one purpose - Dueling. To find out more about pures, read the Pure/Impure class guide on our site. Other people make rather strong mages, which usually have low attack and strength and maybe a defence of 40 so they can wear rune, then they have a very high magic level. The new mage arena staffs seem to be popular with dueling mages at the moment.

If you are interested in dueling for a long period of time, and meeting a lot of other duelers, I recommend going to Lumbridge world 11. A lot of people gather there to duel - some people looking to stake duel, some not looking to stake duel. Also, a lot of high level characters like to duel at Ardougne bank, usually on worlds 8 and 11.

Tactics:

• Make sure you stand a chance - Scout out a worthy opponent. Watch them fight other people around your level and see how others compare to him. If you notice him winning all his duels by a lot, then maybe he/she isn't the right person to be staking full rune with. Also, look in the highscores and see how much HP he/she has. If they have a lot more than you, chances are they will beat you.
• Use potions - I recommend using potions every time you stake duel. Super attack, Super defence and Super strength are best. Chances are that your opponent will be using potions, and whether you use them or not could determine the outcome of the battle.
• If you are fighting with magic and prayer on, then make the most of it. Use weaken spells on your opponent and cast the blood rune spells as often as you can - these will prove very effective. Also, increase your strength, defence and attack with your prayer. This will help.
• Mage Arena staffs - Fairly new to Runescape, these staffs are VERY powerful. The higher your magic level, the more damage these will do. I recommend having at least 80 magic before using these in stake duels, because once you have 80 magic, you can charge your staff temporarily which will increase its power a lot. Also, depending on which staff you are using, its abilities harm your opponent (refer to mage arena abilities in the mage arena guide).
• Maintain full HP - Never commence a stake duel unless you have full HP. This is a huge disadvantage.

Last updated: 11/16/2003