Magic

Magic is a skill that is used to cast various spells, utilizing the power of runes. It is a highly versatile skill, offering valuable benefits to players with high Magic levels. In combat, Magic users can damage their opponents from a safe distance, as well as freeze them in place, lower their combat stats, and even hit multiple targets at once. Outside of combat, Magic allows players to perform various tasks such as teleporting themselves (or others) to distant locations, enchanting various items to give them magical properties, converting items directly into coins, and even curing or healing other players.

Runes
The Magic skill relies heavily on runes, special stones imbued with elemental powers which are focused into spells. Magic users may therefore benefit from a high Runecrafting level, which is used to create runes. Each spell has a certain rune requirement to cast; these runes are consumed during the casting process. (Some Magic equipment, such as the Staff of darkness, may negate the rune cost of a single spell.)

Below is a list of all the runes used in magic:

Part of the rune requirement for a spell can be taken care of by equipping an elemental staff (either a staff of air, a staff of water, a staff of earth or a staff of fire). When equipped, these staves provide unlimited numbers of the elemental rune they represent. A staff of fire will therefore count as unlimited fire runes; High Level Alchemy, which normally requires five fire runes and one nature rune per cast, will only require one nature rune with a staff of fire equipped. The Tome of Frost also provides unlimited water runes when wielded, however, unlike the staves, it is wielded in the shield slot.

In addition, members have access to combination runes created through the Runecrafting skill. Combination runes act as two different elemental runes at once; one dust rune counts as both an earth rune and an air rune for the purpose of spells that require both of these runes, such as Crumble Undead. There are three elemental staves based on combination runes: the mud battlestaff (which provides unlimited water and earth runes), the lava battlestaff (which provides unlimited earth and fire runes), and the steam battlestaff (which provides unlimited water and fire runes).

Spells
Main article: List of spells

The spells of RuneScape are divided into three separate spellbooks. In order to cast a spell, its spellbook must be active.

Standard spells
The only spellbook available to free players, the standard spellbook contains a well-rounded mix of combat and noncombat spells. Additionally, it is the only spellbook to contain enchantment spells, stat-lowering spells known as curses, and teleother spells. The standard spellbook is unlocked by default for all players and can be accessed from level 1 Magic. It is worth noting that some of the combat spells in the standard spellbook allow for unusually high hits for their level; for example, Fire Strike, requiring 13 Magic, can deal up to 80 points of damage. Iban Blast, requiring 50 Magic, can hit up to 250, though there are a few requirements for using the spell. The strongest combat spell in the standard spellbook, at level 95 Magic, is Fire Surge, which can hit up to 280 points of damage.

Ancient Magicks
Unlocked after the completion of the quest Desert Treasure, the Ancient Magicks spellbook is heavily focused on combat spells, though it also includes a handful of teleports. All Ancient Magicks combat spells have side effects in addition to dealing damage: They can poison targets, lower targets' Attack levels, heal the caster, freeze the targets in place, or halve the target's melee and ranged attack speeds. Additionally, some Ancient Magicks spells can hit multiple targets at once, and can now hit many more than nine targets per attack[source needed]. The Ancient Magicks teleports lead to a limited variety of locations across Misthalin, Morytania and the Wilderness. At least 50 Magic is required to complete Desert Treasure and use the Ancient Magicks spellbook, but the experience reward is enough to go from 50 Magic to 51. The strongest combat spell in the spellbook is Miasmic Barrage, which requires 97 Magic and can hit up to 320 points of damage against multiple targets (for a theoretical maximum hit of 2,880 damage, if 9 people are hit).

Lunar spells
In contrast to Ancient Magicks, the Lunar spellbook focuses on non-combat spells, many of which provide unique benefits not otherwise available, and all of which use astral runes. The Lunar spellbook is unlocked after completing the quest Lunar Diplomacy; an additional seven spells are unlocked after subsequently completing Dream Mentor; and eight more spells are available as rewards from the Livid Farm activity. The Lunar spellbook is notable for containing spells that allow players to aid other players in different ways, including curing poison, sharing stat-enhancing potions, group teleportation, restoring life points, and even assisting yourself or other players in combat. The Lunar spellbook also contains Spellbook Swap, which enables the caster to cast a single spell from either the standard or Ancient Magicks spellbooks, allowing for even greater versatility. Spellbook Swap has the highest requirement of the Lunar spells at 96 Magic.

Alphan spells
After completing the Alphans' Quest members can use alphan spells, which require a very high magic level and can only be used if a player choses to keep leveling his magic up to 120, instead of changing to an elemental magic skill. The Alphan spellbook is newly released with RS3 and focuses more on combat spells.

Combat spells
Combat spells are used to deal damage to, or hinder, opponents in combat. The maximum hit of combat spells are determined by two factors: The spell being cast and whether any damage-boosting modifiers are in effect. Magic damage can be boosted by equipping certain items or by temporarily boosting the Magic skill. Each point by which Magic is boosted increases the maximum hit of spells by 3%. Therefore, a magic potion, which temporarily increases the Magic skill by 5 levels, would initially give a +15% bonus to damage, although this decreases as the boost wears off.

The accuracy of a combat spell is determined by a number of factors, including: The Defence skill plays a role in Magic combat: Defence against spells is measured as 30% of the target's Defence level and 70% of their Magic level.
 * The caster's Magic level;
 * The caster's bonus to Magic attack;
 * The target's Magic and Defence levels;
 * The target's bonus to Magic defence;
 * Any Magic- or Defence-enhancing Prayers the caster and target might have active.

If a spell completely misses its target, it will "splash" and have no effect. Its runes are still consumed, however. Note that it is also possible for a combat spell to hit its target but deal 0 damage; this is technically different from a splash, but has the same effect.

When casting a combat spell that deals damage, experience is awarded for casting the spell itself. Additional experience is based on damage dealt, at a rate of 0.2 Magic experience per point of damage (as well as 0.133 Constitution experience). If defensive casting is enabled in the Magic interface, the experience rate is 1.333 Magic experience and 1 Defence experience per 10 damage, along with 1.333 Constitution experience per damage point.

Curse spells
Some spells from the standard and the Ancient Magicks spellbooks are classified as curses, and have the ability to drain the target's Attack, Strength or Defence by a certain amount. The drain is not cumulative; Vulnerability, for example, which reduces the target's Defence by 10%, can only be successfully cast once on a certain target. All curse spells require the use of either body runes, in the case of low-level curses, or soul runes for higher-leveled spells.

Teleportation spells
Teleportation spells are used to instantly transport players to a certain area. For example, when cast, Falador Teleport immediately transports the caster to the centre of Falador, next to the Saradomin statue. Nearly all teleportation spells require at least one law rune, among other runes.

All spellbooks contain teleportation spells. However, the standard spellbook contains Teleother spells, beginning with Teleother Lumbridge at 74 Magic. Teleother spells allow the caster to teleport another player to another area, assuming that player consents and has Accept Aid on. The Lunar spellbook has Tele Group spells, starting with Tele Group Moonclan at 70 Magic, which will teleport the caster and any other players within a 3x3 square area of the caster to another area. The Home Teleport spell is a unique teleport that does not require any runes and does not have a level requirement. It takes around 10 seconds to cast, so it is interruptible by combat. Due to a hidden update on March 28, 2011, the waiting time of 30 minutes between casts has been eliminated. Each spellbook has a Home Teleport spell, with different destinations according to the spellbook. Lumbridge Home Teleport from the standard spellbook leads to Lumbridge, Edgeville Home Teleport from the Ancient Magicks spellbook leads to Edgeville, Lunar Home Teleport from the Lunar spellbook leads to Lunar Isle. A similar spell exists in the Dungeoneering spellbook which teleports the caster to the smuggler.

Note that teleportation can be blocked by use of the Teleport Block spell, or being past level 20 in the Wilderness, except with an Amulet of Glory, which is to level 30 in the Wilderness.

Enchantment spells
Unique to the standard spellbook, enchantment spells are used to imbue certain items, such as jewellery and crossbow bolts, with magical properties. For example, Enchant Level 3 Jewellery is used to turn a ruby amulet into an amulet of strength. Enchantment spells make use of cosmic runes along with other runes.

Alchemy spells
Through alchemy spells, items are converted into coins. Two of the game's few alchemy spells are Low Level Alchemy and the much more popular High Level Alchemy. (Superheat Item could also be described as an alchemy spell, although it is used to smelt ores into bars without a furnace.) Alchemy spells use nature runes.

Miscellaneous spells
Many spells, particularly from the Lunar spellbook, have unique effects that do not fit into any other category. Some of these effects are otherwise unavailable. A few examples:
 * NPC Contact allows the caster to telepathically communicate with a variety of NPCs
 * Humidify instantly fills all water-carrying containers (such as buckets and vials) in the caster's inventory with water, as well as turning clay into soft clay
 * Stat Spy and Monster Examine allow the caster to view another player's skill levels or information about a monster, respectively.

Weapons
Magic users often use staves in order to augment their spellcasting. Some staves, such as the basic staff, simply give small bonuses to Magic attack. Some, however, provide powerful or unique bonus effects. Some examples: A number of high-end staves give a +10% bonus to Magic damage when equipped. These are Ahrim's staff, the ancient staff, the master wand, the Void knight mace, Zuriel's staff and the corrupt Zuriel's staff.
 * Elemental staves, as mentioned, provide unlimited amounts of certain elemental runes
 * The slayer staff, which requires 50 Magic and 55 Slayer, allows the casting of Magic Dart
 * God staves (including the Saradomin staff, Guthix staff and Zamorak staff) allow the casting of the Mage Arena spells Saradomin Strike, Claws of Guthix, and Flames of Zamorak, respectively
 * Ahrim's staff is part of Ahrim the Blighted's set of Barrows equipment, and when used with the rest of the set, may lower the target's Strength by 5 points on a successful hit
 * The staff of light provides a +15% bonus to Magic damage, has a 1/8 chance of negating the rune cost of a spell, and can be used to cast Magic Dart.
 * The Chaotic staff has a +20% Magic Damage bonus and +18 magic bonus. It requires 80 Magic, and 80 Dungeoneering. This provides the highest Magic damage bonus in the game

Armour
Generally, various magical robes are the Magic user's armour of choice. Contrary to the combat triangle, Magic robes do not usually give defensive bonuses against melee attacks; Ahrim's and Zuriel's robes are the biggest exception to this. Rather, Magic robes give bonuses to both Magic attack and defence.

Some mages may instead choose to use Void Knight equipment, particularly with the Void mage helm, as the set bonus grants a +30% boost to overall Magic accuracy. At high Magic levels this can result in a significant bonus to accuracy.

Temporary Magic boosting items
Some items grant temporary boosts to the Magic skill. A boosted Magic skill does allow for casting of higher-level spells than normal. For example, a player with 90 Magic who drinks a dose of magic potion will be able to cast Vengeance Other, which requires 93 Magic. For every boosted level, the magic damage is boosted by 3%.

Activating a Vecna skull can only be done once every 7 minutes.