See Magic damage for a full list of combat spells as well as their actual max hits.

Combat spells are used to by its casters, mostly in battle, for their offensive capabilities. This type of magic can be separated into two sub types. One type of spells give specific elemental damage (Elemental spells, that are often used against monsters with a specific weakness to these elements. The other kind, Curse spells, has different effects and are not mainly used to cause damage, but to make dealing damage easier or safer for the mage casting these curse spells. For example: by lowering the target's (combat) stats, binding the target in place preventing it from moving, curing people of poison.

Elemental spellsEdit

Main article: Elemental spells

Generally, most Elemental spells use some Air runes in combination with some other "Combat" runes, though there are exceptions with the special spells such as Magic Dart. All Elemental spells result in a spell related amount of experience when cast, but also give experience depending on the amount of damage caused to the opponent. Each damage point caused by a combat spell yields 0.2 magic experience points and 0.133 Constitution experience points.

Elemental spells spells will occasionally splash upon contact with a target (i.e. they will do no damage). When splashing, the caster will receive only the base experience for that spell and no additional experience. As a result, there is no physical difference between splashing with a spell and hitting a 0 with the same spell. The splash rate depends on six things:

• The caster's Magic level
• The Magic attack bonus of the equipment the caster is wearing
• Any Magic prayers the caster has activated.
• The target's Magic level if NPC, Magic and Defence levels if player*
• The Magic defence bonus of the equipment the target is wearing
• Any Magic prayers the target has activated (including Protect from Magic)

* In this case, the player's Magic level accounts for 70% of their magical defence, and their Defence level for 30%.

Stronger spells can do greater damage. To maximise accuracy, especially in training and player killing, players are advised to equip magic boosting equipment, unequip magic lowering equipment and drink Wizard's mind bomb or using the Vecna skull.

Some monsters are more vulnerable to certain elemental spells. For an example, most TzHaar or TokHaar are generally more vulnerable to Water Spells.

Curse spells Edit

Main article: Curse spells

Curse spells (or Curses) are a subclass of Combat spells in the arts of Magic and are mainly used to cause a negative effect to the caster's target other than damage. Curses are an underused part of Magic, mainly because spellcasters have little time to waste on casting non-combat spells. In prolonged fights, using a curse spell or two at the beginning may be a good idea. Curses also are useful when competing for a monster respawn, as the curse immediately engages the monster. Curse spells can only be used again on the same target once the first spell wore off, unless the curse 'splashes' and does not affect the opponent.