Poisoning
Contents
“A wise poison master never licks his fingers.”
Subtler than an impaling sword, poisoning food and drink has long been a method of choice for the discerning assassin. For those with a flair for the dramatic, poison can be applied to the blade of a weapon to swiftly bring an enemy to defeat in battle.
Along with the ability to poison weapons and food, higher levels of this skill improve the effectiveness of the Poison and Poison Field spells.
Poisoning takes the place of Tactics in determining the probability to perform poison Special Moves. However, you must have a weapon skill of at least 70 to activate primary move weapons and at least 90 to activate secondary move weapons. The item property of Mage Weapon does not act as a substitute for a weapon skill when it comes to special moves.
Previously, a weapon that had been poisoned could be used by anyone and would have a chance to poison a target with each hit.
One of the criticisms of the Poisoning skill is that nearly any use of a Greater Cure potion or Arch Cure spell in PvP combat would render a successful poisoning of a target useless. Poisoning remains very useful in PvM and roleplaying, however.
Training
Unlike most skills, there is no accelerated skillgain New Player Quest for poisoning. One no longer must train poisoning the old way in which many different targets had to be poisoned. Players may now poison the same weapon or food item again and again(Changed in Insert Correct Publish Here). Poisoning can be expensive and time-consuming to raise. One estimate is that reaching GM Poisoning requires about 80,000 Nightshade worth of various poisons.
The recommended type of poison to use for training is:
- 0 - 30: Train at an NPC Thief Guildmaster
- 30 - 40: Apply Lesser Poison
- 40 - 70: Apply Poison
- 70 - 92: Apply Greater Poison
- 92 - 100: Apply Deadly Poison
The skill ranges listed above also apply to the level of poison you may apply during the Infectious Strike/Serpent Arrow weapon skills. Using these abilities will also cause you to gain in poisoning (tested and confirmed). With each attempt to apply poison to a weapon or food item, there is a chance for the player to accidentally poison themself so having a few Cure potions on-hand is recommended, especially when first moving on to a higher level of poison.
For a power gaming technique to train this skill see the Satyr Trick.
Alchemy skill is required to produce poison from Nightshade. Many aspiring poisoners purchase poison by the keg-full from other players if they do not possess high levels of Alchemy.