OSRS Herblore Guide
What's going on guys, my name's Theoatrix and welcome to my updated level 1-99 Herblore guide.
GUIDE OUTLINE
In this guide, I'll cover the basics of the Herblore skill, how to start off training, and all of the information you'll need to know to reach level 99.
If you'd prefer to watch a video version of this guide, you can watch that below. Otherwise you can continue down the page to read the written guide.
Why Train Herblore?
So why should you train your Herblore? Herblore is a fast, buyable 99, and takes as little as 35 hours to get to 99 using the fastest pathway that I'm showing. For Ironmen, Herblore is used to obtain essential potions like prayer and combat potions. Although, Ironmen gather Herblore supplies themselves, making it a slow 99.
A number of essential quests have a Herblore level requirement, like the Dig Site, Legends Quest, and Song of the Elves. Level 70 Herblore is required to get the Quest Cape, and 90 Herblore is required for the Achievement Diary Cape.
Also, you need 78 Herblore to make the best brews and restores within the Chambers of Xeric, and level 90 Herblore is required to make all of the potions within the Chambers.
Herblore Basics
To access the Herblore skill, you need to have completed the Druidic Ritual quest, which is a short easy quest with no requirements. You just need these 4 types of raw meats, then the quest is all within Taverly.
There are 5 different ways to gain Herblore XP in Old School. Cleaning a grimy herb gives a small amount of experience. After Barbarian Training, you can make Barbarian Mixes. You can create Herbal Tars with Swamp Tar and Clean Herbs. After the Song of the Elves, you can make Divine Potions with Crystal Dust. However, most of your Herblore training will be done by making Standard Potions.
Making Potions
To create a potion, you use an unfinished herbal potion on a secondary ingredient. For most potions, you can buy these unfinished herbal potions and secondary ingredients right off the Grand Exchange. So to train Herblore, you buy a lot of supplies, then stand near a bank and repeatedly make potions to gain Herblore XP. When making potions on PC, you should go to your in-game settings and type in key binds.
Then you can set the escape button to close your current interface. In your bank, you can set the left click x quantity to 14, so then to make potions, you click once on each ingredient in the bank, press escape to close, use one on the other, then press the spacebar to make them all. Making 14 potions takes 17 seconds. Then you click back on the bank, deposit all and repeat. When it comes down to deciding which potion you should use to level up, it really comes down to the Grand Exchange prices.
In this guide, I'm showing you the best methods at the current Grand Exchange prices. If you're reading this guide a while after its release, I strongly suggest using a GPXP calculator because the price of Herblore changes a lot. I've linked a range of calculators down in the description. While training Herblore, there are two important items that you should be taking advantage of.
Useful Items
The Amulet of Chemistry cuts down the cost of your Herblore training. When wearing the amulet, there's a 5% chance that you'll get an extra dose when making a potion, which is very beneficial when you're making potions that cost a lot of money. The amulet has 5 charges, so each charge costs 200 coins approximately. So 200 coins are consumed to give you an extra dose of potion. So this means for any potion where one dose is worth more than 200 coins, you'll be making a profit.
Botanical Pies are the other important item when it comes to Herblore training. Botanical Pies are currently 1.5k on the Grand Exchange, and taking a bite boosts your Herblore level by 4 temporarily. With that, you can gain access to training methods that you're yet to unlock. For example, at 34 Herblore, you can train with Prayer Potions, 4 levels early.
When using Botanical Pies, you should be using the Preserve Prayer with your Best Prayer Bonus gear equipped to prolong your prayer points.
Pathways to 99
In this guide, I'll be showing 3 pathways to 99. The first is the cheapest of the 3, and it costs 35mil and takes around 60 hours. The second is a fast and cheap pathway, costing 50mil and taking 45 hours. The fastest pathway takes only 35 hours but costs 105mil. These costs are calculated after selling the potions back to the Grand Exchange. The actual supplies will cost a lot more, but you'll get some money back after selling the potions. I'll also show some profitable methods after these pathways, which you can do to switch up your training.
Cheapest Pathway
So on the cheapest pathway, you'll start off making Attack Potions until 26, then Energy Potions, then Prayer Potions, with Amulets of Chemistry, all the way to level 99. With Prayer Potions, you'll be getting around 215k XP per hour.
Fast & Cheap
On the fast and cheap pathway, you'll be starting out the same way as the previous pathway until level 52, where you start making Super Energy Potions with the Amulet of Chemistry. Once you reach level 90, you start making Super Combat Potions, which give around 320k XP per hour, and these are made differently to regular potions. There's 4 ingredients for Super Combats, so you withdraw 7 of each ingredient and make 7 potions per inventory.
Fastest Pathway
On the fastest pathway, you could make every potion as you unlock them for the fastest XP, but you'll be spending over 300mil to get to 99. So these are the fastest while still being cost-effective. You start with Attack Potions, then Strength Potions at level 12, then you work your way up making regular potions up until you reach level 77, and this is where you can start 1 ticking potions.
1 ticking works when you have stackable ingredients. You use the ingredients on each other every game tick while holding down the space bar. Once you get the hang of it, you can make a potion every game tick, which gives really high XP rates.
If 1 ticking isn't for you, you can make Saradomin Brews with an Amulet of Chemistry at 81 instead, and Brews are the fastest, most cost-effective training method without tick manipulation.
Profitable Methods
Now let's go over the profitable training methods. At level 18, you can start making Guthix Rests, which are mostly used for PKing. Making these nets you around 500k GP per hour, while giving around 50k XP per hour in Herblore. Overall, they're a good option for players with not a lot of money, looking to train their early Herblore levels.
Cleaning Grimy Herbs is another profitable Herblore method, although it's very click-intensive. It involves buying Grimy Herbs off the Grand Exchange and selling them back for higher value in it's clean form. It's a great way for low levels to train Herblore without spending any money. At level 25, you can clean Ranars, and these give 200k GP per hour, while netting 75k XP per hour. If you want to see up to date profit rates for cleaning herbs, I've linked a calculator down below.
Unfinished Potions are another solid Herblore money maker, and this involves using a clean herb on a vial of water. You don't gain any experience from making them, but they provide some of the best profit rates for Herblore. At 30 Herblore, you can make Unfinished Ranar Potions for over 600k GP per hour. At 63, Unfinished Snapdragon Potions make over 700k GP per hour. The prices of Herbs and Unfinished Potions can change quite a bit over time, so if you want to see updated prices, I've linked a calculator down below.
After Song of the Elves, you can start collecting Crystal Shards from a range of activities. With those Shards, you can crush them to make Crystal Dust, which is used to make Divine Potions. Making Divine Super Combat Potions is currently the best way to use your Shards for profit.
Each Shard is worth around 12k when you make Super Combats, and you get a small amount of Herblore XP for each one you make.
Ironman Tips
As an Ironman, Herblore is perhaps the slowest skill to train, since obtaining Herbs and secondary ingredients takes time.
There's a range of ways to collect Herbs, and the majority comes from Herb runs and Miscellania. To get started training Herblore as an Ironman, you can buy Vial of Water packs from a variety of general stores, and an easy one is near the Ardy Zoo. You can buy Eye of Newt packs from Jatix in Taverly, or Betty in Port Sarim. Then you can use Guams, mix them into Unfinished Potions, and create Attack Potions. Eyes of Newt are an easy secondary to obtain, but with other potions, you'll need to collect the secondaries more slowly.
At higher levels, the Hard Desert Diary allows you to mix bulk Unfinished Potions, which saves a lot of time as an Ironman. As an Ultimate Ironman, you should make potions in the southwestern area of the Grand Exchange. Here, you can mix your potions at the bank, and then you can note the potions by talking to Bob Barter nearby. In the future, I'll be making a Herblore guide for Ironmen, so keep your eyes peeled for that.
Outro
So that's my updated level 1-99 Herblore guide.
If you want to jump to a certain section of the guide, all of the timestamps are linked in the description below.
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Thanks for reading.