Melee

The RuneScape Wiki also has an article on: rsw:MeleeThe Old School RuneScape Wiki also has an article on: osrsw:Melee

Melee is a method of attack that refers to hand-to-hand combat but is usually performed with a melee weapon such as a sword. Aside from ranged and magic, melee is the most common form of attack in RuneScape Classic. Melee does not include long-range attacks like ranged and magic.

Melee combat is made up of four attack styles - Controlled, Attack, Strength and Defense options. Melee experience is received based on the attack style that a player has selected at the end of battle. Upon attacking a monster, players are able to choose their attack style. When the monster is killed, the player receives experience towards the respective skill that their attack style is set on. The experience is divided into 4 parts, 1 of which goes to the Hits skill, the remaining three into the attack style chosen. If the player chooses the Controlled attack style, they will receive 1/4 of the experience in all of the combat skills including Hits.

Using a melee weapon, players inflict damage on monsters or other players when in combat. Types of melee weapons include daggers, maces, Short Swords, longswords, scimitars, spears, Battle Axes and 2-handed swords. The 2-handed sword is often the most popular melee weapon choice among players, up until level 60 Attack as it has the highest weapon bonuses in comparison to any other type of weapon. At level 60 Attack, the dragon longsword and dragon battleaxe are powerful weapons that players often choose to use as there is no dragon 2-hander available in RuneScape Classic.

Combat Formulae

The melee combat formulae are very close to their RuneScape 2 counterparts, with the most significant difference being in how damage rolls are calculated.

For all 3 melee related stats, the formula for their associated values is:

$(floor(currentStat*prayerBonus)+bonusConstant+styleBonus)*(equipmentStat+64)$

Where:

$currentStat$ is the current level of the associated stat.

$prayerBonus$ is 1.0, 1.05, 1.1, or 1.15, depending on the prayer used associated with the stat.

$bonusConstant$ is 8 for players and 0 for NPCs.

$styleBonus$ is +3 if you are using the style associated with the stat (Accurate for Attack, Aggressive for Strength, and Defensive for Defense), +1 if you are using Controlled, 0 otherwise. NPCs have a style bonus of 0.

$equipmentStat$ is the equipment stat associated with the melee stat (WeaponAim for Attack, WeaponPower for Strength, and Armour for Defense). NPCs have equipment stats of 0.

Accuracy

For an accuracy check, calculate both $atkRoll$ and $defRoll$ for Attack and Defense respectively using the formula above. Then, use the following formula to calculate accuracy:

If atkRoll > defRoll:

${Accuracy}=1-{\frac {({defRoll}+2)}{2*({atkRoll}+1)}}$

Else

${Accuracy}={\frac {atkRoll}{2*({defRoll}+1)}}$

Damage

To calculate your max hit, calculate $maxRoll$ for Strength using the formula above. Then, use the following formula to calculate max hit:

${maxHit}=(maxRoll+320)/640$

The calculation for how much damage is done in a given turn is:

${Damage}=floor((random(maxRoll)+320)/640)$

Where the result of the random function is a number between 0 and $maxRoll$.

This calculation is different from RuneScape 2 in that the addition of 320, division by 640, and subsequent flooring are performed after a random number is picked, rather than before. The consequence of this is that damage is fractionally biased. This means that 0 damage rolls are less common, as it effectively makes the lower bound 0.5, and that your max hit is less common than other non-0 values as fewer values round down to your max hit. Other values are otherwise uniform, appearing as often as each other.