Monster killing
Monster killing, also known as Player vs. Monster (PvM) or Player vs. Environment (PvE), is the aspect of killing monsters for the purposes of gaining experience, obtaining drops, or as part of a quest or minigame. PvM is contrasted with player killing (PvP) in the sense that monsters are entities controlled by the game itself.
Characteristics of monsters
The vast majority of monsters drop something once they die (most commonly bones, coins, and many other items).
Some monsters, particularly higher-levelled ones, are aggressive, meaning they attack on sight of a player (such as deadly red spiders). Monsters will no longer be aggressive to players with a combat level of one more than twice the level of the monster in question. However, there are certain monsters that will never become tolerant, such as Flesh Crawlers and Catablepon.
Monsters sometimes possess special abilities that may require the player to deal with, typically found in boss monsters and slayer monsters.
Incentives for monster-killing
Players fight monsters mainly to gain experience, loot, complete quests, or just for the fun of it. Players who fight monsters for experience usually turn on auto retaliate in order to deal more efficiently with monsters that immediately respawn. Bandits, a popular camping ground for member PvMers, are able to attack a player more than once with fellow bandits, so players can gain XP extremely quickly by employing a continuous method of attacking, killing, respawning, and repeating. In free-to-play worlds, the same steps apply, but in different places.
Some types of monsters require using one or more combat styles to kill, whether it be Magic, Ranged, or Melee. These monsters are good for training multiple skills at once.
Those who seek to effectively monster-kill for an extended period of time are known to be "grinding," a process in which a player stays at a certain location or set of spawn points to continuously gain quick XP in hopes of levelling up faster, known as power levelling.
Monsters vs. monsters
In monster vs. monster combat, two monsters engage in combat until one is killed. Although uncommonly seen, monster vs. monster combat can be observed in a few specific locations:
- Dwarf Cannon quest (goblins attacking dwarves)
- NPCs in the God Wars Dungeon and Wilderness God Wars Dungeon
- Goblins in Goblin Village
- 10th Squad fighting the Jungle Demon during Monkey Madness I
- Honour guards and ice trolls in the Fremennik Isles
- Cat NPCs in the Rat Pits (ex. Topsy and Mittens)
- Khazard troopers and gnomes in the Khazard Barman
- Cave lizards attacking Zamorakian NPCs in the Ourania Cave
- Shayzien soldiers fighting lizardmen in the Lizardman Canyon and battlefront
- Varrock guards fighting armoured zombies during Defender of Varrock
- NPCs during the Ardougne Revolution
- Gladiators in the Iorwerth district in Prifddinas
- Fighters in the Emir's Arena
- Soldiers fighting against dragons during Dragon Slayer II
- Demons in the Scar during Desert Treasure II - The Fallen Empire
- Elder Chaos druids fighting zombie pirates
Monster vs. monster combat is sometimes used to an advantage by players because if they deal at least one damage, they will get the drops even though the monster dealt more damage. This is somewhat common in the God Wars Dungeon.