Crossbows in Old School Runescape are the one-handed answer to bows. They’re more accurate and are stronger than bows. However, they reload slower. Fortunately, that’s mitigated by the ability to hold shields or prayer enhance books on the unoccupied hand. As with everything, there are pros and cons to using bows or crossbows. The choice ultimately rests on the player.
So you might’ve come across the Dragon Hunter Crossbow. You might be wondering ‘Why is it more expensive, despite being weaker than the Armadyl? Last year, it even reached a price of 173.6 million OSRS gold. Today, at the time of writing this article, it’s priced at about 98.3 million gold. That’s still a far cry from the Armadyl’s 25.4 million, and here’s why it is so.
Item Effects
What sets the Dragon Hunter Crossbow apart from others of its kind is its item effects. It gives a 30% increase in damage when fighting against dragons and similar enemies. That includes wyverns, the Great Olm in the Chambers of Xeric and other draconic creatures. The exceptions are Elvarg and revenant dragons.
This damage bonus stacks additively with the Void Knight set. The effects of an imbued Slayer Helm do as well, but multiplicatively instead. It’s a massive boon for anyone who is doing the slayer quests for dragons.
Farming Difficulty
Of course, the effects make it valuable, but another aspect to it is its rarity. The only way to get the dragonbane weapon outside of the Grand Exchange is as a reward for completing the Chambers of Xeric. Even then, it’s not a guaranteed reward. You’re likely to need to run the dungeon many times over just to get one.
There’s no telling how many runs you’ll need to do. That means you’re going to spend some of your hard-earned resources and gold. As such, you’ll have to weigh the expenses and the profits you can get before attempting to farm it.
Strength as a Weapon
With an attack range bonus of +95, it’s ranked as the second strongest crossbow used for dragon. That’s only five points away from Armadyl Crossbow‘s (the number one) +100. It’s a good weapon to fight with, and that’s not counting the additional accuracy and damage bonus to dragons. With the right build, you’ll be a veritable one-player-army (or at least close to it) in any dragon hunting situation. It will perform satisfactorily in other PvE situations, even if it’s too specialized.
Conclusion
Sure, there might be a better alternative to the Dragon Hunter Crossbow in the future. When that happens, its price can drop because players will presumably lose interest in it. Otherwise, if the demand for it increases with the current supply, prices can rise. However, these are the variable factors of the dragon crossbow’s price. We focused on the weapon slot items inherent characteristics that influence its value.
That’s that for the question of why the Dragon Hunter Crossbow is quite expensive. Its strength, rarity, and extra effects all contribute to its value. While not as effective in general PvE, it shines when you’re hunting dragons. In the end, it’s up to you whether you want this highly prized crossbow, or something else.
Have fun in Gielinor!
Players want to optimize their damage output when doing PvM so it’s a obvious pick for those that want to get more damage done against dragons while fighting against them using ranged.