Glitch

A glitch - also known as a bug in this context - is a flaw/unintended effect within a game. has seen many glitches; here is a page where they are documented.

Fast magic spell casting
It was possible to cast spells very quickly before a timer was introduced.

Fatigue glitch
A flaw during server maintenance caused all beds and sleeping bags to not work in all non-veteran servers. It was fixed shortly before the second reopening.

Guthix Claw glitch
When a player was killed in the wilderness by the Claws of Guthix spell. The spell animation would continue to play on the spot the player died. Which resulted in an impassable object, either trapping players in places such as the Mage Arena or making it impossible to enter deeper wilderness that was behind a gate or web.

Low level players able to attack high level players in Wilderness
An update on the day the wilderness was released fixed a problem where low level players were able to attack high level players (presumably with ranged or magic) without them being able to fight back.

Max items locking out accounts
Players who gained over the maximum 32-bit integer limit (2,147,483,647) of any item would be disconnected from the game and unable to login. Anyone who deposited over said limit into the bank found themselves unable to open their banks as they would immediately disconnect. It was finally patched on 16 February 2015. Any coins deposited over the limit now simply vanishes.

Mod crowns in chat
Players were able to make moderator crowns appear in public chat after they were added before a reopening. After some time, this was fixed.

Packet construction glitches
With the use of packet construction through AutoRune, a cheating client active at the time, not only were items created and duplicated, but people could also:
 * Attack and kill themselves in the Wilderness
 * Make themselves invisible at the Make over mage
 * Attack any non-player character
 * Cast Spells without runes or a target

Strange player names
Players have been spotted with no name.

Super strength beer cheat
For the first month of Classic it was possible to raise the player's Strength to abnormally high levels using beer. See the update 'Super strength Beer cheat' fixed. It is still possible to decrease levels abnormally low using various types of alcohol; see wining.

Bearded lady bug

 * There are several versions of this bug. The first was to equip a Rune Plate Mail Body as a bearded man, then change the item into a Rune Plate Mail top. The second was through the use of AutoRune, a modified client, or a generic packet editor. This is notable for being known by Jagex for a very long time but never fixed, perhaps putting it into a grey area of acceptance as part of the game.

"Black hole" bug

 * Not to be confused with the original Black Hole.

In certain areas of the game it's possible to go up ladders from certain positions and the player will land outside of the upstairs walls, allowing them to walk around in the infinite blackness and look at other upstairs buildings. They will eventually reach an invisible wall. The only way to get out is to already have a teleport or to bring another account there and to give you runes to teleport or kill you in a duel.

Book of binding bug
The bug is produced after not wanting the enchantment done from the confirmation menu. Clicking on any of the option produces the enchantment on the empty vials, draining the player's magic and prayer points. If player does not want to get the enchantment is best to click out of the menu.

Bring Scythes into Entrana
Normally, Entrana disallows armour and weapons into the island. However, an oversight allowed the scythe to not be considered a weapon, thus making the Lost City quest slightly easier.

Death bug
The death bug is a humorous, but useless glitch in which a player dies from poison while interacting with an NPC/Object. If timed correctly, the player would die and the options to continue an interaction/conversation would persist. Known effects include:
 * Forced teleportation
 * Bank in wrong location
 * Complete Quests in wrong locations
 * Store interface at wrong location
 * Clone certain NPC's

Fatigue training

 * Because of an oversight in the way the fatigue system works, it is possible to gain experience in melee skills without gaining Hits experience through fatigue training.

Gnome ball smuggle
An oversight in which Gnome Balls could be taken out of the minigame. Methods include:
 * Telegrab
 * Teleport
 * Shoot

Infinite zombie spawn

 * Normally, a Necromancer would only spawn 7 zombies. But if a player kills the second Necromancer without killing the spawns, then the first Necromancer will be able to summon 7 more until the player stops doing so.

Menu crashing bug

 * A flaw in which if an entity is interacted with (examining, attacking, etc) after it is removed, the game crashes. This is caused by the rewrite of the action system in 2009-2011, and can make PKing much more risky as players go up and down ladders, teleport, and log out.

Minor glitches

 * Merlin stays trapped in the giant crystal even after the Merlin's Crystal. However, there is no per-player instancing in, so this is simply a result of how the game works.
 * Sinclair Mansion roof stays hidden even when player is outside the mansion between hedgesTutorial island5.png
 * If players stand directly besides a longtable, their character will visually clip through the table.
 * The game contains too many spelling errors to list.
 * Certain NPCs such as the men and guards near the Fight Arena and Sinclair Mansion can be pickpocketed despite lacking said option through packet construction or editing. When killed as a result of aggressiveness from failing to pickpocket, them they drop only bones.
 * Experience is sometimes spontaneously rewarded to players when moving to certain areas. Usually combat.
 * False (and old) death message is displayed even though player has not diedOld Death Message Bug.png
 * A trade screen appears out of nowhere and player is shown to be trading with null
 * The crystal chest can get stuck open if used incorrectly, making it unusable for other players until a server reboot.
 * Non-player characters can respawn and have text above their heads that was said by other NPCs.
 * Players inside impassable objects. Can be caused by an object spawning or if a player descends or ascends into an object. Players however, do not become stuck and are free to move out of the object.


 * Actions involving heavy clicking sometimes mess up, causing the game to not respond along with the following:
 * Add random names to friends/ignore list
 * Turn prayers on/off
 * Disconnect
 * Move to random squares
 * Drop random items
 * Shows the makeover mage interface (won't actually allow you to edit character)

Monsters stealing dialogue
It occurs when you attack a monster and then flee to talk to a nearby NPC. If you are still in dialogue with the NPC when the monster initiates combat against you it will take over the dialogue of the NPC. NPC dialogue options are still available and the monster will speak to you as if they were the NPC.

Negative XP bug
The negative XP bug should not exist for legitimate player. Theoretically the maximum experience for a skill is 536,870,911. However, unlike and the successors, in, it is not capped. As a result should a player continue to gain experience after the maximum point, they will gain experience but from the overflowed (negative) number.

NPC duplicate glitch

 * A glitch occurs where multiple copies of an NPC are spawned. An as of yet inconclusive list of examples include some of the Knights of the Round Table found in Camelot, the evil knight Sir Mordred in Keep LeFaye, Kolodion at the Mage Arena safe spot, as well as the shapeshifter from the Witch's House quest. The bug exists all worlds and it is not always clear if it is caused by a player or by the system.Packed Witch shed.png
 * The NPC duplication glitch will occur during the Witch's House if while fighting the shapeshifter the player flees during combat. Repeating this will quickly start to fill the shack. The duplicated monsters will stay in the shack for around one hour before despawning.
 * The NPC duplication glitch is simple to recreate unintentionally in the case of Thrantax- a demon summoned during the course of the Merlin's Crystal quest. After summoning the demon and spawning an NPC, the player is given dialogue choices. However if they click out of the dialogue the demon will remain- but will not be able to be attacked. This allows for the player to repeatedly drop bat bones, creating a teleport animation and new NPC to appear for each time the bones are dropped. This does not consume the bat bones. In testing, up to 64 demons were able to be spawned before new NPC's ceased to be created.

Thrantax in later versions of

 * In later versions of, it is also possible to continue summoning Thrantax, although he appears as a ghost in both and , and he is not duplicated in the process of dropping bat bones repeatedly.
 * This is not to be confused with there being multiple quest NPCs such as King Narnode Shareen. As this is intentional, to allow more than one player to interact with him.

null players
When there are a large number of players on screen, there were a number of issues that could occur: Chat messages/characters not appearing, player not being able to move, and right clicking will reveal a "player" named null (not to be confused with the actual player with the name Null) with a combat level of --1.

Players who run into this situation need to hop to a different server to log in to move their character.

Removing objects with Charge
By casting the charge spell while standing on the root position of a piece of scenery (its cyan dot on the mini-map), it is possible to remove the object. This can be done with signs, ferns, doors which take up more than one tile, and probably some other objects. This can be fixed by logging out and logging back in to make the object appear again.

Throwing darts
If you pick up throwing darts while having some still equipped they will form another stack of darts.

Unattackable players in the wilderness

 * When using a specially crafted 3rd-party client players can send duel requests in the wild. This allows players to fight other players not within their combat level in the wild.
 * When dueling in the wilderness a player can cast magic spells on players not in the duel. This was typically done using tank mages. Players could duel a friend on another account and cast god spells on other players in the wild leaving the player not in the duel helpless.

Water world glitch
Occasionally, logging into will cause the game to load with all the ground tiles replaced with water tiles. This is rather rare, and seems to be especially prone to happening when connecting with a slow/unreliable internet connection. It is impossible to move around normally, as clicking on any water tile does not result in motion to that tile. Instead, the player may only move by interacting with non-ground objects, such as trees or NPCs. It is possible to train skills while this glitch is active, provided that the player can access the areas needed to train the skill. The glitch seems to last until the player logs out.

Minor bugs mentioned in updates
On 10 May 2001, these bugs were fixed:
 * Fixed 'using ranged combat advances other skills too' bug
 * Fixed 'impossible to mine gems' bug
 * Fixed 'pottery menu wrong way around' bug
 * Fixed 'server sometimes sends wrong error message on login' bug
 * Fixed 'friends list gets blanked on lost connection' bug

On 12 June 2001, there was another bug fix update:
 * Fixed making cake takes flour pot away bug
 * Fixed catching tuna doesn't give XP bug
 * Fixed food shop doesn't work after completing pirate quest bug

An update on 23 June 2001 fixed the following bugs:
 * fixed it so you can still stack extra runes/arrows even when your inventory is full.
 * fixed a bug which could cause stack of 0 coins to be created
 * fixed a bug with arrows of different types not stacking on the ground properly
 * fixed it so that leaving the bank displays your balance properly
 * logging out now works properly when you log out at the exact moment of attack
 * fixed it so people no longer randomly get added to your friends list
 * fixed it so lumbridge and karamja shops don't share the same stock!

On 18 August 2001, an update fixed a problem with the system that decided which player gets loot from a monster.

Another round of bugs were fixed on 10 July 2002:
 * Bug where you could teleport from the high level wilderness dungeon is fixed.
 * Bug where iron arrows were usable on the free servers is fixed.
 * Bug where you could get a skull for retaliating to a ranged attack is fixed.
 * Bug where shadow spiders prevented potions from running out is fixed.
 * Bug where arrows did not stack correctly, if multiple players shot the same target is fixed.
 * Bug where recovery questions were occasionally reported as 'not set' is fixed.
 * Bug where attacking another player immediately after a retreat caused a glitch is fixed.
 * Bug where player occasionally ran in random direction after ranged kill is fixed.