Calcified Rocks is a brand new mining activity exclusive to the mines of Cam Torum as part of the Varlamore expansion.
These rocks are very AFK and super good for ironmen builds as they offer an interesting way to gather passive prayer experience.
Follow my quick guide below (video) or continue reading!
Comparison with existing AFK methods
Calcified Rocks falls in between Motherlode Mine and Shooting Stars in terms of AFK-time.
Mining them feels similar to mining at the Motherlode Mine, just imagine the Motherlode Mine didn’t require running to a hopper, or visiting a bank!
Not having to run to a hopper sounds pretty cool right? Better yet, each ore vein lasts about 80 seconds, which is more than double the veins at the Motherlode Mine (40 seconds).
However, this doesn’t make MLM obsolete, as you won’t get any ores at Calcified Rocks (you get Blessed Boneshards, which I’ll get to in a bit).
So if it’s ores or money you’re after, Motherlode Mine is still the better choice.
But if you want a lower-effort method or passive prayer experience, Calcified rocks is the better choice!
P.S. Motherlode Mine and Calcified Rocks have almost identical exp rates.
Here are the exp rates from my tests on 3 accounts.
You can expect to gain between 30-50k exp per hour between levels 70-99, equal to MLM, and better than the exp rates at Shooting Stars.
However, Shooting Stars are still lower-effort (7 minutes vs 80 seconds) and thus will likely continue to be ‘meta’ for AFK mining.
Blessed Boneshards = Passive Prayer Exp!
With each successful mine, you’ll gain a couple of Blessed Boneshards, an untradeable item that’s used in Varlamore’s prayer activity.
At the Ralos’ Rise prayer altar, each boneshard can yield 5 prayer exp. Since you can expect to get between 1800-2700 boneshards per hour, this can result in between 10-15k passive prayer experience per hour spent mining.
This unlocks a very interesting passive prayer training method for ironmen, but also main accounts with limited funds.
What you need
Mining Calcified Rocks requires 41 mining, and access to the the city of Cam Torum.
To access the city, you’ll have to START the ‘Perilous Moons’ quest.
Obviously, you’ll also need to complete the quest ‘Children of the Sun’ which unlocks Varlamore, and ‘Twilights’ Promise’ which unlocks the Varlamore Transportation network.
Getting there
To get to the Cam Torum mines, travel to Varlamore first, and then take the Quetzal Transportation network to ‘Cam Torum’.
If you haven’t unlocked the Cam Torum landing spot yet, you’ll have to travel to Teomat instead and walk South.
Alternatively, you can also use ‘Calcified Moths’ to teleport directly to Cam Torum. These can be purchased from the Grand Exchange.
How it works
Mining Calcified Rocks is as simple as clicking on the rock and waiting for it to deplete.
There’s almost nothing else to it!
Every so often, you might notice water trickling down, which gives you a very slight exp boost, before depleting the rock.
Since this does very little to your exp/hr, I tend to ignore it.
You’ll receive boneshards which stack in your inventory so you won’t even need to bank.
Every so often, you’ll also gain ‘Calcified Deposits’ which can be broken down at an anvil for more boneshards and a chance to obtain Calcified Moths.
If you don’t drop these, you’ll need to bank every 1-2 hours.
Passive Prayer Training
Varlamore’s mining activity (which rewards boneshards) goes hand in hand with Varlamores prayer activity (which requires boneshards).
For more info on how that works, I recommend you check out my Varlamore Prayer Guide.
I expect this method to become especially ‘meta’ for ironmen looking to push past 70+ Prayer via passive mining.
