Pest control is a safe mini-game in OSRS that involves travelling to an island by lander ship with other players and defending a Void Knight from an onslaught of various pests. The Void Knights are an order of the God Guthix and by defeating the pests and protecting the Void Knight you will help to restore order. One of the main reasons people do pest control is to unlock the Void Knight equipment, which gives accuracy/ damage bonus' to melee, ranged and mage skills depending on which helm is worn. You can buy the Void Knight equipment as well as other items and perks with the commendation points that are rewarded on successful completion of each game. Each game takes around 2-7 minutes on average, and can be faster or slower and with a higher or lower success rate depending on the team you happen to be fighting alongside at that time. The mini-game isn't particularly hard, and there aren't too many intricacies to it compared to other mini-games such as barbarian assault or barrows, it can just be laborious to play, especially if you just trying to get enough points for the Void Knight equipment. Whilst it's not the best way to train combat, some players could find it a welcome change to other training methods, especially as you can focus your commendation points on specific combat skills after the game.

The only requirement to take part and also to use the pest control mini-game teleport is to have a combat level of at least 40. Having a combat level of 40 will enable you to access the novice lander, which on successful completion of a pest control game will give you 3 points, the next combat level is 70 which will give access to the intermediate lander and award 4 points on successful completion, and finally with combat level of 100 you can access the veteran lander and receive 5 points on successful completion. Because a game requires between 5-25 players (the more the better) you should join the official world 344 to find players regularly waiting to play 24/7. Also some people will advertise unofficial worlds where supposedly more organised/ skilful players are playing and thus you have the potential to make more commendation points per hour.

When you select the lander you wish to join, wait for enough players to join and then you will leave for battle. Once you arrive it is important you keep consistently active to help your team, there is an activity bar and if it goes too low then you won't receive any points, even if your team is successful. The rules of the game are quite straight forward, firstly you must keep the Void Knight alive, he stands in the middle of the arena with steps up either side, some players decide to stand near him for the duration and attack pests that get close to him. It is possible to win the game by keeping him alive for 20 minutes although it's extremely rare games will last this long and the usual way to win is to destroy the 4 portals that spawn the pests, in addition every time you destroy a portal the Void Knight will receive 50 hitpoints. Ranging, magic and melee can all be effective. You can also contribute by repairing the barricades, this can be achieved by cutting trees and then using the logs along with a hammer on the damaged barricades, which will give 5 crafting xp per repair job, this is good if you wish to receive the benefits of the min-game, such as the Void Knight equipment without gaining combat experience. If you wish the safespot with ranged or magic there are also elevated outposts you can safely attack the pests from.

There are 7 pests in total each with a unique attack style and purpose, they are as follows: Brawler (attacks with melee, comes in combat levels ranging from 51 to 129 depending on lander, has the effect of blocking attacks, including range and magic and prevents the player from moving past it), Defiler (ranged, comes in combat levels ranging from 33 to 97, and can attack with ranged over walls), Ravager (melee, 36 to 106 combat levels, isn't aggressive but can attack gates and barricades, will hit hard if attacked), Shifter (melee, 36 to 105, can teleport, including between walls and is immune to poison), Spinner (melee, 37 to 92, can heal the portals, you should kill this pest before attacking the portals, if the portal is destroyed while a spinner is still active it will violently spin around and explode with a poisonous effect), Splatter (melee, 22 to 65, explodes when killed which will damage all nearby, pests and players, also will explode when it hits barricades or gates, damaging them) and the final pest is Torcher (magic, 33 to 92, can cast its spells over walls).

The portals all have a shield at the start of the game which prevents them from being damaged, the Void Knight will slowly deactivate the shield allowing you to damage them. The first shield will go down 15 seconds after the start of the game and the remaining three will each go down in 30 second intervals, meaning it's possible to complete a game in close to 2 minutes with maximum team efficiency. It's worth noting that the red portal's shield will never go down so you should focus on the other three portals first. The portals have 200 hp on the novice lander games but have 250 hp on both the intermediate and veteran lander games. The best strategy is to focus on the portals as soon as their shields go down. Whilst you can't predict how strong or smart your team will be it's quite rare to go many games without a win and can often win 15-20 times an hour if you keep entering the lander as soon as you return to pest control island. You should make sure to shut the gates as you enter or exit through them, unless you are sure other players will be following through immediately after you, often players will complain in chat about others not closing the gates, both during the game and on the lander usually after an unsuccessful game. Other than commendation points you will also receive some osrs gp (gold/ coins) on successful completion, the amount is equal to 10*combat level, as you can't lose items on death and don't need to use any potions or food really there is no need to bank the coins until you are done with pest control as it will just waste time.

Aside from the previously mentioned Void Knight equipment there are many other runescape 07 items and perks you can buy from the Void Knights (just right click and trade with them) with your commendation points. You will need 42 in all combat skills to even buy the Void Knight equipment. To get the base gear and be able to use the Void Knight equipment effect you will need 850 commendation points which will be enough for the top, robe, gloves and one helmet of your choice. To buy all the Void Knight gear it will cost 1510 points commendation points total. Other things you can buy are: experience boosts in attack, strength, defence, hp, ranged and magic individually (the boost is relative to your current level, you can buy more at once to receive a discount), herb packs (random lucky-dip-esque pack of randomly assorted grimy herbs), mineral packs (containing coal and iron ore) and seed packs (usually gives lower-tiered seeds in random frequencies).