I want to help you make the best choice for your first combat skill training in OSRS. Understanding which skill to prioritize will accelerate your combat progress significantly.
If you need quality gear to start your training journey, you can buy OSRS gold to acquire essential weapons and armor.
The question has a clear answer for combat skills: Strength takes priority. Training Strength first increases your maximum hit damage, which directly leads to faster experience gains across all combat skills.
This higher damage output means more efficient training sessions and quicker overall progress.
Attack and Defence skills serve important but secondary roles. Attack determines your accuracy in landing hits, while Defence reduces your chance of taking damage.
However, neither skill contributes as much to your training speed as Strength does.
The optimal approach involves training Strength primarily while maintaining adequate Attack levels for wielding better weapons.
Keep your Attack level just high enough to equip your chosen training weapon, then focus on increasing your Strength level. This strategy remains effective until approximately level 85 in these skills.
Your weapon choice plays a crucial role in this training method. Each weapon requires a specific Attack level to use, which creates natural progression points in your training.
This requirement explains why players level Attack alongside Strength, but always with Strength receiving more focus until the later stages of combat training.