Entry posted by Troacctid
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Ardougne Achievement Diary: My Runescape character went to Kandarin and all I got was this lousy cape
Its the Ardougne areas turn for an Achievement Diary, spanning from Castle Wars to the Legends Guild, and from the Combat Training Camp all the way down to Yanille. Theres a sneaky reward for anyone who completes all the tasks...
The new achievement diary is out, and there's only one question on everybody's minds: how the bloody hell are we supposed to pronounce "Ardougne"? (Rhymes with "Des Moines." You're welcome.)
By and large, what we have here is standard Achievement Diary fare. Most of the tasks are straightforward. There's some that are fairly simple, such as teleporting to the essence mine with Wizard Cromperty, and there are some that are rather obscure, such as getting a civilian to throw a tomato at an army recruiter. As with the Falador diary, the tasks span a hefty portion of the continent rather than just the titular city. Be prepared to run all around the southern half of Kandarin as you check items off the list.
Rewards
This section contains reward spoilers, obviously. I'm going to list the rewards and comment on their relevancy.
[hide=Easy task rewards]
- Teleports to the Ardougne Monastery. Seems useless at first glance because there's very little in the area that's exciting; however, this is the closest teleport to an altar in the game. There are also 6 iron rocks just outside the Monastery, making it a fine location for banking iron ore with a Ring of Duelling. It's the best way to get to Larry/Chuck to cash in penguin points. It's right near the bush patch. It provides quick access to the Tower of Life for Creature Creation, which has been vastly improved with the other diary rewards. And it surpasses Edgeville as the closest fairy ring to a teleport without a slayer ring. So...not bad! :thumbsup:
- Improves Thieving success rates in Ardougne. Although Ardougne is known for its Thieving resources, it's actually not a great place for training Thieving, so this is not a particularly impressive reward; however, for the lower-level players (because there are plenty who do thieve here), it may be an attractive reward.
- Twice as many death runes when trading in a cat. Anyone who raises cats can earn a very modest profit in death runes once the cat is fully-grown. Increasing the reward is nice for those who raise cats on the side while they train other skills, but largely irrelevant to players with decent summoning levels, who will pretty much always prefer a familiar. Still, again, it's well-suited to lower-level players.
- Some Creature Creation drops become noted. Before this update, Creature Creation was a lousy minigame with no notable rewards. But now that the unicorn horn drops come noted, it can actually turn a decent profit. I'm still not likely to play the minigame, but I approve. :thumbup:
- Free prayer boost in Castle Wars. Not much to say here--useful if you play Castle Wars, useless if you don't. I like that you don't need the cape to get the bonus--it's just automatic.
- 1k xp lamp. A cherry on top.
[/hide]
[hide=Medium task rewards]
- One teleport to the Ardougne farm daily. This is now the fastest way to reach the Ardougne herb/allotment patch, surpassing the Fishing Guild teleport. I can't think what else it would be used for, though, with it being pretty much right next to Skills Necklace and Combat Bracelet spots already. Still, it speeds up farming runs, which is good, even if you do more than one a day. :thumbup:
- Improved pickpocketing success rate in Ardougne. It's okay. I hear thieving from Paladins is decent cash, and I know some people like to pickpocket guards and stuff for training, but blackjacking is still going to be more efficient.
- Craft extra runes at the Ourania Altar. Although only a marginal boost, this can add up, so all Ourania runecrafters ought to get these medium tasks done. :thumbup:
- More noted drops from Creature Creation. Yup, fastest unicorn horns in the game, not half-bad for profit, and breathes some life into a dead minigame. Cool, cool.
- 100 free pure essence a day from Wizard Cromperty. Pure essence has been hovering around 200 gp lately, so that's a good 20k or so. Not bad, I suppose. This is the sort of thing hardcore DIY players enjoy because it lets them obtain resources at a low opportunity cost without compromising their principles. For the rest of us, it can be filed away as another of those daily things.
- Toggle Ring of Life teleport to Ardougne. Pretty much useless. :thumbdown:
- Extended immunity from attacks in PVP worlds after pulling the Ardougne Wilderness teleport lever. Also pretty much useless.
- 7.5k xp lamp. Everyone loves cherries!
[/hide]
[hide=Hard task rewards]
- Improved thieving and pickpocketing everywhere in Runescape. A solid reward. This one actually comes in handy even for blackjacking, I think.
- Magical traps will teleport you to the Ardougne north bank instead of some other place. I don't know which traps the reward is referring to here, but this is probably useless. :thumbdown:
- Even more noted Creature Creation drops. See above.
- 150 pure essence from Wizard Cromperty daily. I gotta say, this is loads better than the Seers' Diary reward. Not only is pure essence worth more than twice as much as flax, you get more of it, and it's closer to a teleport. Very solid. :thumbup:
- Ability to change the Watchtower Teleport to drop you off inside Yanille's walls. Yes! This makes it so much more convenient! It also pretty much makes it totally unnecessary to have a house in Yanille. This was one of those little things that mildly frustrate you, and now it's fixed! :thumbup:
- 28k xp lamp. A nice big cherry on top of the hard task rewards. :thumbup:
[/hide]
[hide=Elite task rewards]
- Unlimited teleports to the Ardougne farm. Very nice for those of use who do multiple herb runs in a day. (Many of us do.) Also, as a side note, with the teleports being unlimited, this is the fastest way in the game to cut magic logs--not that you're likely to want to cut magic logs if you've got the stats to earn this reward.
- Experience lamps. The chunk of xp you get from these lamps is massive, and it had better be with requirements like 93 summoning. Apparently it's a total of 200k xp in stats that are 85+. I think it should even be higher.
The Elite rewards aren't especially exciting--lots of players don't need unlimited teleports to the Ardougne farm, and while 200k xp is great, it's nothing particularly special when it's in a stat that's level 85 already. This is good--it wouldn't be fair to have them give a significant advantage when so few people can realistically obtain them.[/hide]
How this update affects you
With the Ardougne Cloak 1, you can use the Monastery teleport to speed up bush runs. With the Ardougne Cloak 2, you can use the farm teleport to speed up herb runs. This is a good update for farmers. Every 70+ farmer should be doing poison ivy runs to at least the Champions' Guild and the Monastery now, because they're both super-close to a teleport (Ardougne Claok/Combat Bracelet) and it's a good ~1k experience per seed with a nice profit.
Thieves will probably enjoy the thieving boost from the Ardougne Cloak 3, and perhaps from the others as well.
The pure essence gives us a new daily event which is fairly profitable and pretty quick. It may be worth grabbing an Ardougne teleport to go talk to Cromperty once in a while, maybe snatching a gem from the stall on the way and making a quick detour for the Jade Vine afterwards.
Anyone who visits Yanille will benefit from the faster teleport, whether you collect your sand from Bert every day faithfully or simply drop by every now and then to visit the Magic Guild or whatever.
Bottom line
This has everything I expect from an Achievement Diary: small but useful rewards for players of all levels. While there isn't much about this update that's earth-shatteringly awesome, it's still solid. Thumbs-up! :thumbsup:
In other news: Upgrade Watch!
Players often forget about the minor changes Jagex makes that add up to improve the overall experience of the game. I'm dedicating this section to documenting some of those upgrades that we take for granted.
[hide=Bits and Pieces this week]Arhein in Catherby now sells noted pineapples and seaweed. About time! Buying out his stock daily is about five times as fast now. A plus!
Tiny elf crystals can now teleport you to the Temple of Light. Great news for slayers, who can now kill Dark beasts much more efficiently. It also makes it possible to actually craft deaths through the Temple of Light, although I'm not sure if it's any better than the Abyss. Probably not.
Mithril dragons can no longer interrupt you in a single-combat zone--an annoyance that was apparently a bug this whole time.
Duel tournaments have been tweaked and rebalanced in various ways. The system should function better now.
Your progress will now be saved if you disconnect during the Fight Caves minigame. Woohoo!
The chat window is resizable now, so you should be able to better follow long conversations. Personally, I like it small, but to each his own.
Charges on teleport jewelry can now be combined.
The infamous "redbarring" graphical glitch, in which a monster's HP bar appears completely empty even when it still has a few points of HP remaining, has now been fixed! Man, that was a hassle--glad it's over with at last.
Finally, I feel that some of the new Ardougne Diary rewards fall into this category of Bits & Pieces Upgrades, namely all three of the new teleports and the noted drops from Creature Creation.[/hide]
~troacctid
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