Troacctid's RuneScape Blog

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

Those who have unraveled the mysteries of the plague in West Ardougne, met with the elves and infiltrated the Death Guard will find themselves able to help Arianwyn once again, as they go Within the Light.

This week's update saw the long-awaited continuation of the Plague City storyline, the oldest, most complicated, and arguably most frustrating quest line in all of Runescape. So how does Within the Light compare? Does it do the story justice? Does it learn from the mistakes of previous installments?

I won't let slip major plot details from the new quest without hide tags, so no need to worry about spoilers if you're a storyline buff like me. I'll put the rewards in hide tags as well. But you're at my mercy with minor details and stuff, so if you want to go 100% spoiler-free, do the quest and come back later. I'll wait.

[hide=First spoiler]There's more traps and more puzzles![/hide]

Previous quests

Okay. Now, before I talk about Within the Light, I want to talk about the rest of the Plague City series. This quest line has a history of frustrating, luck-based obstacles--poor quest design--and lists of random objects to fetch and take to some faraway corner of the map--more poor quest design.

In fact, Underground Pass, Regicide, and Mourning's End Part 1 & 2 are the worst offenders out of all quests. Forgot your rope? Whoops, guess you have to spend five minutes running to the bank and back. Run out of food? Ha, tough luck, pal, guess you gotta do the whole Underground Pass over again. MEP1 and Regicide have that awful coal tar bit, and there's the sheep-painting: "Hey kid, go out to the opposite corner of the planet and get some inflated toads to fill with paint. Oh, and stop by the other corner of the planet while you're at it so that you can pick up some paint. See ya later." And all these quests involve stupid, stupid traps all over the place.

However, MEP2 is infamous for its massive light puzzle, a complex array of mirrors and colors and crystals that must be arranged in a certain way to unlock a door at the end. I consider the light puzzle idea to be the high point of the series. In addition, although the traps themselves were unnecessarily frustrating, they did a good job of creating an atmosphere of danger and mystery that suited the trailblazing explorer feel.

What I'm looking for in a new elf quest is to replicate the feeling of traversing a trap-infested area with less blind luck and more clever detection, to provide more puzzles like the one in the Temple of Light, and to advance the storyline, preferably by getting us into Prifddinas to investigate more closely.

All right. Within the Light.

Requirements

The requirements seem like a good place to start. They're very high, higher than any other quest has asked in those skills. This is indicative of a trend. As Jagex releases new quests towards the end of the long storylines, the requirements get pretty damn high. And we're not at the end yet.

The message for quest capers like myself should be clear: if you want to keep your cape, don't rest on your laurels--train your low skills in advance! If any of your skills are at the minimum required level to complete every quest, expect to have to train them up when new quests are released.

The trend here is a result of the quest team's focus on finishing off existing storylines rather than starting new ones. I imagine they feel obligated to increase the skill requirements as the story moves on. Personally, I don't agree with that sentiment, and I think it's misplaced in this quest especially, where right from the beginning Arianwyn tells you that the problem is not as serious as it was in the previous quest. Why do you need to be higher-level, then? It seems as though you just need to have already infiltrated the mourners and explored the temple to be qualified.

I can't complain about the requirements, however, because I already had them. So I'll move on.

Gameplay

One of the first things I look for in evaluating a quest is how far out of your way you need to go to get all the items you need when you need them. Within the Light scores far better in this area than previous quests. Almost every required item is available as you need it. You need a knife and a hatchet for part of the quest--loot them from a nearby corpse. You need a death talisman--Arianwyn has a spare for you. You need combat gear to deal with shadows attacking you--well, no you don't, because Arianwyn brought his crystal bow, and he'll kill them all in one hit. Everyone hates leaving the action because they forgot their tinderbox, and this quest wisely avoids that dilemma. The only exception is the mourner gear, which you can pick up while you're arranging the distraction and charging the teleport crystal. Thumbs-up here.

Then we have a section with a time limit, where you need to charge yourself with energy in one place and run to another place to discharge the energy and activate a spell. This is something I don't think has been done in a quest before, and I like it. It's interesting. You try it the first time and realize that the energy wears off, so you need to try again. The key thing here is that unlike with Regicide or Underground Pass, you're failing or succeeding not because of blind luck but because of your own ability to navigate the Temple of Light. That's good.

Then there's a new light puzzle. There's an array of crystal trees that reflect light in certain directions and several light emitters and receivers of different colors, and the goal is to use the crystals to reflect the proper color of light onto the correct receiver, combining colors as necessary. I think it's a brilliant puzzle, even better than the first light puzzle. The focus in Mourning's End Part 2's puzzle was more on dealing with the mazelike temple full of aggressive monsters; Within the Light has distilled the puzzle down to its essence, which is manipulating light beams to shine certain colors at specific targets. It helps a lot that the mirrors are much closer together, which is a big improvement. The puzzle is challenging without being frustrating. I found it to be just the right difficulty to make me think without forcing me to consult a guide. My only complaint is that it was too difficult to tell by looking which direction the crystals were facing unless the camera was placed at a very low, uncomfortable angle.

One more thing about the light puzzle: it's randomised, which means you can't just peek at the solution in a quest guide. You have to actually figure it out! :twisted:

...Well, or use the official Questhelp, I suppose. Still. :twisted:

Finally, we had a section with a maze of traps. However, unlike the trap-filled Underground Pass or Isafdar Forest, this is condensed into a small chamber of spiked platforms. The spikes move up and down and pop up in different places in such a way that, although you take 10 damage if they hit you, success or failure is based solely on timing. You traverse the platforms to reach the other side of the room, dashing across the spikes when they retract, and fire a ballista at a moving target to open another passageway in the previous room. Then you need to run back around the same platforms again to get back.

I was very happy with this quest's design. The NPCs give you enough information for you to be able to reasonably complete it without resorting to a guide. The puzzle is great and I never found myself dissatisfied with the quest. :thumbup:

Rewards and story

The rewards for this quest were boring. 95k experience spread over four skills. Relative to the levels needed for the quest, that's not much, and not nearly as impressive as the Death Altar or even the Dragon Halberd. Could have been worse, but still a miss for me.

However, usually if the story is good enough, I'm willing to forgive mediocre rewards. In this case, well, we learned a little more, but we still don't have any closure. We didn't get into Prifddinas, although we got closer. We did learn why we can't get into Prifddinas.

[hide=Why we can't get into Prifddinas]The whole city was reverted back into the crystal seeds from which it originally grew.[/hide]

But aside from that, not much happened.

So what we have is a quest that's well-designed and fun, but with very few incentives to actually do it. Oops.

On the other hand, with its restrictive prerequisites including one of the hardest quests in the game and some of the highest level requirements of any quest, perhaps it would be a bit unfair to make the reward incredibly awesome but have so few players able to attain it. I guess that's what the designers were thinking, but honestly, I'd rather get a crystal halberd.

Bottom line

I think it's "crystal"-clear that what we have here is a de-"light"-ful adventure that manages to avoid the "pitfalls" of its predecessors. The rewards are kinda lame, but the fun makes up for it. I'm a sucker for quests, and I especially love quests that are fun, so I approve of this update! :thumbsup:

Author's note: I wrote this speech in February 2009, but I didn't have a blog then, so I'm posting it here now. It's my case for legalizing marijuana. Enjoy.

If I were to walk through a local grocery store, chances are Id see all sorts of foods. Naturally there would be bread. There would be dairy. There would be colorful breakfast cereals, brimming with sugar. Not to mention fruits and vegetables, chips, pasta, pickles, and entire aisles devoted solely [pause] to wine. This last one wouldnt be much of a surprise: our home state is famous for its wine. But 80 years ago, Californias multi-billion dollar wine industry could not have been as successful as it is today. Thats because in 1919, the United States passed the Eighteenth Amendment to our constitution, prohibiting the manufacture, sale, and distribution of all alcoholic beverages.

However, as our thriving modern wine industry can surely testify, Prohibition was an immense flop. Making alcohol illegal didnt stop people from drinking. Instead, it deprived the government of the revenue from taxes on alcohol, and it heralded a massive increase in crime and gang violence. The Twenty-first Amendment eventually repealed the ban in 1933, which means our modern-day vineyards are free to produce some of the finest wines in the world. (Good for them! [thumbs up])

Yeah, yeah, groceries, wine, prohibition...where am I going with this? Let me explain. This Monday, Tom Ammiano, a representative from San Francisco in our State Legislature, introduced a bill to legalize marijuana in California.

Under Ammianos bill, marijuana would have pretty much the same legal status enjoyed by alcohol: it would be legal to all adults age 21 and over, and driving under the influence of weed would carry similar penalties to driving while drunk. (Lawmaker)

It is my strong opinion that this bill should be passed, and I have three main reasons for this stance.

First, we really need the money. Our state has just been through a budget crisis and a $42 billion dollar deficit. At the proposed tax rate of $50 per ounce, its estimated new tax revenues would bring in as much as a billion dollars annually. When you consider our ongoing fiscal crisis, we could really do a lot with a billion dollars a year.

But thats not all. In addition to potential revenue, legalization of marijuana could save millions, even billions, on law enforcement. Furthermore, it would help reduce the number of prisoners being sent into our overcrowded jails, saving even more money. Just from a financial standpoint, legalization looks pretty good.

Second, look at whats already legal! According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, approximately 79,000 deaths occurred as a result of alcohol abuse between 2001 and 2005, and thats not including car crashes involving drunk drivers. (Alcohol) Also according to the Department of Health and Human Services, more than 400,000 Americans die every year from cigarette smoking. (Smoking) Thats an average of roughly 45 deaths per hour. Both these substances are highly addictive. Both these substances have tremendous negative effects on the users health.

And yet, both these substances are legal. In contrast, marijuana is far less addictive, and its negative effects on the smokers health are far less extreme. Despite this, marijuana is the substance thats banned. This is illogical. We might as well legalize the lesser drug, seeing as we allow more dangerous substances already. When we already associate with serial killers, who are we to shun a mere purse snatcher?

For my third reason, lets recall for a moment why Prohibition was such a failure: the alcohol business continued anyway, without the blessing of the government. The same thing is happening with marijuana today. Weed may be Californias biggest cash crop, surpassing even grapes, with an annual profit estimated at fourteen billion dollars. (Walters) Most of this unregulated marijuana gets circulated whether the folks in charge like it or not. Oftentimes the profits (just like with bootleg alcohol in the 20s) are funding gangs.

Instead of spending millions and millions on law enforcement, why cant we just allow marijuana to be grown and traded legally? Why cant we just regulate its sale and distribution?

To recap, marijuana ought to be legalized because we need the tax revenue. Marijuana ought to be legalized because its less dangerous than other drugs, such as tobacco and alcohol, which are legal already. Marijuana ought to be legalized because it would allow the state to regulate the massive industry that produces it.

Anyway, while pot will probably never get its own aisle in the grocery store, and while it will probably never become a symbol of pride for our state, its still worth legalizingeven if it is only about the money.

PVP Worlds initiate new drug testing policy

Following the recent Overload Scandal that has shattered the confidence of PVP fans, the Runescape PKing Council has officially banned the so-called "extreme" potions from all player-vs-player combat activities in the interest of fairness. With the new policy, players will be tested for Special Restore, Super Antifire, Super Prayer, Overload, and Extreme Attack, Strength, Defense, Ranged, or Magic potions before being allowed to participate in any PVP game. The ban will not apply to combat between players and monsters.

The change comes on the heels of the exposure of several Major League PKers, including Mod MMG, who in 1998 broke the PK record by killing 70 players in one season, as having used performance-enhancing potions. Mod MMG declined to comment, saying "My lawyers have advised me that I cannot answer these questions without jeopardizing my friends, my family, and myself." Added Mod MMG, "No, really, if I answered these questions, other PKers would come and kill my friends, my family, and myself."

Fiara, guardian of the Fist of Guthix, introduced the policy. "I've been pushing for a long time to ban all performance-enhancing potions." said Fiara. "I've already banned all potions from the Fist of Guthix, but until now, Mandrith, Nomad, and the others wouldn't listen to me. They're still soft on the lesser potions, but at least they've done away with the worst of them. These new ones are incredibly dangerous for the PKers who use them. Just look at the damage an Overload potion does to the user's digestive tract!" Fiara then produced the digestive tract of a slain PKer to demonstrate that it was, indeed, irreparably damaged, prompting reporters on the scene to nod in agreement, back away slowly, and/or vomit.

Player response to the new policy has been mixed. One disappointed PKer said, "I really wanted 2 use the new pots 4 pvp, but at least i can still use them on the kbd." But not all were so disapproving. "I think this change is for the best," said one player who requested to remain anonymous. "Players with the ability to brew these potions had an unfair advantage. The rest of us just can't compete without potentially damaging our long-term health. I heard Extreme Strength potions can cause uncontrollable aggression, for example--I wouldn't want to expose myself to that sort of thing."

"Who said that? That's ********! Who said that? Tell me who said that so I can Slice & Dice them!" said Andrew Gower, known by fans as A-Gow. Gower denied using Extreme potions to illegally improve his PKing.

The new policy is effective immediately.

Druids discover revolutionary new potions!

Famed druidic herblorist Sanfew revealed today the recent discovery of several new potion recipes.

"Well, I was working on a cure for baldness, as usual. I was experimenting with phoenix feathers to stimulate the hair's rebirth, but the heat from the feather kept boiling the water I put it in." said Sanfew. "I had the idea to try an antifire potion as a base, but my young apprentice Jojo mistook it for an ordinary antifire potion and took it with him to the dragon lair south of here to gather dragon scales. I ran down to stop him, and caught up with him on his way back to Taverley without as much as a scorch mark on him!"

Jojo, age 16, had experienced enhanced resistance to dragonfire.

Said Jojo, "Yeah, I forgot my anti-dragon shield, so I borrowed one of Sanfew's antifire, uh, things. I was expecting to get like maybe at most a couple burns, but they were just wailing on me with their fireballs and it like didn't hurt at all. It was pretty sick."

Added Sanfew, "I hadn't explored using completed potions as a base for new potions since inventing my Sanfew Serum cure-all because of the inherent volatility. After all, a completed potion is a beautifully balanced thing. To recklessly disrupt that balance would be an affront to Guthix. These new recipes should only be attempted by very skilled herblorists confident enough to mix the ingredients with care. Under no circumstances should my Extreme Combat Potions be mixed together--the result would be incredibly dangerous."

When asked if he had been successful in his search for a cure for his baldness, Sanfew replied, "Alas, no. The phoenix potion made me grow feathers instead of hair. But I will continue my research."

The new potions, which include a variety of drinks to temporarily boost combat ability, were made available to high-level herblorists yesterday, and because of their volatile nature, the Bank of Runescape has declared them Class-B Untradeable Substances.

High-level Herblore Potions

"This week, high-level herbalists will find a variety of new, untradeable potions at their disposal, including extreme combat boosts, complete protection from dragon-fire, and a gut-wrenching overload potion."

I've complained for a long time that high herblore levels are useless because the skill stops short in the low 80s, long before it maxes out, and experience afterwards has no bearing on gameplay. Well, this week's update aims to fix that. In fact, this is the third update in a row that is aimed at high-level players, coming on the heels of the Living Rock Caverns' fishing and mining update, which I believe was excellent, and the woodcutting rebalance, which I believe left something to be desired. How did Jagex do this time with herblore? It's time for some content evaluation!

This update introduces nine new potions for high-level herblorists, spanning levels 84-96. The full list is in the game guide, and can be found here. Okay, new potions--so what? They'll be just like all the other potions--mass-produced for level-ups then dumped on the GE with a loss of value, more money-losing potions...right? Wrong!

None of these new guys are tradeable! That means if you want to use them, you have to actually have the requisite level and make them yourself. This is a big change and a very important one, because it creates the incentive to train that herblore skill. Is it worth it? Hmm. Some of the potions are more useful than others.

• Super antifire potions provide full immunity from dragonbreath, enough that you can wield a two-handed weapon like a Godsword, Zamorakian Spear, or Verac's Flail when battling dragons and not worry about the massive damage you'd normally take without the proper shield. It doesn't say how long they last, but since the higher-level dragons like Mithrils are significantly faster to kill with two-handed weapons, there is a definite increase in performance, although on lower-level dragons, the ingredients for this potion may be too expensive to justify its use.
  
• Recover special potions have a unique ability to restore your special attack meter by 25% per dose. This is a huge advantage in high-level combat situations. There's a delay of 30 seconds between each use, which is an important balancing factor, but it's still incredibly brutal with some weapons. The dragon dagger (or Vesta's longsword) is the obvious one, because it takes 25% to activate, so you can get in 5 specs in a row--pretty deadly. However, it's also great with a Zamorak Godsword (which has 60% drain). Doubling up on the special attack can give a full 40 seconds in which your opponent will be a helpless ice cube. Ouch!
  
• Extreme magic potions, unlike regular magic potions, provide an actual damage boost of 40% to your magical attacks. That's pretty significant and very deadly. However, it has little application outside of PvP combat.
  
• The other Extreme combat potions, as well as the super prayer potion, have a similar problem, in that the lower-level, tradeable versions are just fine for most purposes. The added effectiveness is good, but probably not worth all of the millions of xp you need to use them.
  
• Finally, we have the UBER ULTIMATE OVER 9000 DOMINANCE OVERLOAD!!! potion, which puts you into UBER ULTIMATE SUPER SAIYAN DOMINANCE OVERLOAD MODE!!!, boosting your combat stats as high as they can possibly be boosted and keeping them there for five minutes straight. Of course, the UBER ULTIMATE POWER OF DESTRUCTION OVERLOAD!!! has a backlash effect that hits you for five chunks of 10 damage after you drink it, but in the meantime you get UBER DOMINANCE OVERLOAD!!!, which you have to admit is pretty awesome.

Yes, I think the incentives are pretty strong. The best ones, in my opinion, are the first two. I'm sure many people will train to level 83 or 84 for recover special & super antifire potions. (Remember, you can temporarily boost your herblore level with a Greenman's Ale.) Plenty of hardcore mages will go for 90 herblore to get the extreme magic potions. I think only the hardcore herblorists, though, are going to go all the way to the OVERLOAD!!! potion. However, I can now definitively state that there is a now strong reason for training your herblore level, and that the skill has been mostly fixed.

What's left for herblore? We still need training methods that don't involve spending lots of money to process ingredients into far more potions than anyone will ever need. High-level herblore is solidly fixed. However, all herblore levels still need new training methods to make the skill more accessible to players without massive piles of cash to burn.

Speaking of cash to burn, let's talk economics. How is this update affecting our economy?

Economic effects of the high-level herblore update

Expect a huge influx of demand for herblore training ingredients. All herbs are going to rise quickly in the short-term. Similarly, expect a huge influx of supply for most potions. Potion prices are going to drop in the short-term as the market becomes flooded. True, lower-level potions are now inputs to the untradeable high-level potions as well, which will increase demand; however, the huge loss involved in creating potions that can't be resold will relegate them to being created solely for personal use, which is not likely to significantly drive prices.

Over time, prices will grow farther apart, making herblore more and more expensive to train; however, as it becomes more expensive, fewer people will train it, bringing the prices back to more reasonable levels. This is similar to what is currently going on with the skill, except that it should occur on a larger scale now that the experience gained is more valuable. What we've got is a permanent increase in demand. The world of herblore will never be the same.

How can you capitalize on this? First off, don't bother trying to train herblore right now. Wait for the rush to subside. We've been waiting years for these potions, and I think you can wait another week or two. As we speak, I'm sure merchants everywhere are buying out the GE's entire stock of every kind of herb and second ingredient to flip them for a profit on Friday. When they've all sold what they've been stocking up on, the price will peak and crash. Then start training your herblore.

Second, when herb prices go up, farmers make more money! If you haven't been farming herbs, now is a good time to get started, because your profits are going to increase. My profits are going to increase! I like this update more every minute! Similarly, herb-dropping monsters like chaos druids are more profitable to kill.

Third, gathering secondary ingredients is going to increase in profitability as well. Those of you with low levels who need cash, now is a good time to collect snape grass and red spider eggs, grind blue dragon scales, and so on.

Because of these economic ripples, a high-level herblore update is beneficial to low-level players as well! That's trickle-down economics in action right there.

Of course, as prices continue to increase, the folks training herblore will buy fewer supplies, and we'll end up with steady fluctuations as the laws of supply & demand do their thing. Once a stable price curve develops, it will once again be pretty safe for solo merchants to invest in herblore-related items.

Bottom line

This update is great. For rich endgame players, herblore is now useful! For poor intermediate players, high-level herblore ingredients sell for more money! Even those in the middle will find themselves earning more from farming and slayer. And from a game design standpoint, it does a great job of completing a skill that was sorely lacking in relevant content. Thumbs-up all around.

Final note

This update also included a forum upgrade: avatars based on your in-game character. They shall be reviewed separately.

The reason I titled this blog "Troacctid's Gielinor Review" was, see, I had this plan that I would type up reviews of the new content, and that would be the context in which I voice my opinion on "Runescape current events and stuff." So even though I already wrote more than one entry today, I'm going to write another, because I want to talk about this update. I figure that there's always a chance that Jagex Moderators are looking at me because they value my insight on their work, and I feel a need to harness that attention to steer them in the right direction. After all, where would they be without the expert guidance of some random guy who's never designed a game in his life? :thumbsup:

Now that I've lost your attention, allow me to talk about Display Names.

This is one of those updates that's kind of boring, but functional. It's a nuts-and-bolts kind of thing. Sure, it's not new content. Sure, there aren't even any patches this week. But let's face it: we can't get a new Living Rock Caverns every week. It just isn't feasible. I don't expect it, you shouldn't expect it. Hell, I think we get that stuff too frequently. A lot of it could benefit from more time in QA. So I don't mind.

Runescape has always had pretty bland usernames, with a short character limit, no case sensitivity, and every other name trailing along a string of several random-looking numbers at the beginning, middle, or end. Well, no more! I'm sure most of you have already experienced the sort of changes this update has wrought: players mildly dissatisfied with their current names have shucked them off, replacing them with sleeker, shinier, more exciting ones! It's like the U.S. government's cash-for-clunkers program, where people mildly dissatisfied with their merely-adequate vehicles can trade them in for sleeker, shinier, more fuel-efficient ones! With government subsidies! In this case, there's no subsidy, but the service is free, so it amounts to the same thing.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to change your username. We can't all have thought of names as awesome as "Troacctid" when first creating our accounts. In fact, for those unlucky souls with crappy names like "Pkerjoe2718" or "Pwnage8979323," it's pretty much the Runescape equivalent of giving homeless guys free apartments. Or at least a fresh set of clothes. So I like this update, even if it has little to no effect on my gameplay.

Actually, I confess: I changed my own username. Yes, even I, with an awesome name like Troacctid, found room for improvement. Specifically, I changed my name to all lowercase, the way it is on Tip.It. I like it better that way. Thanks, Display Names!

You know the most amazing part of this update? It's been done without any major bugs or data loss, despite all of the technical obstacles involved. That's impressive.

The bottom line: this update is all upside. While it's not a hugely significant change, and things are a little hectic the first week as everyone is changing names at once, there's really nothing to complain about, and I think it improves the game. This is far from a Top 10 update, but it effectively accomplishes what it was meant to accomplish.

Let me start by saying I happen to have a high-school economics textbook handy, and I've been reading through it a lot lately. (Why? Because I'm in high school and I'm taking an economics class. Don't look at me like that. Geez.) The more I go through these basic economic concepts in the first few chapters, the more I find myself thinking, "Yup, that's just like in Runescape." Does that make me weird, a good critical thinker, or both? An economics professor might say it's because you can apply economics everywhere, and my initial thought is, "Yeah, you keep telling yourself that." But it's true. You can't go two paragraphs in this thing without a Gielinorian analogue.

Look, here's an excerpt right out of the first page of the first section of the first chapter:

"To look at the world economically, we can focus on the decisions that people make. You, for example, have to decide what to do with your time--go to a movie or study for a test. Businesses have to decide how many people to employ and how much to produce. A city government may have to decide whether to spend its budget to build a school or a park."

And in my head I'm thinking, "Runescape players have to decide whether they want to go PVPing, level their skills, or quest."

Look, right in the second section. Opportunity cost. Seems like nobody understands opportunity costs in Runescape. Turns out it really is one of the first things they teach you in Economics 101. "Every decision we make involves trade-offs." the textbook offers. "For example, if you choose to spend more time at work, you give up watching a movie or going to a baseball game." Or if you choose to mine pure essence, you can't use that time to train your runecrafting.

I have this urge to just re-write an entire chapter of the textbook using only example from Runescape. So many players have no idea how to apply basic economic principles. It would be so informative and relevant, and yet...so uninformative and irrelevant.

Maybe I should. Maybe I should just write a whole essay on this crap. Maybe I should show it to my teacher. Extra credit?

Students always complain how this stuff isn't useful in real life. Maybe not, but at least it's useful in video games.

When I found out the new Tip.It Forums were going to include a blogging feature, I was ecstatic! Okay, that's a lie. I was mildly intrigued. Okay, that's also a lie. I pretty much didn't care at all. Blogs are boring.

Then I thought, "Hey, you know, I'm kind of hungry. Maybe I'll go eat a banana." So I went to the kitchen. We were out of bananas.

Then I thought, "You know, I'm an opinionated person. I really oughta blog about my opinions."

Actually, that's not entirely accurate. For added accuracy, please read that sentence again, inserting "about online gaming" where relevant. Please refrain from inserting juvenile phrases such as "...in my pants." or "...about your mom." or "...that's what she said." Get your own thoughts to screw around with, okay?

The point I'm trying to make here: Tip.It has a blogging feature. And I'm using it. To blog. About Runescape. And about blogging about Runescape.

I'm sure you'll find it very entertaining. I try to write the way I talk. Actually, that's a lie too. I try to talk the way I write. Actually, that's also a lie. I write the way I would talk if I wrote everything down before I said it.

Which brings me to Runescape.

Actually, that's also a lie. I wasn't planning on talking about Runescape at all in this entry. This entry is just about how I have a Runescape blog and plan on using it to discuss Runescape. It's more of an exposition thing. Hmm, exposition...Ever see "Urinetown"? There's this whole opening number titled "Too Much Exposition" where the characters break the fourth wall and sing a musical number about pay toilets. It's better than it sounds. You should see the play sometime. Or at least illegally download the soundtrack.

I probably should have stopped at the banana. I feel like I'm belaboring. Look, I'm just going to write another entry now. Go read that. It'll actually have substance, I promise. ;-)