Assume Nothing

Believe it or not, people actually calculate opportunity cost before making such radical decisions

I would post xp/h, but I'm not sure where that lies within the rules - it may 'indirectly encourage' some players to bot.

The fact that he has price checked discontinued items, which could be considered as 'money wasted' because it's essentially useless other than being a financial investment, or a status symbol. I guess I've killed the joke given that I had to explain it to you though.

The thing about RuneScape is - even when players don't like playing, they still play. They like the high level content - wearing Torva, using Overloads and Turmoil with maxed melees - they just don't want to essentially dedicate half their life into it in order to get that 'high'. RuneScape addiction only further worsens the problem. The thing about goldfarming is - they need someone to sell the gold to. Thus, it's more about making sure a significant amount of people who feel they have to buy their way to success no longer needs to.

A Dungeoneering bot does actually exist. The worrying thing right now is that the only thing stopping some people from participating in botting would be either the fear of Trojans, or their ethical stance about it. It's not unlikely that more players become botters if JaGex doesn't clearly show that they're at least *trying* to handle the situation

When pmods try and call me out for not responding, I tell them that they're nothing but a volunteer, and I have no reason to even acknowledge their existence. For their claims are merely assumptions - perceived to be true with no evidence as justification. I'd have to agree - 'Bot' is the new 'Witch'

You're likely to get a cliché answer from a card somewhere, which few people would take seriously anyway.

Out of all those pictures, one really stood out to me Notice the 'Money Down The Drayn' task that he just completed?

Botters don't use AHK to script. AHK is only used the way Wicked has used it. The problem is that many people don't understand what the Wicked scripts do and mislabel them. I'm actually writing an article about AHK right now if you want to look over it. I need to send it to an editor sometime, so might as well send it to you now if that's alright. As for how Jagex gets their funds. It is all speculation in the end, but there is a reason they no longer mass ban. I think it's because they are using the bots to milk RS while they frantically try to develop some other MMO but that's again just speculation. I apologize - I merely assumed it would be possible to create a functional script with AHK. It's easy to speculate, but when we are forced to, we lose all credibility as we have nothing to back ourselves up - it's called speculation for a reason. I think they just ban whenever they can, but the problem has grown far out of the control of JaGex's team. In the past, most bots were concentrated at Yew Trees, Lobsters, Flax, Chinchompas, and Pure Essence. Those days are gone - You can see bots at almost every monster that drops bones or ashes (save bosses) - including snakes, Frost Dragons, Green Dragons, Black Demons, Aviansies, Sorceress Garden, Slayer Monsters, Dungeoneering, etc etc. It's obviously more difficult for JaGex to fight against more sophisticated scripts that's more widespread - it's so easy to slip under the radar. EDIT - Oh, and many gold farmers prefer f2p accounts now that 1 dollar pins are no longer on the table

Each to their own I guess. I don't think it's change for change's sake - although it's not a necessary thing, it's still a nice addition that could make RuneScape slightly better. The only problems I see would be implementing it on an established combat system, and the issues with - Martial arts on armour, as it'll obviously be painful to use fists against sheet metal -, and the fact that monsters like Dragons cannot be effectively fought with techniques that mainly work against humanoid monsters (with similar strengths/weaknesses) I guess the time invested in developing the proposed idea would also be an issue too... It would take some time to work out the workarounds for the hitches.

Video guides do have their place - it's less about the format than it is about the author. A poorly written text guide is about as useful as a monotone video guide with poor picture quality drowned in loud music. Admittedly, text guides are easier to make and comprehend, but there's many limitations of text guides that need considering too. Examples of where video guides work; A guide to use Photoshop/Blender/Sony Vegas, etc A guide for showing specific sequences of moves - Nexing, pking and staking etc. I'd say as long as the author doesn't use videos as the primary tool for guides, then it should be fine.

The dungoneering instances are created within the world where the dungeons are hosted. So for citadels I was thinking more like after the party is created the host chooses size ect then chooses the world and all the dgers log in and the dungeon instantly starts. In the same vein people should be able to use clan wars from their citadel. Perhaps you go to the warring board, and it shows other clans open for warring where you can challenge from your citadel. Also a teleport to the deep wild lever. I liked you article, I would have responded sooner except the botting article mentioning AHK really angered me. All this bot talk is really annoying. People don't understand that Jagex wouldn't be able to fund developing this game without the bots paying memberships. Then they group things that they don't understand like AHK in with bots. You're assuming more than what I stated - I was merely pointing out that use of scripting programs, such as with AHK, could allow players to bot, thus pursuing major bot sites is a futile effort. In no way did I compare Wicked_ to a bot scripter - he merely wrote functions with the intentions of making the game less mundane without significant unfair advantage - something which I don't disagree with - so what's the problem here? What I was referring to would be scripts that allowed users to be fully autonomous. Edit - I disagree, I'd say legitimate players can fund JaGex fine - it's just that we're a dying breed of players as more of us are replaced by bots when players ultimately quit out of being 'sick' of what the game has become - and that's not an exaggeration either.

Oh, I'm aware of the distinction, and the argument as such. It's the principle of the idea. There is a view (which I happen to support) that Jagex may be headed down a slippery slope of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em". It may be only a small crack in the dam, but if it fully breaks, can we expect to see a rush of promotional items? Will Jagex follow the path of other game developers and allow players to purchase items for the game, beyond what a basic membership offers? I can see it being a distinct possibility, more so after Jagex decided to link RS accounts to Facebook ones. (That means that I think they might *cough*stoop to the level of other game developers on Facebook*cough*) Based on my experiences on Facebook, yes, I have to begrudgingly agree with Duke Freedom: a small minority of adult players WILL cough up real money to buy game items: for Farmville, Mafia Wars, Castle Age, what have you. Yep, ladies and gentlemen, I'm quite ashamed to say I know plenty of people in my age group (28-45) will spend gobs of time on games with grinding treadmills and some will drop some cash money to beat the grind. So... will Jagex attempt to tap into that? What I said on the other article is that Jagex marketing changed VERY critically after Andrew, Paul, and Constant left the board of directors. There were no in-game items tied to real-world money before they left. Now there is. Somewhat paradoxically, I support the Loyalty Rewards Programme, but that is still tied to basic membership, albeit the incentive is for consistent, unlapsed payments. More disturbing is that there is evidence Jagex is now trying to obfuscate stricter and harsher statements made by Paul and Andrew earlier on RWT-- many players would interpret their statements (especially Andrew's) that they would be loathe to introduce official, sanctioned, purchasable items based on past experiences with other MMOs. Based on my own experiences (see my long story about MUDs on the last article topic), I *would* see it that way. *sigh* I can't find all the quotes right at the moment, but it is connected to arguments concerning the new Banned Account Reinstatement policy. (If that material has been written here, fine, hit me with a virtual frying pan, see if my memory reboots.) The biggest challenge is figuring out how to stop them without significantly crippling the gameplay of legitimate players. Remove any reason that certain 'legitimate players' would ever feel the need to purchase RSGP in the first place - without a market, no supply would ever be necessary to satisfy it

You speak of "Martial Arts" like it's a certain collection of movement or whatever, but it really isn't. Martial arts: "Martial arts are extensive systems of codified practices and traditions of combat, practiced for a variety of reasons, including self-defense, competition, physical health and fitness, as well as mental and spiritual development." (Wikipedia). From that we gather that the term 'martial arts' refers to the collection of such systems but is not itself one of them (also I don't see where I ever denied that martial arts involve weapons...?). Secondly I would argue that implementing any such system in Runescape is useless and doesn't actually improve the game. I don't quite understand your first argument, care to elaborate in layman's terms? In response to your second argument; I think it does improve the game - it adds variety to what is currently a limited range of melee attacks. 'One for all' weapons are great in that it's so versatile, but it poorly reflects what truly happens in combat and fails to bring about a level of 'skill' that I think should exist in combat - which appears to be the case now, as the Chaotic Rapier seems to be the predominant weapon of choice against most things. It may require a new mechanic altogether that's less reliant on a random number generator in order to calculate damage though... @Grasle - 'no.' is not constructive criticism, please refrain from spamming on these boards.

@Quyneax; My proposal is no trivial matter - I'm proposing a combat mechanic overhaul in mainly unarmoured combat, preferably within some form of minigame like Duel Arena Tournaments. There is no exclusive attack in Martial Arts that's good against everything - every attack will have a weaknesses. As I've said many times already, Martial Arts does incorporate weaponry - like the Ninjutsu move with the swords. I realise that it's difficult to implement in this kind of game, but it's not impossible. Difficult, maybe. Impossible, no. I do like the idea of a 'hybrid class', which, when executed correctly, can be devastating although it may be weak in general against the other combat styles (melee, mage, ranged). Unarmed combat is a significant part of staking, it's just working out how to implement the idea to be feasible. I think it'll work - it'll just take some time.

Martial arts does incorporate weaponry too.... watch some of the vids on the OP and you'll see I think the proposal would be viable if it were in a designated arena, much like the Duel Arena Tournaments, or the Fight Pits. Or, as others have stated, stealth combat.

Still, the thing that I've noticed about martial arts is that it focuses on learning about the strengths and weaknesses of the human body. We need weapons, because no matter how many pressure points I learn about, I still need a freaking sword to kill a dragon. And to be honest I think the attack still is already supposed to do something like this, it's just that the amount of dedicated animations something like this would take up would be enormous especially since it would probably need to vary for enemies with different body types. I suppose this might work in some kind of pvp exclusive combat but at that point it'll probably become to niche to justify the enormous amount of dev time that would need to be sunk in order to make this effective. Fair point - but there's a large variety of monsters that are humanoids anyways, so the same would apply for them really. I guess Slayer is supposed to teach us how to effectively kill a monster too, maybe a tweak in Slayer and Attack will work...

Do note that martial arts aren't only about hand to hand combat - it's also about improving combat with weaponry too.

"Josh is typing..." *2 minutes later* ">.>"

It doesn't necessarily have to conform to the mechanics of conventional combat - There could be a totally new 'defense' system in this kind of combat. Certain types of attacks are more vulnerable to specific counter attacks, like a dodge + left hook against a spinning backfist in TKD/Muay thai. I know it'll be difficult to implement within the current game, given the systems we have in place, but the concept could still work pretty good - perhaps a duel arena thing. It would make boxing a lot more fun too, and it could bring some 'skill' into staking.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bPM7i-uuK4 Doesn't have to be bare-hands

I was wondering - would Martial Arts in RuneScape work? Things like Muay Thai, TKD, KickBoxing, Sanda, Ninjutsu, BJJ, Wing Chun, Silat, Krav Maga, etc. can all bring great things to RS, but would it be viable? Examples of moves: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bPM7i-uuK4

You have to realise that stopping gold-farming doesn't prevent the problem - many stakers, not naming names, also participate in real world tradng

I don't remember the last article on minigames being repetitive so much as there being hot flames about the opinion of the author that wrote it. I thought that was unfortunate. While I don't agree with stormveritas's stance on minigames, I thought the backlash about it was rather unfair and harsh. Concerning discussion of bots, I think there is an angle that has been missed: that Jagex seems to be softening its stance on Real World Trading, or rather, they have sanctioned items that require a monetary purchase. Those that went to Runefest 2010 received an in-game item-- the Flagstaff of Festivities. Then there is the Ornate Katana obtained by way of the Gamestop cards. I think the latter is more controversial, because although it is identical to an iron 2H sword with iron longsword attack styles, it is still more powerful that what pay-to-play members would normally receive just starting the game with a new account. I've always appreciated when Tip.It forum members have shared more direct insight into how Jagex works. (This isn't the first time, of course.) I think the referred piece has been covered extensively by Racheya - it would be difficult to not simply paraphrase what she said, intentional or not. I don't think JaGex actually encourages Real World Trading, but their stance on it seems to have either changed, or they're being simply being hypocritical.

Maybe about the new additions to old minigames? Hmmmph, I'm not sure, I'm not into discussing minigames - it gets more repetitive than the article about bots that's just been published. I'll think of something, I think I have a few old ideas that I've left on my harddrive somewhere. >.> On Topic: I like the article about the trip to JaGex, it wasn't particularly topical but it's insightful in how JaGex operates.