helring

If you read between the lines in Osbourne's latest Q&A, you'll be able to figure out the reason why. I'm paraphrasing, but Osbourne said that OoK was a test to see if they could produce good quests faster and cheaper but still keeping the same quality of lore and gameplay. The reskins and asset recycling was obviously what he was getting at. To be honest I didn't mind it at all. There were still enough new areas and characters to make it feel authentic, and most reskins were fine. If they can get the lore right, I'm willing to ignore the re-skins and re-used assets. The re-skins and re-used assets have to either be inconsequential or make sense given the context though (which to my mind they did quite well in OoaK)

I do agree, I went back to mordaut after quest expecting to fill him in, but somehow he already knew what happened.

[hide] I don't know, I thought Guthix's final resting place made sense for a boss fight representing the dragonkin's curse to kill a false user. He was probably the most powerful false user the Stone of Jas has ever had and did more with its power than seemingly any other. Although it undoubtably saved on the graphics budget, it also made sense within the lore to me. I don't know how to portray jas, let alone an echo of jas, so can't really comment on that. I'm not sure anything was really needed for dragons, most dragons are in pretty copy-paste or uninspiring type areas. [/hide]

Is it just me or are there some grammar mistakes in that quest reward? All I see wrong is "...a 80,000..."

Next week, but idk when next week. Not sure they announced a day.

My guess is still that they've had to put a lot of money towards launching transformers. A whole dev team to work on a new game from scratch can't be cheap and they really only have their money from runescape to fund that.

If I had to guess...transformers

He meant the ones that Jagex thought were 5th age got better markers I think. I tweeted him about it and he said right now they're focused on the March quests but he wants to go back later and more clearly mark other 5th age quests looking at player lists. I'm kind of split on this. I can understand why they'd do it since they want so many quests split off from this. On the other hand, if all the major lore events need to be available to people who haven't done quests because they're so major, then it doesn't leave much payoff for those who did stick with the quests. It also means that it could possibly confuse newer players and they won't get to fully enjoy the quest line in order. The second complaint might not be as bad if Jagex actually allowed a player to reset their quests and re-do them, but seeing as they don't it seems allowing players to do quests out of order could be a problem. I remember them talking about doing this years ago, what ever happened to it? If you mean making quests replayable, basically major technological hurdles and even if possible the project seems too large to justify.

I'm kind of split on this. I can understand why they'd do it since they want so many quests split off from this. On the other hand, if all the major lore events need to be available to people who haven't done quests because they're so major, then it doesn't leave much payoff for those who did stick with the quests. It also means that it could possibly confuse newer players and they won't get to fully enjoy the quest line in order. The second complaint might not be as bad if Jagex actually allowed a player to reset their quests and re-do them, but seeing as they don't it seems allowing players to do quests out of order could be a problem.

Post from Mod Osborne about why quests like Temple at Senntisten are not required for Fate of the Gods: Hey everyone, There have been concerns about the requirements for Fate of the Gods, our upcoming Zaros quest. So many of these have been level-headed, well-reasoned arguments (thanks to Robo Hobo, Fswel and many others for the cracking threads and comments). We're discussing it, as you can imagine. But first, I wanted to give you reasoning for why the quest requirements are as they are. Fate of the Gods is the first of many pieces of content that will feature Zaros. Within the space of two months, you will receive another two updates that continue the Zaros story (not quests, but they will have story attached) and there will be more. Zaros will be a core player in all three of our story pillars, and this role will become clearer in Fate of the Gods. This is something that Mod Rowley and I were hoping to reveal after FOTG, but I feel it's something you would benefit from hearing now. Zaros has traditionally been integral to the story of RS, and FOTG will make him integral to its future, and the slowburn story that we are building for the 6th Age. We wanted to include Zaros in so much future content because so many of you - regardless of affiliations - saw Zaros as central, and an intriguing character. The passion shown on the forums seems to confirm this. The obstacle has been that we would have to lock all future Zaros quests/stories behind Temple at Senntisten, Firemaker's Curse etc. Some of you will not see this as a problem, and I can completely understand that. It's a reward for devotion to lore, being an awesome lorehound, and wearing your Quest Cape like a badass. But, as many of you have rightly pointed out, we couldn't justify several Zaros quests if they all required the completion of these quests. I have to justify (and I should have to justify) the amount of resources that are spent on each quest. If 5% of our players will play a quest, and only 20% of our players will ever play that quest, then we have to be judicious about how many of these quests we do, and how lavish we are in their development time and presentation. So, we made the decision to remove quest requirements in the same manner as World Wakes. It buys us something very very valuable: a storyline that can have Zaros included, and included regularly. That was a sacrifice we were willing to make for a fantastic and involved narrative that could a) feature the core '5th Age' characters that the lorehounds have grown to love and b) get more quests released, with a greater frequency of lore-centric, deep storyline stuff. It is also worth noting that Fate of the Gods (as World Wakes is) is an exception. If you look at One of a Kind and Mahjarrat Memories (and the upcoming Mourning's End Part III), we are adding quest requirements that are high and as expected for the lore content they contain. We simply will not be reducing quest requirements often, if at all in the future. World Wakes and Fate of the Gods (and, perhaps, Missing Presumed Death) are the foundations that we can build all of our future narrative on. We have taken on board all of your comments about demarking the 5th Age quests better. This is something I am determined to do. Fate of the Gods will clearly (and slightly pushily) warn the player that they should play Temple at Senntisten. We have 5th Age notifications before each 5th Age quest now (this went in a couple of months ago), but we will look at making this clearer. We will also revisit MPD and others to add similar warnings before playing them. This may not happen for the launch of FOTG, but we hope to do it soon. We will continue to look at your feedback. No doubt this post will not quell a lot of you, and I understand that. But I hope you will understand why we have done it this way, and can see the possibilities of these future stories. We're certainly excited about your reactions to the revelations of this next month. We have a strong year for questing, with more quests planned than last year, and we have a strategy for getting more lore-rich quests in front of you (and many of them will be decided by you). Some of you have questioned our passion for lore, and even stated that we hate questers, but I can absolutely and resolutely say that this is not the case, and we will be proving it in March. Mod Osborne Source: http://[Use Quick Find Code]/sl=0/[Please Use QuickFind Code]?341,342,389,65315295

From what I remember you're right, Sy. They never actually said they'd remove run energy. They said they didn't want run energy to be effected by agility anymore, which could mean they'd remove it or it could mean everyone would have a set amount. It is dependent upon them figuring out some other use fo and reworking agility first though. I really can't see them removing it everywhere now though at least, since heist now relies on run energy as one of its mechanics.

Doubt it, thats supposed to be the week before FotG. Probably some of the lesser stuff this week

I'm not sure I'd count this as a 2 content month. It seems like they probably rushed out revolution when they delayed one of a kind. So in effect the 2 pieces of content switched places. While one of a kind should have been in february, revolution was probably early march, so same number of releases as there would have been.

Apparently a 3000+ word project on before, during, and after zarosian empire. Seems substantial

Hail Zaros!

Its not really discussed, but it is briefly mentioned on the bottom, so its not like they didn't include it at all

Players have been asking for this, its not like Jagex just came up with this on their own.

Thats exactly my point. Castle Wars is fun, but its dead now. Without rewards that people want you have a dead minigame. You can blame the efficiency players, you can blame the endgame, you can blame whatever you want, but the fact is if you make a minigame without rewards that people want it is going to die.

Could possibly work, but then they aren't there for the minigame and probably would boost anyway if possible

Not true. People usually tend to boost when some reward they want is ridiculously hard to get, like Profound Armour or Hybrid sets. But how do you make something sufficiently rewarding and yet easy enough to get so it won't be boosted? It's the easiest thing in the world to do. Don't make it require hundreds of hours like Profound armour or Hybrid armour. Not hard to do. Then you get a dead minigame

Not true. People usually tend to boost when some reward they want is ridiculously hard to get, like Profound Armour or Hybrid sets. But how do you make something sufficiently rewarding and yet easy enough to get so it won't be boosted?

Not sure its been described well enough to know if its like that, but probably. Also its all text and apparently over 3000 words for the project.

I think the current focus on mastery capes is because its getting polled. Things dealing with polls always seem to get more attention than similar things that aren't being polled. Some people have been asking for better drops overall, but when demons/elementals/beasts/ghosts were being polled all attention turned to that. Same with the new dragon poll, people have been asking for adamant dragons for a while, but when that poll came out people zeroed in on that. Its not that those in favour of mastery have forgotten or no longer want skill cape reworks, its that this poll is happening and so they're focusing on that until the poll is over.

There are issues with that for some minigames like castle wars. You may need defenders on the floor right below flag in case someone breaks through, but someone may only break through 3 or 4 times a game. Games like castle wars leave a lot of sitting around time waiting just in case you're needed. In pc it makes more sense because you're only useful if killing or repairing so you can add an activity requirement. Mod Jack's current project, basically a text miniquest like thing which will show you memories of the mahjarrat about the rise and fall of zarosian empire.

The only thing I can think of to possibly remove boosting is to reward you for playing and not for how successful you are. It could still lead to boosting I suppose but maybe people wouldn't feel like boosters got an advantage. Maybe a point per minute played or something.