NukeMarine

Can you explain what this would accomplish? As it stands, you're effectivily punishing someone for changing gear to meet/evade your opponents weaknesses/strengths, and I thought that is something they want to encourage. I honestly don't see what's bad about changing your gear. That's the point. I'm not claiming Runescape is like real life, however in real life it takes time to remove and put on armor. If you're an archer and the knight closes in with you, you might have time to switch weapons, but you're not putting on full plate. Instead of 5 to 10 minutes it'd take in real life, a simple 9 second cooldown will discourage such activity in fast paced gameplay. As far as gameplay is concerned, I think this further helps the combat triangle by discouraging on the fly hybriding. It even makes combat a bit simpler as you and your opponent won't change up the situation by switching armor. Anyway, I doubt Jagex will ever do this, but I do think it'd be a beneficial change overall.

If they're still going to have the Combat Level formula and base it only on skills then it'll still be broken. Anyway a couple of things I hope change, but probably won't: * Each armor slot will have a cool down timer activated in combat. Take off armor and you have to wait a certain time before wearing a new type. So hand and feet would be 3 seconds, head and legs would be 6 seconds while chest requires a 9 second cool down. * Combat level is based both on skills and equipment in your inventory

Any word on if you can visually see when the abilities become usable again? A color change timer like the HP and Energy has near the mini-map seems best. In addition, they can do this in potion and food slots, however the color change represents when you get the most from that slot such as lower health means more of the food shows normal while stats decreasing means more of the potion looks normal. Does this make sense to everyone else or am I explaining it badly?

Inb4theymaketheCruciblearequirementforthecompletionistcape. :unsure: LOL! Look out guys, Runescapes about to get a lot more boobier! :lol: I really hate that I seem to be the only straight male on the internet that can't stand for this kind of crap. Armour, even robes, shouldn't have a giant "stab here" section on it for females. It's ridiculous and impractical, and it's not like men get assless chaps armour all the time either. I'm all for sexy outfits, but not in combat. That's ridiculous. Same was said a few years back when they made the female avatars skinnier with thinner arms and larger breasts. Personal opinion, but female warriors that have to be functional in heavy armor using heavy weaponry will have a body type more like women that do CrossFit or other various intense forms of training: which won't matter anyway since you can't make out the body when they're wearing combat gear like the modern day versions of female warriors:

The fishflingers is a good update. The SOF just turned into a major cash grab by Jagex. It has given players a 1 week window for a decent chance at getting a soon to be discontinued item. Before this, the SOF was essentially paying $200 for ~500k experience (I'm going off memory) since none of the items you got were really worth it. Now, players that believe a discontinued item could turn into 100m+ gp (~$50 value) might be willing to part with $20 for that chance. Jagex knows this and it's pretty shady. Before, I'd argue the SOF was not gambling since it quickly became obvious that you got predictable experience. So guys with money was buying experience. Now, it's gambling since rare items may not pop up even with a $20 purchase on an item that may or may not turn valuable in a year or two. I'll still play, but this is pretty low.

For SoF, I thought most agreed it's not so much gambling but buying xp. There's a predictable result of 750 spins in relation to the xp you'll get. This does not excuse SoF, but don't try to use the gambling addiction argument. The distractions article was very good and applies to my play style. The weekly events can fill a few hours on the weekend while the daily chores of Jack of all Trades and battlestaffs give a decent reason to log in for a few minutes at least. And the 'did you know' is something I did not know. Guess I'll be putting it to use later.

I don't think there's any way that they're suddenly going to do what is the literal equivalent of turning non combat skills into combat skills. Remember the uproar over herblore when extremes/overloads were released? It wouldn't be as bad if it was limited to pvm, but I still think it would end up creating situations where you'd end up needing to train non combat skills to remain competitive at bosses, or get the best slayer exp rates or whatever. First, I'm in the camp that says a fully developed character both in skills, equipment and quests should have a better advantage over those that just leveled combat skills. I loved when they first introduced extreme potions then got mad when they nerfed the use. I love that high level quests gets a person access to high level combat items and abilities. Second, if they're reworking the combat level to be based upon what you're capable of at the moment (items in inventory, selected combat abilities, actual skill level) then there's no problem there either. If you select an ability unlocked from woodcutting, then your combat level will be higher anyway. Big assumption on my part, but time will tell. Third, as I said, gathering skills were already combat in nature. It's just that the NPC didn't move, had 1 hitpoint, and one guaranteed drop. Thinking about it more, I'd like to see them rework the gathering skills like they're reworking combat. What's wrong with some varied gathering animation in addition to some gathering specific abilities you can activate just like combat. Going a little further and having some abilities unlocked with non-combat skills have a benefit in combat would be a natural progression. My main point is that Jagex has a good window of opportunity here to make this expansive update to be more than just about combat. Incorporating abilities into all the other skills just makes more mundane aspects of the game more fun. It'd be kind of cool if an area of effect ability allowed you to gather logs from surrounding trees. Hell, it may even encourage Jagex to release skill based slayer monsters (golems, ents, sharks, tangleberries, etc) finally which would be like the monsters on Runespan but actually attack back.

Lol sorry, and yeah I understand. Thanks though, it was helpful in tracking down all of the mod's comments. Since they're saying that the update will allow combat to grow, there's nothing stopping them from later having skills unlock specific abilities. For example, fishing, firemaking, woodcutting and agility can unlock abilities useful against water, fire, earth and air based creatures. Smith and Crafting can grant abilities to exploit weaknesses in the various armors. Depending on balance, this can be limited to PvM. Even better, these abilities could be used while skilling which could add some more fun. After all, what is a mining rock (tree, fishing spot, etc) but an slayer like NPC that you can only attack with a specific weapon and usually with 1 hitpoint and a guarenteed drop. From the sounds of it, you'll have limited amount of abilities active on the main screen so I doubt it'll be unbalanced. Plus, it'll be similar to letting high level quests unlock abilities.

If I'm assuming correctly (and I never do), the mod is talking about leveling non-combat skills to help unlock combat abilities. This sounds like a great thing and something that's been suggested for years (most common being the flame sword). Of course, I'm now wondering about the skills that already had direct impact on combat which are prayer, summoning, and herblore. I also like that gm quests are getting even more love. Anyway, looks good so far. There'll be a 2 to 3 month beta if all goes well. Looking forward to it. *Edit: Whoops. Just read the RSOF thread and the mod specifies combat skills. Oh well.

About replies to article two: I've never been convinced that having to do 1200 clicks an hour makes something more valuable and worthwhile than having to do 100 clicks an hour. The hour is still spent, you just have opportunities to type to other players or not focus fully on where your mouse is every second of the hour. Fishing and woodcutting were sort of like this from the start of RS2, and any change that added this aspect to other click fest skills were gladly welcomed. On top of that, I'm all for the exponential increase in XP gains when you gain levels vice the old linear increase that just made RS a grind. The first time Pyramid Plunder was released, it became apparent this was the way for Jagex to help players train their skills. Simple changes in the Agility dungeon (new arrow pops up as soon as you get a ticket, diagonal 80+ agility paths) and the Beacon network (get bonus xp when relighting beacons that burnt out ie keep as many beacons burning all the time) could also allow this. Yes, balance can be an issue. I'm more inclined to the passive XP with no items gained (runespan, ivy) versus active XP with profitable products (runecrafting, trees). What I'm waiting for is the runespan equivalent for prayer and herblore. That'll upset the economy is an amusingly chaotic way.

Just as Runespan made runecrafting into a pseudo combat skill, you can do something similar with Firemaking (and other skills). For example, there could be a variant of Pyramid Plunder where you travel increasingly difficult areas to fight zombies and mummies using fire. Your only usable weapon can be something like a metal torch where higher level attack and firemaking is needed to wield, light, and attack with it. Each area can require increasing level of firemaking to access. Maybe you have a time limit to clear each area in order to access the next. Heck, there can even be slayer or other requirements to be able to attack the creatures. Probably more fun than just tossing logs on a camp fire.

Gower once said the main purpose of RS are the quests. The skills are there to make milestones for the quests. I'm not getting this argument that one should treat the skills as if they're an entity unto themselves (with maybe DG as an exception). So instead of a click every second, people are doing a few clicks every 90 to 120 seconds. It's still playing the game. After all is said and done, the amount of character time spent on the skill is still the same. When the time comes to do the quests or DG or certain mini-games, then the attention can be there as well.

It just occurred to me that using a skill as an attack ability was an old suggestion I had with updating slayer to incorporate other skills. While I thought of other skills, I never thought of runecrafting. Seeing how Jagex knocked this one out of the park, it would have been simple to add a slayer requirement to the hounds and wraiths in Runespan. That would not have subtracted much from runespan as esslings could still be used for the ess. The other skills I thought could be for slayer monsters: Mummies - Fire, Sharks and fish (in underwater areas) - Fishing, Ents - Woodcutting, Golems - Mining, Shrubs - Farming, etc. Wonder if Jagex could still consider it?

Makes sense that a good friend chat dedicated to runespan should work. The one I tried (noderunners on w103) didn't do so well at announcing the node locations and cared more about chit chat. Still, a good friend chat channel should keep you up on a nearby node that may be worth running to. Reason being, more people will run to it making the node last longer. Plus, they're quicker at hunting down the sphere. So is there a good runespan friend chat?

Level 80 results Nebula - 32,14 xp (152 attempts) Shifter - 31.40 xp(290 attempts) Jumper - 30.03 xp (184 attempts) Anybody else getting these results on nodes?

Disagree with the Runespan article. Changing the ingame RC aspects by increasing rune amounts or making the altars closer to banks don't make RC more profitable. Putting more runes in the game makes runes cheaper, not more expensive. This is probably a good time for someone to do an article highlighting the various "mini-games" that have become the defacto skilling areas which don't introduce economy crushing items into the game: Herblore Habitat (hunting), Curly Roots (FM), Sawmill (WC) and now Runespan (RC) come to mind in addition to Pyramid Plunder (THF) and Artisan Workshop (SMTH). Removing old skilling methods that depended on expensive ingrediants yet introduced millions of useless byproducts just worked against itself. With the mini-game skilling taking over, that leaves room for created items to gain value as they're made for profit, not for xp.

Thought I'd attack the most efficient XP/hour another way. These are either 100 attacks (siphons) on the esslings or 200 attacks on the esshounds. I'll be doing the last esshound and two esswraiths (w/ 300 attempts) in a bit. This gives you a simple XP average per siphon which gives a decent xp/hour gauge. My assumption, backed by early results, is that the success rate on creatures corresponds to success rates on nodes. I'll also be testing nodes for completion sakes. Long term should have players gathering data based on every 5 levels (99, 95, 90, 85, etc). This'll give the best guide on what players should attempt for most efficient leveling. Level 79 (skull nodes best) essling (100 siphon attempts) 1. air - 8.31 xp 1. mind - 7.86 xp 5. water - 9.53 xp 9. earth - 10.26 xp 14. fire - 10.76 xp esshounds (200 siphon attempts) 20. body - 13.51 xp 27. cosmic - 13.04 xp 35. chaos - 13.73 xp 40. astral - 14.37 xp 44. nats - 15.17 xp 54. law - 15.06 xp (.468 tokens) esswraiths (300 siphon attempts) 65. death - 16.65 xp (.683 tokens) 77. blood - 15.61 xp (.63 tokens) low nodes (>100 attempts) 1. cyclone - 15.57 xp 1. mind - 16.50 xp 5. water - 18.20 xp 9. rock - 21.50 xp 14. fireball - 17. vine - 21.98 xp (125 siphons) med nodes (>100 attempts) 20. fleshy 27.285 (135 siphons) 27. firestorm 35. chaotic 40. nebula 34.817 xp (235 siphons) 49. shifter 54. jumper high nodes 65. skulls 74. blood pools

Here's the best method: Write down your XP, start siphoning the type of node or monster you're measuring. Count ALL the clicks (hits, partial, misses) which should be easy. After 100 clicks (or 200 or 300 clicks, etc), write down your XP. You now have an average of XP/click. I don't know how many clicks you get per minute, but it should be close to 60. The more you do this, the more accurate the XP/click you'll have. If you AFK, it's best to measure monsters as that's the thing you'll be clicking on the most. If you're on a CC and hunting nodes, then figure out the best node for your level.

Shame. Jagex built up some good karma with the Runespan release, then urinate all over it with this horrible attempt at justification. Players didn't really hate the SoF release aside from it being too blatant. They freaking hated the microtransaction update as it gave a predictable means to level characters using real world cash. Strange that neither of those points were addressed in this "update", as others point out. To be fair to Jagex, people for some ungodly reason were buying gp and in a way xp from other sources for almost a decade. Jagex introduces a gaudy, but still legal in game method to at least buy xp. If people are going to spend extra money to improve their way of playing the game, I guess I'd rather see that cash go to Jagex than some gp farmer in China.

I'm going to take a wild guess and say that everyone's definition of normal playing is just what they're doing, while addiction is just something more than that which is obviously not them.

The current system works fine, you can spend a few minutes making the armour if you wish to do so or you can spend your time finishing the dungeon. So you don't have a solution. At least you're honest about it. About the actual update, hopefully, the belt will be modified by the ring. The more you upgrade the skiller slot, the more higher tier items you can store on your belt. Hate to see it like the in game belt where there's no pre-requisite for the slots and what goes in them (besides the untradeable quest specific items).

then there would be no point to binding anything other than slayer drops. everyone would just craft a set of new armor every reset, then continue as planned for the next reset. Only with full body armor. That'd be ridiculously game breaking. the only difference between that idea and actually giving everyone ~10 binds would be the few minutes spent each reset. Everyone? Everyone has 120 DG? I must have missed that memo. Now, if you meant everyone with 120 DG would just spend a certain amount of time getting level 10 gloves, boots, helm and legs then I think you'd be right. However, it's an effort they'd have to expend each prestige set. This wouldn't be just one guy, but all five guys on the team getting decked out again. I don't know the common appearance level 10 ore/hide/cloth, but I think it'll take more than a few minutes. Even then, with the exception of legs which are likely bound anyway, the boosts are nothing compared to one bound chest armor. Still, I'll bite, what's your solution to allow a reasonable method to use promethium drops such as gloves, boots and helm in the game besides a photo op.

I think I'm in the acceptance phase. From all the posted results, this is less gambling and more buying experience. I'm not the type of guy that'll spend 20 dollars for about 125k xp in RC, but if 4 hours of game time saved is worth that to you, have at it. If there's one saving grace, it's that they are experience lamps, so you get better results if you have higher levels. Probably from now on, people should just track the amount of lamps they get on average from spins instead of the xp itself. That'll give Tip.It calculator wizards a chance to help allow people to determine how much runecrafting or herblore levels can cost them. ps: I'm still not comfortable with the saved credit card option. What are the precautions taken for account users under 18 years old?

What can help dungeoneering is the addition of Prestige Binds which are binds that disappear when you reset your prestige. Nothing overpowered, just the ability to prestige bind more as you level: gloves (lvl 1), boots (lvl 50), helmets (lvl 99), and legs (lvl 120). With that, many of the early boss drops have a reason to be picked up and actually used. Another option is some method to change your combat style without all the headache. Currently that means destroying melee based binds when you find or create magic or range based binds. An easy fix is create sort of a dungeoneering deposit chest in the boss room. This box can store say 20 dungeoneering items but deposits only, no withdrawing while in the dungeon. You can even deposit bound items. When you create or join a party, you are given the option to withdrawing items from this chest and binding them prior to starting the new dungeon. With that, a melee character can store all his equipment at a boss room, exit the dungeon, start a new team, and bind mage items. Offers much more playstyle variety for the higher skill levels and gives players a good reason to max out all their ring styles. These coupled with the tool belt should make it more fun to approach dungeoneering in a more casual style.

That's a hell of a leap for that article to take. It's just as easy to conclude people are not being more honest, they're being more paranoid. In the first example, going off instinct most will enter a more favorable result which in the experiment is labeled cheating. In the second example, giving people more time could just mean they have more time to consider the false case of the results or test are actually being monitored. On top of that, this test looks like it was done in isolation. Being a social animal, men and women will be more likely to cheat if they first see that others are cheating and getting away with it. Then again, they also take offense if they see someone cheating at something they did the hard way first. Turns out it's not a noble feeling of justice, it's more along the lines of sour grapes. People don't like the idea of others having an advantage they did not. Similar to the feeling of unequal justice if a person punished when others were not such as speeding tickets. Anyway, it was a good experiment in the article, but I wouldn't draw too much from it.