NukeMarine

Given that there is a concept called "Time is Money", I think it's legit to give players the choice to use gp as a means for their contribution to upkeep a clan citadel. Technically, they are already paying gp by using their time on the citadels instead of on RS proper. However, only skillers are given rings to help make up lost skilling time. All other players get no return on invested time. Personal opinion, it should not be a simple "Pay and you're good to go". Jagex has a rough idea how much each skill produces or costs in the game thanks to the GE, so it can apply that here. Each area can have a paymaster and the cost per "10 minutes of work" could be based current estimate of what 10 minutes of work is worth. You can pay in chunks of 10 minutes. In addition, the payment only works if there's material for that plot. That means players can't pay for the smithing portion if they didn't pay (or no one gathered) for the coal portion. Benefits: Turns into a variant of Player Owned Houses but with a constant money sink. Many, many clans have lots of gp, but don't want to waste time on citadels. This gives them an opportunity in addition to getting GP out of the game and stabilize prices. Anyway, given the opinion on this forum that the Citadels were pretty much DOA this seems like a no brainer. Yeah, it'll tick off guys that want direct effort rewarded but I think they're a minority here. Obviously looking for input on what would be good methods of allowing GP payments, and all benefits and detriments that go along with doing this. *Edit* Took out references to skill levels as those aren't needed. Citadel upkeep is all about time. Players can pay for 10 minutes (whatever the game thinks 10 minutes of time is worth) and gathers whatever resources that would have been gathered in those 10 minutes. This happens in RS proper, so why shouldn't it happen in the Citadel? In addition, players can "assists" other players so that the assisted player gather resources under the name of the assisting player. Again, this happens in RS Proper.

Yeah, this is ackward, but you might want to re-read the description. It's 2.5% which is 1.025x for 30 minutes each day. HOWEVER: Imagine doing that with farming runs. Assuming you do trees and fruit trees, that's bound to be an extra 2500 to 3000 xp. Yeah, it's kind of hard to polish this turd. For the Jack of all Trades you seem to get a bankable tome that offers xp similar to strange rocks (Lvl^2-Lvl*2+100) or something like that. That it's bankable, can be every 27 hours (or once every other day if you're on a timeline), and accomplished in less than 5 minutes makes it a very good purchase.

Also they're saying you just have to get at least 1 xp in 10 different skills just like the description suggested. Someone noted that to get your reward, you must either wait for the aura to deactivate after 3 hours or just unequip it. Seems like a legit choice, though I don't like the 27 hour turnaround on using it. Hopefully enough people can complain to Jagex to make the cool-down only 21 hours so guys like me that play a little bit the same time everyday can use it consistantly. Of course, they never tied tears of Guthix or Bert to GMT new day, so I'm doubting they'll do this either. So if they change the cool down, it seems like a must have. 6500 xp in an expensive level 80 skill daily just by doing 10 quick skills would be silly to pass up. Until then, I might put it on the back burner until more awards come out.

There's a reason why vigilante justice didn't work out in medieval Europe. There's also a reason why Batman exists only in fiction. If the reward is insignificant, you reduce psychological incentive for a player to carry out an act - that's been proven. If the reward is too significant, you open the floodgates to totally different problems that would not have existed prior to implementation of such a practice. Paranoia. Flooding of reports. False reports. Tell me. How would you like it if someone ran up to you and asked "r u bot? answer or I REPORT U"? "I don't mind," you'll probably say. Good. Now imagine this happening every five minutes, day after day after day after day. A player should not be forced to interact with people he or she doesn't wish to interact with. I personally find it more enlightening to read CNN comments than interacting in any way with say, Ipkurmom1337. There's a reason why some of us simply play with public off. ;) Umm, we're talking an electronic landscape. It is a fictional setting so Batman is closer than medieval Europe if we're going for analogies. Anyway, it's not a problem assuming Jagex approaches player reports in a smart way. Basically, reports FROM older, established accounts that have skill levels and quest points should take priority when it comes to looking at it. In addition, younger accounts (the one's likely doing "r u bot" type detective work) that actually were legit reports can be tagged as reliable. Being reported is not a problem. Jagex isn't going "Wow, this account has 100 reports on it, it must be a bot". It's looking at the character actions. So yeah, you're not forced to talk to players. Now, programming wise, I'm wondering if Jagex has the ability to let each server different item numbers. It then randomly resets servers (small amount) and changes item numbers which pushes off bots. Shouldn't be much problem tracking accounts that don't log back onto reset servers. For fun, Jagex could lock highly suspect accounts to only those servers.

Only a few suggestions but they seem easy enough to implement with minimal impact on players: 1. Considering there are tens of thousands of players on the game that aren't bots, could it hurt to give out tools that actively work against bots? Nothing fancy, just something like the ring of stone where the character turns into an NPC or tree or other harvestable item in addition to fake drops that lure bots. Imagine a bunch of fake dragon bones or infernal ashes thrown about on top of a player pretending to be the fourth mithril rock that wouldn't fool a real player but bots may have issue with figuring out. 2. While they're at it, TELL PLAYERS when botters they personally reported (even if it wasn't their report that caused it) get punished and/or banned. Hell, give them anti-bot points or even a cape and you'll find players climbing over each other to report and hinder bots. People love to know when their efforts are effective and even better when appreciated. 3. Also, make character creation a lengthy process like before UNLESS it's sponsored in some way by an active account. It's a small thing, but helps making useful throwaway accounts more difficult. 4. Sounds harsh, but just completely remove bots and rolled back players from the high scores , although they can still be viewed when looked up individually. Remove ability to wear any type of milestone cape or equipment on top of that.

Pardon my naivety, but I assume there'd be a good or great set of youtube videos that illustrate the best ways to do dungeoneering floors, bosses, support, keying, etc. Wouldn't that alleviate a bit of the noob training factor? Yeah, there's the actual practice runs, but seeing what to do is bound to do more than just talking in chat.

I'm also interested in the Auras, but nobody has enough points yet to test out the level 2 auras yet. I'm interested in what the Jack of All Trades will end up doing and if it's worth the daily distraction and diversion or just a minor boost for guys. Seeing that Level 3 is starting out at 40,000 points I'm guessing that level 4 will be 100k. So even when you're at 1 year and getting 15,000 points a month it'll take 6 to 8 months to get such a high level auro. That means people can't do the "gotta have them all" mentality. You're going to have to bite the bullet and go for what you think helps the way you play your character.

I like how there are a variety of reasons people are giving for both quitting and coming back now and again. For all its faults, the game does offer entertainment for a small price. Thankfully, I'm not driven to max out a character nor is it necessary to enjoy the game as I'm playing it.

The Tip.it times touch on it, but it'd be nice to hear reasons from those that did stop for a bit and what got you playing again. Personally, I stopped when I went overseas to Japan as getting a consistent connection was impossible in my situation. I kept up on what was happening and still posted now and again, but did not play. It wasn't till like three years later that I re-upped membership to try out the new dungeoneering skill for a couple of months (happened to be in the US for training during that time). What got me going recently was the start up of member loyalty points. Figured that the points would be reasonable to build up even if I didn't play at, which led me to doing some daily/weekly tasks (mtk, tears, circus), which further led me to level farming (doing pineapple/calquat since it's once per day), doing penguins (did both quests recently to max out), hanky, quests, etc. I'm not grinding like I used to, just doing the daily/weekly tasks on top of the occasional catch up quest (still have 40+ over the last four years to do). Kind of cool figuring out the new best way of doing things.

Let me ask you a question: Players have been maxed out at 138 for quite some time now. Would a level 138 from 3 years ago be able to defeat a level 138 in today's time? The reasonable response would be no as in the last three years players have had access to additional resources and equipment which do not effect the basic combat level (and archaic and unbalanced system at the best of times). Since the release of the Barrow Brothers, there have been NPC's much tougher than their level suggested due in part for non-level affecting "gear" that they count as wearing. Basically, the Mahjarrat are powerful not just in combat stats, but in equipment and skills that make them approach godhood like status.

First Article: I pretty much stopped playing RS when I transferred to Japan four years ago. During that time I did keep up with the game. After my return from a deployment to Africa dungeoneering came out so I played again for a month or two then stopped. Oddly enough, it was the member awards program that got me to re-up and keep membership since 6 bucks a month is nothing (the military pays well these days). That in turn got me to do small upkeep chores with the distractions and diversions and farming (since it's once daily, I can use the really cheap pineapple and casquat seeds). Instead of doing hours of grinding like I did way back when, I'm doing 30 minute tasks once a day with the odd skill leveling, achievement or quest on the week-end. To be honest, this BXPW was the only time I was grinding a skill (hunter and magic). Not sure the point. Since I'm not grinding for a skill or getting gp, I'm not directly annoyed by the bots. All the updates of the last four years are fun to catch up on if you're not trying to finish them as fast as possible. Make it less a chore, and more an evening stress reliever. Second Article: Have to agree that these updates breathed new life in how to approach the game. Instead of just needing combat to be good at combat, now a player needs to have multiple high levels to compete. I see that as only a good thing since how can you seperate guys that are 99 in all combat skills? What I hope will happen in the future are items that require multiple high skill levels to make/use. In addition, they should up the level cap to 120 for all skills (not at once, perhaps one skill every month). Oh, and given their willingness to have specialized servers, create servers where overloads and other non-combat items that impact p2p combat can be used.

Still hoping they'll make a group of closed off servers (economy and log ins) where only members can create a new account (kind of like RSC is now). However, if they do it, I hope they hammer the use of bots much harder on those servers. That way, Jagex can still claim bot cash on the majority of servers, but players that would like to start in a fresh economy not impacted by free world and member bots can play RS in a new perspective. I'm not missing something in this idea am I? It seems that Jagex is not serious about stopping bots on its regular servers anymore.

Yes, I open up a garden with a path that I state must not be walked. I don't block it off or even guard it. However, I ask the tax payers to fund police to capture anyone walking down that path, cause it's against my financial security to block it off myself. Please get my point, Jagex is in it's right to stop real world trading. It's idiotic to think that it should use tax dollars to enforce that concept which is a business decision at most. At the moment, it's taking extreme defense with regards to copyright and trademark. That'll only go so far as pointed out in this thread. TL:DR - Jagex, police thyself.

Well, I'm no lawyer, but I don't see your point. If you were hiring them to train your account or for a bot, you could say that...but account and all of its items are property to Jagex, no matter how much time you put into that. You're selling the account or the gold, you're selling Jagex's property. And that's it. I still don't see why Jagex bothers to sue for copyright infringement regarding the domain name - it's worse than useless. They have a bad chance of winning, in any case it will cost them money for lawyers etc., and the RWTers can just switch to another domain which increases their reputation as they can claim "Jagex can't touch us" basically. No, Jagex is "claiming" that that electronic information belongs to them. You as a player have agreed to it. It's between you and Jagex and the courts don't get involved. In fact, what little footing Jagex had it got rid of with the return of real world trading. To take a real world trading company to court over actual real world trading, Jagex would have to admit that it has the ability to completely stop it (introducing zero trade between players) but refuses to do so. In fact, it went and made it even easier to real world trade. But, pretty please, with sugar on top, can you stop these bad people from taking advantage of our desire to make more money cause we don't want to stop it ourselves. See, the rwt's aren't hacking or circumventing security protocols. They're playing the game as it's offered. Jagex just doesn't like it, but refuses to stop it cause it lacks the technical ability to do it in a way that'll not destroy it's user base. It's like me moaning about people robbing my house, but I refuse to lock the door cause I might lose a customer. No, it's worse that that, it's putting all my property on my front yard then moaning to the cops if somebody walks off with something cause I'm too lazy to watch from the porch. All that said, it is Jagex's property. If they remove your stuff cause you're not playing like they want you to, then don't complain or claim just status.

It may be a small update, but it's got potential to allow some great prayer armor. Imagine a full set of level 50 prayer armor that allows a max passive prayer points of +100 (equivalent of +10 prayer) while a full set of level 80 (80 def, 80 prayer to wear) would allow max passive of +400 prayer points on top of standard prayer bonuses. While they're at it, it'd be nice if they create a prayer book for skills. In addition create instant action prayers that consume a set amount of points per activation. Anyway, yes, they might as well change summoning and run energy to x10 since that's the logical path for the main screen HUD.

The armor seems like a great step in the right direction. It'd also help, at least for CW, to allow for CW specific bows and staffs with unlimited ammo/runes (at a reduced xp rate) so that you're not tied to spending a minor fortune if you want to do something other than melee. You

Sounds totally realistic. Should be any day now. Jagex: "You think some bot is going to log onto the game and ruin us? No! We are the one that logs".... Ok, a very bad BB attempt. Still, that line about being able to hand bots with the return of free trade parallels the heights of arrogance that Walter White achieved.

Yes, it's getting and will continue to get easier. It's from that that I assume we'll see RS allow all skills to go upto 120 in time. Hopefully Jagex is smart and offers tangible benefits to each level of a skill for 100 to 120.

Only the beginning. Jagex has been releasing and getting away with tons of, "That's minor in my book update." over the last few weeks and months. Each time, pushing their luck a little more and sinking a little lower. Each time not taking the interests and cares of their loyal members into consideration... What few of them are still human. Facebook. Loyalty programme. Katana. Temp bans (for members). Refer-a-friend. On and on and on. Again, only the beginning. Ps. Hello, Eduardo. Actually, I like it each time Jagex makes the game "easier", where by easier I mean not having to click for the sake of clicking. To me, the game has done nothing but improve gameplay wise. Granted, let's face it, I'm not to common audience. I didn't play pretty much for four years till recently (minor comeback due to dungeoneering release). Even now it's just minor playing catching up on quests and tasks. I'm not the type that desires 99 lvl, 200 mill xp, top score or max stats even though I understand the motivation. For me it actually is about having fun even though I know how to max out stats or cash. That said, I can appreciate how bots are destroying the game, and am disappointed at the bald face lie made by the CEO when free trade was being bandied about for making a return. This though is just a minor improvement to the game. Yes, it'll help bots but that's a seperate issue that'll exist even if referral didn't happen. Plus, it's not the drastic x2 skill weekend. TL, DR: The game has been around 10 years and apparently has been ruined or died every month in that time. I think RS will suffer the same fate with this update.

Personally I'm for the update. Yes, it'll be abused by the guy that wants a desperate 10% boost for 5 weeks out of the year and is willing to pay 30 to 40 dollars to get it. Yes, it'll be abused by botters to help level up their mining accounts. Yes, it's likely to create more credit card fraud that supposedly started the move away from free trade though that's likely a non-issue now. And yes, it is a microtransaction in the way members is a microtransaction. Likely there'll be other methods to follow. Yes, it's a cheesy way for Jagex to bolster it's "paying member" numbers after the whole 10 million accounts (or whatever number pulled from lower orifices) meant 9 million throw away free acounts lost steam. Still, it's a referral program and will be legitimate for players that are introducing friends and family. It's legitimate for the player that's starting a secondary account for whatever reason (as stated by Jagex, though I wonder if Jagex is dropping the ban on account interaction. Plus, it's only 10% for a week with a limit of five weeks a year. That's minor in my book.

I'm still disappointed, though not suprised, at the bot situation in RS with the return of free trade. Jagex CEO loudly claimed that RS had an easy handle on the situation, then quickly it's apparant they had nothing that was streamlined enough to automatically stop the bots. As for the referral program, don't be so dramatic about it. First, members itself is a micro transaction. So now somebody, if they're desparate, can pay $40 (five throwaway member accounts) to get 5 weeks of 10% boosts. However, it also allows the legitimate player that's making a secondary character with a nifty boost for a week till level 30 in skills. Personally, it's a minor tradeoff. Yes, we're not stupid. We all know it's a money game. The same thing happened with the member rewards program. Still, last I checked, Jagex is a for profit business. All that said, I'd still love for them to create a group of isolated member servers where only new characters can play on (no GE, no alchemy, cannot log onto non-new servers). Seriously, if I'm going to start a new character, I'd love it to be on a group of servers that doesn't have 10 years of economic and bug damage to it.

I'd agree that environmental updates don't draw as many oohs and aahhs from players. Usually it takes a radical NPC update to bring that about. Anybody that remember the original dragon graphics update a few years back will note those were considered one of the best updates of the year despite not adding to gameplay. Of course, that was a pretty big jump that was pre-high detail update. Basically, many players would appreciate noticeable update to the graphics and gameplay of existing content. The new "stay members and get benefits" can hold over the "need continual new content" crowd for now.

Personal opinion that "influential" means you impacted how others played the game. This is seperate from being famous which is more along the lines of popularity. As such, influential would be guys that introduced tactics (combat and skilling), brought about change in the game itself (suggestions), or produced highly used guides such as this site. In that vein, I'd nominate Tomisme as pretty influential pre GE. If you didn't know, in the forums, he had a long running stickied topic that listed a reasonable going rate of tradable items. It was a useful if not vital tool for those that didn't want to get scammed on lesser traded items. Oh, and he was in the top 5 ranging skill for a long time.

Personally, I'm glad after all these years they're not only basing death saves on GE prices, but they're letting players decide the items to keep. This is literally a long awaited update. About making death more deadly in RS It's been suggested before that Jagex can add stricter penalties for death, especially in the boss and high level NPC areas. Imagine the following: At key areas (mainly boss dungeons), when you die your items still go to a gravestone, however you can't retrieve them from it. Instead, Death appears at your respawn location and you must pay him the high alchemy value (or 1/3 GE value if higher?) of your items to get them back. Jagex can make this more dangerous by reducing items saved on death to 2, 1, 0 and 0 w/ no item protect depending on the level of the bosses. Anyway, pay the death tax, and death gives you your items.

But wait, a year is actually 365.256 days!!! You'll be shortchanged $1.25 that year. Only buy a year's worth of members on Leap years where you stick it to Jagex for a whole $3.75. You can spend the other three years hanging around vending machines hoping to collect the occasional dime or nickel that falls to the floor, as that's more productive than the BW wasted by this thread. Or you can just assume it's easier for accounting purposes for both members and Jagex to charge on the same monthly day. Most people are paid on the same days each calender month so having CC charges on predictable days also help. Guys, seriously, it's like 5 or 6 dollars a month. Dog food costs more. Jagex ain't out to rip off your chump change on an individual level.