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Elemental Workshop IV and the Soul Altar


Jard_Y_Dooku

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Runecrafting is one of the oldest RS2 skills, in fact the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 7 years have passed since Runecrafting's first debut, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do. And that is release the soul altar, allowing players with a Runecrafting level of 90 to craft soul runes. We already know the level required to craft them is 90, due to patterns and level-up messages. We already know they will give 11 xp each, and that the tiaras will give 55 xp. We already know they're coming out - Jagex have already stated so, a soul talisman and tiara are already in the game (just not obtainable) and there is a portal in the abyss. It's inevitable.

 

The question is when and where. First let's go through a bit of history regarding Runecrafting. Originally, there were 13 different runes (not counting the life rune which was an unobtainable item in RSC, originally intended for summoning and never released). These were:

  1. Air
  2. Mind
  3. Water
  4. Earth
  5. Fire
  6. Body
  7. Cosmic
  8. Chaos
  9. Nature
  10. Law
  11. Death
  12. Blood
  13. Soul

From later updates, we got Astral runes, used for casting Lunar spells. Those are a unique rune and are not really relevant to our discussion. We also got 6 combination runes (mist, dust, mud, smoke, steam, lava) which are simply... combinations, of the elemental runes. Also irrelevant to our discussion. Lastly there are elemental (which acts as an air, water, earth or fire rune) and catalytic (which acts as any other type of rune) which are used in minigames. These simply exist for convenience rather than forcing players to carry 13 different runes. Don't worry about those either.

 

Now, these runes are usually grouped into several categories:

  • Elemental runes: Air, Water, Earth, Fire
  • Missile runes: Mind, Chaos, Death, Blood (I guess you could also call them combat runes but I'm taking "missile" from their in-game examine info)
  • Curse runes: Body, Soul
  • Uncategorized runes: Cosmic (enchantment rune), Nature (alchemy rune), Law (teleport rune)

Originally it was only possible to craft the first 9 runes - air through nature. In 2004 the Law talisman and altar were released, the talisman (untradeable) being a reward from the Troll Stronghold quest. At first the player could normally only get one law talisman, but could obtain more by dropping the first and requesting a second. Because this enabled players to craft large amounts of law tiaras for no cost and thus gain runecrafting XP very quickly, Then a second trick was used, which involved dying to drop a talisman, filling your inventory with buckets and requesting another. I believe you could get a maximum of two talismans this way. Finally in 2008, Jagex changed the architecture. Rather than granting a law talisman, the quest now granted access to the law altar itself, and talismans became tradeable (becoming consistent with the others) and were dropped by several different monsters such as guards. The altar is located on Entrana.

 

Back in time again. The year after, in 2005, the coveted death altar was released with the Mournings Ends Part II quest. The altar is located in the Temple of Light, deep below the Arandar mountains west of Ardougne. Then, after skipping two years, the blood altar was released in 2008 with the Legacy of Seergaze quest. The altar is located in a series of tunnels approximately underneath Drakan's castle.

 

Now, let us consider the locations of the altars. They each have a logical location that has something to do with the rune's element.

  • Air - located just west of Varrock, right out in the open. I don't think it's documented but I suppose you could say it's fairly windy around that area. The altar was formerly located south of Falador, just north-west of where the road forms a T. Its location was changed for whatever reason - Jagex claims it's the same distance from a bank as before, but I think it's closer, if only slightly.
  • Mind - this is the only altar with no real sensible explanation. It's located directly east of the Goblin village, and west of the Black Knights' Fortress. I suppose you could say that it's at the "top" of RuneScape (just below the Wilderness) just as the mind/brain/head is at the top of the body.
  • Water - located in Lumbridge Swamps. A watery place.
  • Earth - just east of Varrock, between the Lumberyard and Digsite. This one's also a little harder to place, since earth is everywhere, but the proximity of the Digsite to it (which is full of dirt/earth/digging/etc.) does make perfect sense. It's also located right next to the Silvarea mountain range.
  • Fire - located in Al-Kharid, near the Duel Arena. The desert is a hot and fiery place.
  • Body - near Barbarian Village. Barbarians are all about strength and combat and using the body. Makes sense.
  • Cosmic - in Zanaris. That's a pretty cosmic place if you ask me.
  • Chaos - in the Wilderness not far north of Edgeville. The Wilderness is lawless and chaotic.
  • Nature - on Karamja, in the middle of a jungle. Like earth, nature can be everywhere, but the fact that it's basically in the middle of nowhere and that jungles are generally seen as very "natural" reinforces it.
  • Law - on Entrana, a Saradominist island that does not allow weapons. This one's a no-brainer
  • Death - in the Temple of Light, accessible underneath West Ardougne and through the Underground Pass. Both of those places, especially the latter, and along with the evil elves, all involve plenty of death.
  • Blood - underneath Lord Drakan's castle. Vampires - this one needs no explanation.
  • Soul - ?

Now for details on the quests. Troll Stronghold was a fairly low-level quest, rated level 2 difficulty. Its predecessor, Death Plateau, was also low level (2 difficulty). This quest made sense, too, because you were helping the Burthorpe guard, which is a legal authority. Mournings Ends Part II was the 7th (or 6th, if you don't count Roving Elves, which was more of a sequel to Waterfall, but the requirements draw a straight like from Regicide through Roving Elves to Mournings Ends Part I so I guess it's officially #7) quest in its series, at master level. It had fairly "high level" requirements for a quest for its time. It started out with a small, innocent looking level-1 quest called Plague City. The next altar: blood. Legacy of Seergaze. This was a level 3 quest, the 4th in its series. "Mid level" requirements for a quest. This series also started with a small innocent looking level 3 quest with pretty low requirements.

 

According to Jagex, the soul talisman will also be a reward... but from what? It's now time for what we RuneScapers love most.

 

SPECULATING!

 

This is where the Elemental Workshop comes into play. We've had 3 quests so far, focusing on: elemental, mind, and body. I'm sure you're all aware of the popular "mind, body and soul"... saying, or whatever you refer to it as. As much as Jagex loves puns, there's no doubt that Elemental Workshop IV will involve crafting "Soul legs" or some other nonsense. Now the Elemental Workshop series is primarily a collection of puzzle quests. The requirements and difficulty levels (and the series' overall importance in the RuneScape mythology) are fairly low. Now, we must remember that Death Plateau, Plague City and In Search of the Myreque all started out small, but their plots did expand quickly, and their requirements did increase. We're already at the third quest without any sign of this. Personally, I believe this is just to throw us off, or just something that happened to be developed by coincidence. I'd love to hear your theories, though.

 

There's not a lot of "soul" oriented stuff in RuneScape, but I have no doubt the release of the last altar will be rewarded by an appropriate quest, with the altar located in the appropriate place. I have two possibilities in mind for this:

 

One is the Nomad quest. Soul Wars is all about souls. Nomad was collecting them to take over the world. Even though we were left with quite an interesting cliffhanger at the end and the reason he states "you ruined everything" could be because he was protecting or doing something with the soul altar, I believe it is more strongly connected to WGS and the Stone of Jas than anything else. So, while a possibility, a far less likely one in my opinion.

 

THE most likely candidate for the soul altar is... the gnome quests! Because of Hazelmere (also connected to WGS) - this is interesting due to what I said in the above paragraph, but it's probably coincidental; it's about equivalent to saying the Warriors Guild has something to do with the soul altar, probably. Anyways, there's 3 quests centering primarily on Glouphrie the Untrusted - The Grand Tree, The Eyes of Glouphrie, and The Path of Glouphrie. I don't think they're officially a series but do seem like it. Notice Glouphrie went to Arposandra, a hidden city, and experimented with the anima mundi, the life force of all living things. That, to me, screams soul more than anything else. I think it's also interesting to note that the dwarf quests are also heavily tied in with these, but those may follow a totally different subplot unrelated to the soul altar. We have two more of those quests planned. Also, due to the Waterfall quest, the elf, gnome, monkey and dwarf series are all tied together in some way. An interesting web.

 

Another thing i find fascinating is that the Soul Wars Island was moved from west of the elf region, to south of it. Do you think this has any significance? I'm particularly interested in why this was done. Perhaps it was just to save space and not waste a perfectly good body of water, but I still find it a bit suspicious.

 

SO, to end, I think Arposandra will likely be located at the very south of the elf region (probably underground), the entrance either being through that pipe thing where there are locked doors at the end, or even perhaps at the very bottom of Tirannwn, below the poison waste. That's a pretty small area to "censor", and it's been "censored" for quite a long time. We can only wonder what's north of Prifddinas, and east of the Sanguinesti region, eh?

 

So what are your thoughts on the soul altar? Predicted location? Predicted release dates? (For reference, Law - 2004, Death - 2005, Blood - 2008). I'm betting on 2011 since it's been such a long time and I don't really see them waiting any longer. 2012 at the latest.

  • Never trust anyone. You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.
  • Nothing is safe from the jaws of the decompiler.

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I wouldn't think the elf quests or lands considering they already have the death alter.

 

Your forgetting the marrahajat ?? i can never remember that darn name. And how one of them must be sacrificed to rejuvinate the others. Screams more soul alter to me then the gnome quests.

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Great read, I always love your topics.

 

Just one thing, I don't think Air Altar was moved to make it closer to a bank, as (I think) I recall that in the news post they said that the altar hadn't changed its proximity to a bank.

 

The Air Altar's location has moved to southwest of Varrock, next to the River Lum. It’s the same distance from Varrock’s west bank as it used to be from Falador’s east bank.

 

 

Another thing i find fascinating is that the soul altar was moved from west of the elf region, to south of it. Do you think this has any significance? I'm particularly interested in why this was done. Perhaps it was just to save space and not waste a perfectly good body of water, but I still find it a bit suspicious.

How do you know the location (or direction, at least) of the Soul Altar?

"It takes a big man to cry, but it takes a bigger man to laugh at that man."

 

-- Jack Handey

 

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I wouldn't think the elf quests or lands considering they already have the death alter.

 

Your forgetting the marrahajat ?? i can never remember that darn name. And how one of them must be sacrificed to rejuvinate the others. Screams more soul alter to me then the gnome quests.

 

It could also be both :rolleyes:

 

Soul altar could be the ritual site, and it sure is a fitting reward for the end of such a quest chain.

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tl;dr

 

Just Kidding!

Very well thought out post. I never really thought about how the Altars locales are subject to their runeset.

 

I personally think it will be EW4 that does it. Consdering that there is a pile of rubble next to the Body door which may mean an unexplored area and the saying: Mind, Body and Soul.

It would be interesting to see it tied in with the Gnome series though.

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Runecrafting is one of the oldest skills, and the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 10 years have passed, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do.

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts... runecrafting is one of the newer skills of runescape and was released a little more then 6 years ago. I'm sure there are others misfireing in there but i couldn't have been bothered to read it that thoroughly.

 

What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

First to 99 Farming on 27. September, 2005.

First to 3766 Port Score on 20. March, 2014.

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What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts.

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Interesting read. I know it would lead to completion of the skill, but I think jagex would need to make soul runes more useful before soul runecrafting would be a viable option in runecrafting.

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I wouldn't think the elf quests or lands considering they already have the death alter.

 

Your forgetting the marrahajat ?? i can never remember that darn name. And how one of them must be sacrificed to rejuvinate the others. Screams more soul alter to me then the gnome quests.

 

It could also be both :rolleyes:

 

Soul altar could be the ritual site, and it sure is a fitting reward for the end of such a quest chain.

 

I'm thinking the ritual site, too, and possibly new ancient magic spells that heavily utilize soul runes. The soul rune situation is very odd, because there are at least three questlines that could culminate in us being rewarded with the soul altar. The EW line seems to be the most "logical" considering that the next room is pretty much guaranteed to be the soul room, but I'm still thinking that the ritual stone in the Mahjarrat quests is a better candidate.

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Considering the kind of nonsense you have to go through to get to a bunch of the other altars (vampires! elves! dreams!.....heh), I think delegating the soul altar to a low level quest is a bit premature, especially considering that it's used for high level spells.

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What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts.

There is a differance between opinion and a fact. I'm not saying that all this is going to happen, but taking account all that i've seen so far, it is likely. very unoriginal post.

First to 99 Farming on 27. September, 2005.

First to 3766 Port Score on 20. March, 2014.

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I wouldn't think the elf quests or lands considering they already have the death alter.

 

Your forgetting the marrahajat ?? i can never remember that darn name. And how one of them must be sacrificed to rejuvinate the others. Screams more soul alter to me then the gnome quests.

 

Yes, I think this makes a lot of sense actually. That's a well-defined quest line, with a fairly easy and low-leveled starting quest (although it's easy to see from the start that this is an 'important' quest line, much more so than Plague City or In Search of the Myreque was).

 

Great read, I always love your topics.

 

Just one thing, I don't think Air Altar was moved to make it closer to a bank, as (I think) I recall that in the news post they said that the altar hadn't changed its proximity to a bank.

 

The Air Altar's location has moved to southwest of Varrock, next to the River Lum. It's the same distance from Varrock's west bank as it used to be from Falador's east bank.

 

 

Another thing i find fascinating is that the soul altar was moved from west of the elf region, to south of it. Do you think this has any significance? I'm particularly interested in why this was done. Perhaps it was just to save space and not waste a perfectly good body of water, but I still find it a bit suspicious.

How do you know the location (or direction, at least) of the Soul Altar?

 

The altar definitely seems a bit closer to me, if only slightly. And I meant to write Soul Wars Island, not soul altar. I'll fix that.

 

 

Runecrafting is one of the oldest skills, and the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 10 years have passed, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do.

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts... runecrafting is one of the newer skills of runescape and was released a little more then 6 years ago. I'm sure there are others misfireing in there but i couldn't have been bothered to read it that thoroughly.

 

What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

I meant one of the oldest RS2 skills (in fact THE oldest), and I was going by the beta (2003). You are correct in saying it's "little more than 6 years", it's about 6 and a half I think. I usually don't count months and tend to round quite overzealously (7 = 10). So it's not a misprint, just me rounding too much. :) I guess I'll change it.

 

And it's important because it's something that is guaranteed to be released but has gone so for many years. Just a pet peeve of mine, and I think it's fun to speculate about what will happen in the future. Many others also enjoy speculation. If you think soul runecrafting is useless, you won't hear any disagreement from me; I just think it's interesting and I always like things to be complete, regardless of how novelty they may be.

  • Never trust anyone. You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.
  • Nothing is safe from the jaws of the decompiler.

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Runecrafting is one of the oldest skills, and the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 10 years have passed, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do.

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts... runecrafting is one of the newer skills of runescape and was released a little more then 6 years ago. I'm sure there are others misfireing in there but i couldn't have been bothered to read it that thoroughly.

 

What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

I meant one of the oldest RS2 skills (in fact THE oldest), and I was going by the beta (2003). You are correct in saying it's "little more than 6 years", it's about 6 and a half I think. I usually don't count months and tend to round quite overzealously (7 = 10). So it's not a misprint, just me rounding too much. :) I guess I'll change it.

 

And it's important because it's something that is guaranteed to be released but has gone so for many years. Just a pet peeve of mine, and I think it's fun to speculate about what will happen in the future. Many others also enjoy speculation. If you think soul runecrafting is useless, you won't hear any disagreement from me; I just think it's interesting and I always like things to be complete, regardless of how novelty they may be.

I'm sorry for being so blunt about it, but as many people know, people do judge a book by it's cover, and the first statement in an article very commonly decides if you are or not going to read it, and as it was, it just wasn't right. rs2 realease was 29. march 2004, so it's as near as makes no differance 6 years 2 months from today. The 10 year statement is poor because even runescape itself isn't that old, and rc was the 19th(or even alot later if you count the failed skills) skill to be released.

First to 99 Farming on 27. September, 2005.

First to 3766 Port Score on 20. March, 2014.

First to 4664 Port Score on 2. March, 2015.

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Runecrafting is one of the oldest skills, and the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 10 years have passed, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do.

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts... runecrafting is one of the newer skills of runescape and was released a little more then 6 years ago. I'm sure there are others misfireing in there but i couldn't have been bothered to read it that thoroughly.

 

What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

I meant one of the oldest RS2 skills (in fact THE oldest), and I was going by the beta (2003). You are correct in saying it's "little more than 6 years", it's about 6 and a half I think. I usually don't count months and tend to round quite overzealously (7 = 10). So it's not a misprint, just me rounding too much. :) I guess I'll change it.

 

And it's important because it's something that is guaranteed to be released but has gone so for many years. Just a pet peeve of mine, and I think it's fun to speculate about what will happen in the future. Many others also enjoy speculation. If you think soul runecrafting is useless, you won't hear any disagreement from me; I just think it's interesting and I always like things to be complete, regardless of how novelty they may be.

I'm sorry for being so blunt about it, but as many people know, people do judge a book by it's cover, and the first statement in an article very commonly decides if you are or not going to read it, and as it was, it just wasn't right. rs2 realease was 29. march 2004, so it's as near as makes no differance 6 years 2 months from today. The 10 year statement is poor because even runescape itself isn't that old, and rc was the 19th(or even alot later if you count the failed skills) skill to be released.

 

icon_thumbsu.gif Slayer and Farming are good skills. The rest are stupid. Then again, as a skill itself, slayer is pretty dumb; I'd never implement it in my own game. I'd definitely have monsters that you'd need special abilities to kill, but I wouldn't have a skill for it, just like I wouldn't have an damn UNDERGROUND EXPLORING skill (you know, the 25th one they just released)? Hunter's also a good skill idea, RuneScape's version sucks. And construction should have been called house-making. It's too limited. Hmm, I'm getting kind of off-topic though.

  • Never trust anyone. You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.
  • Nothing is safe from the jaws of the decompiler.

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I dont understand why everyone is so convinced that soul is next in elemental workshop. It seems like to me that cosmic pants should be next, followed by gloves/gauntlets of nature, boots of law bringing, a sword of death and a cape of soul to top it all out. Just from a personal perspective, that seems much more complete, seeing as the series started out with ELEMENTAL. If it hadnt started out with elemental Id see heart, body, mind, and soul, etc, in some order, but it didnt.

 

Anyway, there are a lot of arguments for the soul alter being in several different places (I especially like the idea that it is the ritual alter), but Im going to vote with it being the source of power of aprosandra/goo that is forming the poison wastes. Im going to say that the poison wastes are spilled soul goo, just because I can. Icky, nasty soul goo. Seems like that would be good stuff to convert nice, normal dwarves into evil chaos dwarves with.

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I heard it's going to be accompanied by a sailing minigame.

hmg souls are blue like waterz@@@!sailing skall@@!GEJGEW

 

My guess is on majharat ritual site.

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Where is this soul talisman you speak of? I don't remember seeing it in game (Even if it's not obtainable, I've never seen it D:)

 

Also, great read! Topics like these make me love General Discussion!

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Great thread Dooku, we can always trust you with bringing us solid, interesting discussions. While I was reading your thread and came across the region "Silvarea" I actually scrolled up to see who wrote the thread. There aren't many people who know that name sadly.

 

 

Maybe it would be worth noting that Anima Mundi literally means "Soul of the World", a fact which strengthens your theory. By the way, there are only two quests dealing with Glouphrie. The Grand Tree quest centers around Glouph.

 

 

As for my own thoughts, I agree with most of the others posters above me. In my opinion the final installment of the Mahjarrat storyline would be perfect for the Soul Altar. The last and most powerful altar deserves one of the, if not the, longest and most interesting storyline known to Gielinor. Not to mention that the fabled 'Ritual Stone', used by the Mahjarrat to absorb and redistribute life force, sounds much alike to an altar stone with the ability to emit 'Soul' power. I can't see the Soul Altar being the reward of the Elemental Workshop storyline, it's just too simple. It revolves around you rediscovering machinery made by some inventor, which can produce moderately powerful armour. Not really worthy of the most powerful altar in my opinion.

 

Anyway, keep up the good work :)

Due to my epic stats, I have now started WGS (but I still hate spoilers).

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Runecrafting is one of the oldest skills, and the first to be released with RS2. Nearly 10 years have passed, and the skill is still incomplete. Only just... there's still just one thing left to do.

Please, do not post subjective misinformed information as facts... runecrafting is one of the newer skills of runescape and was released a little more then 6 years ago. I'm sure there are others misfireing in there but i couldn't have been bothered to read it that thoroughly.

 

What concerns soul runecrafting....why? Why is it important? there is nothing really missing from the runecrafting skill than an unused novelty altar seen once in a lifetime during a miserable quest? what ever quest it is released with, it's bound to have low requirements and be easy, and not have any good rewards.

 

I meant one of the oldest RS2 skills (in fact THE oldest), and I was going by the beta (2003). You are correct in saying it's "little more than 6 years", it's about 6 and a half I think. I usually don't count months and tend to round quite overzealously (7 = 10). So it's not a misprint, just me rounding too much. :) I guess I'll change it.

 

And it's important because it's something that is guaranteed to be released but has gone so for many years. Just a pet peeve of mine, and I think it's fun to speculate about what will happen in the future. Many others also enjoy speculation. If you think soul runecrafting is useless, you won't hear any disagreement from me; I just think it's interesting and I always like things to be complete, regardless of how novelty they may be.

I'm sorry for being so blunt about it, but as many people know, people do judge a book by it's cover, and the first statement in an article very commonly decides if you are or not going to read it, and as it was, it just wasn't right. rs2 realease was 29. march 2004, so it's as near as makes no differance 6 years 2 months from today. The 10 year statement is poor because even runescape itself isn't that old, and rc was the 19th(or even alot later if you count the failed skills) skill to be released.

 

icon_thumbsu.gif Slayer and Farming are good skills. The rest are stupid. Then again, as a skill itself, slayer is pretty dumb; I'd never implement it in my own game. I'd definitely have monsters that you'd need special abilities to kill, but I wouldn't have a skill for it, just like I wouldn't have an damn UNDERGROUND EXPLORING skill (you know, the 25th one they just released)? Hunter's also a good skill idea, RuneScape's version sucks. And construction should have been called house-making. It's too limited. Hmm, I'm getting kind of off-topic though.

 

By failed skills he meant the ones that were deleted, like Tailoring and EvilMagic/GoodMagic, not skills that came AFTER runecrafting.

 

The elemental workshop series, from what I can tell, has a very long-term goal in mind. The requirements and difficulty levels are ramping up at a very slow pace. I would say that maybe the fifth or sixth installment will have high enough requirements and finally contain a difficult puzzle to release the altar, if it IS being released with the EW series. Then again, the soul rune has neither the price nor the prestige it had years ago.

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And carpentry. :P Yeah I didn't read it properly.

 

Also, you think EW will go beyond 4? I was kind of thinking EW4/Soul would be the last. That would give us a full armor set - helm, body, legs, shield. I don't think capes, gloves and boots are generally considered to be part of an armor set by Jagex. For one, a cape sort of can't be armor, and gloves and boots have almost never been included in armor sets. Think about "rune sets" on the grand exchange, or the original set of metal items we could smith. It was helm, body, legs, shield (2 versions of each) and the rest were all weapons. Still is, I think.

  • Never trust anyone. You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.
  • Nothing is safe from the jaws of the decompiler.

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I suppose the soul altar is located at the Mahjarrat ritual site, because the Mahjarrat seem to be based on liches. A lich is a character who has moved his soul to an object outside of his body (phylactery, soul jar) in order to gain immortality (ability to resurrect after the body of the lich is killed). Koschei the Deathless in Russian mythology is a good example of a lich.

 

The soul altar probably bypasses the effect of the soul jar in the rejuvenation ritual, so the sacrificed Mahjarrat dies without a chance to resurrect.

 

The Death altar was probably originally a portal to Freneskae, which is a "deathly" world according to Enakhra the Mahjarrat. The evil elves wanted the death altar to summon their dark lord, who is suspected to be Zamorak.

 


  •  
  • If Zamorak the Mahjarrat God is the dark lord, we should hear something about it in the next (final) Mahjarrat quest.
     
  • The dark bow, dropped by the dark beasts, is the only bow that can shoot dragon arrows. Dragon items came from Freneskae according to the fairy who sells dragon items in Zanaris. Enakhra the Mahjarrat confirmed this in a postbag.
     

 

I remember it has been said somewhere that the law altar was originally a portal used by Saradomin to enter Gielinor. The blood altar was originally a portal used by lord Drakan.

 

The Moon Clan built the altars to places where the corresponding power was strongest. A portal to the world of death would be the best place to build the death altar over, for example.

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I suppose the soul altar is located at the Mahjarrat ritual site, because the Mahjarrat seem to be based on liches. A lich is a character who has moved his soul to an object outside of his body (phylactery, soul jar) in order to gain immortality (ability to resurrect after the body of the lich is killed). Koschei the Deathless in Russian mythology is a good example of a lich.

 

The soul altar probably bypasses the effect of the soul jar in the rejuvenation ritual, so the sacrificed Mahjarrat dies without a chance to resurrect.

 

The Death altar was probably originally a portal to Freneskae, which is a "deathly" world according to Enakhra the Mahjarrat. The evil elves wanted the death altar to summon their dark lord, who is suspected to be Zamorak.

 

  • If Zamorak the Mahjarrat God is the dark lord, we should hear something about it in the next (final) Mahjarrat quest.
  • The dark bow, dropped by the dark beasts, is the only bow that can shoot dragon arrows. Dragon items came from Freneskae according to the fairy who sells dragon items in Zanaris. Enakhra the Mahjarrat confirmed this in a postbag.

 

I remember it has been said somewhere that the law altar was originally a portal used by Saradomin to enter Gielinor. The blood altar was originally a portal used by lord Drakan.

 

The Moon Clan built the altars to places where the corresponding power was strongest. A portal to the world of death would be the best place to build the death altar over, for example.

 

Ooh, EXCELLENT point about liches/Mahjarrat relating to the soul altar. I'm actually kind of disappointed Jagex didn't call them liches (because they basically ARE liches)... in my game liches are gonna be called liches. :)

 

However I am glad Jagex added some Russian/Slavic mythology to RuneScape (Baba Yaga also). Koschei is simply awesome... he's got like, an ultra-phylactery. Although, I've never heard anything about Koschei's "phylactery" being difficult to destroy, whereas apparently liches' phylacteries (at least the D&D ones, from what I've heard) are super difficult. Or maybe I'm wrong, but one of my old friends said they are supposed to be hard to destroy. Bah! Anyways, both Koschei and Buyan are going in my game. :)

 

How do you know the next Mahjarrat quest is the final one? Has Jagex said so? Also, extremely interesting you mention about the portals' locations. I really never though about that before, but it does sound oddly familiar. That's extremely fascinating. EXCELLENT post, A+++. Bah, sounds like an eBay rating. nevertheless, A+++.

 

Ah, just looked at RS Wikia. Looks like you're right. "The Law altar was built by the Moon Clan, which was then a faction of the Fremennik mountain tribe. It is believed to have been built upon the very spot where Saradomin first set foot upon Gielinor in the Second Age."

Now, one thing I never understood about altars. Why do you use a talisman on them to get to them? The originals were destroyed by the Fremennik. Do the talismans use magic to recreate an original representation of them? Why do the insides look weird though? This is especially interesting. Many of them look logical. Law DEFINITELY does not. And death... trees growing underground? What? I just really don't get it. Are the talismans supposed to "restore" them to their original states? Why do the environments look SO different?

Also I can only understand the Fremenniks destroying the first 10 altars. How did they find the death altar hidden WAY deep underground, not to mention protected by the Temple of Light?! And blood... wouldn't the vampires have ripped them to shreds before they even got close? This is assuming them even knew the locations. And - (assuming soul's up near the Mahjarrats)... wouldn't they have bestowed skeletal death upon them? No matter where the soul altar's located, I'm sure that when it's revealed I'll be wondering how they found it...

Ooh, just before I post, Fire Altar on Wikia says "If the theory is true, that the inside of an altar is the past of the altar outside, the northern Kharidian Desert would be a volcanic area, however, there are no history records of this.". I read through them all, this was the only one that mentioned anything besides the Law altar being about Saradomin stepping foot there. Again, trees in the death altar? -.- UNDERGROUND?

Also, Water Altar says "Some theorize that the water altar's inside is the past of the water altar's outside. This seems unlikely, as Wizard Elriss explains that the isolated locations the Runecrafting Altars are located within are actually "pocket dimensions" created by the rune energy of the altars. He could, however, easily be referring to time dimensions, rather than spacial dimensions.".

Spatial dimensions would make more sense than time dimensions, though, seeing from the areas, such as tiled floors and the like. Then again, Mind altar says "The altar may be the remains of a former Zarosian fortress. A Zarosian symbol can be found south of the altar." That would explain the tiled floors. However, we come to underground trees yet again...

  • Never trust anyone. You are always alone, and betrayal is inevitable.
  • Nothing is safe from the jaws of the decompiler.

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Slayer and Farming are good skills. The rest are stupid. Then again, as a skill itself, slayer is pretty dumb; I'd never implement it in my own game. I'd definitely have monsters that you'd need special abilities to kill, but I wouldn't have a skill for it, just like I wouldn't have an damn UNDERGROUND EXPLORING skill (you know, the 25th one they just released)? Hunter's also a good skill idea, RuneScape's version sucks. And construction should have been called house-making. It's too limited. Hmm, I'm getting kind of off-topic though.

 

Hmmm I don't farm much so I have no opinion on that skill, but I agree, Slayer has become a very popular skill these days. I've seen more slayer capes than ever before, and I certainly hope for level 95, 97 and 99 creatures one day. If I worked for Jagex when they were planning on the Slayer skill, I would probably have given Slayer great power in the combat triangle, with levels giving you the ability to obtain items like hilts and modifiers which could be attached to slayer weapons in order to attack faster, hit more accurately etc. this way the skill would be even more enticing.

 

I'd also give it the power to increase your combat level by a maximum of 12 levels. Being it plays more of a combat role than pouchcrafting (summoning) where slayer requires 100,000+ monster kills (unless you soul wars it all), and pouchcrafting requiring about 40,000 waterfiends. Yet the lesser of the two gives combat levels, it doesn't make sense to me. I personally would have made Slayer more of a combat role with faster attack rates etc. as a reward for the many monster kills.

 

I agree with you about the dungeoneering skill failing XD I'm a combat fanatic myself, and I'm training it with genie lamps / tears of guthix / penguin points because it is so mind-boggling and annoying to level. But anyways... getting on topic =D I've always had the suspicion that the soul altar would be released with an update that opens up Prifddinas. I'm guessing the altar will be somewhere around Prifdinnas/Tirannwn anyway. Elves just have that sort of 'humble spirit' thing about them.

 

Either that or the next Elemental Workshop quest with the whole mind/body/soul theme.

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