Reflections of a 9-year veteran

[Ammako]

Found this on the RSOF, I thought this was worth a read:

 

The last of of old Runscape combat has now come and gone.

For some, this may be a sad day and for others, it is the exciting start of something new.

 

Either way, it is change; and change is in itself inherently neither good, nor bad. I have played Runescape for nine years and have seen many, many things both come and go. I began playing in 2003, first for a year as a non-member. The following year I became a member and began to really play the game. As someone enrolled in school, I often had to balance my schooling, life and gaming habits carefully. I had real life friends play Runescape for a time, and they too came and went, switching to more "visually impressive MMOs". However, Runescape has never disappointed me as a game, and I have always vouched thus. Runescape has a rich story and diverse community that enables it to take directions that many MMOs cannot.

 

Throughout my nine years playing I have seen the introduction of the Grand Exchange, the removal of the wilderness and free trade, as well as their comeback. There is one key point to take away from this little story: Change is inevitable, and although that change may seem bad or good, you have to really ask yourself something.

 

Do I enjoy playing Runescape?

 

If the answer to that is no, then I encourage you to seek out other games. There are many good developers in existence that may have games you will enjoy.

However, if the answer is yes, I encourage you to embrace the changes ahead. Yes, they will be difficult to get used to at first, and they may seem as drastic changes to the familiar. Nevertheless, I encourage you to remember WHY it is you enjoy playing Runescape. Just as the removal of the wilderness seemed outrageous at first, it all worked out in the end, just as I foresee this change.

Just as this change is happening now, undoubtedly others will occur in the future; but don't let change get you down when there's still a good time to be had.

 

-Teh Redfox

 

QFC: 16-17-406-64097038

[Yoko Kurama]

I, too, am a veteran of over 9 years, and I found the piece rather mild. Just a politer way of saying, "If you don't like the update, just quit, or accept it". I can't really find any fault in the piece, though nor is it an uncommon sentiment amongst people like us. Runescape has changed countless times over the years, and it will continue to change, people will come and go, until they decide to pull the plug. Once you have played the game as long as some of us, nothing surprises you after a while, and you learn to understand and accept the nature of temporal things. That's probably why people such as the poster, and myself, and other veterans, weren't too disturbed by the EOC, and were actually supportive of it, and resisted the urge to get hysterical.

[EFG]

I, three, as a 9 year veteran, think this is pretty much commonplace opinion, the only real difference is the '9 year veteran' tag.

The obvious answer here is that people are unwilling to learn the new changes, because they are really very simple. 5 minutes to learn what is different and you're set for good.

I've played a lot of MMOs, and have been wondering what RS would be like with keybinds for years. It's much better for combat, honestly. I never even tried the beta, just jumped into the live game and picked it up about a minute after reading the ability tooltips.

That said, there are definitely some bad things about EoC, but those will be fixed in time(looking at you, targetting system).

[Thus]

It's still unbalanced. The same people who said they would quit are still playing or going to come back in a bit when everything is balanced. Prices of everything are still bad because Jagex is deleting billions of gold from the game from the rwters, causing deflation and increasing the value of gold, paired with panic selling.

[Mercifull]

If I quit every time RuneScape changed I'd have gone in 2001 when fish replaced the need for complex cooking of pies

[Yoko Kurama]

It's still unbalanced. The same people who said they would quit are still playing or going to come back in a bit when everything is balanced. Prices of everything are still bad because Jagex is deleting billions of gold from the game from the rwters, causing deflation and increasing the value of gold, paired with panic selling.

 

Deflation is great; as it is, everything is far too expensive(I am talking about high-end gear of course). Normal high level skillers should not be held to the same standard in terms of what they can afford as idle billionaires. There's simply no way most of them can hope to compete.

[Ammako]

It's still unbalanced. The same people who said they would quit are still playing or going to come back in a bit when everything is balanced. Prices of everything are still bad because Jagex is deleting billions of gold from the game from the rwters, causing deflation and increasing the value of gold, paired with panic selling.

 

Deflation is great; as it is, everything is far too expensive(I am talking about high-end gear of course). Normal high level skillers should not be held to the same standard in terms of what they can afford as idle billionaires. There's simply no way most of them can hope to compete.

Pretty much.

I remember when it was actually possible to make a lot of money from being a skiller; You would see a Lv. 3 with several dozens of millions and everyone would go "Yep, that's because he's a skiller, skillers make a lot of money."

Nowadays, you would see a Lv. 3 (Lv. 4 as of now) and the first thought would be "Yep, that's a gambling account all right."

 

Jagex should implement some item sink or something in the game, find a way to make skilling profitable again.

[tripsis]

It's still unbalanced. The same people who said they would quit are still playing or going to come back in a bit when everything is balanced. Prices of everything are still bad because Jagex is deleting billions of gold from the game from the rwters, causing deflation and increasing the value of gold, paired with panic selling.

 

Deflation is great; as it is, everything is far too expensive(I am talking about high-end gear of course). Normal high level skillers should not be held to the same standard in terms of what they can afford as idle billionaires. There's simply no way most of them can hope to compete.

Pretty much.

I remember when it was actually possible to make a lot of money from being a skiller; You would see a Lv. 3 with several dozens of millions and everyone would go "Yep, that's because he's a skiller, skillers make a lot of money."

Nowadays, you would see a Lv. 3 (Lv. 4 as of now) and the first thought would be "Yep, that's a gambling account all right."

 

Jagex should implement some item sink or something in the game, find a way to make skilling profitable again.

 

I definitely miss the days when skilling could compete with the high-end money making methods (like merchanting). I like that it gave people more options for how they could make their money. You could stake, you could merchant, you could do Barrows, you could runecraft. Now I feel like the options for making a lot of money are much more limited and that limits gameplay as a whole.

 

That's the one main thing I'd like to see change.

[Hedgehog]

The value of xp is too high for skilling to ever be fast and profitable.

[Ginger_Warrior]

I don't think this is much of a reflection, to be honest. Reads more like a small story about his RS history with no substantial attempt to draw out any points from it, finishes with a little tantrum about people who rage over a poorly defined concept of "change".

 

I'd have preferred if he'd explained what's kept him interested in a game for nine years, if there's certain 'milestone' in-game moments which have forced him to change the way he plays and how he interacts with the game. What work he'd like to see done with the game to improve his experience of the game, instead of just saying "It will work out in the end".

 

Neither myself or Jagex would have been able to take anything useful from that article, was my lasting impression after reading it.

[Kaida23]

The value of xp is too high for skilling to ever be fast and profitable.

Exactly. That's why the RS economy is one of the only ones I've ever seen where a completed item has less worth than the items needed to make it.

[tripsis]

The value of xp is too high for skilling to ever be fast and profitable.

Exactly. That's why the RS economy is one of the only ones I've ever seen where a completed item has less worth than the items needed to make it.

 

I don't know, I've seen that quite a few times in other MMOs.

[Platinum_Myr]

They could make a method that is high profit but not high xp. So good/great gp per hr

[abrikoos]

If I quit every time RuneScape changed I'd have gone in 2001 when fish replaced the need for complex cooking of pies

 

I say, let's remove those nasty bank notes and bring back coal and lobster certs !! Woop Woop

[Arceus]

The bit about the XP being the most valuable commodity-while at the same time it's constantly devalued-is something not even the developers predicted, or so I've heard.

[Makoto_the_Phoenix]

It's kind of tough to read posts like "I'm an __ year veteran and ...". I never really know what the point/meaning is of stating how long you've been around, since feedback from someone debating if they'll play the game in the first place is just as valuable, if not more, than some ol' vet.

 

Honestly though, the piece reads neutral. They're not swaying one way or another. It sounds like something that anyone could honestly arrive at. I was hoping for something a bit more earth-shaking in the wake of these new changes, but that's just not the case this time.

[EFG]

The single biggest reason that skilling is not profitable is because of bots. Skilling is by far the easiest thing to do as a bot. Look at the most profitable money making methods, you cannot bot them. High level PvM, merchanting, etc.

Get rid of bots, and long term, skilling will be worth something again. That being said, good luck seeing that ever happen.

[brad1431]

I tried new combat and so far it sucks, I went to glacors with the same gear as before and couldnt even kill one glacor.

[Squakus]

I tried new combat and so far it sucks, I went to glacors with the same gear as before and couldnt even kill one glacor.

 

same gear as before

 

It sounds like you didn't adjust for the changes. Use gear equivalent for your level, work out the correct strategies, get used to the whole concept of using abilities in combat and then try again. Glacors are a boss creature, and therefore you cannot power through them without utilizing the new combat features.

[Barney.S]

9 year veteran...come back in 2 and we'll talk..

 

Anyhow, I find that EOC is a welcome change to RS. I loathed it when rs2 came out, just cause I had just maxxed out my rune pure and they messed everything up for me personally, but I got over it and adopted. EOC is nice, because it actually welcomes people to think! My longest solo trip to Bandos this weekend was 6 hours straight (11 ovl flasks-whatup!) and in this time noone could crash me. This is something that was previously not possible, because maxxing your DPS was a matter of luck mostly, not using your brain. On the other hand, I have taken the time to learn the EOC melee mechanics and using correct abilities at the correct time, all the would-be crashers did was help me get kills faster. Overall in ~1300kc, I only lost 6 boss kills.

 

Post EOC Runescape favours people who use their brains, and as a 11 year veteran in this click-and-go game, I welcome this change with open hands!

[Yoko Kurama]

A few quick comments:

 

@tripsis:

 

I still remember the glory days of Bluerose, or circa 2005(perhaps the peak of RS) when rune armour was the second best non-degradable armour, second only to Dragon(and only marginally so, and when I say marginally, I mean by margins of +4); then barrows and whips were released, and they despite being the best armour in the game were affordable to any high level who wanted them. Skilling was also marginally profitable, though not much. For those who wanted nothing more than obscene wealth, they had their rares and left us warriors and our armours and practical items alone.

 

It's kind of tough to read posts like "I'm an __ year veteran and ...". I never really know what the point/meaning is of stating how long you've been around, since feedback from someone debating if they'll play the game in the first place is just as valuable, if not more, than some ol' vet.

 

 

It is not necessarily a matter of whose perspective has more value. It's simply the case that someone who has been here for a very long time will most likely have a different perspective than someone has been here for less time. Also, someone who has been here for a very long time is also likely in a general sense to be more knowledgeable and susceptible to the general nature of change; and that sort of perspective is valuable. That does not mean that all veterans are like this, nor does it mean that all or that most newbies(relative to veterans) have an incompetent perspective; it`s simply something that might be the case and a matter of variety in perspective, and is worth mentioning in certain cases(such as this one).

 

 

The value of xp is too high for skilling to ever be fast and profitable.

 

False. With just a few minor and some structural changes, not only could skilling be profitable once more(as it has been in past), but it could be amongst the most profitable things if that`s what they decided. Let`s not forget that Bluerose was once not only amongst the most famous players and skillers in RS, but also amongst the wealthiest.

 

Also, this whole obsession with the value of XP is also a particular phenomenon that was not always a part of RS. There was a time when most people considered level 70`s and 80`s and in skills to be quite high and respectable and most did not even dare imagining training further than that. It was only after the release of Skill capes, the fostering of an environment where skills were given social value(despite often being useless), and the celebrity worship and admiration for people like Zarfot that skilling excessively became fashionable; It was something that was deliberately introduced, much like the devaluing of the economic power of skills, and just like that it could be changed.

[Ammako]

I tried new combat and so far it sucks, I went to glacors with the same gear as before and couldnt even kill one glacor.

 

Doing it wrong much?

I hope you realize I killed Glacors in Batwing...

[My Name Changes]

The runescape economy is the players' faults. Rs isn't trash it is its players problems. Even though I see a lot of bots just getting crushed by a fist out of nowhere I still get annoyed that the person botted in the first place. Now combat bots are even easier to find! Because of an exact pattern of combat that before you assumed was eating or potion taking or private chatting. Eoc is actually one of the best things that has happened to rs. For 1. All these ragers don't even play the game they just forum spam. 2. the forums are like 400 -1000 players vs 100,000 + Daily players like 1% or less of the rs player base. And they wonder why Jagex ignores them. I have seen more benifets from these updates than cons. People say sof and sgs are trash ruining the game? Their profit goes towards rs3. Something players are excited for. I am honestly done with the forums on rs. The spam attacks etc. Are so annoying. I visit them from time to time to see server status' economy status, clan status etc.

[Butt Snakes]

Well I've been playing for 8 years, and if you put up with the crap jagex put us loyal players through, then you need to reevaluate what makes a game "good" to you. Because Runescape is currently crap. Likely it will always be, since skill capes were introduces and onward.

[Kimberly]

Well I've been playing for 8 years, and if you put up with the crap jagex put us loyal players through, then you need to reevaluate what makes a game "good" to you. Because Runescape is currently crap. Likely it will always be, since skill capes were introduces and onward.

 

When you say "I've been playing" that means you're still currently playing, right? Aren't you 'putting up' with it too? And if you are, why are you playing a game you don't think it's good?

 

Hopefully you'll understand my confusion, you seem to contradict yourself here greatly.