Divination - one of the new skills reported by IGN

[Sy_Accursed]

Replacing sort of implies that you keep the xp, which defeats most of the point of a NEW skill.

I agree. Additionally, considering how there are many players that have invested hundreds of millions of GP into this, it is highly unlikely that they'll remove the skill altogether. I'm very curious as to how they will make an intricate skill out of what could very well pass as a branch of Prayer.

 

I don't think divination could remotely pass for a branch of prayer, divination sort of incorporates kinda like all the 'fake' 'heaten' 'pagan' stuff that religion kinda views as the antithesis to prayer - fortune telling through all sorts of means, dealing with magical energies and stuff.

 

I know it's not quite the same in RS world how religion would view these things, but conceptually prayer and divination are very separate concepts and don;t really branch from each other in the same way necromancy or enchanting (other skills ppl suggest sometimes) are very clearly forms of magic.

 

Sure if they skill was 'faith' or 'devotion' it'd make sense that prayer and divining could be separate parts of that, but it's not we have Prayer as a skill and the new skill is Divination.

[Urza285]

I like your dowsing concept and fits quite well.

 

I can't wait to try out the skill to see how the mechanics work and the concepts behind them as well. It does bug me I'm maxed and will feel a bit lopsided with this release that incorporates other skills.

[Ulysses]

Can't say I am really excited about having a pseudoscience - divination, as the basis of a new skill.

 

But in continuation with the discussion, 'Divination' as a skill would probably bring in an expansion to existing lore if it indeed involves making discoveries/gaining insights into various things via some sort of supernatural medium. This should be a good thing as it opens up the opportunities for many new and exciting quests..which are becoming scarce lately. But if they do go along the line of 'inspired by some sort of deity' or some sort of supernatural effects, they would need to structure it such that it has sufficient distinction from skills of (subjectively) similar ideas such as prayer and magic. The dowsing concept as described by Binary Mage is well thought out I think, and that could well be part of the skill.

 

 

On an unrelated note, I think the choice of the word 'divination' (even though it is more of an umbrella term imo) made the whole skill/concept a lot more legitimate (and credible) than 'dowsing' (if it were indeed central to the whole addition), particularly after the ADE 651 episode a few weeks ago.

[tintin113]

Can't say I am really excited about having a pseudoscience - divination, as the basis of a new skill.

 

Mm, don't you just hate it when games based massively around magical events introduce pseudosciences? Really wrecks their integrity.

 

I'm looking forward to this, will be interesting to see what happens both with the skill and the markets inbetween the gathering and processing skills are released, however. Will the skill have any use other than its own xp before the processing skill? Perhaps the benefits gained from it would be skill-based rather than combat-based, allowing faster skilling by using Divination 'prayer'-equivalents.

[Binary Mage]

I'm looking forward to this, will be interesting to see what happens both with the skill and the markets inbetween the gathering and processing skills are released, however. Will the skill have any use other than its own xp before the processing skill? Perhaps the benefits gained from it would be skill-based rather than combat-based, allowing faster skilling by using Divination 'prayer'-equivalents.

They've already said that the Gathering and Production skill aren't directly linked (a la Mining/Smithing)--I'd say that we're probably going to see a good amount of current Production skills getting additions using Divination resources even before the second skill is released.

 

It's also pretty likely that we will get some instantly-usable items being harvested every once in a while through Divination as well, since they said that both of these skills will be providing uses for the pocket slot quite a bit. It will be interesting to have a modern twist on a Gathering skill--I have the odd feeling they have some amazing game mechanics and inter-skill relations up their sleeves.

[vmser]

Assuming this is a gathering thing - would it perhaps lead to gathering spirit shards rather then having to buy them?

If so - could the fixed value for shards be lost, thus rendering summoning cheaper?

[Urza285]

Assuming this is a gathering thing - would it perhaps lead to gathering spirit shards rather then having to buy them?

If so - could the fixed value for shards be lost, thus rendering summoning cheaper?

Such a horrible idea...

[Omali]

Can't say I am really excited about having a pseudoscience - divination, as the basis of a new skill.

 

Divination isn't pseudoscience in the context of RuneScape's world. The gods are verifiably real, we've interacted with several of them personally, and we know that there are people who can read the future.

 

Hell, in RuneScape, divination is about as real of a science as archaeology.

[Cheat]

Archaeology - science pfft

[Alg]

Hell, in RuneScape, divination is about as real of a science as archaeology.

For what it's worth, we also have actual robe-and-wizard-hat magic as a skill. It's a bit silly to bring up real world science in any form.

[vmser]

Assuming this is a gathering thing - would it perhaps lead to gathering spirit shards rather then having to buy them?

If so - could the fixed value for shards be lost, thus rendering summoning cheaper?

Such a horrible idea...

 

Why? Seems like a very typical comment from someone with 99 summoning.

 

Heck - I'm 99 myself yet I find the shards to be too much of a money sink which leads to charms stockpiled in bank rather then used for exp. As it stands, summoning is a rather pricy skill to work on, thus the ones bothering to stick with it past 99 tend to be the very rich (from merching or pvm). Creating some would just be a means of avoiding having to use one of the previously mentioned methods to reach the same goal. Just like mining your own ores can help you smith - but it's still easier to just buy a bulkload of ores with money made otherwise.

 

The issue I was trying to bring up is that - despite jagex seemingly have to fix shard value at 25ea as a 'patch' for the GP limit at 2.1b coins - this shard influx could potentially make the summoning skill more widely accesible if the shard influx would allow shard prices to come down a bit. The store price would remain at 25 - so no chances of prices going up beyond that price.

 

That said - it of course raises the argument of 'devaluating' the already earned experience (heck - 40m exp for me) - but that's the way the game is evolving already. The bigger issue is however the overly rich that have huge stockpiles of shards as backup for their cash, which could start complaining alot - because a drop from 25 to 20 gp a shard could mean a loss of 20% of their wealth. It COULD however result into an interesting turn on the rares market.

 

Either way - the cash limit being at 2.1b does make sense in a way. If there's too much cash - get resources instead. Resources are subject to price fluctations - and thus an investment risk - but gathering supplies towards maxing out exp is far more towards an 'endgame' approach then just complaining about not having an inflation-proof method of keeping your geepees.

 

The above doesn't imply I'd be all out in favor of the idea. It'd just be an interesting concept to watch evolve - or just to discuss the possibility of it happening.

[Quyneax]

Summoning isn't very expensive. Smithing, that is very expensive. Considering that charms are obtained along with lots of combat xp and/or gp loot (glacors anyone?), and that you can dump charms for very high xp/h, the cost is pretty low.

[Golvellius]

Divination sounds like archaeology to me.

Just replace the trowel with some kind of magic detector and replace artifacts with divine items (tomes of secrets etc..).

It can be good or bad depending on how it's implemented.

[Sy_Accursed]

Tbf even in real world terms it is somewhat harsh to call all of divination a psuedoscience.

 

Whilst it does incorporate some arts that are provably false, it incorporates many things that whilst not proven to be true cannot be disproven by current science.

[Quyneax]

Yeah... if you can't disprove it, then it's something called 'metaphysics', trancending the physical, which is not science by definition.

 

On the other hand, just because something wasn't disproven, doesn't mean it can't be. It's just uninteresting.

 

Anyway, divination is not science or pseudoscience. It's superstition.

 

(end OT here)

 

In RS, divination can easily be a science, and I agree with Golvellius that it could well be Archeology, just that Jagex didn't want to make the link too obvious.

[Hedgehog]

If it can't be proven true, then it's a pseudoscience.

[Sy_Accursed]

If it can't be proven true, then it's a pseudoscience.

 

Only if it purports to be scientific.

[Alg]

This is a game where you can shoot fireballs at dragons.

[muggiwhplar]

Science has never been about "proof." Only mathematics and logic require proof. Science is about evidence.

[Zhared]

Can I have Preordain instead? Come on, Jagex, three mana for two cards?

[vmser]

Summoning isn't very expensive. Smithing, that is very expensive. Considering that charms are obtained along with lots of combat xp and/or gp loot (glacors anyone?), and that you can dump charms for very high xp/h, the cost is pretty low.

 

Cost per exp seems around the same?

With rune 2handers or rune legs - 13k cost to buy bars, thus 39k to make one - alches at 38.4k (so say 38.3 to cover for nat).

700 GP spent for 225 experience, or roughly 3 GP/exp. Assuming sales to alchers, make that perhaps 4 gp/exp.

 

That's the low end of the summoning cost range...

 

Goldsmithing gauntlets for gold would be roughly 5-6 gp/exp.

 

I could imagine artisans workshop burning through cash, but contrary to summoning there's lower cost (though slower) alternatives available.

[Hedgehog]

Smithing below 99 is expensive (unless you do gold, but gold is really slow)

[aerendil]

Yeah... if you can't disprove it, then it's something called 'metaphysics', trancending the physical, which is not science by definition.

 

On the other hand, just because something wasn't disproven, doesn't mean it can't be. It's just uninteresting.

 

Anyway, divination is not science or pseudoscience. It's superstition.

 

(end OT here)

 

In RS, divination can easily be a science, and I agree with Golvellius that it could well be Archeology, just that Jagex didn't want to make the link too obvious.

 

You are going to meet with a mad axeman in the great hall, i see it with 110% clarity and 110% mark in divination.

 

 

I mean seriously guys, the potential for trolling with hp references is extremely good.

[Platinum_Myr]

If it can't be proven true, then it's a pseudoscience.

 

Have to disagree. If it is un-falsifiable it is pseudoscience. If it can be proven wrong, it is incorrect science. If it is demonstrably possible in the construction of the theorem that it can be false, but has not yet been proven false, it is currently correct science.

 

Science is about finding a model for reality. We can only prove things true by deduction. (And that assumes some things from logic, though those are difficult to want to ignore, but they are still assumptions, in that we cannot prove them.) Induction, not the mathematical kind, but the scientific kind, cannot prove something true 100%.

 

Say you make a statement that "all swans are white". How many swans would you have to see white before you knew it was truth? A thousand? A million? It doesn't matter, because after any number someone can show you a single black swan and the statement is wrong.

 

Science works like that. We make theories and attempt to prove them wrong, until we have thought of no further ways, and then we use those theories as useful things until they don't work anymore. We even use known incorrect theories (Newton's Laws) because they are close enough for most applications and then we use Einstiens's theories which superseded Newton's theories when we need to take into account the things which Newtonian physics did not.

 

Science cannot prove things true because it is entirely about inductive reasoning, not deductive reasoning.

[Saradomin_Mage]

On an unrelated note, I think the choice of the word 'divination' made the whole skill/concept a lot more legitimate (and credible) than 'dowsing'.

Am I the only guy hoping we're not going to be running around with [bleep]ing dowsing sticks for 99 levels.