Guardians of the Rift Improvements

You might remember that last week we made a number of changes to Guardians of the Rift; increasing the total player cap, allowing latecomers to enter during Phase 1 and handing out 15% more Abyssal Pearls.

This week, we have a bunch more changes – let’s take a look!

First up, the fancy timers we showed off last time are now live. The first tells you when the open entrances to Runecraft Altars will change, and the second shows you how long it will be until the shortcut portal closes.

You can also use the altar timer to determine how much time is left in Phase 1.

The dedicated Guardians of the Rift Worlds are now 445 (US West) and 522 (UK). Happy Runecrafting!

Next, we’ve reduced the amount of Abyssal Pearls required to purchase pieces of the Raiments of the Eye from the Guardians of the Rift Rewards Shop:

• Hat of the Eye (500 -> 400)
• Robe Top of the Eye (400 -> 350)
• Robe Bottom of the Eye (400 -> 350)
• Boots of the Eye (300 -> 250)

If you’ve already purchased pieces of the outfit at the higher price, you’ll be refunded the difference in Abyssal Pearls upon logging in. These will be sent to your Bank. If it can't go to your Bank, it will go to your inventory. Failing this, it will drop to the ground. A chat message will display what you've got refunded and where it's gone.

We’ve also added a visual to the barrier in the Lobby that indicates when you're able to enter the minigame. The eye design on the barrier will be open when players can enter and closed when the room is at capacity, or after Phase 1 of the minigame.

Speaking of visual changes, we're aware that the light effects when entering and exiting altars are unpleasant for some players. When you next enter the minigame, you'll be prompted with a message asking whether you'd like to turn these features off.

We’ve begun to review the AI behaviour of Elemental Guardians and Abyssal Creatures, as they get a bit confused when there are too many entities blocking their path in the minigame. One change has been made to them, but there is more to come.

Lastly, we are aware that lit Abyssal Lanterns were previously being destroyed on death, so we've implemented a fix to ensure they now follow standard untradeable item behaviour. Abyssal Lanterns will no longer be lost on death unless you have lost it above Level 20 Wilderness.

Now, without further ado, here are the changes we’ve made this week:

• Items in the Guardians of the Rift minigame can now be dropped and destroyed instantly, instead of requiring a ‘Destroy’ option.
• Players may now uncharge the Ring of Elements by right-clicking it. This action will restore any used Runes.
• A ‘Quick-pass’ option has been added to the barrier in the Lobby.
• When two players are trying to create a Rift Guardian with different tier batteries, the higher tier battery will be prioritised.
• Corrected some colours on a table in the Temple of the Eye.
• Corrected spelling errors that appeared when checking and inspecting Pouches.
• The ‘Inspect’ option on the Abyssal Needle now gives more accurate instructions for its usage.
• Fixed a visual bug that appeared while wearing the Abyssal Bracelet and teleporting to The Abyss.
• Corrected the 'Climb down' text on a pile of rubble.

We'd also like to mention a bug we've discovered on the Raiments of the Eye - its bonus is intended to increase the number of Runes crafted, but it's also giving additional Guardian Stones when crafting combination Runes, allowing for higher XP rates and reward points during Guardians of the Rift. We kind of like the concept, because it means that greater effort equals greater reward - but we feel like such mechanics should be tied to the minigame itself rather than the outfit you're wearing while playing it.

We're leaving the bug alone for now, but we are working on a better implementation already. Our proposal is to make crafting combination Runes more rewarding for a little bit more effort - perhaps they could provide different Guardian Stones which offer more Elemental Points, without making the minigame faster. More on this soon!

Expect even more changes in the coming weeks, including a way to trade in your duplicate Abyssal Lanterns for Abyssal Pearls.

Our Game Jam is next week (more on this below), which will delay some of our planned improvements to Guardians of the Rift.

We'd like to provide a quick overview of some of the outstanding issues that we're reviewing, which we can potentially address in the weeks following the Game Jam:

• Incentivising players to be making Rift Guardians and Shield Barriers at the start of the game. Players have told us that playing defensively doesn't currently feel rewarding enough.
• Reviewing the display of Shield Barrier healthbars as they might be too large. We're also reviewing the 'Inspect' option on Shield Barriers, which some players have told us can be frustrating to use.
• We're monitoring the difficulty of the minigame in group sizes smaller than 10 players. We're also to review solo gameplay and determine how difficult we want this to be.
• Making the HUD visible in the lobby to allow players to see the Great Guardian's Power without constantly inspecting the barrier.
• Extending the 'winning phase' to allow players to use any Guardian Stones they received without missing out on points.
• Adding Guardians of the Rift to the HiScores.

As always, we'll keep reviewing the minigame and making adjustments where necessary, so keep sending us your feedback!

We’ve been closely following how players have been engaging with Nex since her initial release. As many of you know, we increased the drop rate for her uniques in anticipation of much faster kill times than we had balanced around in testing.

Now that the dust has settled and meta's have been established, we'd like to revert her unique drop rates back to their original rate of 1/43 instead of the current 1/53 to better reflects the kills/hr we had intended during our internal testing.

In retrospect, Nex has created an unreasonably long grind for the items that exist within her drop table for many players. Whilst the ideal solution would have been to have less uniques, we can't go back and remove them now! So to compensate we hope that the adjusted drop rates are a welcome change.

Let us know what you think!

There are several other changes this week:

• Ensouled Heads can now drop in instanced areas.
• Extended Loot Keys' despawn time to two minutes, for consistency with other drops.
• Corrected a visual issue with the Stale Baguette's positioning when held by male characters. Ooh la la!

As you know, our ideation process allows us J-Mods to focus on new and exciting ideas outside the remit of our usual work. In the past it’s lead to awesome content like Leagues, The Hallowed Sepulchre, Guardians of the Rift and the upcoming Tombs of Amascut Raid!

We've had problems finding time for everyone to participate in ideation – and that’s an issue we hope to fix with the new Game Jam process! Now, the whole team has a full week to get together and ideate, test, or even prototype an idea. That process has already begun, and we’ve got some great projects in the works.

However, this means that there will be no game update between April 4th and April 8th, to allow the team to focus on the Game Jam. But don’t worry! We’ll be looking to share some of the ideas in a special livestream the following week, and if you manage to miss that, we’ll also be talking about our ideas in the April Gielinor Gazette. Do stay tuned for a few surprises, though…

Get ready to master skills, meet your favourite NPCs and explore the world of Gielinor as we bring RuneScape to the tabletop for the first time EVER!

We’re working with Steamforged Games to bring you a boardgame and Tabletop RPG inspired by the rich fantasy world of RuneScape. Both games will draw on adventures, characters and locations from our shared 21-year history.

In the RuneScape board game, you’ll join a party of one to five players on quest-based campaigns through Gielinor. Craft and upgrade equipment, cook special recipes, and test your skills! Adventure (and many an enticing side quest) awaits!

Steamforged will launch the RuneScape board game on Kickstarter this year. Sign up and be among the first to hear news about the campaign! You can find the page here.

The lead-up to the campaign will be packed full of behind-the-scenes content. You’ll get a tour of the game, interviews with the developers and even a sneak peek or two… miniatures, anyone?

You can sign up for these updates on the Steamforged Games website.

The PvP rota has moved to Period A:

• 539 - (US) - PvP World
• 548 - (Germany) - High-Risk PvP World
• 577 - (US) - Free-to-Play PvP World
• 559 - (UK) - LMS Competitive

World 390 (AUS) for LMS Competitive has been activated with this rota.

Discuss this update on our official forums, on the 2007Scape subreddit, the Steam forums, or the community-led OSRS Discord in the #gameupdate channel. For reference on the above content, check out the official Old School Wiki.

Mods Arcane, Archie, Argo, Ash, Ayiza, Banjo, Boko, Brow, Bruno, Curse, Daizong, Dibber, Ditto, Dylan, Ed, Elena, Errol, Fed, Gecko, Goblin, Grub, Halo, Havik, Hornet, Husky, Jalo, John C, Kandosii, Katies, Kamon, Kieren, Kirby, Kurotou, Lenny, Light, Lottie, Mack, Matheus, Maylea, Markos, Meat, Morty, Nasty, Nin, Nylu, Oasis, Peppers, Regent, Redfield, Roq, Ry, Sarnie, Sigma, Skylark, Soffan, Sova, Squid, Steve W, Tide, Torrance, Veda, Vegard, West & Wolfy

The Old School Team