Runescape - welcome back to 2007 motherfuckers

[Focken Kiwi]

what is the deal with the lore in RS3?

To summarize it, and heavy spoilers by the way, Gielinor (Runescape) was created by powerful gods for the express purpose of generating a source of energy named "anima." The gods create worlds that generate this anima so that they may consume it in cycles of reincarnation.

The cycle is as follows:
1. Create worlds until one shows particular promise in generating vast stores of anima
2. Lay eggs that develop new bodies for the gods
3. Lie dormant while both the eggs develop and anima is generated
4. Imprint memories into the new bodies when the eggs hatch
5. Consume all of the anima eradicating all life on said world and repeat from step 1.

Guthix discovers this world after his own was destroyed in a war between lesser gods. He invited mortals to colonize and enjoy a world free from the influence of gods. He also created a means by which mortals can create runestones and use magic landing the moniker for this world, 'RuneScape.' Guthix went into hibernation as he had no desire to be worshipped. Other gods did make their way to this world and they warred with each other waking Guthix from his rest. Guthix expelled the lesser gods with a barrier known as the Edicts of Guthix and returned to hibernation.

To make things short, the chambers Guthix resides in are discovered by an archaeologist. You prevent the generals from God Wars Dungeon north of Death Plateau from assassinating Guthix and are then given a blessing just before he's assassinated by a Mahjarrat named Sliske. This blessing functionally makes you immune to the powers of lesser gods. With Guthix dead, the lesser gods return to Gielinor. Sliske attempts to orchestrate a new God Wars but ultimately fails on the level he was likely hoping. There is a climactic battle between your character and Sliske disturbing the long dormant creator gods.

These aforementioned gods are close to completing their cycle of rebirth but offer mortals the opportunity at salvation should the mortals placate them in some way. Ultimately, no way is devised to do so and a risky gambit is ran. The eggs are gathered and siphoned from by the lesser gods to delay their hatching. The creator gods send lesser beings to assail the forces of the lesser gods in an attempt to recapture their eggs but dare not intervene directly lest they destroy their chance at rebirth. To end the gridlock, one lesser god abandons the plan and a new strategy is quickly devised. The eggs are taken through a gateway to a stagnating world with limited anima. The creator gods follow and there is no choice but to reincarnate and accept weakened forms.

The lesser god that broke the gridlock attempted an invasion of Gielinor after the threat of the creator gods was dealt with. You drive this god from Gielinor and in the battle, reignite the Edicts of Guthix while consuming the blessing you were granted by Guthix. Currently, there are hints that a great threat is coming but people can only speculate to what that is.

I'm leaving out a significant amount of detail and I'm not really touching on more modern stuff post Necromancy's release. I'm not really too sure where the story is currently at this time as I haven't played RuneScape 3 in quite a while.

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

I'm leaving out a significant amount of detail and I'm not really touching on more modern stuff post Necromancy's release. I'm not really too sure where the story is currently at this time as I haven't played RuneScape 3 in quite a while.

Necromancy was more or less its own contained thing somewhat playing in line with you as the player becoming a Duke and building your own fort in an area of wilderness, reclaiming it, in service of the King of Varrock. This actually was the area where the lumbermill was and it was torn down to build it with the old manager being your new foreman for projects. You gather other whacky friends including a non-binary gender blob woman as your butler. Shenanigans happen during the storyline that I won't get into but suffice it to say forces from the end of the storyline you mentioned with re-establishing the edicts, specifically the followers, try to upturn your little fort and it even ends in a siege with a familiar boss from osrs.

Now you have one of those followers captured and it's a bit more messing with some necromancy and the underworld, turning attention back to the desert if you remember quests like Icthlarin's Little Helper and the Menaphos quests with Amascut. They're finally tying that up before maybe doing something else like gnomes or some other unended quest line and then eventually some new area (Zeah from osrs? Acheron? Who knows).

 

[Focken Kiwi]

Necromancy was more or less its own contained thing somewhat playing in line with you as the player becoming a Duke and building your own fort in an area of wilderness, reclaiming it, in service of the King of Varrock. This actually was the area where the lumbermill was and it was torn down to build it with the old manager being your new foreman for projects. You gather other whacky friends including a non-binary gender blob woman as your butler. Shenanigans happen during the storyline that I won't get into but suffice it to say forces from the end of the storyline you mentioned with re-establishing the edicts, specifically the followers, try to upturn your little fort and it even ends in a siege with a familiar boss from osrs.

Now you have one of those followers captured and it's a bit more messing with some necromancy and the underworld, turning attention back to the desert if you remember quests like Icthlarin's Little Helper and the Menaphos quests with Amascut. They're finally tying that up before maybe doing something else like gnomes or some other unended quest line and then eventually some new area (Zeah from osrs? Acheron? Who knows).

I mean I got most of that. Quests were leading up to Vorkath and I know the newest major update pertains to Amascut. I just don't know where the greater story is going with what Rasial was hinting at at the end of the Necromancy questline. I'm very much apathetic towards RuneScape at the moment, both 3 and Osrs.

 

[The Great Horned Moth]

I don't remember much of RS's lore but I do remember the vague outline of While Guthix Sleeps which was the last quest I finished pre quitting back then. Sliske wants some artifact, you and the runescape avengers of I don't remember who besides a slayer master show up to try to stop him, Sliske stomps a mudhole dry in all of them, you get the artifact, get powered up to fight a tormented demon, then Sliske teleports away with the artifact.

It’s Lucien in the While Guthix Sleeps questline. Sliske is kind of nobody until The World Wakes and the world guardian quest line. Bitch of a boss, though. Power creep has made Lucien seem like a joke at this point, though. Most of this lore is summarized well above.

What happened to Lumbridge and this "Battle of Lumbridge" I keep seeing in dialogs and examine texts?

Saradomin and Zamorak fought in Lumbridge as a big player choice event. Zamorak lost, huge crater left behind and a lot of content moved, hence NPCs and examines referencing it. Actually played this one but it was the tail-end of when I was playing actively. Only recently got back in.

Why is there a demon rift in the swamp just hanging out there?

Honestly don’t remember it being added and not sure lore implications of it. Just there.

Why is apparently Bandos' corpse just hanging out in the wilderness path from Falador?

Another player choice event where Armadyl fought Bandos. Was still playing during this but think I quit right after. Bandos got rekt.

What are all these God emissaries you can find all around the place?

This was related to the Sliske content and the two god battles mentioned above. Pretty much dead content now, but you can get some free titles from them.

Why were the actual gods hanging around in the place where you fight Arch Glacor and why do they look so lame for gods(they looked like the star trek aliens)?

Explained more in depth above. There are quest lines explaining more of it. Towards the end of the quest line they get these gay ass fucking still image cutscenes and stupid as fuck twists with characters that make me think the current dev team should be fired out of a cannon into the sun. I really liked the old lore so it’s been super fun seeing them systematically retcon and make it as pozzed as fucking possible.

What's this fort on the wilderness border and why did everyone I ask about it have nothing good to say about its related questline?

Questline was explained a bit above. But really they just make it as pozzed as fucking possible. They shove it down your throat and it’s the most irritating thing that actively detracts from my gaming experience. The fort itself is just a skilling hub, and that’s very nice to have. The quest line is trash, but a lot of the recent ones have been extremely underwhelming.

 

[BiggestKai]

Glacor is more of a introduction / learning PvM boss to learn basic mechanics. There's much harder ones out there if you're interested

I would be but honestly nothing about EoC felt compelling. When you boil it down it's just the same old runescape combat except every ~2 seconds you pull out some different animation than every skill filling truly unique, the exceptions were AoE attacks and necromancy(I assume because it was designed much later that it had a much more straight forward progression scheme and the abilities actually felt like different abilities instead of ways to bypass my weapon of choice's attack speed stat(was that a bug or intended? You attack as fast as the ability cooldown and not the weapon speed stat).

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

I really liked the old lore so it’s been super fun seeing them systematically retcon and make it as pozzed as fucking possible.

Could you explain further? In regards to the elder god wars it felt like the gods were all pretty much the same but it's been a while since I looked back at the lore. I agree though the fort was a bit of a nothing burger and they made the Raptor the Queen with a hackneyed Batman backstory who before then was just some bitch. It lead to some decent content and a skilling hub but the quests outside of the finale sucked.

Also to answer your question @Focken Kiwi about the next super big thing Rasial was warning about I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be Erebus and Xau-Tak. Ever since the battle of the monolith which kicked off the elder god eggs hatching it's been on a back burner that they poke at every so often to remind you it's gonna come to a head eventually. Rasial/necromancy runes mess with Erebus stuff, Amascut has some powers from Erebus, Vorkath's heart was made of black stone and the weird Bilrach corpse monster thing that siphoned his body is almost definitely Erebus related.

 

[Focken Kiwi]

Could you explain further? In regards to the elder god wars it felt like the gods were all pretty much the same but it's been a while since I looked back at the lore. I agree though the fort was a bit of a nothing burger and they made the Raptor the Queen with a hackneyed Batman backstory who before then was just some bitch. It lead to some decent content and a skilling hub but the quests outside of the finale sucked.

Also to answer your question @Focken Kiwi about the next super big thing Rasial was warning about I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be Erebus and Xau-Tak. Ever since the battle of the monolith which kicked off the elder god eggs hatching it's been on a back burner that they poke at every so often to remind you it's gonna come to a head eventually. Rasial/necromancy runes mess with Erebus stuff, Amascut has some powers from Erebus, Vorkath's heart was made of black stone and the weird Bilrach corpse monster thing that siphoned his body is almost definitely Erebus related.

That clears a lot of things up then. I'll be disappointed then when the area expansion is west to Zeah and not further east to the Eastern Lands and Xau Tak's 'corpse oceans.' I don't trust the Rs3 team to do something new with Gielinor. Instead, I suspect they'll retread old ground the OSRS team was working on.

 

[The Great Horned Moth]

Could you explain further?

Spoiler: Big ol’ rant

So when I stopped, the Sliske God Wars were starting. Huge, world-altering events with massive potential consequences. The gods felt like massive threats, as they should. They’re huge factions with massive powers. Life got in the way, but I was excited to see what they did with all this. Then I got back and found they did… nothing. Beyond those initial 2 fights and Tuska, there’s nothing major. Sliske’s endgame is a good end to the quest line, but even there they mention that nothing really happened. They essentially demystified the Gods for no real reward.

Now, before this, there had been some deeper game hints that there was something bigger than the gods. Stone of Jas and a bunch of other little hints that there is something bigger. There was also a bit of demystifying when we found out Zamorak had ascended, rather than being born a god. This was an interesting plot point and there are some pretty great quests involving them.

After Sliske’s quest line, I quit for years so my timeline gets fuzzy so I may be a little out of order. Only got back in and caught up this last year. Every character essentially gets power-crept until none of the gods feel interesting, powerful, or mystical. Saradomin starts as a good guy, you realize through lore that he may not be good at all, then that essentially gets retconned away as “oh he’s trying his best and made a few whoospie-daisy planar genocides. Still a good god. Here’s his black daughter, now queen of Falador.” Armadyl is generally boring as fuck with no good lore beyond what you could already find before Sliske was around. But now he’s gay, he has had multiple gay relationships we’re going to shoehorn in. Zamorak looks like he could actually be more complex and be for freedom rather than just the evil god? Nah, he’s just straight evil now, again! Zaros as an interesting force of order? Nah, evil. He’s weird and purple. Oh you chose to support these gods? They just betray you for no reason. Great stuff, fantastic writing, really feel invested when every choice made railroads you to the same option with very minor dialogue changes.

They basically took the gods, made them more complex, then retconned them back to being boring and less complex.

As you get farther into the elder god questline, I feel that the writing gets worse, the quests get less imaginative, and you can feel it go downhill. They make Reldo the librarian Charos, of the Ring of Charos fame. Odd choice, even more odd to randomly make him black and then pansexual on top of that. This wasn’t super intrusive, but shows a trend. What is intrusive are the stupid as fuck static cinematics they shove into every one of these quests to force feed exposition. Hate those fucking things. The questline is still alright, but feels much more soulless than everything that came before.

And then, you get to the fort forinthry quest line. I swear every character there is either gay, black, or the raptor. One of the characters is the stereotypical flamboyant gay man. This quest line was just shoving it down your throat as hard as possible. It feels extremely hacky and these quests were lazy as fuck.

It may just be rose colored glasses for the older quests, but they have heart. Some of them have really complex challenges and were some of my favorite experiences in gaming. The new quests are wrapping up huge plots in the most boring way possible. The character feels invincible, partially because of the world guardian bullshit but also because of every more powerful character being brought down. Not every quest can be monkey madness or while guthix sleeps, but the current team has 0 chance of making anything of that caliber.

Every quest, every bit of lore has to shove in some DEI bullshit. They even made the skeleton trans in the necromancy update. They can’t help it, and it’s so fucking disruptive any time you try to enjoy a quest.

They also ignore older quest lines. Gnomes have been left to rot for like a decade now. I would hope they do something with it, but if they do half the gnomes are going to be black and gay and the conclusion to the quest line will be some stupid quest that takes 30 minutes and gives you access to the new gnome area. Then it’s just some repeatable skilling boss. Current team would have made prifddinas a level 1 skill hub with 0 requirements. They hate deep questlines or writing story. Don’t want anyone to feel excluded or to have to play their fucking game. This is also why they let you skip right to the start of the elder god saga. I’m not saying it should all require doing every quest possible to get there. I am saying it’s fucking insulting to make a bunch of the newer quests intros to bossing mechanics and let every old or interesting quest line to rot.

My opinion also may be tainted by this item which people spammed constantly in the fort forinthry update.

Tl;dr: If you liked the quests or lore at any point in runescape, just don’t even bother with the recent ones.

I will say, I haven’t tried the most recent devourer and osseus quests because I got turned off by the level 95 and 30000 souls for Rasial and have let my quest log fill up with all of the boss intro quests that should realistically be miniquests.

Honestly, the old quests are still solid and enjoyable. Recent ones feel like they hate questers entirely.

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

Spoiler: Big ol’ rant

I can agree in some parts. The absolute pozzed bullshit is annoying but whether it's nostalgia goggles or apathy I can tolerate it by compartmentalizing it as "stupid Brits being fucking faggots". That being said it's still annoying whenever it comes up. I remember the first time I really noticed it, like gay couples aside (frankly I like Armadyl as a character, maybe it's more cope trying to just push it aside and treat him like Zeus who fucked anything) the thing that got me was Evil Dave's Big Day Out where you do a freaky Friday with Dave and then have to makeover mage to "Davina" to sneak past some white knights who know and have barred Dave entry to falador. Harmless enough yeah? In fact that almost feels like an old Gower quest idea. But then you go home still as a chick to Dave's mother and there's this brief but noticeable moment where she "accepts [Dave]" for who he is. Adresteia being black is also something I have to notice when maybe 15 years ago I wouldn't notice or care. They even gave her big ol black braids for Succession.

TL;DR neutral/mild approval of sixth age shenanigans

Spoiler: My own big stupid rant.

As for the elder god wars I dunno. I kinda liked demystifying the gods because even during Sliske's questline they showed that barring Zaros and Seren all the other gods are ascended mortals (Zamorak being a bit different since Mahjarrat are divine beings but not even demigods) so it feels like they're not these untouchable beings, they're just mortals that got to power first. They did what they could with making them play ball with Sliske and then basically being dialogue boxes with EGW because they had to sit there and siphon the eggs. I'm going off the assumption that they had different writers throughout the sixth age and had to clean up each other's messes, with Mod Jack running the show. They had the gods return with Guthix dying and that was some crazy shit, but then they had to reel it in so they made Sliske's game to have them not break out into open wars again, merely duel (with some player world event help to have content). Then you blow the whole thing wide open with revealing the elder gods and now the stakes are even higher and more insane. So now they have to come up with something and they decided upon having what gods are left sit in a cathedral and siphon eggs. I have to admit the setting felt really cool and bleak seeing how far back the front lines get pushed and the cathedral being sieged by the dragonkin. All of this culminates with Seren pulling a betrayal, where before she's done some less than nice things because she's written as a BPD with mommy issues whether they intended it or not, to full on betraying all life because she finally decided she's an Elder and not a doll made by one. Extinction was still cool and probably one of the better quests in terms of theatrics and shit going down but it was marred by the slideshow cutscenes, although I don't think 3d in-game cutscenes would've been much better.

To summarize it kinda, I feel they opened an overly ambitious can of worms with adding the gods as physical beings you could talk to, and then the stakes kept rising as ways to make it interesting until we ended up effectively killing the creator gods so now the universe is doomed in the long run. Then they had to make an excuse to remove the gods again so they made Zamorak pull a cartoon villain world domination scheme (admittedly smart given what was written. Everyone else was depleted from the war and he bowed out early) that ends with you remaking the edicts. Now you're no longer a world guardian, but they probably could still have you "refill" the magic put on you but I doubt they will any time soon, the gods are gone, the elders are gone, and Erebus is the next big stupid world ending threat.

All of that shit aside, even with the gays invading my fort the fort and Necromancy (kinda) was a return to lower stakes for a while, as low as they can be after the sixth age at least. I'd have loved it if instead of Necromancy we got the fort and the antagonists in it and then after solving their attack (for now) we got something with Adresteia trying to be Empress of the human kingdoms leading to war between kingdoms, trying to make Papa Smurf proud when the other kingdoms aren't so on board after seeing what the gods did with Sliske's game and then the losses during the elder wars. An enemy without, enemy within thing.

Nah. With Succession we invited some emissaries over and then them and all the citizens went YAAAAAAS MY SARADOMIN EMPRESS KWEEEEN and she sang a stupid song.

ETA: I agree too about the old quest lines being dead. Thankfully they're wrapping up desert now but it feels weird to have it now since it involves a ton of necromancy/modern ideas when it always felt like a fifth age series but you get what you get. Gnomes will probably be as stupidly over the top instead of something like foiling an evil plot to attack another faction ala Monkey Madness. I also gotta agree a lot of these quests have been running around and not a lot of challenge or puzzling, although there was a good old slide puzzle in a fort quest.

 

[The Great Horned Moth]

frankly I like Armadyl as a character

Oh yeah, I can compartmentalize some of it, this is just the first big example I could remember in the timeline. Honestly it’s probably handled the best where it’s just a side note “oh yeah, I had a husband and loved him.” Most basic, least offensive, and natural way to bring it up. Forgot about the Evil Dave one, did enjoy most of that quest because it was fun and reminded me of old runescape. That and Dimension of Disaster were pretty solid newer quests (if almost a decade old can be considered new).

I have to admit the setting felt really cool and bleak seeing how far back the front lines get pushed and the cathedral being sieged by the dragonkin. All of this culminates with Seren pulling a betrayal, where before she's done some less than nice things because she's written as a BPD with mommy issues whether they intended it or not, to full on betraying all life because she finally decided she's an Elder and not a doll made by one. Extinction was still cool and probably one of the better quests in terms of theatrics and shit going down but it was marred by the slideshow cutscenes, although I don't think 3d in-game cutscenes would've been much better.

I will say the setting was very cool and extinction was very solid. That area and the fronts were very cool once I’d gotten to see them. Felt a little less exciting since I didn’t get to see it as it released, but still a better new area. Definitely hard to animate some of those big scenes that happen during it, too.

To summarize it kinda, I feel they opened an overly ambitious can of worms with adding the gods as physical beings you could talk to, and then the stakes kept rising as ways to make it interesting until we ended up effectively killing the creator gods so now the universe is doomed in the long run. Then they had to make an excuse to remove the gods again so they made Zamorak pull a cartoon villain world domination scheme (admittedly smart given what was written. Everyone else was depleted from the war and he bowed out early) that ends with you remaking the edicts. Now you're no longer a world guardian, but they probably could still have you "refill" the magic put on you but I doubt they will any time soon, the gods are gone, the elders are gone, and Erebus is the next big stupid world ending threat.

Yeah, I feel like it was too almost too ambitious. It’s such a huge and fun storyline, but once you open that box it’s hard to pull back from. You’re really going to fight gods and then go back to making a rock cake for some dwarves? Nah, gonna build a fort.

Honestly, reading your comment and thinking about it more, it is hard not to have a soft-spot for some of those 6th age quests. They do have some good pay-off moments and, while I don’t like the slideshows, it’s hard to imagine some of those scenes as cinematics. Also Sliske is a great final boss for his arc. And the twists were pretty interesting at some points.

Still don’t like them whitewashing Saradomin, though. Wish we would’ve gotten that promised quest with the undead centaurs, that might have helped explore him a bit better. Would also have given Sir Owen anything to do.

All of that shit aside, even with the gays invading my fort the fort and Necromancy (kinda) was a return to lower stakes for a while, as low as they can be after the sixth age at least. I'd have loved it if instead of Necromancy we got the fort and the antagonists in it and then after solving their attack (for now) we got something with Adresteia trying to be Empress of the human kingdoms leading to war between kingdoms, trying to make Papa Smurf proud when the other kingdoms aren't so on board after seeing what the gods did with Sliske's game and then the losses during the elder wars. An enemy without, enemy within thing

It did really seem like they were doing that. They also do seem to be building something up with Bilrach and Moia. Could be interesting to see. Honestly if they just stop beating my over the head with the gay shit, I’d be very happy with this point and click MMORPG. I’m too deep in and it still has a lot of good potential.

Necromancy is pretty fun to use. Hate getting souls, but it’s so nice for combat. Also some of the quest elements there were fun. Liked seeing the old crew from While Guthix Sleeps hanging out on the hill, too. That was a nice callback.

Nah. With Succession we invited some emissaries over and then them and all the citizens went YAAAAAAS MY SARADOMIN EMPRESS KWEEEEN and she sang a stupid song.

Oh god, how did I forgot the song. Jesus that was rough.

ETA: I agree too about the old quest lines being dead. Thankfully they're wrapping up desert now but it feels weird to have it now since it involves a ton of necromancy/modern ideas when it always felt like a fifth age series but you get what you get. Gnomes will probably be as stupidly over the top instead of something like foiling an evil plot to attack another faction ala Monkey Madness. I also gotta agree a lot of these quests have been running around and not a lot of challenge or puzzling, although there was a good old slide puzzle in a fort quest.

The necromancy connection works well enough, but agreed it feels much more 5th age. Would love to see some good content for gnomes and monkeys. Criminally ignored factions in RS3.

Honestly, I still really like the game: it just needs to stop telling me the sexuality of every single character. At this rate I won’t be surprised when they make your character ask about pronouns in one of these upcoming quests.

 

[SandyCat]

I cant wait to go on a quest to fetch a magical dilator and affirm a characters heckin valid enby status

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

I cant wait to go on a quest to fetch a magical dilator and affirm a characters heckin valid enby status

You flashed me back to the part where you go to the elf homeworld and there's one sane survivor; the world is covered in Seren's crystals and without her direct presence the elves went crazy and grafted them into themselves to feel her connection and became shapeshifters. The only one with their mind intact is a tranny who was born a man and used the shape shifting magic to "correct" his body to the valid woman he always was before the world fell apart.

The tranny is still in constant agony like the others and it takes most of his concentration to not lose his mind from it. He makes a brief cameo in Extinction but otherwise is just there for the quest he was introduced and their pride month shit.

On that topic too it's funny because he's an outlier even there. Tales of Pride is a sort of miniquest where you go around and collect letters related to the heckin lovely LGBT characters. These include:

-Two gay werewolves
-Zanik, a classic memorable character. because she has a crush for the PC they say she's a bisexual weird short stack goblin, Vaush beware.
-Armadyl, as we said he's the mildest one who just sort of mentions he had two husbands. His letter is actually from the one that got vaporized in the God Wars and it was kinda sad to read knowing that.
-lesbian thieves or something. they had a little quest where you do a museum heist to help the one show her love
-a dragonkin clone who's aesexual, this one is also kinda tolerable because knowing he's a clone it makes sense he never grew up or developed a normal life

And then: an elf who hated his body and used unnatural crystal magic from a freaky alien goddess to turn himself into a woman. His letter isn't even anything nice it's just a list of new names he was trying to decide on. They couldn't even make a touching story about a heckin valid tranny coping with the change because who the fuck wants to write that.

 

[Lone Star]

Just to add on a bit about the gods that I don't think was mentioned in these rants is I hate how they're all talk, no action. At least as far as I got.

"Hmph! Don't cross me again, Player/Other God, or else it won't be pretty."
"I'll work with you for now, but soon, I'll make you pay for before!"
"Speak out of turn again, and I'll bring about my divine fury on you!"

And spoiler, none of these threats are ever delivered. Supposed almighty beings that make simpering threats but refuse to follow through on literally any of them. Just endless buildup to no payoff.

 

[The Great Horned Moth]

Just to add on a bit about the gods that I don't think was mentioned in these rants is I hate how they're all talk, no action. At least as far as I got.

"Hmph! Don't cross me again, Player/Other God, or else it won't be pretty."
"I'll work with you for now, but soon, I'll make you pay for before!"
"Speak out of turn again, and I'll bring about my divine fury on you!"

And spoiler, none of these threats are ever delivered. Supposed almighty beings that make simpering threats but refuse to follow through on literally any of them. Just endless buildup to no payoff.

Yeah, it’s very rare they actually do anything, despite being in the world. They’re generally implied to be doing things while you’re busy, but direct conflicts were very rare. Also they can’t do anything to you, because of the world guardian powers, so they never felt like a real threat to the character. Obvious exception for Zamorak boss fight.

There IS one other exception to this. If you insult Jas, they kill you in Sliske’s Endgame.

 

[Focken Kiwi]

There IS one other exception to this. If you insult Jas, they kill you in Sliske’s Endgame.

Fun fact! There was supposed to be a unique death message and event for the first time a Hardcore Ironman dies in this way. Every player would look towards the Heart of Gielinor in the Kharidian Desert and facepalm to a message along the lines of "You have a feeling that someone did something incredibly stupid."

 

[BiggestKai]

I don't really quit things and the fact that I did it for rs3 still lives in my head rent free. Does the game actually get fun at some point or is it all grinds and I'm all good?
The few quests I tried(I was doing them by release date so I could get a better idea lorewise but I think the last one I did was Ikov's temple or legend's quest) were charming enough I guess.

 

[SandyCat]

I don't really quit things and the fact that I did it for rs3 still lives in my head rent free. Does the game actually get fun at some point or is it all grinds and I'm all good?
The few quests I tried(I was doing them by release date so I could get a better idea lorewise but I think the last one I did was Ikov's temple or legend's quest) were charming enough I guess.

RS is all about the constant grind. If you don't enjoy the grind you won't enjoy Runescape, especially Oldschool Runescape if grinding isn't your thing.

On a unrelated note I was watching this video that made me do a big think

Call me a heathen but I actually enjoy treasure hunter (although I do think they go overboard with it at times) because the amount of free keys you get makes the game a bit less grindy and I feel like I can get more done without it turning into too much of a grinding slog.

The people who like the idea of it being removed probably don't realize they will likely replace it with something far worse. I've seen that happen many times in other games such as Overwatch. There was a huge push to get rid of loot boxes from most games which was successful to an extent but in response most games just added "season passes" and paywalled their content even harder

 

[Sneedfully and Peacefully]

The people who like the idea of it being removed probably don't realize they will likely replace it with something far worse.

They kind of tried it already with Hero Pass and that got REEE'd out of existence. I think the Yak Tracks which were their predecessor were more tolerable because there weren't any content buffs and you got cosmetic stuff by doing gameplay even if you were free (I think like 80% of hero pass you had to buy into it). There's gotta be some happy balance of having some FOMO event where you can get the stuff for free, maybe with a boost if you're Premier or buy into it, and then later it goes into Solomon's store for rune coins.

I don't have the answer but I'd like to see TH killed because it feels like they spend a lot of time developing new "games" out of the limited events and the cosmetics. If you axed the TH team (if there is such a thing) and put them on content I'm sure we'd have better/more stuff more often.

 

[TheArtilleryman]

what is the deal with the lore in RS3?

I don't remember much of RS's lore but I do remember the vague outline of While Guthix Sleeps which was the last quest I finished pre quitting back then. Sliske wants some artifact, you and the runescape avengers of I don't remember who besides a slayer master show up to try to stop him, Sliske stomps a mudhole dry in all of them, you get the artifact, get powered up to fight a tormented demon, then Sliske teleports away with the artifact.

What happened to Lumbridge and this "Battle of Lumbridge" I keep seeing in dialogs and examine texts? Why is there a demon rift in the swamp just hanging out there? Why is apparently Bandos' corpse just hanging out in the wilderness path from Falador? What are all these God emissaries you can find all around the place? Why were the actual gods hanging around in the place where you fight Arch Glacor and why do they look so lame for gods(they looked like the star trek aliens)?

I haven't played in a long time and I'm going from memory, but IIRC there was a quest where Sliske literally murders Guthix (who was just sleeping in a cave near Ardougne I think?). Guthix edicts broke and so the Gods returned to Gelinor in their physical form and we got the god emissaries update.

Since then they've just continued to escalate and jump the shark so many times that speaking face to face with a god is a trivial occurance and lots of beginner areas of the map are cluttered haphazardly with remnants of numerous cataclysmic events that nobody bothers to remember because they were ass.

Personally I miss the subtle world building around the Gods before they started physically showing up everywhere and getting involved in every new quest.

Edit: "The World Wakes" was the quest in which Guthix died and the major turning point for more God related fuckery. That's not a spoiler because you're made aware of it during normal gameplay and how the world changed as a result of it, this despite the fact you haven't even played the damn quest yourself and Guthix has not yet died from your characters POV.

Further edit: I didn't notice this has already been answered in greater depth lmao

 

[Magicat]

I would be but honestly nothing about EoC felt compelling. When you boil it down it's just the same old runescape combat except every ~2 seconds you pull out some different animation than every skill filling truly unique, the exceptions were AoE attacks and necromancy(I assume because it was designed much later that it had a much more straight forward progression scheme and the abilities actually felt like different abilities instead of ways to bypass my weapon of choice's attack speed stat(was that a bug or intended? You attack as fast as the ability cooldown and not the weapon speed stat).

Phone posting late at night. Excuse me.

Bigly disagree with you on some of this. Pre-EoC combat was largely static with the occasional spec. Manual EoC became all about ability rotations to max out damage. Early EoC bosses actually required well thought out use of abilities to master, suck as KK's proactive boss design (though there weren't but a handful of autists willing to learn it back then).

A couple of years ago every style followed the same dogma of building to a damage boosting-ultimate and then unloading everything (burst), but with slight variation:

Melee was all about a short burst of extremely high damage, followed by sustained moderate damage.

Ranged and Magic were about longer sustained bursts, with Magic having the edge with spell utility and auto-attack (non-ability weapon swing) manipulation.

It's largely changed now, thanks to new toys. Some styles perform better backloading damage, and others play around with surplus adrenaline.

Point is it's much more than fancy animations, and learning the combat can increase your performance at bosses. You'd probably enjoy it a lot more.

Necro is what the developers were too afraid to do with EoC, presumably fearing complexity for the average user.

Weapon speeds refer to auto-attacks. Won't matter to the average player, and even less so for Necromancers. It's got neat uses for the other styles.

To give you an example, equip a pair of crossbows -> use needle strike -> a non-damaging ability (such as a defensive). You'll use a lossless auto-attack during that second ability. Fr33 dps
There's a lot of neat manipulation you could do with auto-attacks if you play the game long enough to care

Fuck me. Sorry for the wall of text.