RuneScape ® news & patch notes

Leagues II: EQUILIBRIUM

What Is Leagues?

Brand New Free-to-Play Access

A Significantly Different RuneScape

• Completely overhauled Player-Owned House and Construction skill.

• Reworked Daemonheim Dungeoneering.

• A new continent to explore in the form of Havenhythe.

• Greatly modernised and streamlined combat, thanks to our Combat Style Modernisation update.

• A refreshed Player Avatar.

• A simplified UI by default (the customizable UI can still be enabled via your settings).

• Remastered environments, especially in Misthalin.

• A streamlining of time restricted gameplay with our changes to DailyScape and Auras.

• Various balancing and QOL improvements which will ease your journey through the early and mid-game.

Region Unlocking

• Asgarnia - With its access to places like the God Wars Dungeon or the City of Falador.

• Kandarin - Full of skilling spaces like the Player Owned Farm, Hall of Memories and Deep Sea Fishing Hubs.

• Fremennik Province - Including all of its Islands, such as Neitiznot, Lunar Isles & Jatizso.

• Forinthry (Wilderness) - Chock full of dangerous Slayer enemies, Fort Forinthry & Daemonheim.

• Desert - Brimming with areas like Menaphos and Het's Oasis.

• Morytania - Offers a wide variety of content from bosses like Araxxor, or the skilling benefits of the Everlight Digsite.

• Tirannwn - The elven lands are full of potential benefits, from the City of Prifddinas to access to the Lost Grove.

• Anachronia - Full of big dinosaurs! Hunt em, fight em, farm em!

Auto-Completed Quests

Even Faster Progression

Path to Progress

• Relics, which return from last year's Leagues (Catalyst).

• Blessings, a new combat focused progression system.

Brand-New Relics

New Blessings System

• Choose two or more Blessings of Chaos, and you'll unlock the Chaos God Blessing.

• Choose two or more Blessing of Balance, or one Blessing from each path, and you'll unlock the Balance God Blessing.

• Choose two or more Blessings of Order, and you'll unlock the Order God Blessing.

Tier 1 Relics Revealed

Following community feedback from last year, the Tier 1 Relics have been designed to feel more impactful from the very beginning and throughout the entire league.

Survivalist

Endless Harvest

Golden Touch

Ready. Set. League!

- The RuneScape Team

Hello 'Scapers! 

The Mid-Game Rebalance has arrived, with a strong focus on improving the mid-game experience through targeted buffs and quality-of-life upgrades. Our goal is to bring key areas of progression up to more modern standards and make the journey through the mid-game more rewarding.

Let's get into it!

Index:

• Core Fletching Re-Tier

• Agility Rebalance

• Divination Reblance

• God Wars Dungeon Changes

• General Changes

• Drop Rate Changes

Most of this may feel familiar to some you if you already checked out our preview a few weeks back - since then we've changed the following things, so do check out the details on those below:

Changes since the Mid-Game Rebalance Preview:

• Further buffed XP for Anachronia full lap completions (details in Agility Rebalance).

• Further buffed XP for Harmonic Dust (details in General Changes).

• Removed negative perks from invention (details in General Changes).

• Increased the weighting for Vannaka to offer Sanguine Crawler tasks.

• The Artificers measure now has parity with the new Upgraded Gem bag and can be filled with Opal, Jade and Topaz gems as well as noted gems.

Core Fletching Re-Tier

The Fletching re-tier has been in the works for quite some time, and the Mid-Game Rebalance provides the perfect opportunity to finally bring it to life.

Over the years, a number of inconsistencies have appeared throughout Fletching progression. Certain weapons and ammunition have level requirements that don't align with similarly powerful equipment found elsewhere in the game, while some level bands contain noticeable gaps or confusing progression paths. Some of these issues have also emerged as a result of previous Woodcutting tiering changes.

This update aims to address the majority of those inconsistencies, creating a more logical and intuitive progression path for both Fletching and Ranged combat. By aligning item requirements more closely with their power, filling progression gaps, and improving consistency across level bands, we want the journey from early levels through to 99 and beyond to feel smoother, easier to understand, and more rewarding.

It's important to note that this update focuses on re-tiering the core Fletching skill rather than overhauling it entirely. As a result, not every Fletching item has been revisited as part of this project. Darts, knives, and javelins will remain unchanged for now.

Given their relatively low usage in the current game, we felt comfortable prioritising other areas of Fletching progression for this update. However, we're keen to revisit these items in the future as part of a broader review of their role and relevance within RuneScape's combat and skilling ecosystems.

Summary of Changes

• Retiered existing Shortbows, Longbows, Crossbows and 2h Crossbows  

  • Yew shortbows and longbows are retiered to level 70 and, as a result, have become members only items. Free-to-play players will still have level 40 and 50 Ranged options through Maple and Acadia bows.

• Added in additional Shortbows, Longbows, Crossbows and 2h Crossbows to fill in holes in the leveling.

• Shieldbows are being retired and replaced wholesale with their equivalent tier Longbows. 

  • Our data indicates that shieldbows have been left in such an awkward space that their usage is incredibly low, meaning that they actually add bloat and inconsistency to the game. By replacing them with Longbows we expect the choice of bow to be made easier and less confusing for players. 

    • The primary reason for this change is because shieldbows have acted as a bit of a trap to newer players who are fletching them without realising that they deal vastly reduced damage compared to an equivalent shortbow, despite them having a higher fletching requirement. 

  • All current shieldbows gain +1 range when converted to longbows.

  • The Strykebow remain as a shieldbow.

• Standardised metal usage in Crossbow creation.

• Drop tables and shop inventory containing items that have been retiered, where appropriate, are replaced with the new item for that range level instead.

• Achievements and quests are adjusted where needed to account for these retiering changes.

• Added in missing tiers of Arrows & Bolts (Orikalkum → Elder Rune)

• Bane ammunition has been changed from having its own special creation methods to be unified with regular arrows and bolts.

  • Tune Bane Ore can be cast on bane bolts/arrows, rather than banite ore or banite rock, to enchant them into Abyssal/Basilisk/Dragon/Wallasalkibane bolts/arrows.

  • Tune Bane Ore can still be cast on Dinarrows to enchant them into Jas Demonbane arrows.

• Primal ammunition has also been unified to be created in the same way as regular arrows and bolts.

  • Unf bolts are created by bars and feathered like regular bolts.

  • Primal bolts are made in increments of 50 Unf bolts per bar, bringing them in line with all other bolt creation quantities

    • The bolt and arrow proficiency leveling benefits have been removed, but their XP when you first unlock them has a higher baseline.

Fletching Re-tier Tables

Shortbows

Wood

Fletching Live

Fletching New

Range live

Range new

Shortbow

1

1

1

1

Oak shortbow

20

10

10

10

Willow shortbow

35

20

20

20

Maple shortbow

50

40

30

40

Acadia shortbow

Missing

50

Missing

50

Yew shortbow

65

70

40

70

Magic shortbow

80

80

50

80

Elder shortbow

90

90

60

90

Eternal magic shortbow

100

100

99

99

Longbows

Wood

Fletching Live

Fletching New

Range live

Range new

Longbow

1

5

1

1

Oak longbow

25

15

10

10

Willow longbow

40

25

20

20

Maple longbow

55

45

30

40

Acadia longbow

Missing

55

Missing

50

Yew longbow

70

75

40

70

Magic longbow

85

85

50

80

Elder longbow

95

95

60

90

Eternal Magic longbow

Missing

105

Missing

99

Note that we are not planning to introduce Teak and Mahogany Short or Longbows, as these are considered hardwood, which is entirely unsuitable for use in bow fletching. 

For Crossbows, Arrows and Bolts, head across to our blog HERE to see the full tables of changes.

Agility Rebalance

Following the Early-Game Rebalance, we're revisiting Agility courses all the way to level 99. These changes focus on creating a more consistent progression curve across the skill, with most courses receiving substantial XP-per-hour increases to make training feel smoother, more rewarding, and better balanced at every level.

Level

Course

Old XP/Lap

Old XP/HR (Approx)

New XP/Lap

New XP/HR (Approx)

XP change

48

Ape Atoll

580

46,400.0 

 615 

 49,200.0 

6%

50

Anachronia Novice

520

37,440.0 

 650 

 46,800.0 

25%

52

Wilderness

571

51,390.0 

 571 (No change)

 51,390.0 

0%

60

Werewolf

540

43,200.0 

 750 

 60,000.0 

39%

60

Bandos

380

39,085.7 

 585 

 60,171.4 

54%

65

Het's Oasis

2045

70,114.3 

2045 (No change)

70,114.3 

0%

70

Anachronia Advanced

860

51,600.0 

 1,300 

 78,000.0 

51%

77

Hefin 77

704

60,342.9 

 1,200 

 102,857.1 

70%

80

Dorgesh-Kaan

2375

53,437.5 

 5,500 

 123,750.0 

132%

82

Hefin 82

880

75,428.6 

 1,400 

 120,000.0 

59%

85

Advanced Gnome Stronghold

725

65,250.0 

 1,800 

 162,000.0 

148%

85

Anachronia Full

20,040 

150,300.0 

 28,000 

 210,000.0 

40%

87

Hefin 87

1056

90,514.3 

 1,600 

 137,142.9 

52%

90

Advanced Barbarian Outpost

753

71,336.8 

 2,000 

 189,473.7 

166%

92

Hefin 92

1184

101,485.7 

 1,800 

 154,285.7 

52%

97

Hefin 97

1328

113,828.6 

 2,000 

 171,428.6 

51%

Divination Rebalance

We're making changes to Divination as part of our ongoing effort to improve progression throughout the game. Rather than directly increasing XP rates, these changes focus on making energy gathering feel more consistent as you level up, avoiding situations where unlocking a new energy type can feel slower or less effective than what came before.

As a general rule, we're aiming for players to have around a 70% success rate when they first unlock a new energy type, helping new unlocks feel rewarding from the moment they're available.

The changes below show the average increase to your chance of gathering each type of energy across its level range. Players will see the biggest benefits when they first unlock a new energy type, with the bonus gradually settling into its long-term value as they continue training.

For example, a player unlocking Gleaming energy at level 50 would previously have had around a 64.9% chance to successfully gather energy. With this update, that increases to 70%, and continues to improve as their Divination level rises. Over time, this works out to an average increase of around 4% across the level band, helping to smooth out the gathering experience while providing a small boost to XP rates through more consistent successful gathers.

The values below show the average increase to your energy gathering success rate across each energy type's level range. New unlocks will receive a larger boost initially before settling to these long-term values.

Energy Type

Average Success Increase

Gleaming

+4.0%

Vibrant

+3.0%

Lustrous

+2.0%

Brilliant

+1.0%

Radiant

+1.0%

Luminous

+0.6%

Incandescent

+0.5%

God Wars Dungeon Changes:

We're making some changes to God Wars Dungeon 1, which can currently feel overly punishing for players entering the mid-game. While the experience improves as your account progresses, taking your first steps into the dungeon can be slower and more challenging than intended. These updates aim to make that initial experience smoother and more enjoyable.

• To make repeat trips to God Wars Dungeon 1 less frustrating, killcount now works similarly to God Wars Dungeon 2. Your killcount is no longer lost when leaving the dungeon, allowing you to build and maintain it across multiple visits.

• To balance this change, killcount is now be capped at 200.

• With these updates in place, the Omni Soulstone and the Armadylean, Bandosian, Saradominist, and Zamorakian Soulstones have been removed, as they are no longer needed to support the killcount system.

We're also making some changes to God Wars Dungeon 2. While the Reputation system was designed to reward long-term engagement, it currently takes too long to unlock its full benefits, with many players progressing beyond the dungeon before reaching maximum drop rates. These changes aim to make the rewards more accessible and the overall progression feel more worthwhile:

• Maximum reputation has been reduced from 5,000 to 2,000, with all reputation rewards rescaled to match the new progression curve.

• Drop-rate unlocks have been removed from the Reputation system. All players now benefit from the highest available drop rates from the moment they start tackling God Wars Dungeon 2 bosses, removing the need to grind reputation before accessing the dungeon's best rewards.

  • Reputation can still be earned to unlock its associated rewards, but it should now feel like a natural bonus earned through gameplay rather than a prerequisite for efficient bossing.

    • As part of these changes, the "The Venerated" title has been moved down one reward tier, making it available earlier in the reputation journey.

General Changes:

• Demonic Skull

  • The Demonic Skull was originally introduced as a risk-versus-reward mechanic, but we feel its role in the game is no longer meaningful. Following feedback and a review of its place in modern RuneScape, we're removing the item with this update.

    • The Demonic Skull is no longer be obtainable, and any players who own one when the update launches should receive a full refund of its purchase cost.

• Invention Perks

  • Invention can be a difficult skill to get into, particularly for newer players. One of the biggest pain points is the number of negative perks that can appear on gizmos, making progression feel punishing and discouraging experimentation. To make the skill more approachable and reduce unnecessary frustration, we're removing the following perks entirely:

    • Antitheism

    • Profane

    • Inaccurate

    • Junk Food

    • Undead Bait

    • Demon Bait

    • Dragon Bait

    • Cautious

    • Mediocrity

    • Fatiguing

    • Committed

    • Butterfingers

    • Blunted

    • Cheapskate

    • Confused

      • Any existing gizmos or augmented items containing these perks have had the affected perk removed automatically.

• Dive Ability

  • This ability is currently locked behind the "Succession" Quest, which requires 60 Mining and 60 Smithing to complete. These requirements feel out of step with the ability itself, creating an unnecessary progression barrier and making the unlock path feel inconsistent.

    • To better align the ability with its intended use, it no longer require completion of Succession and instead is unlocked naturally at 30 Agility.

• Red and Crystal Sandstone

  • We've heard your feedback on sandstone mining, and we agree that it still feels slower than we'd like. With flask prices continuing to rise, we think it's the right time to make gathering sandstone quicker and more rewarding.

    • To help with this, we've reduced the hitpoints of all sandstone rocks by 50, allowing them to be mined more quickly.

      • We're also giving an additional boost to the higher-tier sandstone sources. Sophanem Red Sandstone (unlocked through the Elite Desert Tasks) and Meilyr Crystal Sandstone (found in the Edimmu Resource Dungeon) have had their hitpoints reduced by a further 50, making these premium sources even faster to gather from.

• Harmonium Harps

  • With the removal of the Travelling Merchant, we've seen feedback that obtaining Harmonic Dust now feels more time-consuming than intended. To help offset this and keep progression towards crystal tools and equipment feeling reasonable, we're increasing the rate at which Harmonic Dust is earned from harps.

    • Harmonic Dust gained from harps has been increased by 40%. This should make gathering Harmonic Dust feel significantly less grindy while preserving it as a meaningful long-term goal.

• Instances

  • Instance costs are being removed from all boss encounters. These fees no longer provide meaningful gameplay value and can act as an unnecessary barrier, particularly for players learning new bosses.

    • Boss-specific entry requirements remain unchanged, so you'll still need items such as Ascension Keystones, Keys to the Crossing, and Barrows Totems where applicable.

• TzRek-Jad (Jad Pet)

  • This pet was previously purchased with Zeal or Thaler and felt a bit disconnected from the rest of the boss pets. For this reason it has been moved be onto Jad's drop table and collection log. Please note, however, that this pet will not be able to be set as an override for familiars.

• Upgraded Gem Bag & Artificer's Measure

  • The Upgraded Gem Bag has felt a little inconsistent, particularly when upgrading to the enhanced version. We want it to feel like a more natural progression upgrade and a clear quality-of-life improvement for players who spend time gathering gems.

    • The Upgraded Gem Bag can now hold up to 100 of each gem type including Jade, Opal, and Red Topaz gems.

  • The Artificers measure has also been updated to have parity with the Gem bag and can be filled with Opal, Jade and Topaz gems as well as noted gems.

Drop Rates

Drop rates have be increased on the following items:

• Dragon Pickaxe

  • The Dragon Pickaxe is an important mid-game upgrade, but its current drop rates make it rarer than we'd like for players at this stage of progression. We want to make the item more accessible while preserving its value and keeping it a rewarding drop to obtain.

    • Chaos Dwarf Dragon Pickaxe drop rate increased from 1/5,000 to 1/3,000.

    • Chaos Giant Dragon Pickaxe drop rate increased from 1/10,000 to 1/1,000.

• Sanguine Crawler & Vampyrism Gloves

  • Vampyrism Gloves don't quite fit the progression slot they're intended to occupy in the mid-game. While we still want them to feel like a valuable reward, the current drop rates can make obtaining them more difficult than intended. 

    • Vampyrism Gloves drop rate increased from 1/500 to 1/200 while on a Slayer task.

    • Vampyrism Gloves drop rate increased from 1/2,000 to 1/1,000 while off-task.

    • Vannaka's weighting to assign Sanguine Crawlers as a Slayer task has been increased to 15.

• Corporeal Beast Sigils

  • Corporeal Beast Sigils occupy an unusual space in the game's progression. Not only are they rarer than we'd like for the power they provide, but the current distribution of sigil drops can also feel inconsistent, with some sigils appearing far more frequently than others.

    • The overall Sigil drop rate has been doubled, increasing from 1/512 kills to 1/256 kills.

    • All Sigil types now have an equal chance of being awarded. When a Sigil drops, each of the four Sigils have a 1-in-4 chance of being received.

• Linza the Disgraced (Barrows)

  • Linza's equipment currently stands out from the rest of the Barrows rewards due to its significantly lower drop rates. This makes completing the set feel disproportionately grindy compared to other Barrows gear, despite filling a similar progression role.

    • The drop rate for Linza's equipment has been doubled, improving from 1/192 to 1/96.

Luck

While working on this project, we took the opportunity to fix several other issues that had arisen.

• Added luck drop chance modifier for Dragon Pickaxe when killing Chaos dwarves and dwogres.

• Added luck drop chance modifier for Unchecked dinosaur eggs.

• Added luck spawn chance modifier for Gout Tuber.

• Off-hand khopesh and Seren symbols drops should now display correct message in chat about obtaining them.

We're excited to hear how you get on with today's changes!

Welcome Home

For nearly two decades, Player-Owned Housing has been a part of the RuneScape journey.

It's where many of us built our first virtual homes (way before we knew what the heck a mortgage is), proudly showed off our achievements, hosted house parties with friends and spent far too much time figuring out where to put that next portal. It was our corner of Gielinor. A place that was uniquely ours! 

But as RuneScape continued to grow, Player-Owned Housing remained largely unchanged. The fantasy of building and customising your own home has always been there, but the tools available to bring that vision to life haven't kept pace with the game around it. 

Well... that changes TODAY!

Today, we're excited to share the next chapter of Player-Owned Housing and Construction. This isn't just an update to an already existing feature. It's a complete reimagining of one of RuneScape's most iconic systems, rebuilt from the ground up to give you more freedom, more creativity, more progression and more reasons than EVER to call this little plot of land your home! And better yet, just like our Dungeoneering overhaul, this rework is intended to set a foundation that can enable both the Player-Owned-House and the Construction skill to continue to develop and expand in future.

Whether you're dreaming of a cosy cottage tucked away from the world, a huge mansion filled with all the trophies you've collected on your adventures, or a bustling Homestead shared with your friends, this update is designed to help you create a space that reflects your journey. 

Welcome home!

Blog Index

• What's new and why we're so excited

• Build the home you've always wanted

• Proudly display your journey

• A house you'll actually use

• Create or join a Homestead with other players 

• Construction reimagined

• What's happening with your old home

• Getting Started

• Get your Housewarming Gift

What's New and Why We're So Excited

Let's start with the easiest of questions: Who is this update for?

The answer is simple: everyone.

• The PvMer preparing for another trip to Amascut.

• The clue hunters looking for simple destination teleporting without the baggage of too many objects.

• The collector with years of trophies and keepsakes waiting to be displayed.

• The social player planning their next house party with friends.

• And the architect who simply wants to build the home they've always dreamed of.

• No matter how you play RuneScape, there's a place for you to call home.

Our video above and our blog below will go into much more detail, but here's a tl;dr preview what's waiting for you:

• Build and decorate with over 650 pieces of furniture and decoration.

• Place furniture freely and create layouts that are uniquely yours.

• Showcase your adventures with trophy rooms, collectables and displays earned throughout your journey.

• Find a home for all those items you've been hoarding for years..! 

• Craft prestigious Eternal furniture and create your dream home like never before.

• Create a Homestead with up to five players and build a thriving community together.

• Take Construction all the way to level 120 with a brand-new progression journey and furniture crafting system.

• The free-to-play level cap is being raised to level 20.

Build the Home You've Always Wanted

Every great home starts with an idea. At the heart of the new Player-Owned Housing experience is the freedom to make it your own, and the first time you step into Build Mode, you'll immediately notice something significant has changed...

In total, you'll have access to or be able to unlock:

• 5 house exterior styles

• 12 room shapes

• Over 650 pieces of furniture and decorations

• Free furniture placement

• Updated classics and brand new additions

Now let's dive into the details of what the above actually means! 

Room placement

Let's start with room placement. As you progress through the Construction skill you'll unlock larger rooms, and more interesting shapes. Much like the original system, rooms will cost coins to place.

Build Mode offers two ways to add a room.

In the first instance, simply click on an existing doorway in your home and select "Add Room". If there's enough space, your new room will connect seamlessly to your house!

The second option places the entire room at your fingertips. Literally! Move your selected room shape into your chosen position, give it a few rotations to ensure you're happy and then click to commit! 

Customize your room's entry spaces or hide them entirely! 

Another change coming to the new build system is the ability to customise your doorway spaces. You can choose between an "open doorway", a "filled in wall", or a "wall with a window" to let all that sunshine in!

Furniture placement

Gone are they days of having a specific room like 'Quest Hall', or 'Workshop' where you were limited to a specific piece of furniture in a very specific spot. We've also said farewell to the constrictions of building a piece of furniture and having to completely delete it if you weren't happy with it's placement.

Now, furniture you've crafted and collected can be stored in the Furniture Storage system found in Rimmington. Once furniture is stored here, it can be easily accessed in Construction's Build Mode, ready for placement. Think of this like a dedicated inventory for your Player-Owned House! 

Enhanced Controls

With all the new systems being implemented we of course needed to overhaul the way you control them!

You'll be able to manipulate the position of both full rooms and pieces of furniture using your mouse controls and keyboard. Once you're happy, just click to commit. And if you do change your mind, simply pick the piece up, reposition, and place it down again.

Alternatively, if you're wanting to start over fresh, you can enter the remove furniture mode that will return any furniture you click back to your storage for use again later. Simples!  

For years, housing has offered players a place to call their own, but there were always limits to what you could build. This reimagined system gives you far more control over how your home looks, feels and essentially functions, allowing you to build a space that's truly yours. 

Whether you're carefully recreating your dream home, designing the perfect social grounds for your friends and clan or experimenting with your layouts in a way that would make our RuneScape Estate agents weep, the choice is entirely yours!

The result is a Player-Owned House that feels unmistakably RuneScape, while giving you more freedom than ever before to make it your own.

Proudly display your journey

The most important things in your house won't just be the walls, the furniture or even that Bob the Cat rug you love so much.

Each item will have a story.

For years, adventurers across Gielinor have been collecting rare rewards, earning those capes, defeating bosses, completing age-old quest lines and uncovering hidden collectables along the way. Until now, many of those memories lived in your bank tabs, achievement interfaces or tucked away in some storage. 

With your new Player-Owned House, your accomplishments finally have a place to belong!

Create trophy rooms filled with all your greatest victories, proudly display your hard-earned collections and turn your home into a reflection of the adventures you've had through RuneScape. 

A House You'll Actually Use

Player-Owned Housing has always had its uses. A handy teleport here, an altar there, and then off you went on your next adventure.

With this reimagining, your home becomes so much more.

Designed around the way players actually play RuneScape today, your house can become a hub for planning and preparing before setting off.

Travel across Gielinor with additional teleport options, prepare for your next PVM with specialist utility furniture and finally find somewhere to put all that stuff you've been hoarding.

For the first time, your house isn't just somewhere you occasionally visit. It's a meaningful part of your RuneScape journey. A place to prepare, regroup, organise and return to time and time again. Below are just a few examples of the functional furniture you can look forward to!

Examples of New Utility:

• Potion Cauldron

  • Each cauldron can store on timed potion type at a time, up to 250 doses. Non-timer potions cannot be added to the cauldron. 

  • Drinking from the cauldron acts as drinking a normal single-dose drink and, where applicable, a larger multi-dose drink option.

  • Up to 5 cauldrons can be placed on your plot.

  • Upgrading your cauldron tier can increase the potion timer duration. 

• Jewellery box

  • The Jewellery Box stores your teleport jewellery (think: games, glory, wealth etc.)

  • Depending on the tier of Jewellery Box, you'll be able to use it to quick-teleport to various jewellery destinations.

A quick note on Damaged Artefact storage - In an earlier blog on Player-Owned Housing, we mentioned some of the functional furniture we’d like to introduce with this update. One of the most requested additions was Damaged Artefact Storage, aimed at helping players free up valuable bank space. Head over to our regular update blog to find out what's happening with that.

Create or join a Homestead with other players

Another very exciting addition coming to Player-Owned Housing is the introduction of Homesteads.

Create or join a Homestead with up to five players and build a thriving community together. Move seamlessly between homes, make use of each other's facilities and create something far bigger than any one house could be on its own!

Fancy showing off your latest creation? Visit public Homesteads, explore other players' designs and take inspiration from homes across Gielinor.

Or, if we're being honest, just be incredibly nosy.

And because visitor numbers aren't restricted, we're incredibly excited to see what happens when house parties make their return!

For the first time, your house doesn't just reflect your own journey. It becomes part of a living community. Your community.

Construction Reimagined

Of course, none of this happens overnight.

Everything you've seen so far is powered by a completely reimagined Construction skill, that is not just expanding all the way to level 120, but is being completely reimagined from the ground up.

Progressing through construction will now generally mean unlocking new furniture, new utility features, new customisation options and new opportunities to grow your home. 

The traditional build-and-destroy training loop has been replaced with a brand-new furniture crafting system designed to make every level feel rewarding.

As mentioned above, everything you construct will be added to your Furniture Storage system. However, those furniture items will require recipes to be craftable. You'll discover new recipes through levelling, questing and exploration across Gielinor, providing you with expanding opportunities to experiment as your home grows.

And yes, for those looking to push their craftsmanship even further, you'll be able to create Eternal furniture, taking your building aspirations beyond Mahogany and into entirely new territory.

Player-Owned Housing has been built to grow alongside RuneScape. As new adventures, rewards and content arrive across Gielinor, we'll continue expanding the system with new furniture, decorations and ways to personalise your home.

Getting Started and Returning to your House

Never built a Player-Owned House before? Don't worry, we've got you covered 😉

Every player, whether you're stepping into Player-Owned Housing for the very first time or returning to redo a home you built years ago, will begin their journey with a brand new introductory quest: There's No Place Like Home...

This short tutorial experience will guide you through the basics of Player-Owned Housing, teaching you how to place and remove furniture, build new rooms and start bringing your dream home to life.

By the end of your journey, you'll have your very own house, a handful of starter supplies and everything you need to begin building your corner of Gielinor.

That is, of course, just the beginning though! 

Getting to your house with ease is an important part of what sets it's foundation as a place to return to. With that in mind, after you've completed the 'There's No Place Like Home' quest and reached level 50 Construction, your Teleport to House spell becomes free to cast, offering you unlimited access.

House portals have taken on a mechanical refresh too! Rather than specify your preference for which portal you want to access your home from, you'll instead be able to teleport to your home through any of the House portals scattered across the world, providing you have the associated Construction level needed to use it.

House Portal

Construction Level

Extra Requirements

Rimmington

1

None

Taverley

1

None

Pollnivneach

20

Members 

Rellekka

30

Members

Brimhaven

40

Members

Yanille

50

Members

Menaphos

50

Members, plus Jack of Spades / Menaphos access

Mazcab

60

Members, plus Goebie reputation unlock

Prifddinas

75

Members, plus Plague’s End and Prifddinas access

'If you can access them from anywhere, surely we can exit to anywhere?' - Correct! On your house exit portal, you'll find a new option; 'Exit to another portal' which will allow you to pop out at any of the house portals across Gielinor, providing you have the associated requirements shown above.

You'll still be able to pick a preferred house portal to arrive at, as well as deciding if your Teleport to House spell or tablets will place you inside or outside your house. Whilst we were tinkering with means of access, we also included a bit of QoL by added the ability to land inside or outside your house when using "Teleport to house" tablets.

What's happening with your old home

Of course, you will be wondering what's happening to your old Player-Owned House, especially if you've invested a lot of resources and furniture into it.

The gobbos came in the dark of night and carried it away brick by brick. Probably.

Either way, its walls have been folded in. However, any furniture that was present in your old house and that has been converted into the new system as part of todays update will be placed in your new Player-Owned House furniture storage. You'll be able to access this once you've completed the tutorial!

We've ported over most furniture, but don't worry if there is a previous piece of furniture that you cant find in the new building system. We have maintained a log of those items in your backend-save. This means that if we do port over any of those pieces of furniture in future, we'll know who already had them in the past and will be able to add them to your furniture storage unit. 

A couple extra notes:

• Player dungeons are not launching with the new player-owned house at launch, as the entire build and plot system work very differently to before. But don't worry, your rocnar is safe and sound should the day come to reunite (edited) 

• Portable Workbenches have been temporarily disabled with this update due to the skill's rework. We are looking into reenabling some of their functionality in future, though please do note that they will likely be affected or removed by our MTX item clean-up that is taking place this Winter. 

Welcome Home

For years, Player Owned Housing has given adventurers a place to call their own.

Today, we're taking that idea further than ever before.

Now you have a place to build.

A place to gather.

A place to showcase your achievements, prepare for your next adventure and create something lasting within this wonderful world.

Whether you're planning your dream cottage, building the ultimate trophy hall or creating a thriving Homestead with friends, we can't wait to see what you create!

It's time to shape your corner of Gielinor.

Welcome home.

PS - Before you head off!

You can't get a new house and not expect a housewarming gift! And no, don't worry, it's not another gravyboat. It's a little something from us to celebrate the last 20 years of player-owned houses. 

For the first month from release, between July 13th and August 13th, if you visit your Player-Owned House (after completing the tutorial quest), you'll find a small token of our appreciation waiting for you. It's a unique piece of furniture that looks back to where this all started. Happy constructing!

Howdy Scapers!

Player Owned Housing

Leagues II: Equilibrium

Havenhythe Part 2

API & Plugin Support

Dive into Sunlight Sands

Alongside this new roadmap reveal we have also launched out weekly update and Summer event "Sunlight Sands" check them out in game today.

Index:

• New Event - Sunlight Sands

• Last chance plushies

• Patch Notes

• Whats Happening in the Community

Community Topics:

What's happening this week:

In Case You Missed It:

• Last week we shared the ongoing work to improve Gielinor's Goblins, courtesy of Mod Wov's dedication to them. Check it out here!

• We also shared a preview of our upcoming Mid-Game Rebalance. You can read that here. Look out for it's release date being announced this afternoon!

JMod Replies on discussions worth highlighting:

New Summer Event - Sunlight Sands

The Beach's Legacy

• The Dungeoneering hole has been filled and is no longer available. While the accessibility of easy, AFK Dungeoneering experience was something some players enjoyed, we recently Remastered Dungeoneering and feel this is the right time to retire this activity.

• The Temperature Gauge, Heatwaves, Icecreams, Happy Hours, and similar systems have also been removed, and XP gains from activities have been rebalanced accordingly. Originally, one of the features of the Beach was offering higher XP rates than other events, balanced by the Temperature Gauge limiting how long you could participate efficiently. However, this design ultimately encouraged daily min-maxing. As a result, we’ve removed these mechanics so you can now spend as much time as you like at Sunlight Sands gathering currency and progressing at your own pace.

  • Icecreams remain available purely for earning the associated title.

• Several Beach cocktails have also been removed. Previously, some of these provided XP boosts that led to a sense of mandatory upkeep rather than fun gameplay. To improve the overall experience, we’ve streamlined this system.

  • You will still be able to acquire the “Fisherman’s Friend”, “George’s Peach Delight”, “Palmer Farmer”, and “Ugly Duckling” cocktails, as these provide boosts to event activities and feel more integrated into the updated design.

• Sandy Clues were another daily mechanic and have not made a return for this event.

Merch Update - Last Chance to preorder the latest plushies!

https://www.makeship.com/shop/creator/runescape

Patch Notes

Player Avatar

• A variety of animations have had blinks added! This addition should help break-up the "dead stare" that has been more noticeable since the improved eyes on the player avatar.

• Fixed an issue where a number of NPCs within Senntisten church had broken or invisible heads following the Avatar Rework update.

• Fixed a gap in the model for the Goebie Warpaint Top (All Colours)

• Skin clipping has been fixed on Hallowed Hood and Unhallowed Hood

• The chathead eyes for Malevolent Helm (Soul) / (Ice) / (Aurora) now glow as intended

• Fixed a gap with the degraded version of the Grifolic Poncho

General

• An additional 4 preset slots in the Wardrobe have been added for all your FashionScape desires!

• Fixed an issue where no SFX would play when using the Occult loot beam override.

• Fixed an issue with the skill banners inside the Max Guild in Prifddinas where they had a transparent space around the skill icons.

• Updated the 'Remote Totem Charging Point' to be displayed as 'Remote Totem Access Point' on the Anachronia base camp management UI.

• The 'Chaos of Corruption' soundtrack now correctly unlocks while fighting Seiryu (ow, my ears).

  • The black crystals destroyed while fighting Seiryu no longer drop bones.

• Fixed an issue where part of the bridge near the waterwheel was missing collision in the Blooming Burrow.

• Fixed an issue where players could clip through environment pieces near the Twin Furies arena entrance in GWD2.

• Removed a couple of force-walk tiles in the Mos Le'Harmless jungle area that were unintentionally present.

• Fixed an issue with one of the dragon heads mounted on the wall in the Yanilla pub where it would clip through the ceiling to the first floor.

• The sink located in Anachronia Dinosaur Farm is no longer interactable.

• Fixed an issue that caused the "All Mine" achievement completion message to appear again while mining rocks.

• Fixed an issue where the right-side of the 'Gate of Goshima' wall was removed if the 'remove roofs' option was set to 'always'.

• Fixed a typo in Sandy the crab's post-quest dialogue.

• Fixed an issue that caused the Dungeoneering broadcast to not appear properly when the Ring of Kinship interface was opened.

Engine

• Fixed tree leaf and plant fade-in when moving around the world.

• Fixed an issue where tri-planar mapping rendered incorrectly.

• Fixed an issue where the "Quietest World" button could recommend worlds with a different language setting

Community Topics:

• As June draws to a close (WHAT? HOW?!) and July beckons, look out for a video early next week which will provide an update on upcoming releases!

• Avatar News

  • Work on the Avatar is progressing well, with over 105 avatar-related models being updated to the new avatar standards this week. This continues the skin ungrafting work that forms a large part of the update and that simply takes time to work through.

  • Beyond the above, our patch notes include a number of Avatar-related fixes regarding clipping, stretching and other issues.

What's happening this week:

• GOBLINS. A Bloggo for the Gobbos, landing in the middle of this week.

• Our Mid-game rebalance is coming up in the near future, so we'll be sharing a preview of what it incorporates later this week.

JMod Replies on discussions worth highlighting:

• JMod congratulations on whatever-the-heck is being achieved here.

• Mod Luma on skill requirements being removed from Dungeoneering Puzzle Rooms.

• Mod Anvil on Intel Render Bugs

• Mod Anvil commenting on Protoxx Grand Exchange Improvements Video

A Note of Phishing (The bad kind)

There are no P-Mod Application forms, and anything you download for RuneScape must be a subdomain of Jagex.com or RuneScape.com to be considered safe. Always download anything directly through our website or Launcher – nowhere else.

• Don't click suspicious links or download unknown files.

• Jagex will never ask for your password or verification codes via email or messages. Never give away credentials that could be used to access your account.

• Use your browser's phishing filters.

Patch Notes

Player Avatar Refresh

• A stretching issue with the Superior Morrigan's Leather on the female avatar has been fixed.

• Hands no longer clip and stretch with the Fenrir body for the Male avatar.

• Overseer Siv animates correctly in the Dead and Buried Questline

• The avatars face now looks as expected with the Varrock Agent's Cowl

• The Gold, Silver and Bronze Athlete's legs now animate as expected

• Both eyes now glow when wearing the Malevolent Helm for the female avatar

• Bik's Acolyte's Hood now covers the whole face including the nose and ears.

General

• Resolved an issue that in rare cases caused bleeds to persist after death in a duel.

• Resolved an issue that in rare cases caused bleeds to persist after death in clan wars.

• Fixed an issue that caused the spellbook swap on the action bar to stop working after changing the spellbook.

• Bloodlust stacks are now disabled during classic combat mode, as you have no way of activating them.

• The action bar will no longer attempt to use abilities you can not use if you do not have the level required but are stat boosted. These abilities will also no longer light up on the bar or in the ability book.

• Fixed an issue where other players and NPCs could appear invisible on a specific tile in Daemonheim.

• Updated destroy messaging for Daemonheim Rewards shop items.

• Forgotten Necromancers are now in a casual stance by default, rather than their combat stance.

• Corrected the Hunter and Slayer level prerequisites for the "Giant Game Hunter", "Giant Chinchompa Hunter", and "Giant Kebbit Hunter" achievements.

• Fixed the notice boards in the bank on tutorial island.

• Fixed the benches in the church on tutorial island.

• Fixed an issue that caused players and NPCs to clip inside the spinning wheel in the Cadarn Clan district in Prifddinas.

• Removed a misplaced map on the south of Lunar Isle.

• The "Going Down With the Ship" achievement can now be completed by ironmen as fishing trawler is now playable by ironmen.

  • If a CGIM is on the boat they will not get any rewards at the end of the minigame if someone outside of their group helps with the activity, but the achievement is still earnable.

• Lumbridge Castle flags are now animated consistently.

• Model updated for the wooden beams on both ends of Lumbridge's northern bridge.

• Several Surge, Escape and Dive trails were unintentionally updated and have now been reverted to the state they were in prior to the update on the 22nd June, 2026.

• The Portent of Death now correctly deals damage to Flesh-Hatcher Mhekarnahz.

• Sound effects added to Penance Aspect Spell

• Prevented a rare occurrence that could make the UI think a player was on tutorial island incorrectly.

Index:

• Graphical Update to Waterbirth Island

• Patch Notes

• Whats Happening in the Community

Latest Avatar News:

• Todays update includes fixes for about 18 outstanding issues related to the Player Avatar. While work still continues, we've today addressed instances of missing skin, incorrect or washed out colours, Npcs missing their chatheads, stretching issues and clipping issues. The Max and Comp Capes should now also be a little less floaty and a bit more snug and attached.

• We addressed issues with some animations, specifically making sure you no longer look quite so wonky or unhinged during Party Fever Walk, Shrug and Parasol Idle.

• We also resolved issues with 16 animal masks that are obtainable from clue scrolls (so you should no longer randomly have a bald held when wearing them).

• Finally, we are in the process of spinning up a new system to have unique female and male chathead animations. This will in turn allow us to improve the female chathead and push this much closer to the mesh seen on the body.

• Just to recap our previous prioritization of work:

• Focus on fixing Critical Bugs and known issues.

• Finish off the outstanding work to bring all items in line with the new Avatar. That includes ensuring none of the old Avatar skin is present on worn items.

• Consider which modifications to Avatar faces or body proportions are necessary and possible based on evolving community feedback.

• Further patch notes for the Avatar can be found below.

In Case You Missed It:

• Last week we shared updates on two hugely anticipated projects - check them out here!

  • Grand Exchange Improvements Preview - We took a deeper look at the Grand Exchange and shared what's coming up for this exciting project in the near future!

  • API Project Check In - We offered you a a peek behind the curtain on this project and also look to get your thoughts on your more anticipated plug-ins!

JMod Replies on discussions worth highlighting:

• Mod Anvil on working with the RS Wiki team.

• Mod Shrike on why the community proposed Wendlewick Agility Course is unviable.

• Mod Ryan on in game timeline inconsistencies.

Waterbirth Island Exterior Graphical Update (or WIEGU for short)

Before/After

Patch Notes

Hotfixed

• Fixed a script crash which could occur while using the auto screener at specific excavation spots.

• Fixed Security booths in Daemonheim not awarding artefacts.

Player Avatar Refresh

• Restored the missing ankles to the Storyteller legs.

• Fixed an issue that caused the shoulderpads of the Malevolent Cuirass (Third Age) to have a pinkish hue.

• Adjusted the shoulders during the 'Shrug' emote to reduce stretching.

• Adjusted the facial expressions while any parasol is worn.

• Resolved an issue that caused some NPC chatheads to appear incorrectly.

• Adjusted the facial expressions when using the Party Fever walk override.

• Fixed an issue with the Ghostly hood not showing the new avatar head.

• Adjusted the material for the female avatar 'Layered' hairstyle to be more inline with other styles

• Resolved clipping issues for the Comb-over hairstyle.

• Adjusted the wrist position on the Spirit Hunter walk override to work better with the new male avatar.

• The Demonic Claw hairstyle now applies the correct eyecolour.

• Fixed various clipping issues on the Acrobat hood for both avatars.

• Resolved an issue with the back of the head for animal and dragon masks from treasure trails.

  • These have been restored to the way they appeared prior to the avatar rework, where the back of the head is covered by fabric matching the mask colour

• Fixed an issue with certain items having pink colouration that should be white

Digsite

• Typo resolved in Ancient tablet IV for the 'Shadows of the Colossi' mystery.

• Fixed an issue where the Ring of Kayazu was being triggered each time you'd interact with a soul storm disturbance, rather than only on completion of the soul storm.

• Fixed issue where Mystery - Moonrise achievement was not appearing under master quest cape requirements.

• Ring of Kayazu can now be stored in Group Ironman storage.

General

• The Saradomin Sword should now correctly use a crushing style.

• The 'Say It, Don't Spray It' achievement now requires 'Hermit Permits' to be completed.

• Metals: A musing' book can no longer be obtained on free-to-play worlds.

• Implings should no longer be able to take any damage, as was the case with Sheer Cold effect.

• Fixed a typo in the modern game interface layout description.

• Fixed a script crash and error which prevented restoration of multiple artefacts at a time.

• Updated headwear addons description to remove incorrect references to free loot.

• God Wars amulets can now be noted when using magic note paper on them.

• Drakes are no longer attackable while they're in the process of turning into Mega Duck.

  • Duck food can now be used to spawn Mega Duck.

  • The sack of duck food now has right-click options to take multiple duck food.

• Surge, Escape and Dive trail particle effects have been reduced to reduce visual clutter.

Index:

• New Archaeology Dig Site: Moonrise

• A message from Mod Stu

• A note about Tuesday's Maintenance

• Patch Notes

• Whats Happening in the Community

Community notes follow below.

Avatar Latest News:

Today marks the launch of a long-awaited refresh to the Player Avatar! Discover a brand-new iconic face for the character you’ve always known and loved.

Accept marketing cookies to watch this video here. Alternatively, watch on YouTube

Before we continue, let's clear up what is a "Player Avatar"? In short, the Player Avatar is you or, more accurately, your character in Gielinor. It's the character beneath the armour that you created when you first started your account.

Today's Release:

New Base Avatar

Updated Hairstyles

Legacy Hairstyles

Beards

List of Known Issues

• Some heads, torsos, legs, hands and feet items will still be displaying the old avatar skin and may look out of place (explained above).

• Certain items may encounter clipping issues, especially with Tiaras or ‘legacy’ customisations (old style customisation but new avatar).

  • Clipping is a visual bug that occurs when two textures pass through each other in a way that is not realistically possible. An example of clipping would be a hair texture poking through the solid top of a hat.

• The flip-side of clipping is when you can see gaps between joins so that items feel unconnected or floaty. You may encounter this on a certain number of items.

• Heads in interfaces and speech may have bugs (chat heads).

• Some clothes or limbs may appear stretched or at awkward angles.

• Some NPCs may be missing parts of their heads.

• The photobooth, which is used to reflect your in-game avatar's face onto our website, has been temporarily disabled, while we proceed with work to integrate the new avatar code into the website.

What's next?

Hey folks!

While the sun and the rain battle it out for which weather is better Mod Anvil and Mod Ryan are back chat about what's to come in June and keep you up to date with our Roadmaps.

Here is the full June Ahead schedule:

Index:

• New Quest: Secrets of Amberfell

• Merch Store Update

• This Weeks Patch Notes

• Whats Happening in the Community

Community Topics

• AMD Graphic Cards on the latest set of drivers have been having rendering issues causing things like missing textures/blank areas. This issue arose in the last few weeks with the launch of the latest AMD drivers and our update last Monday has just brought this into frame for more players.

  • This issue is currently resolved by rolling back your graphic drivers to a more stable previous patch.

  • We are currently investigating this from our side to reduce future complications but whenever there is a new set of graphic drivers there is always the potential for a mismatch.

• We have also recieved reports from MAC OS users of similar missing texture and graphical issues occurring. Our team has been diving into these reports all week and the common element is the use of Intel integrated GPU and the team is working on a fix

• Other users have reported stuttering or framerates hitching especially when transitioning to regions such as going from the overworld to a cave system and this is further noticeable for users who hide the loading screens. We currently investigating a solution to this issue but there is not a current ETA on a release.

• We will be sharing June's Month Ahead later today be on the lookout for that!

• We are running a Quarterly Survey currently! You can find it in the lobby, head on over when you next login and help us shape the future of RuneScape!

JMod Replies on discussions worth highlighting or not covered above:

• Mod Yuey clarifies a question about carer tickets for Runefest.

• Mod Soul has been dilligently chasing after info for graphical issues that cropped up this week.

Dungeoneering Remastered is now live! Let's dive back into Daemonheim! ⚔️

Index:

• The Dungeoneering Remaster launches today! Find out more here

• RuneScape: Untold Tales of the God Wars Graphic Novel launches tomorrow!

• Full patch notes can be read here!

Community Topics:

• This week we'll be primarily focusing on the launch of Dungeoneering, including a livestream Dungeoneering event with Mod's Yuey, Mod Luma, Mod Reaper and community members. 

  • This will take place on Thursday, May 14th - 16:00 server time on our Twitch Channel. Alternatively, do join us in-game at the same time: World 77 - Daemonheim. See you there!

• We're also planning to share a one-stop-shop blog on what's releasing on the marketplace, as well as looking for some of your thoughts on cosmetic related questions. We're aiming to share this blog on Tuesday.

• Last week we kicked off our Player Avatar Beta. This is running through till tomorrow, so make sure to jump in if you haven't already! We'll share some more news about the Player Avatar next week (week of the 18th).

• We also shared insights into the Performance Investigation and the fixes we undertook earlier this year. This is a tech-heavy blog, but it does provide an under-the-hood look at some of the inner workings!

Daemonheim is getting a huge refresh on the 11th May across gameplay, balancing, rewards, visuals, and more! Here’s some of what’s coming:

• Rebalanced floor XP and massively increased token gains

• Prestige replaced with a brand new floor buff system

• Full Necromancy integration, including new gear, rituals and Ring of Kinship classes

• New Ruinous T90 weapons with Warpbane effects

• Huge quality of life improvements across floors, puzzles and bosses

• Smuggler’s Storage and expanded binds

• Full speedrunning support arriving May 18

We’ve also teamed up with Rheyo for an early hands-on look at the remaster, where he dives into the changes, rewards and new additions coming to Daemonheim. Read the full blog here: https://secure.runescape.com/m=news/delve-into-dungeoneering-remastered Watch Rheyo’s preview here:

Hey ‘Scapers!

Community Notes

• While the majority of the Dungeoneering Remaster is launching on May 11th, we will only be releasing aspects of the update related to speedrunning in the following week. This is to ensure that there are no issues present in the update that would give early speedrunners an unfair advantage over later speedrunners. We also want to use this gap to validate how expected time thresholds for completion change after the update has been implemented.

• We are continually working on a number of other blogs and community topics, so you may see a few more pop up throughout the weeks. We will, however, always try to give you a heads up that these are coming using the weekly Monday blog post.

Index

• Game Update: Visual Update - World Declutter

• Double XP is back! This event will be running from Friday May 1st for ten days. In classic fashion, Double XP is a 10-day event where you have 48 hours of Double XP to use at your leisure.

• RuneFest tickets go on sale this week!

• Items previously obtained using Loyalty Points from Solomons Store have now be added to the Marketplace as a bundle, free to claim for all members.

• Patch Notes

Community Topics

• We'll be kicking off a discussion about shaping aspects of the mid-game balance in the middle of this week. Rather than sharing any design direction, however, we want to use this first step to understand what issues you've encountered around mid-game balance. Keep an eye out for our kick-off topics on Reddit and Discord!

• Mod Anvil and Mod Ryan will be sharing a lookback at April and what May has in store for you this Thursday, April 30th.

In Case You Missed It + Our Reactions to Last Week:

• Last week we released a few Game Jam quality of life projects, including (but not limited to!) Boss Enrage Mechanics Update and Quiet World smarthopping.

• We also ran a rollback on April 20th, which affected a couple hours of player playtime. Find out more about that here.

• We shared some insights from the recent quarterly check-in Survey as well as some Double XP Event details. Read the blog post here!

• Finally, we shared progress on how our Player Avatar is coming along as well as some details about the upcoming Player Avatar Beta. Find out more here!

Patch Notes:

• Improved Necromancy Conjure's so that players are unable to target them anymore making it easier to traverse and use movement skills.

  • Additionally they are now lower in the visibility order so NPCs will appear on top of them if they are on the same square.

• Reduced the length of the Conjured Zombies particle trail and updated SFX when the zombie is summoned and walking around.

• Residual Soul stacks are now only visible to yourself, no longer do you need to see how many souls your fellow Necromancers are working with.

  • Similarly, they also now hide when unequipping a lantern and reappear when equipping one. This should help cut down on UI elements in combat with friends!

• The HP and Prayer boosted buffs have been removed from the buff bar, these very common buffs were taking up valuable real estate while being something players could easily see elsewhere in their UI.

  • We have kept the negative version of these effects though as it's useful for specific bits of content (Magister / Zuk).

• Transformed the Tile Indicator visual to be a square instead of a circle, this should help clearly show which tile you're moving towards along with showing an enemies size.

• The blinding pillar of light from the Scripture of Wen has been revamped into a more subtle visual and sound effect.

• Updated the size of the Aftershock VFX to be less obtrusive and visually cluttering. The SFX have also been updated to match.

• The size of the Incite Fear VFX has been reduced to be less obtrusive and the SFX has been updated to match.

• The Sapphire and Opal Aurora spells have been tweaked to reduce the amount of VFX, additionally the visual effects when used with the Prism Spells have been revamped to be less intrusive.

• Improved readability of where Yakamaru's Poison attack will land.

• AOD Minions are shown in the order they are killed below the boss health bar, they are ordered from left to right.

• Reduced the size of the VFX related to the Boon of Apmeken.

• The size of the trail left behind by Dive/Escape and Surge cosmetic effects has been reduced to improve visibility.

• Improved the clarity and visibility of the Lumberjack's Intuition when chopping Eternal Magic Trees.

Game Jam Projects

A handful of Game Jam projects have made it through the pipeline and are now live in the game today!

Boss Enrage Mechanics Update

With the release of Amascut we had created a Boss with a smoother enrage experience and many players have requested we show the same love to previous enrage bosses, and now it’s finally here.

Mod Pigeon and Mod Reaper have been hard at work getting this one wrapped up but now Enrage choosing has now been unlocked for the following encounters:

• Telos

• Arch-Glacor

• Zamorak, Lord of Chaos

Players can now start at any enrage level they choose, all the way up to the fabled 4,000%.

Zamorak due to going to 60,000 enrage works a little differently as to respect the time and achievements of our most dedicated Zamorak players, the Zamorak encounter will initially allow entry up to 4,000% enrage only.

Then once you have bested 4,000%, you will be able to push beyond that threshold with each successful Zamorak kill at your highest enrage above 4,000% now increasing enrage by 100% increments (up from 10%).

Quiet World smarthop

Been on the hunt for a slayer drop but keep running into cannons and coils? Well Mod Samy & Easty has been working on a smart hop feature to help players find a quieter world when looking for a chill grind spot, this feature will suggest quieter worlds for the spot you are in and make hopping easier.

Boss Portal Sorting

Mod Helen popped the hood on the Boss portal system to do some dev side stuff that will make it easier to work on in the future and while she was at it installed a sorting system so that players can choose how the list is ordered to help find the best you seek! By default it's set to Chronological (Old → New) which is the current style but you can also now reverse this and sort it alphabetically! This affects both the War's Retreat & Max Guild portals.

Potion Reservoir Device status

And as a bonus Mod Helen has also retrofitted the Potion Reservoir with a Device status so players can know if it's doing its job at a quick glance.

Upgrading the Rune Pouch capacity

Ever since the addition of the Necromancy Nexus, players have asked for the same rune capacity to be added to the existing Rune Pouches and Mod Desert has done just that! Took a little elbow grease but you should now be able to store up to 2,147,483,647 of a type in your pouches!

Patch Notes

Fixes and Improvements In this week's game update

Hotfix

• Fixed an issue that was preventing the spellbook swap spell from returning to the original spellbook after casting the 'Penance' spell.

• Fixed an issue that was not allowing the limitless ability to be triggered correctly.

• Fixed an issue with weapon bundles in the marketplace appearing as available when they had actually already been purchased.

• Fixed an issue that caused disconnects when adding new favourites in the Grand Exchange interface.

Game Jam

• Added a device status section to the potion reservoir's tooltip which informs the player if the device is turned on.

• Implemented various QoL improvements to the portals at War's Retreat and the Max Guild:

  • The boss portal interface has options to sort the bosses by:

    • Chronological (Old to New)

    • Chronological (New to Old)

    • Alphabetical (Ascending)

    • Alphabetical (Descending)

      • The default option when first opening the interface is set to "Chronological (Old to New)"

• A new button has been added to the World Select menu for the new Quiet World hopping.

• Made a change to rune pouches to increase the max stack of runes held to be consistent with the Necromancy Nexus.

• Boss Enrage Unlocking has now been unlocked for the following encounters:

  • Telos

  • Arch-Glacor

  • Zamorak

    • Across all three encounters, players can now start at any enrage level they choose, up to the fabled 4,000%.

    • To respect the time and achievements of our most dedicated Zamorak players, the Zamorak encounter will initially allow entry up to 4,000% enrage only. Once 4,000% has been defeated, players will still be able to push beyond this threshold.

    • The only change being, a successful Zamorak kill at your highest enrage above 4,000% will now increase enrage in 100% increments (up from 10%).

General

• All aspect spells can now be cast multiple times to extend the buffs up to a total of 1 hour duration. Additionally, a "multicast" option has been added to each spell's right-click menu, which - for x5 the rune cost - will extend the buff to the max duration.

• The 'Penance' spell has been moved to the Ancient spellbook.

• Fixed an issue in the Amascut boss encounter where 1,000 enrage was causing waves to occur faster than intended. Wave timing has been adjusted so that there is now a 3-tick delay at 4,000 enrage, a 4-tick delay at 2,000 enrage, and a 5-tick delay across all other encounters.

• The boss portals in War's retreat now allow F2P players to access the Ivar boss encounter.

• Fixed an inconsistent description for the Remototem effect visible in the totem bag.

• Updated the audio for Death's Swiftness so it no longer plays after the ability has ended.

• Updated the visual effects of some Melee abilities.

• Fixed an issue that caused Masterwork sinew to drop on the ground when crafting with a full inventory.

• Fixed an issue with the 'Identify' option on Eternal Magic Tree displaying untranslated text in non English game languages.

• Fixed some animation issues with Bear the dog.

• Fixed some tree stumps across the world.

• Players can now use fish on food hatches to specifically only add the fish (or algae) of the used type to the food hatch.

• Fish Farm XP yield per catch has been adjusted for each fish type.

• Pools on the Fish Farm now generate more fish per run.

• Required number of fish to start farming the swordfish pool has been increased

• Players are now informed that Maya will note/unnote more types of fish.

• Added a buff icon explaining the Pool Synergy effect."

• Tutorial popup windows won't appear until players leave menus that are not related to the tutorial.

• In the Dungeoneering puzzle room with the three statues there should no longer be a floating weapon if a statue is given the incorrect weapon.

• Fixed a typo in the dialogue with Taylor during the Violet is Blue Too quest.

• A typo in the Igneous Kal-Mor cape's description has been corrected.

• Fixed some text issues with the staircase in the Falador Shield Shop.

• Fixed a typo in the Necklace trinket's destroy message.

• The worldmap tooltip for the Shilo Village's stepping stones shortcut has been corrected and now displays the correct agility level requirement.

• A typo in the dialogue with Drezel when asking about the columbarium during the Legacy of Seergaze quest has been corrected.

• Fixed an issue that caused the 'Christmas Bundle received' message to appear after every login.

• Missing spinning wheel world map icons have been added in Burthorpe.

• The Spring Cleaner's Mode Select text is no longer cut off.

RuneFest 2026 is BACK!

There’s nothing quite like a year with RuneFest – and we are so excited to be back THIS YEAR with our biggest and best one yet. This October, hundreds of J-Mods will come together with 6000 (!!) of you to celebrate 25 incredible years of RuneScape. We’ll be bringing new surprises along with all your favourite bits and pieces amped up – those big “Holy S***” roadmap reveal moments, deep discussions about our games across two stages, IRL skilling with Skillchips and much more. If you’ve ever thought about going to RuneFest, this is the year to say "I’m going!”. Tickets go live on Thursday April 30th at 16:00 BST / 17:00 CEST / 11:00 EDT / 08:00 PDT.

So what’s actually new this year?

We know what makes RuneFest special, so while there’s some new exciting things to talk about, it’s also about going bigger on what you love most. For those who have been before, you know how awesome it is to feel a little piece of Gielinor bleed into the real world. We’ll be bringing back our iconic fixtures from last year – like the Lumby gates, the Grand Exchange & Varrock Fountain – as well as some brand new parts of Gielinor that we’ll leave for you to discover on the day. Speaking of bringing our games IRL, we’ll also have new variations of our Skill Chips! Expect 8 brand new challenges to see if that 99 in game has any translation to the real world (no judgement if not, we have the coordination of a banana). Complete all 8 Skill Chips and complete your set with the special final reward chip. It’s like a completionist cape, but for your desk. Alongside peppering you with free socks and huge content reveals on the main stage, we will have a second permanent stage inside the RuneFest hall all weekend long. This will be packed full of developer panels and Q&As for the full behind the scenes experience. We’re also trying something we’ve never done at RuneFest before: Questing! You’ll be able to take on RuneFest quests across the weekend, earn quest points, see where you land on the hiscores, and maybe even earn some exclusive rewards. No Quest Helper though...

Tickets and what you get

Standard tickets give you full access to RuneFest across both Saturday and Sunday, along with your goodie bag packed with exclusive gifts you won’t be able to get anywhere else, including some 25th anniversary surprises. We’re also introducing a Gold Tier ticket for those of you who want to go even bigger this year! Gold Tier includes an upgraded goodie bag featuring an exclusive RuneFest Gold Trim Rune Armour Figurine by Youtooz, never to be reproduced or resold (pictured below). You’ll also get early access to the merch store, a 15% discount on all merch purchases at the event, reserved seating at the front of the main stage, and priority booking for LAN sessions and meet and greets.

Pricing

• Standard tickets are £210 plus platform booking fee

• Gold Tier tickets are £375 plus platform booking fee.

Our prices are based on two important principles; making sure we deliver an event full of core memories, and one worthy of the time and cost it takes to be there. We do not make our events or set ticket prices for profit in any way.

Pre-Order Merch

You’ll be able to pre-order merch alongside your ticket at early bird pricing, including some exclusive lines that won’t be available at the event. Pre-order items will appear as add-ons during checkout, so don’t miss your chance to personalise your gear and lock in your preferred size and style before they sell out. Your ticket will be reserved for 15 minutes while you complete your order, and you’ll be prompted to select sizing and any personalisation (where available) at checkout. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/38802315/ab019f9b38d95047790790483e7418fa8e8437d5.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/38802315/bff85d4f0b5b09e362a033a62c829d014312e324.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/38802315/f85a3077fc521fe39bbec91299d0942445893c19.png For the first time, you can pre-order your skill chip box, and we’re introducing a new long-sleeve version of the t-shirt! Check out the full range and size guides here to be ready for the 30th. If you’ve been before, you already know what RuneFest feels like. If you haven’t, it’s so hard to put into words... but for us, there’s nothing like being in a room packed with people who love Gielinor just as much as you do. Bit cliche, but it really feels like home. This is 25 years of RuneScape, all in one place. You don’t want to miss it.

- The RuneScape Team

Hey ‘Scapers!

As we continue to follow through on delivering both our 2026 and our Road to Restoration roadmaps, we are continuing to look for ways to keep you, our community, both involved and informed. Mod Anvil very recently sat down with Mod Ryan to chat about the work we’ve done so far while also taking the opportunity to preview the month of April.

Check it out here and let us know how you feel about this format as a roundup of the previous month + previewing the Month Ahead!

As part of this video we unveiled our plans for the month of April. Check it out here!

Community notes:

• We didn’t mention it in our video above, but we’re planning to release a few projects that our fellow JMods worked on as part of recent Game Jams. These are slated to release in week 4.

• In our video above, Mod Ryan and Anvil touch on the subject of RuneScape’s Technical Performance. Improving performance and addressing Frame Dropping and Microstutters are a high priority investigation for our teams and we intend to share more insight into this as part of a community topic this month - both what we’ve already done but also where our investigation is leading us. We are making some promising headway, but because this is a live and ongoing investigation, we can’t yet lock down a specific week to share our findings, bearing in mind that we want to provide you with specific, useful and interesting information as part of this communication rather than only being able to say that “we’re looking into it”.

Content:

• Today we're launching the Blooming Burrow spring event as well as an update to the Cosmetic Toggle. Read more about both of these in their dedicated sections on todays blog! 

• Full Patch Notes can be found further below in this post.

Community Topics:

• We'll be revealing our Month Ahead plans for April this week, most likely on Wednesday, April 1st (seriously). 

• We've just this morning created a Jmod topic on our Discord to chat a little bit about the Dungeoneering Reward Shop item pricing. This is more of a short check-in chat than a proper community topic, but if you'd like to get involved, please visit the Discord channel here.

In Case You Missed It + Our Reactions to Last Week:

• Last week we launched Havenhythe, a brand new landmass and RuneScapes biggest area expansion to date. Read all about it here!

• Havenhythe has been a huge focus for us this past week - you can check out all our JMod replies in our dedicated Discord server #social-feed channel. Today's patch notes cover a number of important changes to this area, so do make sure to check them out in the dedicated module below!

  • Change Highlight: Ivar, King of Bones's unique drops are now all F2P! This includes the bonecrusher maul, magic skull mask, colossal bones (x100; 1 per kill), and his pet drop.

  • We also hosted some of the team behind Havenhythe on our regular RuneSkill & Chat Twitch Stream. Watch it here!

JMod Replies on discussions worth highlighting or not covered above:

• Mod Luma on Honey Badgers

• Mod Rowley on Bosses

• Mod Ramen on Cameras

• Mod Anvil on LoDing to improve performance 

• Mod Anvil on the Phoenix D&D Pet

• Mod Ramen on how to display the edge of world

Patch Notes:

Hotfix

• Fixed an issue that prevented players from receiving Phoenix Eggling pets after completing the D&D encounter.

• Fixed an issue where birdhouses were not tracking seeds when used from the inventory.

• Fixed an issue that caused Skeka's hypnowand to not function correctly in the new Big Game Hunter encounters.

• Fixed an issue that blocked players from placing new traps and setting up birdhouses on Havenhythe.

• Fish transported by signs of the porter at the fish farm now contributes to fish farm achievements.

• Fixed an issue causing scan clues to have a -6 radius.

• Devotion now works with sanguine crawlers.

• Cats now only eat raw fish and fish.

• Fixed issue with 'Round One' task not completing after all patrons were given beer

• Resolved an issue with Silverquill not despawning on kill, resulting in another one spawning on top.

Havenhythe

• The Magic butterfly net has been added to Fox's hunting supplies box in the Hollow Hill cave.

• The required amount of rope for traps in Chinchompa encounters has been lowered from 2 to 1.

• Moths spawned from the Hollow trees during Chinchompa encounters have been increased in size.

• Moths spawned from the Hollow trees during Chinchompa encounters now give 2 moths instead of 1 on a successful catch.

• Moths spawned from the Hollow trees during Chinchompa encounters have had their movement and speed slowed down and adjusted to make them easier to catch.

• Burned tall grass during Chinchompa encounters now regrows after 18 seconds.

• We have made some mechanical changes to the Havenhythe boss fights

  • Ivar, King of Bones:

    • Boss timer now starts as soon as Ivar spawns.

    • Reduced the time for his initial attack delay from 6s to 3.6s to allow the fight to feel more fluid.

    • Ivar now uses his special attacks in a random rotation, rather than performing them in a set order. This allows lower level players to hone their abilities through reactive gameplay, rather than learning a fixed rotation.

    • Dialogue for Ivar's special attacks will now appear in the chat.

    • Ivar will now perform dialogue before his Ranged and Melee attacks. In combination with the above, this provides an audio queue for which special attack will occur.

    • Conk Blast's projectile will appear earlier, giving you more time to visibly react to the attack.

    • Telegraphing for his Ranged and Magic special attacks have been modified to more accurately reflect the duration of the attack.

  • Silverquill, the Dreadhog:

    • Boss timer now starts as soon as Silverquill spawns.

    • Damage over time effects are now cleared when Silverquill phases to prevent bleeds from reflecting against the player when phasing.

    • Blood bombs now uses the square telegraphing system to better reinforce that they are area of effect attacks.

    • The blood hog attack now fires a projectile from the minions to the blood hog so you can clearly identify when Silverquill has been healed.

    • Info boxes for the Silverquill encounter will now better respect your info box location settings.

• When receiving a unique drop from Silverquill or Ivar. The broadcast message would be sent twice, instead of once.

• Fixed an issue with the portals in War's Retreat using incorrect images for Ivar, King of Bones and Silverquill, the Dreadhog.

• Fixed Colossal Bones as they were not operating like other bones. Upon burial, they were not getting counted as a daily challenge, could not roll for holy shards or the skill pet.

• Ivar, King of Bones's colossal bone drop is no longer capped at 100. They are now just his 100% death drop. (They continue to not work with bonecrushers, however.)

• Ivar, King of Bones' unique drops are now all F2P! This includes the bonecrusher maul, magic skull mask, colossal bones and his pet drop.

• Ivar, King of Bones's maul and mask drops have had their drop rates increased, and their alch values have been increased to give them a higher floor price.

• Silverquill's silver and sanguine spines drops will no longer show up in the Adventurer's Log.

• Replaced 'Grimy Marentill' with 'Grimy Guam' from ivar's droptables on F2P worlds since 'Grimy Marentill' is a members-only item.

• The Hill Giants death animation was fixed to stop it cutting off prematurely when slain

• Wendlewick flower patch now appears on the Remote Farm interface.

• Added a post-quest achievement for Hearts of Sanguine called 'A Sliver of Silver Helps the Sanguine Go Down'.

• The Havenhythe canoe station skillguide entry is no longer a green skirt.

• Fixed issue preventing players from continuing the 'Visions of Havenhythe' quest if exiting the final cutscene early

• The elegant parasol now disappears correctly when performing various skilling actions.

• Banker Nathan now allows you to access the usual banking options when talking to him after completing Trader Woes.

• Adjusted the size of clickboxes in the Fish Farm to be easier to use

• Banker Nathan will no longer turn when you speak to him.

• A placeholder map that appeared south-east of Sophanem has now been reverted.

• The Spirit Wolf' title now says 'Unlock' instead of 'Buy'.

• Added a post-quest achievement for Hermit Permits called 'Hello, I Like Money'.

• Updated the cost of bones, the bones will now be worth more to certain trader NPCs.

• Added a right-click teleport to Marigold Farm, to the Wendlewick Teleport. This is available to use after completing Wiz Kid.

• Completing 'Finding Tali' has been added as a requirement to the 'Research Director' achievement.

• Demetrius the gardener is now visible on free-to-play worlds.

• Fixed an issue where some scrolls (such as Kili's Equipment upgrade task list) had the title and the contents swapped around.

• The Tailoring map icon now lists all of the armour which can be tailored.

• Dilapidated canoe stations can now be fixed with planks from the plank box.

• The Hollow Hill cave entrance can no longer be accessed from atop the excavation site in the mountain.

• Havensilver ore now works with signs of the porter.

• Fixed an issue with Masterwork and Starbloom armour being listed twice in the crafting skill guide

• Apex sinew can now be correctly cooked at level 90 Cooking

• Updated the destroy message for Selene's Lessons to now mention the book is reclaimable from Raz.

• Sanguine crawlers have had their combat level updated to be more reflective of their stats.

• The honey badger familiar model has been reverted.

• Fish farm achievement 'Maximum Poolpulation' now triggers consistently.

• The stools on the balcony of the Wendlewick tailor's building can now be sat on.

• Can no longer spam-create lutes during 'The Lute of Love' task

• Players can catch swordfish at the fish farm with barehanded fishing enabled.

• Added two mini obelisks to Havenhythe.

• Added option to discard bird meat to Groundskeeper dialogue. Hunter urns now work with birdhouses.

• The clickbox for the log trap in the chinchompa encounters has been reduced.

• Clockwork box traps now reset their fall timer on catching a new creature

• The withdraw limit for stackable items in Fox's hunting supplies box in Hollow Hill cave has been fixed.

• Items will no longer drop to the floor when adding them to Fox's hunting supplies box if the box is nearly full.

• Resolved an issue that sometimes caused the Giant Carnivorous Chinchompa to get stuck on the environment, in the Big Game Hunter encounter

General

• Asphyxiate has had its base damage increased from 120% -> 130%

  • Tumeken's Replendance Asphyxiate Ratio has been adjusted and remains at 624% for the full cast

• Channelling a full Apshyxiate now grants Channelled Might for 3.6s

  • This grants 15 % critical strike damage during that 3.6s

• Channelling a full Apshyxiate with the full Tumeken's Resplendence set grants Channelled Might for 9s (Unchanged)

  • This grants 35 % critical strike damage during that 9s (Unchanged)

• Wild Magic now has +20% critical strike damage and +10% critical strike chance

• The Equilibrium perk can now be obtained at rank 1 and 2 from Manufactured components

  • With access to the lower ranks of these perks being now much more obtainable we have rebalanced the scaling to be 6% +2% per rank (8%/10%/12%/14%)

• Fixed an issue that prevented locators from being created due to Divine Locations being removed from the game.

• The following locators can now be crafted from a variety of different ingredients: inferior, poor, good and superior.

• Removed references to the Wilderness Flash Events from the Infernal Puzzle Box.

• Removed a reference to 'Rune Goldberg machine' in the runecrafting skillguide for the 'skill mastery' perk description.

A brand new landmass arrives in RuneScape today! Welcome to Havenhythe.

What’s Included in Havenhythe Part 1

Quests

• Visions of Havenhythe (Intro quest, F2P, no requirements)

• Hearts of Sanguine (continues the story, F2P)

• Wiz Kid (standalone side quest, Members)

• Hermit Permits (standalone side quest, Members)

Hunter (now extended to 110, Members)

• New Big Game Hunter-style encounters

• Black chinchompas (Level 73)

• Spirit moths (from Level 15 Hunter, non-combat charm method)

• Bird house training method across the island

• Clockwork traps allowing multiple catches per trap

• Improvements to early Hunter methods (including rabbit snares and ferrets)

Additional Skilling Content (Members)

• Fish farming activity (Levels 45–84 Fishing, including Giant Crayfish at 84)

• Slow Summoning training method for higher XP per pouch

• Sanguine crawlers (Level 35 Slayer) with early-game vampyrism gloves

• Creeping Ivy (low-level Woodcutting, more AFK-friendly)

• Giant crayfish fishing (Level 82 Fishing)

Combat Encounters

• Ivar, King of Bones (early boss, teaches protection prayers, F2P)

• Silverquill, the Dreadhog (mid-level boss, teaches telegraphed combat, Members)

What is Havenhythe?

Welcome to Wendlewick

Exploring Havenhythe

New Activities Across the Island

New Combat Encounters

The Story of Havenhythe

This Is Only the Beginning

Welcome To Havenhythe

Check out today's "This Week in RuneScape" blog on the link here, including some tweaks to Combat and more information about RuneMetrics.

Today's Update

• DailyScape Overhaul Launch

  • This update is going live today. Read all about it here!

The Week Ahead

• World Declutter

  • The World Declutter project is a game wide initiative to focus on grounding the world and pulling back on over the top effects, with a likely focus on combat related visuals.

  • Mod Yuey will be joined by other JMods to chat about this on a Stream on the RuneScape Twitch Channel this Thursday, March 19th. The Stream will start at 16:00 gametime and will run for about an hour. We will then flow into our regular community stream at 17:00 gametime.

• Player-Owned Housing & Construction 120 Design

  • Player-Owned Housing & Construction 120 Design will be a first look at this exciting project, slated to release later this year. In this first Community Topic on the subject we're planning to focus on what we want to achieve and may include a sneak peak at some of the technical improvements that will support this update.

  • This blog is scheduled to release on Friday, March 20th.

Havenhythe Part 1 is almost here.... On 23 March, we set sail for our biggest area expansion yet, welcoming a whole new corner of Gielinor with brand-new quests, bosses, skilling updates and a vast stretch of land to explore and call home. We’ll see you in Havenhythe!

Find out more on our official blog.

Hey 'Scapers!

What's in a Remaster?

So what's the focus of this project?

How can you get involved?

• Which of the features we've covered are you most excited about?

• Which of the features we've covered do you have questions about?

• What do you think is a nice to have, but you wouldn't want us to prioritize it over others?

The Details

Rebalancing Output (XP / GP / EFFICIENCY)

• The end-of-floor XP differs greatly across all 60 floors, with lower-level floors (e.g. 35 and lower) usually getting rushed or skipped as they don't give worthwhile XP at higher levels.

  • We will rebalance floor XP to make all floors worth doing across all levels, decreasing the gap between the lowest and the highest floors. We will be mindful not to unbalance the early game for low level players, and we will still aim to maintain a feeling of progression across floor themes. This ties into our plans for the Prestige System, detailed further down.

• Solo players don't always feel like they gain rewarding amounts of XP compared to when playing in a group.

  • We will make solo play much less punishing.

  • As part of this change we may consider removing the Dungeoneering Party Simulator item, as these have been largely obsolete since 2022 and the planned overall rebalancing should address the issues that the Dungeoneering Party Simulator was intended to address.

• Different gameplay styles are currently not appropriately rewarded. Think exploring the dungeon vs speedrunning to the end.

  • We will keep rewarding highest efficiency and will consider reducing the penalty of guide mode (or removing it outright but improving critical path readability)

  • Dungeoneering XP will be gained from actions taken within the dungeon. For example, opening doors, gathering from resource nodes or exploring optional paths should provide Dungeoneering XP. When this change is implemented it would likely leave the Scroll of Daemonheim in an odd spot, rendering it largely obsolete. With that in mind, we will likely be removing the Scroll of Daemonheim.

• There is no monetary value in Dungeoneering.

  • We want to look into adding resource bags as a reward for completing floors (Perhaps using similar items to Motherload Maw).

• Bosses and mobs are generally outdated.

  • We will be looking over the stats of bosses and mobs, though we will need to be mindful of those instances when low level players are grouped together with high level players.

  • An important note to make here is that we don't want to drastically change the current flow of Dungeoneering that largely works - we're not planning to make changes towards an exhausting grind. What we're keen to achieve is that bosses feel like bosses once more, rather than mobs with a bit more health. Players should need to gear up for a boss fight and put effort into it. Conversely, mobs should not become so strong that they greatly slow down the pace of Dungeoneering.

  • A prospective change here might be increasing mob lifepoints while reducing their defence at the same time to even things out.

  • Mobs should also take the potential addition of Necromancy into account.

• Elite Dungeons and Archaeology give a lot of tokens, which are more rewarding than doing the skill itself. Dungeoneering should be the main way of acquiring Tokens, rather than getting them through other non-core-skill means.

  • One consideration is to reduce the tokens gained from Archaeology and Elite Dungeons, primarily by reducing the moments at which they are received for the latter.

  • We may, however, feel that it's best to remove Token acquisition entirely from these activities.

• XP Based Gorajo Cards are much too powerful, especially when combined with DXP events and create the kind of play-loop that is incompatible with our move towards a more integrity focused game.

  • We are investigating removing XP-Based Gorajo cards, but may remove the entire Gorajo Card system as many of the non-XP based cards have been found to not be particularly valuable.

Quality of Life

• No longer needing to have to bank before starting a dungeon - Instead, items would be automatically banked for you.

• Relevant Keys and skills to be shown on the dungeon map.

• Going from two clicks to open a Skill or a Key door down to one click.

• Allowing Ironmen and mains to dungeoneer together (add right-click invite for ironmen).

  • Note: Our thinking here is that it should be easier for Ironmen to jump into Dungeoneering, instead of having to find a group of other Ironmen. This change would also make this system consistent with group bossing.

• Investigating how skill door and puzzle requirements create impossible barriers for lower level players when playing with higher level players.

  • The likely change here: Move away from skill doors having a hard requirement ("You need a skill level of X to do that"). Instead, players could attempt to open the skill door, but at a greater fail chance of failure if you're of a lower level. The intended direction here is to enable low level players to get through a Dungeon, rather than slow high level players down.

• Improving the Bind System by adding a small (but potentially expanding) Dungeoneering bank that is accessed via the Smuggler. This wouldn't be intended for hoarding, but should be an improvement on the existing limited loadout system. This system would use banking presets as you know them and would mean that you don't need to lose all your non-bound items at the end of each floor.

Prestige System Overhaul

• Floor XP will no longer be penalised by this system.

• Completing a unique floor will give you a buff.

  • Buffs will be along the lines of XP boosts, Resource boosts, Token boosts, Damage reduction, etc.

  • There will be around 5-10 different buffs in total. These will stack up.

  • Buffs will be set relative to the amount of floors you have done, not assigned to each floor. For example, the buff for your first completed floor will be X% resource boost, regardless of if that floor is floor 3, or floor 55.

  • So, ticking off floors will instead mean that you have gained the buff from that floor.

  • As with the existing Prestige System, if you have already completed the floor but there is an uncompleted floor in the same theme, this will instead tick off and provide the buff from that floor instead.

• Your buffs will reset automatically once you have completed the maximum number of floors currently available to you.

  • This does not refer to unique floors, but is instead a count that increases with any floor you complete.

  • These carry over between sessions, so there's no pressure to do as many floors as you can in a single session.

  • These reset automatically to avoid creating a meta of stacking 59 buffs and then simply repeating a completed high-level floor.

• You complete 16 unique floors in total: floors 1-11 (all Frozen floors), 15, 23, 38, 45, and 60. This gains you 16 buffs (1 buff per unique floor), some of which will have stacked up.

  • Your buff reset count is now at 16.

• You re-complete floor 45. As you have not yet completed all the Occult floors, this ticks off floor 36 for you and provides you with 1 buff (bringing you to a new total of 17 buffs).

  • Your buff reset count is now at 17.

• You re-complete floor 1. As you have completed all the Frozen floors you do not get a new buff, but your floor XP is not penalised for the re-completion.

  • Your buff reset count is now at 18.

• You continue on to complete 42 more floors. Upon completing the 60th floor any buffs you had reset, as you have completed 60 floors in total (60 being the number of floors that are available to you).

Adding New Skills

• Necromancy

  • Player-Centric

    • Add Necromancy to the Ring of Kinship + Classes.

    • Add ectoplasm, which you would receive from a small Ritual site added to the starting room.

      • The Ritual site would include one candle, one glyph spot, a platform and a pedestal.

        • Candles and Ink would be purchased from the Smuggler.

    • Add necromantic runes, which you would craft through the usual Runecrafting means while using impure essence.

      • Impure essence would be created by performing a ritual on normal essence.

    • Add 11 armour and weapon tiers associated with Necromancy.

      • Crafting relevant armour would require ensouled cloth, ensouled thread and necromantic runes.

      • Smithing relevant weapons would require ensouled bars and necromantic runes.

      • 10 different tiers of ensouled cloth and bars would be created by performing a ritual on regular cloths and bars and threads.

      • Tier 11 armour should drop from bosses.

    • The idea is that Rituals should be a greatly simplified version of their overworld counterparts, though would likely take less time. Like in a normal ritual, the outputs will be categorized as Lesser, Normal and Powerful materials..

    • Adjust the bind system to allow for Necromancy (this would only be necessary if we do not convert the bind system into a bank).

  • Daemonheim-Centric

    • Adds Forgotten Necromancer mobs to all floors while removing existing Necromancers.

    • Update the Necrolord boss to use Necromancy.

    • Update mobs to take players Necromancy level into account - this would likely be done as part of the wider mob and boss rebalancing task.

• Invention:

  • Add Invention related doors.

  • Adding Invention as an entire skill to Dungeoneering is currently considered beyond the scope of what is possible, given all the other changes that we want to focus on first.

• Archaeology

  • Add Archaeology related doors.

  • Adding Archaeology as an entire skill to Dungeoneering is currently considered beyond the scope of what is possible, given all the other changes that we want to focus on first.

Speedrunner Support

• We will add dedicated Titles that will be acquired by completing floors in a certain time limit, as well as dedicated Ultimate tier titles for unlocking all titles:

  • We have a few early ideas for Titles, but wanted to hear your thoughts on what would make the most sense - what do you think the titles should be for following achievements?

    • Complete Frozen floor in timelimit

    • Complete Abandoned 1 floor in timelimit

    • Complete Furnished floor in timelimit

    • Complete Abandoned 2 floor in timelimit

    • Complete Occult floor in timelimit

    • Complete Warped floor in timelimit

    • Ultimate Tier Titles (Bronze, Silver, Gold) for completing all floors in timelimit

  • These will come in Bronze, Silver, and Gold.

• We will add Quickchat support.

  • What Dungeoneering statistics would be most important for you to show off with Quickchat?

• We will add floor time High Scores.

  • At a minimum this would be an in-game noticeboard, but ideally these would be displayed on a webpage - that is something we're investigating.

Miscellaneous "Nice-to-Haves"

• Improve tutorialisation

  • The Smuggler should provide more information.

  • We should add Guide book items.

  • We should add UI popup tutorials.

• Review Interfaces and update these where needed

  • Are there particular interfaces you find useful or that you struggle with? Any that are particularly outdated?

• Rework other Ring of Kinship classes (melee/magic/ranged).

• Add Overload potion creation

• Remove the "Shared XP" option.

  • We have found that very few players actually use this system, and it adds complexity to what is already one of the more difficult to onboard skills.

    • Do you agree with this assessment? Have you found that you use shared XP frequently?

• Remove the "Complexity 2-5" options when forming a party, and rename this function to provide either "low" or "high" complexity.

  • We have found that very few players choose options 2-5, creating a level of bloat that is unnecessary.

    • Do you agree with this assessment? Have you found that you use complexities 2-5 frequently?

• Update the models for Bats, Skeletons and Zombies to their more modern versions.

• Guide mode changes

  • Move the guide mode to the starting a dungeon interface.

  • Reduce the XP penalty of guide mode

  • Improve the readability of the critical path (i.e. make it easier to identify where to go)

  • Remove the Guide mode penalty and the always on toggle.

  • Consider removing Guide mode entirely.

    • How do you currently use Guide mode? Should it be kept or potentially improved with the above?

• Add lootbeams and new mini-map icons (instead of just the red dots) for Meilyr recipe drops.

Rewards

• Reward Shop & Reward Trader Shop (this task is currently earmarked as a nice-to-have depending on what is manageable).

  • Combine the Elite Dungeons Reward Shop with the Rewards Trader shop. The combined shop would mean that there is a single place to spend your tokens. This would also mean removing access to the Elite Dungeon Reward Shop from anywhere other than the Rewards Trader, which would also reduce world clutter.

  • Update items bought from the Reward Shop so that they come with a 100% charge from the start, instead of their current 20%.

Hey Scapers'

Why not keep Auras as they are?

Lets talk balancing

• The Vampyrism aura is the number one most used aura by players each day. On average over the past month its use represents around 6.6% of daily members.

• Legendary Greenfingers, which hovers around the 4th-6th most used Aura per day, represents around 2.7% of daily members.

  • This falls to 0.3% for Supreme Greenfingers.

• Legendary Five-finger Discount comes in as the 7th most used aura per day, with its usage representing 2.7% of daily members.

  • The Supreme version represents 0.4%.

Feedback you gave us

• You didn’t like slot “competition” when an extra slot has traditionally existed, the pocket slot was a common concern here.

• There were concerns around adding to Relics or Invention Perks because those things have their own frictions that you've expressed.

• There were concerns around weakening aura effects if they are rebalanced (which we covered above).

Aura Effects And What's Happening With Them

Skilling Auras:

Aura

Notes

Daemonheim

All passive effects remain as passives for completing the respective tier of Daemonheim area tasks. The 1-hour activation effect for prayer-restore will also simply become a permanent passive. The "Thok Headbutt" animation that replaces the Backhand ability animation will become a combat cosmetic override, unlocked once the respective area tasks have been completed.

Focused Siphoning

The increased success chance will become a passive unlock. It can be bought from Wizard Rinsit's Runecrafting shop requiring Runespan points to purchase.

Greenfingers

The increased crop yield effect will become a passive unlock. It can be bought from Sydekix's Shop of Balance using Crux Eqal favour to purchase.

Five-finger Discount

The increased Thieving chance will become a passive unlock. It can be bought from the Thieves guild using Pilfer points to purchase.

• Dev note: We'll be making Heists award Pilfer Points alongside this.

Enrichment

We'll be directly buffing the chance to obtain an enriched memory as part of the skill.

Quarrymaster

We'll be making this one of Mining's levelling benefits. The first unlock will give +5% critical strike chance at level 59 Mining, and another +5% at level 85.

• Dev note: Quarrymaster was originally planned to be removed, but we understood your feedback about keeping its critical strike chance effect, especially for content such as Croesus and Gate of Elidinis.

Call of the Sea

We'll be increasing or adding the success chance to various tools and rewards.

• Perfect Juju Fishing potion: 5% → 10%

• Tools:

  • Rod-o-Matic: 0% → 3%

  • Dragon Harpoon: 6% → 9%

  • Crystal Rod: 5% → 8%

  • Tavia's Rod: 10% → 13%

• Summoning Familiars:

  • Granite Crab: +1%

  • Ibis: +2%

  • Granite Lobster: +3%

Dev Note: These changes bolster the rewards and allow players to continue using their typical Fishing setups as is, allowing you to stack up on fishing success chance boosts.

Lumberjack

We'll be increasing the effectiveness of hatchets.

Tracker

We'll be directly buffing the success chance for capturing creatures across the board as part of the skill.

• Dev note: This was already done for Birds and some Kebbit tracking with the Early Game Rebalance update.*

Resourceful

This will be removed.

• Dev Note: Resourceful was originally planned to be removed without its effect being maintained in game. Crystal and Red sandstone will become a permanent resource once the Dailyscape Overhaul update releases, so this will no longer be a problem as players will be able to mine it indefinitely. One key point you raised however, was that Resourceful was useful for Archaeology material caches. As such, with this update we'll be making material caches give a guaranteed minimum amount of materials before depleting.

• Flameproof

  • This was originally on our list of maintaining as part of the Totem of Auras (Totem of Skilling) but given that burn rates are part of Cooking's level up progress, and players have access to cooking gauntlets and eventually the 99 Cape perk, we deemed it one to remove.

• Surefooted

  • This was originally on our list to maintain, but after investigating we found that increasing success rates on laps would make the failure chance so tiny that it would defeat its purpose as a mechanic. As such we've decided to remove the aura.

• Dedicated Slayer

• Illumination

• Jack of Trades

Combat Auras

Aura

Notes

Vampyrism

We'll be creating a new "Aspect" for the effect, "Vampyrism" under a new category: Aspects of Sustain

• This will be unlocked in the Ancient Spellbook with level 68 Magic

• Rune cost: 15 Blood; 10 Death; 6 Soul; 40 Fire

Dev Note: This would be aimed as a mid-game unlock, and work the same way as other Aspects such as Animate Dead and Darkness, where one can be used at a time, lasting 12 minutes.

Penance

Well be creating a new "Aspect" for the effect, "Penance" under a new category: Aspects of Sustain

• This will be unlocked in the normal Spellbook with level 62 Magic

• Rune cost: 30 Body; 30 Mind; 15 Soul; 20 Chaos

Dev Note: This would be aimed as a mid-game unlock, and work the same way as other Aspects such as Animate Dead and Darkness, where one can be used at a time, lasting 12 minutes.

Salvation/Harmony/Corruption

We'll add this as an effect to the Sunspear. We'll be tweaking this effect. Instead of it giving 10% per 500 prayer XP, we'll make it give prayer restore on each Vyre kill, with a 0-5% restore. To unlock this effect, players will have to cremate Vyres in the Columbarium. Every 50 Vyres cremated gives +1% restore, up to a maximum of 5% with 250 cremations. Dev Note: Currently, it normally takes around 2 vyres kills to trigger the 10% restore, whereas this would give up to 5% restore, but guaranteed on each kill. Essentially, this makes training at Vyres a bit more consistent as you'll restore half as much prayer, but it will trigger on each kill (double the previous amount), levelling out the effective change.

Poison Purge

We'll be tying this effect into the Anti-poison totem Changes:

• Remove the ability to hold the Anti-poison totem in the off-hand, only wearable in the pocket slot instead.

• Increase the immunity when worn in the pocket-slot from just 50% to 100%.

• When under the effect of an anti-poison potion on top of this, it will allow you to heal a percentage of poison damage taken

Dev Note: This aura was originally planned to be removed, but we saw an opportunity to carry out some QoL with the anti-poison totem. However, given how niche this aura is and that Venomblood already exists, we'll only be going forward with this as long as it sticks within the scope of the update. (The Anti-poison Totem works in a bit of a strange way, wearable in two different slots, and giving a different amount of poison immunity based on what slot it's equipped in.)

Desert Panethon (Might of Het)

The Might of Het effect from this Aura will be transferred over to the Totem of Auras. Dev note: Your feedback on the previous design, for the Totem of Auras giving skilling effects, was that the level requirements for this totem were too high for the benefits they gave. We'll still need to do something with the Totem of Auras with this update. Rather than outright removing it, we see its high requirements as suitable for the "Might of Het" effect from the Desert Pantheon aura, which was an effect you expressed wanting to keep. We'll rename this to something like "Totem of Vitality".

• Aegis

• Ancestor Spirits

• Berserker

• Brawler

• Dark Magic

• Inspiration

• Invigorate

• Knock-out

• Maniacal

• Reckless

• Runic Accuracy

• Sharpshooter

• Equilibrium

• Reverence

• Mahjarrat

• Dwarven Instinct

Misc. Auras being removed

• Friend in Need

• Oddball

• Wisdom

• Prime

Marks of War and Aura & Life Refreshes

About Aura Refunds

Next Steps

The Month Ahead

• For the month ahead, all updates or content releases for the game, will be noted in the golden container or the parchment visual (e.g. "New Quest" or "Combat Update").

• Below that, we have the "Community Topics", which are topics for discussion that we will be talking to you about during the relevant week.

  • How exactly those topics will unfold is something we want to share at the start of each week. Sometimes these might be a straight-forward blog on a set day, other times they might be previews, feedback gathering threads, streams, podcast appearances or curated discussions on Discord. Hopefully also a mixture of the above!

• The aim is to always provide you with the information to know what we're talking about when, and how you can get involved.

• Of course, the nature of development does mean that sometimes things may shift around a little and we may need to push a planned update back to ensure that it lives up to our standards and your expectations. When that happens, we'll try to provide an update in the next suited "This Week in RuneScape" blog that usually rolls out on a Monday.

The Week Ahead:

Combat has always been a big part of RuneScape, and now it’s getting a modern makeover. The Melee, Ranged, and Magic styles are all being refreshed with cleaner systems, sharper visuals, and a more enjoyable experience for players at every level. If you want a more in depth rundown of all the changes, head on over to our Combat Update Patch Notes on our official website or if you would like something a little snappier we have teamed up with enigmatic Edimmuz to create a video to help get folks up to speed!

We have been iterating on the design since December, running a Beta with you, the players, listening to feedback, rolling out near-weekly updates, and fine-tuning the systems to make sure this update hits just right. Dive in game today to get grips with your new abilities and power!

Community Topics:

• Aura Overhaul:

  • This blog follows up on our earlier Aura Overhaul design and will give you an insight into what changes we've made since then.

  • We're aiming to have this blog ready on Tuesday, March 3rd, but it's possible that we may opt to release it on Wednesday, March 4th instead.

• Remastered Content:

  • The blog will unveil our next focus for refreshing some of the aspects of RuneScape that haven't been updated in a while.

  • We're aiming to share this blog on Thursday, March 5th.

In Case You Missed It + Our Reactions to Last Week:

• Last week we shared two updates:

  • Grand Exchange Improvements

  • Updates to Premier Membership Benefits

• Mod Shrew on Livid Farm Rebalance

• Mod Ryan on Armour Visuals

• Mod Anvil on Optimization and World Consolidation / Follow up Thread

For the rest of the Month:

• The Player Avatar topic will be a first look at the task that we're faced with when working with the Player Avatar and we'll be looking to get your take on what's more and less important to you.

• For the Havenhythe Preview, we'll be looking a little more behind the scenes as to what you can expect in our biggest area expansion yet in our latest Dev Diary!

• Player-Owned Housing & Construction 120 Design will be a first look at this exciting project, slated to release later this year. In this first Community Topic we're planning to focus on what we want to achieve and will be keen to hear what's important to you. We're also hoping to also include a sneak peak at some of the technical improvements that will support this update.

• The World Declutter project is a game wide initiative to focus on grounding the world and pulling back on over the top effects, with a likely focus on combat related visuals.

Runemetrics Pro Data

Collect it before March 20th The in-game RuneMetrics functionality will become completely free for all paid members (including Bond users) later this month. This is part of a wider effort to make our tools more accessible and genuinely useful for all players. As part of this you are currently no longer able to purchase RuneMetrics Pro. RuneMetric Pro users will have until 20th March 2026 to download any data they would like to keep from the RuneMetrics Pro website. If you wish to download this data please check out this article for instructions.

Hey 'Scapers!

The Background

How you can help today

• Which of the feature(s) we've covered are you most excited about?

• Which of the feature(s) we've covered are you not really that bothered about? They might be nice to have, but you wouldn't want us to prioritize them over others?

What we've heard you say

• Buying or selling items is a slow process that is not particularly transparent. Quite often, you may find yourself putting up offers multiple times before being successful.

• The Grand Exchange itself has performance issues when it comes to reflecting the most recent economy with a degree of accuracy. Quite often, there will be significant lag between what the GE tells you something is worth and what players are currently trading it for. We've seen cases where the displayed GE price could be off target by as much as 300%...!

• The GE's functionality is too basic. It lacks advanced features such as improved filters for new items, most traded items, price ranges and more.

What we want ensure we get right (Including thought starter example ideas)

• We want to ensure the Grand Exchange matches modern interface standards, but it's equally important we retain a sense of familiarity. You should still feel like you're playing an MMO in the RuneScape franchise.

• We want to make it easier and faster for players to engage in trading, with fewer clicks per action.

  • Example 1: We should consider right click options to increase/decrease the value of offers.

  • Example 2: Changing the default number for quantities from 0 to 1

• We want to avoid the system feeling bloated or cluttered. With that in mind, for some of the following proposals, where they are accessible is something to consider. More niche "support" or "unessential" features shouldn't intrude on the UI or experience of the wider player base if they aren't relevant or regularly used by the majority. That may mean that some of such proposals may find a better home on our website, in submenus or at specific stages of the buying and selling process.

• We want to ensure that the system feels transparent

  • Example 1: It should clearly indicate when the four hour buy limit for an item offer has expired.

  • Example 2: We want to consider whether the GE should display buy and sell volumes and price trends of items over a set number of days (1 day, 7 days, 30 days).

• Following up on the above point around transparency, we want to ensure that there would be no need for player-driven manual tracking on third party websites. While we respect that these have played a role in the community over the years, their existence has often been the result of official functionality not being up to par.

  • An ideal outcome would be displaying valuable data within the game itself - this could include, for example, displaying recently completed transactions. We do want to hear from you on what kind of data would be valuable for you to have in-game (and what you might consider noise or clutter), so do get involved in the discussions.

  • We also want to consider stronger tie-ins with official website partners where it makes sense, such as the RuneScape Wiki.

• We want to investigate offering advanced buy/sell features including:

  • Instantly sell an item for a reasonable price.

    • If this sounds like something you'd be interested in, how do you imagine it would work on a mechanical level?

    • As a short reminder, you can already do this in the current Grand Exchange by putting a sell offer for 1gp. The system currently matches active buy offers, so while there is inherent risk that it might sell for 1gp, the greater likelihood is that it will sell at the market's going rate, which should be higher than 1gp.

  • The flip side to the above would be the ability to instantly buy items, using the same idea of "I don't care what the final price is as long as I'm not getting ripped off".

    • This one is more technically complex than the "instant sell" feature, so we need to figure out if it's worthwhile to do - we'd be keen to hear from you though: how highly would you rank such a feature against everything else mentioned today?

  • Add a custom +-% button to provide better percentage accuracy beyond the existing +- %/20% that is currently offered.

• We want to investigate offering advanced search/discover features including:

  • Improved searchability such as searching by item tags, fuzzy text matching, auto-complete options and highlight notes for in demand or low stock items. Each of these are its own body of work though, so be sure to let us know which of them you value or even whether just implementing keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl + A; Ctrl + C; Ctrl + V) might be enough to cover your needs.

  • Improved discoverability such as displaying most traded items, newest items, price ranges as well as categories such as "food" or "slayer".

    • We may also want to consider showing a history of completed offers on an item so you can get a sense of the price range and trend for yourself.

• We want to ensure that we do not introduce changes that increase the risk of price manipulation by those looking to unfairly benefit off of others.

What's Next?

Community Topics:

In Case You Missed It + Our Reactions to Last Week

• Last week we launched our Early-Game Rebalance, which was followed by a Tuesday Thieving Rebalance to address feedback regarding how Thieving had been affected with a view towards AFK options. We used that same Thieving Rebalance to share our views on what AFK gameplay should offer in RuneScape - you can read more about that here. The associated coldfix launched last Thursday. You can read the patch notes below.

• On Wednesday we launched our fifth and final beta update for the upcoming Combat Style Modernisation. You can read more about that here.

• On Friday we shared a preview of our plans for the Aura Overhaul, with the intent of getting your feedback in and seeing what resonates (and what doesn't). Since then we've been actively reading your discussions and asking follow up questions where possible (see JMod links below). While it's still too early in the week to commit to any completely revised designs, the discussions have been valuable! For example, we have understood your feelings around moving aura effects into either the Pocket slot or the Relic System, so we will look into better alternatives for these and will not look to add any aura effects into the Pocket Slot or Relic system. Other feedback will need more time to be reviewed and considered, so we won't yet be able to respond on that.

We also want to better highlight where our JMods have provided some smaller insights into non-megathread discussions over the last week. Here are a few highlights

• Mod Anvil on alternatives to Pocket Slot and Relics as hosts for Aura effects

• Mod Breezy on the potential to use Summoning Familiars as hosts for Aura perks

• Mod Breezy on why Quarrymaster isn't part of the proposed Skiller's Totem

• Mod Ramen on Player proposed 120 Construction Rework Ideas

• Mod Breezy on Silverhawk Spawns on an Agility Course

• Mod Anvil on Optimization of game performance

• Mod Hooli on the mistaken assumption of purposefully inflated nerfs, our feedback cycle and approach to communicating

• Mod Yuey on how we react and our commitment to transparency

• VOD of Mod's Yuey, Breezy and Desert Rebalance Deep Dive Stream on Twitch

The Week Ahead:

• Combat Beta - "Final Run"

  • We're spending this week preparing the overall Combat Modernisation update to be ready for the week of the 2nd of March. We've still got some minor feedback to implement and bugs to squash - most of this will be done in time for launch, but a few bits may be actioned in the post-launch period. As mentioned before, Combat is something we're keen to maintain a close eye on, and it will continue to receive tweaks every now and again.

• Grand Exchange Improvements

  • Part 5 of our Road to Restoration blog series, the "Grand Exchange Improvements" project is about enabling players to able to trade quickly and fairly through a modernised, transparent and functioning Grand Exchange.

    • We're planning to share some early thoughts on this project on Thursday February 26th. This project is still in pre-production, so the associated update won't be launched for a while yet (which gives us a better opportunity for feedback!).

Patch Notes

Fixes and Improvements in this Week's Game Update

General

• Thanks to Mod Nixon, the Still Night music track is reborn! Busy Night and Still Night music tracks are once again unlocked from the mining site south-east of Varrock.

• Broken fences should now appear correctly on the Livid Farm.

• Players will no longer find the 'green cape' when collecting the eggs for the Cook's Assistant quest.

• Fixed an issue where players didn't receive the 'Blood Bank Withdrawal' achievement for opening the blood rune chest in the Chaos Druid tower.

• Fixed an issue where Starbloom seeds could not be received from pickpocketing master farmers.

• Fixed an issue where the Building status window and Construction skill guide were showing old XP bonus values from Fort Forinthry chapel.

• During the One Of A Kind cutscenes the camera will no longer be able to clip under the ground.

• Updated the interface that appears when trying to destroy an item.

• If the loot interface is open and if the player tries to open the settings interface, the options menu pop-up should now disappear correctly.

• The vis wax menu has been fixed to hold the text within the buttons and tooltip areas more appropriately, specifically the "Harmony Pillar" button and the "gather limit extender" menu.

• Increased the size of the "Add Friend" and "Remove Friend" buttons in the "Friends" tab in the lobby to prevent truncated text.

• Fixed an issue with text overlapping in the Temple Trekking Rewards interface.

• The combat mode icon toggle has been removed from the edit mode window, due to defunct functionality.

• Text in the Animal Info panel should now wrap nicely.

• Death's Overflow Storage buttons have been changed to yellow.

• Improved the readability of the text in the Mystery journal during "Murder on the Border".

• If the player's interface is set to the classic layout, it will no longer be forcibly changed to the modern one if the player played on mobile.

• Resized the loot window on the Classic interface layout so the custom loot button now fits the text within it.

• The Dungeoneering "Start Room Modifications" interface has been updated so that the text no longer overlaps.

• Graphically updated chicks across the game.

• Initial reduction of sizes of some textures used in Free-to-play areas to help improve performance.

• Hotfixes

  The following changes have been already implemented.

  • Improved the AFK-ability of pickpocketing in line with the recent blog.

    • Improved the level bonus for all targets across 3 brackets. The level bonus gives you an extra "X-level boost" for your next X pickpockets

      • For low-level targets (level 1 - 30) your initial level bonus has been increased from 10 -> 15 for 10 picks.

      • For mid-level targets (level 31 - 50) your initial level bonus has been increased from 10 -> 20 for 10 picks.

      • For high-level targets (level 100+) your initial level bonus has been increased from 10 -> 25 for 25 picks.

  • A new effect has been added to the Crystal Mask spell that will reset the players’ pickpocketing target when used.

    • When pickpocketing the player's success % goes down with each attempt after X guaranteed attempts. If the player goes under 100% and then reuses this spell they correctly jump back up to above the 100% threshold as expected.

  • After the buffer your chance of being caught starts to reduce, this has been reduced from 1 level per time to 0.25

    • This will ultimately prolong the amount of AFK that players can have from the current 2-3 mins to around 4-6 mins, lining up with the Crystal Mask time of 5 minutes and what players have suggested is a good AFK time.

  • Added a message when you can first start to be spotted (your chance has gone below 100%) so that it is clear to players that they should try to find a new target (or renew Crystal Mask)

    • Also added a sound effect.

  • Adjusted Sticky Fingers Archaeology relic to be less harmful to the player

    • Currently it makes the player pickpocket 50% faster for 33% less XP. In the new system this means you fail much faster too.

    • We're going to make the relic reduce the above threshold to 0.17 per attempt instead which should balance the speed aspect to still allow a decent amount of afk.

  • Reduced Pickpocketing XP for targets introduced with 120 Thieving, reflecting the changes outlined in the blog (approximately a 30% XP reduction).

  • Resolved an issue with the Thieves’ Guild doors being unusable.

  • Rune arrowheads will no longer be converted to components by the spring cleaner.

  • Fixed an issue that caused the UI to not update after completing a clue step.

Introduction

Hey 'Scapers! I'm Mod Breezy, here once again to welcome you to our 4th design blog in the Road to Restoration series! In these design blogs we share information on upcoming updates that are part of the Road to Restoration roadmap. We've covered a lot of topics already and have been keeping an eye on your discussions and feedback so far as we continue on this journey together. 

The Road to Restoration roadmap aims to address integrity and game health, and has multiple goals as we shape the future of RuneScape. In case you haven't read the first blog we covered what we want to achieve in our direction for RuneScape, you can check out that blog here. Todays blog will cover the Aura Overhaul update. For this update, the following goals have guided our approach:

Hello again 'Scapers

This is part three of our blog series on the Road to Restoration.

Today's topic covers "Regrounding Items", but many of you have wondered what that actually refers to. 

The "Regrounding Items" project is about making visuals and worn items fit better thematically into the world of RuneScape as we work towards something that is more immersive and consistent with the game.

In short, we want outfits in the game to no longer be obtrusive.

In todays blog we'll cover the rationale with which we are approaching this topic, as well as previewing some of the planned changes coming later this month on the 23rd of February. Further changes as part of this project are planned later this year.

Before we get to that though, there has been some discussion in community as to what "grounded medieval fantasy" for RuneScape might mean, and whether there are beloved elements within the game that would clash with that identity. For example, some folks may have worried that to be grounded means to step back from the fantastical or lean much more into low fantasy as a concept. That's not the case. We will continue to develop RuneScape as a game with high fantasy themes, where magic permeates every aspect of a world built on medieval foundations. Built on top of those foundations should be a player journey through a world that feels like home - and that may also mean that not every quest or event needs to include an existential threat to the universe.  

Grounding refers to making the world feel cohesive and consistent within the outline above. Having magic with a fantasy world does not mean that just about anything goes - instead, we want to maintain that all things within Gielinor should make sense for our unique world. Our work to reground the game therefore simply means that we want to ensure that the world feels like it obeys a specific ruleset.

With that said, lets take a look at our rationale, approach and also provide a preview of the upcoming changes. 

Rationale:

Let's begin with the why.

As a reminder, one of our key goals for RuneScape's Road to Restoration is to curate a game that is consistent and cohesive, and that has a clear visual identity. All existing content should be brought in line with our integrity guidelines. 

Over the years we have added a wide range of items and cosmetic overrides that are visually intrusive or thematically out of place. The technical term for something that doesn't fit into the world is "non-diegetic" - you may see us occasionally use this when it comes to discussing visual integrity. You've already helped identify many such outfits and cosmetics which fundamentally break in-game immersion and do not fit within the medieval fantasy theme of RuneScape. An important distinction to make here is that while cosmetic overrides are able to be toggled off as of this past January, item visuals cannot. As some of these items have the same level of immersion breaking impact, they must therefore be considering against the above goal.

Approach:

This project aims to resolve these issues via whatever method is most appropriate. Where possible we'd prefer tweaking or replacing the visuals, but we may need to consider removing particular items, or restricting where certain items can be used (e.g. Snowboards only in the Christmas Hub) as well. We want to consider all options available. One very important caveat: With the amount of items we may need to tackle here, creating brand-new designs for all of them is impossible. Our aim therefore is to address the greatest amount of items by changing them for the better and aligning them with our visual standard as a minimum. 

Here are a few guidelines that we are considering everything against: 

• Does this wearable make the player look non-human? 

• Does this wearable significantly change the proportions of the player avatar (e.g. flatten or enlarge your head)?

• Does this wearable get in the way of other players being able to identify what's happening on screen? (Overdone particle effects & oversized outfits beware) 

• Does this wearable fit into the world thematically?

• Could this wearable have been created from the materials available in RuneScape?

What precisely are we tackling?

Please note that as a lot of this work is still in motion, there will likely still be some changes between today and launch day. We may add or remove items from the list, or we may change how we decide to handle them, based on the work required. 

Without further ado, let's take a look. 

Elite Skilling Outfits

Elite Skilling outfits are probably amongst the most egregious offenders for this project. A number of them are intrusive and mess with the integrity of the game, while in some cases even their very naming feels inconsistent. 

"Master Archaeologist" tells you exactly what's in the tin. "Fury Shark"? Not so much. 

An additional issue with the outfits is that the elite outfits for a number of skills are made up of three to four other outfits that are then combined to get the master outfit. We plan to rework this system, so that you will only need to craft what is currently the "combined" outfit using an invention table. This would also mean removing the lesser pieces of the outfit from the game. What that means for rebalancing the outfit fragments is still something we're investigating. 

All uncombined versions are planned to be removed - should you have any of these keepsaked, the keepsake key will be returned to you. If you have any uncombined parts, the correlated combined part will be unlocked - So if you had (for example) the Burnt Shark head unlocked, you should instead have the Master Anglet's Hat unlocked. 

Below is a table of the current outfits we're currently looking at for this matter, as well as what direction we're planning to take with them. 

Skill

Current Name

New Name

Appearance Before and After 

Fishing

Fury Shark Outfit

Master angler's outfit

Divination

Elder Divination Outfit

Master diviner's outfit

Runecrafting

Infinity Ethereal Outfit

Master runecrafter's outfit

Mining

Magic Golem Outfit

Master miner's outfit

We are currently workshopping these items' visuals and aren't yet ready to share them.

We are considering reshading outfits such as the Lumberjack and the Golden Mining Suit to be more in line with the golden and burgundy of the outfits above. These two outfits are the most consistent against their base outfit and are considered unintrusive, but their age does mean that they aren't entirely on par for quality with the other outfits (e.g. less detailed or more blocky).

For the mining outfit, that might look like the below (along with a change to the base Golden Mining Outfit), but our exploration in this matter continues. 

The lumberjack outfit isn't yet ready for sharing. There are no easy answers as our time is limited here and we may not be able to create brand new silhouettes - How would you feel about the above? Let us know! 

Woodcutting

Nature's Sentinel Outfit

Master lumberjack outfit

Thieving

Master camouflage outfit

Master thief's outfit

For thieving, we feel the updated outfit isn't yet ready for sharing as it still feels too far removed from the core Thieving identity.

Dungeoneering

Warped Gorajan Trailblazer outfit

Master dungeoneer's outfit

No Change to Visuals

Farming

Master farmer outfit

Master farmer's outfit

No Change to Visuals

Hunter 

Volcanic trapper outfit

Master hunter's outfit

No Change to Visuals

Other Individual Items

Moving on from Elite Skilling outfits, we've focused on a few items that are either non-diegetic, have an overabundance of particle effects, or that just outright stick out like a sore thumb.

For the below lists of affected items, we will provide a simple example (Helm of Darkness) of the intended changes, rather than case by case screenshots. As the work on this project is still ongoing, many of them are not yet in a final place for sharing. 

The following helmet slot items are problematic because they place what feels like actual monster heads on the player avatar, making it feel non-human. For these instances we plan to make them feel more human by converting them into something more mask-like that sits on the face or head of the player.

• Slayer Masks & Helms (such as, but not limited to: Helm of the Frozen/Verdant/Parched Wyrm, Jellyhead and more)

• Pumpkin Masks & Mask of the Grove Guardian

The following items have been identified as being too particle heavy. We plan to tone down the glow on these items in particular, though it is worth noting that we have also upgraded some of these designs to our more recent VFX tech which enables more improved particle visuals

• Lovers Medallion; Hater Medallion; Bat Necklace

  • Note: We'll tone the amount of particles down as well as change the particle source so that they emanate from the medallion itself. 

• Cinderbane and Samid's gloves

• Luminous Alchemists and Alchemists amulets

• Gatherers cape

• Desert Treasure (Damis Dark & Light; Kamil, Fire Warrior Outfit)

Bespoke Resolutions:

• Soul Cape

  • Issue: The effect of these capes can be quite garish due to the associated particle effects.

  • Resolution: Rework the capes to aim for the same effect without it being particle based. 

The following items either have too many issues associated with them, or have a particularly insurmountable issue. These problems make their continued existence alongside our visual standards no longer viable and they will be removed from the game. Should you have any of these keepsaked, the keepsake key will be returned to you:

• Flaming Head and Flaming Skull items

• Zodiac Costumes

• Mimic Helm

• Octopus Backpack

• Super Disco Outfit

• Infected Zombie Outfit

That about sums it up for todays community topic. As with the rest of our Road to Restoration blog series, we're eager to share as many previews of our work as possible with you - both to involve you in the journey but also hopefully to excite you about the coming changes. Last week's Early Game Rebalance and Dailyscape Overhaul blog was a good example of us sharing something with enough time to react to your feedback before the update roles out, so please do keep it coming - we'll react to feedback where it is both possible and it aligns with our Road to Restoration goals and values. As you may have noticed in today's blog, you're getting to see piping hot developments and changes pretty much straight from the oven our desks. That does mean that in some cases things we mention may not always be ready for visual sharing, and in other cases our overall design exploration may not yet have been fully completed. It also means that what you're seeing may not be the "final_final_I_swear_to_guthix_this_is_final_V5.jpg" version and that there may be some changes and tweaks between our preview and what gets released. However, these timings do give us all the opportunity to shape RuneScape in the best way possible, and we're all very excited to continue on this journey together with you!

Community Topics:

In Case You Missed It + Our Reactions to Last Week

• Last week we shared what we want to achieve on the Road to Restoration and also shared a preview of our upcoming Early Game Rebalance and DailyScape Overhaul.

  • Having posted the latter blog on Friday and let discussions run their course for the weekend, we're spending this morning looking at what feedback we might be able to implement as part of the respective updates or where we can provide clarification. While we're moving in the overall right direction and are firm in our resolve to get there, your feedback, as always, helps identify areas of change where a little more consideration is required. With that in mind, here are just a few short (non-exhaustive) notes below:

    • An easy one to not go ahead with is the Chaos Altar and the Demonic Skull. We've heard you loud and clear on this point, and will not require the Demonic Skull to be used at the Chaos Altar. Instead, we will change the Chaos Altar buff to have it be acquired through the Wilderness area diary.

    • Livid Farm, Sacred Clay and RuneSpan points have, amongst other things, featured heavily in your discussions. We are considering what can be done about these - while we're not yet ready to commit to anything yet, we just want to let you know that we're taking your thoughts on board.

    • For consumables like Vis Wax and Wicked Hood Teleport charges, you will be able to continue using your remaining ones. A brief reminder: They will not be removed from your inventories at this time.

    • For Thieving, we will tweak the planned changes to the Crystal Mask as well as look to increase high level pickpocketing buffs. We still want to position the Crystal Mask as the best unlock for thieving when used in combination with Light form.

  • Additionally, in Friday's blog we mentioned there were further Hunter buffs in the works for the early levels. We'll be buffing Bird and Kebbit catching methods, such as increasing the success chance on catching birds and XP when caught.

    • For example, Crimson Swifts currently have a success chance of 39% at level 1, increasing with your Hunter level. We'll be buffing all birds to start at 75% success chance at their unlock level instead.

  • There is a concern from some folks that we're removing AFK activities. This absolutely isn't the case, we're just looking to ensure that they are balanced appropriately against the effort, to allow for other more "lean forward" methods to have a place too.

• We also updated our Combat Modernisation Beta on Thursday and have continued to take your thoughts about it on board. We've got another week ahead of us with the Beta and will continue to work on the Combat Modernisation update throughout it - there is a chance that we'll update the beta once more this week, but we'll confirm that via a blog post on the day.

The Week Ahead:

• Regrounding Items

  • Part 3 of our Road to Restoration blog series, the "Regrounding Items" project is about making visuals and worn items fit better thematically into the world of RuneScape as we work towards something that is more immersive and consistent with the game. We're planning to preview some of this work on Thursday February 12th, with the associated update coming into effect during the week of the 23rd.

• Aura Overhaul

  • Another blog in our Road to Restoration series, we'll be previewing our design direction for how to tackle Aura's this Friday, February 13th. Note that the update itself to overhaul Aura's is still some weeks away.

Upcoming Maintenance

Just a quick reminder that we plan to have a short maintenance tomorrow February 10th at 9am UTC which should last for approximately 20 minutes. This is part of our ongoing work to improve the infrastructure and core experience of our games, if you would like to know more please check out the previous post.

Patch Notes

Fixes and Improvements in this Week's Game Update

General

• Added functionality to allow players with remaining shards from the inverted skillcapes event to exchange them with Hans between the 9th and 15th of February.

• Added some hints to make it clearer that you need to have Princess with you as a follower to progress 'Princess and the Pauper'.

• Added 'a bowl of water' to the required item list for 'Princess and the Pauper'.

• Fixed typos in 'Princess and the Pauper' quest.

• Princess is now correctly visible at the start of 'Princess and the Pauper' for all players.

• Fixed a bug that prevented the bottom four quests in Timeline->World Guardian sort from appearing.

• Added "Follows events of: The World Wakes" to "The Death of Chivalry" quest.

• Reclassified the "Stellar Born" quest from Ambiguous to Age of Chaos, due to its Sixth Age skill requirements and reference to Tuska.

• "Kili Row"" is now listed between "Necromancy!" and "Rune Mythos" when sorting quests by Timeline, rather than after "The Spirit of War" (since "The Spirit of War" unlocks additional Kili upgrades).

• Changed the flashbang in the Chosen Commander quest to fire off only once.

• The delivery package item is no longer visible when a player attempts to harvest wisps.

• Chat message will now correctly state what happened with the reward when capturing a Seren Spirit.

• The Sparky pet is no longer transparent in the pet preview interface.

• Improved sorting of seasonal quests in the Quests tab.

• Certain call to action buttons across the game should be more consistent now. This includes mobile, where these buttons appear red.

• The captain's log and the ports table in Fort Forinthry will now open the ship status interface just like before.

• Interface elements with multiple right-click options should now show "+ x options" in the tooltip.

• The 'It's Alive' emote no longer causes the players head to appear invisible.

• The Ironman plaque has been updated with more Group Ironman achievements from groups that have completed achievements in all group sizes.

Engine

• Fixed an issue where some animations were overlapping ​and did not display key visual queues to the players.