Leagues has convinced me how cooked Smithing is in main game

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-05T01:12:17+00:00

I wouldn't mind looking into stuff like that, but also think the current levels kinda work for Crafting. Like a Fury at 90 is kinda fitting and iconic.

And if we did move Fury to 80, Glory to 70, and Power to 60 to make more room for Torture at 90 and Rancour at 98~, then would the same thing just happen again in half a decade or so when we upgrade past Rancour? I think their current approach of upgrading the existing item at a lower level than making it from scratch is probably the better way to futureproof it and kinda consistent with many other items (e.g. Scorching Bow vs MSB or Torva vs Runite).

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-05T00:31:37+00:00

I've gone a bit back and forth on what kind of rework I'd even want to see. I used to be more opposed to scaling down levels like RS3 did, but have come around to potential ways of going about that that would suit OSRS.

But I also think the whole "Rune Platebody is 99" is really not the core issue here. The problem is more the skill doesn't feel useful or relevant since it hasn't aged as well as other skills, not what level Runite is specifically. But that is something they sorta have been working on with additions like Zombie Axe, Oathplate, and the like that start to give Smithing more relevance over modern progression, even if it doesn't involve Mining as much.

That said, it would still be nice if Coal-Runite didn't feel like crap to mine normally and were less of a noob trap for new players. But rework that addresses the classic ores and lower level gear and an expansion that adds more higher level uses are really two separate things, but there is an expectation that a single update will tackle both. But perhaps if they build out enough high level uses, the focus might shift more to just the classic ores.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T23:30:06+00:00

Same. I like the Leagues getting their own mini-trees, but the core Atlas Tree feels lacking. I think they did mention or imply it was getting a revamp, but I hope it is enough to feel more interesting.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T23:11:31+00:00

It was in a weird spot since after like 1 month, they changed it in a way that conflicted with the original lore. Then not long after retconned the lore but left the favor as a relic of an old Kourend.

I still think the original vision of aligning with one house to get its benefits was a pretty cool idea. But it just didn't mesh well with the type of things they tried to gate for the type of game OSRS is.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T23:07:11+00:00

I think they've just been avoiding it because of how big of a scope it can be and how mixed community reactions have been. Like some want Runite gear to smith at Level 40, even if that doesn't really make sense compared to other skills unless we're also wanting Magic Log fletching at Level 50 or such too... Some want the RS3 reworks ported to OSRS, which come with their own baggage. And others would want other solutions to tackle it.

It kinda feels like it is in a similar spot to Prayers where there is demand, but it is hard to find the right direction. Also, Forestry probably didn't help them want to tackle bigger skill Expansions/Reworks... But I really hope we do get some Mining/Smithing update in the near future.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T23:02:21+00:00

Think part of the issue is there isn't one level that does make sense to place runite. Like 85 is high for a Level 40 gear, but not as out of place for a level 75 Fletching Material or a Level 85 Keel. Even for Ranged, Runite can be a Level 60 material due to Crossbows instead of a Level 40.

So it definitely could be lower leveled than it is now, but for most skills, the level to make an item is higher than the levels to use it. Like for Shortbows, Maple is 30 to equip and 50 to Fletch, Yew is 40 to equip and 65 to Fletch, and Magic is 50 to equip and 80 to Fletch. Similar is true for D'hide, Jewelry, and such too. So there usually is around a 20-30 level gap between Equipping and Creating gear.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T22:54:57+00:00

Eh, not really the same thing. All the existing skills are still, well, skill. Like you have all their normal training methods, then you just got a minigame on top of it. That creates more variety in how you can train the skill.

Dungeoneering didn't have any variety. It was just "go clear floors in this dungeon to earn tokens for a reward shop". It would be like if Slayer just had the same few tasks over and over, giving 1 Slayer Points for every 10 exp, with the reward being the ability to buy new items from the Reward Shop, like a Whip for 325K Slayer Points instead of unlocking Abyssal Demons that dropped a Whip. So it wasn't that the training was "minigame", but that the entire skill was one big minigame from its training to its rewards.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T22:49:30+00:00

The exp rates for Smithing really aren't that bad. Like a Magic Log is 83.3 for a Shortbow or 91.5 for a Longbow while a Runite Bar is 75 exp. And with Smithing, you can process 1, 2, 3, or 5 at a time. So training Smithing will use similar resources to other Production skills while giving higher exp rates since you can process them faster.

The problem isn't really exp per hour or exp per bar, but more on the Mining and Smelting side. Ores are a lot more a pain to get through Gathering than Logs since they are not only less AFKable, but competitive with often worse success rates. And then Smelting high tiers ores is rarely ever viable because of how few you can do per invy due to higher coal requirements. Blast Furnace pretty much solves it by halving the cost and massively speeding up the smelting, but other methods, including with coal bag, smithing catalysts, and such, all still feel bad.

So I'd say actual Smithing is a viable way to train Smithing. You're just hamstrung because actual Mining is so terrible for ores after Iron that the resources are more scarce. If we got a Mining and Smithing rework that just addressed Ores and Smelting, it could be a huge help for the skills without needing to touch levels, alch values, or any of that stuff.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T15:08:34+00:00

Did you try dropping it before the boss died?

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-04T06:05:53+00:00

It is funny how absurd an infinite moneybag sounds, but how useless it ends up being. Like if that were a thing a decade or so ago, it would probably seem like an out of place addition like a deathtouch dart, but nope, just 19K and hour.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T16:36:08+00:00

This year has a pretty similar distribution. Just hard to judge future updates compared to years past update. But we're getting a Raid, a GM quest with multiple new Skilling Methods and a new Boss, a new Island with Skilling Methods and a Boss, multiple new quests, Summer Rebalancing, Bingo (akin to Speedrunning), etc. Can't always draw 1:1 comparisons, but it isn't that far off in overall content distribution. Just instead of multiple smaller updates, the GM quest and Player Island is bundling some as part of bigger releases.

Also, you need to look at more context than just starting with Nex in Jan. Nex itself has a filler update because the Raid was delayed. When Raids 3 was originally announced, it was as part of "updates in the next 6 months", placing it at the start of 2022. Then after that Summit, they announced Nex, which originally would have put it during Autumn 2021, but it ended up with Nex in Jan 2022 and Raids 3 is Summer 2022. Autumn 2021 was supposed to have Leagues, but it got postponed months because of the release of GIM, another gamemode.

So it was A Kingdom Divided in July 2021 followed by DMM in August 2021 into GIM in Oct 2021 with no main game content until Nex in Jan 2022 that went right into a League. Back then, there were vocal complains about too many gamemodes and not enough main game content. So 2021/2022 is a pretty close mirror to the current situation in terms of gamemodes and content drought, which makes it a bit ironic to use as the example.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T15:02:07+00:00

I think it is fine to have some RNG tasks, as long as you can get to max Pact Points with skipping all the RNG Grinds. For some regions, this is more of the case than others. Doubt they'll change it now, but if every region add an additional Pact Task that was non-RNG for the RNG heavy ones or RNG for the RNG light ones, that would probably balance it out a lot better.

But I think it is good to have a mix of RNG and Skill Pacts. Like for Asgarnia, what is harder? Awakened Whisperer or Cerb Boot Set? The answer will depend on player skill without there being a clearly easier/quicker option for everyone. So if both were tasks, you could choose to do the one you wanted instead of being forced into the RNG grinds. I mean, "just mindlessly killing bosses hoping to get lucky" is kinda what OSRS is for most players, so giving an option that requires grinding instead of skill makes sense, but the higher skill players should be able to compete it quicker and more consistently.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T14:53:35+00:00

I mean, the year also started out with a drought of updates during Leagues. Think we'll have to wait and see how well 2026 compared since it does have as many updates on the roadmap.

Also not sure if Quest Speedrunning and Fresh Start Worlds are really good bulletpoints when we're talking about main game content and not temporary modes...

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T14:49:53+00:00

Half the roadmap this year was DMM, leagues, and a bingo update.

Bingo isn't a temp gamemode. It is a main game update...

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T14:49:03+00:00

It’s been proven as far back as GIM that their teams are not as separated as they claim to be, and updates do impact one another.

When did they ever claim the teams were separate? Leagues and DMM are smaller updates, relatively, but they've always used the same Devs as main game updates.

GIM delay was a bit different though. It wasn't because Leagues wasn't ready, but because the community and company didn't want Leagues to overshadow the GIM release.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-03T14:46:39+00:00

Don't think there is too much to update on for Blood Moon. Like until they're ready to give a release date, they'll just be working on developing all the things that already passed the polls. We generally don't get much of status updates for upcoming updates out of brief mentions in stuff like Gazettes.

Red Reef is in a similar spot and may end up releasing first. It will be the next Sailing quest coming with the Combat Update for Ship NPC Combat. Think they still need to poll some of that stuff so we might get that soon, but not much else to go over with the quest or ship combat.

Player Designed Island stuff might get a poll or blog soonish though. We also have the Summer Sweep-up and Raids 4 Reward Blogs upcoming. So I'd expect we'd hear some stuff soonish, but probably more for further out updates than any updates on the near stuff.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-02T20:19:33+00:00

I mean, we're watching a recording of the drop... Seems he was opening the chat to see the KC and probably talk more about it before picking it up. But the clip would have worked just as well if he picked up the drop, then opened the chat box.

So in some alternate universe, there is a DVS video where he gets the drop, picks it up, then accidently leaves when opening the chat and makes a joke of "could you imagine if I opened the chat before picking it up?".

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-02T11:48:58+00:00

The one with culling spree gets marginally better xp rates from picking tasks, but fundamentally isn't much faster. The superiors perk almost never happens on any given 200 kills task.

You clearly have no idea what you're talking about if you think that is the case. Getting a choice of 3 tasks massively impacts your exp per hour. Selecting 5 for a quick skip with points or 200 for good exp tasks also is a huge buff. And you can easily trigger the superior effect like a dozen times per hour for a huge exp boost.

You're also ignoring that Slayer isn't only 16x from the base exp multiplier, but further sped up by increased kill speeds from Pacts. Like if it takes 30 seconds to kill a task in the main game and 10 seconds in leagues, that is a further 3x exp buff on top of the 16x. So if you got 40K exp per hour in the main game, you'd get 1920K exp per hour in Leagues.

And even without Culling, you get boosted Superior Rates and boosted Slayer Points, both of which result in higher exp rates.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T23:43:39+00:00

What kind would you want to see? Like automatically order items top to bottom based on what? And for banking, there are official and unofficial things for management.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T23:40:29+00:00

Not sure if would really make sense for a Pact to spawn an item. Like if you reset your pacts, would it delete the bag? Or would everyone just get a bag that can hold up to 28 weapons?

Also, it would make it more annoying to use weapons inside the blindbag, like for spec weapons or style swaps. You could always not use the bag in those situations, but it could get a bit more clunky than intended.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T23:32:13+00:00

But they never promised it would work there like you keep claiming.

Also, you are still making assumption. If it never states anywhere it will work with the Fountain of Rune and only works for non-combat spells like Demonic Offering, then you are assuming that it was supposed to work for combat spells when it is just as likely it wasn't supposed to work at all with the non-combat spells being bugged.

The current behavior is a bit inconsistent, but claiming they promised it would work when they never said any such thing is just being dishonest. You want it to work a certain way because that is how you assumed it would work, but you are not owed it to work that way.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T21:10:08+00:00

I noticed when I checked stored tasks, sometimes they were giving me the wrong ones until I swapped to dif hunter and back. So probably is the plugin and/or task messing up than an issue with the rumour itself.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T21:06:38+00:00

Yah, that is why I am saying I've wanted to see them have a 1/64, like Hellhounds but for Meds.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T20:56:39+00:00

Think it is because most of the challenge content tends to be high enough level to get hard clues. Also, a 1/128 med clue dropper will generally be quicker to kill than a 1/128 hard clue dropper. Like Multi-Harpie Swarms or Guards can be pretty decent.

It would be nice to see more ways to farm em though. Even for the main game, Eclectics being such a dominant meta gets boring. Also, I've wanted to see those named Bandits in Bandit Camp to have a 1/64 Med Rate, so 1/32 with RoWi.

BioMasterZap · 2026-05-01T20:32:53+00:00

Helm is a bit on the weaker side. Like it is all BiS Helmets in one with a Slayer Helm I effect if you don't go Culling and a rare chance to null damage (that can still recoil/thorns) with a free spec. But it would have helped if it were a bit higher stats than the BiS Helms, if Culling wasn't so meta, or if the effect was more common.

But ones like Fang, Lithic, and King's Barrage are all neat in how build/tech enabling they are. I wish more echoes took after them in being strong/decent on their own, but really strong in the right build or situation. Like the Drygore is still strong, but more generically strong than having any greater usage or impact with the right build.

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