The week sees the release of the Halloween 2019 holiday event and changes to the Bounty Hunter rework beta.
Halloween 2019 Holiday Event
Spooktober is here, which means it's time for the annual Halloween event! As you travel north of Lumbridge, you might notice that a player has been trapped by what appears to be two goblins wearing bedsheets. If you're feeling brave enough, why not see what you can do to help?
This year's event unlocks brand new cosmetics as well as all previous Halloween rewards and music if you don't have them already.
As always, the event it available to members and free players, and doesn't have any requirements.
To begin, head to the chicken pen just north of Lumbridge, indicated by the Halloween icon and highlighted in the map below:
Some Words From The Developer: This year's Halloween event is my first project on the Old School team. It has been an incredible experience learning how Old School is built and actually designing my own piece of content. Before I started the design work for this I asked myself why I started playing RuneScape back in 2006. I wanted the update to feel similar to events and quests I experienced when I was younger, while adding my own personality, and showing some of what you can expect from me in the future.
I'm currently working on Leagues, which I have been very passionate about since I joined the team. I believe this update will bring a breath of fresh air to the game, while still honouring its roots. We now have endless opportunities to challenge your theory crafting, game knowledge and mechanical skills in interesting ways.
I hope you enjoy this year's Halloween event and its rewards. I am incredibly proud and grateful to be creating content for this game and its community.
~ Mod Flippy
Bounty Hunter Rework Feedback
Last week we opened the Bounty Hunter Rework Beta. Since then, we've had loads of feedback and suggestions which we've started working on. This week's changes are designed to address three key points:
- The minigame needs to be more rewarding.
- The Beta doesn't accurately represent the real Bounty Hunter minigame.
- Loose ends caused by the rework.
We'd like to thank all the players who have played the Beta and given suggestions. We're also grateful for the patience of Bounty Hunter players while the live minigame is paused. With your continued feedback, we're confident we can get the Beta where it needs to be!
The Points System The main feedback we received was that the new points system is not rewarding enough. To improve this, 3 points will now be awarded per kill, increasing to 4 and 5 when you begin a killstreak of 5 and 10. This scale was previously at 1, 2 and 3 points. This may still be adjusted further if needed.
Player Bounties We would also like to make the tasks more rewarding by increasing how quickly they cycle and the points they award. We also have feedback changes to make to tweak the existing tasks and add new ones. These can be expected in an upcoming update.
Gear Chest, Presets and Stats We've also made some changes to make the Beta a better simulation of Bounty Hunter in the live game:
- Items in the chest have been limited to ones you're more likely to find players using in the minigame. It also includes the Ornate Maul Handle.
- The pre-built loadouts which are accessible via the chest have been made more realistic.
- You can no longer customise your stats at the chest. Instead, we encourage you to use the pre-built setups mentioned above.
Special Attack Pool and Spellbook Switching The energy pool and Prayer altar for changing spellbooks have been moved out of the Bank to be more accessible.
Emblem Trader's Rewards Shop All items in the Rewards Shop have been re-costed according to the new points system. The exception is the rune pouch which is dependent on the results of an upcoming poll to make it tradeable, reduce its cost in the Slayer points reward shop, and add it as a reward for other content.
Rune Pouches and Looting Bags
Because these items will be unavailable from the Bounty Hunter Rewards Shop for the duration of the Beta, we've made them accessible elsewhere. Slayer Masters now sell the rune pouch (to non-Ironmen only) for 1,500,000 GP and the looting bag for 30,000 GP. This is a temporary fix and will be reverted at the end of the Beta.
On the topic of the looting bag, we're adjusting its drop rate from NPCs in the Wilderness. Previously NPCs always had a 1/30 chance to drop the looting bag. Now, this chance scales with the combat level of the NPC. You can expect to get a looting bag from a level 50 NPC at a rate of 1/6 and from a level 100 NPC at a rate of 1/3.
Ring of Wealth and Magic Shortbow Upgrade Scrolls
To alleviate the concerns of certain restricted accounts, these two upgrade scrolls have been added to the Wilderness Slayer loot table. They also remain in the Bounty Hunter rewards shop.
The roll that normally provides a Slayer's enchantment scroll (used to enchant the Slayer staff) is now a roll that has a 3/6 chance to give the Slayer's enchantment, 2/6 to give the Ring of Wealth and 1/6 to give the magic shortbow scroll.
We also want to make Clue Boxes accessible elsewhere - likely the Larran's chest in the lower part of the Wilderness, however there wasn't time to include it in this week's update.
Dagon'hai Robes
The Dagon’hai Robe set has been added to Larran's chest as a very rare reward. When opening the chest, you have a 1/256 chance to receive each piece. The stats can be seen below:
In Other News
- Following last week's change to Teleport Block, some more spells have been updated so that the game won't offer to cast them on NPCs if they can be cast only on other players, or vice versa.
- Items now correctly appear on the ground if dropped at the top of the steps from Dorgesh-Kaan to the Agility area.
- Some small pieces of scenery have been mapped down just outside the Lumbridge Castle bank. These help the game navigate you correctly if you click on the bankers while inside the bank. Previously it navigated you out of the bank to the wrong side of the wall.
- Pathfinding around the Kourend castle bank has also been improved.
- Players can no longer stall the Nylocas Vasilias in the Theatre of Blood.