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This is the second portion of our May Game Health Update blog, if you haven't read Part one click the button below to check it out!
Although last month's news post was only a summary, intended to be followed up with another post providing further details, we understood your concerns and the need to be clearer with what changes we're making ahead of time. The following breakdowns will highlight the changes we've made to the content and drop tables, as well as an explanation for those changes. All of these changes were made with the design philosophy outlined in part one serving as our guidelines.
Following the delay to the update, we sat down once again and made some additional data-facilitated tweaks and changes. Although quantities were lowered across the board - in various places, we replaced lower-value items with items that currently carried higher values. This was done to ensure the drop tables still carry some weight and variety across the table as a whole, rather than continuing to drop already low value items at even lower quantities. On the flip side, we increased the chance for rare items in several places, remedying situations such as the Frozen Core of Leng or slightly tuning the boot drops at Raksha to reduce how often they're dropped - in favour of the other rares.
Notably, you'll see an almost complete removal of items like Inert Adrenaline Crystals and Sirenic Scales. We've done this as the value of them has dropped too significantly due to the sheer volume of them coming into the game. Limiting the supply of them this way will allow them to regain some of their value again as time passes.
In no particular order, let's get into it!
The above changes are aimed at reducing the influx of most of these items, including raw GP in the form of coins and alchables. The removal of Inert Adrenaline Crystals similarly aims to choke the over-supply of them so that they can start to regain some value as time passes. This will be the same for the rest of the changes we'll discuss today.
The maximum dropped quantity of Manuscripts of Jas has been increased to make this drop more rewarding, with a similar outlook on increasing the drop rates of other rares such as staff pieces.
We teased a little data on Arch-Glacor earlier to explain just how responsible it is for the over-supply and consequent devaluing of items in the economy, but now we'll give you some more examples.
Every day, Arch-Glacor is responsible for:
Note: The above values are referring to drops from NPCs, and don't include items made by players or received from things like reward chests.
As you can see from this sample of drops alone, Arch-Glacor is consistently over-supplying huge amounts of these items into the game every day, including the influx of GP. In the grand scheme of the game, these numbers may be a drop in the ocean - but coming from only one boss alone every single day with little effort makes this a clear problem.
If we refer back to the data of gold sources detailed earlier, although it's not a direct comparison, Arch-Glacor would come in 5th place for the amount of gold it brings in with its raw GP & alchable drops.
The above also doesn't include things like Charm drops - which negates the need to do other content such as slayer or even other bosses - and Starved Ancient Effigies which give generous amounts of XP!
The sheer volume of the skilling items has also dramatically affected their GP value, and feeds into the progression points we were discussing earlier, as well as having a knock-on effect on skilling profitability and other PvM drop tables. The changes we've made, detailed below, aim to keep Arch-Glacor a useful combat-teaching boss in normal mode while hard mode is intended as the starting point for those who can comfortably do 5 mechanic kills.
Normal mode Arch-Glacor works a bit different to the other bosses we're discussing today due to how the mechanic selection adds multipliers to the possible loot you'd receive. Instead of detailing how each drop would be affected - as it'd be too long to do so - we'll cover the core changes and show you how the drop multipliers have changed.
The first of the changes to normal mode Arch-Glacor is that the 0 and 1 mechanic fights now have a separate drop table. Intended to act as an entry-level boss that can aid players in learning RuneScape's combat system, the 0 and 1 mechanic fights have instead found a lot of use in AFKing for great loot and decent XP. This change intends to maintain that original intention and discourage AFKing. 0 and 1 mechanic kills will also only give 1 drop now, instead of 3.
Next on the list of changes is the mechanic loot-multiplier. The quantity of drops received at Arch-Glacor is determined by the number of mechanics active, with each additional mechanic increasing the multiplier. We've reduced that multiplier across the board as these were drastically affecting the quantities of commons coming into the game. Hard mode Arch-Glacor with its enrage and kill-streaking mechanics will continue to lean on the concept of loot multiplying as intended.
The loot multipliers for normal mode have changed as follows:
| Mechanics Active | Old Multiplier | New Multiplier |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 1 | 1.5 | 1.25 |
| 2 | 2 | 1.5 |
| 3 | 4 | 2 |
| 4 | 7 | 2.5 |
| 5 | 15 | 3 |
An example of these multiplier changes with actual drops:
Below is a summary of the core changes mentioned above, including other changes we're making to normal mode Arch-Glacor:
Hard mode mechanics remain unaffected in terms of broader mechanical changes, although there are still some drop table changes:
Firstly, the base quantities of many of the hard mode drops were reduced due to the sheer number of these items being introduced to the economy each day. These values are multiplied by the kill-streak number, resulting in overly-high quantities of drops and the reason for their overall reduction.
Simultaneously, we increased the chance to roll a rare and receive a Frozen Core of Leng by shifting the weighting from the Scripture and Artefact, as we know a common feeling amongst the community is that Arch-Glacor is a bit stingy with that drop. Spirit Weed Seeds were removed due to the quantities of them entering the game each day, and their price drop ever since Raksha's release, to allow them to regain some value again.
Please note: Those of you who have existing streaks and unclaimed chests will have the streak ended and will need to claim your current loot before attempting the encounter again. Your existing loot will remain unaffected by the above changes. If you're on a streak currently, we recommend finishing that before these changes come into the game.
Rare Drops:
Alchables:
Other:
Much of the changes to the Zamorakian Undercity drops were to simply add more variance in drop quantities, as items were being dropped in static quantities each time. A bug preventing Dark Animica Stone Spirits from dropping was also fixed. The chance to receive Onyx Dust as a drop was also reduced, with the weighting being shifted to each of the Slivers.
Note: Where you see a decrease or increase in "value-weight", these have the inverse effect because Zamorak's drop table gives an "allowance" for drops. Each drop is worth an amount of points, and these points are deducted from the total allowance. This means that the smaller the number of "value-weight", the more of that item which could actually be received. Basically, a decrease in value-weight is a buff, whereas an increase is a nerf.
Much like (and in some cases even more problematic than!) Arch-Glacor, Zamorak's drop table mechanisms and the enrage mechanic were heavily affecting the quantity of drops received.
The decrease in quantities you see above is to bring this more under control, because like the other bosses we're discussing today, Zamorak is responsible for bringing a lot of these items into the game. To elaborate on this more, every day Zamorak is responsible for:
Note: The above values are referring to drops from NPCs, and don't include items made by players or received from things like reward chests.
Here's another fun statistic! As of writing this blog, in the past 3 days, Zamorak alone dropped on average 2x the amount of Blood Runes rune-crafted by all players on that day. Looking back further than 3 days, on some days it was almost 4x as much!
When it comes to Onyxes, Zammy takes the cake. Uncut Onyxes have for a while now been near alch value, though they did see a return in value from mid-2020 to mid-2021, but have since then flat-lined at alch value. The change to this drop is to choke the over-supply and let the Onyxes breathe a little!
In terms of GP, every day Zamorak drops:
If you remember our data of gold sources from earlier in this blog, the Spring Cleaner sat at rank 3 bringing in an average 39.4 billion GP each day. Although it's not a direct comparison, Zamorak alone would almost sit at 3rd place for the amount of gold he brings in with these 4 drops.
Alongside these changes, we've also increased the chance to receive a Bow of the Last Guardian piece, in line with raising the rates of rare item drops on the other bosses in this blog.
Normal and Hard Mode:
The changes above were made to target alchables and once again remove Sirenic Scales to let them regain some value.
The biggest change overall, however, was to prevent players from purposefully failing and repeating certain waves of the fight to farm drops from the minions while AFK. When looking at the data, we found a disproportionate amount of players killing regular and Igneous TzekHaar-Hur on wave 4 of the fight. Instead, drops will now only be given upon the first attempt of these waves - failing and repeating the wave will not give subsequent drops.
Once again many of the changes to Raksha were made in order to reduce the impact of alchables and over-supply of commons.
However, we also made the decision to replace some of the items on the drop table to give back some value to Raksha with other drops. As many of you rightly pointed out - Raksha's commons were already not that great. Much of this was due to the overabundance of the items and subsequent bosses that have dropped those same items.
We're sure many of you will be delighted to also see that Raksha now drops Arbuck Seeds! Finally, we once again increased the chance of receiving some rares such as the ability books and Shadow Spike by decreasing the chance to receive the boots - which have also had a lower GP value for some time now due to dropping more commonly.
Wilderness Flash Events are a very popular piece of content, bringing players together regularly, especially for the special events.
One of the biggest offenders in terms of drops here was the Necronium salvage, which has now been replaced 1:1 with Orikalkum salvage.
To maintain supply, the quantities of drops such as Bloodweed Seeds, Magic Logs, and Wyvern Bones were also reduced. One notable such drop is Bakriminel Bolts. Once a popular skilling money-maker for players, Wildy Flash Events have unfortunately made this a more redundant method.
We want to see that return, so we've replaced that drop with a drop consisting of regular and combination runes. Similarly, we removed the Wilderness weapon drops as they were being dropped in abundance from the reward sacks, but increased the chance for them on the Wilderness slayer chest.
The cherry on top of all this - we're sure you'll be excited to see a 50% increase in the chance to receive a Dark Onyx Core!
When we reviewed Vorkath we determined it didn't need to receive any nerfs or replacements, and instead we've increased the chance to receive Vorkath's rares.
Rasial is a consistently popular boss especially given he's the source of Necromancy's T95s. The changes above are aimed at alchables once again, as well as things like Onyx Dust which contribute to the Onyx issue we discussed earlier. The seeds were also reduced in quantity due to the sole amount coming from Rasial, with the aim of choking the supply a bit to allow them to regain some value.
Here's some more data to highlight the situation. Every day Rasial is responsible for:
Note: The above values are referring to drops from NPCs, and don't include items made by players or received from things like reward chests.
Whew and here we are at the end! We want to thank you for taking the time to read through this behemoth of a blog and hope that we've illustrated the situation and why updates like this are important.
As always, we'll be keeping an eye on your feedback, and monitoring the effects of these changes whenever they go live. Adjustments will be made where necessary as we watch the effects of these changes in real time.
Finally, we'd like to hear what other game content you think could use Game Health update too! We have many such things we'd like to correct and improve ourselves, but we know that you as a community are experts who have plenty of great ideas to share on this.