Debunking the need for Runescape's Evolution of Combat

Now, I know what current Runescape players will think when they read this.

"It's been 4 years, get over yourself."

Yes, I got over it within the day the EoC was officially published. I outright quit and canceled 7+ years of ongoing membership.

This is merely a post to exercise my interest in game design and my nostalgia for RS2, and give old veterans something to think about for how the EoC could have happened.

I also just kind of enjoy debates and have some free time to think about a random topic from years ago.

In a series of posts, I shall address many of the concerns that led some of Jagex's decisions at the time.

I may have forgotten most of the stuff from 4 years ago, as the combat beta threads are of course, all gone now.

List of pre-EoC's balance problems: An index to the solutions.

Mistakes Jagex made with EoC:

• The EoC was rushed. It was left unfinished for over 2 years after release.

• The EoC was forced upon us.

• Jagex was in denial about how the players really felt about the EoC, with loaded votes that they skewed to favor the EoC.

• The EoC failed in keeping the community together.

• The EoC killed the old playerbase.

• They threw away a lot of pre-EoC content to make the new system. (Please RS3ers, stop complaining about the notion that giving anything to RS2ers will make you guys lose content in the game. It's hypocritical after they already removed a lot of content from us.)

• Jagex put out the message that they don't care about old players, now they only care about new players.

• The EoC made me quit Runescape, and through cause and effect, got me to get my feet wet in other MMORPG. Now that I've compared RS3 to modern MMORPG, what RS3 tried to create looks like complete jaberwocky. I also feel that, if 2011scape still existed, I would still be playing it along side modern MMORPG. But RS3 in its current state is both inferior to other MMORPG and not worth playing alongside other MMORPG because it's not unique any more.

• OSRS is not worth playing. It took me 7 years of gameplay to get to where I was at in RS2. I can't play with my account reset. Because, 7 years later, now I'm an adult, with a full time job and college. Now I can tell generations of people and friends about Jagex's way of doing things, which is to throw away players on hasty business ventures.

• Adding abilities not only makes Jagex look like they are copying other games, it not only makes Runescape's combat no longer unique, but, I will repeat, it also gave us a comparison to see that it's now inferior and is no longer different.

• Homogenization of weapons is extremely bland. It was complained against from the start as well.

• Jagex tried too hard to rope players in with some "good side things". In other words, Jagex was throwing a variety of doggy treats... into a gas chamber. And the players didn't know.

• Jagex releases dual wielding to bait people into liking EoC.

• Jagex releases weapon sheathing/unsheathing to bait people into liking EoC.

• Jagex releases new items to fill gaps in the combat triangle to bait people into liking EoC.

• After finally releasing the mistake known as EoC, they tried to patch it up, poorly, to try and bring some old players back. Legacy mode isn't RS2. Doesn't actually really feel close to it at all.

• Jagex gave off this huge vibe that they were trying to copy and paste formulas other MMORPG use instead of trying to balance the game based on what Runescape already is. They changed Runescape into something it isn't. They tried too hard to copy paradigms that work for other MMOs and lost a lot of uniquity of Runescape.

And here is a bulleted list of what the EoC did good, or at least, would have been good changes for RS2 if it weren't for many of the other blatant problems bundled together with EoC.

Changes the EoC did good with:

• The hotbar/skillbar is a perfectly okay addition.

• The improved UI is a perfectly okay addition, as long as compatibility to the old one is kept.

• Adding new items to fill in armor/weapon gaps for mage and range was good.

• Making magic cheaper was good.

And here is a bulleted list of how the EoC could have been done differently, or suggestions on specific things to help solve balance issues at the same time. Some of this even works to make the combat a little more interesting, while keeping the RS2 combat system.

And some of it are just arguments against what Jagex thought was imbalanced.

What the EoC could have done differently:

• The mandatory and most important part, is to not have added abilities and not try to copy this cooldown system of other games.

• Shields with a "Special Defend" mechanic to add a whole new variety to PvP and PvE.

• Weapons with 3 different possible special attacks, using a split special attack bar with the 3 options.

• Make the Lv60 dragon weapons good for their weapon, but requiring upgrading to become Lv70-80-90 equivalents for higher level gameplay.

• All of RS2's balance problems are entirely a number game that completely did not require the addition of skills to Runescape. It could have all been done with armor/weapon adjustments, new/improved/tweaked adjustments to combat skills, and possibly new mechanics such as special defends, better spells, things that can combo somehow.

• RS2 could've simply gone by with adding new items and modifying old items to fit the gaps that Rangers and Magers were missing in combat triangle balance.

• Magers could've used a short range teleportation spell and more stuns against melee, using the old system, to make them more viable against melee. In general magic could've used more support types of spells in the normal spellbook.

• In terms of adding new bosses with new mechanics, many have already been proven to not really need the skills EoC added - they could've been made in RS2 by adding new spells/special attacks. My special defend system would've added a nice variety.

• For adding new bosses I would suggest against "boss specific items". E.g., adding variety to new boss fights shouldn't exist in the forum of requiring Kalphite King Repellent to defeat him, but instead should use mechanics like being able to guarantee inflicting poison on a boss at a certain time to weaken him, poison being a mechanic that can be used on any enemy in the game. Otherwise we add pseudo variety by making ad-hoc "only useful for one boss" items.

• 100% protection prayers were OP and limited boss design according to Jagex. I disagree at that being a problem. It is something everyone was assimilated with and not a huge problem to deal with. Extremely powerful bosses should be able to hit through it as if there were no protection. There's no need to even sugar coat that way of ignoring prayer. Giving boss fights multiple forms of combat isn't a bad idea. Giving bosses "typeless" damage isn't terrible if used in the right scenario.

• A dungeon could've been released that keeps you at 0% prayer. For example, an Abyssal Dungeon with bosses on par with the God Wars Dungeon, but is based on combat with no prayer usage. Now, this is only a good single-time or temporary solution. They can't just make all future dungeons infinitely drain your prayer to 0%. But it could be a big major release like God Wars was, and unique bosses could be put into it.

• There's many good excuses to make humanoid bosses where protection prayers follow PvP rules against them and only give 40% protection.

• There were no players that complained about it in the first place. It's not even really that terrible from a game design perspective. I know Jagex wanted to make the food market better, but damaging the combat experience and fun of the game was not worth it.

• Scimitars were better than daggers, warhammers, maces, longswords, shortswords, spears, 2H swords. What if they were rebalanced damage stat wise to be similar DPS, or to give them mechanical differences? For example, they could make daggers attack faster like a shortbow does for ranged. They could make longswords more accurate. They could make shortswords better for stabbing and the same speed as scimitar. Homogenization probably wouldn't look so bad in RS2's combat system if it weren't for EoC's ability nonsense. But we can also give the weapons slightly different mechanical change. Think CLS vs CR. People actually had some choice between those as people would use CLS for its better accuracy or bigger hits.

Also, I liked this guy's post:
https://rsaccount4u.wordpress.com/2014/09/22/was-the-eoc-actually-needed-for-runescape-to-move-on/