Non-Player Characters

It's got to be the Varrock cleaner, only just winning (?) over the Varrock stray dog as the most useless NPC in the game.

According to  the RS Wiki, the cleaner's job is to "help cope with the large number of ashes that often littered the streets of Varrock". 

Really? Because all I ever see this guy doing is leaning on his broom around the east bank. The only times I've seen him sweep up ashes were when someone was trying to collect them for herblore. He rather enjoys pushing his broom around the Varrock east bank. I suppose he's cleaning up all that dirt and dust we adventurers track inside (read that with heavy sarcasm). 

If he's really looking to do his job of ash removal, he might want to move his cabbage across town to the west bank and the GE, you know, where people are actually lighting fires.

Another interesting debate is who is currently the richest NPC. A couple years ago, the hands-down favorite was Saniboch, to whom you paid 875 gold to enter Brimhaven dungeon. With the addition of the achievement diaries, the entry fee is waived when you wear the KAD gloves. Alathazdrar, the demon butler, may be near the top of this year's list with his whopping 10k gold salary, but not everyone has a servant. Personally, I'm choosing the fruit tree patch gardeners and the 25k gold they get (in papayas) to keep an eye on palm trees.

How to win friends and influence people

Try this in Real Life:

1. Find the person nearest you, preferably a stranger.

2. Say, "Hi"

3. Call them, "Jerk"

4. Wait for response

Sucking it up

At the beginning, runecrafting was a fun skill to train as the levels came rather quickly and there was something new at each one. Once level 20 came around, I could make all the F2P runes. Of course, why not keep going until 30 so I can be on the hiscores? That's about all you need for F2P, the other runes will have to be bought. Around this time, I got membership. P2P comes into it with the ability to make new runes until 77 and throwing in 4 essence pouches as well. After level 77, the only things to change are more runes per essence and a schmexy cape if you're a weirdo who likes runecrafting. :P

So what keeps me slogging my way through a skill I absolutely despise?

It steams from a mix of reasons. One, I need certain runes, like astrals, laws and nats, for crafting and alchemy and I'm not buying when I only need a few hundred or so. Two, goals of all levels above 70/80/90. Three, I've finally relieved my kung-fu grip of hoarding runes Just In Case and am making deaths to sell. 

And why don't I like runecrafting?

It's a lot of work for a little pay. When first starting, 5 exp per rune is great because the experience between levels is small. Right now, I'm staring at 413k exp until level 88. Just thinking about all those runs through ZMI or the Abyss is killing my will to train it. ZMI will make it go faster, giving me nearly double the experience over the same number of death runes.

There and Back Again

I have a RuneScape Classic account from the reopening in November 2009. I barely played on it until this week, when I went in to find out just how different the quests are from RuneScape (2). One quest tested my memory: Fishing Contest.

I'd been fishing shrimps at Draynor and got the urge to get to Catherby for more variety. Seeing as I don't have the magic and runes for a teleport over White Wolf Mountain and I kept getting my cabbage handed to me attempting to go over it, I talked to the dwarf at the little hut to see about using the shortcut under the mountain. I accepted the mission to get him the fishing trophy, wandering back to Draynor to level up my fishing skill. While dipping my net into the water, I tried to figure out a way to get to Catherby safely. RuneScape has changed so much that I'm not sure if the travel methods there would be in Classic, but I really had nothing to lose except my life. I had no idea if the boats traveled from Brimhaven to Ardougne, or even if Ardougne was there.

As I did in RuneScape, I found the nearest man and started repeatedly mugging him for change. I needed 60 coins to pay for boat fares - Port Sarim to Karamja and Brimhaven to Ardougne (hopefully). I managed, even learning the art of timing 3 combat rounds, and found myself walking across the volcano, avoiding the scorpions. Oh, the Brimhaven boat was there! I walked up to Catherby and discovered I was back to shrimp fishing but in a different location (and there's no range either). 

After another day of fishing to level 10, I had to do more random muggings to gain fares so I could go to Falador for a spade. Sure, I could've just wandered up WWM, died and respawned in Lumbridge. I was proud of my memory proving accurate, so I took the boats and headed to find the possible spade spawn in Falador. My mind told me it was at the house next to the furnace. I wandered about town to keep myself active, looking out for red dots, while I opened up the Classic Wikia for a description of this place. Nothing was said about a spade spawn and farming hadn't been thought about yet, so I kept wandering inside buildings. It took 2 days, but I did find the spade (and a gloves spawn too) which is in a house near the north wall.

I packed up my traveling supplies - bronze platebody, bronze platelegs, iron dagger and 12 cabbages - and made certain I had everything from this side of the mountain - garlic and spade - and set off again via the boats (after more judicious thieving). The next hard part was getting the red worms from the woods without dying to a guard dog. More time was taken finding the loose fence (it's the wooden bit along the east wall) and the dog's bite nommed me for half my health before I could run away. I dug up 2 red worms and escaped. The best part of this is that I could speed through it. I paid my fee, plopped the garlic in the sewer pipe and then started the fishing contest. 

I fished up 2 big carp, handed them over and got the trophy. Walking to the other WWM dwarf and giving it to him got me 4 fishing levels. Not bad and now I can use the under shortcut. :)

It broke the camel's back

I'm going to be hanging out in my clan chat for a while. Either my thick skin is not as thick as I thought or the accumulation of annoyances has reached its peak.

Ask a question -I'm a Grammar Nazi

Put someone on ignore/ask not to be called "kitty" - I'm an Elitist

Offer supplies - I get scammed

Mention star/tree locations - I'm spamming

Don't talk/have 99 hunter/have high skills - I'm a bot

Do absolutely nothing in chat - I get named chat gorgon

If you've heard about Canting, only go if Merch is in there. Otherwise, prepare to be glomped (and not in a good way).

My level is

It's not long until you reach the big goal of fishing: sharks. A few more lobsters separate you and you prepare the big moment like you've seen others do in clan chat countless times. You go into clan quick chat and say:

My fishing level is 75.

Another lobster crawls inside the cage; bang! Fireworks explode over your head and in triumph you tell the clan:

My fishing level is 76.

The congratulations pour in from those in the chat, along with the invariable troll to spoil your achievement:

My fishing level is 99.

This happens every single day in Canting. A person will be working on a skill, mention the current and newly achieved levels in clan quick chat, only to be overshadowed by someone outstripping them, usually with a 99. It comes off as being rude. You trolls piss all over another person's accomplishment because you want to be seen as a better player. It's nice that you have 99 fishing, but you've had your parade so let someone else shine for a moment.

Quest picks

Here are my lists of the to do quests in RuneScape, separated into F2P and P2P and my reasoning. I'm taking in all, not focusing on only combat/skilling/pking.

Top Five Must Do F2P Quests:

1. Prince Ali Rescue - free entry through Al Kharid/Lumbridge gate (negated by Lumbridge bank)

2. Doric's Quest - jump start on mining (1300 exp =nearly level 11)

3. The Knight's Sword - huge boost for smithing (12,725 exp = level 29)

4. Cook's Assistant - let's you use the Lumbridge castle range which gives you better success to not burn food

5. Blood Pact - a little boost to all combat skills, free gear and a place to train

Top Ten Must Do P2P Quests:

1. Fishing Contest - shortcut under White Wolf Mountain

2. My Arm's Big Adventure - disease free herb patch

3. Cold War - opens up penguin spying

4. Druidic Ritual - starts up herblore

5. The Grand Tree - gives you spirit trees and gnome gliders for transportation

6. Throne of Miscellania - Manage Thy Kingdom for skilling/profit

7. The Hand in the Sand - 84 buckets of sand, every 24 hours for free

8. Smoking Kills - slayer points to buy abilities and items like permanent canceling tasks and slayer rings

9. Ghosts Ahoy! - Ectophial

10. Lost City - allows ability to wield the dragon longsword and dagger

The high cost of living

Many would say hiring and using a servant will make construction training go much faster. Let's look at the cost of using the servants to run noted logs to the sawmill.

The earliest servant to take noted logs is the cook, who will unnote and carry back 16 planks. She's available at level 30 construction, but for this we'll hire her at level 33, the level we can make oak larders. Her salary is 3,000 gp upon hiring and per every eight trips afterwards. In order to reach level 99, we need to make 27,118 oak larders (216,944 oak logs). If we take 24 oak planks with us for the first trip and have the cook convert the remaining oak logs into planks, we'll need 59,324,000 gp to cover the costs of her salary (5,088,000 gp) and oak log payments (54,236,000 gp).

A little over five million gold extra paid because we're too lazy to convert our own logs. Of course, this is sticking with the cook. How much would it cost if we upgraded to the butler and then to the demon butler at the appropriate levels?

The amount of oak larders stays the same - 27,118 (216,944 logs) - and we'll already have 24 oak planks ready. Taking on the cook from levels 33-40, we'll pay out 60k. Then we hire the butler for 5,000 gp from levels 40-50 for 275k. Now for the demon butler! He costs 10k to hire and will convert 26 logs into planks. So, from level 50-99, the demon butler will want 10,380,000 gp for his salary and the oak planks will cost 53,888,000 gp for a grand total of 64,603,000 gp spent. 10,367,000 gp spent hiring and paying servants.

Shared information

Bit by bit, I've been getting into regularly checking for falling stars and strange saplings. When I find one, either via diligent searching and patient waiting or run by on my way to somewhere else, I tend to provide the details in whichever clan chat I'm in at the moment. Those in the chat can then do what they like with it. They can join or ignore me. I'm not forcing or begging anyone to do this, just sharing information.

You're wasting those!

This week marked the beginning of being able to put experience lamps, books of knowledge, reward lamps, tears of Guthix and penguin points into dungeoneering. For those who'd rather have their nails ripped off with rusty pliers than be trapped in a dungeon for 2 hours, it's a blessing.

I was hanging out in a friend's clan chat when she announced she'd dumped her penguin points into dungeoneering. This prompted a big of a kafuffle. Some said it was good. Some said it was a waste. The arguements for are what I'd term the rule of thumb for those little bonus experience points we can get: put them in a skill 1) you hate training, 2) costs a lot of money, or 3) is close to a level. The naysayers argued she was missing out on tokens to cash in for rewards. 

What would you put your bonus experience points in?