Bakriminel Bolts

Since I accidentally spent most of my money on bolt tips, I've been doing these at least once a day. You're lucky if you get more than 1 log per tree, and so far that's only happened for me in the wilderness. I was able to get 1600 each selling what I had on the ge, so even if you only get 1 log you're profiting about 14k. So in that sense it's not as bad as it appears.

Anyway, here's the update faq. There's some interesting stuff in here.

Spoiler (Click to View)

This sticky has been created in response to the most commonly asked questions regarding the most recent game update.

Whilst we continue to gather feedback, we will add any other frequently asked questions regarding this update to this thread - you may wish to check back every now and then.

Enjoy!

Updated: ...

Will the focus of skilling updates be more aimed at "daily activities"? Recently we've had Flasks (50/day) and now these new bolts (can only be cut every 6 hours so effectively 3 times max/day).

Mod Mark: We certainly don’t expect all updates to have this limited access approach and are dealing with it on a case by case basis. We believe that there is plenty of content that already exists that a player can infinitely repeat, and frankly we can do slightly more interesting and rewarding activities if we can assume each player has limited access to some content. It also improves some of the issues that exist around competition for resources.

The gameplay behind the bolts is very interesting. I see that you guys are working on the combat revamp. Any news on that?

Mod Mark: Nothing yet, sorry! Look out for some blogs in the near future.

Crossbows have the same speed as a longsword, so effectively with these bolts, rangers are using Dragon Longswords in comparison to DPS. Any plans to possibly give Ranged some speedy hits in PvP in the future?

Mod Mark: Possibly, yes.

I don't understand, are the bolts tradeable?

Mod Raven: The complete bolts are tradeable yes, the component parts are not tradeable. Also, the bolts must be created at the tree, you cannot take the logs/incomplete shafts away from the tree

Do the bolts work in PvP minigames?

Mod Raven: Yes.

Does this mean we will be in a competition at every tree or does each have their ‘own’?

Mod Raven: Each person has their own. There should be no competing for the same tree...well other than if you decide to murder the people next to you of course, which, as temporary advocate for pure evil, I think is a marvellous idea.

Why are there no arrow tips and Bakriminel arrows?!

Mod Raven: Well the obvious answer is because these are bolts, not arrows, designed to work with crossbows, rather than bows. Truth is we felt that conceptually the crossbow was a better weapon to use with this set of ammunition, as it feels more appropriate a weapon for a sniper to use (the unofficial title for these bolts were sniper bolts). That said, never say never, perhaps Mami Rimba can find a way to turn them into arrows, but she's working on other things for the moment.

Many players are getting equal, if not less logs from the wilderness trees than they would from the trees outside of the Wilderness. Why is that?

Mod Raven: Honestly? The rule of statistics. What we're seeing is people taking a small sample and extrapolating from that and we're looking at a sample from people who, for the most part, feel that the wilderness trees aren't good enough. Those who are getting the expected yield are keeping quiet as there's no real reason for them to be posting about their results. So what we're looking at is a small sample, from a somewhat skewed set of results. When we tested this QA ran a lot (and I mean a lot) of tests to ensure that the trees in the wilderness do indeed give a better average yield.

So in short, try cutting down the trees with a dragon or rune hatchet (the dragon is noticeably better) and on average you should see the wilderness trees give a better yield.

Why is there a respawn rate of six hours on the tree? That's incredibly long!

Mod Raven: We wanted to give these bolts a reason for skillers to make them and that reason comes from their sale value. By giving the tree a long respawn time, we make it so that the supply is limited, meaning that the bolts will sell well. This means that a skiller can make a run or two a day, quickly, and make a nice bit of money. People who want large numbers of the bolts can then buy them from the exchange. This benefits the skiller and it also means that we see an increase in skillers in the Wilderness, which means more targets for PvP players, so everyone wins.

The advantage over these trees, rather than normal trees, is that once your six hours are past you are guaranteed to be able to cut your tree, as everyone's tree works for them and only them. Meaning a billion people can be cutting down the same tree you're cutting and it won't affect your haul of logs.

Mod Edam: We want to limit the number of these bolts coming into the game – to keep the price at a reasonable value so that skillers can make some money from these. This technique seems to be working reasonably well on content like potion flasks which seem to be maintaining their value. It’s one technique that we’re trying to use to give skillers a means of making money, but it’s certainly not something we’ll do with every update.

Since the headshot is considered the only good special, and it can easily be negated by switching to a helm, are there any plans to change or review the other specials?

Mod Raven: I think the other specials are being given a bad rep here, in the right situations they're very powerful. A frozen mage, unable to cast spells, with 5 points of damage being taken every second or so, whilst still being pummelled with rapid fire bolts, is in a pretty bad spot. I think the value of these specials will be seen after people get used to the update a little, on the face of it these may not sound much, but in testing we've found that they've been quite effective.

So in short, we are looking at the specials, but we've no current plan to change how they work.

Mod Edam: These specials hit a lot more frequently than normal bolt specials. So they’re more reliable in PVP combat. Once the special has hit you can then switch to a different effect or another type of bolt.

The body shot bolt effect is very underwhelming. 60 to 300 damage per minute is not going to make much of a difference, if any at all. Can you boost the damage it deals?

Mod Raven: That's 60-300 damage a minute, whilst being pummelled in the face with highly damaging bolts. That situation eats your health fast and once that minute is up, if you are somehow still alive, then you'll likely get the damage all over again. I'm actually quite surprised that it's considered underwhelming. It's not an instant KO, but it will no doubt be something that can turn the tide of battle. So no, there are no current plans to boost the damage.

Does the resourceful aura work with the bloodwood tree? If it doesn't work, are there any plans to make it work?

Mod Raven: No it doesn't and there are no plans to make it work.

Does the Inferno Adze work the same as a Dragon Hatchet would at the Bloodwood trees?

Mod Raven: Yes.

Would you consider giving these bolts a much higher range strength? Why did you decide to only give them +125?

Mod Raven: Only 125 still puts them high up on the foodchain of crossbow bolts. We also didn't want to make these bolts too powerful after all the effects themselves should be the main reason that people will want to use these. I think 125 is strong enough for what is required to create them.

Any chance of adding a minimum hit to the bolts, similar to Storm of Armadyl, so rangers can compete better with mages?

Mod Raven: Not at the moment no. The bolts already hit quite hard and have some nifty effects, if we made them hit even harder, or guarantee a hard hit, then we threaten to make them too powerful and that would cause further problems.

How do the bolts work in Castlewars?

Mod Raven: We look at is whether or not they have cast a combat spell in the last few seconds. If they have, they are eligible for the head special effect. If they haven't, they are safe from the special effect....not safe from a sharp piece of wood to the face, but then so few things are.

I love what you've done with the trees, but arctic pines no longer have a unique animation. Any plans to change this?

Mod Paul B: We are trying to unify all assets of a similar type in RuneScape so that we can better handle them as a group rather than having to treat assets on an individual level. Part of the trees update has meant that some animation has been removed, but this will allow us to update them more uniformly and effectively in the future.

On the same thread they say they're planning to make some changes. Here's the quote:

Spoiler (Click to View)

Hi guys,

Just as a heads up to let everyone know that we are listening to your feedback, we are currently working on making some changes to how the specials work.

Firstly, we will be looking at whether the mage has cast a combat spell in the last 30 seconds or so and if so they will be susceptible to the special effect, regardless of the armour they are wearing in that slot. Secondly, if they are wearing armour AS well, the chance will be significantly increased.

As well as modifying the specials, we are looking to give a minimum yield to the wilderness trees. Whilst the trees themselves do offer an average increased yield, we want to make sure that players know they will always get at least 2 logs from the wilderness trees, with the deepest wilderness tree getting a minimum of 3 logs.

I can't guarantee when these changes will go live, but we are working on them as we speak. Just wanted to let you know.

= Raven =