50k and below:

Jim Wampler, author of Mutant Crawl Classics, Scientific Barbarian, and more, as well as a well-known artist, has designed and made free for use a "This product is free of AI" badge. It's free to use by everyone, and is a nice-looking design. I've noticed an uptick in AI-generated art and text in the past six or so months, and I think it's a great thing for the indie and small press community to have this. Let's see what's new in the gaming front! *The prolific Philip Reed has launched a new fundraising project, hot on the heels of his last one. This one, Fichte's Rumors of Lost Treasures, is a collection of rumors that can be used to entice your players into adventure. There are some assorted new titles available as well as part of the Kickstarter. *It's not OSR, but I thought Realms of Riddles looked interesting, mostly because having a resource of riddles is always a great thing for a DM to have tucked in their back pocket to confuse and delight. *Christian Eichhorn is raising funds for Monsters!, a bestiary of monsters for use with Mork Borg. They put out consistently good products, so this is definitely worth a look. *Another Mork Borg related project now on KS is Mork Manual, a hack of MB designed to emulate the classic fantasy genre. *Best known for his 5e work, as well as the amazing amount of time he's put into documenting the trainwreck that is nu-TSR, David Flor is crowdfunding the Mosidian Temple, a dungeon he wrote at the tender age of 12 and just recently re-discovered. *Again, not strictly OSR, but the Lair of the Leopard Empress looks like a super cool Swords and Sorcery book that is now available on Drivethru. *Iko's Skyrealms was successfully funded awhile back, and pdfs are now out (hopefully with print soon to follow). In celebration, they're hosting a game jam on itch. *Long Tail Games is sponsoring a Tiny Library game jam on itch that is about halfway through and has nearly forty submissions. The theme of this jam (and the new version of Tiny Library) is modern fantasy. *James Mishler has written the Shapeshifter class for Shadowdark. *Chronicles of Aeres: Wilderkind, is a 3rd party supplement for Castles and Crusades that provides rules for playing Redwall-style characters. *Jeff Talanian, with art by Del Teigeler, has produced a free ready-ref sheet for the Hyperborea game. *I was excited to see this the other day. Although I haven't had a chance to look at it, Christopher Heatherington has released a free, one-roll mass combat system for Old School Essentials. *Enemies Closer, by Richard Kelly, is a supplement for Pharmagothica that adds faction rules. The system is based on Mork Borg. *Joshua Burnett has released Crepuscular #2, a zine for DCC with some really cool art. You can get the physical zine though my webstore. *Delver Issue 8 is out in pdf on Drivethru. This zine, by James Kelly, is written for OSE and other old-school systems. Kelly's also release the Book of Tombs, Vol 2, a collection of twenty maps, monsters, and random tables. *I haven't heard of Prudence Publishing before, but they've just released Hexploratores Vol. 1. It's written for OSR games, specifically Knave, and does something similar to what I do with the Populated Hexes Series. This issue looks at an island in their default setting. *Men in Metal, by RHampton, is a PWYW look at early fantasy wargaming, before it became Chainmail. I believe the author has said it will only be PWYW for a short while before they put a fixe price on it, so now might be the time to grab it. *I've added a bunch of new titles to the webstore, both old and new. I don't have the space to list them here, but they include some used Battletech titles from the late 90s/early aughts in NM condition, some new DCC titles, zines, and more.

Greetings,
I am looking for 4 or 5 players, or an established group seeking a DM, for a game focusing on dungeon crawling, exploration and an old school vibe. I plan to stitch together a handful of classic D&D modules, recent OSR mega dungeons and heaping helping of classic sword & sorcery tropes to round out the game world.
Lamentations of the Flame Princess is the base rule set, modified by the 10 foot polemic house rules (which honestly is pretty much a different game at this point). The Vancian magic system is removed, classes are added, xp gain is expanded and more. I haven't had a chance to run a game using them fully but have folded some of them into various home games to good effect.
Ideally I'd like to run the game in a bar or brewery on a weeknight (Tues-Thursday) after work. I can start the game as early as 5pm and run till as late as 11pm, but I am not looking to run 6 hour sessions. Sessions would run 3-4 hours in that window.
Players should be 21+ due to the nature of the venue I'd like to use but otherwise I am open to game with anyone who comes to the table with a friendly disposition and shows respect to everyone there and their valuable time. If you have a desire to draw maps on graph paper, have Elf be a class and save or die this could be the game for you.
Play as an adventurer on the western frontier of a crumbling empire. Gather your party and set forth from a lonely border fort into untamed wilds sure to be chock full of dungeons, tombs, crypts, temples and all sorts of other places that dead guys left a ton of loot. A deadly dragon roosts in a nearby mountain, surely one could buy a kingdom with the wealth of that great beast.
If you have any interest in my game pitch please feel free to comment or dm me.

Through Wednesday, May 24 we present the Dungeon Age Adventures Quick Deal featuring old-school fantasy modules in the Dungeon Age series by writer and game designer Joseph R. Lewis. Set on Joseph's ancient world of Harth (inspired by classic fantasy authors like Jack Vance, Michael Moorcock, and Fritz Leiber), and presented in dual versions for both Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition and for Old School Revival-style retroclones such as Old-School Essentials, these ready-to-run Dungeon Age scenarios fit easily into any ongoing fantasy campaign. Explore a toxic city (Acid Metal Howl) – ride a flying merchant ship across the Great Sand Sea (Desert Angel Fiasco) – try to escape a cursed village (Witches of Frostwyck) – and two of these modules are titled, accurately, Kraken Corpse Delve and Orbital Vampire Tower.
Joseph R. Lewis has self-published two dozen novels and more than a dozen short Dungeon Age FRPG modules. These tightly focused scenarios earn praise for their clean layouts, clarity, OSR-style terseness and flavor, and immediate zero-prep page-to-table utility. Unstoppable reviewer Bryce Lynch, at his venerable Ten-Foot Pole blog, lists several Dungeon Age modules – Acid Metal Howl, Ragged Hollow Nightmare, Desert Angel Fiasco, Kraken Corpse Delve, and especially The Obsidian Keep – that satisfy his exacting expectations. (Content notice: Bryce does curse a bit.)
Joseph Lewis publishes prolifically on DriveThruFiction and Amazon. His new FRPG Harthbreaker and its solitaire version, Reavers and Rogues, both use the Apocalypse Engine. And in December Joseph published a new sequel Dungeon Age module, Orbital Vampire City, which is enough right there to make us want to revisit the line someday.
Meanwhile, this all-new Dungeon Age Adventures Quick Deal gives you enough adventure to occupy an entire Orbital Tower of old-school players. Pay just US$14.95 to get all ten modules in our Dungeon Age Collection (retail value $66) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, each in separate versions for D&D Fifth Edition and for old-school B/X-based systems:

Acid Metal Howl (character levels 5-8): In the deep desert lies the dead city of Yumar, the source of countless bizarre rumors. Was it destroyed by a demonic metal sphere? Did it sink into a pit of acid? What happened to Yumar a century ago matters less than what will happen a few days from now.
Battle for Carrion Vale (levels 6-7): In this dark sandbox adventure, the player characters have survived a terrible battle at Castle Yennagor and now decide whether to flee the field, plunder the dead, or finish their mission to discover what happened inside the castle.
Desert Angel Fiasco (levels 1-3): The characters hire on as security for a flying ship attempting to cross the uncharted Great Sand Sea.
Kraken Corpse Delve (levels 1-3): An eldritch woman from the future begs you to save her from her sister, who wants to drag her back to her own time. To close the time portal, you must climb down through the buried corpse of a kraken. The prize? A giant diamond worth 10,000 GP – if you can pull it out of the portal!
The Obsidian Keep (levels 1-3): Last month a fleet of holy warships sailed out to destroy the evil sorcerers of the Obsidian Keep. The fleet never returned. Righteous heroes (or brave treasure hunters) try to find the fleet, rescue the sailors, recover lost treasures, and discover the fate of the Keep's cruel masters.
Orbital Vampire Tower (level 3): High in the night sky, a vampire's tower is torn apart by a rampaging angel. People and monsters are trapped. Magical treasure lies scattered everywhere. It's all yours for the taking, if you can find a way out before the angel finds you.
Ragged Hollow Nightmare (levels 1-4): Yesterday young Tobias went to investigate an old tomb by himself. Everyone told him it was a bad idea. Everyone was right. Today you and your companions awaken to a town in chaos. Why is the temple sealed behind a divine shield? Why are children and worshipers trapped within? What did Tobias do?!
Star Dragon Rage (campaign of 6-20 sessions, starting at level 1 and continuing to levels 5-6): The pastoral village of Kettle sits beside a strangely warm lake. When the cemetery erupts, a stranger reveals that a magnificent city lies hidden below. Wondrous treasures sit forgotten in towers and vaults, but deadly monsters roar in the darkness – and they're clawing their way up.
Witches of Frostwyck (levels 1-4): You're lost in a frozen forest of deadly predators. Your only refuge is the tiny village of Frostwyck, where metal is rare and kindness is rarer. But Dama Zhadna has cursed the village so none can escape. Now you're trapped here – unless you find a way to defeat the Witches of Frostwyck.
13 Weird One-Shots (level 3): Short linear dungeon delves and side quests featuring a wide variety of locations, environments, creatures, and genres.

This Dungeon Age Quick Deal ascends to the Orbital Vampire Tower of Revelius Onar to face the insane metal angel Novaad and be devoured by the cosmic horror Gorj Wednesday, May 24.
https://bundleofholding.com/quick/DungeonAge

After discussing the issue here, and elsewhere, and reading an awesome post by goblin punch (link below) I made a blog post summarizing my favorite points/procedure. Full text copied below but better formatting/hyperlinks in the blog (contains some self-promo and affiliate links).
https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2023/05/reaction-rolls-in-practice-osr.html
Here is a small procedure for reaction rolls.
1. Goals and disposition. Decide (or roll for) goals and disposition, in any order. 2. Role-playing and actions. Ask what the PCs say and do. 3. Roll to persuade and reactions. Roll to see how the NPCs react, if it isn't obvious.
Let's analyze each step.

Goals and disposition Goals could be obvious. A beast is looking for food, or protecting if found in lair. Bandits are looking for easy money, not a bloody fight. Etc. But what if you find a chimera in the woods? Well, Teratogenicon has suggestions of goals for most monster types. Here is one that could work for supernatural, chaotic "monsters" in general.

d6 Goals 1 Hate. I want to destroy all natural creatures. 2 Cruelty. I like to play with my prey. 3 Survival. Everyone thinks I’m a menace. I’ll destroy them before they destroy me! 4 Predator. I kill because I need to eat. 5 Collection. I enjoy a specific type of object (gold, shiny things, iron) or flesh (hearts, eyes, fingers). 6 Fear. I must protect myself from anything that comes near!
Disposition is friendly/hostile. Roll 2d6 as usual. Charisma does NOT affect this roll.
Decide in any order. You can roll for disposition and then decide if the wolf is hostile because it is hungry or territorial, or find a goal (hunger) and then roll disposition (a starved wolf might be aggressive or weak and docile enough to beg for food).

Role-playing and actions Ask what the PCs say and do. This part is role-playing and doesn't require a roll. Do the PCs offer the beast some food? Or prepare their weapons when they see a misshapen humanoid? Etc.

This is the time to consider languages, and maybe also alignment, class, race, etc.
The NPCs reaction will sometimes be obvious - for example, bandits that outnumber the PCs seeing weapons drawn, etc. If not obvious, proceed to the next step.

Roll to persuade and reactions If you are unsure if the bandits will accept a bribe to simply walk away, or if the wolf is docile enough to accept meat from humans, make a roll. You can use 2d6, but since you already have a disposition, a good roll will mean it improves by one or two steps (from hostile to uncertain, for example), and a bad roll means the opposite. Charisma applies here.

Since my current game (Dark Fantasy Basic) uses d20 skills, I just make a persuasion check (DC 15) to change disposition.
Friendly bandits (step 1), when offered a small bribe (step 2) and a bad roll (step 3) will ask for more, not attack immediately. But if they are neutral, a small offer and a bad roll will indicate they require A LOT more - maybe ALL OF IT, while a terrible roll means immediate attack ("you try to fool us? Now die!").
And that`s it for the procedure.
But let me ramble on a bit. After I show you the 2d6 table I'm using (also Teratogenicon):

[img]
Why I´m writing this I have just realized I had not been not using reaction rules in my current sandbox campaign, defaulting instead to "the NPCs will do the predictable thing according to their motivations and your respond to the PCs according to role-playing".
It works fine. But random encounters become a bit predictable and stale. For example, the PCs encountered some wolves, and I thought the wolves wouldn't approach a big group of humans for no reason. The PCs did nothing, so they walked away. Which was okay - but if I had rolled aggressive or friendly wolves, I could have rolled with it and have a more memorable encounter.
Likewise, when they met a group of clerics when looking for a temple, I made the clerics immediately friendly due to circumstances. But again, what if they were suspicious of the PCs motives? Could be interesting, too.
I have started thinking and talking online about this... And then I remembered I wrote about this before. But I thought it was worth another post.
Initiative, surprise and single-roll reaction
While I like the procedure outline above, it takes three steps instead of a single 2d6 roll. The results are more nuanced and varied, but maybe you prefer a quicker method.
If that's the case, just use the traditional 2d6. Do not add charisma unless the PCs win initiative (or surprise etc.) and try to talk to their foes. Add circumstantial modifiers as needed (-4 to +4; e.g., NPC is a guard and PCs are invading, the weapons are drawn, NPC has a different language, etc.).
Rolling 1 on both dice means an immediate hostility regardless, and double 6s mean a positive attitude, within reason.
Even if you don't want the quicker method, using initiative in this way gives PCs meaningful choices. Do they attack now, or do they concede initiative to a potential enemy?
Alignment
In the absence of explicit goals for most monsters, you can use alignment as an indication. Chaotic monsters are more likely to attack when outnumber, cheat, steal, hide, break promises, etc., while lawful ones might be more honorable even when hostile ("I am bound to defend this bridge with my life, scum! Retreat or perish!")
As I mentioned before, alignment would be more useful if more specific.
Morale and courage
As seen on the table above, "hostile" doesn't mean "attack" necessarily. A weak foe might simply run.
Morale can be used to see how the NPCs respond to a credible risk or threat. You can add Charisma to the roll if you want, or require a Charisma check to trigger the morale roll when in doubt (as always, with circumstantial modifiers).
Recommended reading:
https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2016/12/how-to-run-npcs-in-combat-days-of.html https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2017/09/social-skills-role-playing-versus-roll.html https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2021/05/monster-statblocks-how-good-is-ad.html https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2022/10/a-d20-reaction-check-osr.html https://goblinpunch.blogspot.com/2023/03/how-to-handle-parley-as-osr-dm.html

It seems like publishers have picked up the pace again after a few weeks of slowish releases, especially with Kickstarters. Let's check and see what is new, shall we? *Ryan Thompson of Appendix N Entertainment is raising funds for Devilry, his follow-up (and the second in the projected series) to Demonology, which will be adding classic and new OSR devils to Old School Essentials. *Back to BasiX is back with Issue 12 of their fanzine. This one features, amongst other things, an interview with OSE creator Gavin Norman. *I'm sure most readers are aware that Ben Milton, of Questing Beast, is Kickstarting the second edition of his well-regarded Knave system. *I can't believe I forgot to mention this, but Soul Muppet publishing is raising funds for Inevitable, their game of doomed Arthurian gunslingers fighting against the dying of the light. *Eric Bloat is Kickstarting Forgotten Ballad, by Fellipe da Silva, a "sword and song" adventure game, a whimsical, rules-light game in zine format. *Ardann Creative is raising funds for The Game Master's Pocket Pal: Crypts and Cultists, a collection of 10 system neutral maps with an emphasis on the occult. *Monsters of Mythic Greece, by Ahimsa Kerp, is an old-school adventure that is raising funds for all new commissioned art. *FIST: Ultra Edition, is a game of paranormal mercenaries in the second half of the 20th century taking on missions that no one else can. *I can't remember if I mentioned this or not, but This Mortal Coil is currently itchfunding. It's a game of space necromancers, and the art I've seen so far is magnificent. *Undertree Temple of the Elf Gods is a free adventure on itch written in a system-neutral, OSR format. *Elven Tower has released Tomb of Huram, an adventure written for a 3rd level party using the Shadowdark ruleset. *Speaking of Bloat Games, they've got a supers bundle on Drivethru that combines all of their Vigilante Cities titles. *Forty Fiends is a bestiary for Mork Borg. *I'm glad to see that The Golden Age of Khares is progressing. I saw it on Kickstarter awhile back, and it looked like a really neat Swords and Sorcery game. The Basic version is now available on Drivethru. *Bayt al-Azif, a Call of Cthulhu fanzine, is out with its 5th issue; it looks like it has expanded to included the Borg family of games, which is a good fit thematically. *Caves and Catacombs is a pretty cool-looking solo dungeon crawling game with a definite old-school influence. *Hive is a PWYW adventure for Cepheus Engine(the Traveller clone) written by Joseph Mohr. *What Lurks Beneath Tidewatch Tower is an adventure written for Shadowdark and set in a coastal tower. *I've added Populated Hexes Monthly Issue 21 to Drivethru. It features a desert hex, containing an ancient manor house long buried by sand dunes and inhabited by leucrocottas, as well as rules for adding prestige classes to OSR games. *I've added a bunch of new titles to the webstore, too many to list, including Pan, His Majesty in Yellow by Wayne Robert (in addition to restocking Dungeon Plumbers), the Dungeon Moon of Karth, and more.

Please note the use of affiliate links in some of these entries. Affiliate links take nothing away from the creators, and help me to compile these roundups every week.

Today's anniversaries are:
1995

2000

Venetian Snares - printf<"shiver in eternal darkness/n">; (electronic, idm, isolate, venetian snares, wai cheng, analog, breakcore, jungle, Winnipeg)

2005

Knelpunt - Eerste steen (alternative, jazz, world, fusion, instrumental, poetry, Rotselaar)

2009

Closure in Moscow - First Temple (Alternative, Rock, Indie Rock/Rock pop)
El grupo nuevo de Omar Rodríguez-López - Cryptomnesia (experimental rock)
Leprous - Tall Poppy Syndrome (Alternative, Metal)

2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

Albionic Hermeticism - Ascetic Synchronism (black metal)
Badcore Horns - Smash! (drum & bass, gypsy, jazz, drum & brass, horns, Plymouth)
Consumed with Hatred - Structural Violence (punk, hardcore, hardcore punk, mdhc, metal, Maryland)
Cyclopean Blood Temple - Unholy Union (blackened crust, metal, crust, death metal, grind, grindcore, hardcore, punk, Gainesville)
Kuilu - Monumentti (metal, atmospheric, black metal, dark, depressive, doom metal, melancholic, Finland)
Now, Now - Saved (alternative, dream pop, electronic, emo, indie, pop, rock, shoegaze, Los Angeles)
Portal-Hex - Veridical Dreams (electronic, experimental, metal, progressive, trap metal, Brooklyn)
Tongue Party - Looking for a Painful Death (punk, loud, minneapolis, minnesota, noise rock, stoner, Minneapolis)

2019

Erin Royer - After the Moment (classical, cross over, new music, original music, saxophone, Perth)

2020

2021

2022

You're aware words can have multiple definitions, right? Once again, my criticism isn't that sailing is or was a meme, but it was a meme within the community before. Sailing isn't going to fail because it is or was a meme, and I've never said it would because of that reason. You're getting too caught up in defending that it was never and could never be a meme, you're getting lost in the sauce my guy.

I simply don't agree. I feel like you didn't engage with combat prior to slayer if you think it didn't bring a LOT to the table here.

You're entitled to your own opinion my guy. You can feel however you'd like, but your opinion is merely your opinion, as mine is my own. I don't think slayer adds anything to combat, you're doing nothing fundamentally different than any other method of training combat, you're just told to go elsewhere. That's literally all the skill does, what is that adding?

Bosses and raids, things that add unique mechanics and ways of going about combat, those solve combat.

So something slayer added an avenue of progression and unlocks solved combat?

No, and that didn't even respond to my point I made earlier. Slayer doesn't really add any avenue of progression outside of number go up, there's nothing unique being added that couldn't have been added elsewhere. Hell, originally slayer didn't have slayer point, it was literally a do-nothing skill that was just "kill this monster so many times." Unique mechanics help make combat less monotonous, because at least you're engaging in something more than just click and wait for HP number to go down. Turoths are just like chickens, but you require a magical leaf weapon or slayer stick to deal damage, but I'm not engaging in combat any differently.

Almost like.. slayer added diversity of choice

The diversity of choice was literally always there, you're just being told to do something else. That's the whole point, and in fact, you have less of a choice with slayer because you're forced to do one task. So much diversity! You could have always killed dogs off a slayer task, but congrats, you decided not to! Oh, you're assigned dogs? How exciting!

You fight new monsters, different ones by the hour

You could just choose to do that by yourself if you really wanted. Slayer doesn't necessitate that. Slayer isn't adding variety that didn't already exist in game, it's just necessitating a pseudo-variety. Monsters aren't different than anything outside of slayer, you may as well just be doing the same thing because the monsters act exactly the same as each other.

Slayers progression system is based around its reward space

It didn't originally have a reward space upon release, and on top of that, those rewards could easily be added elsewhere. Slayer was introduced in 2005, Smoking Kills was introduced in 2008 which added slayer point, OSRS was released in February 2013, slayer points were added in December of the same year. You're telling me that slayer had a reward space before this? No, it didn't, I remember playing RuneScape before they added Smoking Kills, there was no point to train slayer outside of quest requirements or just wanting the cape. The progression is just the same monster over and over again with different stats, no monster added anything unique to combat, and that's the whole point. That's hardly progression.

Shamanism would have added no new gameplay from the skill itself, simply through its reward space behind level-gated unlocks.

We have absolutely no idea how making rituals would have worked, that could have been new. Again, the core issue with sailing is the lack of a game play loop that isn't a minigame-like activity. If the core game play loop is truly just do minigame for experience, then why not just add a minigame of the same thing? Minigames can have progression, Giants' Foundry has progression, LMS has progression, Barbarian Assault is entirely about progression, so if sailing is just package delivery or do a task for an NPC then it could just be a minigame.

Is progression through a skill to gain rewards and unlocks not a core part of skilling in your mind? Is it only repetition of mundane actions?

It doesn't have to be. Progression is important, that's one way skills work, but so do other pieces of content as I described above. It's the type of progression that's important, because sailing could be a minigame where, as you progress, you unlock upgrades for your ship. While Old School's Temple Trekking is different than RS3's (after all, TT in OSRS is what it was before), RS3 has Temple Trekking as a progression minigame. As you take people back and forth, those people gain experience and can level up which allows them to do different things.
Shades of Mort'ton has progression but it's not a skill. Warriors' Guild has progression, but it's not a skill. Tai Bwo Wannai Cleanup has progression, but it's not a skill. I don't think progression is the key marker for a skill. Quests have progression, but quests are not skills.
I think having a core defined game play loop that couldn't be done as a minigame makes it a skill, and unfortunately sailing doesn't have that because it was literally left undefined. Slayer could have been a minigame, it adds nothing unique to itself as a skill that required it to be a skill, "progression" isn't unique to skills. If sailing is just going to be slayer on the water then it isn't adding anything unique as a skill that requires it to be a skill, I don't want slayer 2.0 because it doesn't feel like a skill, regardless of the fact it's classified as a skill.

Cmon mate, if you're saying slayer is no variety

Slayer literally has no variety as a skill itself. You're doing the same combat as you're doing without slayer, there's nothing unique being added by having a layer of slayer. C'mon mate. Its reward space doesn't necessitate the skill itself.

Also if we're going to go into rituals being unique interactions, shamanism falling awfully fast into that "its a minigame" complaint territory.

How? If you could demonstrate it then maybe you'd have a point, but you do nothing but make statements. I've at least described many times how sailing feels like a minigame. You just saying that doesn't mean anything, c'mon mate.

Another opinion. Agility, especially with sepulchre, which is what I'd consider the "agility on water" sections to act like, is one of the better designed and more interesting skills.

Never said it wasn't an opinion, c'mon mate. Agility didn't always have sepulcher, and even then it doesn't add anything to the skill itself as it could have been made entirely without agility existing. We could have sepulcher without agility all the same, and if that's all agility has to offer then it's literally just a minigame skill. Agility courses and rooftops are boring, shortcuts are nice but unnecessary and could be done without a skill, the only benefit truly is graceful but we could also just add resting like RuneScape 3 has to replenish run energy.

Right! Completely different! Instead of going up to patches and harvesting herbs using farming, you'll.... go up to patches and harvest herbs using farming.. but sometimes gather "nature essence" or something! Unique!

Who's to say? Just like with sailing, we get to provide feedback and input to Jagex. While this is the easiest to conceptualize, there could be different methods. This is true for sailing, but sailing has many more problems than just the literally undefined game play loop, namely functionality within game. The game was made when it was just a browser game, it demanded as few resources as possible and to be as small as possible, this meant cramming everything as tightly as possible to save on space. This also has hard programmed teleports in games that are coordinate dependent. It's going to be an absolutely monumental task for Jagex to try and expand the ocean so they're not all cramped together, and if they don't do that then "sailing" between Ardougne and Rimmington/Port Sarim is going to be cramped as you barely squeeze through Crandor, Entrana, the fishing platform, the small outcrop of land before the fishing platform, and the northern tip of Karamja. If boats are just 1-3 tiles long then the skill looks weak and underwhelming, but that's what's going to be required as we can't sail a 5-15 ship, 3-12 if we condense the wall and diagonal tiles together, they simply wouldn't fit.

This is only the case if sailing offers a currency reward system to buy from a shop, which is your main gripe about slayer being a minigame

I was using your logic of what a minigame is. You said minigames offer its own isolated and unique currency, slayer literally does this with slayer point. My main gripe with slayer is that it fundamentally doesn't add anything to the game as a skill that required it to be a skill. If slayer monsters had unique mechanics that were only learnable by slayer masters, then sure! Requiring a leaf blade or slayer stick to be able to damage a monster isn't learning a unique mechanic, it's just requiring an equipment piece.

Just quoting your exact words and taking them as what they mean mate. I don't speak the cryptic way you do.

While you say mate and spell words with re, it honestly sounds like English isn't your first language despite the way you speak. It wasn't cryptic, it was a direct following of words and comparisons.

You saying "oh i didn't mean a skill didn't mean to be different I meant it didn't need engine work". Then write that?

I'm sorry you don't understand context.

Re-wrote it for you to make it mean what you said it apparently always meant and I'm just "not understanding".

I clarified because you didn't understand what was being said. You literally aren't understanding.

Most of your comments are starting to focus on unrelated things.

How? I'm responding to you directly and expanding on my own points.

Inclusion of more elemental related monsters -
The Temple of the Crushing Wave did this pretty well. So, expanding on that theme I added more encounters with monsters that fly for the Air Temple for example a will o wisp luring the players into a huge swarm of stinges in the A. 8 Ruined Villa instead of an Umber Hulk as an example or a Lava Child included in the Fire Temple.
More non-human cultists -
I reskinned various cultists to not just be human or genasi but kenkus, owlins or in the fire temple fire newts. Same powers and abilities and hit points just reskinned so the players did not get tired of just fighting humans all the time.
More noncombat encounters and exploration rooms -
Chapter 4 can be a bit of a slog and despite there being always a second in command wanting to talk you into fighting the prophet for them not a lot of folks to role-play against. I made some of the bugbears or hobgoblins bored and willing to be bought because they are tired of the cults and their apocalypse nonsense. I just added a few set pieces or little chests in living quarters with nasty traps and such. This part was easy for me because I am running mashup with the original Temple of Elemental Evil and Princes of the Apocalypse and could easily add more weird Gygaxian set piece psych out rooms.
This is where most of the delegates are -
You know all those prisoner rooms in these dungeons? Well most of the delegates are found here because at this point they are giving you clues and hints about what the cultist prophets are planning at the nodes. Even my neutral to evil group is like no way a Prince of Elemental Evil in my backyard is a hard no go for me. It gives payoff for the often neglected Missing Delegation hook sooner and you use them to impress the danger the entire world is in if a creature of that size gets loose.
Be ready to nerf and buff -
My characters wanted to hit the earth temple first and then the air temple and then water and leave fire to the end. Be ok with adjusting difficulty. It really helps for players to have more agency in this one.
Do not be afraid of the side quests and be ready to change a few things to tie it back to the main story -
I did this with the necromancer caves and the Vale of the Dancing Waters.
Just something fun I did.
I also decided to theme each level on some aspect of my own experience growing up in the 80s playing D&D since I am running for a younger group.
Two things everyone thinks about with OSR gaming:
Temple of Black Earth - Dungeon Crawl (easy one)
Temple of the Crushing Wave - Swashbuckling Sword and Sorcery feel (lots of giant monsters and pirates in that one)
Two things you do not think of:
Temple of Howling Hatred - Dark Silly Humor (From DungeonLand to the Land Beyond the Magic Mirror and the first Castle Greyhawk to funhouse dungeons D&D could be weird and funny) . They were allied to the Air cult so a city tour of evil with Savra Belabranta from the Spire leading them past the torture and interogation room and Windharrow beating a flutist asking “Were you rushing or were you dragging?” The kenku mocking the humans being tortured and that sort of thing.
Temple of Eternal Flame - Heavy Metal I even added a Mad Max moment where they were on a thing that looked like a Hellfire Engine (look it up so cool) but was basically just a juggernaut with azers riding on top and a bard riffing. All the ogres in plate mail had spikes coming off their outfits so they looked like members of Gwar. It was not hard at all.

Hi! Glad to be able to write this.
I've DMed my first game 10 years ago, but only now have I been able to truly finish a multi-year campaign.
Here's the basics:
System: D&D 5e, with some homebrew.
Campaign: Started as Lost Mine of Phandelver, into Princes of the Apocalypse. Went to level 15.
Tooling: Roll20, Discord for Audio and a bot linked to my spotify account for the tunes.
Party:
1 Stor Thuridan, male Human UA Ranger / Fighter. Original member. Evolved from edgelord brooding murderhobo into a leadership figure. Married an elven horsemaster in Amphail.
2 'Lora', female half-elf Fey Warlock, Pact of the Chain. Original member. Eventually we changed her Pact to a custom "Pact of Consumption", where she ate her former familiar to become a true fey. Became an important lady of the Unseelie Court.
3 RIP Ashor Uhara, male Half-Orc Cleric(war) or Torm. Original member and leader. Fought valiently, but fell to a fire elemental in Scarlet Moon Hall. Became a sort of 'recurring planar ally' when the players moved around planes.
4 RIP Akta Nemeia, female Tiefling Wizard(Divination). Original member. First game she played. A bit murderhobo-y, but she picked the rules well enough. She was Ashor's player's GF, so when it fell apart, so did the character. We made her join the antagonist Cult of the Eternal Flame, and the group eventually found her body.
5 RIP Lucius Mallister, male Half-Drow Monk of the Four Elements, with a homebrewed set of improvements. Original member. Awkward player, didn't gel well, but stayed quite long, as he was Lora's characters BF. As with the previous player,
6 Malach Belabranta, male aasimar Bard/Sorcerer. played by Ashor's player. Became an important character, played more like a wizard than anything else. Still, well-developed relationships to Waterdeep's noble caste, as well as an antagonist, Savra Belabranta, his sister. In the end, became a planar scion and an important noble in Waterdeep, an arcane teacher and harper leader.
7 Bran of the Elks, male Barbarian/Monk. late arrival, but a great player with a busted combo character (Totem Barb + Moon Druid. Dude had like 3 health bars). Great roleplayer. Helped settle the Elk tribes in the remains of a ruined city, destroyed by the antagonists.
I don't think you'd be interested in me talking about the characters woes and stories, but if any of these are interesting to you, I'll gladly spill more beans in the comments.

Key notes:
As you probably guessed, I've installed a new rule for future campaigns: No bringing partners unless you're married to them! External drama seeped deep into the table and we have to cut off players, some of which didn't deserve it.
I've had to change the adventure (POTA) dramatically. The original adventure isn't very well balanced, but its also very one-note: it takes place in a singular multi-layered dungeon, but tries to make the players go back and forth. Instead, I split everything after Tyar-Besil into their own locations, and included new, custom-made adventure arcs in those. The Fane of the Eye, for instance, became an astral plane Zigurrat, where Tharizdun was locked. Players had to race to the top against the other cults to meet with the Solar of Just Maintenance, where they learned the locations of the Elemental Portals, and even defeated one of the prophets. The freedom to consider the 'adventure' as a toolbox rather than a 'script' made our adventure great.

Also the BBEG art sucked. Found better shit online.

POTA's Dungeon maps can be great, but some were awful. For some events, I learned Inkarnate to create some viable battlemaps, some of which you can find on my profile.
D&D 5e is a shit show after lvl 10. While I certaintly did my part on that (characters had plenty of buffs and magic items that made them punch above their weight), even Lora, the simplest character in terms of build, was able to dish out a lot of damage every time. The notion of "8 encounters per day" to account for attrition is awkward and unreliable, and sometimes you need to stretch a fight a bit longer, or put some extra hurdles. I'm a video game designer by trade, and always considered encounter design for these fucks as one of my greatest challenges. I think I did well, though, even if sometimes I needed to create shit from scratch.
Speaking of hurdles, specially in the later stages, I made copious use of 'skill challenges' as a means to reduce resources. running away from a falling temple, or flying over a forest during an volcano eruption, dodging elementals hurling fireballs, etc - these were great opportunities to explore
I will not be DMing 5e again, even though I planned to do Out of the Abyss after this. Besides being bothered by WOTC, I don't dig the direction its taking, and I'm not as excited for the multitudes of species and classes we got. I've jumped to PF2e and plan to try to brute force it into an OSR-type adventure. I'll let you know how that goes.
Thanks for reading!

Hi! Glad to be able to write this.
I've DMed my first game 10 years ago, but only now have I been able to truly finish a multi-year campaign.
Here's the basics:
System: D&D 5e, with some homebrew.
Campaign: Started as Lost Mine of Phandelver, into Princes of the Apocalypse. Went to level 15.
Tooling: Roll20, Discord for Audio and a bot linked to my spotify account for the tunes.
Party:
1 Stor Thuridan, male Human UA Ranger / Fighter. Original member. Evolved from edgelord brooding murderhobo into a leadership figure. Married an elven horsemaster in Amphail.
2 'Lora', female half-elf Fey Warlock, Pact of the Chain. Original member. Eventually we changed her Pact to a custom "Pact of Consumption", where she ate her former familiar to become a true fey. Became an important lady of the Unseelie Court.
3 RIP Ashor Uhara, male Half-Orc Cleric(war) or Torm. Original member and leader. Fought valiently, but fell to a fire elemental in Scarlet Moon Hall. Became a sort of 'recurring planar ally' when the players moved around planes.
4 RIP Akta Nemeia, female Tiefling Wizard(Divination). Original member. First game she played. A bit murderhobo-y, but she picked the rules well enough. She was Ashor's player's GF, so when it fell apart, so did the character. We made her join the antagonist Cult of the Eternal Flame, and the group eventually found her body.
5 RIP Lucius Mallister, male Half-Drow Monk of the Four Elements, with a homebrewed set of improvements. Original member. Awkward player, didn't gel well, but stayed quite long, as he was Lora's characters BF. As with the previous player,
6 Malach Belabranta, male aasimar Bard/Sorcerer. played by Ashor's player. Became an important character, played more like a wizard than anything else. Still, well-developed relationships to Waterdeep's noble caste, as well as an antagonist, Savra Belabranta, his sister. In the end, became a planar scion and an important noble in Waterdeep, an arcane teacher and harper leader.
7 Bran of the Elks, male Barbarian/Druid. late arrival, but a great player with a busted combo character (Totem Barb + Moon Druid. Dude had like 3 health bars). Great roleplayer. Helped settle the Elk tribes in the remains of a ruined city, destroyed by the antagonists.
I don't think you'd be interested in me talking about the characters woes and stories, but if any of these are interesting to you, I'll gladly spill more beans in the comments.

Key notes:
As you probably guessed, I've installed a new rule for future campaigns: No bringing partners unless you're married to them! External drama seeped deep into the table and we have to cut off players, some of which didn't deserve it.
I've had to change the adventure (POTA) dramatically. The original adventure isn't very well balanced, but its also very one-note: it takes place in a singular multi-layered dungeon, but tries to make the players go back and forth. Instead, I split everything after Tyar-Besil into their own locations, and included new, custom-made adventure arcs in those. The Fane of the Eye, for instance, became an astral plane Zigurrat, where Tharizdun was locked. Players had to race to the top against the other cults to meet with the Solar of Just Maintenance, where they learned the locations of the Elemental Portals, and even defeated one of the prophets. The freedom to consider the 'adventure' as a toolbox rather than a 'script' made our adventure great.

Also the BBEG art sucked. Found better shit online.

POTA's Dungeon maps can be great, but some were awful. For some events, I learned Inkarnate to create some viable battlemaps, some of which you can find on my profile.
D&D 5e is a shit show after lvl 10. While I certaintly did my part on that (characters had plenty of buffs and magic items that made them punch above their weight), even Lora, the simplest character in terms of build, was able to dish out a lot of damage every time. The notion of "8 encounters per day" to account for attrition is awkward and unreliable, and sometimes you need to stretch a fight a bit longer, or put some extra hurdles. I'm a video game designer by trade, and always considered encounter design for these fucks as one of my greatest challenges. I think I did well, though, even if sometimes I needed to create shit from scratch.
Speaking of hurdles, specially in the later stages, I made copious use of 'skill challenges' as a means to reduce resources. running away from a falling temple, or flying over a forest during an volcano eruption, dodging elementals hurling fireballs, etc - these were great opportunities to explore
I will not be DMing 5e again, even though I planned to do Out of the Abyss after this. Besides being bothered by WOTC, I don't dig the direction its taking, and I'm not as excited for the multitudes of species and classes we got. I've jumped to PF2e and plan to try to brute force it into an OSR-type adventure. I'll let you know how that goes.
Thanks for reading!

Today's anniversaries are:
2003

Derek Sherinian - Black Utopia (Rock)

2009

百景 (Hyakkei) - おくりもの (Okuri mono) (Alternative)

2012

2013

Richard Cheese - The Royal Baby Album (jazz, lounge, swing, Las Vegas)

2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

2019

Antonino Restuccia & Santiago Bogacz - Subsuelo (experimental, jazz, uruguay, ethnic, latin american, montevideo, Montevideo)

2020

Ambr - De entropía (post-hardcore)
Carnival of Blood - Things Over and Done With (avant-garde jazz)
No Babies - Miskatonic University Fight Song (noise rock)
Retina - Immersion Error (metalcore)
Serpent with Feet - Apparition (R&B, pop)
奈落の底 (Naraku no soko) - 1376 (progressive metalcore)

2021

2022

The deepest crypts would be a semi-rougelike experience completely overhauling the crypt experience in both loot and difficulty, making grave robbing far more profitable an risky than its ever been before
contents

Overview
general changes
the crypts
Bosses and rooms
rewards

overview

the objective of this update is to make pyre log training a viable method of training prayer and combat, while having profitable rewards enticing players up to mid endgame combat and dungeoneering.
This update would feature a rougelike dungeon feature which will instance and randomize you and up to 6 friends in a dungeon together with loot comparable to an elite dungeon on its highest difficulty, and loot comparable to mid range slayer on its lowest.

General changes

shade keys are now all solid colors (black silver, bronze etc)
three new key tiers, mithril, adamant, and runite
- gold is now a skeleton key which grants its unique drop table at all tiers
stolen from OSRS new in inventory remains bag that while weighing 50kg can hold up to 50 shade remains, upgrades from clearing each key tier (first unlock for bronze, final for runite)
Materials bag (Also stolen from OSRS) to hold building supplies for the minigame avalible for 10k gp with upgrades as you clear each tier once
- can combine together with the remains bag with 90 crafting
keys now stack in stacks of up to 15, or 25 if you clear the runite tier at least once. unlimited stacks in the bank naturally.

the crypts

Obtaining keys and entering the crypts would be the same as normal, if in a group you may now enter as long as everyone has at least one key.
Upon entering the crypts you'll have between 3-12 rooms randomly assembled together. Each room will contain 1-3 chests you and your friends may loot with your keys. Be warned though shades will assault you every step of the way
To clear a room you'll need special burial keys, these are obtained either by killing every shade in the room or completing small puzzle objectives. Every room cleared will give you dungeoneering xp too just to sweeten the deal, though training via daemonheim or other methods will still be more effective. there will be between 9-15 shades needing clearing regardless of the room's method of progression.
Upon reaching the final room a big chest will be guarded by one of a handful of bosses, clearing these bosses will award a chest that rolls 3x on that key's loot table.
Players may leave at any time HOWEVER, you may not return even if your party is still in the dungeon should you leave
Additionally there are three new shade tiers to the crypts

Malevolent (combat level 132)
- 95 firemaking to burn the remains, drops mithril and gold keys
Grudgeful (combat level 150)
- 97 firemaking to burn the remains, drops adamant and gold keys
Hellbound (combat level 200)
- 99 firemaking to burn the remains, drops gold and runite keys

Bosses and rooms

dungeons are semi randomly generated and would include at least 1-3 puzzle rooms, one boss room, and 1-3 transition rooms.
Rooms

room	method forward	exclusive?
Tunnel with a hexed door	kill all targets	no
tunnel (U L straight and V)	just advance, usually high level enemies and lots of chests	no
four way split	Simply pick a path, kill or run, be warned though the first door opened will be the only way forward!	no
Buried tunnel	tunnel collapsed with rubble that splits into 3 passages, one will randomly be the way forward and you need to mine your way through and repair struts like DG	no but more frequent on low tiers
Ceremonial fires	A simple memory puzzle, upon pulling the levers 4 braziers will flash, simply light them in the order they flashed	no but more frequent on low tiers
burning chamber	several prepared pyres await you in this room, similar to the daemonheim ghost room a "soul" will hop between	no but more common on middle tiers
foggy chamber	a chamber filled with fog, to progress you must clear the fog by lighting special ceremonial braziers. this room is a time trial with lots of hidden obstacles obscuring the path, failure moves you to back to the start of the chamber minus some life points	yes bronze/steel
Pressure chamber	offers a few free extra keys if you can swap out some supplies for the keys via agility, failure causes heavy damage and poison that ignores venomblood	yes any chamber black or higher quality
munitions room	requires you to via a quick time event move from cover to cover to avoid several manned ballistae, failure results in heavy damage naturally	yes, any chamber silver or higher
Reliquary	Free bonus loot! pick one chest and move on	no, but more common on runite
hanging room	several traitors to mort'ton with riddles hinting the order the corpses were hanged, move them to the correct noose to proceed.	mith, addy, and rune only
the putrid room	A room with a large putrid pool of water, inside lurks a swamp beast from temple trekking, much higher level than normal and with 100% accuracy without protection prayers (which lowers it to 50%). slay it to progress and get a bit of bonus loot in an unlocked chest.	addy and rune only
a small clearing	a small clearing with a pond. this pod has a "rest by" option which will fully recharge all stats and lifepoints.	any but more common on higher floors

Bosses
Each boss will have their own mechanics and a guaranteed lore page for mqc that will expand the story of shades of mort'ton slightly. Upon clearing every boss the Loar shades will still attack the temple but all villagers will be unafflicted and provide additional services in the town

Boss	combat level	Descrpition	main mechanics	Tier
Far'din the lost	70	a commander of a long forgotten battle, far'din attacks primarily with melee and has legion over all Loar shades. It is he who bides the restless dead's unceasing assaults but he is not the tide's master	the most basic of the bosses Far'din acts almost identically to the luminescent icefiend. save for not making himself immune to damage, that said unlike the fiend his attacks will kill you if you get hit too many times.	bronze
Lothal of Hallowveil	90	the defiled shade of an Iycene warrior. He is an unwilling pawn that resists his fate, he imparts keys upon every shade's earthly remains in the hopes that someone will someday slay him	Lothal behaves very similarly to blink in that he will reposition himself frequently to avoid players. he will occasionally ignite a quadrant of the room dealing massive damage if you stand around too long. Players who do close the distance to melee Lothal will find he is incredibly weak to melee damage (1.5x damage-3x damage for some attacks).	steel
Rowina the forsaken	125	Forsaken apprentice of an unknown master, Rowina was betrayed and rendered an undead puppet... yet she's never felt more alive.	rowina is particularly weak for a monster of her level, she relies primarily on waves of enemies that will greatly enhance her defense, as a result she has few unique attacks other than being able to enhance her shades to deal more damage making it a race against time to slay her before her shades overrun you.	black
Regius the beheaded	140	Tracing his illustrious roots back to Fremmenik settlers who left the tribe, Regius died in quite possibly the least dignified way possible; by falling upon his own halberd and decapitating himself. The only natural shade in the catacombs he challenges all he meets to a duel to the death riding upon the back of his mighty mount Thor! (the snail).	Regius will somewhat slowly cross the room upon his snail blocking off access to parts of the room from the acidic slime trail before occasionally lobbing bombs or charging forth upon his "mighty" steed dealing high damage to anyone caught in the lanes. These lanes despawn naturally over time but will require you to not kite yourself into a corner. Regius can swap at any time between a crossbow, orb and halberd.	silver
Rena the ex-ex-parrot keeper	250	former owner of the great swamp farm and last to be offically buried before the affliction broke out, rena fights with her flock of Ex-Parrots for an unknown and dark master.	Rena is probably the most unique of the bosses in that she is literally surrounded by a swarm of undead parrots. Defeating Rena is a similar process to throne watcher and defender from DS2 where one will revive the other if not killed quickly enough. The parrots will create small cyclones that deal rapid and increasing damage and track players, Rena will try to stab players with a diseased knife that steals combat stats and grants her them (she has a relatively fast attack speed). Both need to be killed within about 30s of each other or the other will revive at 20% lifepoints	mithril
Hina formerly of the east	450	A foolish priestess who traveled to Morytaniya after tales of Ak-Haranu reached Waiko, she would attempt to banish the evil deep within the mort'ton catacombs only to perish at the hands of the evil within. She is now resurected	borrowing some of her kit from Matsua and Akrisae, Hina will always protect pray one specific style. Dealing too much damage over time will activate her special attack summoning the water orbs from matsua's fight to drown her opponents. these orbs when struck will shatter after a few seconds dealing high damage if within a tile but clearing them fast. Hina will at random drain up to 20% of a players current prayer points. Her prayer CAN be disabled via the ancient mace and smash BUT this will count towards her overall damage cap for her special.	adamant
Rohan of the endless expanse	500	Infamous necromancer put to death centuries past, risen as a lich who has taken advantage of vampyric rule to seek revenge upon the villagers of mort'ton.	Possessing his body like the accursed edimu Rohan primarily focuses on large AOES while healing his rather low life pool. At 75% 50% and 25% health Rohan will channel an unblockable instant kill attack which must be deflected by activating ceremonial lanterns in the four corners of the chamber while he caves the roof in dealing massive damage if you are hit by rubble (with a shadow to show its drop location)	Runite

rewards

Now, what do you get out of all of this you might ask.... well a ton of loot and new unlocks for the town based on progress. as well as some new rewards for related activities. Keys will have general drop tables based on their approximate level range and unique rewards (which will be listed)
general

reward	source	use
Nailbeast (unchecked)	temple trekking	nailbeast nails, nailbeast fangs
swamp snake (unchecked)	temple trekking	awards snake hide and snake venom allowing you to make dissolving poison
Myre snail (unchecked)	temple trekking giant snails, or extremely rarely	awards snail acid and grows to be giant snails awarding shells
Myre toad (unchecked)	random reward from looting crypts	awards 3.6x more poison than anachronia toads.
Swamp kraken (unchecked)	Temple trekking (swamp beast event)	grows up to be a swamp beast, awards Perircing spines
Spine bomb	crafted for one primal extract, 5 peircing spines and 1 bomb vial. 90 herb	detonates in a large area dealing between 150-1,500 damage to every monster caught in the radius. especially effective against undead and mages
dissolving poison	P++ added to felstalk unf and snake venom, 85 herb	the highest grade of poison available, degrades the targets defense by up to 5 levels max (10% in pve)
Acid bomb	snail acid + primal extract + bomb vial, 105 herb	throws a pool of acid that deals tick damage over time ramping up the longer a target is in the effect (50-150 per tick). lasts 1 minuet in pve or 30 seconds in the wilderness/pvp
Fang ornament	created with 50 nailbeast fangs. added to any neckslot item glory or better (with 50-95 crafting).	allows you to follow up with an attack that deals 10% of the last hit you dealt. works for shadow clones from the SoS and adds onto swift gloves. Will eventually run out of charges (100 uses per ornament) and need more teeth to recharge

rewards (bronze, steel)

reward	use	source
level 50 slayer table	general drops like mith and adamant salvage	chests
Shade robe kit	upgrades shade robes, shade robes halve all prayer drain WHILE OUT OF COMBAT. making it great for imp souled perks	chests, final chest
Far'din's shield	a t50 shield with potential, it can be upgraded up to t90. Each tier it gains it reduces damage taken by 1%, or 10% if enhanced with a spirit shield. debilitate and resonance last 5s longer if used with this shield equipped.	Far'din's reward chest
Splitbark enchantment	a special enchantment that upgrades splitbark to t65. T65 splitbark increases spell accuracy greatly but lowers your maximum hit cap by 5%	final chests (Steel, bronze)

rewards (black, silver)

reward	use	source
level 80 slayer loot table	mostly addy and rune	chests
"true" fremmy equipment patch	upgrades superior fremmy gear to Spined/skeletal/rockshell hero armor. These armors have greatly increased defense in their effective range, are augmentable, and t78 (i.e. melee takes 15% less damage at close range)	Regius chest
Twisted Witchwood	upgrades the slayer staff to t85 giving it a 15% damage boost and 15% accuracy boost against slayer targets, can be combined with a staff of darkness to absorb its unique effects, allows slayer dart to scale to level 99	Rowina's chest
Anima Rotting Armor	added to elder rune armor to transfigure it to Rotted Elder Rune, this armor will at random poison targets and heal off the poison damage, can be augmented HOWEVER it is like most t90 armor and eventually turns to dust	Black, silver boss chests
Witchwood armor	Armor crafted from witchwood, this augmentable hybrid armor takes 10% less damage from slayereaper assigned tasks and enhances the accuracy buffs of your slayer helmet by 5%	Rowina's chest
Thor The mighty	unique resting animation that allows you to move while resting! lets you ride the infamous Thor the giant blamish myre snail.	Regius's chest
Regius' halberd, crossbow, and wand/orb	these t90 weapons serve as sidegrades to nox weapons with a special attack that adds stat draining acid to the attacks, and can be combined with them to add an armor draining acid to mirrorback allowing the spider to deal ranged damage of its own and reflect damage	Regius' chest

rewards (mith, addy)

reward	use	source
110+ slayer loot table	mostly rune and some orich	chests
The Ex-Swarm token	Aura override that covers you in the parrot swarm	Rena's chest
Eastern prayers	scrolls that alter port armors, makes them t90 and adds a similar effect to the fremmy gear, being in "perfect range" will greatly boost defense (15-20%) and boost accuracy (10%).	Hina's chest
Twisted Dagger	a unique dagger, has the effect "sundowning" which when activated grants Rena's boss effect of inflicting disease and adding half of those stats to your own. In multi target areas it will also cause the target to wound a nearby npc.	Rena's chest
Auspicious katana + upgrade kit	the OG TH item now avalible from the chests, can be upgraded to t90 via a nox scythe and upgrade kit. The upgraded katana has the special attack "precise strike"	Hina's chest

rewards (runite)

reward	use	source
ED3/1 loot table	orichalcium, runite, and necrite salvage and appropriate tier herb seeds and logs	chests
Unstable Necromantic energy	Upgrades barrows armor to t90 in quantities of 30 per piece with equal amounts of malevolent energy and 5 reinforcing plates each. Barrows armor will then need more malev/necro energy to maintain and is still augmentable	Rohan chest
Rohan's Wand	a broken wand. Add to the Staff of Sliske to upgrade its special attack so that it mirrors your abilities used (for less damage obviously)	Rohan chest
Dark Anima core	a deadly orb of anima, add to the ZGS to allow the ZGS special attack to still boost your stats even when outside the blackhole	Rohan chest
Stolen crystal shard	a shard of irreparably broken crystal. Add to the SGB to make it far more accurate against targets taking up 2-3 tiles or less guarenteeing at least 3 arrows hit for greater damage	Rohan chest

town unlocks

unlock	NPC	purpose	criteria to unlock
Specialty store	Greta	Buys TT goods for high prices for a set amount each day, snail shells, long bones, nailbeast nails/charms, and other goods you find in the swamps during TT will fetch a high price for a limited stock per day	defeat Far'din
The great swamp farm	Jorgen	unlocks 3 new pens for new PoF creatures. unlocks stage skipping honeycomb from corpsey honey comb (shade remains of any type with higher tier counting for more for the bees), works only once per animal.	defeat Lothal
Rare Curios	Hans	hans will buy rare curios daily for between 7-40x their normal price. these can include goods like pyramid plunder artifacts, dragon weapons, and even rare boss drops like godswords. He will have a set limit daily though how many he will buy	Defeat Rowina
Long range tradesmen	Karl	Karl will buy up to 15 different types items of a random variety every day for 3-50x their high alchemy price including stone spirits, hunter pelts, pouches, metals etc.. Karl will accept up to 100 of any given item type a day (i.e. he'd take 100 kyatt pelts and 100 attack potions)	defeat regius
Rune shop	Ingrid	rune shop that sells a limited number of soul, blood, and death runes alongside elemental (100 of each). unlocks mort ton teleport spell (infinite)	defeat rena
Lumbermill	Robin (the brave)	Unlocks a special lumber mill that processes planks and stone at a slightly cheaper cost. must have fort forithiny unlocked to make use of the features though.	defeat Hina
Miniature spa	Johan	allows you to access one chosen pool from the ooglog spa or a new pool that causes once upon hitting 10% hp rapid health regen back to 50% health, with an hour cooldown and hour duration.	defeat rohan

The April 2023 Game Jam has concluded! This thread will summarize the creative ideas showcased by JMods in the past week. Which ones are your favorite?
Note: this is only what we've seen based on JMods' tweets throughout the week. The May Gielinor Gazette will have more detail on these concepts, and possibly some we haven't seen yet!

We need to be able to ferry vast quantities of goods to sell for profit at different ports. Possibly some kind of rotating/random daily/weekly prices on what ports will buy. Hell, even start with something like temple trekking as a base idea (interactions pre-set on a route) and then the player will sail their ship and cargo between ports, receiving sailing xp and being able to sell their goods for profit. This can be kept fresh virtually indefinitely with enough variations of encounter and routes.
Additionally, I’d rather like some kind of floating ports that have unique uses/interactions, such as a red bearded pirate that got sick of having his Redwood Ship damaged by stray logs floating out at sea and decided to cut them into planks, which became a lucrative business for him. Players could then bring a cargo of hundreds or thousands of logs and have them converted into planks (for a fee).
Also, as much as I hate the idea of 1x1 or 1x2 boats, if Jagex really want us to be able to sail up to the shores of catherby (but really is anyone actually asking for this?) I suppose this is the only option. Although please don’t make a big song and dance about the groundbreaking change of changing how the engine works to allow greater than 1x1 player models if this ends up being the case. It’s going to look really damn janky. If this must be the case close to shore then for sailing to be considered a legitimate skill/addition we need some minor loading screen as we ‘sail out to sea’ and then have the player standing on the deck of our ship surrounded by crew. Allow us to go into the map room where we can assign our crew, plan voyages and perhaps view the daily/weekly rates on items in different ports (maybe only those we’ve visited that day/week).
Let us construct a telescope so we can be guided by the starts into unique interactions.
Let us build old-timey dive capsules to traverse the sea floor.
Give us the option to change every detail of our ships, from the base materials to the ship type (fishing vessel/pirate galleon/merchant travelletreasure trover) that each have unique build slots like a POH.
Sailing could be the greatest addition to the game we have ever seen. But it needs to be given the time it deserves to truly implement it in an osrs ‘next-gen’ way.
Additional suggestions: - fishing vessels that wash up on the shore filled with famished North Korean fishermen.

trawling conglomerates that trawl the seafloor wiping out fish in areas as they go.
boaty mcboatface

Hello, I'm making this post to discuss my ideas for the core design of the Sailing skill as it enters refinement and how best to make it solve a number of potential complaints the community has outlined:

The skill sounds like a minigame
It needs to be fun and engaging
It needs to feel oldschool
Jagex would be better served updating older skills
There is no thematic distinction in how Sailing will be trained, some people only want to explore islands/raids 4 on the ocean/dungeoneering with boats

Minigame:

In the current landscape of skill discussion, this is probably the most parroted criticism to the concept of Sailing. The belief seems to hold that Sailing doesn't need to be a new skill and we should instead turn it into a minigame.
First, to tackle this point we need to actually define what makes a minigame a minigame. Without a clear vision of what it even means for something to be a minigame, we cannot hope to develop around this core complaint in a way that is satisfactory. In this way, the complaint becomes an excuse - one meant to shut down discussion rather than make any meaningful progress.
So what makes an activity a minigame? The big components I can think of is that they are isolated from the rest of the game world, fairly complex, cyclical in nature, reset once the objective is complete, are relatively short bursts of engagement, and offer no sense of physical progression. I may have missed any points so please enlighten me in the comments about any other distinctions a minigame has over skills.
Through this, we have so many different minigames like Temple Trekking, Pest Control, The Gauntlet, Last Man Standing, Clan Wars, Castle Wars, Soul Wars, and Trouble Brewing.
Complex gameplay mechanics and broad-reaching design choices, however, are not an adequate measure of an idea being a minigame instead of a skill. The entire Hunter skill and Agility skill both rely on complexity and abstract design for much of their training. Thieving, likewise, has many different activities to train it, with all aspects being drastically different and unrecognizable from one another.
The Solution:
The solution to this problem is fairly simple. By introducing a sense of level-based progression and expanding the assets available to a player as their experience in Sailing increases, it creates a distinction of being a skill.
So a player should see a sense of real progression where their increase in ability means an increase in content they can engage with. A player without level 49 Thieving cannot steal artefacts for Captain Khaled, for instance. A player without level 43 Hunter cannot engage with Falconry, and a player without level 52 Agility cannot enter the Hallowed Sepulchre.
Another sense of progression that could be added is becoming better at doing various tasks. Higher ranged levels increase a player's max hit and accuracy. Higher level Mining and having a better pickaxe increases the rate at which you mine. These concepts can be included in Sailing by having sturdier ships, better firepower, and a lower chance of failing to brave dangerous weather systems, as a few crude examples off the top of my head.

The Skill Needs to be Fun and Engaging:

This is another open-ended idea that seems too broad to easily tackle. As the ideas of fun and engagement are vague and purely subjective, an idea put on paper may only sound fun to one person but sound completely terrible to another person.
The Solution:
Thankfully, as someone who had ~10 years of experience working in the gaming industry, with much of my work done in the design space of player retention, part of which involved increasing player engagement (admittedly, to get players to keep playing and spend more money. I am not proud of this fact. I worked as an upper manager for a game studio before leaving shortly after Covid. I signed a rather tight NDA so I cannot get into any more details. Sorry)
Anyways, one of the things I discovered during my work is that it's actually rather easy to make content that can be considered fun enough and engaging enough for the majority of players to continue playing it. The key is variance - or constant changes to the game so that mundane and repetitive tasks feel less repetitive.
It's no secret that Slayer is one of the most popular skills because of this reason. At higher levels, a player will often engage in different slayer tasks in different ways, ranging from bringing a cannon and a Venator Bow against bloodvelds, barraging dust devils, or killing a slayer boss like Cerberus.
In an even smaller scale, we have the Hallowed Sepulchre, one of the most popular ways of training Agility. The act of simply having different pathways that engage the player's ability to maneuvre is enough to make the skill feel slightly more engaging than other options, and this effect seems to apply a considerable amount of time after a player masters each pathway to the final goal.
Simply applying the concept of variance to a skill like Sailing will make it a fun and engaging skill.

It Needs to Feel Oldschool:

This is another problem that many people have with how Sailing could play out. With too many foreign concepts, the big operative fear is that the skill will not feel like it belongs in the game, either by being too unique or too unrelated to the other gameplay loops in the game.
The Solution:
Introduce training and engagement methods with simpler gameplay loops. The idea of Sailing might sound grandiose and bombastic, but if we boil it down to its core and build upon humbler foundations not dissimilar to the current lineup of skills, we can create something that doesn't seem too out of place with the rest of the game.

Jagex Would be Better Served Updating Older Skills:

This is a fair criticism of the development pipeline. When we have so many skills like Firemaking, Smithing, and Hunter that are lacking in meaningful updates to make them feel more varied to train or more useful in the wider game, it always seems a little disheartening.
The Solution:
This is actually the aspect of the game where Sailing can shine the brightest of the three options that were proposed.
Sailing has the opportunity to create new interactions and new uses for current resources which otherwise seem to have no purpose. It likewise has the opportunity to organically make use of a character's experience in certain, lesser-used skills.
Sailing could easily be developed in a way where other skills are a major part in the skill's overall training methods. After all, Slayer is entirely trained through simultaneously training your combat skills. However, Sailing should also not replace any current methods for training current skills as Slayer does not automatically dismiss training Combat outside of Slayer. Slayer simply opens up more doors for combat, and Sailing could easily do the same solely through progression. We don't even need to add new skilling methods to the reward structure of Sailing.

There is no thematic distinction in how Sailing will be trained:

This is a problem that cannot be addressed with a simple solution. However, going forward, it is certainly imperative that the training methods set forth may need to be distinctly separated from the potential rewards the skill could unlock.
Exploring islands and finding new raids or dungeons should not be the priority in building the Sailing skill, simply smaller aspects of the skill. The skill needs to focus on tasks that can be done consistently but also explicable by having more experience in being a sailor.
This does not mean the skill cannot have cool ideas - far from it. Cool ideas should be implemented into the skill to give progression an end-goal. Players should have something to look forward to.
An Example of Structuring Sailing:
With all of me trying to address these immediate problems with a development pipeline for a skill as ambitious as Sailing, I would be lying if I didn't have hundreds of ideas popping into my head on how the skill could be built.
As such, allow me to give you a crude outline of what I believe could be created while being grounded in reality.

Sailing:

Disclaimer: These are simply ideas on how the skill can be structured based on the points I made above. They will most likely not be added to the final refinement of the skill at all and are mostly just ideas without any structured gameplay ideas behind them. I have no knowledge of the OSRS engine and could not tell you how the game will or could handle any of these systems.
I also apologize for no black background yellow text. If you'd like, I can do that sometime this weekend.
The Core:
First and foremost, this entire idea is built upon the assumption the ocean would be an open-world. Making the entire skill single-player instanced in an MMORPG would be utterly deranged.
The core of the skill should be built upon a foundation of three separate training ideologies, a passive and conservative method, an active and engaged method, and an explorative and opportunistic method.
To this end, I first propose a semi-randomized open-world ocean. While major landmarks and islands should not be randomized like a personal instance, the ocean should be designed with designated hotspots where interesting ocean encounters could potentially spawn. To create a living, breathing ocean, it would naturally be fitting that the ocean feel treacherous and unpredictable.
I also propose that we add new port-masters that essentially send the player off to complete certain tasks that the player may choose. These tasks would combine the Sailing skill with other skills and give players access to consistent methods through which they may train another skill.
Finally, NPC ships that exist on the open ocean that a player can attack. I will try to flesh out ship combat later down in this idea section.
These three core ideas create an ecosystem where all three training ideologies may exist in harmony. A player who wants a more passive and conservative method need only listen to the port-master, an active player will want to take advantage of both the direction they're sent on by a port-master and the various encounters they may find at sea, and an explorative player would simply need to set sail with no particular goal in mind to engage with whatever they drunkenly stumble across.
Tasks the Port Authority/Taskmaster could give you:
These would be training methods that are more grounded in continuous engagement, giving new methods to train some existing skills in unique ways.

Item Smuggling - This method would engage in both thieving and Sailing, utilizing a player's knowledge of thieving to evade NPC ships that have placed embargos on certain goods entering certain ports. The natural progression would be smuggling more dangerous items that cause more NPC ships to be aggressive towards you as you travel from point A to point B with your cargo. Naturally, these smuggling tasks could easily fit into the lore of Gielinor very seemlessly.
Plague Ships - This method would engage in both Herblore and Sailing, utilizing the player's knowledge of Sailing to locate the position of a distress ship in the open ocean and use the player's knowledge of Herblore to formulate a cure. As you level up, you would be tasked with more difficult rescue missions that involve navigating rough seas and involve saving crews from starvation with your knowledge of Cooking or fortifying and fire-proofing the distress ship with your knowledge of Firemaking.
Bounty Hunting - The Port Authority will send the player to sink a certain number of enemy ships, ranging from pirate vessels to flagships in the Asgarnian navy. This would focus primarily on training Sailing alongside Slayer and Combat. You will be able to engage with any ships at any time, but becoming a better sailor will naturally mean being able to tackle higher level foes with less difficulty.
Hunting/Whaling - The Port Authority tasks you with tracking down a massive sea creature either fantastic or mundane. This method will engage in a player's knowledge of the Hunter skill alongside Sailing and potentially Combat. As you level up, you will naturally be tasked with hunting down even more deadly and dangerous beasts in the open ocean.
This bullet is left intentionally blank to add more ideas at a later time, preferably by someone else.

Tasks you Could Find on the Open Ocean:
These would be training methods you could find randomly on the ocean while navigating. Generally, the major idea would be for these methods to spawn and disappear after being completed by any player, similar to how Implings spawn at designated hotspots and disappear when only one player catches them. These methods would mostly be competitive between players, though others could end up cooperative or neutral, with many players engaging with them at once.

Shipwrecks - On occasion, players may find the debris of a sunken vessel floating in the sea. Using a player's knowledge of agility and Sailing, a player could approach these vessels and board them, exploring and navigating past obstacles flung about by disrepair.
Undersea Caverns - A player may find an undersea cavern that they could dive into and explore. Within the cavern could be a treasure trove of natural minerals ripe for the mining. A player's knowledge of Mining and Agility could be tested within these undersea caverns, alongside a player's knowledge of Sailing to safely enter the cavern via usage of equipment such as Diving Bells or Diving Suits.
Sea Fortresses - A player may stumble across a crude fortress built by lawless pirates to harass merchant vessels and generally be a public nuisance while living safely in a floating fortress. Using a player's knowledge of Firemaking and Sailing, a player could navigate past any crude defenses and locate any structural weaknesses that they could burn to sabotage the sea fortress.
Weather systems and hazards

Icebergs - Players would find icebergs in the northern reaches of Gielinor's oceans and would need to either navigate around them for experience as a Sailor or blast through them for experience as a sailor and a miner.
Hurricanes - Players will mostly be sailing through a hurricane and engaging with their knowledge of Sailing.
Calm seas - Players will be in hot and windless oceans. In these situations, a player's knowledge of Firemaking will be useful in ensuring they do not overheat.
Coral reefs - Players may find themselves scraping through coral reefs and will need to navigate to minimize damage as much as possible. Afterwards, a player can assess damages and repair with their Construction skill.

This bullet is left intentionally blank because my imagination has run out of ideas. If you have any ideas, feel free to comment about them.

Combat Encounters on the Open Ocean:
This is probably the most interesting aspect of Sailing that people will like - Ship Combat. My main proposal here is how I feel ship combat should function at its core and how that core can progress through the game. Any additional ideas like Magic in Sailing, I lack in imagination to brainstorm.

Lower level ships - These would be the bread and butter of the ship combat. They would be plentiful and relatively simple to defeat, relying mostly on attacking until they sink before you.
Flagships - These would be uncommon but higher level ships occasionally found in your travels. To keep with the idea of variance for fun, they shouldn't be too rare but also not too common where they become a point of tedium. To engage with a flagship, a player could first damage it enough to where it is disabled, similar to "Lower level ships" but then board the ship and engage in land-based combat to defeat the crew and capture the vessel.
Treasure Fleets - This should be the Sailing endgame. A massive armada of impressive ships that a player can find on the open ocean. The 12 year old inside me really loves this idea. Ideally, it would be a group of ships that large amounts of players come together to defeat, sinking lower level ships until they open a path to take on a vanguard of flagships. Only then could they attack the main Ship of the Line, the boss of Flagships that would have a distinct boss aboard with unique rewards.

The Armada of Armadyl - a Treasure fleet built by the remnants of Armadyl's glory on Gielinor, roaming the high seas aimlessly, long after they served their purpose during the God Wars. Led by Fleet Admiral Kree'gal, they aggressively attack all ships that pass their way, deeming them all guilty of treason against their God of Justice.
The Treasure Hunter Fleet - a Treasure fleet built by a certain Alice that many may know and many more probably hate. Alongside the Goblin Rear Admiral, Yelps, she sails the seas, pillaging and swindling many unsuspecting sailors with no other motivation but pure greed.
The Iron Chancellor - A formidable treasure fleet and a testament to the ingenuity of the KGP, the Iron Chancellor (and a reference I am making to the German Battleship, the Bismarck, during WW2) is a massive warship with impenetrable defenses and surrounded by a fleet of submarines. Sailors will likely see the damage the Iron Chancellor's avian allies may cause before seeing half of their targets. If dedicated players manage to successfully disable the Iron Chancellor, they will come face to face with a GMP, or a Giant Mechanical Penguin.

This is all I can really think of in terms of the problems Sailing poses, how to make the concept of Sailing interact with the rest of the game, and how to make cool content that primarily focuses on the aspects of ocean travel without muddying the structure using unrelated concepts like island exploration.
Certainly, the addition of Sailing as a new skill feels daunting to the community because the scope is so broad and so uncertain. I hope, at the very least, I grounded many of the aspects of what Sailing truly could be and I hope my examples of Sailing concepts sounds intriguing to some of you.
At the very least, I hope players going into this refinement stage look at Sailing through the lens of the problems that need to be addressed for it to integrate rather than solely building something cool that has no sense of identity or form.

Thought about this as I wrote this reply to u/MilesOSR about Geordi’s VISOR being the cause of the Enterprise D’s destruction in the Veridian System.
Data once received a subspace signal, “malfunctioned”, and hijacked the D in the middle of a medical emergency.
Another malfunction occurs, and Data - while connected to the computer to become a backup, put Troi, Worf and Alexander in danger in the holodeck.
Later, Data suffers another malfunction and Carrie’s radioactive material to a primitive society that suffers widespread radiation poisoning.
And another time, another malfunction occurs, and he’s firing phasers at a village’s infrastructure, exposes a duck blind, and ruins an observation mission where Starfleet personnel are allegedly held hostage.
Then after one contact with a Borg, Data ends up being controlled by Lore and capturing Picard, LaForge and Troi.
And another time, he was “influenced” by an alien archive that turned the D into the temple of a god.
His emotions chip malfunctioning led to LaForge being captured by Soran and the Klingons and causing the destruction of the Enterprise D (aforementioned and linked).
Last in my list (but not chronologically), the Borg Queen was able to manipulate him by grafting organic skin onto him.
Of course, in all these situations, Data “came back” and the problems caused were ultimately solved, but the question remains:
Why was Data still given command-level access to systems, and sensitive away missions when any malfunction or “rogue” radio communication could cause mission setbacks or security breaches?

Intro

Hey guys, I came up with an account idea that I wanted to share. Anyone is free to use or modify it if they want to try it out. I have not played this account at all, this is all just theorycrafting.
If you saw my previous post, I decided to make an underground only F2P ironman, and it's a lot of fun. But it made me think about the opposite scenario. What if your account was locked to areas that are considered 2nd floor and above (or 1st floor and above for UK players). I believe there's a lot of potential to discover unique training methods and item spawns, and it gives generally dead areas more importance. The grinds that I came up with would be possible, but aren't too horrible, so I think it would be fun.
I am curious to hear your inputs. Is there anything I'm missing that would allow certain skills to be trained? Are there any long-term goals you can think of to make the account more interesting?

The Main Rules

No obtaining items unless they are obtained in upstairs areas. Examples are outlined later in this post. You can still drop or recover your items on the ground floor though.
No gaining XP unless you are upstairs.
No using banks or deposit boxes unless they are upstairs.
Random events can be allowed if desired, but you must talk to the NPC upstairs so that you don't break the first 2 rules.
You can freely travel to get from one upstairs area to another. You can talk to NPCs, pay for boat rides, use minigame teleports, etc.

Relevant Locations

I went through this map and changed it to show upstairs areas to find areas of importance. Here is a big list of what I found, but I know there are a lot more that I didn't look into. I don't currently have membership, so couldn't test some areas.

Lumbridge Castle
- Spinning Wheel
- Bank
- Log spawns
Lumbridge Store - has an item spawn, what is it?
Al-Kharid
- Has some upstairs, but idk if any are useful
- The abbey also has upstairs but I think it's empty
- Basically can't enter the desert. Would require buying a shanty pass or using the mith grapple obstacle, but can't make mith grapple I think.
Mage Training Arena - has upstairs, but can you even buy anything?
Draynor
- Garlic in cabinet of one dude's house
- Maybe wise old man's house?
- Draynor Manor has random stuff upstairs, including a tinderbox
Wizards' Tower
- Lesser demon on top floor
- Wizards on middle floor, for runes and magic gear
- Can trade guy for splitbark armor, but I don't think you can get it
- If you could get beads, could finish Imp Catcher and get the amulet, but no imps upstairs anywhere
Port Sarim - Has lots of upstairs, but again I don't know if they have anything
Rimington
- Anja's house has a bronze scim spawn upstairs, and Anja can give coins to the player
- Crafting guild has an upstairs with a tanner, but would be locked due to brown apron…
Falador
- Has lots of upstairs areas. The castle is most notable.
- There's a cooked chicken spawn, maybe an axe too
North of Falador
- Chaos temple has an upstairs with wine of Zamorak, but you'd need Zamorak Vestments from clues since Zamorak monk robes are unobtainable with these rules
- Black Knights' Fortress is possible to enter. Get iron chain from cyclops and bronze med helm from men. Has an altar on the 2nd floor and black knights.
- Monastery has monk robes, altar, needs 31 prayer
- Tower in Goblin Village has goblins. Can get cape and easy clues.
Edgeville has some upstairs areas
Barbarian village has the lookout tower, the only doable beginner clue step
Cooks' Guild
- Requires chef hat. Might be obtainable from goblins on Goblin Village tower.
- Ranges, pie dish, cake tin, bowl, cooking apples, churn, grapes, pot, jug
Varrock
- Lots of places, needs exploration
- Castle has guards, altar, training dummies
- General store has a spade spawn upstairs I think. Also has a knife
- Museum, might be able to get some kudos?
- Church belltower for achievement diary, if possible?
- Jolly Boar Inn has an upstairs too but I think it's useless
Wilderness
- Dark Warriors' Fortress - nothing except dark warriors
- Rogue's castle - bronze sq shield and iron dagger spawn, maybe more
- Larran's chest - technically it's upstairs on the crashed ship.
Pest Control - what if you stand in the guard tower and attack ground-level creatures? But you can't really get the rewards, so it's pointless
Gnome stronghold - Lots of upstairs areas for cooking, bank, clothing
Tree Gnome Village - Has the only viable upstairs general store
Yanille - Wizard's Guild has shops upstairs, could get full mystics
Ardougne
- Black scimitar in castle
- There are nature rune chests upstairs, but idk if you need to pick a lock on ground floor first which might grant XP
- There are lots more upstairs areas that would need to be explored
Witchaven - upstairs areas need to be explored. The fishing colony also has upstairs areas
Ranger's guild - can get those arrows like Settled did in the one inventory slot series
Seers Village - has upstairs areas but idk what's in them
Keldagrim - has lots of places, but idk if any are of note. Shouldn't need to break any rules to get here.
Burthorpe
- Archers at top of castle can drop bows and arrows, but you'd need more range levels first
- Warrior's guild - can get strength cape as well as rune defender
Clan hall - what's upstairs? I've never been there
Catherby - needs exploring
Taverly - There are druids in the upstairs of the herblore shop. They drop vials, antipoison, druid robes, iron dagger, limpwurt root. If you allowed yourself to unlock herblore, you could theoretically make strength pots.
Entrana - has a couple places, but are useless I think
Karamja - needs exploring
Corsair Cove - has a few somewhat useless items upstairs
Kourend castle - Head guard upstairs has rare drop of rune kite and rune scimitar
Dark Wizards' Tower - has dark wizards
Isle of Souls - Forgotten Souls at Crumbling Tower drop some decent stuff like elemental staves
Kourend - all of this needs exploring

Viable Skills

Melee is obviously doable. You can try to find the best drops based on available monsters.
Magic is doable, but you will mainly rely on monster drops and maybe some spawns for the beginning of the journey, until you can use the Wizards' Guild shop.
Ranged is possible by using the Phoenix Crossbow. It's not a cheap trick this time, you can actually join the Black Arm Gang and do all the steps without breaking any rules to obtain the crossbow yourself. You can get bronze bolts from men and women. After that, you will likely need to fletch your own shortbow or get a bow from clue scrolls. You can get bow drops form Burthorpe archers.
Prayer is doable, just bury bones.
Firemaking can be trained using log spawns such as the ones on Lumbridge castle.
Fletching can be training using those same logs, plus knife spawns.
Cooking will be tough at first. You can get pots of flour from white knights at 1/128 rate. You can easily obtain water to make bread dough, then you have to cook bread until level 6. At that point you can utilize gnome cooking methods and the skill becomes more viable. From what I can tell, there's no other way to train it for those first few levels.
Crafting will be tough. Lamp to 10, then use flax from beekeeper random event until 20. At that point chiseling gems is one of your only options. It is possible to get balls of wool, but there are no furnaces upstairs anywhere, so I don't think you can really make jewelry.
Smithing - can only train this with superheat I think. No anvils or furnaces are upstairs, excluding the Dragon Slayer 2 anvil which would require too many exceptions.
Thieving is easy. Train on men and women, guards and warriors in Varrock palace, maybe others.
Herblore is possible if you allow exceptions for Druidic Ritual. There are lots of herb drops for cleaning and vials of water are obtainable. I know for sure that strength potions would be possible to make by killing druids.
Agility is possible but not very viable. At a minimum, you could lamp to 10 agility and then utilize Draynor rooftops. However, you cannot jump down from the roof at the end of the lap, because that would give you XP when you're on the ground floor. You'd have to teleport out and restart the course after each lap.
Construction is not really possible without exceptions. You could make exceptions to build an upstairs in your POH at level 27, but then there's not a lot you can do after that, I think. I haven't looked into it much but most materials are unobtainable on this account. One training method could be Mahogany Homes, and you'd only build furniture that's upstairs, but you can't cancel contracts so you'd get stuck early on. Planks are also not possible to get I think.
Slayer is possible if the monster is upstairs, but you will definitely get stuck at some point.
Mining - don't think it's possible
Woodcutting - don't think it's possible
Fishing - don't think it's possible (except from Evil Bob random)
Hunter - don't think it's possible
Farming - don't think it's possible

Potential Account Goals

Gain access to the Cooks' Guild
Gain access to the Warriors' Guild
Gain access to the Ranging Guild
Gain access to the Wizards' Guild and purchase full mystics in the shop upstairs
Gain access to the upper floor of the Edgeville Monastery, get monk robes
Reach 99 Strength and get the Strength Cape from the 2nd floor of the Warriors' Guild
Obtain a rune defender
Complete at least 1 beginner clue. Only 1 step (Barbarian Village tower) is doable, because finishing a clue step provides a new clue or casket, which could violate rule 1.
Complete at least 1 easy clue. There are several upstairs steps so this might be easier.
If you want a more dramatic end goal, you could defeat the only boss I can think of that is upstairs, which is the Grotesque Guardians. However, it would require exceptions for training Slayer on non-upstairs monsters, plus beating Priest in Peril would be an exception since it grants Prayer XP not upstairs. Duradel is also upstairs so if you make more exceptions, you could get 99 slayer and the cape. Feels a bit cheap though.

Conclusion

Can you think of anything else that would be useful for this account? If anyone wants to explore some of the upstairs areas that I couldn't, please do and let us know your findings. If anyone wants to make a series of videos or posts for this account, I will definitely follow along!

And it won't be in osrs either. There are a plethora of games that have tried to do sailing, and unless you love sailing they won't hold you for more then 30 minutes.
Every time sailings brought up, actual sailing is almost a non factor in people's thought process. It's a reason to expand the map and have some ocean adventures, it's about what can I get out of sailing, not what can I do sailing.
If the act of sailing becomes a bigger focus, I don't see how it could be much more then a bedazzled hybrid of water temple trekking, fishing trawler, and agility. We are limited to what osrs is capable of, and again I ask you to go look at what other sailing games are like and what they offer. And truely ask yourself if you could see a way to implement anything like it into our game fluidly. I sure don't.
And if you want to solve that by making sailing about destinations not the journey, then whats the point of sailing. You can have new training methods at sea, New islands, New encounters without sailing. The mods have said so if it had the community's support so the content your hoping for isn't gone if sailing doesn't pass.
It feels like the meme dream has gone on too long and some perspective beyond the meaning is needed.

Temple osrs

W385 F2P

50k and below:

overview

General changes

the crypts

Bosses and rooms

rewards

Slayer Improvements

Graceful Skilling Outfits

Capybaras & Other Animal NPCs

F2P Rat Boss

Wilderness Rejuvenation

Hunter Expansion

Completionist Cape

Resting and Inns

Quest Porting