The overdue hardcore mode has been released! Alongside this, a Pest Control minigame has been added, moving most of the untradable shop items over. Finally, a large number of changes and bug fixes have been made.
Hardcore Mode
For those of you not aware, hardcore mode is a mode that mixes aspects of both normal mode and ironman mode into one. Lower XP, smaller drop and XP boosts, short quests for items, heavily reduced shops, and no grand exchange are many of these differences. If you have an ironman account, you're already familiar with all the differences between that mode and normal mode and should expect to see nearly identical differences.
One other significant factor is trading: while you can trade other players, those players must also be hardcore. This game mode is essentially a spin on the current normal mode and it's economy: you can continue playing the normal mode for the easier XP, money making, and drops, or you can create a hardcore account and take on the increased difficulty it brings.
Pest Control
While this isn't identical to OSRS, it shares many similarities. There is one endless game that can be joined and left at any time, allowing you to collect points for however long you'd like. It's set up in a way that allows you to gain points without needing other players, although other players will improve the rate at which you gain points.
It's pretty straightforward; The void knight and portals both have respawn times of 5 minutes and give point boosts depending on their state. As long as the void knight is alive, you'll receive a 10% boost in points. Likewise, for each portal destroyed, another 10% boost is given to any points you receive. Points are given for the damage you inflict as you inflict it, and will also be given for dealing damage to portals.
In Other News
- Past 20 wilderness, untradables not protected on death will be converted to coins (matching OSRS).
- The Chaos Elemental will now change weaknesses every 30 seconds, which can be tracked via the quest tab and ingame messages.
- Improved the drop rates of the Chaos Elemental.
- Increased the time items stay on the ground from death from 15 minutes to 30 minutes.
- Improved the likelihood that dragon implings spawn at Puro Puro.
- Ironmen can now participate in the PK Raffle, and the entry count has been raised to 50.
- Runes can now be used directly on the rune pouch to add them in.
- Summer pies can now be eaten.
- The mage on the final wave of The Inferno will no longer respawn the ranger.
- Added the remaining missing emotes.
- Improved the automatic mole locator of the Falador shields.
- Added a message when a hunter trap breaks.
- Ironmen will no longer protect their items on death by having Gold Membership.
- Ironmen monster kills in God Wars will now count as 1 or 2 as a Gold Member.
- Ironmen can no longer kill Barrows brothers in the wilderness.
- Ironmen can no longer kill slayer bosses off task.
- The ironman icon now appears in global messages
Bug Fixes
- Fixed the Abyssal Sire teleporting players into an area they can't move out of.
- Fixed the final kill on a Slayer task not applying some bonuses (such as Slayer ring effects).
- Fixed void knight armour requiring 42 prayer instead of only 22.
- Fixed withdrawing runes from the rune pouch with a full inventory.
- Fixed the greater demon Catacombs of Kourend teleport.
- Fixed the level requirements on the ornament godswords.
- Fixed the level requirements on the ornament dragon defender.
- Fixed the mud staff not giving unlimited earth and water runes.
- Fixed Dharok's greataxe attack animations being swapped around.
- Fixed staff of the dead's melee animation.
- Fixed the powdered wig not appearing correctly.
- Fixed an issue with custom loadouts.
- Fixed a region memory management issue that had previously been disabled to prevent bugs.