Distractions, Diversions and Daily Activities

This is my little review of the distraction, diversions and daily activities that seem to be popping up more and more frequently in RS. Now maybe I didn’t notice it before, but it sure seems that RS has become much more enamored of daily micro games and resources lately.
Here’s my review and rating of distractions and diversions plus the weekly/daily things that you can do. Scale is 1-10. And it’s all about how useful and how playable something is.

Update: Someone asked if the changes I suggest would make things to easy. Two things. One, I want consistency. If Zaff and Bork are on a 24 hour clock why can't they all be? Same with noting things. Otherwise what I want are level appropriate rewards. I'm not thinking that this will be unbalancing. More encouraging of higher levels to remain interested in these things.

Weekly Things:

Tears of Guthix-9. At lower levels this was a ten. I knew I could get a level or two every week. Even at a free level every 2 weeks how could you say no? Now, it’s worth maybe 50k in gp to me each week. Always used it for construction until summoning came out, then summoning until I pushed my summoning past construction.

What I like about it: Easy. Fast xp. Helped get me through some expensive levels early on.

What I would like to see changed: More quests=more time. Jagex I want about 30 more quests. Thanks.

Kingdom of Miscellania-8. For me this is a weekly thing. Others might do it daily. I like waiting 7 or 14 days, get a little bit more since the bonus items round up. When I first started doing this I used it to make money. Now that I’ve got my equipment squared away I use it to acquire resources for skills.

What I like about it: It’s about the only good way to get tree seeds. The bonus items help fill up my bank.

What I would like to see changed:

• Farming seeds! So much junk there. I wish my subjects would look at my farming level and ask themselves “what’s she going to do with 189 potato seeds?”.
• Pure essence. Obviously some of my people can mine as they can get me coal. So why can’t they mine pure essence? I can already get flax and low level fish so don’t say it will hurt the lower levels income.
• Mahoghany and Teak. I’ll pay more for them to plank them too.
• Deliver the stuff to ME!! I hate going to see Advisor Ghrim and have him say “You need 1 more bank space.” Just gimme my stuff (noted) and I’ll go sort it out.

Penguins-8 Talk to Larry at the Ardougne zoo to get started with this.

What I like about it:

• Choosing the skill you use the xp on. Unlike Tears you can choose the skill. (I like how Tears does it too so don’t think that’s a criticism of it).
• The xp increases to appropriately reward you.
• It rewards people who quest while not penalizing those who don’t. (To get all the penguins each week you need to have done a fair number of quests).
• It helps you learn your geography and your teleports/fast transportation methods.
• It’s a good thing to do in a small group. Needs some organizing but not too much.

What I would like to see changed:

• When I click on a penguin it should say “you’ve spied on the Yanille penguin” or “you’ve caught penguin number 7”. I hate chasing the same penguin 3 times to be told “you’ve already spotted this penguin.”
• Penguins that look exactly like their backgrounds. I see this occasionally. If I’m playing on my laptop I can often hear but not see the penguin because there’s not enough contract with the background. I know this is minor but making them a little more contrasting would help. (Example, toadstool one at tyras camp is sometimes hard to spot because it blends into the background very well.)

Circus-9 Moves weekly. You can work mage, range and agility there.

What I like about it:

• Circus barkers tell you where to find it! Huge help.
• Two choices, go for the costumes or go for the xp! Love choices
• Mage and range are slow and can be expensive to raise. Love 20k a week of free xp.

What I would like to see changed: Nothing really.Might be nice to explain to people that max points is not max xp and vice versa.

Daily Things:

Zaff (Battlestaffs)-10. My last 5 crafting levels-battlestaffs. Also creates a market for the orb manufacturers. Love that Zaff will note them.

What I like about it: Great reward for doing the Varrock diary. Not excessive, just a nice bit of icing on the cake. I’d be even happier if someone would permanently break down his door but I can’t have everything.

What I would like to see changed: Nothing.

Geoffrey (Flax)-8 Reward much like Zaff.

What I like about it: I get 120 flax for just running past Geoffrey on my way to farm in Catherby. Easy, fast.

What I would like to see changed: Give me more flax. By every measure the battlestaffs are a much better reward then the flax.

Arhein (Pineapple/Seaweed).-5 I buy him out everyday. In a pinch I’ve sold pineapples but I usually use them to make supercompost. Every few months I get on lunars and make tons of glass with the sand.

What I like about it: The price is right and the quantities are appropriate.

What I would like to see changed:

• Arhein needs to go to school with Zaff and Geoffrey and learn to note things.
• And while he’s there he needs to learn to tell time. Everything should reset at midnight GMT.
• We should be able to buy even more seaweed and pineapple if we are wearing a seer’s headband.

Bert (Sand)-Reward from Hand in the Sand Quest

What I like about it: Not only does Bert note things but you can use NPC contact and he’ll deliver them to your bank.

What I would like to see changed: Bert needs to learn that a new day starts at midnight GMT!

Stars-8 Using a telescope you can see when the next star lands. Either solo or as a group you can hunt it down getting xp and stuff.

What I like about it:

• Encourages teamwork. Small teams work really well for this.
• Tests your geographic and transportation knowledge.
• Rewards high level construction, but it can be done with low level summoning.
• Good rewards, even a low level miner can get 90k a day in cash and items plus good xp.
• I like that it’s 1x a day to cash in. Keeps the hordes from overwhelming every star.

What I would like to see changed:

• I hate large star hunting clans. But that can’t be fixed.
• Cap should be raised to 300 stardust. Or laddered so 200 stardust to level 60, 220 to 70, 240 to 80 and 250 at 90 mining.
• For 200+ stardust the alien should give us some mith or addy ore.

Evil Tree-6 Talk to a spirit tree to see when the next evil tree will sprout. You will get a hint and go search for the sapling or wait for it to sprout and get teled right there.

What I like about it:

• Another way to get seeds.
• No matter Leprechaun magic is the best! Great reward.
• 2x a day keeps the crowd under control.

What I don’t like about it:

• The farming xp isn’t that good.

• If I remember correctly you only need 42 farming to nurture an elder tree. Come on! Stars need level 80 and 90 miners sometimes, trees should need high level farmers sometimes too.

• Really? 100% of the rewards from an elder tree and I get an acorn? Ridiculous. There should be a floor of tree minus one level for seeds. So a mage tree could give you a mage or yew seed. Yews could give mage, yews or maples.

• You get there and it’s an oak. And you either leave (after waiting 10 minutes for it to sprout) or you waste one of your 2 chances.

• If I go to the spirit tree that I grew it should give me a hint or free tele before everyone else. Go get 83 farming if you think is unfair.