Eye on Ashenfall | 0.12.1 - Agility, QoL and the Road to Kuldra
RuneScape: Dragonwilds · published
Hello Adventurers! Dragonwilds' final update before the Scorned Wilderness Raid arrives is coming to Steam Early Access soon! Let's get an early look at what it'll contain:
Agility
With the 0.12.1 release, we're delighted to be introducing a long-overdue addition to RuneScape: Dragonwilds - Agility! Our latest skill will allow you to build up your stamina and sculpt yourself into a speed machine. Across Ashenfall, you'll find SIX new stations with flags for you to interact with. There, you'll find a leaderboard of times, and a trail of orbs to gather along a fixed course. From there, you'll be able to continually repeat the courses over and over, improving your time, getting XP with every lap.
You'll earn rewards for completing Agility courses, and mastery of the courses will net you Gold Medals. You can throw those on your walls, like Pristine Fish from Fishing, as trophies to show everyone who's the boss of the course. Mastering the region's agility course will also grant you a gilded trimmed version of the regional cape as an extra reward.
Firstly, let's talk about passives:
You'll be able to gain XP passively while running across the world, too - but you won't get XP on mounts. Stop cheating and get those knees up! As you level up through the Agility Skill tree, you will passively consume less Stamina while you sprint.
At levels 50 and 75, you'll also unlock passive increases to your maximum carry weight.
You'll also be able to use Agility Shortcuts to make use of Kebbit Burrows situated across the world. They'll be dotted on your map, and you can dig them up to open up tunnels to cut across side routes in the world. In early Agility levels, you might take damage when failing to squeeze through unharmed, so be careful using the shortcuts on low HP.
At higher levels, you'll start to break your falls from higher up by rolling out of them to avoid taking as much damage. Fatal falls will still kill you though.
The skill tree also, of course, comes with its own Skill Spells and unlocks.
Windstep is now an Agility skill spell, rather than a Runecrafting skill spell.
At higher levels, Windstep will also cause you to send out a blast of air when you land, sending enemies to the floor.
So, you can run further, carry more and scoot across the world in shortcuts. But that's being fast - not agile.
How about... an aerial dash? A short, horizontal dash to cross small gaps and add extra evasive manoeuvres during combat?
Sounds good. What if we gave you... a second jump? You'll be able to jump, jump again in mid-air and then dash horizontally to get over and around enemies. Pretty cool, right?
You'll also be able to use a new skill spell - Recall.
Leave a runic marker on the ground, and then recast to teleport back to the initial marking spot - great for quickly grabbing something urgently and getting out of danger. If you fall to your death while tethered, you'll also teleport back, and the tether will be consumed.
All of this is built to make you faster, leaner and meaner - and we'll be factoring it in moving forwards in how we design exploration, puzzles and more. So don't start thinking you'll be able to make an Agility Pure account - it's time to do some cardio.
The Great Body Robbery
Our longest Secondary Quest to date can be found in Bloodblight Swamp - an unfortunate experiment has rendered the Good* Doctor* Fenkenstrain in a bit of a pickle. You'll need to help him out. Your rewards are a new club weapon that's shockingly good, and a buildable decoration: the Pylon. This functional decoration will generate an area of effect in a radius around it that intercepts lightning strikes to allow you to build in places known for... inclement weather.
* = The validity of this claim is highly disputed.
Combat and Movement Improvements
We're introducing the Ascension Cores feature to the Mystic Forge - use those cores to upgrade Masterwork and Vestige weapons to higher tiers using the relevant cores!
We're adding a radial hotwheel for both Controller and Keyboard + Mouse users to speed up selecting primary items, as well as adding the quick cast shortcut for either a spell OR an item.
Swapping to a 2H weapon and then back to a 1H weapon will automatically re-equip your off-hand item too.
Stability changes are coming to make jumping more consistent in suboptimal networking conditions that led to losing the ability to jump in some circumstances.
You'll be able to cycle through your runes/arrows in mid combat to save you having to open your inventory.
Jumping will cost 10 stamina, down from 20 - reducing further when Agility levels are reached.
Leggings of Lightness, Mounts and Windstep should each be unaffected by this, so your general mobility won't change!
We're making good progress on improving performance, additional ambient VFX and tons of optimisation for Fog, trees, grass and even the coastline. All of that is intended to make the experience more stable/smooth for you to focus on what you do best. Smacking the living daylights out of goblins.
We're also adding more to the existing jump to improve its "ledge forgiveness" - as in, if you walk off a ledge, there's a small window of time for you to jump before you cartoonishly plummet to your demise.
Visual Fidelity
We've done a bit of a pass over the starting areas (Brynmoor and Ghornfell) with an emphasis on visual improvements, performance and clarity. We've improved how trees will look nicer at a distance, the visual clarity of moss and fog, our existing grass and foliage to include more flowers, and we've improved performance at lower ends of the settings.
We've revisited night sky visuals, volumetric fog across the world, storm weather visuals and we've also added additional ambient VFX across the region and along the coastline.
Bug Fixes
The 0.12.1 update will contain the following fixes:
We're resolving an issue where Axes were dealing incorrect damage to trees.
We misplaced a decimal. Oops!
We'll be reverting this to its intended value with 0.12.1, alongside several other bugfixes to woodcutting, including Splinter and Axetral Projection removing stumps.
This was giving people disproportionate XP based on the damage dealt - we're putting values back to where they should be!
Fixed an issue where Axtral Projection upgrades would not chop down all intended/highlighted trees.
Fixed an issue where Splinter would destroy tree stumps if used on an adjacent log.
Fixed an issue where the Yew Farming Plots did not snap in building modes correctly.
Fixed an issue where Rune Vents would appear full for clients in multiplayer worlds even when depleted.
Fixed an issue introduced in Umbral Sands where game music would loop repeatedly, primarily triggered upon respawning.
Fixed an bug where summoning Buddy in a wall would cause the game to crash.
Get it? Bug? Becau- oh, forget it.
Resolved an issue where a part of the Burning Spire zone where the player could fall through Lava.
Fixed an issue where returning to the main menu after dying would respawn the player back at the location of death.
Fixed an issue where Potion Effects would be removed between game sessions/on logout.
Fixed an issue where Lodestone teleports placed on the edges of the map could only be used one-way as they would fail to be displayed on the map.
Fixed an issue where the search area on the map for the "Saga of the Adventurer" Quest Step was incorrectly aligned.
Fixed an issue where Wild Jade Vines would die to poison in the Toxic Swamp.
Resolved an issue where Ascension Cores weren't displayed correctly in the Mystic Forge of the crafting menu.
Fixed an issue with the TokTz-Mej-Tal staff would not consume runes on attack.
Fixed an issue with some items would display a white square placeholder depiction.
Resolved an issue where the Right Stick on controllers would not turn the camera within a 30% radius in some contexts.
Fixed an issue where some shaded areas would let Scorch stack up to 500% without triggering.
That's probably going to leave a mark.
Tweaked the lighting in the Velgar Arena to improve visibility when fighting him at night.
Fixed an issue where the Spellwheel would not show descriptions for spells as a client in Multiplayer worlds.
Fixed an issue where the Fire Cape would refill Stamina even if the enemy was not afflicted with burns.
Fixed an issue where the Kharidian Inner Corner 45° Stairs would be unclimbable.
Fixed an issue where players could walk under a specific Sand Dune.
Fixed an issue where an Air Anima vent was situated inside a pillar within the Umbral Sands.
Fixed an issue where the Chamber barrier in the Contact! quest would be invisible at very low, low and medium graphics settings.
Fixed an issue with the Special Attack of Hammer weapons which could stunlock Lesser Dragons.
Fixed an issue where the "Shrimp Catcher" quest completion would not contribute to the Achievement "Brynmoor Helper".
Fixed an issue where the Kalphite Queen would respawn in an invisible state after being defeated.
Fixed an issue where the Kalphite Queen's Sting Attack would become angulated.
Fixed an issue where the dunes behind the Kalphite Queen Vault had missing collision.
Fixed an issue where the ground atop the Cave of Screams was missing collission.
Fixed an issue where there was a small invisible barrier blocking pathing in the Dunes of Uzzer when moving on foot.
Fixed an issue where Quicksand and its VFX were showing in areas that weren't actually quicksand.
Fixed an issue where a Sanguine Urn icon was incorrectly placed in the Bloodblight Swamp.
Fixed an issue where users could get stuck in a small spot in the Burning Spire.
Fixed an issue where Desert Weed did not have any healthy growth stage assets when planted. It looks as healthy as it is, now!
Fixed an issue where part of a rock surface in the Burning Spire would behave like lava and damage the player when walking on it.
Fixed an issue where the Menaphite Desert Cape was missing a Journal Entry.
Fixed an issue where the Rapid Growth Skill Spell had a placeholder icon in the Spellbook
Fixed an issue where collision remained on the Zi Core quest item after it had been collected.
Fixed an issue where Korean Subtitles were not showing correctly during the opening cutscene.
Fixed an issue where the Skills Necklace has an unclear description in the interface.
Fixed an issue where Localised text for the Construction Skill bonuses was not displayed correctly.
Fixed an issue where completing a quest for Lagra, Alcarrid's Butcher would not yield rewards if the player's inventory was full.
Fixed an issue with the Yew Shortbow when fully drawn back causing visual clutter.
Fixed an issue where the Fishing Minigame could not have the keybinds rebound.
Fixed an issue where Bones to Peaches would not mention the stack limit is limited to 10.
Fixed an issue where the Blue Dragon was incorrectly labelled as "Lesser Blue Dragon" instead.
Fixed an issue where Stamina would instantly regenerate after jumping when wearing the full set of Wizard Robes.
Fixed an issue with a typo in the Hall of Heroes Journal Entry.
Fixed an issue where Miniaturized Mushrooms in the Dunes of Uzzer could not be gathered.
Fixed an issue where Torches in the doorways in Umbral Sands were unnaturally bright.
Fixed an issue where attempting to cast Fishnado on a Net Fishing Spot would show an incorrect error message: "Your fish has escaped!"
Fixed an issue where Green Dragons' flame attack VFX were not aligned to their mouths properly.