This past weekend saw the Winter Summit showcase from Old School RuneScape drop a whole bunch of promised reveals for 2023’s content plans, but if you happened to have missed the suite of announcements, then you’ll be happy to know that Jagex summed them all up in a news post.
The first reveal was a plan to create a new skill, the decisions for which will be fueled primarily by Jagex’s favorite method of feedback collection: player polls. The post that starts the process of seeking player input via polling goes into detail about this process and why the devs believe now is a good time to add a new skill.
Speaking of new skills, there will also be a new forestry activity for the woodcutting skill, with the aim of making it a more social experience. The whole system is introduced once players pick up a forestry kit, which in turn presents an opportunity for unique events to pop up while cutting trees such as chasing off poachers, culling pheasants, rehoming bees, or styling the hair of a friendly tree ent. Rewards and XP from forestry will scale with woodcutting levels, and tree despawning will be adjusted to facilitate the new system.
For those who are more combative, the Summit unveiled plans for two new quests: Desert Treasure II, which will pick up where the 17 year-old Desert Treasure quest left off as players delve deeper into the enigmatic Mahjarrat and the history of a long-forgotten empire; and Secrets of the North, the “mysterious quest” that has been teased by Jagex prior to the event. This new quest will begin on January 11th.
The Summit confirmed that the Bounty Hunter activity is making a comeback. Readers will recall that these plans were referenced by the devs back in 2020 and that the minigame had to be shut down due to players cheesing the mechanics to farm easy kills and rewards. The devs promise that the new-look Bounty Hunter will feature many of the same fast-paced mechanics players know, but with some adjustments and input fueled by more player polls.
In addition to these major pieces of content, 2023 will also herald the addition of official game modes that let players modify their experience by applying handicaps, and tech updates to enhance account security, server stability, and gameplay stability.
