r/runescape • u/Ruuxe Completionist • Aug 06 '26
Appreciation - J-Mod reply After Some Time, I'm Now Glad Aura's Were Removed
When aura's were first removed ~4 months ago, I was pissed. Felt like a serious loss all around, both combat and skilling.
However after some time and the tweaking of skills added to the aspect spells system, I'm super glad they did it.
The game now feels way more balanced and rewarding in terms of progression and end-game pvm. Being able to multi-cast an aspect is great. Though vampirism is basically unusable thanks to the heal cap, it forced me to play differently, mainly using dodge aspect 24/7. Removal of Solomon's general store just made the game feel a lot more grounded and less convoluted.
I didn't see the vision at the time but now I see it. Just putting my appreciation out there but a small update that didn't get enough love <3
81
u/JagexRyan Mod Ryan Aug 06 '26
Thanks for sharing!
This is actually quite a common thing in design. It's our responsibility as designers to consider the long-term impact of a features purpose, or a change across the entire game. Players don't (and shouldn't have to) look at it the same way, so it's completely natural to respond based on how it feels in the moment.
Sometimes, a good design choice is one that doesn't sound or feel great immediately, but over time it helps create a better overall experience. It's great to see and hear when these sorts of changes start to make more sense with time.
9
u/Ruuxe Completionist Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Well put, thankyou for taking the time. Also, you are the best mod :)
4
u/GenerousRacoon Aug 07 '26
Nice mitigation but players should absolutely think long term. Considering that long term thinking is the basis of our society and essentially staying alive as a human, it should come pretty easily. We shouldn’t get complacent with our expectations just because the average person can’t maintain a thought longer than a YouTube short.
1
u/rocketscape3osrs Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26
Hilarious considering the company fucked up so bad, they had to start over from 2007 (which is 4-10x more successful at any given moment) and the players made all the the decisions for about 11 years there too. It also took 14+ years to remove predatory mtx.
What responsibility the devs have!
2
0
u/ShinyCapeRS Enthusiast Aug 07 '26
Is Aegis 10% damage reduction and inspiration extra adrenaline and vamp+ darkness still on the table for being incorporated into leveling benefits/ unlocks ?
-1
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26
Mod Ryan, at this point you and Jagex are being 100% willfully ignorant in ignoring the critical feedback and comments that have been given on the aura change and pretending only the positive feedback exists. It's frankly insulting and dismissive of many of your customers. It's also really obvious that it's happening, which only doubles down on the insult/dismissive nature of it.
It reads as you/Jagex still being very insecure about substantive responses to critical feedback.
Same with the membership prices and fucking of people who had grandfathered rates, but I know that question is above your pay grade at least.
1
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u/TidyCups Aug 06 '26
And what about the people who don't come around and think this "makes more sense with time"? They can just go fuck themselves?
The removal of auras was based on spurious reasoning. I think more people would've been ok with the changes had Jagex listened to people who said repeatedly that auras could exist outside of the loyalty program which was one of the biggest pain points of obtaining them in the first place.
Aspects aren't a terrible replacement, but the issues with the dissimilarity between aspects and auras in practical use, are undeniable.
6
u/Azaldir Ironman Solo DG Enjoyer Aug 07 '26
And what about the people who don't come around and think this "makes more sense with time"? They can just go fuck themselves?
Basically, Yes. It's not possible to cater to everyone, and devs needs to have the balls to make decisions sometimes that doesn't make sense to a person who doesn't look at the bigger picture but just the individual change.
The removal of auras practically shattered a completely arbitrary glass box within which people were restricted to move around. This in turn granting them significantly more freedom to "roam the pasture" as they like, whilst successfully incorporating the minimal benefits of having them in the glass box to the overall pasture at a *slight* loss of quality.
Who do you think ends up being the happier animal?
The one in a box, without freedom, but fed the best grass in set quantities at set times?
Or the one outside of a box, with freedom, grazing slightly less qualitative grass but without limited quantity and without it being only within a specific very short window of time?3
u/This_Designer_2696 Aug 07 '26
I am one happy cow now that they removed my glass box! The grass outside is soft and chewy. Moo! 🥰
I adore your analogy!
1
u/TidyCups Aug 08 '26
What is the "glass box" in this (poor) attempt at an analogy? Is it the timers? Because last I looked, things like cauldrons and potion TIMERS in general along with instance timers and on and on and on are all a part of the game.
It was a flawed premise from the start that auras caused some undue stress to people using them, because they had time limits.
2
u/Azaldir Ironman Solo DG Enjoyer Aug 08 '26
Yep. Timers. Very fixed, rigid timers and a significant downtime while waiting for it to come back up. The analogy is perfectly intact. It may seem like that isn't the case for you as a result of you either forgetting or conveniently omitting crucial variables that make auras and potions/instances very different, focusing too narrowly/pedantically on the word "Timer".
The commitment that was being asked of the player were multitudes higher with the auras than it is with your given examples. There's absolutely nothing stopping you from starting another instance immediately, or taking another sip of the potion. With multicasting and also different kinds of cauldrons, you have more freedom than ever before in that aspect as well.
Not all timers are made the same. The reason why something like potion cauldrons/potions themselves work where auras did not, is because of the freedom to choose the level of commitment/spending, without the consequence of "and now you must wait for X hours before you can do it again, sucks to be you if you want to do it again before then". Committing 5-10 minutes at a time with the freedom to add another 5-10min to that whenever you feel like is a far cry from committing to a full hour with a 4 hour cooldown.
Instance timers may very well be on the way out in the not too far future as a direct result of instance costs being entirely removed now. The timers on instances made sense from the perspective of being a GP sink, forcing people to re-submit coins to extend/start a new one, and by the time they stopped doing instance costs it was probably just easier for them to 'copy-paste' the instance system than change it up (not to mention keeping consistency). Only reason I could see for them to not remove instance timers in the future would be if it's got to do with server performance or *maybe* as a small-yet-existent step to create a hurdle for would-be bots now having to incorporate a 'instance refresh' into their processes, what do I know.
Auras felt like an absolute prison to play around, and to play without them felt like you were griefing yourself and thus made you have less fun straight up automatically, because off-aura many fights would play out very differently.
6
u/GInTheorem Aug 07 '26
At the end of the day, you have to alienate people who lap up slop like auras if you want to appeal to any major portion of the gaming audience.
2
Aug 07 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/TidyCups Aug 08 '26
Yeah because player retention doesn't matter, right?
There's better middle ground than what was executed. It's not even about auras but all the Jagex sycophants can't wrap their head around this concept.
2
u/DyzzyVR I can finally play the game... Aug 07 '26
Auras were awful though.
0
u/TidyCups Aug 08 '26
Sorry to hear someone had a gun to your head forcing you to use them.
2
u/DyzzyVR I can finally play the game... Aug 08 '26
Yeah it was a real shame. Happy to be free though, now.
41
u/Aelarick Aug 06 '26
vamp aura was capped at the exact same value wasn’t it?
22
u/Capsfan6 July 22 2017 Aug 06 '26
Yes. It also isn't even that bad with the cap. Some styles can get a lot of value out of it
5
u/NecessaryTrouble2041 Aug 06 '26
Since you can only have 1 aspect active at a time, it's basically useless.
Before, you could use Vampyrism aura with another Aspect, and it had some uses.
3
u/Aelarick Aug 06 '26
Hmm. Interesting. I guess it depends on content. I use it frequently for afk combat, seems to work fine. Instead of an hour with the aura I can do all day if I want.
2
u/NecessaryTrouble2041 Aug 06 '26
If I don't need penance for prayer upkeep, then yeah it's useful. But almost everywhere I go to afk, I need prayer.
1
u/BackhandBeamboy Ironman Aug 06 '26
Where are you gping that you need to afk that you can't anymore due to the aura change?
Genuinely curious because with the combat changes melee has plenty of sustain to afk with penance.
1
u/NecessaryTrouble2041 Aug 07 '26
First one that comes to mind: moss golems. I need animate dead and also penance, but I can't use both, so I have to use penance powder.
Basically, anywhere that requires AD and penance to afk got screwed over when they made Vampyrism and Penance mutually exclusive with the other aspects.
3
u/BackhandBeamboy Ironman Aug 07 '26
Can't you just use animate dead, protect melee + t95 or t99 prayer and sustain with a super prayer renewal potion and holy scarab familiar using blood barrage?
1
u/ButchTheKitty MaskedMidget | RSC/2/3 Aug 06 '26
I don't know what specifically you're looking to AFK, but have you looked into getting a Demon Horn Necklace and using it with the Bonecrusher and/or the Ectoplasmator? It doesn't work for every mob out there, but getting 100-150 Prayer back per kill is more than enough to enable me to pop an Aggression potion and step back.
I returned to the game back in April/May and have taken my non-Necromancy combat levels from the mid 80s up to 96+ by doing a lot of AFK Slayer training with that combo while at work. I also took my slayer from 85ish up to 102 in that same time, again largely AFK.
1
u/NecessaryTrouble2041 Aug 07 '26
Yes I use DHN and Ectoplasmator where I can. Sophanem Slayer dungeon creatures, Moss golems, and a few others I like to afk dont drop bones or ashes.
1
u/legaladviceneeded542 Aug 07 '26
this is just completely wrong. Vamp is incredibly strong in the mid game.
0
u/DargonofParties Aug 06 '26
I think the compromise is supposed to be that if you stop an activity early you aren't penalized with a hefty aura cooldown. In the middle of a Sanctum run while it's time to visit your herbs? No worry, since the extra yield from greenfingers was made a passive effect you can unlock. Just do your farm run, re-up your timer, and carry on.
I still think familiar and incense timers need some tweaking, though, since they kind of suffer from the same problem auras did.
3
u/BigArchive Aug 06 '26
Your example is kinda bad. Greenfingers aura removal had one of the biggest nerfs out of all auras.
People who had legendary went from a 15% boost to a 7?% boost.
Since greenfingers aura lined up super nicely with herb run timers, people almost always had greenfingers aura active for their farming.
Greenfingers aura had 20 minute of disease protection, which is now gone.
Overall, I find i miss greenfinger auras (and zerker auras) the most out of everything.
0
u/DargonofParties Aug 07 '26
Point being is that you aren't penalized so heavily for switching activities like you were before.
137
u/boredguy12 Aug 06 '26
I like not being time-slotted to an hour min or max when using auras
17
u/Iamironman956 For the war God! Aug 06 '26
This for me is a big change, before I wouldn't do some skilling things if I didn't feel like doing it the full hour because it felt wasteful using an aura for only 20-30 mins, now I can jump around between things how I want and feels a lot more enjoyable doing a few things over an hour or two than doing the same thing for that time because I'm using an aura or extended aura.
5
u/Zelderian 200M all, 2m Abby Demon KC Aug 06 '26
Also I’m glad to not have to min/max aura usage around premier resets and cooldowns. I know I never had to, but it felt like a waste not to. Nobody wanted to use a good aura and waste the majority of it.
-7
u/Revent7 Aug 06 '26
Except since they moved the Penance/Vampyrism aspects to the Ancient Spellbook, I am still forced into hour min maxing with multicasting the aspect since I wanna use Vulnerability or Enfeeble hexes on the Normal Spellbook.
2
u/XawdrenRS Skills at 120: 18/29 Aug 06 '26
Spellbook swap is there for you my guy. I use this all the time camping ancients to re-up my temporal anomaly.
-3
u/Revent7 Aug 06 '26
Wait, really? Oh Guthix, I had NO idea!
Sarcasm beside, no, Spellbook Swap is not the answer you think it is. It adds extra clicks and costs that while not world ending is really annoying in the long run. Believe me, I did test this when they announced the stupid change to switch Penance from Normal to Ancient Spellbook. When I am on Normal Spellbook, I can just click my quick key to cast Vulnerability to my target. If I have to spellbook swap it, I have to first spellbook swap, then cast the Vulnerability, paying the rune costs for both which also mean less inventory space either with the extra runes or having to carry yet another rune pouch.
Also if I wanna use magic in combat, your selected auto-cast spell is not saved between spellbook swaps. If I am on Ancient Spellbook while using magic combat and want to use spellbook swap to cast Vulnerability from the Normal Spellbook, my character stops attacking 'coss on Normal Spellbook I do not have auto-cast spell selected.
And before you mention Vulnerability bombs exist, yes they do and they are also almost 20x times more expensive than the cost of runes needed to cast the Vulnerability hex spell.
Ideally it would be just better and simpler if they would allow us to have the stupid Penance/Vampyrism aspect on the Normal Spellbook also.
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u/XawdrenRS Skills at 120: 18/29 Aug 06 '26
You can't autocast while using vuln/enfeeble anyways due to gcd, so your point about not attacking during spellbook swap is invalid. Vuln bombs don't trigger the gcd, which is why they are preferred over casting and rightly more expensive to use.
There is next to no reason to ever camp normal spellbook for magic combat when you have incite fear, exsanguinate, and smoke cloud available. The only exception is if you need crumble undead. Camping normal just so you can quick cast vuln and enfeeble is nerfing your damage for not having access to smoke cloud when magic's whole identity is crit damage.
-2
u/Revent7 Aug 06 '26
Look, my main issue is that I don't want to be having deal with Spellbook Swap when I am using Necromancy. Before I could just camp Normal Spellbook, cast Vulnerability whenever and Penance every 12min. Now I am beforehand forced to switch to Ancient Spellbook, multicast Penance, then switch back Normal to be able to use Vulnerability without having to deal with the hassle of extra clicks and costs of switching spellbooks during combat. So I am stuck with the exact same problem as people before cried with the auras (except worse since I can't stack Penance with other aspects). There was no reason the Penance/Vampyrism aspects couldn't be on both Spellbooks.
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u/XawdrenRS Skills at 120: 18/29 Aug 06 '26
I'd agree that penance should be available on the normal spellbook, but vampyrism doesn't make sense lore wise. At least you aren't locked out of the aspect when your timer runs out which I thought was the root of the issue, since you can just recast it and runes being very cheap in the late game. People felt stuck doing certain content for the entire hour because they would be locked out for 3 hours waiting on the cooldown so they had to get the most out of it.
-5
u/Brandgevaar Aug 06 '26
Yep, this is the problem with cauldrons in the PoH atm.
5
u/_shadesmar_ Aug 06 '26
How is that even remotely the same?
2
u/Brandgevaar Aug 06 '26
You drink ten doses of overloads, now you're locked into a combat activity for an hour. Same as when you activated an extended maniacal aura.
1
u/_shadesmar_ Aug 06 '26
But you are not? The overload does not go on a cooldown you need a resource to get rid of, or can't get rid of at all? You can reapply at any time
1
u/concblast Conc Blast Aug 07 '26
You can't refund your doses at the cauldron so yes it does lock you in for the hour which defeats all of the benefits of the aura removal. Cooldowns were solved by aura refreshes. Adding in a custom dose count or ability to top up by one dose would fix so much.
1
u/_shadesmar_ Aug 07 '26
I can't say I agree at all, but I do see what you're saying. Adding a custom amount would indeed be good though, great suggestion
1
u/Brandgevaar Aug 07 '26
You could argue the overloads are the resource you need. That said, obtaining ovls isn't timegated unlike aura refreshes.
Still, just like with auras, it doesn't feel good to waste 30mins of dosage when it could've been no waste. Scrimshaws would be the perfect system. Let us toggle on up to 24h of ovl at the cauldron, then toggle it off whenever we want to do something else.
56
u/KobraTheKing Aug 06 '26
Loved it from day 1.
No more multi-year timegate to get all auras.
No silly glow and extra UI.
Way less need to care about timers, whether reset or duration.
Less micromanaging. Less to remember. Just go do stuff.
Auras had a pretty bad track record historically. I still remember the days where you had no resets, they were only from loyalty points, and they ran while logged out. That accounts for most of their existence.
6
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26
All of the issues you noted could have been addressed without a full removal.
2
u/Own_Barber_7025 Aug 07 '26
Every aura effect being converted into levelling passives was a common opinion. How can you keep auras and adjust it so that each of this guys complaints are resolved? It’s literally impossible.
0
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 07 '26
No it wasn't.
People don't seem to have any trouble with god books, but apparently auras were too hard to figure out lmao
1
u/Own_Barber_7025 Aug 07 '26
Doesn’t change that it is impossible to fulfil the guys requests, which means the claim that it was possible is clearly wrong
1
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 07 '26
No it's not my dude. You've just decided that because you don't want to.
1
u/Own_Barber_7025 Aug 08 '26
Explain how the auras can remain without a single additional ui panel. There would be no way to view auras.
2
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 08 '26
Why is the UI an issue? Do you realize auras were literally items originally before that UI was added?
2
u/retrospectivevista Aug 06 '26
Yeah, I think a lot of people have very fixed mindsets and can't conceptualize that these aspects could have just been removed from auras. And the result would largely have been better.
5
u/KobraTheKing Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26
Not hard to conceptualise, the system could be altered in many ways. Just that I didn't like any aspects of auras beyond the effects of auras themselves, and aura removal was removing the poor system but keeping the relevant effects around in some form. I used to have milder stance on auras that they could have been addressed, but I'm glad we skipped the half measures.
I don't think it should have been an item slot given how immaterial auras were compared to actual items in other slots
I didn't like their visuals
I didn't like how they were obtained
I didn't like how their duration and cooldown worked (or resets)
I didn't like it adding another layer of UI
I didn't like how nonexistant it was within lore or the world because they were never integrated into the setting at all. Spells, incantations, prayers bother with that. Auras didn't.
At some point what is there even left after that?
I assume most that go "it could have been addressed without full removal" didn't have issue with all these points, or most of them. I did. For me, removal as we got it was pretty much what I wanted, because it kept the interesting effects but had them be far better integrated into game systems and setting. Auras got the sigil slot fate with its removal, and I do think it earned it.
1
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 07 '26
At some point what is there even left after that?
EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THOSE QUESTIONS WAS ADDRESSABLE, and plenty would be left. Your incredulity is disingenuous. I don't even think you lack creativity at this point. You are straight up willfully ignorant.
2
u/KobraTheKing Aug 08 '26 edited Aug 08 '26
You seem to mistake a disagreement on solution for a lack of vision or ignorance. I heard your god book charge/toggle idea and I think its worse than the removal from what little you said on it.
There is a lot that could be done, but it also has to be better than what we got and thats the part that keeps failing. I don't have any of your disaste for the removal, and actively think aura system was a mistake from release to removal.
There would not be plenty left, and it would be really easy for system (that would unrecognisable as auras with said changes) to run afoul of things like "I don't think it deserved an equipment slot". I very rarely am pro removal of things in the game. Hell, I was originally "change auras" until I realised removal was the better answer.
I don't know why I bother with this reply. I'm being called disingenious for no reason by someone that think that liking removal of one of the most consistently heavily criticised systems require fucking astroturfing and isn't broad community sentiment.
1
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 08 '26
Of course you don't like the god book idea when your position requires to to reject any ideas. You wouldn't concede anything at this point, simply for the sake of argument and ego. I'm calling your out for others, not to convince you.
2
u/KobraTheKing Aug 08 '26
I disagree with your idea because its not particularily compelling an idea. You barely expand on it yet seem to think its so self evidently the better solution without bothering to sell it and anyone that disagrees will get random insults at them because it can't be that what you envision won't have everyone on board or just isn't that great. We have a pocket slot. Why do we need a second pocket slot separate system.
It must be ignorance, or lack of creativity, or astroturfing, or people being married to an idea and narrow minded and being filled with ego and arguments. It can't be what you propose or how you present it, the people who disagree are the problem, even though you don't seem to get support for your stance normally.
You've not called out anything, because your comments have been so consistently off the mark that you've never bothered to engage in honest convo and you're yelling at some strawman in your head. Frankly, everything you've levied at me seem to be self reporting.
0
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 08 '26 edited Aug 08 '26
The pocket slot is already cluttered with too many items. People ask for second ring slots all the time. You haven't fundamentally justified why a second pocket slot isn't a good thing. Nor is it even fair to say the aura slot is a second pocket slot, since they have totally different effects. The "aspect" spells are fundamentally just an more fiddly equipment slot anyway, they didn't actually make the aura slot problem, just made it more annoying to use and maintain.
We keep getting told the new philosophy is "play your way" but it's largely been "here's what we think the majority do, so that's all you can do now, enjoy!"
And once again, you prove my point - you lack creativity to think of solutions and your only goal was to hear what I said and attempt to argue against it, poorly. You are very predictable. It's laughable that you complain about the lack of honest convo when you rarely if ever engage in it yourself, then get surprised when people who know you stop engaging honestly. Self-reporting indeed, no wonder you need to hide your comment history.
1
u/retrospectivevista Aug 07 '26
Aside from the UI, all that could be easily fixed if you think about it. Though I don't see how they contributed to the UI problem, they were just a single box in the worn equipment. We wouldn't have had to deal with more aspects, for one thing. The ones that directly transferred over into full passive effects were fine to remove, but not all them were easily transferable, if at all.
2
u/Plightz Just like that ;) Aug 06 '26
Facts. Idk why people are so attached to auras too, fuck if remove the bandaid and if people cry so be it. All the crying is from very specific things too like being too lazy or stripping away stacking auras and aspects.
-1
u/wrincewind Questmeister Aug 06 '26
I constantly forgot to apply my auras before doing things, and then felt like an idiot for not using them.
10
u/Blasphemiee Aug 06 '26
As a filthy casual those where items someone like me has a hard time keeping track of. I recently came back and had completely forgot about them until I read this post lol. The game already has SO much in it.. it is easy to forget items when you are leaving the bank after a 6+ month long break.
4
u/Terrible-Support3416 Aug 06 '26
Filthy casual? No. The average player.
5
u/Blasphemiee Aug 06 '26
You need a new user name that was incredibly supportive thank you, you're right.
3
8
u/Radyi the tainted Aug 06 '26
I think largely they have been changed for the better, however some of the changes ignored that the auras were effectively always up (ie you would do farming every time greenfingers was up, because your crops couldnt realistically grow faster) and then nerfed them because they would 'always be up'. I think this was a bit disingenious and some of the buffs should be added back in. Felt bad losing power. Another thing is something like darkness being unable to work with penance/vamp, which was previously possible.
8
u/Lasershot-117 Completionist + MQC Aug 06 '26
My only annoyance has been not being able to use Darkness + Penance or Darkness + Vampyrism at the same time.
7
u/BigArchive Aug 06 '26
vampirism is basically unusable thanks to the heal cap....mainly using dodge aspect 24/7
People hate on the vamp aspect wayyy too much. Vamp beats darkness in a lot of scenarios. I've tested exactly how much vamp heals compared to darkness at 11 different places so far (admittedly, most of them slayer), and vamp aspect outperforms darkness at every single one.
2
u/Ruuxe Completionist Aug 06 '26
Maybe for slayer yes. But for high end pvm the 20% dodge equates to a lot more hp saved. Just because you'll be taking frequent large hits
5
u/BigArchive Aug 07 '26
You might be surprised. Even at something like Raksha, which is single target and relatively endgame, with hefty autos, vamp (3-4.5k lp/minute) was performing twice as good as darkness (1.5k lp/min)... You need to be very endgame or have some very bad armour before darkness starts to beat vamp.
1
u/Ruuxe Completionist Aug 07 '26
I'll give it some more testing before I write it off then! Thanks :)
6
u/Alone-Horse2857 Completionist Aug 06 '26
I was excited when they first announced it. I always fucking hated auras. It's pay to win with extra steps.
5
u/Unodeaks Aug 06 '26
Yeah its a bit inconvenient to get the new passive but I agree it feels better.
4
u/TheLordOfStuff_ Aug 06 '26
Love these positive posts, and I fully agree with you here. I was miffed at first but now I like it. Having penance permanently active for alle bossing I do is such a quality of life and has honestly removed my need for super prayer renewals.
4
u/Aleucard Aug 06 '26
Literally my only complaint is that penance/vampyrism didnt need the stealth nerf and should have been a Wars totem unlock rather than adding a conflict with darkness/AD.
7
u/RoflWotl Aug 06 '26
Fully agree: it is great to feel free to start and end some pvming/bossing whenever I like. It gives much more freedom, and in fact I found myself not using the new potion cauldron yet because I prefer this flexibility. It is now so easy to switch to some rl activities and back as well.
12
3
u/Rossmallo Maxed 06/04/2024. 3-Month League Advocate. Aug 06 '26
It's great to see that more and more people are reaching the "post-withdrawal" phase of the Cold Turkey process.
It did absolutely suck for a while, but it was definitely the right thing to do.
3
u/Vast_Temperature_211 Completionist Aug 06 '26
I really don’t miss the toxic feeling of having to lock myself to the one skilling activity for an hour because if I was doing it outside that hour I wasn’t being “optimal” with my resources.
7
Aug 06 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
0
u/Iamironman956 For the war God! Aug 06 '26
This I feel would be the biggest impact before 99, no other aura had such a huge change in how the skill was changed they mostly just made it a bit better.
5
u/WryGoat Aug 06 '26
The only thing I still miss is the farming aura. The yields are still lower even with the harvest unlock and my starblooms are diseased all the time.
9
u/malibujukebox Aug 06 '26
Yah I don’t miss them, but still feel a bit salty about losing my Mahjarrat Aura which I had just purchased around Nov 2025. Oh well, it is what it is.
4
u/ThePenisHammer Aug 06 '26
I was in the same boat! Had pretty much just gotten it and it was gone 😭
2
u/DrayxArt Aug 06 '26
FOR REAL
That and boss instances being free makes RuneScape feel less like a job, that I've ironically been spending more time on it lmfao
3
u/ginganinja1256 Aug 06 '26
Only thing I don’t really love is not being able to use penance/vamp with AD/Darkness/Temp, but that’s pretty minor in the scheme of things tbf
3
u/throwthe20saway Filthy casual Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Vampirism and Penance aspects would be fine if they're added to the game as they are now.
The change feels like going backwards and making life difficult. Like if they removed the freecam mode on the interface, and forces you to craft an orb of oculus from materials (requires Magic level and completion of 4 quests) and keep it wielded while it drains from your charge pack, just to re-access the pre-existing functionality.
And it requires more micromanaging because you have to be on the right spellbook, doesn't last for a fixed duration, has specific rune upkeep you have to remember, and doesn't have an aura slot for easy tracking.
2
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
People are really drinking the Jagex kool-aid. I suspect a number of posts like this are astroturfed by their employees.
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u/TidyCups Aug 06 '26
Do people who post this sort of shit, and the ones glad-handing along with them in the responses understand that beyond the specifics of aura removal, Jagex set a precedent to remove items on a whim, with absolutely no compensation, no apologies, nothing...???
Nobody was being forced to buy or use auras.
0
u/Psych0sh00ter Quest points Aug 06 '26
I'm sorry you had to find out this way, but you aren't a real human being
3
u/ShinyCapeRS Enthusiast Aug 06 '26
They still haven't been incorporated all the way though which is frustrating. 10% damage reduction from aegis is not incoporated, concurent vampyrism + darkness, penance+ darkness etc.
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u/Trip_Owen Aug 06 '26
Yeah because you don’t need any of this. It’s way too broken
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u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Yeah, t90 weapons are and above are broken too. Actually, every new update is 'broken' if you just arbitrarily decide you don't like it and look for any reason to discount it.
Get a real reason
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u/Zepertix Working on Soul Wars Remastered Aug 07 '26
Mahj + eq + all zerker auras with no downside + insp + invig all wrapped together + darkness or vamp
Or choose one auras and darkness.
Vamp was never the good choice to begin with. We have obtained severely more power from combat update and people feel like they somehow still need vamp on top of all of it when we are so much stronger now.
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u/DargonofParties Aug 06 '26
The scaling back of power was kind of necessary, tbh. This game has so many stacking buffs it can become a hassle to keep track of all of them.
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u/Zepertix Working on Soul Wars Remastered Aug 07 '26
Its not even that, we have the majority of auras just inherently baked in, we are stronger now than before, we just dont have vamp also its just a choice just like it always was (and very rarely the right choice)
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u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26
Alright, let's scale back t90+ weapons then. That's what actually broke the game. Power creep only matters when you decide it does, apparently.
2
u/DargonofParties Aug 06 '26
Yes, let's nerf the legendary weapons, like the FSOA (previously nerfed), Roar and Ode (literally only used as a spec switch if you own an FSOA), EZK (had to be buffed), lengswords (already reworked), BOLG (utilizes ammunition that is tedious to make, negligible drawback for mains but someone has to do that hard work regardless), and necromancy weapons (combat style already nerfed by the removal of Auras).
Wait, most of the items on that list have already been nerfed in some way. What's your point, here?
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u/Zepertix Working on Soul Wars Remastered Aug 06 '26
Vamp + darkness is still far worse than what we have now
3
u/xxlibrarisingxx Aug 06 '26
I miss them
1
u/blorfff Aug 07 '26
i miss being able to pop an aura to save myself when i run out of food/pray pots (yes i know this is a me problem). and popping a dwarven instinct to spice up a boring bit of skilling.
1
u/iMidNitee Aug 06 '26
You still have them as passives, what are you on about?
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u/Late-Truck-3304 Aug 06 '26
no, we have much worse versions of them as passives. for example legendary greenfingers aura gave us 15% extra chance of an crop, the bountiful harvest 2 we got as a replacement is only 7%, so less than half. aura was up for every single herb run.
on top of that the aura made crops immune to disease while it was active, so 20min of disease immunity when herbs take like an hour to grow, so quite useful, after the removal I feel like I see diseased herbs way way more often.
and also now you have to grind quite a lot for some of the passives.. 30k crux eqal favor or 5k pilfer points etc.. I dont think ill ever go back and grind the pilfer points.
0
u/KobraTheKing Aug 06 '26
Both of those point prices frankly are way nicer and well placed than what was, for fresh accounts, 14 month wait time for a single legendary aura (precluding you from buying any other aura).
It did speed it up... to 8 months to reach a legendary aura, once you had built up to getting maximum loyalty points a month.
Getting most of the useful ones was like a decade of waiting thing.
2
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26
Yeah, there was absolutely no way to keep auras but change how they were earned and maintained. You always pretend that's not an option, that the only option was how it worked before or nothing at all.
Always a laughable position.
1
u/KobraTheKing Aug 07 '26
My position has literally only been that I prefer the solution we got to alternative suggestions I've seen.
Its not a grand revelation that you can change this and that aspect of the system. I've never pretended that wasn't an option. We've changed things about auras repeatedly through the games history, of course we could have changed it further and more radically.
But auras, like sigil slot, was poorly integrated and an ill fit for the game that should have never been made a slot in the first place. Sure I didn't like how resets worked, or the duration, or how they were earned, but frankly I did not like auras conceptually as an immaterial item slot or visually either. Whats even left at that point, the effects themselves which is largely the one thing that survived?
We're clearly not going to see eye to eye on this, but I thought at least you'd be honest of my stance, given that you keep responding to me on the topic. I'm not going to convince you that deletion was the correct path, and you're not going to convince me that with this and that change auras were worth keeping. Whatever it was that made you fond of auras, has never appeared for me.
1
u/Late-Truck-3304 Aug 06 '26
Well, I for example stopped my iron to play group iron cause they had all auras unlocked, and that was a primary reason for it.. now the auras are gone and now It feels kinda pointless to play GIM (I play alone) but I still got 6 months premier left and am kinda invested into this account already so dunno, I miss auras personally.
but yes the system was very shit for normal accounts, but I think they could have just given them for free for everyone just like how GIMs got em.
2
u/Alone-Horse2857 Completionist Aug 06 '26
I was excited when they first announced it. I always fucking hated auras. It's pay to win with extra steps.
2
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u/omgatyphlosion Aug 06 '26
Yeah its something im getting used to. i was conditioned for so long to do 1 hour long boss runs. it felt so weird for a while lmao
2
u/So_ Yellow partyhat! Aug 06 '26
What are you doing about familiars? I still only start bossing if I know I have a clear hour
1
u/seejoshrun Aug 06 '26
Is ~100k of input cost really that important to schedule around? Especially when you could just go for half an hour, then use the other half hour later?
2
u/So_ Yellow partyhat! Aug 06 '26
i farm 2k zamorak, I could summon 100 kalgs with the profit I make from one kill in commons. Doesn’t mean I’d like to waste duration on them.
Also I log in pretty frequently during the day to… not pvm? I might do 5 herb runs during the day, boom, half my kalg just wasted.
1
u/seejoshrun Aug 06 '26
It feels like a pretty minor thing to optimize around, especially given your flair. But you do you
1
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u/Mahjaarrat Aug 07 '26
I’m hoping for a future reward that let’s us use two aspects at the same time.
0
u/dark1859 Completionist Aug 06 '26
Mixed.I feel like they've handled a good part of it decently with it now being through skilling benefits , but there are more than a few auras that either just cease to exist entirely , which completely crippled necromancy , because of it ( it wasAlready a pretty bad style, and no.Adding a shitty invention , perk does not fix the problem lol)
And i'm just gonna say this the way they handled vampirism and penance feels like a goddamn travesty... i'll give them credit where it's due.Not having to rely on hour long timers is very much appreciated, but losing access to things like wisdom and a lot of the fun auras with no replacement, ever going to come just sucks, and I get admittedly quite tired of the people who are constantly glazing it. When these issues I have raised here , have still gone unaddressed
1
u/ToGloryRS To Glory Aug 06 '26
I'm glad that some of "you" are finally seeing what we meant back then :) Way less fomo, isn't it?
They were just numbers that you had to use in a very annoying way, at the end of the day. Now those numbers are gone, but so is the crunch surrounding them.
1
u/SexualHarassadar Aug 06 '26
Only thing I dislike about Aura removal is that combat Auras were replaced with the ability to get 120 in the combat skills, but this came after combat XP was nerfed across the board and at best you're looking at another 40 hour grind PER skill to get back to your old power level.
2
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26
Yeah people who talk about the auras just being put into combat are being super disingenuous.
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u/SexualHarassadar Aug 06 '26
As someone who did ED3 to get all of my combat skills from the 70s to the 99s, it feels super weird that I'm now being asked to get 8x the total XP in each skill with slower methods.
(I totally get why ED3 farming had to be nerfed when they only went to 99, but now it's just a slog)
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u/Alone-Horse2857 Completionist Aug 06 '26
I was excited when they first announced it. I always fucking hated auras. It's pay to win with extra steps.
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u/Vaikiss 4.1/5.8 btw Aug 06 '26
I miss auras and some skilling feels worse now that auras are removed
-1
u/ConstantStatistician Coiner of the terms "soft" and "hard" typeless damage on rs.wiki Aug 06 '26
The game is better off without them. Not every aura effect was transferred over to other content, though.
2
u/Azaldir Ironman Solo DG Enjoyer Aug 07 '26
Nor was it necessary for them to be either, to be fair.
0
u/CourtneyDagger50 Rainbow Aug 06 '26
Can we at least get something else added to buy with marks of war? Im tired of getting the popup that im at the Cap
2
u/Azaldir Ironman Solo DG Enjoyer Aug 07 '26
Pretty sure they've said that they want to entirely remove Marks of War. They won't do so until they've decided upon/implemented a substitution for sign of life refreshing.
0
u/Rombom [KARIL THE TAINTED] Aug 06 '26
Obligatory comment.
Combat auras were handled poorly. Aspects are a clunky system. Issues with auras could have been addressed, cooldown/duration was easily solved by converting to a charge-based system. The transference of aura stats into combat levels doesn't fully solve these issues.
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u/JustTrawlingNsfw Aug 07 '26
A charge based system would have forced people into a "I have to do x content every y hours to not waste charges"
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u/SpazzBro Clue scroll Aug 06 '26
I love not being locked into an hour of whatever I just obligated myself to do
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u/Ilikelamp7 Kill them with kindness Aug 06 '26
Kinda still do that with instances and cauldron timers
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u/ConstantStatistician Coiner of the terms "soft" and "hard" typeless damage on rs.wiki Aug 06 '26
Instances are free now. You don't need to drink cauldrons, just drink the potions 6 minutes at a time. Same with aspects. The main 1 hour buff now are familiars, which cost around 100k at most.
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u/Ilikelamp7 Kill them with kindness Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
I know instances are free. I was talking about the hour duration. I don’t know of a single familiar that is being used that has a 60 minute timer.
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u/SpazzBro Clue scroll Aug 06 '26
I mean I don’t personally have it, but a lot of people I know use the totem of summoning for longer familiar duration. Also dismissing a kalg doesn’t feel nearly as bad as wasting an aura lol
0
u/ConstantStatistician Coiner of the terms "soft" and "hard" typeless damage on rs.wiki Aug 07 '26
Instances are free and functionally infinite. Nothing forces you to stay the whole hour because you won't lose any money from it. It's the other buffs that cost money.
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u/Eragore_Rs 41k 5.8b Aug 06 '26