Quote (jagex)
The skill is unique and not similar to any other skill.
It will involve all current skills!
The skill will partially be F2P.
The new skill will take you beyond the current free map.
Aspects of the skills will be good for Pures in PVP.
It won’t have any impact on your combat level.
The skill doesn't start with a ‘B’.
Training will not be money driven. [5]
A ship is featuring in it quite prominently
It's not Sailing or anything like that.
There will be no start quest.
No other skill levels required for any part of the skill.
Everything else in this post, from here on, is just my thoughts and speculation, but im kind of a big deal so its probably trueWill start with a list of talking points just like the jagex quotes above, then can branch out in further depth and explanation when a discussion comes up
first off, name of the skill, it wont be anything simple like boating or proficiency or raiding, it will be a name that, if spoken to someone who didnt play the game, they would not be able to deduce what the skill consists of. the name is simply something epic to get people excited to try this game. If i were to guess, this new skill will be named (one word) to imply a journey/destination/development of character, possibly including some reference to the soul, to further emphasize the individualized aspect of the skill.
In order to preserve the integrity of the "end game" gear, or, to "not revolutionize" it, there wont be new "craftable or otherwise acquired" gear, which some people anticipating would come from a "proficiency or weapon mastery" skill.
I think item drop tables in the game as a whole have room for expanding, but summoning stretches the system already, i dont forsee having to pick up regular monster loot, charms, and then a third skill reagent off average monster kills, so i rule that out. I think the introduction of hundreds of new items in the form of seeds, tools, products, etc, from farming was over the top as well.
I think there will be an item-drop system integrated into the new skill, but it will be a rag and bone man-style semi-rare drop semi-"expected" drop. These items will not be something you farm for exp in the skill, they wont be farmed for money, it will be restricted in a way. The drops wont be able to fuel the skill as a standalone item.
There wont be a significant amount of money required other than to buy supplies that you would normally have for training skills/fighting before the new skill, you might need to pay small sums in the course of the skill to an npc for some service such as in a quest or achievement diary.
Now, for the actual idea behind the skill itself, i think the "ship featuring prominently" will be the initial "face" of the skill. The skill is heavily based on individual character development, extending the reach of your experience in the game being solely reflected by your stats and the money you have. I think this ship may be used in beginning a story of telling your characters past, the story which would then catch up to the present and proceed into the actual gameplay stage of the present.
The skill isnt driven by solely by mechanical actions such as camping a bank for 3 hours at a time training "new skill". experience is gained dynamically, somewhat like slayer, except not a task of monsters to kill, and with more flexibility on choosing what to do yourself instead of being assigned. You wont be nailed down and forced to fletch bows or mine ore to gain exp in the new skill.
Experience gain in the skill will be a mix between three systems, as followed
1. strict time restraints - you wont be capped on amount of experience per day through something like number of possible drops, or number of things discovered since last reset, but, say you are looking to come across a random item laying on the floor in a target area (example), the frequency at which the item persists may be lower based on the amount you have found in the past "x amount of time/days/etc", leading to ->
2. exponential training time - someone who "trains" this new skill 5 hours per week (example) will not gain a full experience rate, no matter how high their other stats, gear, efficiency, skill is. On the same note, someone who trains the new skill 50 hours per week (example, but take note of the proportionality) will not gain 10 times the experience of the person who trains 5 hours per week. Experience rates (over a long period of time) will be harder to attain the higher they get, although there wont be a strict cap, but there will be a discrepancy between training speed of different players (unlike say, firemaking, where everyone burns logs at the same general speed)
There will not be a direct requirement to train, you will be able to do this skill in different methods, so that it is nearly the same for people who want to level through combat, or exploration and non-combat skills, which leads to the individualization of what each player gets out of the skill.
as for incentives for leveling the new skill, item imbues for pre-existing items, area/boss attunements similar to WGS for tormented demons, but not as rigid as slayer where you need a firm level in order to access a feature. The progression choices will give inherant bonuses to other skills, but nothing groundbreaking in terms of experience rates, something similar to stealing creation where time invested can be utilized to gain experience in another skill similar to if you had just trained the individual skill in the same time frame.
this is only a few points of the skill, im sure alone this wont describe a skill at all unless you already know the basics of what im saying
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