Assist System

The Assist System allows players to use each others' skill levels temporarily. The Assist System is designed to be a replacement for obtaining items through risky and unbalanced trades that could be abused to scam players. Previously, if a player did not have the requisite skill level for a task, they would have to ask a friend to help them through a trading process, risking his or her items. Using the Assist System, one simply "borrows" the friend's skill level, ensuring that the items needed for the task do not leave the player's inventory. The friend receives all skill experience in such use.

This feature was released on 5 November 2007. On 12 November 2007, an update was released that removed the Fishing, Hunter, Mining, and Woodcutting (the item extraction skills) from the Assist System, due to player complaints on the official forums and elsewhere (including a few minor riots) that this ruined work ethics. After the change, the complaints quickly died down.



Usage
With the Assist System there is a new right-click option for players, labeled "Req Assist". Assistance requests are similar to trade requests, in that the target player receives a message in the chat box which when clicked opens up a window. The target player is unable to move or do anything other than chat to friends or surrounding players whilst the window is open.

Most of the non-combat skills are displayed in the window, along with the amount of experience the target player has gained through the Assist System in the past 24 hours. Any of the skills can be clicked, which gives the skill level to the player who requested it. If the player requesting assistance already has the requisite skill level to do something, they will gain experience rather than the target player, even if the target player has lent their level.

When using the Assist System, if the assister uses a temporary boost, its effects will also pass to the assisted player.

The Assist icon will appear in the bottow right corner of the game window of the player being assisted.

Restrictions
The following restrictions apply to usage of the Assist System:


 * It cannot be used for any combat skills except Magic.
 * It cannot be used for Woodcutting, Fishing, Mining, Hunter, Thieving, Firemaking and Agility.
 * Does not work for quests, Achievement Diary segments, and minigames.
 * Only 30 000 experience can be gained each day through assisting others. Once this limit is reached, it is impossible to assist any further.
 * Assist requests can only be sent if the target player has set the "assist" option at the bottom of the interface to a group that includes you ("friends" if on their friend list, otherwise "on").
 * The player lending their skills must remain within 20 squares of the player they are assisting.

Trivia

 * When the Knowledge Base Article on the main RuneScape page first came out, the picture showing "Req Assist" from the player "A" had a Right-Click "Report Abuse" option. This picture has since been removed and replaced with a new one with the clarification update.