Evolution of Combat

The Evolution of Combat is a complete rework of RuneScape ' s combat system, released on 20 November 2012. Billed as "one of the largest content updates in RuneScape ' s history", the evolution brings a variety of new content including powerful abilities, dual weapon wielding, new Magic and Ranged equipment, and new Prayers. In addition, the combat triangle has been massively balanced, monsters have new attacks, and the combat level formula has been revised.

To accommodate the enormous changes, Jagex ran a beta for six months, where players could enter specialised worlds with the new combat system loaded on them. These worlds were segregated from the rest of RuneScape: nothing done on them had any effect on the live version of the game.

Intentions
Jagex have introduced the Evolution of Combat for many reasons that they have stated:
 * To balance out the combat triangle. Previously, melee was much more powerful in most cases when compared to Ranged and Magic
 * To make the combat system "more fluid, interactive and exciting for everyone"
 * To refocus combat to be more about player skill
 * To encourage a variety in combat equipment

Leak


On 4 May, five images of ability icons were uploaded to the Official RuneScape Wiki by a Jagex Moderator. Each picture showed 12 different abilities, in Attack, Strength, Defence, Ranged and Magic. They were soon noticed by the community.

News
On 11 May, the first news about a combat update was posted. It laid the groundwork for future posts, explaining that there would be a beta prior to the full launch. Additional posts were made in the next weeks, showing off pictures of the evolution and explaining the beta registration process. A Combat HQ page was set up that gave more concrete details, including the first explanation of abilities and the ability bar. A week later, there were posts about buffs and weaknesses, adrenaline, and a day before the beta, dual wielding.

Og Blogs
Mod Mark (Og) wrote four substantial blogs about the upcoming EoC update enumerating Jagex's goals and explaining many of the major concepts of the evolution for the first time.

Videos
Before the Evolution of Combat beta was released, the official Jagex YouTube channel released four videos regarding some changes to the new combat system.

The first video briefly showed some different types of abilites with melee, ranged, and magic. It did not include much content as it was just a mention of the Evolution of Combat.

The second video first talked about the hit splats that occur, where it was revealed that "no background" hits are normal hits, whereas the red background hits are attacks done with abilities. The video also introduced a new interface which shows the weaknesses of an opponent and the effects currently affecting them such as being bound or being under the affects of a potion. Another interface was also introduced which allowed the player to choose whether their attacks gained them either Attack, Strength, Defence, or all three if using melee,  Magic, Defence, or both if using magic, or Ranged, Defence, or both if using ranged weapons.

The third video introduced the concept of Adrenaline and the action bar. The different categories for abilities (basic, threshold, and ultimate) were also announced.

The fourth video revealed dual wielding and how it works. Most weapons have their own offhand equivalent, and some weapons that existed in the main servers prior to the release of the EoC which were mainly used for their special attack, such as the Enhanced Excalibur, were turned into offhand weapons. Magical orbs and ranged shields were also revealed.

Forums
Just before the Combat Beta was released, Mod Rathe and other Jagex Moderators were hosting Question and Answer threads about the Evolution of Combat on the forums. Many details were mentioned about many topics regarding the Evolution of Combat.

Combat beta
Players had to register before the release to gain access to the worlds, and not everyone who registered was given immediate access to the beta. In order to register, everyone was given a combat beta contract where a link was found to register the account to play the beta. Players with 12 months of consecutive membership were automatically given access to the beta and 50,000 other members were picked. The servers were released on 26 June 2012, but later on all members had access to the beta worlds on weekends. On 2 November 2012, Jagex opened the combat beta to all players at all times. The beta servers were taken offline on 20 November, when the Evolution of Combat was released to the live game.

Action bar
A customisable interface module, called the action bar, was added above the chat interface. The action bar consists of five palettes of twelve slots, into which players may add shortcuts to abilities, spells, prayers, items, and even some special interface actions like the quick prayer button. Each shortcut is assigned to a key on a player's keyboard; the default keys are the 1-0 numerical keys, as well as the "-" and "=" keys. Players have the option of customising each slot's keybinding to any alphanumerical key. Players can cycle through the five palettes of slots by clicking on the up/down arrows on the right of the action bar or by using a keyboard modifier such as Ctrl, Alt, or Shift (which can also be defined by the player), then pressing the number key that corresponds to the desired palette. For example, if a player who wishes to switch to the third palette and has the Alt modifier key set, he or she would press Alt and 3.

Other features of the action bar include a lock icon that fixes each shortcut in place and prevents them from being moved or deleted. While the action bar is unlocked, players can remove shortcuts from the action bar by dragging them into the trash icon beneath the lock icon. The adrenaline bar is at the top of the action bar. Finally, players can minimise the action bar by clicking the small minimise icon in the top-right; right-clicking this icon also allows players to sheathe/unsheathe their weapons, as well as change targets. While the action bar is minimised, shortcuts cannot be used.

Shortcuts are added to the action bar by dragging and dropping an ability, spell, prayer, item, emote, or special interface action into a slot. When a shortcut is triggered, either by clicking on it or pressing the key that is assigned to it, it acts as though its target has been left-clicked. For example, abilities will activate, prayers will activate/deactivate, and items will have their left-click option activated (so a piece of food, or a dose of potion, will be consumed). In this manner, the action bar can be useful for training non-combat skills, as players can keybind activities that would otherwise require repetitive clicking.

Because the action bar's shortcuts can be bound to any alphanumeric key, players must first press the Enter key in order to type into chat. Minimising the action bar allows players to type into chat without first pressing Enter.

Abilities
To replace the old system of weapons having special attacks, Jagex introduced abilities, combat techniques that characters learn and keep with them at all times. There are multiple abilities for every attack style; melee abilities are separated into abilities for Attack and Strength, while Ranged and Magic have multiple abilities of their own. Additionally, there are abilities for Defence and Constitutionthatprimarily focus on defence and healing. All abilities require a certain level in their associated skill to use, and many have equipment requirements; for example, some melee abilities require a two-handed weapon, and some Ranged abilities require dual-wielded Ranged weapons. Additionally, once an ability is used, players must wait for its cooldown period to expire before it may be used again.

Abilities are separated into three classes, depending on their adrenaline requirements. Basic abilities require no adrenaline and may be executed at the beginning of combat. Once the adrenaline bar is 50% full, threshold abilities may be used. Threshold abilities are much more powerful and effective than basic abilities. When used, they drain the adrenaline bar minimally. Ultimate abilities may only be used once the adrenaline bar reaches 100% capacity. Ultimate abilities are, as the name suggests, a player's most powerful techniques, and the use of an ultimate ability can easily turn the tide of a battle. Once an ultimate ability is executed, the adrenaline bar drains to 0%.

When not using abilities, players will automatically attack their targets with auto-attacks, with a rate that is dictated by their equipped weapon's speed. The damage of auto-attacks can be increased using the ability Momentum, an ultimate ability found in the Constitution tab.

Effects
Abilities can have a wide variety of effects. Some, such as Slice, merely deal extra damage to the target. Some abilities have damage-over-time effects that deal a certain amount of damage over a period of several seconds, in many small damage splats rather than one larger splat. Chain and Ricochet are two abilities that can hit multiple enemies at once. Some abilities stun targets for a short time, which prevents them from taking any action. The abilities for the defence skill can reduce damage taken, reflect damage back at the attacker, heal the user, and even bring the user back to life if the player dies.

Dual Wielding
Many one-handed weapons can now be dual-wielded by equipping their off-hand counterpart. A feature available to members only, dual-wielding allows for faster attacks and an overall higher damage per second (DPS) value, but it sacrifices the defensive advantages of a shield. Some melee and Ranged abilities require that two weapons be wielded. Magic spells cannot be dual-wielded, but players can equip books or orbs in their off-hand which increases casting speed. This results in roughly the same effect as dual-wielding.

Special off-hand versions of many one-handed weapons exist. For example, instead of equipping two regular dragon scimitars, players must equip one dragon scimitar and one off-hand dragon scimitar. The offhand versions of these weapons are obtained in the same manner as the regular versions, either through monster drops, NPC stores, or the Smithing, Crafting, and Fletching skills.

Make-X
The Make-X interface allows players to control how they produce items. It can be opened by using two items on each other (like bow strings on unstrung bows) or by clicking on a tool like a range or an anvil. Depending on membership status, skill levels and materials in the inventory, players will be able to process certain items through the Make-X interface in skills like Smithing, Crafting, Cooking, Fletching and Herblore. Once a recipe has been selected and the skilling begins, a new interface will appear, displaying the experience gained, number left and time remaining. This last interface can be disabled by right clicking the xp counter and selecting "toggle production dialogue". When disabled the make-x operation works at the same pace as when the dialogue is present. The advantage of having it disabled is that the game area is not obstructed.

Equipment
As part of the Evolution of Combat, many aspects of equipment were entirely overhauled.

Weapons
Weapons give bonuses to Accuracy and Damage (damage dealt) to their respective classes. Each player now derives their offensive potential almost entirely from their equipped weapon(s). This solved a balancing issue that had previously existed for years in which melee users could wear any set of armour and still be offensively effective, but rangers and mages had to wear their classes' respective armours. Weapon speeds were refined, reducing the range of available speeds. While some melee weapons may have had multiple attack styles, such as a longsword having stab and slash attacks, all weapons now have only one attack style. As a result, longswords and swords now give the same bonuses, and the only difference is their attack style.

All weapons of the same equipment tier (for example, all rune weapons) have had their stats adjusted in order to have roughly the same damage per second (DPS) value. Slower weapons such as rune spears and rune battleaxes are, theoretically, as effective in combat as faster weapons like rune scimitars and rune daggers. This theoretically rendered the concept of different weapons useless, but in practice it was found that using the attack style that a monster is weak to is needed for maximum efficiency. Two-handed weapons have a 50% higher DPS than one-handed weapons of the same tier in order to compensate for the lack of an off-hand item.Additionally, two-handed crossbows were released to give Ranged an equivalent to the various melee two-handed weapons. Magic staves were all made two-handed, with slower casting speeds, but providing a significant damage increase in return.

Armour
Pieces of armour now give bonuses to the Armour value of their respective class, which is a single value as opposed to the multiple possible defensive bonuses previously available. The Armour value is combined with a player's current class in order to determine their defence against different attacks. A player who equips a set of melee armour will have a high Armour rating that is of the melee class. According to the combat triangle, that player will have a strong defence against Ranged attacks, a moderate defence against melee attacks, and a weak defence against Magic attacks.

All pieces of armour boost lifepoints in a similar manner that torva, pernix, and virtus armours did previously. However, the boosts are much more substantial; players who equip armour sets that are appropriate for their levels receive as much as 60% of their total lifepoint pool from their armour - more if wielding a shield. Currently, it is possible for players to exceed 10,000 life points by equipping the highest-tier equipment available and boosting life points with rocktails and a bonfire.

Armours of different classes, but of the same tier, were adjusted to have the same stats. For example, a dragon platebody is of the same tier as a black d'hide body and a grifolic poncho, as all require level 60 Defence to wear. These three items all give the same bonus to Armour and the same life points boosts, but each gives its armour bonus to its class (Melee, Ranged, and Magic, respectively).

Weaknesses
Player and monster weaknesses in combat were expanded and made more prominent. The combat styles tab was replaced with the Combat tab, where players can view certain information about themselves and their opponent, such as remaining life points, any active buffs or debuffs, and weaknesses. Players have weaknesses as dictated by the style of armour they wear; a player wearing ganodermic armour, a type of Magic armour, will have a weakness to Ranged attacks. Players who attack a monster with that monster's weakness will be more effective offensively, although players are not outright prevented from fighting a monster with a style other than that monster's weakness.

Weaknesses could simply be melee attacks, or stab/slash/crush attacks in particular. Monsters could be weak to Magic attacks in general, or specifically weak to air, water, earth, or fire spells. Different Ranged weaknesses include bolts, arrows, and thrown weapons. However, players will only be weak to one of the three combat styles, not any of the more specific weaknesses.

Most boss monsters, such as generals in the God Wars Dungeon, have no weakness. Against these monsters, all attack styles are equally effective, and players may use whichever offensive styles they like. This was part of an effort to balance the combat triangle, and to make Ranged and Magic more effective in combat. Players may also have no weakness if they equip armour with Armour bonuses to all classes, such as Void Knight equipment. However, such armour usually has lower bonuses than class-specific armour.

New content
New armour types exist to fill gaps in Ranged and Magic armour and to thus balance the Combat triangle. Additionally, there exist new shields and boots for all classes.

New melee equipment
For melee, there are new offhand weapons, such as the offhand chaotic rapier and off-hand dragon scimitar. Some new shields, such as the Bandos warshield, were planned for the Evolution of Combat but were released beforehand into the main game. As the claws were separated into a main-hand and an off-hand weapon, players who had any kind of claws in their banks before the release of the EoC, were notified about the change and had their regular claw and the offhand verison.

New ranged equipment

 * New Ranged armour was created to fill in a low-level tier. Carapace armour can be crafted from carapace, and it requires 30 Ranged and Defence.
 * Hard leather armour and studded leather armour were given boots, gloves and shields to fill out the sets.
 * Ranged armour sets from leather to black dragonhide now include dragonhide shields.
 * Longbows have been turned into shieldbows, which in addition to their offensive bonuses also give defensive and lifepoint boosts.

New magic equipment
New Magic armour was released to fill in missing tiers.
 * Imphide robes - Crafted from imphide. Requires 10 Magic and 10 Defence.
 * Spider silk robes - Crafted from spider silk. Requires 20 Magic and 20 Defence.
 * Batwing robes - Crafted from batwing. Requires 50 Magic and 50 Defence.

In addition, all magic armour sets were updated to include one-handed main weapons (wands), off-hand weapons (orbs) and shields (books). Other sets like virtus and ganodermic armours were given boots and gloves.

Combat level
The combat level formula has been greatly simplified; it is now $$x + Defence + 2$$, where $$x$$ is a player's highest skill level among Attack, Strength, Magic, Ranged and Summoning. Consequently, players will start off at combat level 4, and the maximum combat level is 200. Constitution and Prayer no longer affect combat level.

Experience gain
Previously, players would get combat experience for hitting their opponent after every successful hit. However, players now get the experience after they defeat their opponent, ranging from very little to extremely high XP at a time. This has removed some popular training methods, such as throwing red chinchompas at mummies and attacking a dagannoth sentinel in the Dominion Tower. It also makes group skilling less effective, as only the player who receives the monster's drops receives experience for killing the monster.

To balance this out, there is an interface where players can choose where experience goes for each combat style. For example, while attacking an opponent with melee, a player can choose to receive experience in Attack, Strength, Defence, or all, while attacking with Ranged a player can choose to receive experience in either Ranged, Defence, or both, and while attacking with Magic a player can choose between gaining experience in Magic, Defence, or both.

Attack Styles and Combat Experience
While previously it was possible for a melee weapon to have multiple attack styles, each weapon now only has one style. For example, godswords were previously slash and crush weapons, whereas now they are slash weapons only. Ranged weapons no longer have the option to choose between Accurate, Rapid, and Longrange styles, which respectively increased a player's accuracy, attack speed, and range. Magic weapons no longer have the option to "cast defensively", which split combat experience between Magic and Defence.

Prior to the Evolution of Combat, the chosen attack style would generally determine which skills received combat experience. Additionally, most weapons could only train certain skills; for example, the abyssal whip did not have an option for training Strength. Now, all weapons can train any related combat skill. Melee weapons may train Attack, Strength, Defence, or all three at once; Ranged weapons may train Ranged, Defence, or both at once; Magic weapons may train Magic, Defence, or both at once. When multiple skills are selected for training, experience from killing a monster is evenly split between them.

Monsters
Monsters were greatly affected by the Evolution of Combat. Their combat levels were formatted and range from very low levels up to 210. Some monsters had an increased combat level while others had their combat level lowered. Also, monsters will retaliate against the person that first attacked them instead of attacking the monster that they are currently fighting. Some monsters, like the Dagannoth Kings, are much more difficult and dangerous to kill, while others were made easier to kill.

Some monsters were refitted with a new style of attack, and some had a boost in their defenses against combat styles they were strong against. For example, bloodveld, who used to use a magic-based melee attack now use pure magic attacks instead. Other monsters, such as aberrant spectres, are weak to range now and have much stronger defenses against melee attacks than before.

Because of the combat level changes, many previously aggressive monsters are now tolerant depending on the player's combat level. Some examples are aberrant spectres in the Slayer Tower, most monsters in Kuradal's Dungeon, and trolls (execpt thrower trolls at Death Plateau). Others are more aggressive than before; revenants will attempt to attack players whenever they can, even going to the borders of their wander range.

Multi-Combat and Tagging
Everywhere in RuneScape is multi-combat, including the Wilderness. As a result, familiars can be used anywhere and attack anything. Due to complaints over the multicombat Wilderness caused by a large numbers of rushers and player jumpers, the Single-Way Wilderness ability was introduced that allows you to swap from Multi-combat to Single-combat in the Wilderness, or vice-versa. This requires around a 10 second wait which is interrupted by any actions on the players part or by being attacked. Multi-combat players are shown with two swords crossed on their head.

With regards to player-versus-monster combat, a tagging system was implemented wherein the first player to attack a monster "tags" it, and once the monster dies, only the player with the tag receives experience and drops. This system was added to solve the problem of kill stealing, which had previously existed in multicombat areas prior to the Evolution of Combat; under the old system, experience was awarded per hit, but the kill went to whomever dealt the most damage. Monsters that are meant to be fought in groups, such as many bosses, still use the old system to distribute drops, but experience is still awarded at the kill for all participating players.

Players who attack and tag a monster, then leave combat with it, lose their tag, and the monster heals itself to full health. This mechanic prevents players from dominating an area by tagging multiple monsters at once. Additionally, attacks from the dwarf multicannon will not tag monsters, though they will cause monsters to become aggressive.

Wilderness
Along with the combat updates to the Wilderness, players are now automatically considered "skulled" even though the skull itself no longer exists. This means that if you die, you will lose every item, unless the Protect Item prayer is active. A warning is given in a game or chat box upon entering the Wilderness. Wilderness levels were also changed. For example, if you use a Waka canoe to enter the Wilderness, you will end up at level 42 Wilderness. This was to make up for the range of combat levels, making the Wilderness twice as deadly as before.

Food
The healing power of food has been drastically altered. Each piece of food heals more depending on the player's Constitution level. The amount healed starts off at 200, and is equal to 16 times Constitution level, up to a maximum level at which point it will heal 20 times Constitution and stop increasing. This optimal level is usually tied in with the Cooking level requirement for the food, if any.

For example, level 80 Constitution is the optimal level for eating sharks. At that level, eating a shark will heal 1600 lifepoints, and eating a rocktail will only heal 1280, even though the rocktail is of a higher tier. This creates a demand for many types of food, as the best food is dependent on Constitution level.

Prayers
Protection prayers and deflect curses no longer provide full protection from monsters, but instead give a 50% damage reduction. The Augury and Rigour prayers are no longer unlocked through Dungeoneering; they are available by completing the Knight Waves Training Ground, along with Chivalry and Piety, and any Dungeoneering tokens used to purchase them have been refunded.

There are several new Ancient Curses, unlocked after completing The Temple at Senntisten. Sap Range Strength and Sap Magic Strength were added to the sap curses, in order to differentiate from Sap Ranger and Sap Mage, which drain accuracy rather than strength. In the same vein, Leech Range Strength and Leech Magic Strength were added to the leech curses. The highest level prayer in the game, Turmoil, received Ranged and Magic equivalents in the form of Anguish and Torment; all three unlock at 95 Prayer.

Similar to changes made to the sap and leech curses, new prayers were added to the standard prayer book. Charge, Super Charge, and Overcharge increase Magic strength by varying degrees, and Unrelenting Force, Overpowering Force, and Unstoppable Force increase Ranged strength.

Ammunition
Rune requirements for spells have changed, and on the whole are significantly lower. For example, it is possible to cast Wind Surge using only air runes, instead of air runes, death runes, and blood runes. Ice Barrage costs two blood runes and five water runes. Rush and Burst spells use death runes, whereas Blitz and Barrage spells use blood runes. Additionally, only auto-attacks consume ammunition for rangers and runes for mages; abilities do not consume ammunition.

Poison
Poison once was applied to specific weapons (spears, daggers, arrows) and stayed on permanently. It now works in a manner similar to other potions; drinking a dose of weapon poison will temporarily poison all weapons for a predetermined period. The poison counts as a buff for the player. While fighting monsters, there is a small chance that they will be poisoned for about a minute, and a small poisoned hit will be displayed every ten seconds.

Monster poison was affected too. K'ril's starting poison can vary, and he has the ability to decrease the duration of antipoison effects and increase his poison against players.

Miscellaneous

 * Magic blastboxes and celestial surgeboxes provide unlimited air runes in the ammunition slot, instead of storing runes for combat spells. They now only exist within Daemonheim; players who purchased the boxes from the rewards trader had their tokens refunded, as well as any runes stored in the boxes.
 * The Inspiration aura affects the adrenaline bar instead of the special attack bar.
 * Barrows equipment and Void Knight equipment still retain their set effects. However, they only trigger on auto-attacks, not when abilities are used.
 * Godswords' special attacks were replaced with passive abilities that mimicked their former special attacks. The enhanced excalibur, now the offhand abyssal whip equivalent, has a passive healing effect.
 * Untradable potions such as extreme potions and overloads are usable in the Wilderness.
 * The ring of vigour allows players to retain 5% of the adrenaline bar after using an ultimate ability, instead of the bar draining to 0%.
 * To compensate for the loss of its special attack, Korasi's sword received a stat increase as well as a 1% melee critical bonus.
 * The polypore staff has had Polypore Strike its spell removed from the staff and placed in the spellbook instead. The staff must be wielded to cast the spell, and still degrades based on usage.
 * With the addition of new equipment, some of the old equipment's level requirements were rebalanced to better fit on the new scale. Among the prominent changes, rune equipment was raised from level 40 to 50 Attack and Defence, ganodermic armour was lowered from 85 to 75 Magic and Defence, and glacor boots were raised from 75 to 85 Defence and relevant combat skill.

Release
The Evolution of Combat update was released in the morning of 20 November 2012. The servers were taken offline at 10:16 AM UTC and came back online at roughly 10:20 AM UTC.

When first logging in after the update, players' items were unequipped to their inventory if there was space there, or to their banks otherwise. All players were given 15 extra bank spaces to ensure that this was possible. They were also teleported to a safe location, randomly chosen from Lumbridge, Varrock (East or West bank), Edgeville, Draynor, Falador (East or West bank), Al Kharid or the Grand Exchange.

Market
The removal of special attacks and the reordering of equipment have caused significant price changes in the main game, even prior to the implementation of these changes. In the lead-up to the combat beta, the future removal of special attacks and the equality of godswords was announced. This caused dragon claws and the more expensive godswords to gradually crash to historic lows, although much of this loss was later made up as the Evolution of Combat took so long to implement. When the full release was announced on 7 November, many staples of the old combat system like amulets of fury, dragon claws, dragonfire shields and berserker rings began falling immediately, with the claws specifically losing half of their value in a matter of hours. Torva armour, pernix armour, and the more expensive spirit shields also gradually lost value as the release date approached. Many potions also lost their value, due to potions being overall less effective than before.

Other items however, such as the Fremennik rings (except Berserker), Barrows equipment (execpt Karil's and Dharok's) rose in price because the rings gave a 2.7x bonus of their combat type, and Barrows equipment had the same health and defense as God Wars equipment. Some potions were unaffected because players need it (such as Antifires and Prayer potions).

Free players play minor but noticeable roles inside the market effects. Since the EoC favor weapons with higher damage output and accuracy per hit, Rune warhammer, battleaxe and 2h sword stayed high in price, while rune scimitar losing its focus and dropped towards 13,000 coins throughout the six months of beta. Price of adamant equipment slightly rose because players intending to minimize training time with just 40 to 49 attack/defense, can no longer equip rune items, and adamant is the best type of equipment for them to train to 50 attack/defense, in order to use rune items again.

Population
The EoC had a negative effect on the population. Estimates are that around 10,000 players left the game after the release. Reasons for this vary, but most say that Jagex made a mistake in trying to copy the 'action bar system' in other popular online games, but it is unknown where they have gotten their proof or just stating that because it has only a few aspects of the other games. however, Jagex said they would get new players from this update, in which they probably refer to bringing advertisments about the update to attract new players.