We’re back with a quick update on our Forestry proposal, including the changes we’ve made in line with your feedback, potential release timelines, and, of course, the questions you’ll see in the official Forestry Content Poll on March 1st.
Before we dive in, please note that the specifics of the content may still be tweaked slightly. This applies to stuff like exact XP and GP rewards, skill intensity, and timelines. Don’t worry – the core details will remain the same, and we’ll tell you all about every change we make as soon as we’re able.
One more thing – huge thanks to everyone who’s taken part in the discussions surrounding this exciting new Woodcutting expansion, and GINORMOUS thanks to everyone who filled out the survey. We've updated the original Foresty which you can find here with all the changes!
Now, let’s see the changes!
Timelines and Scale
Following your feedback (and some internal discussion), Forestry will launch as a split-release update. Since this is such a big, exciting project, we want to split the release in half and ensure that all the features are polished, shiny, and ready for you to enjoy at launch.
Obviously, what we release and when may change depending on the results of the poll, but here’s an idea of what we’d like to bundle together:
Phase 1, June 2023:
- Group-Cutting and Tree Behaviour
- Leaves, Campfires and Tea Brewing
- First Batch of Events and Rewards
Phase 2, August 2023 (TBC):
- Balancing Changes
- Second Batch of Events and Rewards
As Leaves are both rewards and used for the construction of items in the Forestry Kit, we’ll launch both alongside the more social elements of the expansion. This’ll give you the opportunity to try a little of everything during the first phase before we bring you everything left over in the second phase, alongside any balancing changes to Leaves and their various benefits.
Content Placement
The survey results are in, and you’ve told us that you want Forestry to sit somewhere near Sulliuscep Mushrooms in terms of XP. That’s better than AFK Redwoods, but nowhere near the heights of 1.5 or 2-tick Teak chopping.
For GP, you’d like Forestry content to compete with tree-cutting in general, sitting somewhere between Magic and Mahogany Trees.
In terms of intensity, you’re hoping for something akin to Wintertodt, without the forced interruptions.
Thanks to all who submitted their feedback – as you can see, this is really useful data! To clarify, we don’t plan to change the core XP gain from chopping trees. Instead, we expect buffs to come from the new group mechanics and events. This is where you’ll gain the most experience and gold, and we expect it to be a more interactive experience, too. More fun, more gold, and a little more XP – sounds fair to us!
Tree Cutting Behaviour and Mighty Trees
A lot of you were super on-board with our new approach to tree chopping. To make something clear that we missed previously, this behaviour will be changed for everyone – both free-to-play and members’ trees will work in the same way. We’re still looking into which other parts of Forestry should be free-to-play, and we’ll have more to share with you on that point when the poll closes.
Although there was decent support for including both the new behaviour and Mighty tree variants, we think that ultimately this would go beyond the scope of the update and might even affect the release schedule of our other projects. Since you liked the idea, we will explore Mighty trees in the future – but for now, we’ll only be polling the new tree cutting behaviour.
Should we change the behaviour of how trees spawn/despawn so a timer begins from the first cut and regenerates if the player stops cutting?
This would remove resource competition for Woodcutting
Should players chopping the same tree receive an invisible bonus to Woodcutting?
This would be limited up to 10 players
Forestry Kit
Good news: the only change we’re making to the Forestry Kit is removing the Forester's Scone for now. Great news: we’re not making any other changes because you loved the items already!
While we’re on the topic, though, we saw a lot of discussion about the Clothes Pouch. Since the reception has been so positive, we’ll definitely be including this item in the Forestry Kit. Now you’ll be able to let your best FashionScape shine!
One thing raised on our live stream was the potential of making the Forestry Kit craftable so that players all over Gielinor can access it. While we’d like to offer alternative means of obtaining the Kit, we’re not sure which approach we’d like to take just yet. We’ll start exploring our options once we know the results of the poll.
Should we introduce the Forestry Kit, a wearable back-slot item that would hold all materials needed for Forestry?
Should we introduce the Clothes Pouch, an object that will store the Lumberjack outfit pieces within and allow you to gain the bonuses whilst wearing other items?
The bonus from the Clothes Pouch will prioritise over any other effects
Should we introduce the Forester's Ration, a new item that when consumed restores run energy after chopping down a tree?
This item will also increase the bonus received if consumed at a Campfire
Should we introduce the Secateurs Attachment, a new consumable item for the Forestry Kit that helps you gather more leaves?
Should we introduce the Nature Offering, a new tradeable consumable, that allows you to get extra resources when cutting trees?
The chance will increase based on the number of other Foresters cutting the same tree (up to 10).
Events
More data? More data!
It seems that all the events we suggested have gone over well, but we wanted to check out which ones were most popular so we could see the common themes between them. The top three events were Leprechaun, Dryad, and Rising Roots – and the unpopular ones are Pheasants, Poachers, and the Struggling Sapling.
Interestingly, we saw some comments surrounding the violent nature of the lesser-liked events, which is pretty rich coming from adventurers who’ll murder thousands of innocent NPCs in the name of sweet Slayer gains – but we agree that such violence doesn’t really mesh with peaceful activities like Woodcutting. If these events pass the poll, we’d like to shape them into less-violent versions that offer similar rewards. We already have some fun ideas, and we can’t wait to share them with you following the poll results!
Some of you were also concerned about combat experience from events. After further discussion, we’ve decided not to award combat experience from events at all. This means that all you skiller accounts can rest easy while you chill and chop!
Should we introduce Forestry Events?
These will appear while collecting logs (in the overworld) and all players can interact with them to gain rewards.
Tree Leaves, Campfires and Tea
Across the whole expansion, this was probably the area with the most feedback. Although it was mostly positive, you still had a few key concerns.
One of the major issues raised concerned combat boosts – you just don’t feel like that meshes right with the content, and considering we already have Potions, it also feels a little pointless. As previously stated, we don’t want to tread on the toes of existing buffs and boosts, which is why we’ll be removing any and all combat bonuses from Leaves, Teas, and Campfires moving forward.
Instead, we want to focus on gathering and production benefits – and we’re also interested in exploring some of those niche effects we spoke about in the initial proposal.
Some of you were also wondering how Tea Flasks might work with the new brewing system – that’s definitely something we’d like to explore, but, again, it’ll all depend on the results of the poll.
Should we expand the systems behind gathering leaves?
This will include more varieties of leaves, give each leaf type a unique bonus that contributes towards campfires and tea-brewing and makes all leaves tradeable on the Grand Exchange.
Should we explore the idea of Campfires?
Lighting a fire and adding a number of the same leaves will give a temporary bonus to all players near the campfire, dependent on the leaf type.
Should Iron Players benefit from other player's Campfire boosts?
This question will be restricted for Iron Players Only
Should we explore the idea of Tea Brewing?
Using the leaves from trees, you can create own your own teas in a free-style format in order to create new Teas that give you benefits.
Rewards
While we’ve made no major changes to the rewards, your feedback highlighted a couple of points for further exploration.
Firstly, we’d like to give the Two-handed Axes some kind of combat stats so you can live your lumberjack dreams while smacking dragons in the face. Don’t expect them to be amazingly powerful – but do expect them to look pretty cool.
You were also interested in – surprise surprise – pet transmogs! While we still want to offer the Funky-Shaped Log, what we can deliver depends on our team’s schedule – so this may just mean that your Beaver will have less colourful options. We also saw interest in having the Fox from the trailer as a pet, so that’s something else we’ll be keeping in mind.
In terms of polling the rewards, we will be including those rewards we want to offer with Phase One in this poll and potentially holding a separate mini-poll exclusively for the rewards in Phase Two.
Should we introduce the Log Basket, a new untradeable, wearable reward from Forestry that can store up to 28 Logs?
Should we introduce the Sturdy Harness, a new tradeable item that combines the Log Basket and the Forestry Kit to create a wearable item with the benefits of both?
Should we introduce the Forester Outfit & Recolours as a reward from Forestry?
This would be an untradeable cosmetic override to the Lumberjack Outfit and feature multiple recolours.
Should we include 2H Axes (of different metals) as a reward from Forestry?
This would offer more experience than normal axes while receiving fewer logs.
Should we offer the Funky-Shaped Log as a reward from Forestry?
This untradeable item can be given to a Beaver to unlock transmog options.
Should we include the Bee Box as a reward from Forestry?
An object for your Player-Owned House that would allow you to keep Bees inside your home.
That just about wraps things up, and we really look forward to seeing the results of the poll – in case you missed it, that’ll go live on March 1st. Until then, please keep up your discussions and debates around Forestry, as we’re always keen to see more feedback. Until then – keep chopping!
You can also discuss this update on our official forums, on the 2007Scape subreddit, the Steam forums, or the community-led OSRS Discord in the #gameupdate channel. For more info on the above content, check out the official Old School Wiki.
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