Jagex took it upon themselves to grace us with a rather large update for the third week of the month. The update includes a whole bunch of new stuff to explore in the world of Runescape. They finally updated the long-despised dragon axe, provided a new form of transportation and even added some new prayers for all the rangers and mages!

The new prayers are the highlight of the update. 6 new prayers now exist, each improving the accuracy of ranged or mage attacks. They are in pairs of twos, with 3 pairs, each improving more accuracy than the last. The weakest increases accuracy by 5%, the moderate increases by 10%, and the strongest (which require a prayer level of 44) increases by a whole 15%.

Charter ships have also been introduced. They act as normal ships except, you get to choose your destination! This is very handy, considering you can go to any port you want from any of the many ports in Runescape. The ports available initially are the following: Karamja, Shipyard (Lower Karamja ), Port Khazard, Brimhaven, Catherby, and of course, Port Sarim. Additional ports are available, though certain quests need to be completed first. But for a brave adventurer such as yourself, that shouldn’t be too hard! The extra ports are: Port Tyras (Quest Needed: Regicide), Port Phasmatys (Quest Needed: Ghost’s Ahoy!), and Mos Le’ Harmless (Quest Needed: Cabin Fever). Of course, such conveniences like this don’t come without a price. The cost to charter a ship is a much steeper fee than normal. However, if the proper actions are taken, you may be able to reach an agreement with a much lower cost. If you have completed the quest Cabin Fever, the ship’s crew assumes you know your way around a ship, and the cost will be halved (WOW!). Also, if you have the fortune of owning a Ring of Charos (a), the price will be lowered even more! Check out Runescape’s Knowledge Base report on Charter Ships for a detailed graph on the individual prices.

A smaller but equally important update was also released…the improving of the dragon woodcutting axe! The axe had been mostly ignored, the reason being that it was basically the same as the rune axe, at least speed-wise. It quickly became the least popular dragon weapon ever created. Jagex obviously took note of this, resulting in them improving it. It is now a definite improvement from the rune axe.

This was no doubt my most favorite update of the entire month. Though I’m not much of a ranger or a mage, the new prayers are fantastic. I’m sure most everyone enjoys them. The charter ships will revolutionize the traveling industry. Now I can get to Karamja from virtually anywhere! Hurrah! And wow! The dragon woodcutting axe was an unexpected, but much welcomed update! It will help me with cutting those magic logs…whew! Well, I’d better go now…The dragon axe price shot up because of the update…And now I’ve gotta find a way to come up with the extra 1.5mill! xD

~Gamefreak318