Woodcutting and some related skills get many new mechanics
During the Winter Summit, Jagex announced and showed Forestry: Way of the Forester. They described it as an expansion to Woodcutting, adding various features and mechanics to help skillers. Of course, this can also open new ways to farm OSRS gold and make leveling Woodcutting more efficient. Here are the proposed mechanics of the feature.
New Quest and Location
If you’ve leveled Woodcutting enough to chop down Oak trees, you unlock a new quest. On your next chopping session, you’d find a Leafy Note that triggers it. Completing it gives you access to the Freaky Forest and introduces you to what you can do in the location.
You’ll also get a Forestry Kit that contains everything you need for foresting.
The Forestry Kit
It’s a wearable container that allows you to use various tools, changing how you interact with the forest. The devs describe it as essential for the expansion. You can also upgrade it, making specific events happen more often or making actions more efficient.
You’ll need Anima-Infused Bark, which you can get in various forestry events (more on this later). The upgrades to the kit are tradeable, making a smaller economy for foresters. This is one good source of OSRS GP, especially at the beginning when everybody needs the upgrades.
The kit can also hold all kinds of consumables for the activity, leaving free space in your inventory for other things.
Here’s what the kit contains:
- Clothes Pouch: Stores the Lumberjack outfit, giving you the boosts while wearing something else. It’s a permanent upgrade. Making one requires level 50 Crafting and Woodcutting, the blueprint, some leather, and thread.
- Forester’s Ration: Restores run energy after chopping down a tree. Scales with tree difficulty. It’s a consumable item. Requires 35 Woodcutting and Cooking, some Normal Leaves, and Cooked Meat.
- Forester’s Scone: Increases the likelihood of events happening based on how many other players with scones are cutting the same tree. You’ll need 35 Woodcutting, 50 Cooking, some Normal Leaves, Dough, Flour, and Water.
- Secateurs Attachment: This lets you gather more leaves but fewer logs. To use or make one, you need level 35 Smithing and Woodcutting, plus Secateurs Blade and Steel Bars.
- Forester’s Lucky Charm: Makes the Leprechaun random event more likely, and increases the variety of its rewards. Requires 75 Crafting and Woodcutting, 35 Farming, Clover Insignias, Gold Bars, and Balls of Wool.
- Petal Circlet: Encounters with the Dryads become more frequent when used, increasing the chances for better rewards. Has the following requirements: 50 Woodcutting and Fletching, Crystal Charm, Assorted Flowers, Ball of Wool.
- Wind Chimes: Increases enchanted tree yield and makes the ‘Fairy Magic’ event more frequent. 50 Woodcutting, 50 Smithing, a Wind Chime Bracket, Gold Bars, and Mithril Bars are required.
- Bee Smoker: Allows for the Bee Hive event and increases chances for the Sturdy Bee Box parts. Requires 35 Herblore, 50 Woodcutting and Smithing, Bee Smoker Fuel, Steel Bars, and Leather.
- Sturdy Harness: Combines the Log Basket and Forestry Kit. You’ll need 75 Smithing and Woodcutting, a Log Brace, Adamantite Bars, Steel Nails, and Rope.
- Slingshot Ammo: To be used in the Pheasants event. 35 Smithing and Woodcutting, some Treated Resin, and Limestone Bricks allow you to make them.
- Bee on a Stick: Allows for the Flowering Tree event and increases tree seed yield. Requires 50 Smithing, 35 Woodcutting, Powdered Pollen, Logs, and Bees.
- Nature Offering: Increases the chances for extra materials when cutting trees. The effect amplifies the more players are chopping the same tree. Has 60 Farming, 70 Woodcutting, undefined Forestry component, Herbs, Ultra Compost, and Nature Rune requirements.
- Squirrel Treats: Provides a chance to get tree seeds from events. 60 Cooking, 75 Woodcutting, an undefined component, Seeds, and a Forestry Ration are needed to make one.
All these are consumable except for the permanent Clothing Bag. As a rule, the above are all tradeable as well. You can put up these OSRS items for sale and get some extra gold. Since many of them are consumable, there will always be a demand for them.
Forestry Events
These are new encounters that happen at random. You can use some of the above items to make one more likely. Though the events are unexpected, they can be categorized as happening while you chop trees or after doing so. Events will not overlap, and the more players using the item when chopping trees, the likelier one will appear.
Some proposed events:
While Chopping
- Rising Roots
- Friendly Ent
- Bee Hive
- Pheasants
- Flowering Tree
After Chopping
- Leprechaun
- Dryad
- Enchantment Ritual
- Struggling Sapling
- Poachers
All events scale with how many players are participating. While that influences difficulty, it also affects the rewards. That means the more players participating, the better the rewards! Suppose you are gunning for a specific event. In that case, it’s also easier to nudge the odds toward that one when the group uses the same item.
These are your primary source of Anima-Infused Bark, which you need to upgrade your Forestry Kit. They break the monotony of chopping trees, giving a little variety to your skilling. Make sure you have the correct tools for the event. Otherwise, you might not be able to participate. All events give bonuses to Woodcutting XP, so there’s no reason not to do them.
Other Forestry Mechanics
Group Tree Cutting
This expansion aims to make Woodcutting a more social experience. The current mechanics make it easier to do solo and cultivates competition among players. Way of the Forester’s goal is to make it more co-op friendly with the following changes:
- Trees have a despawn timer that counts down once you start chopping them. The timer will increase its duration if you stop before cutting it down. They’ve set the durations to be the average time different trees last.
- A group of players cutting the same tree receives an invisible Woodcutting XP bonus. It scales with how many players are there (up to 10).
Mighty Tree Variant
Another proposition is to have Mighty variants of trees. Like Superior Slayer, these trees offer more logs, longer despawn timers, and better chances of encountering special events.
Campfires and Tea Leaves
Tea leaves are already in the game, though they’re more of a cosmetic item now. With this expansion, the developers consider giving them some functionality without replacing potions entirely.
So far, they’re exploring boosting Combat, Production, Gathering, the power of the tea, or the duration of its effects. They have made a list of proposed boosts for each kind of leaf.
How do you use them?
In another effort to make skilling more social, use it on a warm, toasty campfire. You can throw up to 15 leaves at your lighted-up chopped wood. Depending on which ones you use, allies around the fire receive a buff. You can also eat a Forester’s Ration for a bigger bonus and restoration of some Run Energy.
The second way is to brew them into tea. This is a more flexible process than brewing potions. While the latter has set recipes, you can add leaves in whatever quantity to get the desired effects. The amount of leaves you can use depends on your Herblore level. You can add more of the same to amplify the boosts or mix in other kinds for different results and longer durations.
What About Ironmen?
Solo Ironmen won’t be affected by other players’ campfires but can still participate in events and join in group Woodcutting. Only fires they made themselves can affect them. Of course, for Group Ironmen, only those who are part of the group can be affected by their campfires.
More details about this are in the survey.
Forestry Rewards
You won’t be left taking away only your Woodcutting levels when participating in Forestry. There are many rewards up for grabs when you join this activity.
- Log Basket: Allows you to carry up to 28 more logs. It can be combined with the Forestry Kit for the ultimate all-in-one forestry storage container.
- Forestry Outfit and Recolors: Outfits that come in many different colors for the fashionista in you.
- Player Owned House Bee Box: Lets you take care of bees in your house.
- 2-Handed Axes: Slows down your cutting rate but gives more XP per tree.
- Lumberjack Outfit: Like other skilling outfits, this provides a bonus to Woodcutting XP. This time, it’s available in a more related activity than Temple-Trekking.
- Arborist Gloves: Provides various benefits such as reduced production costs and higher yield, among other things.
- Seed Packs: Pack of assorted seeds for farming.
- Sawmill Voucher: Using it makes converting logs at a sawmill more efficient.
- Funky-Shaped Log: This lets you change the color of a Beaver Pet.
Things Are Still Subject to Change
These are only proposed changes and values. You can submit feedback through a survey on the site, which can still change some of these features. After all, this can end up imbalanced, and nobody wants that. The mods are asking for the players’ opinions to ensure that the expansion will be well-received and that everybody’s on the same page about it.
With more eyes on it, any problematic feature or function will be easier to find. Of course, we can’t account for everything; bugs are ubiquitous in any game. No matter how much we try to scour for these errors, we can’t catch them all. Still, the survey ensures that no unfair or unbalanced feature will be released.
Participate and give your feedback! This helps OSRS improve as it gets updated. If you have any problem with anything mentioned above, go to this link and say your piece.
Look forward to Forestry, group Woodcutting, and more stuff to do for skill!
Keep on enjoying OSRS!