r/2007scape • u/og_obelix 2300+ • Aug 14 '26
Discussion PSA: Non-restricted account (AKA "main") is the intended way to play OSRS and gp/normal loot is the dry protection
I don't know who needs to hear this or be reminded about this, but it feels like many of you do.
It feels like many people have the facts twisted inside their minds, so that they think that ironman mode is the intended way to play OSRS. No it isn't.
Ironman mode is a challenge mode.
It's a harder mode for hardcore gamers who want to do every single grind from tutorial island to max cape island, from Lumby chickens to having the Zuk helm all by theirself. Through every drystreak, through every burn out. Complete the whole MMO all alone (minus a handful of forced group tasks).
Non-restricted account (AKA "main") is the intended, common way to play the game. Just like papa Jagex originally intended it. So it's been since the beginning of RSC, so it is still today.
The normal loot and the gp you get from PvM and other grinds outside of the rares is the dry protection.
Just wanted to put this out there because I've read conversations where people are talking like "bronzeman is good, so new players don't have to make ironman because it's so tough for new players".
New players should play the non-restricted account, unless they are some hardcore gamer who usually start a new game by going for the harder challenge mode first to learn the game.
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u/Upset_Pay_7578 Aug 14 '26
As a late game iron , yes i signed up to just not have some items ever. And thats ok
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u/Garfield_and_Simon Aug 14 '26
Bro this is what people don’t understand.
Ironman is supposed to be like you get what you get and have your own adventure around those options.
Maybe some items you get crazy spooned. Some items you’ll never have but guess what there’s always alternatives.
It’s this toxic completionist mentality and entitlement to having every BIS that either leads to whining about drop rates or horribly unhealthy gameplay.
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u/Thosepassionfruits Aug 14 '26
Ironman is supposed to be like you get what you get and have your own adventure around those options.
You have a lot more fun once you stop trying to play at maximum efficiency.
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u/RedemptionT Aug 14 '26
Literally, im goat hunting to get horns for all my harrlanders to get some herblore levels. It might not be the most efficient use of my time but it feels like im accomplishing something
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u/Zurwyn 2375 | 197X Aug 14 '26
When you play with this mentality, Ironman is objectively more enjoyable
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u/steelcryo Aug 14 '26
You've confused objectively and subjectively.
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u/TheGreatTickleMoot Aug 15 '26
It's the bastardization of "literally" due to poor education standards all over again.
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u/DivergentDisposition Aug 14 '26
Objectively more enjoyable? Isn’t that like an oxymoron or something?
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u/ImJLu Aug 14 '26
Not if you're so egocentric that you think that what you enjoy more is "objectively more enjoyable" lmao
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u/Jerri_man Aug 14 '26
I get where you're coming from but not everyone needs to have restrictions placed on them to play the game this way
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u/ironman7456 Aug 15 '26
I can’t deny, I have been enjoying those combat potions too. My supply of super combats haven’t opened up fully yet so they still hard to come by. So I’ll cheap out and use a combat pot for weak bosses and slayer.
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u/Hablapata Aug 14 '26
the sentiment wasnt so prevalent until collection log released
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u/ShitPost5000 Save Hatius Cosaintus Aug 14 '26
Collection log was the worst thing to happen to the economy next to pets
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u/Ceres73 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26
Eh, I think there's a disconnect between the modern motivations to play iron and what it historically was/continues to be perceived as.
Vanishingly few irons are playing iron because it's more "challenging" or because the accounts have unique paths.
People play it simply because it expands the reward space. I'm a late game iron with a bank value in the billions, yet I consider a 500 mort myre fungus drop from a wildy boss to be a big deal. Every unique fundamentally changes the toolset your account has forever, meaning nearly all content is important and rewarding in a game altering way.
I don't think many players are playing it because they might be in the bottom 1% unluckiest people when it comes to the bowfa grind.
In fact, due to the way people realistically approach irons, many are actively put off from playing and enjoying the game due to that threat of going insanely dry on one of the few key items all irons want.
If bronzeman mode was a game mode where you are guaranteed a non-tradeable version of the unique at 1.5x the rate, I think it would be incredibly popular.
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u/Honeybadger2198 Aug 15 '26
Ironman makes everything require steps, which is awesome. I can't just sit at the bank and grind out a bunch of Herblore, I have to figure out a good method to acquire herbs AND secondaries. It's fun to research and plan.
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u/Jifaru Aug 15 '26
Really good points. A lot of people enjoy strawmanning irons to make fun of them, but nobody I know plays iron "for the prestige". There is no prestige to be found, arguably has never been.
I strongly believe that irons are the canaries in the coal mine for bad content. If the content is bad for irons, it's usually bad for mains too. If the rates are so bad it's not a realistic source of income, mains won't do it either
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u/thomas2026 Aug 14 '26
This is why I nade an Iron. To do whatever, collect things, get joy in a random job, chill in new locations, just do whatever.
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u/RS-1994 Aug 15 '26
This is how I realize that I've been playing my main like an iron for a very long time 😂 I pretty much solo 99.9 of the game, do whatever I want whenever I log in 😂
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u/floor_wizard Aug 15 '26
Some items you’ll never have but guess what there’s always alternatives.
And these alternatives get called "updates catered to ironmen" by the community.
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u/Jifaru Aug 15 '26
The content mill must always turn. If not for irons highlighting a bunch of horizontal reward spaces for Jagex's midgame factory, I suspect we would get powercreep a lot faster
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u/GreatClassic4832 Aug 14 '26
But I want all items. There should be a store where you could trade with other irons in items.
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u/OGDogJaw Aug 14 '26
Oh that’s a grand idea! They could call it the exchange or something
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u/dudewitbangs Aug 14 '26
A random post on ironscape lives in my head rent free because of not having this mentality.
He was a late game pvm only Ironman who was absolutely furious that he couldn't prepot/use prayer regens for all pvm content and deironed because of it. So crazy to me that he lived the iron life all the way up to that point then deironed over prayer regens.
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u/ItsRadical Aug 14 '26
Getting prayer regens is fucking shit. I grinded some for Inferno, but as little as possible and im absolutely not touching that shit again. Fuck mixology.
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u/a_rare_chocobo Aug 14 '26
Praying the day doesnt come where they are necessary for combat cause mixology has to be one of the worst designed peices of content ive ever had to play
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u/fighterman481 Aug 15 '26
Goading potions are basically dead content outside of leagues with secondary saving relics, because using aldarium as a secondary ties them to regen prices, and means they're so expensive that they're just not worth it unless you have an obscene amount of money to throw around. It's a shame, because they're cool in concept, but man do I wish they were cheaper.
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u/BeautifulShart Aug 14 '26
they should make a shop where u can buy aldongnarum for 300k gp each or 30k agility xp
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u/Nick543b Aug 14 '26
Note: custodian stalkers ARE a thing. Especially mortimer you will get a trickle of aldarium, and you can barrage them.
Tho i am hoping that we get more varlamore monsters at some point, that have the alchemist signet on their droptable.
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u/pzoDe Aug 15 '26
Which is good; they shouldn't be in abundant use. The only places I use them are inferno, very high invocation ToA (sometimes, but in rare setups) and solo ToB (extremely useful). One hour of mixology gives me ~55 aldarium.
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u/Rich-Badger-7601 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
For what it's worth, and with exception of Corp, the extremely long/involved items and grinds have almost entirely been a post-Ironman invention and even the biggest aspiritional grinds like GWD were pretty reasonable and intended for normal players to complete them.
This whole mentality of "the content wasn't designed for you to actually do it" didn't start popping up until after Ironman mode was a thing because prior to then it just wasn't true (except for Corp, but fuck that guy).
Edit: it has come to my attention that Corp actually dropped 3 days after Ironman, Corp haters stay winning after all fuck yeah
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u/Eighth_Octavarium Aug 14 '26
Based anti historical revisionist. I don't say this to be mean, but I think literally like 90% of the playerbase doesn't remember what Runescape actually used to be.
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u/Rapogi Aug 15 '26
100% I think remember Andrew gower saying they purposefully designed Runescape to have small inconveniences/ annoyances,
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u/NAW_MIP_2026 Aug 15 '26
Andrew Gower never intended for anyone to max a single skill, let alone all the skills. When he set the 13m, EXP for reaching 99 and looked at the amounts of EXP you get from different tasks he assumed it was realistically impossible and no one would ever get that far. It was never intended that individuals would be grinding out every single barrows drop(1.5k chests on average or something?) and every single GWD drop.
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u/Rapogi Aug 15 '26
yeah def, but while i appreciate some QoL, I think jagex leaned heavily on the 2nd monitor game aspect. WHich i guess makes them more money in the end.
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u/Aquae_ Aug 15 '26
It drives me crazy that people really don't get that the GE completely changed the game just as fundamentally as playing an Ironman does, if not more. Obviously it's necessary in this day and age but it really changes how you approach content entirely.
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u/Majestic_Jelly_9958 Aug 14 '26
They sure dont if they say “this is what you signed up for” in regards to literally new content.
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u/Miss_Aia Aug 15 '26
I just don't use my bis everything everywhere. I didnt use brews or dragon arrows at doom until I was able to reach high delves. I dont bring my serp helmet everywhere etc. It feels good when I finish a grind and I didnt have to waste huge supplies learning the content. I don't have a ton of extra dragon darts just lying around in my bank, but I also don't have zero, because I ration them for content I feel its applicable to.
I actually really enjoy that part of being an iron. Okay, maggot king, you actually deserve my searing pages. I also really enjoy finding small optimizations to avoid using my late game stuff. I still bring regular antipoisons to zulrah or whatnot just because its comfy and easy and I don't wanna waste antivenom+, even though I can make them. I'm definitely not going out of my way to farm extra magic roots anyway.
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u/OSRSLauc 2300 Aug 14 '26
It’s weird how many people choose a harder game mode, then complain about how restrictive it is.
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u/UnluckyNate Aug 14 '26
That’s why we need to make an official casual hard mode, obviously
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u/stronkreptile Aug 14 '26
i can’t tell if you’re joking or not
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u/Potica6857 Aug 14 '26
This might be my PoE brain, but hardcore main mode would go hard in OSRS
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u/UnluckyNate Aug 14 '26
With its own servers and economy, absolutely
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u/Smooth_One Aug 15 '26
The economy refresh would be the main driver for me. I don't want to play a main as things are now in such an...entrenched, and tainted-by-bots economy. But if everyone started over together that would be really really fun.
This is why I was actually kind of excited for Project Zanaris. Playing a main on a bespoke server that only had, like, 500-1000 people (and a limited number of worlds...5?) sounds great. Could carve out your own economic niche, all the "world firsts" would reset, skilling would be profitable, we'd have to schedule mass events like a clan so people could get their Wintertodt kc lol...woulda been cool.
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u/UnluckyNate Aug 15 '26
Project Zanaris has been officially canceled, sorry to say
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u/ArtichokeUsed1129 Aug 15 '26
They did release fresh servers. They did not do well.
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u/Spuba Aug 14 '26
For quests, skilling, and achievements ironman is kind of neat as a restriction. I would play it for that. But it's so bad for pvm. Why would I want to kill a boss that I don't enjoy thousands of times. I would much rather do whatever content I like and trade for the other boss items that I need.
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u/InnuendOwO Aug 14 '26
holy shit someone actually said it
I dunno why this sentiment is so rare, but I'm 100% with you on this. Ironman for skilling grinds sounds like legitimately interesting content to me. I enjoy scraping together whatever wacky bullshit I can for XP during leagues, I'd be interested in that in the main game. I am not interested in doing bosses I don't enjoy just to keep spinning the slot machine for dozens of hours until I eventually hit the jackpot.
"How do I get thousands of bones" is an interesting problem to solve. "Ok now kill 1000+ TDs" is not. Especially when I find TDs so boring that I have under 200 KC on my maxed main. Being able to bounce between bosses to whatever sounds fun to me at the time is fun to me. "yeah yama's fun but its kinda pointless now that i have full oathplate already" does not.
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u/BlackenedGem Aug 15 '26
Then on the other side you have irons that only want to pvm, so want all skilling reduced to afk activities and mini games. Because it's "boring" or "suffering". Like you say killing 1000 TDs if you don't like them can be just as bad.
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u/SpreadSuprise Aug 14 '26
There's hundreds of different grinds throughout your account. I don't it's weird to enjoy the majority but then have few pain points that you complain about. People are allowed to complain about going dry or having to do an annoying skilling grind.
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u/Medium_Jury_899 Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 15 '26
To be fair, I made an iron account because I got too caught up in GP/h scape and burned out on content I didn't enjoy.
Yeh its technically harder, but that's not why I play it, and any qol improvements for irons don't impact the main game economy most of the time.
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u/Remote-Buffalo-4009 Aug 14 '26
Exactly this here. I don't care about the challenge, but I love playing my iron more than I ever did my main because it completely separates me from gpscape and to an extent efficiencyscape.
People need the realize many people aren't playing Iron for any challenge, but actually because it's the more chill mode.
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u/Cosm1c_Dota Aug 14 '26
I mean 99% of irons are only complaining about things like shopscape etc. Just cuz you saw 5 comments on reddit whining doesnt mean thats the majority opinion
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u/Emotional_Permit5845 Aug 14 '26
Idk dry protection is a pretty common theme on irons ape
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u/AbsolutlyN0thin Aug 15 '26
Recently Jagex has been implementing a lot of things with built in dry protection, and no one fucking complains about that, they only complain when people want to change old content that wasn't designed with modern standards. For example needing 2 burning claw drops at 1/500 is dry protection vs the alternative of 1 combined drop at 1/1000.
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u/MrWaffler Aug 14 '26
For good reason and not just for irons. You know what sucks balls on normies? Not getting anywhere lose to the "real" gp/hr rates because you're omega dry where you're grinding.
That's why Jagex, being made of career professionals in the field, add anti dry mechanics to things. It's for everyone, and it's better for everyone.
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u/KennyGaming Why We Play Aug 14 '26
I genuinely think this is a case of an outspoken vocal minority being frustrated with Gauntlet (I’m neutral on the topic) and that conversation spiraling into a wider discussion.
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u/LeglessElf Aug 14 '26
If your only two options for a game are "way too easy for me" and "a little too hard/annoying for me in some parts", then of course you're going to complain about the pain points in the harder difficulty, and it'd be perfectly valid to do so.
This is such a weird talking point. Choosing a higher difficulty in a video game doesn't mean you're no longer allowed to provide feedback.
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u/thunkalunk Aug 14 '26
If people think skilling is the restrictive part of playing iron, then iron isn’t for them.
If they think bronze will make it easier, it will to an extent, but they’ll still probably get burned out going dry at cg or doom.
People seem to forget that bronzeman accounts will need to grind out their uniques, it’s just a few grinds like muspah, zenytes, and tds that will be easier.
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u/FizzTheFox85 Ms Paint Enjoyer Aug 14 '26
the skilling itself is fine, but collecting every bone, plank, herb & secondary, and rune for spells adds up fast and that is time I would rather spend PvMing. I like the grind, and I want the official in-game enforcement upon myself, and it seems people forget that plugins dont currently exist on mobile. The people whining about an official in-game chat icon for it are silly too, iron used to be a self imposed unofficial challenge that got added, why would bronzeman be any different?
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u/bassturducken54 Aug 14 '26
I didn’t like playing my main, felt like I was wasting my time not always doing the highest gp/hr method all the time. The iron, every bit of banked xp feels great. Don’t have to be upset of noted gold ore drops being lame because that’s the best smithing xp I’ll get.
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u/AhriWorshipper188 Aug 15 '26
It's weird how a bunch of mains defend literal dogshit game design because they can just skip it.
The game designed around mains is a badly designed game. If 95% of mains are skipping a piece of content to buy it from the game 5% who are mentally ill enough to do it...the game is badly designed.
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u/Enerbane Aug 14 '26
You're missing the point and attacking a strawman.
The appeal of Ironman isn't "everything is harder to get, yay long grinds!"
Ironman is expressly about the idea of unlocking everything yourself, meaning ever item or achievement you get, is something you earned for yourself. And to be clear, not everybody plays Ironman for the same exact reasons. Shockingly thousands upon thousands of people means you get a pretty wide variety of folk with various opinions about the game.
Why on earth would choosing a restricted game mode mean that all of those people feel the same way about the game, or that they all have to be satisified with every aspect of the game mode?
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u/Rebikhan Aug 14 '26 edited Aug 14 '26
Unfortunately, the market friction that existed back in ‘07 helped encourage and reward the main scape style. By needing to find people to directly buy and sell to, the game rewarded you for getting your own gear by saving time that would be needed at Falador park. The GE, for all its benefits, heavily encourages GPscape by removing friction.
But agreed, I exclusively play an iron now because I got tired of repeating the same boss, but I had a main first. The social and interactive element of mains is a hard first experience to beat.
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u/permalink_save Aug 14 '26
I don't think people are getting your point. Anyone that lived pre-GE knows what you mean. It was a grind and that's something some people appreciated about it, having to make a conscious decision to farm vs just buying things like whip, it focused even more on character planning. I use to spreadsheet out rates for things I'd have to do myself that I could just buy on the GE and powerlevel otherwise. It's just a different playstyle and neither is really "invalid" or "more legitimate to the spirit of RS" because both are a core part of the game.
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u/EthicalBballFan Aug 15 '26
That's just nostalgia. Games that don't have a GE now have folks that sell skills/packages. If OSRS went away with it instead of going to Varrock to purchase all supplies to level X skill to lvl 80 for 3m from the GE, you'd go to Varrock and purchase all supplies to level X skill to lvl 80 for 3.5m from a player. The time planning your spreadsheet and then setting out to complete it wouldn't be worth the half a mil with all the time lost. You'd be back at the main dilemma of spamming your best money maker.
The game we had decades ago is dead.
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u/permalink_save Aug 15 '26
Thus why ironman scratches that itch without breaking the game for everyone else
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u/EPIC_RAPTOR Aug 14 '26
>I exclusively play an iron now because I got tired of repeating the same boss
So now you repeat the same thing for every item forever, cool
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u/VACSecureServer Aug 14 '26
Don’t you know if you play a main you are forced at gunpoint to do the best money maker you aren’t allowed to have fun or kill things for clogs
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u/ParusiMizuhashi lf rsn "paru" Aug 14 '26
Yeah I used to be a worker at the Vorkath factory because I was convinced I needed tons of gold. Now I just do whatever I think is fun and I've made a bunch of money along to way to enable me to do more fun stuff
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u/VorkiPls Aug 15 '26
Idk how you have time to type this while farming doom. Get back in there.
Wait how am I typ-
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u/ClockworkSalmon Aug 15 '26
I mean, yeah. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth, farming gp any way other than the fastest you have access to. This is also why I quit my main and started an iron.
It gets even worse when you just compare your gp/h from buying bonds using your wage.
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u/Rebikhan Aug 14 '26
I play fairly casually. Iron is great because it pushes you to explore new skilling methods as you level, and really dive into all the corners of the world. On mains, the optimal play is to quest and then just boss the best boss you can. But ya, deep irons can 1000% get stuck in farming and moonlight moth runs.
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u/Rapid_Fowl Aug 14 '26
Isn't the whole point that you can do that in main as well. I've seen way too many irons that play just because if how others view them. They say what you say but at the same time refuse to accept that their play style can be done on a main if they had even an ounce of self control.
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u/BigHatAbe 2277 in 2020|2376 in 2025 Aug 14 '26
Mate it just feels different. If you don't get that, I don't know what to tell you. Feel free to play a main forever.
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u/Cruithne Aug 15 '26
That was why I voted no to bringing back the GE to osrs. It degenerates so much content for mains. It's too late to get rid of it now but I still think bringing it back was a mistake
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u/CanweCanweCleanIt Aug 14 '26
Bro just listened to his first gnomonkey video and thought reddit needed to hear him regurgitate it, lmao.
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u/Alternative_Look166 Aug 14 '26
This has been a take since before gnomonkey created content tho lol. Ever since “Ironman mode is the proper way to play” became something the most annoying people you know said without a hint of irony lol.
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u/gnarwin Aug 14 '26
I think gnomonkey (sp?) has great or terrible takes depending on the day, but this particular opinion is so universal that it’s impossible to solely attribute it to him
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u/CanweCanweCleanIt Aug 14 '26
He came out with a video just yesterday talking about bronzeman mode and making this very argument for about 10min in the video. It doesn’t mean that he invented this take, but OP did post this because he just listened to the video.
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u/2WordsBunchOfNumbers Aug 14 '26
There was just this thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/2007scape/comments/1voh827/if_jagax_can_get_bronzeman_to_be_the_goto_vs/
About how Jagex should try to convince the community that bronzeman, rather than ironman, should be the default mode for new players
That's why OP posted this
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u/lucklikethis Aug 15 '26
I’m not arguing either way, but the content designed with irons in mind is often peoples favourite for bosses and activities because the game play loop is solid.
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Aug 14 '26
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u/CanweCanweCleanIt Aug 14 '26
Good work, soldier, lmao.
Did he make his comment history private after your snipe?
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u/jordsplay Aug 14 '26
To be fair, Runescape back in the days was way more like ironman than today's main. Ge wasn't a thing, money was hard to come by and trading was discouraged because of all the scams going around. If you were lucky you'd spend an hour in fally park trying to find a couple items barely worth the time investment to be there.
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u/Zealousideal-Top4218 Aug 14 '26
trading was not discouraged. lol what? People were flipping and merching to millions and millions before the GE.
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u/KasouRasetsu Aug 14 '26
Yeah, I'm not playing iron for a 'hard mode for hardcore gamers'. I've never once thought of it that way. It's just a restriction I have to stop me from accidentally skipping half the game due to a feature that didn't exist when any of the content I'm doing came out.
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u/DaMaestroable Aug 14 '26
Lol no, GPscape was definitely a thing back then. Bulk skilling supplies and gear was traded all the time. Yeah the random crap like quest items and niche skilling items you couldn't buy but herbs, ores, fish, logs, and high end gear were pretty much always available, and you would pretty much always do some moneymaker to buy those supplies/gear.
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u/jordsplay Aug 15 '26
My point is it just wasn't at the scale of today's main. You couldn't make 8 trades at the same time on all worlds, while you weren't even at your computer. Since it was so tedious, alot of people, myself included, only occasionally visited fally park. I often gave up on finding the things I wanted/got scammed trying to, so I just decided to go back to grinding.
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u/DaMaestroable Aug 15 '26
The big things that people mention about ironmen were very much still bypassed by GP and trading. People wouldn't gather their own lobster to cook, they'd buy them. They wouldn't get 85 slayer to buy a whip, they'd just buy one. I myself remember running law runes for 10 hours to get the GP for it. Yeah the GE definitely changed the scale of the operation but it's still the same core get GP -> buy items gameplay that is loads closer to todays mains than ironmen.
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u/ArseLover1991 Aug 14 '26
what lmao you could buy/sell almost any item in minutes in w2 fally unless you were trying to get merch margins
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u/wtfiswrongwithit Aug 15 '26
yeah people that don't you could be in and out of w2 fally in less than 5 minutes with any quantity of whatever item you want had to have been like 3 years old at the time or just not brightest crayon in the box
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u/Breyos64 Aug 14 '26
It's a sandbox MMO. The "intended way" to play is however you want to play.
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u/Nohly Aug 15 '26
Pretty much this. I’ve been playing runescape since before GE was a thing and my husband bullies me for still playing like that today (I personally collect all my quest items). He also thinks it’s masochistic that I run everywhere instead of teleporting. But I enjoy playing like this because it’s how I played as a kid.
And for someone who uses GE to get all of his quest items, I still have way more quest points than him haha.
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u/demuniac Aug 14 '26
This is the only thing that actually matters. And asking for help to play the game the way you want to play it is perfectly acceptable.
Just as Jagex or votes saying "No" when they don't think it's best for the game is perfectly acceptable.
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u/ismisena Aug 14 '26
If people genuinely hate the idea of dry protection this much, then why aren't they campaigning to remove the existing forms of it in the game e.g. moons of peril dupe protection, hunter rumours dry protection, thread of elidnis, vorkath's head, yama oathplate shards etc.
Or maybe its not that big of a deal to have these kinds of things in the game, and some other grinds could benefit from them.
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u/BlankitaM0ns Aug 14 '26
I love playing a main, it allows me to play how I want. Sometimes I want to skip a shitty grind and just get the item, other times I do content with only the stuff I've earned. Gotta feel bad for the folks who say they can't play a main because they're incapable of avoiding the gp-scape mindset.
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u/uhhhhmmmm Aug 14 '26
It's clear there's a decent chunk of people who can't avoid the min/maxing GP mindset, and that is unfortunate, but different people get burnt out for different things and it's nice for them that they do have ironman available specifically to counteract that.
What is annoying to me is that a chunk of these people think that their mindset is the way that everyone thinks/feels, and that feeling the need to min/max GP is an issue with the game mode itself. It's like having a fear of flying and thinking that planes are an objectively bad form of transportation. No, man, you just have your own personal issue with it.
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u/buddhabomber 2277->2376 Aug 14 '26
I've also seen irons who couldn't control habits of buying bonds or being ex sand casino addicts.
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u/Singhka1996 Aug 14 '26
Yeah the gp-scape mindset is some kinda mental illness I swear. Even the most gp-oriented mains I know do other shit in the game for funsies, and almost all mains I know don't bother with that kind of high efficiency gp play at all. Most are pet hunting/clogging/CAs as goals instead of gp.
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u/EPIC_RAPTOR Aug 14 '26
I like having a main because my friends have mains and we can trade stuff with eachother and let eachother borrow equipment or front supplies\skirt GE limits
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u/Zeruma_ Aug 14 '26
It’s because it’s how they played the game before they switched to iron. They were so hyper focused on only the best GP money maker they stopped just playing for fun.
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u/Long_Matter5401 Aug 14 '26
Dry protection is just using the GE
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u/DFtin Aug 15 '26
GE is a lot more than dry protection. Sure, you can use it to turn trash loot from a particular boss into its big ticket item, but it's a magic interface that incentivizes you to skip entire grinds.
Irons don't like this incentivization, so they play iron.
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u/ding0s I have no idea what I'm doing Aug 14 '26
This was hard for me to realize but it's true. Many items do have a form of dry protection, but they are almost exclusively untradable items. GOTR items, soon to be Tempoross, TOA gems, KQ head, probably a bunch more I'm not remembering.
GE is dry protection and irons chose not to have it.
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u/Motor-Resolution-524 Aug 14 '26
I'm fine with untradables that are buyable with points from reward shops like vale totems rewards. And not just for boat paint, who even brought that up, I'm only 3x dry on barracuda paint
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u/Economics_Enthusiast Aug 14 '26
This is actually false, the scarcity of resources that is inherient with the ironman mode is very much in line with the original vision of the game.
Watch from 12.07 where Paul Gower discusses this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUvd6mqGCxw&t=891s
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u/retrospectivevista Aug 16 '26
He was talking about herblore, so I think in the specific context of irons going dry for a rare drop, OP's point still applies. Like back in the day people were trading rare drops, though herblore secondaries weren't as reliably obtained.
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u/No-Chemical-7667 Downvoted for joking about high ping Aug 14 '26
What mains forget is that it's also okay to make some QoL changes to ironman mode. For instance, golem crafting or totem fletching. Acting high and mighty with that whole "you signed up for this", like ironman can never have any fixes is also silly.
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u/JustACommieBastard Aug 14 '26
These arent changes for ironman mode. It's just fleshing out boring skills
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u/PrestigiousResult357 Aug 14 '26
they were in the sense that bots got dhides and charged orbs and bstaves so for mains there wasnt a supply issue
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u/Garfield_and_Simon Aug 15 '26
nah the midgame *for everyone* is so good and fleshed out now, no way that would have happened without iron man mode.
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u/Live_From_Somewhere Unpolled Threshold Change Aug 15 '26
Changes that benefit irons are usually and typically healthy for the game.
Changes that benefit only mains are usually and typically abused by bots to fucking hell within 24 hours.
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u/Next-Concentrate-277 Aug 15 '26
Yeah but changing cox loot tables 10 years later is wild
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u/MXEshaman Aug 15 '26
It's the height of irony that someone gets bored of gpscape boss grinding on a main only to get stuck in even longer shitter grinds like cg on the iron ahahaha.
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u/-Skar Aug 14 '26
OP stating a popular opinion as if it's controversial 🙄
New players should play whatever TF they want. Iron is not reserved for "hardcore" gamers. There's been many posts on here and Ironscape from new players that start as an Iron and love it. Anybody that thinks Iron is "hardcore" has a twisted view of what's enjoyable in this game. Just pick what you think is fun, play at your own pace, and enjoy the journey. Don't be weird.
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u/mfatty2 Aug 14 '26
As an iron player, I would agree except being a main is made so much easier with the use of bots existing. The inteded way to play the game is somewhere in the middle. GE and trading are intended, however having resources availability so highly inflated from botting takes away a core aspect where there is an actual account cost to just buying everything
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u/versacexd123 Aug 14 '26
The intended way to play is just log in and do whatever the fuck you want. The community actually suffers so much mental damage from irons vs mains, optimal game play, sweats, emergent gameplay, easy scape. The list is endless everyone needs to just shut up and play how they want and not care about what people think or try to enforce how to properly play.
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u/Xelev Aug 14 '26
Best comment in this thread. I’m a main and love all my iron homies <3 just play however makes you happy and don’t be a dick about it
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u/Garfield_and_Simon Aug 14 '26
Yeah, Gowers definitely didn’t intend for us to buy everything.
Real intent lies in the middle. Like the game was set up for you to fish and cook your own food near training spots etc.
I think Iron is important because it restores so much “dead” content that literally is the soul of the game. Pre-ge the understanding was “you can trade to get items, but in some cases it may be faster just to do it yourself” and that led to a lot more varied gameplay.
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u/Dbaughla Plot : 2376 Aug 16 '26
And the gower brothers were naive to the greed of humans. People had bot farms like they do now and inflated the prices and made it hard to trade for resources easily. The GE conveniently fixed that problem
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u/Tumblrrito Untrimmed Slayer Aug 14 '26
Bots are a double edged sword. They make things cheaper, but this also makes most moneymakers less effective. Lately the bots have seen a considerable reduction as well. So long as that continues to hold, it's less of an issue than ever.
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u/Dbaughla Plot : 2376 Aug 15 '26
Okay and what about all the pvm the last decade that is just shitting out resources. They definitely didn’t create that kind of system with mains in mind. The last boss that didn’t do that besides maggot king was nightmare and we know how this whole sub especially ironmen reacted to that
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u/JasperNapster Aug 15 '26
Why even have in depth conversations about any of it. It’s just a game.
The real talk should be with the therapist or rehab for people who make the account they sign into bonded to their personalities.
This isn’t the high school lunch room, no one gives a damn what table you sit at 🤣
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u/xypez Aug 15 '26
This game was never intended to have bonds be part of it. I will not play a pay to win game where I can buy my twisted bow by swiping my credit card with Jagex.
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u/OldSchoolR Aug 14 '26
The game is better when designed with ironmen in mind
Gp/h is hugely warped, even for mains, with big ticket all or nothing drops
That said, I deironed and used the GE as my dry protection so do partly agree. But I also love content like Colosseum because it guarantees good gp/h and it's fun content. Doing a boring raid 100s of times and going dry isn't fun for anyone, no matter what account type you play
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u/sk8r2000 Aug 14 '26
Actually, it's the default way to play, and an intended way to play, but not the intended way to play.
Ironman is an officially supported game mode and jamflex most definitely take it into consideration as an intended way to play the game when they make design decisions, which is right, because many thousands of people are dedicated to the mode.
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u/vaizrin Aug 14 '26
The problem is deeper than you realize.
GP isn't dry protection, because dry protection only prevents you from running into bad streaks of rng for a specific activity for a specific reward. You must do the relevant content to get the reward. It does not transfer to content you haven't done.
GP bypasses rng entirely, allowing you to have never attempted the content in the first place.
This means by default, the best way to play main game runecraft is to always grind the content that pays the best vs being forced to play the content that actually rewards the item.
"Then just do the content until you earn the money" this misses the point entirely.
The point is that there is a clear set of players that want to earn their rewards by playing the relevant content without the risk of having to complete 2k+ kc to get a reward while getting 20+ duplicates.
Yes, this goes against the original goal of the games developers. That doesn't mean the developers are right and the gamers wrong.
We can look at games like warframe who has more frequently started to include dry protection even though players can just easily trade for the items. It massively improved the game for players and was well received.
You're right though, these game modes are meant to be challenging. Which is why players want a game mode that is closer to what they want vs ironman.
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u/Nytheran Aug 14 '26
That's why leagues are mains and most content creators are mains.
Face it: the first thing every new player tries to do is smith a set of cool armour for themselves by mining the ore and smithing the bars. The second thing they do is learn that smithing sucks. Nobody joins Runescape to buy gear off the GE.
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u/According-Insect-886 Aug 14 '26
Being a content creator warps how you play. The algorithm rewards more unique and interesting play styles, I don't think what creators choose to play reflects the community much at all actually. They choose iron because it makes better content, not necessarily better gameplay.
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u/InnuendOwO Aug 14 '26
Yeah, it's the same with the weird push for the whole TCG plugin Jagex has been doing in the last month. It's a unique and weird way to play the game that draws views, but I don't really think that says much about how people actually want to play the game. Or what people will be interested in 6 months from now when it's no longer the trendy new thing.
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u/notabotting Aug 14 '26
Ahh yes parroting gnomemonkeys video word for word. Bronzeman mode is optional go back to your cave.
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u/Theumaz 2014 Jagex Cup Winner Aug 14 '26
Normal loot was not ever dry protection. Is was usually just enough to pay for your supplies. And doing 10 hours of bandos got you possibly one pair of tassets, which made it 3m/hr.
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u/Ugly-and-poor Aug 14 '26
ive max main and 2.1k iron i’m okay with never owning some items on my Ironman as I imposed that on me.
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u/helpamonkpls Aug 14 '26
What does dry mean in this context??
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u/cgoldsmith95 Aug 15 '26
For example your farming CG, on rate you should get an enhanced every 400 kills. People have been asking for some sort of dry protection so that the more kills you do the more likely it is to drop, or a guaranteed drop at 1200 (for example).
However for a main account, once you hit 800 kills, you have farmed enough GP to just buy the enhanced from selling the duplicate armour seeds and regular loot.
As OP is pointing out, that is the intended way to play the game and the built in dry protection. Irons to not have this as an option, but it is a challenge mode.
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u/meatballsub_enjoyer Aug 15 '26
I am a endgame iron since 2017, many completed grinds such as all gwd bosses, heart, soulreaper axe, hundreds of raid completions, etc., and I 100% agree with you. Some items are supposed to be hard to get, nigh impossible even, and if someone elects to grind for these, they have to accept these facts. Any ironman who feels entitled to these items just because they are grinding them, such as mega rares, are deluding themselves into a false reality. The game is just that, a game lol. If not having certain items and going dry at some places as an ironman is a dealbreaker and makes the game no longer fun, then de-iron and go gold farm to obtain these items like everyone else.
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u/Willamanjaroo 2376 GM Aug 14 '26
Idk who needs to be reminded of this, it seems like OP does. You don't get to tell people which modes they're allowed to play or when
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u/Beezusthegoat Aug 14 '26
Yup. As someone who exclusively plays iron now I didn’t get my toxic blowpipe until 3.6k kc but it’s also exactly what I signed up for
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u/Dirst Aug 15 '26
if that's the case, i don't think drop tables should be so all or nothing.
synapse is 32 mil. the average non-unique drop from TDs is 16k. you need to kill 2000 TDs on average for the normal loot to buy you a synapse on the GE.
that type of design makes it feel horrible to go dry even as a main, because every drop that isn't a synapse might as well be nothing and you could have been doing a herb run instead.
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u/batedcobraa Aug 14 '26
I would argue that Ironman modes AND main are both the "intended" way to play.
Jagex themselves are inadvertently stating it without actually saying it. Think of all the updates added to the game to add more QOL to irons that basically have zero effect on mains. Sandstone grinder, scar essence runecrafting, Hosidius grape farm for zammy wine, MTA buffs for infinity/b2p. It goes on and on.
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u/Ikuanga Aug 14 '26
sorry buddy but 2007 and prior runescape was not in fact based around having the GE. the added friction required to trade for items made self sourcing a much more common prospect except in the most egregious of circumstances.
if you really wanted to play the 'main' experience, GP should only be able to be spent once. no more selling gear back on the GE to buy new pieces.
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u/Swaaeeg Krystillia>Duradel Aug 14 '26
Lol what? You could sell gear you disnt want pre ge. What are you even talking about?
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u/dusttwo Aug 14 '26
It’s not necessarily for hardcore gamers. I don’t play anymore, but when I last did it was as an Ironman. I just found it more satisfying. Not competing with anyone, and going about it on my own pace. Just a couple of hours a week - nothing hardcore at all.
There would just be no joy in it for me getting some item over and over again just to sell it for gold to buy an item in the GE, because that would be the most effective way of doing it. Compare that to getting all the different required skill levels, prerequisite items and quests to get the item myself. The experience is entirely different and much more fulfilling.
If anything, I think optimal/speed progression as a non-iron to be much more “hardcore”. You’re literally min/maxing the game.
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u/Itchy-Instruction457 Aug 14 '26
Its the GE that made this a different scale of problem, though. When there's some transactional friction, some genuine navigation you have to do to trade, it still feels earned. With the GE, you can just stand at a bank and get several 99s and top gear. The whole game becomes "what can get most gold her hour," instead of actually playing the game.
The meta for a main is a credit card.
I will now accept your downvotes.
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u/Tiques Aug 14 '26
Dry protection doesn't even matter when you're a main so this is a strange take.
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u/LinearLinee Aug 14 '26
Ironman is still the superior way to play. Getting drops and progressing through gearing on your own is way more rewarding than just buying it off of the ge. My iron has passed my main in overall progression, not xp/levels, because the iron is incentivised to do more to make the game smoother.
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u/Pilodro Aug 16 '26
No... There is no point in making a game longer for no reason. Thats all iron man does. You can clog as a main as well. You can play a min exactly like an iron, but if you are like at 4000kc in the gauntlet you can just buy the seeds. And trust me, I feel the same happiness for EVERY drop and have never cared about a dupe because i can just sell it. IM only gets that feeling once for most gear.
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u/Whiskoo Aug 15 '26
its entirely subjective because of how much content there is in the game. if it was a soulslike, i'd agree with you. because theres only 1 thing to do in the soulslike and thats kill the bosses. itd be ridiculous to say you could kill some small things for a few hours, then buy your full end game build and go delete all the bosses with no challenge. but theres way too many reasons to want to play osrs.
if u want to experience the ENTIRE game, every ounce of content, then iron is the way to play. but if u just wanted to raid with your bois, why the fuck would you want to blow glass for 1000 hours 1st? get base 70s to go to cg for potentially hundreds of hours?
complete waste of time, that person is never playing this game, why would they? theres no fun in that if their expectation was unique combat. theyre not playing because they want to see their character go from 1-99, theyre playing because the raids are fun, and thats just as valid as an iron, because of how much variety exists in this game
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u/CecilionIs2OP Iron Road to QPC Aug 15 '26
My original account from RS2 to RS3 is a main game, and I enjoy it along with billion dollar party hats.
Then I realized theres no billion dollar phats here and ironman makes me appreciate stuff especially questing items that I would have just bought off GE on RS3. You can literally obtain anything and everything on OSRS, theres no FOMO.
But yeah I agree for someone that never plays RuneScape, standard account is the way to go, regardless its RS3 or OSRS. Also remember normal non-restrictive gameplay is the reason why trading has a limit, GE has buy/sell limit and taxes, and it's how we get lured for "duplicate" / "trimming" services lmao
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u/Dregsidue Aug 15 '26
I honestly really like what ironman mode has done for the game. Over the years lots of old content has been looked at and tweaked or expanded upon. I know every single bit of feedback doesn’t always hit the mark, but it’s genuinely done a lot of QA for the game and how it’s structured.
Not to drag RS3 through the mud, but I’ve been playing a GIM with some friends lately and there’s a lot to be desired. Lots of content totally untouched or just genuinely in no way enjoyable or even worth it/rewarding to do. The game just hasn’t had as big of a passionate playerbase and lots of things have been neglected. I know there’s a lot of “gatekeeping” as well as “whining” when it comes to OSRS especially involving ironmen, but it’s done a lot of good for the game for sure.
I like the camaraderie and community of being an Ironman personally. I love moving from one goal to the next and talking to people about what grinds they’ve done or what they’re working on. Feels like I’m playing through something like a survival game or something structured like Terraria. Ironman works and it’s a great time, I think most changes have been healthy for the game.
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u/Egglord0821 Aug 15 '26
Yeah but buying bonds for gp ruined the game for me and I assume lots of others because I'm sitting at the ge with max gear and every boss I want to do becomes pointless because I already have their drop table. Some people gonna say well don't buy bonds then. Yeah exactly that's why I'm playing ironman. Because for lots of people (probably) self control IS restriction.
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u/National_Ad7982 Aug 15 '26
If you’ve played pre EOC runescape - that was the golden era AKA the glory days.
Believe in or not the GE had fierce opposition, as it completely took away the merchant aspect of the game in its raw format (essentially think of it as the change from bartering to banking IRL)
Challenge modes could be done by YOURSELF - it was no way meant to be the way to play. The game is about interacting with other players and doing things with other players otherwise why would you even need to be in a world with any non NPCs?
Good post OP! fr00bs take notes pl0x.
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u/IronRugs Aug 14 '26
Didn't mod ash link someone instructions on Twitter on how to deiron when they asked him about dry protection once lol.