What's new?
What a month we've had, eh, Adventurers? We're hard at work delivering our 0.9 update, which includes the Ranged Skill, Skill Spells, as well as a new weapon type we're exploring based on player feedback we polled across our socials! That's arriving on September 9th, but we're also launching a 0.8.3 update in August, with an extra batch of awesome fixes - including building from chests! We have plenty to look back on for this month! Let's get stuck into this one, shall we?
Bolt from the Blue
We put out a call for feedback, votes and invited discussion from you, the Community, on what we should focus our attention on first for the Ranged Skill update that will be coming in September: Crossbows, or Throwables?
The response was clear - 77% of you wanted Crossbows.
So, Mod Pointy and the team have started cooking. We're showing you a very early look at a (janky!) test of what we're hoping to allow you to do with Crossbows - shield yourself. It's early days, but the work is still ongoing, and since I drafted this blogpost, work has been done! It's an exciting time to be a ranger.
I want to caveat this and be very clear - what you're seeing above is a developer gym, a whitebox area that showcases rough, unfinished assets that we can use to test ideas. The team are moving fast with this, so what you're seeing is already going to be out of date by the time this reaches your eyeballs, and the project is moving super fast. I'm hoping to share how the project is coming along with you all at regular intervals between now and the launch of 0.9 in the start of September - only a few weeks away now!
Community Campfire
We sat down with our Executive Producer Mod Dutch and our Creative Director, Mod Rook, to answer YOUR questions.
0.8.1 AND 0.8.2 Released!
Fidgety Widgety, Timey Wimey Stuff
We released our 0.8.1 update - a modest little spritz of fixes, QoL updates and adjustments based on player feedback! UI improvements, a day-night widget, solo game pausing, and a cape rack. Check out a more robust list of changes in the patch notes here.
Picky Bits, Fixy Bits
Our 0.8.2 update has brought in improvements to picking up items by increasing the clickbox, added additional protection to terrain and interiors against dragonbreath attacks, and a bunch of extra bugfixes.
Combat Level Requirements
Many of you asked "When are there going to be level requirements for combat gear?" and since then, we've been pondering the idea. Mod Pointy jumped in to talk through our approach and we put the vote to you, our players, on Discord and Reddit. The reponse was clear - Unlock Requirements were the most popular design approach, so now the team are ready to go away and assess how we can take learnings from this system into our future updates.
That's not to say that everything from now on will be locked behind a level requirement, but there will be items/gear pieces that we'll be looking to implement level requirements down the line so look forward to more news from us on that as we go!
Skeletons
There's no place like Bone
We shared a first look at the Skeletons that will be joining the fray as part of the Fellhollow update. This calcified crew will be causing problems, and we wanted to give you an early look at them in all their ghoulish glory. 
Read the full breakdown with a section from our Art Director, Mod Aaart, here.
Swamp Sounds
Ambient beats to wade/trudge to
We've opened up a poll in the Official RuneScape: Dragonwilds Discord to ask you which classic OSRS or RS3 song we should adapt into RuneScape: Dragonwilds' musical style - Nyckelharpas, Dulcimers, all the clicky-clacky, tactile, earthy sounds that have been serenading us as we wander the lands of Ashenfall. We've heard from so many of you offering suggestions, and far too many of you ignoring the bit where I told you not to say Sea Shanty 2, but that's fine. The tracks that came through ran the gamut of tracks from OS and RS - from Zulrah's "Coil" to the Croesus Front, from Fe Fi Fo Fum (seriously?) to Yesteryear.
We shortened that list down to 4 results: Stagnant, Dead Quiet, Morytania and Yesteryear. The result was close, but Morytania took the top spot. Look forward to us sharing progress on what we're cooking up in the future!
The poll was over in the Discord - join today to make sure you're part of these in the future!
Creative Mode
Now you're thinking creatively!
Mod Deluxe jumped in to share some news about the upcoming Creative Mode that will be launching this September as part of our 0.9 update!
We'll be launching the update with a broad range of features:
Building
- All Building pieces will be unlocked.
- Buildings will not have any material costs.
- Infinite carry weight.
Crafting
- All crafting recipes will be unlocked.
- No material cost for crafting.
Skills
- All skills will be maxed.
- No rune costs for spells.
- No cooldown for spells.
- No rune costs for Lodestone usage.
Environment and Survival
- Hunger, Thirst and Endurance will always be full.
- No world events (Dragon attacks, "You are being hunted" events or Base Raids)
- AI will not attack.
To accommodate multiple game modes, we're doubling the number of potential character save slots from 4 to 8 characters. You'll also be able to set up whether a world will, or will not, have stability systems on when you create a world. Once you create the world, you can't change the setting, so please be sure of what you're looking to do when you make the world!
Modding
Can't spell JMod without... uhhh. Mod.
We recently shared our updated Fan Content Policy and Modding Guidelines for RuneScape: Dragonwilds. The TL;DR is that Modding is possible, supported and encouraged. To be clear: this isn't substituting our commitment to delivering content to you. Meaningful content every quarter is still our mandate. We're not looking to "outsource" our content to community modders, but we also know that some absolutely legendary content, game modes and moments have come from community modding. Being able to modify your game, customise your experience or just add something new and unexpected is something we want to enable, so you can continue to enjoy this game, your way, for countless hours to come.
We recently put a survey in front of players to ask about their experience and preferences with modding - make sure you're part of our Discord and Reddit to hear more about surveys like this one! We'll try and keep updates on Steam to be the biggest pieces of the month, every month, so you're not feeling overwhelmed.
Speaking of which, I wanted to showcase a Mod Creator that's been creating some really great mods, with a sprinkle of lore flavour too! Spartandestroyr1 has been making a range of mods, the one that's caught my eye being "The Demon's Guidance", which extends your Fire Spirit Skill Spell. We can't wait to see more mods in the future!
Community Art
Our Discord member and building master "divine_gaze" has been absolutely crushing it on the builds which have taken some 600 hours of solo play! 
BoldSawyer has made a Duel Arena inspired battleground with four distinct arenas within its walls. Whose corner are you in? Lougrim? Saradomin? …Zamorak?
I know what you're thinking! "Wow, a photo mode to capture these in all their glory would be amazing!". Well, we're exploring how we can introduce a Photo Mode in a future update, if that's of any interest to you folks...
For now, that's everything. But we'll be sharing more songs, sneak peeks, shooty things and so much more in the coming weeks. Be sure to join the Official RuneScape: Dragonwilds Discord server to show off your best builds, find parties of dragon-slaying adventurers and chat! Be sure to follow us on our socials, too! We're on Twitter, BSky, Reddit, Instagram, Facebook, Twitch, YouTube and TikTok!
Be good, and we'll see you in Ashenfall.