well I am not a noob, I've been playing runescape since late 2001, and I personally think the recent updates Jagex has made were for the worse. I don't think they needed to be so extreme. Think about it, probably 85% of players were pkers, I for one was not. I was always interested in skills and quests, never Player Killing or dueling. I've never been in a clan and never pest-controlled for combat skills. I quit last month, not because of the updates, but because of the community. I miss the old runescape, I don't like how crowded it is and how many jerks there are - it seems like 95% of the people I meet anymore are 11 year old kids begging for me to do something for them. I was scammed over 300M 2 years ago, by a trusted friend (rares I kept over the years). Just last month I was scammed a santa hat and about 10M.
I love the Grand Exchange though, I really do. But actually, I had about 8M to my character after quitting and emptying out most of my bank to friends. I met a few worthy new players, and helped them out. I met one last night, and was going to give him 50k to start out, but guess what - I couldn't. The new trade idea is unrealistic, and it is preventing my generosity.
I really wish I could have kept playing, but I know if I would I'd be unhappy anyway. I had just bought supplies for 99 construction and fishing, and had 99 woodcutting/firemaking under my belt as well, and was on my way to getting herblore to 90+. It really is a shame I think, that Jagex had to make such drastic changes to the game. Think of all the older failed updates that were just a sad attempt to stop macroers and rule-breakers. Rune vs Pure essence, the town criers that nobody ever talks to, the stronghold of security, and above all, RANDOM EVENTS. All of these were just annoying to the good players - Bots can easily get around random events, and can be programmed to complete them.
Merchanting isn't a bad thing, but I didn't do it. I made all my money runecrafting and skilling, selling what I made, the way it was meant to be. I do realize that the new trade thing will stop scammers almost completely, at least trade scammers. But think about how many people are quitting because of this update. Lots. Jagex is losing more players than it is gaining from the recent updates. Instead of taking out the problems, they should have found better solutions. Yes, I hated abyss pkers, and I never liked PKing, but regardless, the wilderness is meant to be dangerous.
Their goal with the trade thing is to stop lower-levels from getting scammed by higher levels. They realized that people were quitting because they got scammed, so what did they do? They made the Grand Exchange (good) then took out unbalanced trade (BAD). Now, I'm okay with the idea of no unbalanced trade, but I don't like how it's based on QP. I completed every quest, yes. But I was f2p when the update happened, and I still could only trade 3k. Well besides that, I think it would have made sense to add on to QP - so that total level and combat level also affected the amount you could trade, perhaps up to 100k+. I have a few friends with 2277 total and every quest complete, and a bunch with every quest but only 1900+ or so total, I just find it a bit unfair to the veterans who worked hard and still can't be trusted trading more than 50k or so to other people.
Lots of lower levels quit the game because people are ignorant and refuse to help them. Many of my friends would help out lower levels by giving them 20k or so to get a decent start in the game, but now we can't give more than 3k, which is just barely enough for a set of steel armor or something. I wish I could quit for good and give my items away to those who deserve it but.. I can't.