Gilbert's Colours

Gilbert's Colours
Released		8 June 2017 (Update)
End date		22 June 2017 (Update)
Reward		Rainbow scarf
Preceded by		N/A
Succeeded by		2022 Pride event

One of the rainbows a player may find while searching for Rainbow strands.

Gilbert's Colours was an event that took place in Old School RuneScape as a promotion of LGBT inclusivity.

Players started the event by speaking to Gilbert, a leprechaun found in the Lumbridge Castle courtyard. Gilbert asked the player to gather six strands of colours from rainbows found throughout Gielinor. Each colour represents a specific meaning based on the rainbow flag in real-life.

Once the player gave Gilbert all six strands, he rewarded players with the rainbow scarf.

Locations

Each of the clues refers to the meaning of one of the stripes on the rainbow flag.

Colour		Riddle	Location	Colour meaning
	Red	"South of my magical location, I see life! New adventurers and baldness rife."	South of the Wizards' Tower.	Life
	Orange	"Beside me now, a person of healing. Those who test their luck, find this place appealing."	East of the Duel Arena bank.	Healing
	Yellow	"On my face; shining sunlight. South of a dwarf whom redberries delight."	The southern point of Mudskipper Point.	Sunlight
	Green	"Lush natures and trees are to the east. The Green strand... no orange! No, blue! No, red! Green! Argh! There's so much bickering in this area it's hard to pinpoint its location..."	The entrance of the Goblin Village.	Nature
	Blue	"In this area, there's a silent and artistic harmony... Ironically, north-west, wizards kill newcomers effortlessly."	In the rams' pen, south of Varrock.	Serenity
	Purple	"The knights in this area, are full of Saradomin's spirit. On the top of this fortress, when I yell - all hear it!"	On the top floor of the White Knights' Castle, just upstairs of Sir Amik Varze.	Spirit

Controversy

Gilbert's Colours was an extremely controversial event which received mixed opinions from the Old School RuneScape community. Criticism from dissenting players claimed it was too overtly political and thus out of place and "irrelevant" to the world of Old School RuneScape. Upon announcement of the event on Mod Wolf's personal Twitter account, it received significant backlash, culminating in offensive and inflammatory in-game protests (dubbed "riots") against the event which received outside media coverage.

In a 2020 interview, Mod Mat K, a former Senior Product Manager, described the backlash as "horrific", stating that an investigation by Jagex afterwards concluded that the majority of the protestors were not active players, but instead came from anti-LGBT communities across the Internet who joined Old School solely to protest the event. Mod Wolf, the developer of Gilbert's Colours, was the target of death threats and severe harassment as a result, causing him great personal distress. In February 2022, Mod Wolf (who had also departed Jagex by that time) stated that his only regret regarding the event was that Jagex did not continue to do Pride events yearly because of the backlash, a sentiment Mod Sween agreed with.

As a result of the 2017 community backlash, there was no new Pride event until 2022. Numerous countermeasures were put in place to prevent anti-LGBT protests in 2022, including the disabling of Dwarf multicannons, Hunter traps, mithril seeds, and fires in the area surrounding the event and the muting and banning of protesting players specifically for disruption of the event.

Transcript

This article on an event has an associated dialogue page. Click here for a transcript of possible conversations encountered throughout the event.