The Elder Scrolls Online

signati_sl · Mar 4, 2014

Ut, Cyrodiil has enough mindless zerglings who have great fun losing already. Letting people in at level 1 would make it even worse. People get tired of explaining how to use wayshrines as it is. If zone chat is filled with stuff like, "How do I equip this sword?" then strategy would become impossible and people would just start leaving.

Vitality · Mar 4, 2014

Utnayan_sl said:
This is kind of what I mean by soul as well. (..etc..)

I feel like Cyrodil (and maybe two other areas introduced like Cyrodil) is a much better place to include all this suggested content if at all possible. I mean, the difference between Cyrodil and the other "Islands" is just night and day as far as breadth of landscape and what not.

Would you agree to this? Expanding Cyrodil to include dynamic content?

Do you still have that contact conected to the Developer behind Cyrodil? If so, tell that genius fker I want to buy him a beer.

Yes, I am a Cyrodil Shill. The rest of the game sucks in comparison.

Caliane · Mar 4, 2014

Vitality_sl said:
I feel like Cyrodil (and maybe two other areas introduced like Cyrodil) is a much better place to include all this suggested content if at all possible. I mean, the difference between Cyrodil and the other "Islands" is just night and day as far as breadth of landscape and what not.

Would you agree to this? Expanding Cyrodil to include dynamic content?

Do you still have that contact conected to the Developer behind Cyrodil? If so, tell that genius fker I want to buy him a beer.

Same could be said about the islands and pve mainland in general honestly.
If the game started on the mainland, much of this conversation wouldn't be had.

signati_sl · Mar 4, 2014

The 1-10 level curve has been softened and players start on the mainland after the tutorial in 0.18, so we're really discussing solved issues. If they'd allow the Coldharbour tutorial to be skipped among alts, since the main already got the intro to the main quest, then they'd have a solid start schema.

Vitality · Mar 4, 2014

Caliane_sl said:
Same could be said about the islands and pve mainland in general honestly.
If the game started on the mainland, much of this conversation wouldn't be had.

I think the general consensus here is that the PVE introduced in this game is lackluster and near worthless. If you dig a few pages back I outline how Grinding tightly packed mobs is nearly twice as fast as following a quest chain.

The loot output of grinding is also exponentially better than the time spent questing.

PVE in this game wasn't well done, the story is just kind of uninvolved, lacking effect on the game etc.

I believe "Arbitrary" fills the role of describing PVE here.

Disagree with me if you will, that's just a summary of the majority in this thread, I'm sure we can all agree that "Dynamic" is what we want our PVE experience to be.

Tauro · Mar 4, 2014

zzeris_sl said:
Why would they rearrange content for the WoW PvP type players? The guys that can't handle that hard 7 hours to get to content they like? So, that they can then complain about the game being an everything for everyone game while they push for exactly that kind of game? The complaint that PvE for 7 hours is just too much is hilarious. That's the first sign you really don't like the game or just can't handle a bit of 'inconvenience. So, why are you buying it?

+1

They could make a lot of money with a character boost to level 10 for 25$

rhinohelix · Mar 4, 2014

Utnayan_sl said:
The same? But with content that has a soul to it.

SWTOR: For all it's faults, had a great story line for some classes. That was the carrot to get passed some of the trivial and mundane side questing and travel sinks.

GW2: Really had a go anywhere mentality with fun and engaging PvE where new things were tried and you could see it outplay in the world. More than just "Put out this fire and get thrown into the next phase to see people". Different play types such as jumping puzzles and map completion.

TSW: Had very engaging atmosphere and a new puzzle system for questing. But the care that was put into the art assets here was above and beyond anything most developers could shit out because they put thought behind it. For instance, the franklin mansion while going through different time era's while playing through the haunted history of the house. Even the landscape changed. They could have easily just copy pasted that, but they spent the time to make sure it was all different for that 1-2 hour patch of PvE content.

WoW: A good example of how to use phasing within a quest system starting with WOTLK. Quests you actually remember long after you played through them. Like the fight into Icecrown and establishing a future base to inch onward into the zone itself. (THis happened with 3 quest hubs that I remember that weren't quest hubs until you did the story line and phased through it in a military invasion style system)

I agree with you about all the above but I also like the questing in ESO. /Shrug. The three starter zones all tell pretty good tales: While exploring the legends of the island, Bleakrock is invaded by the Daggerfall Covenant; In Stros M'Kai, you have to help a pirate captain assemble a crew and pull off a caper to liberate the island from its local despot warlord; In Kenrathi's(sp) Roost, you enlist an seperatist island to the Dominion cause by liberating them from an ancient treaty with aggressive Sea-Elves. While not the stuff of legend, its the only the first six levels.

Anyway, if anyone is really still on the fence, the next beta event should have bugfixes o'plenty enough to see if its something you want to spend money on. I would imagine large numbers of people are going to stay in the thread to tell anyone who is still listening that the game is total shit; do yourself a favor and try it for yourself before making up your mind. For me, I am all in. I just scheduled a couple of days off during the headstart so I can get my fill before the inevitable problems set in with retail launch.

ESO is really trying to fit down the middle between TES fans and MMO fans; whether they succeed enough is entirely up to you.

alavaz · Mar 4, 2014

zzeris_sl said:
Why would they rearrange content for the WoW PvP type players? The guys that can't handle that hard 7 hours to get to content they like? So, that they can then complain about the game being an everything for everyone game while they push for exactly that kind of game? The complaint that PvE for 7 hours is just too much is hilarious. That's the first sign you really don't like the game or just can't handle a bit of 'inconvenience. So, why are you buying it?

Maybe they would do this because they don't want this game to be a deader piece of shit than it already is destined to be?

signati_sl · Mar 4, 2014

JTheRuler_sl said:
Maybe they would do this because they don't want this game to be a deader piece of shit than it already is destined to be?

More than 100 posts in the WoW thread, almost nothing elsewhere. Real objective and trustworthy opinion there

rhinohelix · Mar 4, 2014

Vitality_sl said:
I think the general consensus here is that the PVE introduced in this game is lackluster and near worthless. If you dig a few pages back I outline how Grinding tightly packed mobs is nearly twice as fast as following a quest chain.

The loot output of grinding is also exponentially better than the time spent questing.

PVE in this game wasn't well done, the story is just kind of uninvolved, lacking effect on the game etc.

I believe "Arbitrary" fills the role of describing PVE here.

Disagree with me if you will, that's just a summary of the majority in this thread, I'm sure we can all agree that "Dynamic" is what we want our PVE experience to be.

I disagree; maybe if that kind of grinding/min-max/time-efficiency thing really matters to you, sure. It does belie the point, though: Is the issue that grinding is more efficient that questing, or that everything is forced to be quest-oriented? I have seen both arguments over the last 10 pages. You can't hate something for being something and also for not being something at the same time. Well, I guess you can but that is between (generalized other, not you specifically, Vitality) you and your cognitive dissonance.

Cinge · Mar 4, 2014

signati_sl said:
More than 100 posts in the WoW thread, almost nothing elsewhere. Real objective and trustworthy opinion there

Must quote this for prosperity, because its coming from someone who joined less then a month ago and has only posted in this thread, all of them defending the game.

alavaz · Mar 4, 2014

signati_sl said:
More than 100 posts in the WoW thread, almost nothing elsewhere. Real objective and trustworthy opinion there

Wow you are fucking retarded, you joined two weeks ago, only post in the ESO thread and try to drop this little "discredit?"

Blackwulf · Mar 4, 2014

It's going to sell big. Don't kid yourself

Rescorla_sl · Mar 4, 2014

Utnayan_sl said:
Obviously highly subjective based on sub topic. But I will illustrate some sub-topics that I think are more objective that definitely hurt the soul of the game. Some impacting TESO, some not. I'll mark them with an Asterick if it effects TESO.

* 1) Copy/Pasted Areas to save on development costs - Repeated dungeons, using the same art assets time and time again, rinse and repeat encounter game types with different monsters.
* 2) Copy Pasted Itemization - (You get a sword at level 10, you get the same sword after a dungeon encounter at level 19 with better stats with the same art. Rinsing and repeating itself with armor)
3) Randomly generated map content in an MMORPG without a static world environment to remember.
* 4) Lack of diversity in the game play mechanics of the questing system.
* 5) Artificial feel of the world due to overuse of instancing and phasing. (Seeing players you never saw before pop into a new phase, over-world instancing, PvP world instancing/layering
* 6) In an RvR game, the lack of an ongoing always on persistent war without a timing mechanism. With a lack of * Many * static PvE world outcomes of various nature as a result of ongoing war.

Just a few off the top of my head that make games lose their substance.

Probably a waste of time to try and reason with you but here goes.

#1. The torch dungeons are nothing but caves that a solo player can easily finish in 10-15. They are no different than the 100s of caves found in Skyrim and Oblivion. Trying to make all of them unique would be a collosal waste of developer resources. They are caves and all caves look similar. That is something I can deal with.

The public and private dungeons are all unique so your complaint isn't applicable to those.

#2. Your complaints about itemization is just more proof you haven't played any of the game past whatever is available in the weekend beta. Your assertion that itemization is just copy pasted is ridiculous and just another outright fabrication on your part. The reason armor and weapons look the same for you is because the loot you are getting is all in the same tier for your level, which is capped at 17.

Want to hear something really cool? Once you get into your 20s, the loot drops you get will have different graphics that what you got in your teens. Want to hear something even more cool? Same thing applies to crafted gear. Want to hear something even more cool? For every tier of crafted gear, there is a unique graphic for each race in the game.

Every single piece of medium armor I have gotten as a quest reward was uniquely different than the item it replaced. Same thing applies to every dagger upgrade.

#4 & 5 the overwhelming consensus of the closed beta testers is that the ESO quest system, to include the extensive use of phasing, is that it is well done, creates a lot of immersion and gives you the sense that your character is having a direct impact on the game world. Everyone is entitled to their opinion but I'm willing to bet the negative opinions posted here about the questing and phasing design are going to be a small minority of the player base.

signati_sl · Mar 4, 2014

Cinge_sl said:
Must quote this for prosperity, because its coming from someone who joined less then a month ago and has only posted in this thread, all of them defending the game.

Right, but I'm not going and posting content-void, vapid shitposts in threads about other games. If you like WoW, cool, but that doesn't mean that everything that isn't WoW will fail.

Also, all of my posts have not defended the game. If that's what you think, then you haven't read my posts. I just don't suck the Blizzard cock, which in some small worlds equates to being a fanboy of other titles. WoW is a great game, but it's not the only game in the world.

Tuco · Mar 4, 2014

Sabbat_sl said:
Tuco's complaint of walking into a burnt out town with nothing in it was one of the funniest, and fucking sad things I've ever heard. That default state, the one with nothing in it? that's the town without YOUR involvement. You're damned right it's a ghost town, every cunt is already dead. You could bitch and moan that you should see the end result if you walk into it, that you should see that it was under attack, but that makes no sense either. Talk to the chick outside, and shit gets set in motion, because you've arrived in the nick of time.

So there's a few ways they could have implemented this:

1. The way they did. When the player enters the village it's a ghost town state. The player finds the quest NPC on their minimap, runs to them and they put the village in the on fire state. The player then competes with other players to save villagers and once they save 5 villagers the town is put in peaceful but slightly singed state and the player gets some reward.

2. Slightly improved, when the player enters the village its in a on fire state. The player is notified either through a quest NPC running around asking players to do shit (annoying), a UI element that pops up saying what to do ala GW2 (easy but immersion breaking) or by the villagers running around on fire asking in say (with or without chat bubbles) for help (best way as its integrated into the game world). Bonus points if said villagers die if you don't help them.

3. The zone-integrated dynamic approach: there is some enemy faction centered in some area that periodically fucks over the local villagers. If they get powerful enough where they light fools on fire they will send 20 NPCs from their base of operations to the village, if they successfully get there they will start lighting shit on fire and the village goes to the 'under fire' state. If they successfully light stuff on the village will go to the 'on fire' state. If no players come in some period of time the village goes to the ghost town state which involves some rebuild quest. If local players rebuilds, puts out the fires, or kills the NPCs that are lighting shit on fire the village goes to the peaceful state. It doesn't matter who does it, just as long as it gets done. Defeating this faction will temporarily prevent them from trying to fuck over the villagers.

#1 and #2 are very similar, just #2 is more well thought out. #3 is what GW2 attempted to do (and successfully did in many instances) and it's a huge disappointment that TESO didn't attempt to follow those footsteps. #3 gives the world life, meaning and a constantly changing environment. It's also hard, time consuming and requires talented developers. The other thing that the #3 approach allows you to do is to enable PVP-based quests. Where instead of good villagers being blown up by bad NPCs you have Altmer NPCs warring with Orc NPCs. And different players from different factions can help the Altmer or Orc npcs.

My big problem with the PVE in TESO is that when they choose between "Living breathing world with players being able to impact it." and "Instanced world with players being able to only impact their instance" they chose the latter. In doing so they stripped out the heart of TES and the heart of MMO and merged a soulless abomination together.

Gecko_sl · Mar 4, 2014

Cinge_sl said:
Must quote this for prosperity, because its coming from someone who joined less then a month ago and has only posted in this thread, all of them defending the game.

Yet all the long term posters are just plopping down real informative gems over the last week in this thread. *sarcasm flag for impaired*

When Ut is the only long term guy doing any non vapid discussions, and we're filled with WOW fanbois claiming how boring the game is before running back to farm raids or dailies, I think we've jumped the Shark.

Cinge · Mar 4, 2014

Tuco_sl said:
So there's a few ways they could have implemented this:

1. The way they did. When the player enters the village it's a ghost town state. The player finds the quest NPC on their minimap, runs to them and they put the village in the on fire state. The player then competes with other players to save villagers and once they save 5 villagers the town is put in peaceful but slightly singed state and the player gets some reward.

2. Slightly improved, when the player enters the village its in a on fire state. The player is notified either through a quest NPC running around asking players to do shit (annoying), a UI element that pops up saying what to do ala GW2 (easy but immersion breaking) or by the villagers running around on fire asking in say (with or without chat bubbles) for help (best way as its integrated into the game world). Bonus points if said villagers die if you don't help them.

3. The zone-integrated dynamic approach: there is some enemy faction centered in some area that periodically fucks over the local villagers. If they get powerful enough where they light fools on fire they will send 20 NPCs from their base of operations to the village, if they successfully get there they will start lighting shit on fire and the village goes to the 'under fire' state. If they successfully light stuff on the village will go to the 'on fire' state. If no players come in some period of time the village goes to the ghost town state which involves some rebuild quest. If local players rebuilds, puts out the fires, or kills the NPCs that are lighting shit on fire the village goes to the peaceful state. It doesn't matter who does it, just as long as it gets done.

#1 and #2 are very similar, just #2 is more well thought out. #3 is what GW2 attempted to do (and successfully did in many instances) and it's a huge disappointment that TESO didn't attempt to follow those footsteps. #3 gives the world life, meaning and a constantly changing environment. It's also hard, time consuming and requires talented developers.

My big problem with the PVE in TESO is that when they choose between "Living breathing world with players being able to impact it." and "Instanced world with players being able to only impact their instance" they chose the latter. In doing so they stripped out the heart of TES and the heart of MMO and merged a soulless abomination together.

I don't mind 3, but the whole thing is ruined when its all just repeated 15 minutes later for another group of players. There is no living world or you impacting that world.

I think it would take a combination of 3 and really heavy phasing to get actual living world and seeing a impact your actions have on the world, in a MMO. Or a non instanced objective and player built objectives pvp game to get that result.

Tuco · Mar 4, 2014

Cinge_sl said:
I don't mind 3, but the whole thing is ruined when its all just repeated 15 minutes later for another group of players. There is no living world or you impacting that world.

I think it would take a combination of 3 and really heavy phasing to get actual living world and seeing a impact your actions have on the world, in a MMO. Or a non instanced objective and player built objectives pvp game to get that result.

Yeah if it's repeated every 15 minutes it sucks. GW2 pioneered this and many of the dynamic zone-wide events were so light that it kind of failed.

If a group of players pushes the evil NPCs out of the village, then drives the fight to their home-base and wipes them out, the village shouldn't be under attack for another hour at least.

Utnayan · Mar 4, 2014

Rescorla_sl said:
Probably a waste of time to try and reason with you but here goes.

#1. The torch dungeons are nothing but caves that a solo player can easily finish in 10-15. They are no different than the 100s of caves found in Skyrim and Oblivion. Trying to make all of them unique would be a collosal waste of developer resources. They are caves and all caves look similar. That is something I can deal with.

It wouldn't have been a waste of resource to have more than 1-2 templates. Given how easy it is to create the land content in this game from a developer perspective, it would have been about a 2 week endeavor had art assets not been tied up.

The public and private dungeons are all unique so your complaint isn't applicable to those.

I think you are confusing graphical changing of the colors and unique. If they were confident in this, it would be in open beta and people would be testing this as we speak, not hamstrung to 1-17 content. What is your take on the existing boss encounters and the rinse and repeat mechanics?

Your assertion that itemization is just copy pasted is ridiculous and just another outright fabrication on your part. The reason armor and weapons look the same for you is because the loot you are getting is all in the same tier for your level, which is capped at 17.

This will go into more he-said-she-said so we will just agree to disagree. Heavily.

Want to hear something really cool? Once you get into your 20s, the loot drops you get will have different graphics that what you got in your teens. Want to hear something even more cool? Same thing applies to crafted gear. Want to hear something even more cool? For every tier of crafted gear, there is a unique graphic for each race in the game.

Different colors do not mean different art styles. Mind you, I didn't say * All * of the loot is copy pasted. You will see a lot of re-used art assets with nothing more than different colors (If Lucky) and upgraded stats. Again, this will be he said she said, so I will heavily disagree.

#4 & 5 the overwhelming consensus of the closed beta testers is that the ESO quest system, to include the extensive use of phasing, is that it is well done, creates a lot of immersion and gives you the sense that your character is having a direct impact on the game world. Everyone is entitled to their opinion but I'm willing to bet the negative opinions posted here about the questing and phasing design are going to be a small minority of the player base.

Part of what makes an MMORPG is immersion with other players. What breaks it is seeing something phase and all of a sudden all these once before invisible players are now visible in what is supposed to be an online world full of people. That, in definition, is immersion breaking in of itself. We can debate the nuances of this, but the same cross-server overland phasing has destroyed any sense of this in WoW. But at least with the phasing aspects of content itself (spawning different zone data sets based on character flagging) is used minimally for major events. When it is used every 5 seconds, you have no idea where the hell anyone is. Judging from what I have read, it isn't a minority in the complaint box. Of course, if we wanted to use your example, Matt Firor stated that combat was fixed back in August and heard no more complaints about it from the closed beta testers. And we all know that wasn't the case. I think you need to start taking closed beta tester feedback with a grain of salt. As seen in every mother MMORPG to date, there hasn't ever been a moment where the majority of the closed beta tester pool isn't busy brown nosing the devs or have stars in their eyes speaking to them on a private forum.

Do you still have that contact conected to the Developer behind Cyrodil? If so, tell that genius fker I want to buy him a beer.

Yes, I am a Cyrodil Shill. The rest of the game sucks in comparison.

I would have liked to see this game with just Brian Wheeler in charge and the director of PvE as well. From all accounts he listens to feedback from his team.

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