Eshelmen wrote: »

And believe me, I'm not disagreeing with you at all.
If you give everyone reasons to get back to the zones, this game can expands exponentially.

Love the post

Yeah @Eshelmen , I've been posting things for expanding base game zones since the game was sub-only, and the fact that all dev effort seems to be 100% Crown Store skins and new DLC is exactly why I and many others were worried about the game going B2P. But if it's doing just so much better and making a ton of money with B2P, having some projects that go slow but are still focused on the original zones should be possible if the studio is growing and working well.

Here is what I (being selfish) would do with such a slow-moving, secondary project:

• you have the TG and DB and fishing already to get people into these zones so leave that as is
• add the *optional* downscaling so that people can revisit old content they over-leveled, help friends, do events like dolmens for generals with challenge, and do new repeatable quests
• turn dark fissures into events on par with dark anchors to add more "we don't need to group but can still come together" style moments
• add, some to start and more over time, new repeatable quests for the base alliance zones, which would be 1-50 for some or CR ranked for others, but it would be 15 zones worth of "new" content for any individual player:
  • one at first and then another Wrothgar-like quest for each delve which you get from innkeepers (TES nostalgia!)
  • one at first and then up to three quests for the public dungeons
  • two or three at first and then up to ??? new quests for overworld where you either have to kill so many existing mobs and grab an item placed there by the quest, or do something with new mobs placed there by the quest, etc; can do standard MMO quests or hopefully get really creative or at least add some fun elements like in-jokes for TES fans
  • you can only get or do these quests while originally leveling and being in the right level range or by scaling
  • you can get an XP/gold bonus each day for doing one of these while scaled, one bonus per type
  • loot table would include some fun sets that don't ever get scaled up but now will be available at your true level when scaling
  • loot table would include other items that even experienced players would like such as stacks of mats
• redo portions of Craglorn and have players scale to it as well so that when gear-cap goes up to CR180, CR200, and beyond there is a reason to go back there, too

Didn't have time to write that out before and I figured it would be TMI and distracting in an already long original post. But basically this explains why, if you aren't worried about having over-leveled via Cyro, or doing DLC, or having ESO plus, etc, or worried about ruining dolmens and such for lowbies, or about going back for missed content, or about running with lower level friends, you still might want to do it.

It opens up so much more to do in base game, reduced player segregation by level, encouraged increased socialization, and so on. I mean sure some players still won't care, but I envision so many in-jokes and homages to similar quests from the original TES I to V games as well.

And if you have this toggled on, the only content you would not be scaled to would be base-game zones above your level, so that a sense of progressive challenge and getting stronger would remain intact while leveling up. You would be matched to everything else to make more of a seamless world, where you are just as challenged by a goblin in your starting zone as in your current level-appropriate zone.

ADarklore wrote: »

Funny because the devs have said numerous times that they will not be going back to re-work older content. They make no money off older content and it would take developers off current and future content, which again, they make no money off of. Financially it is better for them to focus on the quarterly DLC releases to give players more 'battle-leveled' zones which they can play at any time, and after a few months from now, with all the DLCs, people won't care about 'going back' to older content.

Also, DCUO tried updating their older zones to scale, it didn't work, and they ended up restoring everything back to the way they were originally. So clearly it is not as easy as so many arm-chair developers like to make it sound.

Yeah @ADarklore, like I said just above in this comment, it's one reason I don't like B2P. Never said anything I suggest is easy

But.

(dramatic pause)

This isn't zone-level scaling. It's player-level scaling. Take the current code for upward battle-leveling, tune it the other way. Yes that still takes time, but it's much quicker and easier than trying to re-balance everything in several zones.

As to what has been said before, the devs can be wrong, and they can change their minds. Not saying they will on this issue, but, they have a goldmine of content they could unlock to make the base game more fun for all, which in turn means more people to buy the DLC. They are already sending people back into the base game with some of the new DLC, and I believe that more little things to make that base game more fun, repeatable, and enticing for the price of the original box is a win-win.

The DLC-only strategy has limitations. Long time players get bored, and many burn through new DLC fast. New players want to play with experienced friends and meet more helpful experienced players and have people in their zones to do stuff with. There is a lot of level segregation and some base games zones are fairly empty much of the time. Not to mention all of the issues I started the thread with that would be largely resolved by a proposal like the one I am making.

So I mean, yeah, I do think this is something that would warrant at least consideration as a base-game improvement move; not as a competitor with DLC, but, like other base-game improvements, to compliments the DLC and increase overall base game sales and player retention (which again = more people around to buy the DLC). Let the DLC teams do their thing, and have whoever they already pull for base-game stuff get a crack at this.

It could be a secondary project that moves slowly and incrementally:
-reverse engineer battle-leveling, add to game (part of update A)
-add a few repeatable quests in some base-game zones (part of update C)
-add repeatable quests to a few more zones (part of update F)
-add more repeatable quests to zones that have some (part of update G)
-add the new "event-level" dark fissures (part of update I)

At any stage, they could see how well it was going in terms of player reaction. If it was a hit, devote more resources and speed up the time table, if not, leave it wherever it gets to and close the project.

Sardath wrote: »

Just to clear some misconceptions on the downscalning in GW2, it's one of the few things that the game does better than ESO PvE-wise.

It doesn't eliminate progression, at all. You will be stronger than a true lvl 15 for example. No one forces you to go in the lower level zones, you can jump in the appropriate level zones, as there are plenty, and still feel that you are progressing.

Now, if you've gotten to max lvl, you have to option to visit low level zones and still have fun in the events/world bosses. And because maps have mats(and also items that you can deconstruct into mats) as rewards, you have a reason to do them. Low level maps always feel alive because of this.

There really isn't a downside to this.

I disagree completely. Respectfully, but completely. Of the things I absolutely hated about my time in Gw2, this ranked up there as one of my most loathed features. You were "technically" stronger than the true lvl 15, but you didn't feel like it. Aside from world events, I never once set foot back into a Gw2 lower level zone. And lets face it, before some key additions, world bosses were just zerg fests where you could tap the boss and /dance until it was down to receive the same terrible loot and play the rng game. Haven't played in well over a year, so not sure how much of that has changed. In my mind, the entirety of Gw2's pve content was basically all of us running around the zones with a nerf bat, smacking things for 1 dmg a piece, no matter how much better we geared ourselves and leveled. I'm not saying downscaling was totally to blame for this feeling, but it didn't help matters.

Enodoc wrote: »

Etchos wrote: »

I dont think this is a good idea. For example:

-If i click this magic switch to scale down do I then have to manually go and tell the game which skill points i want to lose? or does it just make an assumption?
-Does it make a distiction between level up skill points and skyshard points.
-Then when I unclick the switch is it suppossed to remember where those points where
-Also same issue for attribute points
-I dont really want to have to go and buy/craft low level gear anytime i want to do reduced level content. And i have no room in my bank to be keeping low level sets to equip when I down level.
-Also does this effect individual skill lines? Or can i run around at a reduced level popping flawless dawnbreaker when there is no way I could have progressed l10 fighters guild at that point in the game?

@Etchos I would imagine it would work exactly the same as battle-levelling does now. No skill points or gear are affected, but all character stats (health, magicka, stamina, weapon damage, spell damage, etc) would be proportionally reduced.

Exactly. You don't lose anything, it's just battle-leveling expanded to go both ways.

Callous2208 wrote: »

I disagree completely. Respectfully, but completely. Of the things I absolutely hated about my time in Gw2, this ranked up there as one of my most loathed features. You were "technically" stronger than the true lvl 15, but you didn't feel like it. Aside from world events, I never once set foot back into a Gw2 lower level zone. And lets face it, before some key additions, world bosses were just zerg fests where you could tap the boss and /dance until it was down to receive the same terrible loot and play the rng game. Haven't played in well over a year, so not sure how much of that has changed. In my mind, the entirety of Gw2's pve content was basically all of us running around the zones with a nerf bat, smacking things for 1 dmg a piece, no matter how much better we geared ourselves and leveled. I'm not saying downscaling was totally to blame for this feeling, but it didn't help matters.

I totally understand what you're saying. I didn't enjoy the faceroll content either and never revisited the zones except for some world bosses, but you're omitting two things. Firstly, there were multiple zones of the same level, while you could see a 50 zone at lvl 50, you can see another completely different 50 zone at lvl 80 and still partake in the events. Secondly, the content doesn't have anything to do with downscaling - it was faceroll whether you do it for the first time or not. When you have good content, downscaling enables you to complete it without it being a faceroll, which I think is a good thing.

As for braindead open PVE, what MMORPG doesn't have it? ESO isn't any more challenging. Even when I try to solo a dolmen for some challenge, sometimes I get another high level player that two-shots everything, which I find worse.