Opening up zones which become locked after certain quests

Bobcat

Greetings,

As a roleplayer and fan of the Elder Scrolls, I must confess I feel strongly disappointed whenever I find myself facing a locked door after having completed one of the quests in the game. Let me explain.

We can find several types of environment in the game: public dungeons, group dungeons, taverns, houses, outdoor zones, countless ruins, not to mention a few planes of Oblivion and so on and so forth.

Being a roleplayer (that is, a player who practices roleplay, or RP), as I mentioned above, I love to go out exploring in roleplay after I have completed the quests, so that I am not bothered by phasing and I can just follow my own imagination rather than being constrained by the quests and the gameplay (there is a huge difference between “roleplay” and “gameplay”, but that’s a whole different debate).

I also happen to be the Game Master of an RP guild which organizes roleplay based on adventure and exploration (in a sort of Indiana Jones style, but adapted to the Elder Scrolls universe). In order to do that, I need to have access to locations I can use to create roleplay events.

At the moment, the best location I have found in the Aldmeri Dominion (which is where I play), is a Khajiti ruin in Khenarthi’s Roost. It’s an absolutely ideal environment for adventure RP, because there are no enemy NPCs. As a result, one can easily play with emotes using /e and /s (traditional roleplayers like me use the chat channels more than their gameplay skills), and it’s pure heaven! Narrative emotes flow in abundance, as do player reactions, and not a single time are we bothered by the spawning and re-spawning of hostile NPCs coming to spoil our fun and to interrupt the impetus of our writing.

Throughout the rest of the game, there are numerous areas which could be like that. Areas with a gameplay quest to be completed, which unfortunately become inaccessible after said quest has been completed.

These areas hold no interest whatsoever for PvE players, and much less of course for PvP players, but they could represent so much for RPers! They could give them so many possibilities! I don’t think it should be too difficult to reprogram these zones to be unlocked once their quests are completed and the area has been cleared of all mobs. And it’s a much more modest request than, for example, the one of introducing a PvP campaign tagged [RP].

All it takes is to unlock these areas in order to allow roleplayers like me to return there and to enjoy the game through this very immersive and often too criticized form of gaming that is roleplay.

Of course we are not as numerous as PvE or PvP players. We are a very modest community compared to these two other types of players which constitute the “priority” for the developers of a videogame. But we also would like for our opinions to be taken in due consideration.

I am not asking for a new high-level PvE zone, I am not asking for a more challenging PvP, I am only asking to unlock certain locations which are currently locked in-game in order to peacefully conduct our roleplay there, with fun and good humor.

---

This is a translation from that original thread in french : Ouvrir les zones verrouillés post-quête made by Feynn after me in the TESO-RP forum Community. Here the thread : Open "one-used" areas

TheHumanFloyd

Yes please!

Vendersleigh

A nice idea.

Bobcat

Every day, on the french thread, I speack on it just for said nothing... Actually it's for upping the thread on the top. I will do it until a Z' answer or until I quit the game for another one who think about RPers (Archeage looks like the next one, actually)

Whisper292

Fantastic idea. Not only are a lot of places locked, but the respawning of hostiles in places that have already been played can be cumbersome as well. A few private spots for the RPers would be very welcome.

Llevndryn

This is something we ask for a long time and that is important for us, the roleplay community.
Please ZOS, you do an amazing job on some quest area and building and we want continue to enjoy it and play inside.
This is a common problem that we face and to resolve it would allow some great adventure and epic stories to be created in these beautiful environments !

KairnHarbard

+1 ...
no +10
Great Idea

Tomg999

Even though I am not an RPer, I totally understand and think it's a great idea. As a PVE player, I also would love to just go and look around in certain locked areas just for fun.

However, as for areas where mobs keep respawning after the quest is complete (which sometimes makes no sense), I think there are a lot of players who are leveling up, who appreciate it when they can grind in an area in which they have completed the quest.

Llevndryn

Nice to hear that this would not only benefit the roleplayers !

Bobcat

Hi, as the french community is nothing to ZOS, i'm here for speacking about opening those area afin complete quests. I hope the English Community is more importante for ZOS than the french one is.

First, I have to thanks ZOS because all zones in Orsinuim is free to go in and out with quest and it's still open after finish the main quest and that is just great ! I can climb that mountain again even if I already complete the quest and that is just so great ! Thank you so much for taht !

BUT... what about Thieve's Guild ? Will you open all areas even if we finish the main story ? Will it be possible to play and, particularity, roleplaying in those areas ? I'm asking because you did it for Orsinium but no for the vanilla game neither for Imperial City (that cathedral ! What awsome place ! But we can not go back there for roleplaying, that's a shame).

Weel, if some roleplayer read that, please explain how it could be awesome to make some roleplay in every areas in the game, every instance, every maps !

You, Zenimax Online, cann't imagine what roleplay is and how a roleplayer can make your great game an a wanderful one

Thanks.

Llevndryn

Is One Tamriel going to change this thing of zones becoming locked after certain quests ? It'd be really great !
@ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_KaiSchober @ZOS_GinaBruno

nudel

I'm not a roleplayer, but as a compulsive librarian, I would love to have the OP's suggestion as it would permit access to a lot of Eidetic Memory books that get walled off after quest completion. ZOS has spent some time moving duplicates of these books out of the quest area to get around this, but some still lack their openworld counterparts.

As for the comment about grinding, you could get around this the way they do already with some quest areas. Keep the NPCs, but make them neutral rather than hostile. You can attack them if you want, but the roleplayers can bypass them if they desire.

makreth

irrelevant to the thread but I had to ask... @Bobcat do you have a khajiit called bobcat?! And are you doing those wrothgar dailies on AD side?

Ryuuki

Friendly towns, farms, villages and settlements need to become neutral (or not hostile) once the questchain there has been completed and the threat removed. That way, players can RP there without mobs interrupting them.

Examples:
- Blackrock Village
- Deleyn's Mill
- Senie

Elana

Bobcat wrote: »

another one who think about RPers (Archeage looks like the next one, actually)

Archeage is everything but RP friendly, even the unofficial RP server, Dahuta, is a gank-fest. It's an open world pvp game with vast majority of the world being free to pvp without restrictions and you get ganked by players of both enemy and your own faction. Even major pve dailies and events are in open pvp zones. It's a game that highly rewards PK, in every form, offering Honor points, (even though there is zero honour in the deed) and usually a straight-up material benefit to the killer.
Now, that aside, let's assume you, as a roleplayer want to stick to safe zones, sure you can, but you will miss 90% of the content, won't be able to explore or earn gold efficiently and the worst of all as a Roleplayer you will be contantly trolled and mocked. There is no RP community there so unless you bring a pack of friends, you're gonna have a really hard time.
I experienced EU servers, which are said to be "milder" than US.

TL:DR - There is no game less RP friendly than Archeage. Not even bloody Lineage II.

Apologies, I had to get that off my chest, when you spoke of leaving ESO for a more RP friendly game.

On the topic: I concur. I long given up hope for the RP tag on character sheet so you have much higher chance of getting into an instance with other Roleplayers, but perhaps we could have something like the OP suggests, please?

Daemons_Bane

Not much of a roleplayer, but removing limits seems like a great idea

Amaryllis_Arvensis

Can't agree more than this.
True open world is one point we are waiting for an Elder Scrolls.

Laegwing

Hi, roleplayer here and admin of the French RP community Please forgive my English.

It's a shame that a LOT of locations are closed after the quests are accomplished. Some of them even were opened a long time ago and then closed and I still don't know why ! For examples, in AD : Khenarthi's temple of the Mourning Springs, the last room ; Auriel's Temple at Vulkhel ; Mathiisen's forges ; Haven's Fighters Guild and Sewer ; Arenthia's districts... Those were once opened and we even roleplayed there !

With Dark Brotherhood, at Gold Coast, it's even worse, almost nothing is open...

Some places are so beautifully made, it's just a shame to go there once and never come back again. Please let us roleplayers make these places live again ! And I'm sure even PVE players will be glad to go back to some locations

With One Tamriel, maybe it is time to open up even more the world ?

EDIT : oh I just thought... all those destroyed villages... isn't there anybody to rebuild them now ? No one to clean up the corpses or put the captured villains in jail ? :P

Llevndryn

All of these things would be great !

But just to open up the locked zones would be a really good start. As it used to be once. I don't really understand why they was locked, but I assume that this wouldn't be a difficult thing to just unlock it.

Yamir_Dar

Mrrraow !
I agree with all previous reviews of my friends Roleplayers !
I speak particularly of the last extension, i've loved browse the contents of the black brotherhood and my favorite being Monts Jerall in the principal story ... But I was so frustrated to can't to return again in this area if maginifique after the quest !

I like lively events and when I PvE, it's that comes most story ideas.

Please ZeniMax, yes I want one Tamriel, but I want to profit ALL your content. I know to model areas as beautiful as the mountains Jerall it must a lot of work, so... let us honor this work and not just in minutes quests.

I hope our little Rp community will be heard because we...we always honor a hand extended to us !

Thanks for reading me.

Bonzodog01

This...so much this. Like @nudel , I am a compulsive librarian, so imagine my disappointment in finding that there were random notes and stuff locked inside quest only areas. ZOS have been doing a reasonable job in finding these and dropping them outside where they could remember them, but there is still no end hidden away.

Ralen

As Bobcat said, and as a huge roleplayer on ESO, I have to agree with all my friends before me.

These plenty of locations that are finally closed when the quest is done... That's clearly a great mess for us. We could roleplay hours and hours in this kind of place.

So please, ZoS, reopen them, let us have good time in there !

RoyJade

Still agree with this wonderful idea. I'll love to see again some locked area.

Nyniell

Agree !
Some beautifull locations are closed, please open them !

Llevndryn

And this would really be an open world in all its glory ! It seems like the thing to do with the ambition of One Tamriel.

Digiman

Bobcat wrote: »

Greetings,

As a roleplayer and fan of the Elder Scrolls, I must confess I feel strongly disappointed whenever I find myself facing a locked door after having completed one of the quests in the game. Let me explain.

We can find several types of environment in the game: public dungeons, group dungeons, taverns, houses, outdoor zones, countless ruins, not to mention a few planes of Oblivion and so on and so forth.

Being a roleplayer (that is, a player who practices roleplay, or RP), as I mentioned above, I love to go out exploring in roleplay after I have completed the quests, so that I am not bothered by phasing and I can just follow my own imagination rather than being constrained by the quests and the gameplay (there is a huge difference between “roleplay” and “gameplay”, but that’s a whole different debate).

I also happen to be the Game Master of an RP guild which organizes roleplay based on adventure and exploration (in a sort of Indiana Jones style, but adapted to the Elder Scrolls universe). In order to do that, I need to have access to locations I can use to create roleplay events.

At the moment, the best location I have found in the Aldmeri Dominion (which is where I play), is a Khajiti ruin in Khenarthi’s Roost. It’s an absolutely ideal environment for adventure RP, because there are no enemy NPCs. As a result, one can easily play with emotes using /e and /s (traditional roleplayers like me use the chat channels more than their gameplay skills), and it’s pure heaven! Narrative emotes flow in abundance, as do player reactions, and not a single time are we bothered by the spawning and re-spawning of hostile NPCs coming to spoil our fun and to interrupt the impetus of our writing.

Throughout the rest of the game, there are numerous areas which could be like that. Areas with a gameplay quest to be completed, which unfortunately become inaccessible after said quest has been completed.

These areas hold no interest whatsoever for PvE players, and much less of course for PvP players, but they could represent so much for RPers! They could give them so many possibilities! I don’t think it should be too difficult to reprogram these zones to be unlocked once their quests are completed and the area has been cleared of all mobs. And it’s a much more modest request than, for example, the one of introducing a PvP campaign tagged [RP].

All it takes is to unlock these areas in order to allow roleplayers like me to return there and to enjoy the game through this very immersive and often too criticized form of gaming that is roleplay.

Of course we are not as numerous as PvE or PvP players. We are a very modest community compared to these two other types of players which constitute the “priority” for the developers of a videogame. But we also would like for our opinions to be taken in due consideration.

I am not asking for a new high-level PvE zone, I am not asking for a more challenging PvP, I am only asking to unlock certain locations which are currently locked in-game in order to peacefully conduct our roleplay there, with fun and good humor.

---

This is a translation from that original thread in french : Ouvrir les zones verrouillés post-quête made by Feynn after me in the TESO-RP forum Community. Here the thread : Open "one-used" areas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8cZUhiP3us

Ralen

ZoS, if you read us, please consider our demand... It couldn't be so complicate to apply this kind of changement.

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_KaiSchober

Bobcat

makreth wrote: »

irrelevant to the thread but I had to ask... @Bobcat do you have a khajiit called bobcat?! And are you doing those wrothgar dailies on AD side?

Aye that's me but, it's wierd, but I play only Bosmers. The fact is, "Bobcat" in French means nothings and that character was creat before I learn English.

You, ZOS, cann't imagine how many things we can do in RolePlay. RolePlay is not just talking in taverns, it's not just play emotes, it's not just changes how our characters looks like. RolePlay is playing all around your game, it's imagines our own adventures. Our characters have backstories, their own personnality. Of course we play the story you made but for us RolePlay et PvE are two differents things like if they're an ESO PvE game and another, just for us, an ESO RP game. And in that last one, we use every things in the game, we use your maps, we use all your instances you made, we ignore NPCs and we make our own stories. How wanderfull it could be if we can play a mariage in Auriel's Temple at Vulkhel ? How great it coult be if some bad characters looks for finish the work of Anumaril ?

Dear ZOS, please consider it. More than one of those instances where once open even after quest. It couln't be hard to made it.

We just ask to unlock those areas. Please, do it.

Birdovic

Best example (for my character) Is The "Vile Laboratory" in coldharbour.

It Looks amazing, but After Finishing The Quest Inside, you are not allowed to enter ever again

Pendrillion

I agree with this... I always wanted to visit the rest of Arenthia after doing the quest and driving the imperials out. And other areas through the game. Some of the Farms in Stormhaven would be also very interesting RP locations weren't they infested with bandits and daedra...

Llevndryn

And that Imperial manor near Kvatch would be a so cool place to roleplay in ! Plus it don't have mobs inside.