DenverRalphy wrote: »

JeroenB wrote: »

Odd question perhaps, but am I missing something obvious regarding acquiring the Nirnhoned traits?

I know you get one item of a random type by completing the Craglorn questline.

My understanding is that the only way to get more traits is to buy items crafted with that trait from Guild Traders, at a cost of hundreds of thousands of gold for each individual item type. Collecting them all would cost several million gold, and that assumes they're even available. (Taking the daggers suggested in this thread, TTC currently lists a grand total of one single Exemplary Nirnhoned Dagger for 250,000 gold on PC-EU.)

You can buy nirnhoned gear from the traders relatively cheap. On PSNA Potent Nirncrux is currently selling 13k-15k, so you can just buy that and have someone craft a nirnhoned weapon for you. Fortified Nirncrux even cheaper for nirnhoned armor items.

This and if in an semi decent guild you can get someone to make nirm gear for research if you give them a nirm trait stone.

Balance after subclassing has been brought up a lot here on the forums. After a Reddit "Ask Us Anything" and other attempts to communicate with the community, players are still confused about what's going on with balance. Rich Lambert gave an interview recently where he gave us a very insightful take about the issue:

“I'm really happy with it, overall, just the amount of customisation that is now possible as a result of that is mind-blowing,” he says. “There's a ‘meta’, right? People say this is the only way you can do a thing. I love going against that, pushing the boundaries, and showing this group does it this way, and that works for them, but this works for me.

“I think overall it's been really positive in the community. I mean, obviously, there's feedback, especially at the top end, where they're like, ‘Now everything's the same.’ Only because you want it to be that way.”

“We went in eyes wide open,” he says. “We’re confident enough that we know the system's going to work, but we're also confident that players are going to find unique combinations of things, or do things that we didn't necessarily think about and potentially break things. We were comfortable with that. We knew that was going to come.”

Full interview here: https://www.thegamer.com/elder-scrolls-online-interview-directors-leads-sublassing-controversy-balancing-stop-killing-games/

I think it's interesting that ZOS is comfortable with the imbalance that subclassing causes because of the freedom of choice it gives. It's also interesting to see the common argument that meta is just something that the players make up and it doesn't need to be followed. What does everyone think?

I mean, obviously, there's feedback, especially at the top end, where they're like, ‘Now everything's the same.’ Only because you want it to be that way.”

This rings a little out of touch or sort of cavalier, imo. Of course people at the top end would love to be more creative with their playstyles, but some fights are designed in a way that you need to optimize in very specific combos to clear. I would love for the devs to show us a quite off-meta composition clearing hard encounters with decent times/vitality.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

We chose Reddit because the layout and upvoting make it easier for the team to find and address relevant questions in an AMA format. Reddit also does a better job of keeping conversation threads together. We have tried to find a ways to replicate that here on the forum, but it isn't built for that.

I know this was a fun thread, but I thought I would provide an answer incase anyone was wondering.

You understand that not everyone that plays your game are the type to hangout on Reddit, yes? Seems to me that if you pick a platform that has a reputation that you are choosing to limit your audience. <== My done-with-Reddit-years-ago opinion.

Most players only have a limited amount of time they can play each day. Sure, you can probably clear all pve content including vet trials with an off meta build, but it'll be slower. That means more chances for individual players to make mistakes and more mechanics to deal with, which'll further slow the group down on top of the lower damage. It's not a matter of players wanting everything to be the same.

Also, I don't want to join a group and feel like deadweight. Even if I'm just playing with friends, I'd feel like an *** if I told them "I know we could have an easier time running this and maybe enough time to run it multiple times tonight if I hump the meta, but I want to feel unique so we won't be able to farm it as many times, deal with it."

Most folks aren't chasing the meta in pve because big numbers are the only thing that makes them Feel Alive, they're doing it because they want to fully contribute to the groups they join.

Then, of course, pvp. I play a relatively off meta build there. Do you think I don't know it puts me at a disadvantage vs meta builds? Do you think it feels good to feel neglected by zos, knowing I'd have an easier time if I gave up on trying to make the playstyle I enjoy (ranged, soulcleaver magblade) work? At least I'm playing nightblade which... is still a nightblade, even if I'm running a worse version of nightblade. It could always be worse, I could be a necromancer enjoyer.

Rich is just telling people who enjoy off-meta classes or playstyles "play how you want and deal with being at a disadvantage, have fun fighting uphill with an arm cut off". PVP is a competitive environment, there's always going to be a meta but the difference between a player chasing after the meta and one just playing a class or build they enjoy is far too large compared to a couple years ago.

How often do you get into a fight now and see Storm Calling and Assassination together, with animal or spear to round it out and of course healing soul + vitality script for a burst heal? How often do you see smallscale/solo builds (shockingly) choose to run Restoring Light for a defensive line, instead of bone tyrant or draconic? It's almost like some skill lines/combos are so much stronger than the competing options that you'd need to be a masochist to not use them.

Is it technically impossible for ZOS to make the mobs disengage earlier? Their aggro behaviour is truly silly. I ride past a group of bandits/wolves, and have to wait patiently at the wayshrine as every.single.one.of.them runs up to me to smack me and then run away.

Make their aggro stop completely after a certain distance. Alternatively, give us a green tree perk that makes creatures no longer hostile to us. Of course, cultists and daedra realistically should still be, but there's really no reason for skeevers and wolves to keep hounding you if you're just riding by.

Gabriel_H wrote: »

ESO's problem is that an add kited passed its patrol zone boundary keeps running after you and keeps you in-combat. A fix to that could be to enforce boundary rules more tightly, though this could be open to some abuse, such as a player pulling away from a multi-player fight in order to drop combat and switch gear or skills.

Like other issues like combat balance, they should implement different rules for PVE and PVP.

Very casual player standpoint, it's easy to say "meta doesn't matter" if you're doing content where it's negiligible, it's like comparing a match and a flamethrower underwater.

Of course you can go off meta, get creative, and still pull off massive DPS, but the average group struggles in high end content EVEN if they're running whatever meta is, so there's no room to get comfortable there for most.

And it's not just about you, it's about your team, if you're not bringing the best you can to your group, you're making the decision to make whatever content you're doing worse for everyone, if ONLY the combat team would care more about balance to allow different subclassing combos to be on the same level, it wouldn't be much of a problem.

I'll restrain myself quite a bit and only do a small remark on it.

Having such a balance state, where most item sets are essentially a "noob trap" and not a viable option is making community even more separated. As simple as one person is seeing they're doing 80% of damage in a dungeon as a tank, it's already a material for a potential conflict. Or group of friends raiding together, surely someone could be hard carried there and it's not a big deal but some dissatisfaction might easily arise for both carriers and the carried, it all can start from the state of balance rather than people's sentiment alone. It circles back to Brian's "all sets have it's place".