Update 35 Combat Preview

Grandsheba

Can we please get alchemical poisons and status effect interaction back with proc sets? Even proc sets interactions with other proc sets for combos?

So much creativity in having sets to pair and combo with enchants or alchemy have been removed since update 33 and its not fun. Some sets that were nerfed or altered due to proc interactions are not just dead as they werent changed back once this interaction mech was completely removed from the game.

It just sucks to be punished for being "efficient".

Jaraal

joaotextor wrote: »

LuckyGhost wrote: »

Good changes IMO. Light attacks doing 20% of my damage when I had to utilize 10 abilities and 2 ultimates to claw out the other 80% just felt weird. The highest damage ability in a parse was the basic light attack? Never made sense to me.

Light attacks still accounting for 6-11% of the damage sounds solid enough to be rewarding, and even essential for an optimized build, but not so overreaching as it was before. I don't understand the frustration with bringing down LA dmg a little bit tbh.

Dots lasting longer is very interesting. My necro's spammable wont be barswap? I'll actually get to use a spammable. I'm excited to see how this plays out and what kind of sets and builds we can utilize to take advantage of the changes

Dots lasting longer is interesting indeed, as long as they do the exact damage per second.

They stated that DOTs will do 33% less damage.

Lockdownfighter

As a average/slightly above average DPS player around 85-90k on live this update kills my HM clear possibilities. Most of my raids are pugged and this will increased the difficulty ten fold. Very rarely will the fight stay in the exact spot for the increased DOT duration to make it worth it. As a tank the healing ticks are going to hit the ability of people pugging hard content. As I understand it the team is going for the high end players but in reality it’s not them who will suffer. It is the people like myself trying to enter the endgame scene, just to have it become out of reach after years of work and dedication. Imo the people that are running world records or score pushing deserve their top tier damage. They didn’t start this game yesterday, they have been living and breathing this game for years. If anything their 130k+ damage can help mid tier players like myself clear more. Please revert these changes before it hits the live server. We as a community can work this out for a future update and it be released as a polished version more people agree on, not one that will take until update 36-37.

Cin_Vhetin

I'm not a high end player. I don't know what I parse. What I do know is that weaving made the game playable. With this combat change I think it will take longer to get through mobs and bosses and this has significantly dampened my enthusiasm for playing the game at all. In fact I haven't been playing much since the news of update 35 changes to combat came out. All my effort to learn to weave in order to just get through pve content is now a big waste imo.

Goodman777

The problem with weaving can be defeated with the introduction of a cooldown after a light attack. This levels the chances in pvp of players with a high ping against players with a small one (there are a lot of videos when one player carries 20 players and this player has a ping of 50-70 in pvp zones). And the pve should be adjusted to the new realities.

Brightuatha

As long as I can still solo delves and zones, I’m happy. It will be interesting to see how these changes play out. Thank you for communicating with us and allowing for debate.

DYSEQTA

Master_AlucarD wrote: »

Better directly go the final step to "fix" the gap: Remove all skills and leave us with B = Block and A = Attack

You forgot the other 3 buttons on the ideal controller so I fixed it for you. Ponder this image, do a little digging on FTP business model research, and all of a sudden all those seemingly insane decisions being made by the powers-that-be since the day the game went live and the apparent deliberate ignoring of player feedback start to make perfect sense.

EDIT: If this game had stayed subscription-based as it was from the beginning the game would be in a very different place right now as they would have been able to stay focused on making the game the best it could be rather than how best to milk the player for every cent they can.

lamGroot

Congratulations Zos . You successfully killed your game . 1100 players quit playing via steam in the last 30 days .

isokillb14_ESO

If this really does make it (Unnecessarily) harder to clear content that i already find Challenging. I will never spend a dime on Beth again.

The server already seems empty on xbox as it is

Mordredmoth

This is by far, THE WORST update i've ever seen, its dumb and very far from what zenimax intended with this patch, the dps drop is ridiculous and nearly broke mostrly of builds and playstyle, Templar for example is garbage rigth now, and the new animation of the jabs is ugly [snip], not to mention the dps nerf of the skill... i really dont understand why zenimax goes this way, even when the comunity told them no to.

[edited for profanity bypass]

Xepaa

Yo i guess the best option is just to quit the game until they revert that mess

Alienoutlaw

epic fail

anvilbert

[snip] There is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in this update to make it more accessible. The endgame players are the bread and butter of this game. They log in every day spend money in the crown store constantly, when these players become disgruntled they talk to other gamers. As a former business owner word of mouth advertising is the fastest and best you can get it can make or break a company faster than any other form of advertising. And with the internet it's even faster than before. [snip] ITS A DISATER FOR ALL PLAYERS.

[edited for bashing]

Xepaa

did i mentioned how BAD and UNNECESSARY the "update" is?

Malfious1986

Hmmm, I don't like it

rexagamemnon

This update is disgusting. At the very least the changes made to templar need to be completely removed from the game never to be brought back again. Also someone still hasnt apologized to the community for their very disrespectful and insulting tone in a statement that was made to the player community about “knee jerk” reactions.

Cyber10

rexagamemnon wrote: »

This update is disgusting. At the very least the changes made to templar need to be completely removed from the game never to be brought back again. Also someone still hasnt apologized to the community for their very disrespectful and insulting tone in a statement that was made to the player community about “knee jerk” reactions.

This right here^^^^

The community deserves an apology..

lathemonkey69

so has zos made a statement about this patch since its went live? are they going to fix the damage they did? with the current state of the game im ready to quit. ive tried lots of different builds for my templar, they are all garbage, dont even have fun with my dk eigther... i hate sitting in this limbo land, wondering if i should invest any more time into this game. i love it but this current patch just killed it for me.. took me a year to get where i am.. just to go back to the drawing board. i would imagine there is enough backlash they will do something about it. was just curious if anybody has seen or knows what the future is looking like

Jaraal

lathemonkey69 wrote: »

so has zos made a statement about this patch since its went live? are they going to fix the damage they did? with the current state of the game im ready to quit. ive tried lots of different builds for my templar, they are all garbage, dont even have fun with my dk eigther... i hate sitting in this limbo land, wondering if i should invest any more time into this game. i love it but this current patch just killed it for me.. took me a year to get where i am.. just to go back to the drawing board. i would imagine there is enough backlash they will do something about it. was just curious if anybody has seen or knows what the future is looking like

Their standard MO is to remain silent after an unpopular update, until players 'get over it.'

deathbytiki

Zeni - Pets are little more than an annoyance. Crap damage, barely viable for pvp, and not worth the cast time for whatever buff they give you (bc other abilites will do better PROMISE). So whyyyy, nerf the tormentor? She's little more than an annoyance and I guarantee most use the matriarch. Even with the 60% from 53% buff.... shes still not that OP with basic attacks.... its just, crap honestly. So please save whats left of the summoner army!

anvilbert

This forum should be a way for the dev's to stay tapped in to the players and listen to what they have to say to make the game experience better. It has been said repeatedly for yrs that you will never reach balance until you separate pvp and pve completly, u35 is still BAD after hitting consoles. This is no way to treat your players. Top 1or 2% still find a way to hit massive dps numbers while lower teir feel the heavy loss. It is my opinion that this forum is a worthless waste of time, no ones listening on the other end .

Jaraal

ZOS_Gilliam wrote: »

Greetings!

It’s almost time for the next update, and that means it’s time to share some of the reasoning behind the upcoming big shake-ups. This update brings a massive slew of balance adjustments all at once to hopefully reduce the need of large sweeping changes in subsequent updates, since some seemingly minor changes affect a huge part of the game’s combat. The main focuses in Update 35 are twofold: improving accessibility to the game’s combat by increasing the duration of outgoing ability effects (such as damage over time, buffs, and debuffs) and a continuation of the attempt to quell some of the obscene damage production at the high end. Let’s start by breaking apart some of the fundamental realities of ESO today.


Weaving

Currently, to be truly effective in ESO’s combat, you need to learn to manipulate something that is known as “weaving,” which refers to the act of squeezing multiple actions into the global cooldown window. Doing so drastically increases your agency and output, and it is a staple of the game that we’ve come to embrace, as it helps our combat feel different and exciting to participate in once you learn the ins and outs. However, the impact of weaving leads to a massive gap in performance where players who cannot interact with it as effectively are left miles behind those who can. While this is partially unavoidable and an important part of what makes the mastery of ESO or any activity utilizing a similar system particularly satisfying, we want to do what we can to shorten that delta. The closer the gap between the low and high end, the easier it is to create content that can accommodate a wider audience, while making more natural progression points for those looking to improve. To this end, we’ve started to look at the impact that one of the most common and important forms of weaving has in ESO: Light and Heavy Attack weaving.

Coming in Update 35, we’re reducing Light and Heavy Attacks’ impact in damage production by adjusting their damage to deal a flat amount, regardless of stats. We have spent a considerable amount of time investigating the baseline experience that a new player would have with these attacks, using that as our starting point for how much damage they do moving forward. The aim is to not harm the low-end experience, and target only the higher end. In doing so, we hope to reduce the difference of damage potential in a way that retains the satisfaction of learning to weave, where the impact is still felt, but to a much less degree than before.

For reference, in many of ESO’s high-end experiences and activities, the average build sees roughly 15–20% of their overall damage coming from Light Attacks alone, which is a huge contribution to the delta of power we see. While testing these adjustments internally, we’ve seen a reduction of 6–11% to overall damage, which allows for a much smaller and healthier gap while still retaining the sense of mastery and expression of that mastery with weaving.

With this adjustment, we’ll also be making a significant number of changes to item sets, passives, and buffs to ensure classes remain balanced in damage production, while also trying to do a better job allowing builds to amplify these actions (we’ve heard your cries, Heavy Attack build lovers, and we want better for you) without introducing unhealthy gameplay between PvE and PvP.


Combat Effects

The other area we have spent a considerable amount of time on for this update is the uptime of effects in ESO, as these are another huge way to improve your combat capabilities. Outside of weaving, the main limiter of your effectiveness in combat is your ability to output events, such as damage, healing, shielding, etc., which is bound by activating abilities, which in turn are bound within the global cooldown system. Activating an ability from your action bar locks out your other abilities for one second, so, a way to circumvent this system is to utilize actions that add power or extra events without your need to continuously activate them. These are often seen as buff and debuff abilities, or damage and healing over time abilities. Keeping as many of these abilities up as long possible dramatically improves your combat potential, creating another area of mastery and potential of power deltas.

Currently, many of these abilities fall within a 10-second window, meaning to maximize your efficiency, you must activate them once every 10 seconds. With 10 total active ability slots at your disposal, this often creates a situation where you want to load up almost every slot with one of these abilities, adding to your combat output for each duration-based effect you utilize. Between this and the engagement of weaving, this creates a reality where high actions per minute (APM) is required to be effective, as well as a robust rotation to keep as many of these effects up as possible. This in turn reinforces a need to glue your eyes to your action bars, taking you out of the action happening on screen. While this can create exhilarating combat experiences where you need to constantly monitor different activities on screen, it can also be overwhelming and particularly challenging for you to do so at the rate required to be effective.

As such, coming in Update 35, we are increasing the duration of many of these effects in game, primarily damage over time, buffs, and debuffs. By extending the duration, we hope to reduce the stress of many combat rotations, allowing for you to focus more on the action in front of you rather than the action of juggling buffs and debuffs on your ability bar and making the game far more accessible.

Since many of these effects currently add a tremendous amount of power per cast over their duration, simply increasing their duration would merely inject a significant amount of power into the game, where this is already in excess. To combat this, we’re adjusting many of these values to account for their increased duration; there will be overall increase of effectiveness per cast, while reducing their effectiveness per second while active. This should reduce the ceiling potential of many builds, while improving their baseline experiences where many players will have an easier time keeping these effects active. In simpler terms, we’re reducing the damage potential for these abilities per second, while increasing their total output overall.

For example, previously, a damage over time effect would deal 1.5× the damage of a “spammable” attack (such as Surprise Attack) over its duration of 10 seconds, or 0.15 relative damage per second. Now, damage over time effects will deal 2× the damage of a spammable attack over its duration of 20 seconds, increasing its damage per cast while reducing its relative damage per second to 0.1. In accordance with this, many healing over time effects will have their values adjusted to ensure they do not overperform when compared to damage over time, while still being impactful in PvE environments.

Both areas required an extensive pass of existing class ability and passive power to ensure they remain balanced with one another afterward. As such, the PTS patch notes will have a sizable amount of number tweaking. We recognize this will create a lot of changes in how you optimize your builds and how you play them, but it is our hope that by the end of the transition to these standards, the game will be more enjoyable and accessible to everyone.

After these adjustments are live, we are going to focus on any resulting balance issues for the next few updates, hopefully reducing the chaotic nature of change for a brief period after the initial turbulence. We’ll be keeping a close eye on the discussions that come out of this, as well as the initial feedback over the upcoming PTS cycle. Since the scale of these changes is large in nature, please understand it may take more time for adjustments to come since changing one standard affects many specific abilities.


We hope this helps provide some clarity of our goals with the upcoming changes you’ll see and aids in bracing yourself for the number of changes coming as well. We know this is never an easy process, and we appreciate your patience and tolerance as we try to improve the game that you (and we!) love. May your roads lead you to pleasant journeys, and we look forward to seeing you in Tamriel!

So now that we've had time to experience the full effects of the changes, do you feel that your goals were achieved with this update? Was the skill gap reduced? Obscene damage numbers quelled? Light and heavy attacks weaving damage reduced, while leaving the low end experience unharmed? Reduced the stress of combat rotations by standardizing all buff and DOT timers?

TechMaybeHic

Nevermind

CrushDepth

So I guess that this most does away with all those weaving sessions that I have been reading today? Heck, I am still not really clear on what a Light Attack actually is.

ZOS_Hadeostry

Hi there,

We have gone ahead and closed this thread down since it is about Update 35, which was well over a year ago.

Thanks for your understanding.