PTS Update 42 - Feedback Thread for Scribing (Combat & Skills)

ZOS_GinaBruno

This is the official feedback thread for Scribing, specifically focused on combat, balance and Scribed skills. If you would like to give feedback on Scribing quests or system functionality specifically, please visit this thread.

After you have a chance to fully test the Scribing system, we would appreciate you taking the time to complete this survey. Note that once you begin the survey, you cannot go back to change your answers so please ensure you have spent enough time with Scribing first.

Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

• Do the abilities present new ways to play, or create other fun options for you to pick from?
• Do the abilities present allow you to better create a build suited for your playstyle?
• Do these abilities feel close to existing abilities in terms of power? Please explain your answer.
• Do you have any other general feedback?

MashmalloMan

Really love the new system, I love the future this can bring for this year and years later. I really hope you visit WW, Vampire, Undaunted, Psijic Order, and classes with this. It's THAT good.

As to how it is now, I really wish you gave all 8 elements for every grimoire instead of 3-4 as it is. I feel like this was simply due to reducing the workload, while still providing some variety. I can understand how all 8 would add a lot more work, but in my opinion it's necessary to tackle in the future.

I can appreciate the fact that most grimoires have at least 1 martial (stamina) or 1 magical (magicka) option to play around with for damage dealing.. However, I feel even this is a missed opportunity in some areas because the representation of the available magical elements feel incomplete. When looking at the 4 martial weapons, you have a perfect opportunity to allow 1 magical element per weapon.

I fully expected something like:

• Sword + Shield = Magic Frost... since it's the equivalent tanking/utility element for magical.
• Bow = Flame... since it has roots in fire damage via the original volley dealing flame damage.
• Dual Wield = Magic Shock... since DW and shock are largely DPS based.
• 2H = Magic... since 2H and magic are largely utility based.

Instead, magic damage is placed on Sword + Shield, DW, and 2H, with only Bow having fire damage as the magical option. It's unfortunate.

Veesk

The Templar class mastery script feels incredibly out of place being the only kiss curse type of script out of all the classes. Personally I would much prefer a mastery script that doesn't have a debuff even if that greatly reduces any sort of buff or effect.

I didn't get much time with scribing due to the on going situation currently, but I would love to see the Templar script change.

MashmalloMan

Another point: Since Scribing is potentially introducing multiple skills for years to come for skill lines that players typically don't use as often. I fully expected ZOS to revamp the skill line passives to accommodate a more complete kit.

Eg. Assault and Soul Magic specifically have 3 passives instead of 5, of those 3 none of them actually improve how using skills in those lines function. Please consider adding at least 1-2 passives for "when slotted get X" to make using these skills feel better. Soul Magic is even worse than Assault, the passives are outdated, based on the original launch of the game providing next to no real utility.

xStaticx

What determines the resource cost for the scribed skill? Can you choose it to be stamina or magicka? or is it based on max resource?

MashmalloMan

xStaticx wrote: »

What determines the resource cost for the scribed skill? Can you choose it to be stamina or magicka? or is it based on max resource?

You can not choose the resource type, it's determined based on the focus damage type.

Eg. Wield Soul Pull (magic damage) is mag cost, Shield Throw Pull (physical damage) is stam cost.

Edited for false info.

umagon

I really like the shield throw and how knight’s valor scales off bash damage and works with deadlands demolisher. Also, how it can hit multiple targets. It gives me a ranged option on my bash build and patches up some deficiencies when dealing with ranged targets.

monkidb16_ESO

Vault:
Forced backwards movement feels bad and sometimes unpredictable.
With enough player skill you can use this ability to move forward (spin camera, cast, spin back) to get a Streak-like ability but with no escalating cost.
I suggest reducing the movement range and make it ground targeted (like Vampire Mist Form) to reduce the skill floor and ceiling.

Elemental Explosion
While it has a respectable Tooltip thanks to it's 2 second cast-time this ability is out-dpsd by a lot of instant cast spamables.
This ability can be cast fully from stealth, however, enabling some insane stealth burst.
I suggest slightly reducing the Tooltip and halving the cast time as well as revealing the caster on starting the cast.

Mender's Bond
Feels the most niche ability out of the bunch.
None of the variants help the caster, some even hurt them (Ult Drain/Damage Transfer)
Some of the Variants can be somewhat nice (anti-slowdown/anti-stun) the way you need to aim this ability makes it hard to impossible to target the right ally most of the time.
I feel like this ability would need a complete rework

Stncold

Major Breach needs to be an option for some of these. Ideally traveling knife and shield throw where it makes the most thematic sense. As fun as some of these abilities are to use they aren't going to make a dent in the backbar ice staff meta in pvp if you guys don't provide us with additional sources of major breach.

TX12001rwb17_ESO

I cannot get in as it says it is locked content even though I clearly own Gold Road.

MashmalloMan

It's really weird that you added long cast times to abilities such as Trample, Elemental Explosion, and Torchbearer. I guarantee players will not enjoy using these despite them looking incredibly cool. It's really unfortunate.

Smash has a low 0.6s cast time, so I can see some players managing to enjoy it despite the fact because it fits in the 1s GCD. On that subject, why is it called "Smash" when it should be called "Scoop" based on that awkward animation?

Suggestions:

• Trample = 0.8s cast time, 2s travel time, so about a 3s cooldown.... OR... make it behave more like Warden's Scorch where it's instant, but an obvious delay shown on the caster of 3s before it fires out.
• Elemental Explosion = Instant, but add a growing AOE field telegraph on the floor that takes 3-4s to complete. This allows Destruction staff users to use Ele Explosion AND Impulse together as aoe spammables, where as right now, it feels like they're working against 1 another. Make it like 25% stronger than aoe spammables instead of the current +100% to warrant the delay, this is problematic for PVP providing more burst than ultimate's like Dawnbreaker where people at the back of groups will spam it.
• Torchbearer = 0.8s cast time, similar to jabs. Reduce damage or ticks accordingly.

All of the above changes would fix how clunky these skills feel, while still allowing for counterplay and better use of them in rotations. ESO players hate cast times, please do everything in your power to make them instant or at the very least fit within the 1s global cooldown.

Vaqual

I am a bit confused by the distribution of damage types on the focus scripts. Example:

•Smash can unlock bleed damage, while flame damage is locked. 2h already has 2 potential bleed sources.
•Elemental explosion can access flame damage, but not bleed. Destro already has access to a complete kit of fire abilities, Ele Sus or triple-type force shock.

Would it not be much more interesting to offer something that is not available yet? The animations need not be flashy and could also totally make sense for scribing ("Ice shards cut deep wounds", "Searing steel burns a blistering wound").

I think the current distribution is lacking and quite the opposite of what I was hoping for.

MashmalloMan

2 major oversights:

Edit - This part was resolved:
Grimoire Stamina Cost: There's an error for Soul Magic skills. They don't have -15% stamina cost baked in, Soul Magic does not have a cost reduction passive, where as Dual Wield, Bow, 2H, Sword and Board, and Fighters guild do. You did include the -15% stamina cost for Assaults' Trample where it doesn't have a cost reduction passive, so at least that line is correct.

-15% stamina cost is normally baked into the skill when there is no dedicated passive as found from Weapon/Guild lines. This should be added to Soul Magic Grimoires.

Grimoire Scaling: Grimoires don't rank up at all, this was initially pitched as a positive because we would not need to level the skills, in reality it's a negative because the scribing team did not match the standards of rank 4 morphed skills, they matched them to rank 1 base skills. -6 ranks are missing resulting in lower damage and in some cases cost vs other abilities.

Using a base template character, ranged instant spammables starting at rank 1 deal 2024 damage, then rank up in 1.1% damage 3 times up to 2090 damage. All morphs round up to 2091 damage, ranking another 3 times towards examples like damage (Swallow Soul), cost reduction (Crushing Shock), aoe (Force Pulse), duration (Anti-Calvary Caltrops), etc. This explains why Wield Soul is 3.3% weaker than Silver Shards with a tooltip of 2024 instead of 2091.

There is no doubt scribing is a powerful system that may need adjustments, but standards were introduced for a reason. At minimum, grimoire focuses should be treated as rank 4 morphed skills in terms of initial cost, range, damage, etc.

Specific Example of Both Issues: Below are 2 screenshot examples from https://en.uesp.net using a template character.

Base skill Flame Skull rank 1-4 in comparison to morphed skill Venom Skull rank 1. Damage scales as follows: Rank 1 = 2024, rank 2 = 2046, rank 3 = 2068, rank 4 = 2090. When Flame Skull rank 4 is morphed to Venom Skull rank 1, the damage is rounded up to 2091 with -15% stamina cost despite no cost reduction passive.

Savos_Saren

Thrown Shield: Every ability listed (except the Physical/Magic specific ability) should be listed as "Does XXX Physical or XXX Magical damage based on your highest resource"

I love the fact that ZOS is making hybrid tanking- but it definitely should apply to Thrown Shield. My magic tanks would appreciate it!

RaptorRodeoGod

The 10s buff timers feel pretty low in duration on skills with cast times. It's difficult to keep up savagery/prophecy on the new trample skill.

Savos_Saren

Also with the Thrown Shield ability- in the Affix section- you could add a small execute. It doesn't need to be overpowered- but it would fill the gap of weapon skill lines the fill "missing elements".

That is what Scribing is supposed to do, right?

Savos_Saren

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Really love the new system, I love the future this can bring for this year and years later. I really hope you visit WW, Vampire, Undaunted, Psijic Order, and classes with this. It's THAT good.

As to how it is now, I really wish you gave all 8 elements for every grimoire instead of 3-4 as it is. I feel like this was simply due to reducing the workload, while still providing some variety. I can understand how all 8 would add a lot more work, but in my opinion it's necessary to tackle in the future.

I can appreciate the fact that most grimoires have at least 1 martial (stamina) or 1 magical (magicka) option to play around with for damage dealing.. However, I feel even this is a missed opportunity in some areas because the representation of the available magical elements feel incomplete. When looking at the 4 martial weapons, you have a perfect opportunity to allow 1 magical element per weapon.

I fully expected something like:

• Sword + Shield = Magic Frost... since it's the equivalent tanking/utility element for magical.
• Bow = Flame... since it has roots in fire damage via the original volley dealing flame damage.
• Dual Wield = Magic Shock... since DW and shock are largely DPS based.
• 2H = Magic... since 2H and magic are largely utility based.

Instead, magic damage is placed on Sword + Shield, DW, and 2H, with only Bow having fire damage as the magical option. It's unfortunate.

I agree with you. Those Thrown Shield abilities need to be based off stamina or magicka (or ice as your suggestion). Tanking is no longer defined by stamina-based abilities.

Neatle

As always, i'm concerned with your decisions to create extremes to remedy imbalance instead of fixing imbalanced abilities you've already done this with Onslaught and Corrosive Armor which ignore every single points of armor investment a tank has to make including sets, abilities and heavy armor pieces:

Arcanist damage shields ultimate, Magsorc damage shields were a problem? well.. there you go (Trample is an AoE btw):


also this:


has led us to this:

this could be an AoE spammable deflecting a direct attack every time you use it.. a potential spammable

edit:
Also, an AoE dispel on the ground, removing up to 3 AoEs, is not normal

You should stop adding 10 new differents mechanics with a brand new system, you're burning steps

Oshea_OK

So, my very first impression of Scribing is that I like it.
I mainly do Oaskensoul Heavy Attack solo playstyle and so my feedback will be focused on this type of playstyle.

* For HA builds, the animations are way too long, for the destruction staff, and fighters guilds skills. It reduces dps. And so most of the dps skills are not optimized with Heavy attack weaving. Destruction skill AOE needs to be a quick animation to work with HA builds, because it is a perfect fit for HA builds.

*Destruction staff skill needs minor breach added to its options. HA builds need a ranged breach debuff for AOE, because Oakensoul builds already use Sergeant Mail, which means less penetration stats. For example, Socrs needs ranged AOE for breach debuff.

*Using the soul skill for Damage shield, HoT and minor resolve is a great all-arounder for any solo build. I think the overall size of damage shield, HoT and minor buff were on target for a strong skill, but not overly so. HoT, could be a little stronger. The animation on this one was not to long and good for HA builds.

*When I tested I only saw one Soul skill to craft, not the 2 I saw on the official video?

---

* I overall like the options, and I think its a good start for power etc. I think however, there could be even more options, for more creativity. Why not have a - damage shield - Shock over time - and - Debuff? I think we could at least try it out to see if it works, without breaking anything.

Good start. Thanks.

Jsmalls

For abilities that have the option of being Martial or Magical damage type, the Martial always tool-tips higher.

This would be understandable if there were melee range requirements but that is not the case. These should be adjusted according to range or melee standards not damage type.

Jsmalls

The cast time abilities feel too long for fluid gameplay.

Torchbearer and Trample feel very awkward to use.

Torchbearer animation is not pleasant, and leaves a lot to be desired.

RaptorRodeoGod

Jsmalls wrote: »

The cast time abilities feel too long for fluid gameplay.

Torchbearer and Trample feel very awkward to use.

Torchbearer animation is not pleasant, and leaves a lot to be desired.

I agree on these skills feeling awkward. The cast times for these seem to be a little long. Personally, I think the elemental explosion cast time is fine as is for now though

xXCJsniperXx7

To start, the Scribing system is a good beginning. But, it needs some work to really fit the bill. So in relation to the feed back your looking for:
1.) These Scribing skills do offer some nice imagination to your bar. But, it does feel limited with what's available in each skill. For example not all martial or magic damage is an option in thier respective skill types. Example, Smash can't do poison damage and Soul Burst has default Magic and Shock damage. It would be better if all Martial Scribe skills could select from Physical, Bleed, Poison, or Disease damage when selecting the Focus Script. Same idea going for magic you can decide if you want Magic, Flame, Frost, or Shock.
2.) Most Scribe skills aren't as good as our class or weapon skills already from a PVE perspective. A large reason why is thier costs and durations. For making spammables the costs are too high to be sustainable. For example I made a poison Traveling Knife that's cost was 3943 stamina on my test DK. Comparing that with Rapid Strikes 1784 cost with my Stam DK on live, Traveling Knife is insufficient. Suggestion is to add a categorization to decide if a skill is a spammable or not. For dots and hots these customizations need to be attuned to the single target and aoe duration standards. If it's a single target DOT your adding it should be a 20 second duration. If it's an AOE then the 10-15 second range.
3.) In relation to power most Scribe ability aren't as strong. Most skills are weaker, though a few skills are stronger than our current ones. An example of a weaker one is elemental explosion. It's Largest draw back is the 2 second cast time. Most cast time abilities are .8 seconds like uppercut, snipe, and crystal frags. It would be best to change this skill to fit the common .8 value if your using as a spammable. Or if you using it like a DOT such as Fulminating Rune, make it change to an instant cast time to fit within your rotation. A very strong one on the other hand is a Wield Soul I made that had a 13460 tool tip and 16312 20 second DOT. This out performed Frost Clench when I was hitting the dummies. So some Scrying abilities need to be to be buffed while some need a nerf.
4.) Now one skill that needs a vital change is Vault. The skill in its near entirety needs a rework. In short this skill has the same flaw as Scatter Shot did many updates ago before it was revised. There's little benefit from having a skill that pushes you away from the target. At least from a PVE perspective. The time it takes to do the back flip is better spent casting abilities in your rotation therefor making Vault a dps loss. Also you have to consider the back and forth movement you would need to do to manage the 20 second dot you can add. Every time you back flip away is lost potential dps. My suggestion is alter Vault into a bow skill that fits in melee range and flows with your rotation. Like for example that skill you see bow npcs use where they shoot the ground and a fissure targets you. It's still ranged but can be used in melee. Almost anything is better than a skill that sends you backwards.

This is a summary of my suggestions and feedback so far. I'll will be doing a deep dive on each of the skills independently.

VixxVexx

Torchbearer might be worse than the new jabs animation. The person that made this really outdid themselves.

Also, what's this obsession with trying to force more cast times in a fast pace action combat enviroment?

huskandhunger

For the werewolf Terrified mechanic, currently only a debuff icon is shown. To further enhance the theme of marking/tracking prey, a subtle glow or a
slight visual particle effect, perhaps could further deliver on providing a hunting theme and feel really exciting 😎

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin

Bashev

The oblivion execute should be in melee range.

Tannus15

The cast times need to go. Like, they literally make no sense.

Skills pretty much fall into 2 basic categories. spammable and not spammable.
Anything with a cast time can be ruled out as a spammable. it's too clunky and slow, it doesn't work.

Some of these skills *might* work as a cast time buff skill, similar to accelerate, but the buff durations are too short for it to be worthwhile.

Take Trample. 1.5 second cast time for a 10s buff. That means if you want to keep up the buff you need to be casting the skill every 10- seconds. it's crazy. no rotation works with this. not only is it horrible to use and FEEL bad to use, but keeping up the buff takes basically 1 out of 5 skill casts.

At a bare minimum the buff durations on cast time skills need to be increased to 20 seconds, preferably 30+

olsborg

Cast times equals useless for pvp.
I posted this in another thread.

olsborg wrote: »

The scribed skill more or less overshadows the class skill in this instance.

Savos_Saren

olsborg wrote: »

Cast times equals useless for pvp.
I posted this in another thread.

olsborg wrote: »

The scribed skill more or less overshadows the class skill in this instance.

Don't forget that there's a purge option, too. Now you can cloak and purge off Elemental Susceptibility- no more DOTs pulling you from stealth.

Tommy_The_Gun

huskandhunger wrote: »

For the werewolf Terrified mechanic, currently only a debuff icon is shown. To further enhance the theme of marking/tracking prey, a subtle glow or a
slight visual particle effect, perhaps could further deliver on providing a hunting theme and feel really exciting 😎

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin

Truth be told, it is a perfect opportunity to add detection skill to WW toolkit as this is one of many limiting factors for the use of WW in PvP. So both roar morphs should have Terrified de-buff mechanics, but one could get "an upgraded" version that would work kinda like NB's Piercing Mark (when only the caster sees the invisible target for X seconds) but it would be applied via AOE around you.

StShoot

First off i realy love that you decided to add new skills, 6 years after summerset and most of them seem op but fun (looking at the soulburst skill with oblivion execute ).

However i realy dont like the 2 secs cast times on some of them.
In general casttimes in an somewhat fast combatsystem (For an MMO) feel out of place and lock certain roles and playstyles out from using them.

Most of the time you wont see a tank using a channeled Skill because often you wont finde the time to apply it. And when it comes to DDs or heals, they are probably better off casting 2 skills in the time it takes to fire off one of those. For PvE in general casttimes tend to kill players, i have seen it way to often, that players died while using the tentacles because they were unable to block something.
In PvP you lock out smallscalers and 1vX players especially when the skill is interruptable, some(cast)time skills can work if you are able to gain distance by cloaking or streaking but most solo players tend to phase them out if they are not needed in their build. Ballgroups and large Zergs on the other hand, dont realy have to worry about casttimes. But Ballgroups are already so dominant that they realy dont need more tools/buffs.
I would rather see the casttime removed and the potency of the skills halfed. Or have the casttime as a drawback for realy powerfull modifications.