Where is the ink?

James-Wayne

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

This is not enough. I have all wings unlocked and have been farming nodes in West Weald for the last 4 hours (did WBs and Dolmens as I went round) and have got nothing, not a single ink drop.

I have unlocked all unlocks in scribing system and nearly finished my class scripts but I dont have ink to use the system. I wont be wasting my time grinding for maybe a chance at one.

Please do more. Put them in the crown store, I will buy them at this rate.

wolfie1.0.

virtus753 wrote: »

FafiQ_xP wrote: »

Must be crazy low, I was grinding nodes for 30 minutes and 0 Ink...

The chance was not above 1% from resource nodes on PTS. I may have gotten lucky or unlucky with my 0.6% drop rate, but I won’t be able to test it on live properly until my summer starts next week.

A lot of people post time they have spent farming, which is a very reasonable way for us to figure it as humans with time to manage. The game only rolls every time you harvest a node, though, and some people will harvest more and others less in the same 30 minutes. And since it is RNG with very low chance, there’s no actual guarantee as to when it will drop. I got 6 in 15 minutes one day after at least an hour of nothing. It can indeed feel very frustrating.

Ya sample size is going to matter for actual drop rates... someone should make an addon to track it......

Overamera

Been farming nodes for 2 hours and only got 7 ink so far. They really need to increase the drop chance because this game is getting so boring with the same grind over and over again.

i11ionward

virtus753 wrote: »

i11ionward wrote: »

Over the weekend I made about 20 normal randoms, I killed and checked the drop on every mob in the dungeons. NO ONE INK! For me personally, this situation is abnormal.
Also during the weekend I did vMA 2 times and vVH once, I did 30+ daily quests, I participated in battlegrounds several times, also no one ink.
I actively played for about 10 hours over the weekend and didn't get any ink. This is complete ***, to be honest.

They have already said boss drops are broken.

I will be curious to see how much you get in your 20 random normals and three trials once that’s fixed. They don’t tell us what the chance is, so it could help or it could leave things much the same.

The drop rate from basepop is better than it used to be but still very, very low.

There is nothing in BGs that can give you ink, so I would not try to get blood from that stone.

I know that boss drops are broken, but what about other mobs in a dungeon?

And I know that BGs will not give ink. But the point of the second part of my post is that there are a lot of different activities in the game and I'd like to get ink for them too, with a small chance at least.

By the way, since my last post, I complete Infinite Archive for 2-1-1 twice (with two different characters), also I had 2 games and a win in ToT, [snip]

[edited for bashing]

Dracosin369

I did the resource node grind in a very base game spot for about 1.5hrs and got 9 ink. That was picking everything in sight, about a node every 3-5sec on average. I did 4 IC quests and got a ink from a mob drop and a crate, ie 2 while doing normal activites. But no other ink doing anything else for hours on end. So in a year we will end up having way to much ink, but in the short term its limited.

SeaGtGruff

Imryll wrote: »

I think farming ink is a mistake. Farm resources and kill mobs and rejoice when you get ink. Already this week I've gotten at least 3 ink from plants and one from a deserter in Fort Colovia. I'm also getting scripts from unattuned alts doing things that they would normally do. If you could get everything you wanted the first week folks would be complaining about not having anything to do. We just need to be a little bit patient and we'll develop a supply of ink just as we have with other resources.

I agree. It's a mistake for players to think they should be able to very quickly acquire enough ink to scribe dozens or hundreds of possible skills. (I think they said there are over 4000 possible combination?) It's like when you've acquired only a small bit of gold, or a small amount of tempering mats, or a small number of skill points, or a small amount of CP, etc.-- you must think about the items or gear or skills or whatevers which are available to you at that point, and judiciously decide which ones you want to buy, or improve, or put points into, etc., or even whether you'd rather hang onto what you've acquired and wait until you've acquired more and have also gained access to more items/gear/skills/etc. that you might want to purchase instead.

TDVM

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

Fix the problem with boss enemies and additional adjustments drop ink do not need to do, the ink should have value, and such as it is now quite a good value. Unless with a rare chance to give away this ink for entering the game. Otherwise everything is fine and nothing needs to be changed except for the bugs.

Tommy_The_Gun

TDVM wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

Fix the problem with boss enemies and additional adjustments drop ink do not need to do, the ink should have value, and such as it is now quite a good value. Unless with a rare chance to give away this ink for entering the game. Otherwise everything is fine and nothing needs to be changed except for the bugs.

If they keep ink hyper rare, then what is the point of Scribing in 1st place ? It is supposed to be a flexible system that gives us the ability to adjust & modify skills to our preferences. But how can we know what those skill even do if all we get is 12 ink for the quest and the rest is hyper rare ? 12 is not even enough to try out all the skills, let alone different "mods" that skills can have.

How do I know what different modifiers do aside from guessing (based on the skill & effect description) ? There is no way to "try out" skill before spending ink currency. It is actually better to go to PTS and test it there, so we would not waste ink on "experimenting". That is not how it is supposed to be. It feels wrong.

CrashTest

James-Wayne wrote: »

Please do more. Put them in the crown store, I will buy them at this rate.

And there we go. The drop rate is so horrendous that people have reached a point where they'll pay real money for more.

It's not surprising. It's just sad.

Dagoth_Rac

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

There is no way to "try out" skill before spending ink currency. It is actually better to go to PTS and test it there, so we would not waste ink on "experimenting". That is not how it is supposed to be. It feels wrong.

But this is exactly how it is supposed to be!

It is how every other crafting profession and crafting resource in game works. How long did it take me to farm the 40 dreugh wax, and 150 or so transmutes, and 5 Kuta, and a few Hakeijo for the big pieces of armor, and so on to make myself a new 5-piece set of gear? Only to discover at the trial dummy or just through regular gameplay that it is not as effective as I thought, or does not match up well with my playstyle, or is just not a fun set?

You play the game. You slowly but surely acquire crafting materials. You craft stuff. Maybe you like it. Maybe you don't. But you certainly don't have nearly infinite crafting materials to min/max with for any craft, let alone one that came out less than a week ago.

Maybe they will need to increase ink drop rate. But, "I am forced to be judicious in my use of this new crafting material that I just started getting a few days ago," is to be expected.

Elvenheart

I guess the thing to do is to unlock Scribing on all the characters, do the entire chain with one, collect all the scripts, then pretend Scribing isn’t there for a year and just play normally and see how much ink we get in a year.

And agreed, the drop rate is horrendous. I think that inside the training room in the Scholarium there should be a way to test skills without using ink.

CP5

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

There is no way to "try out" skill before spending ink currency. It is actually better to go to PTS and test it there, so we would not waste ink on "experimenting". That is not how it is supposed to be. It feels wrong.

But this is exactly how it is supposed to be!

It is how every other crafting profession and crafting resource in game works. How long did it take me to farm the 40 dreugh wax, and 150 or so transmutes, and 5 Kuta, and a few Hakeijo for the big pieces of armor, and so on to make myself a new 5-piece set of gear? Only to discover at the trial dummy or just through regular gameplay that it is not as effective as I thought, or does not match up well with my playstyle, or is just not a fun set?

You play the game. You slowly but surely acquire crafting materials. You craft stuff. Maybe you like it. Maybe you don't. But you certainly don't have nearly infinite crafting materials to min/max with for any craft, let alone one that came out less than a week ago.

Maybe they will need to increase ink drop rate. But, "I am forced to be judicious in my use of this new crafting material that I just started getting a few days ago," is to be expected.

I can make as much gear to purple quality as I like without a care, given how much vet content I've run and deconed purple gear from. Upgrading to gold is pricey for me, but I don't need to upgrade too gold to see how a set works, I can even just craft it without upgrading it at all to at least get a feel for it. I spent 3 ink trying out vault, since I'm an archer main at heart, just to see how it felt to use, and I honestly feel like I wasted 300k worth of materials on an experiment than getting something useful out of it.

"Exactly how it is supposed to be" is incorrect, given ZOS's enthusiasm when talking about the scribing system and how they hoped to have players would 'go back and try the different scripts as they got them.' This ink drop rate does not enable experimentation or spontaneity, it punishes you for trying out skills, if you find they don't feel good to use, and it encourages players to not touch the system at all until they get just the right combinations of scripts to make the exact best version of the skill they want as their first version, so that way if it is a good skill then they wouldn't need to spend even more ink refining it.

It's bad enough that the process of getting scripts is heavily based around doing very old and dated content, but the fact that the fuel needed to actually experiment and engage with the system is so rare will put many players off quickly. You don't need all gold gear to see how the gear works, and getting traits isn't an rng process like what scripts are. The whole system just screams 'engagement metrics.'

Aurielle

Aurielle wrote: »

Update: still have not harvested any ink. Have gotten plenty of scripts and grimoires from RotW, but the ink eludes me. Beginning to think my account is cursed.

Further update: still have not harvested any ink. Finished zone stories for Deadlands and Firesong today, and am halfway through Necrom. Have grabbed almost every node I’ve encountered while doing the quests, plus many backpacks and other containers.

This is getting a little ridiculous…

Jaraal

Aurielle wrote: »

Aurielle wrote: »

Update: still have not harvested any ink. Have gotten plenty of scripts and grimoires from RotW, but the ink eludes me. Beginning to think my account is cursed.

Further update: still have not harvested any ink. Finished zone stories for Deadlands and Firesong today, and am halfway through Necrom. Have grabbed almost every node I’ve encountered while doing the quests, plus many backpacks and other containers.

This is getting a little ridiculous…

Do you have the "Sigil of the Luminary Indrik" and the "Sigil of the Luminary Netch" in the Upgrades section of your Collections menu?

sarahthes

I farmed most of the day today and got another 30 or so ink, all of which I listed for sale.

Aurielle

Jaraal wrote: »

Aurielle wrote: »

Aurielle wrote: »

Update: still have not harvested any ink. Have gotten plenty of scripts and grimoires from RotW, but the ink eludes me. Beginning to think my account is cursed.

Further update: still have not harvested any ink. Finished zone stories for Deadlands and Firesong today, and am halfway through Necrom. Have grabbed almost every node I’ve encountered while doing the quests, plus many backpacks and other containers.

This is getting a little ridiculous…

Do you have the "Sigil of the Luminary Indrik" and the "Sigil of the Luminary Netch" in the Upgrades section of your Collections menu?

Yes. This stuff is just refusing to drop for me — again, why I think my account may be cursed (or, at the very least, bugged). The RNG gods don’t always favour me, but this is ridiculous. I might do an hour of dedicated node farming today to see if the bad luck holds up, but I really should have gotten some ink by now with all the nodes I’ve picked up during questing.

Jaraal

Aurielle wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Aurielle wrote: »

Aurielle wrote: »

Update: still have not harvested any ink. Have gotten plenty of scripts and grimoires from RotW, but the ink eludes me. Beginning to think my account is cursed.

Further update: still have not harvested any ink. Finished zone stories for Deadlands and Firesong today, and am halfway through Necrom. Have grabbed almost every node I’ve encountered while doing the quests, plus many backpacks and other containers.

This is getting a little ridiculous…

Do you have the "Sigil of the Luminary Indrik" and the "Sigil of the Luminary Netch" in the Upgrades section of your Collections menu?

Yes. This stuff is just refusing to drop for me — again, why I think my account may be cursed (or, at the very least, bugged). The RNG gods don’t always favour me, but this is ridiculous. I might do an hour of dedicated node farming today to see if the bad luck holds up, but I really should have gotten some ink by now with all the nodes I’ve picked up during questing.

It does sound like some really bad luck.

I've been running a farming build, with Ring of the Wild Hunt, Steed's Blessing, Celerity, Master Gatherer, Plentiful Harvest, max Keen Eye passives, and HarvestMap with node pins marked. Finally gotten over 100 inks collected, but I'm also spending over half of my playing time harvesting. Striking while the iron is hot, so to speak. I'm sure I'll get tired of it soon... but I'm also getting a ton of other mats that I can either use or sell. Helps take some of the sting out of golding out gear and making tri-pots for PvP.

Tommy_The_Gun

sarahthes wrote: »

I farmed most of the day today and got another 30 or so ink, all of which I listed for sale.

It seems to me like the primary function of the new system is not to provide new skills, but to be a new update for trading guilds

TDVM

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

TDVM wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

Fix the problem with boss enemies and additional adjustments drop ink do not need to do, the ink should have value, and such as it is now quite a good value. Unless with a rare chance to give away this ink for entering the game. Otherwise everything is fine and nothing needs to be changed except for the bugs.

If they keep ink hyper rare, then what is the point of Scribing in 1st place ? It is supposed to be a flexible system that gives us the ability to adjust & modify skills to our preferences. But how can we know what those skill even do if all we get is 12 ink for the quest and the rest is hyper rare ? 12 is not even enough to try out all the skills, let alone different "mods" that skills can have.

How do I know what different modifiers do aside from guessing (based on the skill & effect description) ? There is no way to "try out" skill before spending ink currency. It is actually better to go to PTS and test it there, so we would not waste ink on "experimenting". That is not how it is supposed to be. It feels wrong.

1) There is a description of what modifier does what
2) There are addons like super star, which adds a constructor of the modifiers you've learned.
3) Third-party sites

TDVM

Overamera wrote: »

Been farming nodes for 2 hours and only got 7 ink so far. They really need to increase the drop chance because this game is getting so boring with the same grind over and over again.

No

TDVM

James-Wayne wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

This is not enough. I have all wings unlocked and have been farming nodes in West Weald for the last 4 hours (did WBs and Dolmens as I went round) and have got nothing, not a single ink drop.

I have unlocked all unlocks in scribing system and nearly finished my class scripts but I dont have ink to use the system. I wont be wasting my time grinding for maybe a chance at one.

Please do more. Put them in the crown store, I will buy them at this rate.

This does not mean that you need to increase the chance of dropping ink, according to reports from different people you can conclude that everyone is +- satisfied, just some are luckier than others

Aurielle

TDVM wrote: »

James-Wayne wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone, just wanted to let you know we've seen your feedback over the drop rate for ink. We've found that ink is not currently dropping from boss enemies, and we'll be fixing that in an upcoming incremental. Additionally, we did double check and confirm ink is dropping as intended from nodes, though it's worth reminding everyone that ink will only begin dropping from nodes after you've completed the Netch quest.

Once the fix goes out for the boss enemies, we'll continue to monitor the drop rate and make further adjustments if necessary.

This is not enough. I have all wings unlocked and have been farming nodes in West Weald for the last 4 hours (did WBs and Dolmens as I went round) and have got nothing, not a single ink drop.

I have unlocked all unlocks in scribing system and nearly finished my class scripts but I dont have ink to use the system. I wont be wasting my time grinding for maybe a chance at one.

Please do more. Put them in the crown store, I will buy them at this rate.

This does not mean that you need to increase the chance of dropping ink, according to reports from different people you can conclude that everyone is +- satisfied, just some are luckier than others

One’s ability to use a new system one has PAID FOR should not be dependent upon luck… No other system in the game is like this.

LadyLethalla

Before I finished the Gryphon's trial I got 2 Ink. Went and completed that and the final quest / trial then went out to gather surveys. I found a total of 4 on two (non survey) nodes I picked one after the other, one of which was a wood node, and then I travelled to a starter isle where I found another 2 Ink. So I've found a total of 8 this evening, and six of those were within the space of 5-10 minutes. I think that proves there's no cooldown.

Tommy_The_Gun

Like I have said before: With drop rate like this (and of course high prices caused by this), players are more likely to do Scribing quests on alts vs trying to farm this stuff. If you have 10 alts, then it is 120 Luminous Ink. Going even further, I would not be surprised if players would make a new character, do Scribing quests, bank the Luminous Ink & the delete the character (and the repeat). I doubt it is what ZOS intended.

Shadowbinder7

i11ionward wrote: »

I'm definitely not happy with the new system. I have Focus Scripts, Signature Scripts, Affix Scripts, but I can't start experimenting with new skills because of the damn ink.
My advice to those who haven't bought the Gold Road, if your goal is Scribing, you better hold off on buying it. Right now Scribing looks like your delicious dinner that you paid money for, but you are not allowed to eat that dinner.


P.S. @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin Unfortunately, I can't affect the ink drop in the game, but I'll have you know the first impression of Gold Road is already ruined for me.

Well said.

Are you reading devs? 👀👀👀

Shadowbinder7

kind_hero wrote: »

AlienSlof wrote: »

And here we are yet again with silly drop rates and endless grind.

Sorry ZOS, I'm not grinding in a game for anything. It's a game, not work. Games are supposed to be fun. Still, I have many other games to play.

THIS

They forget it's not 10 years ago, and this game isn't fresh. Actually I have lost interest for a while (playing for 10 years btw), and seeing this scribing system made me want to try it out and make cool spells like I imagined years ago.

But this system is nonsense. That ink should be a vendor item.

I mean, why did I spent months back in the day to unlock all the traits for each armor/weapon style? Why can't we expand the existing crafting system to something rewarding, like people who craft a lot get the chance for special mats/inks whatever to create grimoires for others, instead of a dumb grind?

ZOS doesn't really see there are so many other new games. People need so little to leave or just play less and less. With this drop rate, I don't even want to like scribing, because I don't want to waste hours not having fun playing a game.

Sad truth, I must highlight is for myself (not sure how many others) I literally come back for Elder Scrolls lore these days

So far ZOS has not dealt with so many inefficient and overly grindy systems in the game that frankly, yes, it feels like work more often than game and has for years.

End of the day yes loads of other games out there. But if the right changes aren’t made ESO is just gonna lose players, new and veteran faster in the future. Real shame

Shadowbinder7

I’d like to add, in case devs happen to be reading this.

The only nice thing I’ve seen so far is the scribing quests themselves. Very nice learning more about Shalidor’s wife and her works

Yet in terms of gameplay, ZOS seems obsessed with the idea that gamers love grinding to have fun. It’s simple not true

Games should be creativity, experimentation, strategy and challenge, all to go with the story.

Not just repeating picking up a plant or standing in a place next to a boss to wait for at 0.5% chance item to appear

I think the devs know this. But it comes down to the future decisions and fixes (LOTS needed) that ZOS makes which will determine if the player base just… slowly evaporates. Which would be a tragedy, but seems like it will head that way

sarahthes

In my personal experience, getting ink to drop in the wild is faster than repeating quests to get ink.

XSTRONG

Shadowbinder7 wrote: »

I’d like to add, in case devs happen to be reading this.

The only nice thing I’ve seen so far is the scribing quests themselves. Very nice learning more about Shalidor’s wife and her works

Yet in terms of gameplay, ZOS seems obsessed with the idea that gamers love grinding to have fun. It’s simple not true

Games should be creativity, experimentation, strategy and challenge, all to go with the story.

Not just repeating picking up a plant or standing in a place next to a boss to wait for at 0.5% chance item to appear

I think the devs know this. But it comes down to the future decisions and fixes (LOTS needed) that ZOS makes which will determine if the player base just… slowly evaporates. Which would be a tragedy, but seems like it will head that way

I think grind in a game is necessary and I personally enjoy grinding for stuff and things if there is a meaning to it.

Many players are doing daily writs and daily quest like crazy isnt that a grind?

I personally think there is not much grinding in Eso, I play d4 alot and that game is 99% grind

Elrond87

MyNameIsElias wrote: »

Does ink drop fom survey nodes?

no, i done a lot to test