Population shrinking, PLEASE do something

Coo_PnT

I am looking forward to the Battleground update for U44. And I will be one of the first to play Battleground.

Is there a roadmap for ESO in 2025 or a developer statement anywhere that is close to that?

ChuckyPayne

Coo_PnT wrote: »

...
Is there a roadmap for ESO in 2025 or a developer statement anywhere that is close to that?

As usual, we will receive a partial road map in the second half of January. When the chapter of the given year is presented in a show. Nothing before.

Elsonso

ChuckyPayne wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

...
Is there a roadmap for ESO in 2025 or a developer statement anywhere that is close to that?

As usual, we will receive a partial road map in the second half of January. When the chapter of the given year is presented in a show. Nothing before.

All of the interesting stuff happens in the first half of the year. The climax for the year is in June, and after that, it is just left overs paced out over the boring months between June and when the June hype starts next year.

barney2525

Population is shrinking?

I dunno. characters seem to be as tall as they were at creation.

XSTRONG

Elsonso wrote: »

ChuckyPayne wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

...
Is there a roadmap for ESO in 2025 or a developer statement anywhere that is close to that?

As usual, we will receive a partial road map in the second half of January. When the chapter of the given year is presented in a show. Nothing before.

All of the interesting stuff happens in the first half of the year. The climax for the year is in June, and after that, it is just left overs paced out over the boring months between June and when the June hype starts next year.

Infinite Archive was released q4 last year and pvp update this q4 even tho they sure could have done more with the pvp update it dosent feel like leftovers to me.

Eso new expansions isnt very fun in my opinion but I do buy them, I think these new game and reward systems is more fun and I spend alot more time in IA then anything else Zos has released so far.

Sure new zone and stuff is fun for a week but its all same same every expansion, wb, delves, world event, daily quest etc and im not a story quest person so the story might be super good I have no idea.

Destai

Coo_PnT wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

ZeniMax Media is simply following Microsoft's wishes. Nothing you say here on this forum is going to make any difference. In fact, the comunity manager is just there to vaguely muddy everything and extend a response. Am I being banned from this forum for this statement?

I will defend the "community manager" by saying that things are much better now than they used to be. Not to slight the other community managers. ZOS just needed more of them. Maybe still does.

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

ZeniMax Media is simply following Microsoft's wishes. Nothing you say here on this forum is going to make any difference. In fact, the comunity manager is just there to vaguely muddy everything and extend a response. Am I being banned from this forum for this statement?

I will defend the "community manager" by saying that things are much better now than they used to be. Not to slight the other community managers. ZOS just needed more of them. Maybe still does.

Can you tell me specifically what is better or worse than before?
Why are you talking about before? Isn't the problem now?

You may have been around for a long time, but isn't now the important thing? In fact the community manager has muddled the response to the following question

In the past you probably would not have gotten an answer. Probably. A lot more things went unanswered. I consider that better. You might not like the answer, but you got one. Ten of them, actually.

Edit... android typing assist... sigh.

I am new to the forum here.
Can you tell me specifically what is better or worse than before? Please answer something important.

Do you mean that before you didn't answer at all, but now you sometimes respond? Is it your perception that not answering is normal? This forum is repeatedly posted by a dozen specific people, including you. Why do you go to such lengths to defend the ZoS comm manager? Isn't this place a closed comity?

Just going to provide some additional perspective here, as a long-time regular on the forums.

Prior to 2021, the forums would seldomly get engagement from the community manager then, Gina. It seemed like the forums were not considered a wide-reaching platform, despite being an official platform. We'd get stuff like patch notes and other official links. Issue acknowledgements weren't as consistent as they are now. I recall some big console-edition issues where players tagged her for two weeks, waiting on some acknowledgement of the issue. Players had to reach out to her on Twitter to get the attention here (I was one of them). Events like this happened a few times, iirc.

Kevin, bless his soul, joined us in 2021. He immediately earned some goodwill by being more candid and engaged. It really was a breathe of fresh air. I also felt like he was open to hearing some of the concerns around moderation, at least early on. He also has consistently help players get support tickets resolved. For this, a lot of people are willing to defend him, rightfully so. He means well. I definitely have my concerns, especially after U35 and now the big lag thread. But overall, he's a boon to the community.

So, I will say things are better, but not where they need to be IMO. Most of what we see now is just some flavor of "we'll pass this along". Seeing feedback being organized, clarifications being requested - normal workplace back and forth - isn't something I really see here. Engagement feels very light-touch, likely because of workload. For major technical issues like the big lag thread, I'm worried the CMs either aren't getting the answers/support needed to close things out, or aren't understanding/asking the right questions to them because they're not technical folks.

Ultimately, I think we need more forum-dedicated CMs. It's too much work for one person.

Coo_PnT

Destai wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

ZeniMax Media is simply following Microsoft's wishes. Nothing you say here on this forum is going to make any difference. In fact, the comunity manager is just there to vaguely muddy everything and extend a response. Am I being banned from this forum for this statement?

I will defend the "community manager" by saying that things are much better now than they used to be. Not to slight the other community managers. ZOS just needed more of them. Maybe still does.

Elsonso wrote: »

Coo_PnT wrote: »

ZeniMax Media is simply following Microsoft's wishes. Nothing you say here on this forum is going to make any difference. In fact, the comunity manager is just there to vaguely muddy everything and extend a response. Am I being banned from this forum for this statement?

I will defend the "community manager" by saying that things are much better now than they used to be. Not to slight the other community managers. ZOS just needed more of them. Maybe still does.

Can you tell me specifically what is better or worse than before?
Why are you talking about before? Isn't the problem now?

You may have been around for a long time, but isn't now the important thing? In fact the community manager has muddled the response to the following question

In the past you probably would not have gotten an answer. Probably. A lot more things went unanswered. I consider that better. You might not like the answer, but you got one. Ten of them, actually.

Edit... android typing assist... sigh.

I am new to the forum here.
Can you tell me specifically what is better or worse than before? Please answer something important.

Do you mean that before you didn't answer at all, but now you sometimes respond? Is it your perception that not answering is normal? This forum is repeatedly posted by a dozen specific people, including you. Why do you go to such lengths to defend the ZoS comm manager? Isn't this place a closed comity?

Just going to provide some additional perspective here, as a long-time regular on the forums.

Prior to 2021, the forums would seldomly get engagement from the community manager then, Gina. It seemed like the forums were not considered a wide-reaching platform, despite being an official platform. We'd get stuff like patch notes and other official links. Issue acknowledgements weren't as consistent as they are now. I recall some big console-edition issues where players tagged her for two weeks, waiting on some acknowledgement of the issue. Players had to reach out to her on Twitter to get the attention here (I was one of them). Events like this happened a few times, iirc.

Kevin, bless his soul, joined us in 2021. He immediately earned some goodwill by being more candid and engaged. It really was a breathe of fresh air. I also felt like he was open to hearing some of the concerns around moderation, at least early on. He also has consistently help players get support tickets resolved. For this, a lot of people are willing to defend him, rightfully so. He means well. I definitely have my concerns, especially after U35 and now the big lag thread. But overall, he's a boon to the community.

So, I will say things are better, but not where they need to be IMO. Most of what we see now is just some flavor of "we'll pass this along". Seeing feedback being organized, clarifications being requested - normal workplace back and forth - isn't something I really see here. Engagement feels very light-touch, likely because of workload. For major technical issues like the big lag thread, I'm worried the CMs either aren't getting the answers/support needed to close things out, or aren't understanding/asking the right questions to them because they're not technical folks.

Ultimately, I think we need more forum-dedicated CMs. It's too much work for one person.

Thank you very much for the detailed information and your time. I have been playing for about 4 years now and have not read the forum except for the patch notes.

Again, thank you very much.

Artanisul

endorphinsplox wrote: »

Doesn't help they just had this big banning spree that revealed their new implementation of 24/7 private message surveillance in-game. Who the hell wants to play an MMO where they can't DM their friends without risk of losing their entire account and everything they worked for?

If you can be banned for what you say in chat then you are saying some pretty horrible things in chat. It's not a surveillance issue, that's a morality issue.

MISTFORMBZZZ

barney2525 wrote: »

Population is shrinking?

I dunno. characters seem to be as tall as they were at creation.

Glad you can still laugh about that ^^

pklemming

Coo_PnT wrote: »

I am looking forward to the Battleground update for U44. And I will be one of the first to play Battleground.

Is there a roadmap for ESO in 2025 or a developer statement anywhere that is close to that?

This aged poorly in the space of 1 day. The new format is horribly imbalanced, far worse than when we had 3 teams.

StihlReign

JiubLeRepenti wrote: »

I currently have over 7,000 hours on ESO. I also know a lot of people, through guilds, Discord channels, forums, who used to be endgame/PvP players with over 5,000 hours or even 10,000 hours. Many of them have simply stopped playing. Because ZOS has been stuck in the same content loop for years now.

I think a lot of players got tired of asking for the same things over and over again, without ever really being listened to. I could easily list over fifty suggestions that have been made by the community over the years and never implemented by ZOS.

ZOS keeps hiding behind the “technical limitations” of its servers and game engine to justify its lack of innovation/meeting expectations. This is all very well. But gamers (in general, not just the ZOS community) simply don't care. Just do it. Fix the servers and the game engine. Or let the game slowly but surely die.

And don't feel sorry for the game. We're literally paying for it. I've personally spent over 5,000 euros on this game over the years. But I'm not investing another cent. The game and its new content simply don't deserve it.

Hard to disagree. Upper management seems to be totally disconnected from the product they approve/develop and the one players want to play.

ESO lurches around with tons of potential while everyone but the company laments the massive opportunities and capital left on the table.

ESO lately feels like someone injected capital into the housing fund, called it End-Game and forgot there was a War and evil to fight in the Year 2E 583....it just meanders around. There's no longer any sense of purpose, connection or urgency to the entire affair.

MISTFORMBZZZ

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

moderatelyfatman

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I'm on PC NA and outside of US primetime, the population drop has seemed obvious since patch 35 but has increased of late in recent months. I belong to multiple guilds and in each case, it's getting more and more difficult to fill trials. Even pledges for dungeons can take 5-10 mins to queue on a healer if they're not in my local primetime.

dk_dunkirk

JiubLeRepenti wrote: »

I currently have over 7,000 hours on ESO. I also know a lot of people, through guilds, Discord channels, forums, who used to be endgame/PvP players with over 5,000 hours or even 10,000 hours. Many of them have simply stopped playing. Because ZOS has been stuck in the same content loop for years now.

I think a lot of players got tired of asking for the same things over and over again, without ever really being listened to. I could easily list over fifty suggestions that have been made by the community over the years and never implemented by ZOS.

ZOS keeps hiding behind the “technical limitations” of its servers and game engine to justify its lack of innovation/meeting expectations. This is all very well. But gamers (in general, not just the ZOS community) simply don't care. Just do it. Fix the servers and the game engine. Or let the game slowly but surely die.

And don't feel sorry for the game. We're literally paying for it. I've personally spent over 5,000 euros on this game over the years. But I'm not investing another cent. The game and its new content simply don't deserve it.

I'm in the ballpark on that kind of spend, and while I still subscribe, I stopped buying any extra Crowns (or using the ones I have) months ago. They're certainly not listening to the feedback on these forums, despite the fact that the users here must certainly represent the bulk of the revenue stream for this game. Unfortunately, it's become clear that this is the only signal that ZOS/Bethesda/Microsoft even has a chance of responding to.

Arrow312

X EU same but dont know if it is because the issues now. It seems always empty outisde main cities. Same problem like server upgrade took to long and other games came / come out. Seems to like consoles EU server arent important enough. PC EU felt ok saw many known players from X EU there.

Elsonso

I play on XBox EU every day. I like EU because my play time is not generally at server max times. This event, though, it is pretty busy everywhere I go, even at times it is normally quiet. I expect that the server will quiet down again as people get all the loot they want from the golden goodie bags.

XSTRONG

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

MISTFORMBZZZ

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

You must be playing on a different PS EU if you call this busy lol.

I guess everything is fine then

Rkindaleft

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

I don’t think queue times is as a consistent measure of game population as people think it is, as they tell both sides of the story - it may very well just be emblematic of a lack of people queuing (at least on the DPS role, which contains 90% of the people who queue) which may be that there are less players doing grouped content which has been stated 1000 times in the thread already.

I only do trials now because no content, bad updates and lag have killed my motivation to do anything else, and I haven’t done any in the last 2 weeks (or even logged in for that matter) after being tired of trying due to a lack of both interest from others and capable players that are active to fill rosters (because of bad updates and lag.) Just reading discords it feels like every week I see someone I used to play with stop playing - endgame communities on basically all servers are small enough to the point where everyone knows or has at least heard of nearly everyone else and everyone says the same thing.

MISTFORMBZZZ

The queue times on PS EU are actually outragous im honest, its really bad.

You can be happy if you find something in prime time unless its a random dungeon

XSTRONG

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

You must be playing on a different PS EU if you call this busy lol.

I guess everything is fine then

I didnt say the server is busy, I said "it feels alive at least during this event" thats what I think and people are aloud to think otherwise.

Reading this thread it sounds like the server is completly dead and have 10 players.

And no I dont think its fine because I still think we need crossplay with xbox and PlayStation, isnt the 10 year anniversary for Console next year? Imagine the hype if they announce crossplay at the anniversary!

MISTFORMBZZZ

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

You must be playing on a different PS EU if you call this busy lol.

I guess everything is fine then

I didnt say the server is busy, I said "it feels alive at least during this event" thats what I think and people are aloud to think otherwise.

Reading this thread it sounds like the server is completly dead and have 10 players.

And no I dont think its fine because I still think we need crossplay with xbox and PlayStation, isnt the 10 year anniversary for Console next year? Imagine the hype if they announce crossplay at the anniversary!

Im just affraid its gonna be to late if they wait that long but i cross my fingers and i agree with you; it would be great!

Niliu

All you people complaining it's a dead game prove it isn't.

Nihilr

moderatelyfatman wrote: »

I'm on PC NA and outside of US primetime, the population drop has seemed obvious since patch 35 but has increased of late in recent months. I belong to multiple guilds and in each case, it's getting more and more difficult to fill trials. Even pledges for dungeons can take 5-10 mins to queue on a healer if they're not in my local primetime.

Yeah. Because we don't like spending our time waiting for trial group PUGs, nor joining guilds that EXCLUSIVELY do trial runs. The Devs should make a storymode or 2/4 player version of trials. They can use the mechanics from the IA bosses cut and paste. Otherwise I hope 12-player Trials continues to hemorhage players. 🤷‍♀️

manukartofanu

Niliu wrote: »

All you people complaining it's a dead game prove it isn't.

Who complains that it is already dead, quote please

Surtalogic

Nihilr wrote: »

moderatelyfatman wrote: »

I'm on PC NA and outside of US primetime, the population drop has seemed obvious since patch 35 but has increased of late in recent months. I belong to multiple guilds and in each case, it's getting more and more difficult to fill trials. Even pledges for dungeons can take 5-10 mins to queue on a healer if they're not in my local primetime.

Yeah. Because we don't like spending our time waiting for trial group PUGs, nor joining guilds that EXCLUSIVELY do trial runs. The Devs should make a storymode or 2/4 player version of trials. They can use the mechanics from the IA bosses cut and paste. Otherwise I hope 12-player Trials continues to hemorhage players. 🤷‍♀️

You do realize you're playing a game that is designed as an MMO right? This story mode crap is ridiculous. Every single thing on normal difficulty in this game is basically story mode.

Bammlschwamml

Once upon a time there was a small city called "Xplayboxstationtown". A huge investor wanted to build a new football stadium there, for the next World Cup or whatever. When half the stadium was built, they opened it for games and started selling season tickets. So people started playing and training and having fun, while construction was still ongoing. There were some problems with the grass on the field, and all the balls would just disappear from time to time. The toilets didn't work and there wasn't enough parking space. Some games had to be cancelled because the construction workers would randomly kick players out of the stadium.

Everyone was waiting for the stadium to be finished in time for the new Olympics or something, but the investors realized that this small city next to "Aninsegatendotariville" couldn't support such a big event. So they started to build big restaurants, hotels, shopping centers, a waterpark and a casino right next to the almost finished stadium.

But they couldn't figure out why the balls kept disappearing and why the grass wouldn't grow on the football field. The toilets kept breaking too. Annoyed by all the unsolvable problems and frustrated football players, they chose to focus on the other projects first. The casino was a big success. The new housing projects too.

Unfortunately the small city of Xplayboxstationtown was build on a very old swamp. The architects and engineers who designed the stadium (and everything around it) didn't know that for some reason, so the whole thing began to sink into the ground. Every new building added to the massive project accelerated the sinking.

The stadium was already under water when the other buildings only started to notice a slight tilt and some rumbling from time to time. What had been an almost finished football field was now a small hill with one goal on top of it. That's what happens when you leave your trainees in charge of old projects i guess. They just added more earth to the field, so people could still play (kind of), while their bosses were working on a solution aka finishing the new train station.

Now nobody wants to show up to play or watch the games anymore. Just a few old drunks like me, playing hillswampball in the middle of an almost completely sunken stadium once every blue moon, just for the giggles. Sometimes people from the casinos get lost on their way home, but they don't stay very long, and now some of them want to build an airport where the stadium was. I guess they haven't noticed the cracks in their newly bought mansions yet...

AzuraFan

While I did find that there weren't a lot of players waiting for WBs to spawn in Gold Road soon after release, which was unusual, I haven't seen any other signs of population decline. I belong to three active social/PvE guilds, and I've been using the dungeon finder just about every day without a problem. I think there's only one day that the queue just wouldn't pop for some reason. I also play outside of prime time for my region, most of the time. Yet there are always lots of players around.

Maybe only certain types of activities are experiencing population decline?

XSTRONG

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

XSTRONG wrote: »

MISTFORMBZZZ wrote: »

I have more and more people in discord servers im in saying they quitted the game on the server PS EU because it feels empty and the population is down.

I dont know what zos is doing but it takes to long.

Call it doom thread or whatever, but that the game is dying on Playstation EU is a fact.

I play on Pseu and at least during this event the server seems very much alive except for pvp.

I just did 3 random dungeons as dd and que time wasnt more then 2 mins and there are alot of players in the cities.

You must be playing on a different PS EU if you call this busy lol.

I guess everything is fine then

I didnt say the server is busy, I said "it feels alive at least during this event" thats what I think and people are aloud to think otherwise.

Reading this thread it sounds like the server is completly dead and have 10 players.

And no I dont think its fine because I still think we need crossplay with xbox and PlayStation, isnt the 10 year anniversary for Console next year? Imagine the hype if they announce crossplay at the anniversary!

Im just affraid its gonna be to late if they wait that long but i cross my fingers and i agree with you; it would be great!

Its probably all about if its worth investing into or not but im pretty sure Zos thinks the same as console players that doing crossplay at least between consoles would be a good investment if they want to stay relevant on the console gaming market.

Nihilr

Surtalogic wrote: »

You do realize you're playing a game that is designed as an MMO right? This story mode crap is ridiculous. Every single thing on normal difficulty in this game is basically story mode.

Same argument but just as ineffective:
"You do realize you're playing an Elder Scrolls game and they've always catered to single player crowds?"

Or how about: "If you don't like this is an Elder Scrolls themed game, go play another MMO" in response to the typical "If you don't like this is an MMO, go play a single player TES game."

So since both sides of that argument are ineffective or cancelled out with the same logic, come back with something constructive or ignore my posts.

Storymode doesn't hurt the game at all, it just saves people time when they work 50-60 hours a week, while being able to continue questing without the sweaties complaining about access to "1337 gear basically handed to unworthy casuals" (that's what you're worried about right? Gatekeeping?)

Storymode trials can drop 0 loot and it would still be healthier for the game than gatekeeping trials to force people to play in guilds or waste time with PUGs that create a bad experience overall for everyone involved. A large playerbase plays ESO in particular for the lore and the fact it's an Elder Scrolls game. Sweaties claiming ESO is an MMO first, when Elder Scrolls came before ESO, mot the other way around. Just silly.