Why does ESO punish players for wanting to help groups?

e.gamemarkb14_ESO

I have no incentive, none, zero, zip, in helping to heal, tank, or dps a dungeon I have already completed simply because I get practically ZERO xp and the loot drops are terrible!

I just completed a full round of the lvl 28-32 dungeons, and out of the 15+ bosses defeated, I think I got 4-5 blues, while every other boss loot consisted of 1 white, 1 crystal, and maybe 1 green item.

You get NO xp for clearing mobs, if you already completed the dungeon / story, again, you get nothing. The only thing I did get was a giant repair bill. =(

This is the only game I have played that truly does not let players play the way they want, and fosters a very hostile attitude in helping others in dungeons once completed the 1st time, because between xp and loot drops, they simply are NOT worth it.

I fail to understand how this can be, why the game design is set up to force such hostilities towards group play. FFS, you are penalized for having more the 2 players in a group! What the hell kind of thinking is this??

ESO needs to:

1. Seriously re-evaluate its game design decisions based on grouping, and find a more reasonable way to foster positive reasons to group with others and run dungeons more then once.

2. Need to overhaul loot drops for defeating bosses. This could be done easily by placing better loot after defeating the boss the 1st time, then adding in a back end timer as to how often the boss can drop a blue item at the very least.

Something like allowing players to run dungeons once every 2-3 hours in which they can get decent xp and good loot drop opportunities would go a long way in correcting the current issues here.

3. Play your own game for gods sake! I honestly do not believe that the devs play their own game enough or feel our frustrations with this hostile grouping environment they have created, else this wouldn't be an issue today. =(

I want to enjoy this game, but between the hostile grouping and penalties for PvE listed above, + the major issues that continue to plague PvP, how do they expect to keep quality players subbed in this game?

I understand they are working things out, but over 50% of these issues were highlighted and addressed by Beta testers months prior to release, yet they ignored everything we said. It is the truth and sometimes the truth hurts, but at least it is the truth.

In the end Zenimax, your going to bleed subs unless you make a serious decision to make some sweeping changes for the better, instead of finding ways to further penalize your audience for grouping, helping others, or playing the way they want to.

Alpha_Protocol

I agree. Once through and that's it. An unfortunate and misguided decision was made by someone only interested in forcing players through 300 hours of quests and not letting them play the way they want to. It's really a shame.

Tarwin

Just implement mentoring and have the whole experience again

*Edit* Hold on a sec, re-read the post. Are you saying if you go through a dungeon and get the dungeon clearing achievement, you cannot get xp from anything in it again?

Meneleas

Agree with the OP but this has been brought up since week 1 of release (maybe earlier - didn't follow beta forums) and to quote a phrase, you're p*ssing into the wind - multiple patches and only lip service to this glaring issue.
For an MMO this game is extremely anti-grouping and it'll take a ton of bled subs before they get this. People will not pay X per month to spend most of their time questing.

drogon1

Ugh I just posted on this issue today due to overwhelming frustration and my eventual awareness of just how poor the xp from dungeon runs actually is (who would have thunk it who has even the smallest amount of mmo experience - that dungeon runs yield next to nil xp?).

To discover that this game mechanic - essentially no xp after first completion - is WORKING AS INTENDED will frankly be a deal-breaker for me and many of my friends.

Why would you push people away from one of the most enjoyable PVE mechanics ESO has to offfer - namely, its dungeons? /boggle

Dantonian_Rarstiana

You have identified a very serious problem with the game, and it extends far beyond just dungeons.

The insane amount of phasing, and the inability to join anyone else's phase is also a symptom of trying to make an MMO feel like a single player game.

Basically, fort the game to work as intended, you should only do content once, with other people who are doing it for the first time. You should not attempt to party or help anyone who is not on the exact same step of every quest in every zone that you are.

knaveofengland

all new games face the same problems they are not unique to eso , all mmos have bots gold sellers etc that's a fact period.
I would suggest these things
more team play in questing including dungeons or game is all about end level + pvp content,
lower the prices for some items + repairs you will get less gold sellers period
really need higher levels for dungeons like fungal grotto , hours trying to get a team no luck, it was a level 30 and a lvl 32 in the end felt sorry for me and helped
me out so I treated them to 1k each, so needs some work here.
if you look at some of the starting areas wont mention what ones 1 is very quick to do the area is massive also you get more shards crates etc etc etc , so in some starting zones needs some loving care

I am a long time fan of the series and still own them all , please look and make more team play dungeons any level can help you and give them something in return,
game plays like a classic , just needs more loving

Audigy

Why would you push people away from one of the most enjoyable PVE mechanics ESO has to offfer - namely, its dungeons? /boggle

Not everyone thinks of MMO´s as you do. Playing a dungeon crawler is fun for you, but that doesn't mean MMO´s must be like that.

We have a popular dungeon only game created at Irvine, I would advice that you play this one. There you can do dungeons all day and get tons of xp, loot drops and achievements

I enjoy it a lot that ESO isn't all about dungeons, people that do them do them for the fun and the company and not for xp or epics. Working as intended.

Alpha_Protocol

Audigy wrote: »

Why would you push people away from one of the most enjoyable PVE mechanics ESO has to offfer - namely, its dungeons? /boggle

Not everyone thinks of MMO´s as you do. Playing a dungeon crawler is fun for you, but that doesn't mean MMO´s must be like that.

We have a popular dungeon only game created at Irvine, I would advice that you play this one. There you can do dungeons all day and get tons of xp, loot drops and achievements

I enjoy it a lot that ESO isn't all about dungeons, people that do them do them for the fun and the company and not for xp or epics. Working as intended.

No one is asking to make ESO a "dungeon only" game... Can you be less ridiculous?

Dungeons are a social mainstay in mmo's. People seek each other's help and offer their own. ESO has somehow disregarded this extremely common thread in mmo gameplay. Instead they've created a system where players will typically only run through a dungeon one time because the time and effort required to run more than that simply isn't worth it.

Working as intended? How unfortunate. If that's the case, ESO will become the single player game that many already consider it to be... because you'll be the only one playing it.

Senatour

Just like to put this out there. Some of your criticisms are not present in veteran tier dungeons. You always get XP and decent drops are available from completing them over and over. Its only in the pre veteran levels that you get little benefit from repeating dungeons. So you should probably spend more time playing the entire game before making sweeping statements. Yes they should probably give more XP for pre-vet dungeon repeats but they certainly give good amounts in veteran dungeons. (the ones you need to grind for good late game gear). Another point is that while levelling to veteran, you can very easily replace gear with better things outside of a dungeon. Its only in veteran dungeons where you are looking for end game sets that you would want to grind these dungeons (in my opinion). No hate, just saying.

yodased

@Senatour couldn't have said this better. Why the hell are you running lvl 35 dungeons over and over? Run them once and move on to the next one, you will outlevel and outperform any gear gotten in those dungeons within a couple of hours of playing, so why farm it?

To the point of "helping" other people. You are not helping them in this situation, they are helping you. If you are farming dungeons for gear and grinding through them to level up that isn't helping someone. I help people through lower dungeons and same level on a regular basis. I just understand that I am going there to HELP the people that need to complete it, not go under false pretense of help in order to get mediocre gear that nooone wants anyway.

Endgame dungeons give you the fix you are looking for.

Beyond that you have to remember that this game is set up as a hybrid really. 1-50 is PvE centric story quest mode. VR1-10 is PvP and hardcore 4 man Pve VR11+ is PvP and super hardcore 4/8/12 PvE and full 40 man raids.

Although you may want them to shift around the priorities, its working as they intended.

TL:DR There are no twinks, keeping yourself at a set level makes no sense and gear from dungeons is mediocre at best. Endgame dungeon is the prize you are seeking.

Alpha_Protocol

Senatour wrote: »

Just like to put this out there. Some of your criticisms are not present in veteran tier dungeons. You always get XP and decent drops are available from completing them over and over. Its only in the pre veteran levels that you get little benefit from repeating dungeons. So you should probably spend more time playing the entire game before making sweeping statements. Yes they should probably give more XP for pre-vet dungeon repeats but they certainly give good amounts in veteran dungeons. (the ones you need to grind for good late game gear). Another point is that while levelling to veteran, you can very easily replace gear with better things outside of a dungeon. Its only in veteran dungeons where you are looking for end game sets that you would want to grind these dungeons (in my opinion). No hate, just saying.

yodased wrote: »

@Senatour couldn't have said this better. Why the hell are you running lvl 35 dungeons over and over? Run them once and move on to the next one, you will outlevel and outperform any gear gotten in those dungeons within a couple of hours of playing, so why farm it?

To the point of "helping" other people. You are not helping them in this situation, they are helping you. If you are farming dungeons for gear and grinding through them to level up that isn't helping someone. I help people through lower dungeons and same level on a regular basis. I just understand that I am going there to HELP the people that need to complete it, not go under false pretense of help in order to get mediocre gear that nooone wants anyway.

Endgame dungeons give you the fix you are looking for.

Beyond that you have to remember that this game is set up as a hybrid really. 1-50 is PvE centric story quest mode. VR1-10 is PvP and hardcore 4 man Pve VR11+ is PvP and super hardcore 4/8/12 PvE and full 40 man raids.

Although you may want them to shift around the priorities, its working as they intended.

TL:DR There are no twinks, keeping yourself at a set level makes no sense and gear from dungeons is mediocre at best. Endgame dungeon is the prize you are seeking.

Yes, yes... I get all of that. But no one is really talking about farming dungeons either...

As a tank or healer in every MMO I've ever played... there is no incentive for me to whisper someone spamming zone chat... at all. So yes, if I'm questing in a zone and a group is looking for someone to tank and I've already done the run... why isn't it helping out another player?

Why do people always feel the need to frame their arguments with polarizing extremes? You're either farming or your running once... no 2-3 runs for fun or to help out another group. Give me a break...

Hiddenbunny

ESO = a single player game that you happened to play online with a bunch of other people.

If you haven't figured that out by now... And people love it and people hate it. Anyway, the group content and mechanics are not well thought out at all, and all the draw back and inconvenience of making group and lack of any grouping rewards will eventually drive the people who want to play that way away.

In general, I don't see ZOS trying to encourage group PVE play at all, so why even bother pestering them about it. That's obviously not the game they envisioned. Mass FFL is more like the game they designed, and group PVE is just an after thought.

drogon1

Alpha_Protocol wrote: »

Yes, yes... I get all of that. But no one is really talking about farming dungeons either...

As a tank or healer in every MMO I've ever played... there is no incentive for me to whisper someone spamming zone chat... at all. So yes, if I'm questing in a zone and a group is looking for someone to tank and I've already done the run... why isn't it helping out another player?

Why do people always feel the need to frame their arguments with polarizing extremes? You're either farming or your running once... no 2-3 runs for fun or to help out another group. Give me a break...

Nice to see someone articulate and reasonable on these forums. Paper tigers. Taking a differing viewpoint to the extreme and knocking it down is easy and may make you feel better, but it's useless as a matter of substance. And we do care about substance, don't we?

Most vet MMO players run dungeons for the sheer fun of it. Not to farm lol.

This MMO does not allow you to advance your characters through the traditional group content of dungeons. Thus, there is little reason to level a dedicated healer or tank, and every reason not to. So much for freedom of choosing roles.

This MMO essentially forces you to complete quests (typically solo) to advance your character. So much for freedom to choose manner of advancement.

As the above poster said, it's essentially a single player game with a lot of people running around in the background.

I've been playing MMOs for the last 15 years, and yesterday was the first time I refused a call for a tank or healer to assist a group to complete a dungeon. It's actually kinda comical if it wasn't so utterly shocking that a game company could endorse such a design.

bean19

Here's the short answer (which is still kind of long):

If you build characters that have strong burst AoE as your 3 DPS* in a dungeon and have one healer then the dungeons would be extremely easy and rewarding to farm.

This is because ESO's rewards were designed strangely with normal PvE kill xp giving much higher amounts and quest reward xp giving much lower amounts than your average MMO. Also, ESO fights tend to be vs. multiple enemies at once. The result of this is that fights with just one normal enemy tend to be over very quickly compared to other MMOs. As a consequence, group that use AoE at the same time vs. numerous enemies just plow through them AND the reward is much higher than questing.

What will likely happen at some point is that they'll do a balance pass on this where they look to greatly improve quest reward xp (doubling or tripling it depending on quest length - long quests with less combat should still have good xp/time) while lowering kill xp (most likely cutting it in half). Once they've done this, the xp reward for running dungeons could be made normal again (though this would be the new normal where the xp is about half what the current kill xp is set). Until we see reduction in kill xp, dungeons will still be terrible places with almost no xp reward and good , but not great (or exciting) loot rewards (the other thing they need to fix if they want people to run group dungeons more than once for the skill point).

*A tank isn't really needed in most dungeons as the bosses are not tank and spank and often don't seem to use an aggro table. Also armor stat soft-caps at 30% damage reduction so even "tanks" aren't that tanky.

drogon1

bean19 wrote: »

*A tank isn't really needed in most dungeons as the bosses are not tank and spank and often don't seem to use an aggro table. Also armor stat soft-caps at 30% damage reduction so even "tanks" aren't that tanky.

In my experience in the beginning dungeons, a good tank makes a huge diff, as does a good healer. Without a tank, if you're dps is at level for the dungeon, your healer will become inevitably the tank, and most likely the group will wipe. Ditto without decent heals.

All of the dungeons from the first two zones have trinity mechanics for many of the bosses (tank-heal-dps). If you have overleveled dps, then you may succeed without the trinity, but otherwise it is unlikely. So I'm not sure we're talking about the same game (at least in the first 2 zones).

rdfarley89

In my opinion, why does there have to be a reward other than having fun? It is a video game and not a job... I guess like I dunno only thing I can compare to is like say...Mario. I know they are totally different games but does Mario reward you with anything other than fun? You get a mushroom, maybe a fireflower. I just do not understand why there needs to be a reward that is other than fun or maybe a challenge. I honestly do not care if I get XP, gear, money, whatever as long as I am having a good time with my friends and/or guild members. Guess I am just weird.

bean19

drogon1 wrote: »

bean19 wrote: »

*A tank isn't really needed in most dungeons as the bosses are not tank and spank and often don't seem to use an aggro table. Also armor stat soft-caps at 30% damage reduction so even "tanks" aren't that tanky.

In my experience in the beginning dungeons, a good tank makes a huge diff, as does a good healer. Without a tank, if you're dps is at level for the dungeon, your healer will become inevitably the tank, and most likely the group will wipe. Ditto without decent heals.

Actually, this isn't correct but that's okay because most people can't get groups in dungeons because the rewards are so "meh" and thus people haven't learned how to play ESO dungeons that well. . . but I didn't explain this well, so you are right to call me on it. I'm copy/pasting this bit from another post I made as it is the same information. Hopefully, you'll find it helpful.

Just by wearing 5 pieces of heavy armor and a shield, you will likely hit the soft-cap on armor which is about 30% damage reduction (which of course is "meh" in the world of MMO-tanking). This is why the job of a "tank" in ESO is so different from other games. Basically, you are a dps whose job it is to take boss hits when they can't otherwise be avoided, and they OFTEN can by: interrupting (your job as your 5th ability in sword-and-board is the best interrupt in the game), kiting and range attacking (dps needs to snare if the boss can be snared and you should run from it), staying out of "fire" (ground AoE), and killing adds. These are all your job as much as the other DPS with the one caveat that you MAY need to eat the occasional big hit from the boss.

Too often, I see tanks in ESO frantically using their taunt on the boss and all the adds to get all the hate at once and then see them just stand still and cower under their shield (or worse, they deal white damage to the boss instead of blocking). This is so wrong! You are going to be a DPS that is all about crowd control and putting the hurt on mobs 85% of the time. You can't and shouldn't hold all the hate. You also shouldn't try to stack your tank stats to be able to do this as it will just make you weak at your actual intended role as an add-killing, trash-stomping, crowd-controlling mofo who happens to taunt and block every now and again in boss fights to better eat a heaping helping of mega-hit.

If you're truly awesome, then you'll learn the boss fights well enough to expect the big hit and use your DK tank ultimate (or at least your class armor-boosting ability if your ultimate isn't up or you aren't a DK) before taking the big hit and/or you'll anticipate it and buff against it with your resto-staff alternate weapon and buff for it before switching back to sword and board to block it. As a guy who heals a lot of dungeons, a truly good tank in ESO who has already adapted to this new style of tank gameplay is a godsend. You guys who think you need to chase around the group of mobs I'm kiting after having snared them and then peal them off to then have them chase you while you aren't blocking necessitating me casting more and more heals instead of just killing the mobs. . . well, you know, there is a learning curve and I certainly can't type all this in-game, and many of you might be offended by it.

Of course, the other problem is that 85% of this job is also the job of those playing DPS 100% of the time, and they get even fewer group dungeons because the rewards are so terrible. That means that they are even less likely to know the boss fights or which skills to use to mitigate damage with crowd control and/or kiting or deal the best dps with synergies and skill usage. I've had to actually remind DPS that they should be ending each fight with empty magicka and stamina bars. . . the goal being to deal as much dps as quickly as possible as some of them will actually sit about dealing white damage and occasionally throwing a skill like it is solo PvE.

Finally, you're right that a good healer is very important. The only effective ones I've seen so far are Templars and higher level sorcs who use the Storm-Calling ultimate and/or Dark Conversion to be able to spam Resto-staff heals/buffs due to their ability to churn out the mana. Templar meanwhile can use Breath of Life for emergency heals and Rites of Passage for a group "I win" for six seconds button (which also helps when low on mana). . . and yet I've still seen PUG Templar healers fail miserably despite only really needing to use these two buttons. . . . well and their instant ranged snare if they get aggro. For some reason a lot of healers can't seem to heal AND kite. . . which is bad because that's your job as a healer in ESO.

TL;DR - Tanking in ESO is more about using the right skills for crowd control and dealing damage than it is about holding aggro and mitigating damage via gear stats. If you're tanking as you do in other MMOs, then min/max of your gear is going to disappoint you.

Hiddenbunny

rdfarley89 wrote: »

In my opinion, why does there have to be a reward other than having fun? It is a video game and not a job... I guess like I dunno only thing I can compare to is like say...Mario. I know they are totally different games but does Mario reward you with anything other than fun? You get a mushroom, maybe a fireflower. I just do not understand why there needs to be a reward that is other than fun or maybe a challenge. I honestly do not care if I get XP, gear, money, whatever as long as I am having a good time with my friends and/or guild members. Guess I am just weird.

What is "fun". Is "fun" killing monsters with friends? Is "fun" character progression? This is a RPG... so we have level, we have gears, it is part of the fun.

You might have a good time to clear a dungeon with a group of friends and get nothing. Will you have more "fun" if you cleared the dungeon and get some stuff that make you better?

There is no static "fun" value. People simply argue that it would be more "fun" for them to do something other than grouping in dungeons. Imagine farmville where all you do is growing stuff and but never be able to sell them and upgrade your farm. This is what dungeon is like right now.

Badh0rse

Go play WoW if you want to do dungeons! ..... Oh wait ... I thought I was one of these idiotic fanboys for a second.
Seriously though ..... if they come out and say that "dungeons are as intended" it will go down in history as one of the DUMBEST decisions in mmo history. I honestly can't imagine that is what they will say though .... especially if they care at all about making money.

Kaelis33

I really was fairly disusted with the no xp on dungeons. I play MMOs to play with other people NOT solo run around and do quests. This game does NOT remotely compare to the single player experience of Skyrim. So if I had wanted a single player game I would have just stuck to that.

I prefer to level in dungeons, not running around doing this ADD quests. There are SO many friggin quests its annoying. I like dungeons because they are like a lengthy quest. This is not an MMO in any sense.

They copied GW2 too much and it shows. GW2 had notoriously bad PVE dungeons, It seems Zenimax begrudgingly put them in the game. Progression doing dungeons needs to be exactly comparable to running these lame quests. I am tired of solo MMOs. Its like they are all too lazy to program the game. We are literally moving backwards in terms of complexity and game elements. I was not going to buy this game because I knew where this it was headed.

My friends at work convinced me to buy it however. I regret that decision. There is no excuse for leaving dungeons yielding no XP. This is a RELEASED game! It should not be in this state.