[Discussion] Is micromanaging getting too strong an influence?

Leandor · July 2015

We have another toggle removed and substituted by an activated ability. We have abilities that gain extra effects that have to be activated separately and abilities that are only used conditionally depending on a proc. We have more and more short time buffs and the few buffs with long duration are slowly changed to short duration.

The game was very "active" already at initial release, but it gets more so. I start too feel like an RTS player, with 400+ actions per minute required to keep everything up. I fear that this is getting more of a chore than anything. I am slow and possibly dense, maybe, but I start losing the overview on my surroundings over the management.

Am I the only one concerned that the game takes this course? Can it be enough with even more shorter duration abilities that need to be managed? Where is the limit aspired by ZOS, make the game for youngsters only, because people like me who have reached their forties, do not have the hand-eye-coordination necessary anymore?

Mojmir · July 2015

seems almost like it would be better just to have an auto pilot function, its getting to be more of an assembly line job than a means of relaxing and gaming

Wing · July 2015

agreed

I blame the success of moba's. particularly LoL, and companies trying to copy its model.

Leandor · July 2015

Don't misunderstand me, I like the activity. But I would like to be able to also do other things.

If the average buff duration would be 15 seconds instead of 6 seconds, it would be fine. I do more button presses in combat relating to "I have to keep buff xy active" than to attack my opponents AND heal my companions combined. That is what I would like to change.

Mojmir · July 2015

if it werent for FTC running, id have a hard time with my buffs and keeping track. i can only imagine how this will play out for console users as well.

ewhite106b16_ESO · July 2015

More active gameplay and options are good, buff management is way less annoying in ESO compared to other action mmos I've played - Conan in particular that have way more minor buffs to keep active. The main exception here is shield stacking, i agree spamming three different shields would be annoying as hell. Shields aside i think some p!ayers are worrying too much about keeping every possible proc/effect up all the time

Turelus · July 2015

As said above this is still less demanding than other MMO games however I would much rather see buffs on a 30second timer so we can cast, dive in and focus on the fight for the opening.

I dislike rotations where leaping x skill active is required as because of what has been said I focus more on my skill bar / cool downs / visual effects then just hitting enemies.

Solanum · July 2015

I think overall it's a bad thing when you practically need to install addons to get a clue of which buffs are active and which are not.

I wouldn't want to compare pushing an additional button every 10 seconds to the downright impressive feats of Starcraft players seemingly managing an army of 200 units while still pulling individual units out of fights or having specific units within that group cast abilities with flawless timing.

It takes some getting used to, but before no time you'll be admiring the environment while pushing that extra button out of habit. It's just a shame they make the gameplay more clunky this way.

Leandor · July 2015

Thanks for your input, guys. I can see both sides of the coin. Maybe it's a bit of my background, that I am not so excited about micromanaging.

It is also not about buff stacking, but more about the buff interactions. To give an example, playing a stamblade with a build based on skirmisher. To be "viable", I have to have the damage buff active. On the other hand, dodge is also my primary defence. Up to now, it was no issue at all. With the cost increase for dodging, this becomes a much larger issue, since timing will be reduced from a 6 second window to a two second window. With a cast time of 1.2 seconds on abilities like snipe, this becomes a chore because I need to spend a large amount of attention on not messing up. Not generally, but in certain situations.

Also, a lot of these short term things are on a different basis. 6 seconds, 4 seconds, 10 seconds have the smallest common multiple at 60 seconds - longer than most fights last. Which in turn means that it will not be a rotation, but more of an "organized buttonmeshing" while trying to keep in mind when each buff runs out.

It starts to be enough of an issue for me to start worrying...