Does Pete Hines Retirement Mean Anything for TOT?

Personofsecrets · October 2023

Context:

Additional Context: Pete Hines, 2016

https://web.archive.org/web/20160903173316/https://www.polygon.com/2016/9/3/12782396/elder-scrolls-legends-pete-hines-magic-the-gathering-pax

"But Hines’ interest in strategy card games didn’t stop there. He began to sample many different kinds of collectible card games like SolForge and Hex: Shards of Fate, but also card-driven strategy games like Card Hunter and Dominion."

"I’ll have worked on The Elder Scrolls for 17 years next month," he said. "I started in 1999 when it was the early days on Morrowind. The Elder Scrolls is my life. I’ve never not worked on an Elder Scrolls game. The franchise means a lot to me, and I want Legends to succeed and be something that matters a lot to people."

Comment:

Although The Elder Scrolls Legends was a massive tremendous long term failure plagued with an incredible number of development issues, you could tell that there was passion, somewhere, willing it to live. Well, passion gives out to overwhelming amounts of money, that's just life, but one is left wondering about TOT.

I've never seen Pete comment on TOT. Maybe I just missed it? It would make sense if he had something to do with the game, but perhaps he never did. It would be interesting to find out if his moving on will impact TOT at all.

LunaFlora · October 2023

why would it?

SeaGtGruff · October 2023

When he was speaking with Rich during the big High Isle reveal a while back, I got the impression that he didn't have anything to do with developing Tales of Tribute. And he worked at Bethesda Softworks, not at ZeniMax Online Studios.

Personofsecrets · October 2023

SeaGtGruff wrote: »

When he was speaking with Rich during the big High Isle reveal a while back, I got the impression that he didn't have anything to do with developing Tales of Tribute. And he worked at Bethesda Softworks, not at ZeniMax Online Studios.

I did some additional research and found this passage. It isn't meant to counter you at all since I don't have the primary source nor am familiar with the High Isle reveal you mention, but it still may be somewhat interesting.

Probably not ZOS' decision by themselves: Pete Hines was the one who really wanted TESL to happen (and which partially died because rest of Bethesda did not care much about the game), and based on how he talked in the announcement stream, he was the one to have made Tales of Tribute to happen. Hines REALLY loves the CCG genre.

https://web.archive.org/web/20231031145210/https://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/u8h6oy/comment/i5l65gb/?context=3&rdt=50862

spartaxoxo · October 2023

I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped making new decks

Soarora · October 2023

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped making new decks

I would be. They make a new deck, new companions, and new mythics every Chapter. That is the hole they dug themselves into. I 0% see what this has to do with ToT development.

spartaxoxo · October 2023

Soarora wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped making new decks

I would be. They make a new deck, new companions, and new mythics every Chapter. That is the hole they dug themselves into. I 0% see what this has to do with ToT development.

Well, they still make new stuff for PK PvP but it's mostly just stuff like new rewards. So, I wouldn't be shocked if ToT eventually ended up in the same boat as other forms of PvP, especially when someone retired that really liked card games and was a driving force behind TES franchise having them. Then he again doesn't work for Zeni directly so maybe it won't change anything. Time will tell. I'd imagine if he did have something to do with it, next deck is already a go. But, after that High Isle becomes F2P and new ToT stuff starts looking like just more new rewards rather than more new decks.

Personofsecrets · October 2023

With the designers thinking that it's about time they made a fast winning deck, I think that it's safe to not want further development of new decks.

My average game time is 10 minutes. Despite my playing of long drawn out combos, alot of that time can be attributed to opponents playing slowly. More of that time can be attributed to the animation system not being properly adjusted to reflect player needs/desires.

But yes, 10 minutes. Exactly what number of minutes is an acceptable amount to expect those who don't like TOT, but find themselves forced to play through it, to be comfortable with?

I know that it's hard to answer exacts. What is a ballpark number of minutes that the lowest common denominator can be expected to hold attention?

5 minutes?

2 minutes?

There are already fast options for such player archetype. If the lowest common denominator doesn't already understand that and has to have all of these changes directly aimed toward them so that they can finally win once the game decides that they are first player, then why would they understand that Mora is a patron for them?

Anyhow, back to the subject, there is probably a limit to the number of decks that will be made. Scrying for gear and creating new NPC skins to follow players around as companions probably have alot more design space and an easier to work with design space.

WitchyKiki · November 2023

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped making new decks

I'd be fine if they just implemented new rewards and incentives for players to queue up. I dont care for anymore new decks.

ESO_player123 · November 2023

WitchyKiki wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped making new decks

I'd be fine if they just implemented new rewards and incentives for players to queue up. I dont care for anymore new decks.

Same here. It's getting messy as it is.