Braffin wrote: »

They don't reduce content tho.

Maybe I should have been more precise: The quantity might be about the same, but it feels like they reduce production efforts. More repeatable systems, asset recycling, things they can add stuff to easily and without higher costs. Less costly content where you would need writers, voice actors, and other artists. And even within story content I see a reduction: the writing quality also got worse, at least between Elsweyr and Necrom (in Necrom it improved again, fortunately). The number of quests per chapter was also much lower during the last few years compared to how it had been in Morrowind and Summerset. As someone who very much focusses on lore and stories, it's very noticeable that there was/is a decrease.

casparian wrote: »

RIP harder overland. Disappointing, as I'd love to play the quests but just can't force myself to slog through the unimmersive combat.

The vast majority of overland mobs are bears and wolves and big cats and occasional trolls that most players just run past and don't even engage when questing. Making these more difficult would not aid in immersion unless the player stopped and engaged every mob they saw as they were questing. It is very doubtful that this would happen.

The quest objective mobs are often humanoids of some type that would not logically be as strong as the hero that is coming to save others from this threat.

Some players feel the quest bosses aren't hard enough, but changing all of overland isn't going to affect that. Just creating a challenge banner or hard mode for these bosses would solve this issue rather than increasing difficulty for all overland mobs that most players aren't even engaging.

Braffin wrote: »

Sarannah wrote: »

Instead of story mode, it would be better to have a +three companions dungeonqueue that grants transmutes. This way players can do dungeons at their own pace.
If storymode dungeons is their solution to speedrunners/fake roles, it won't work. There is a major difference between going slow(story mode), going fast(killing everything on the main path), and going "let's ignore everything in the dungeon and every other player" fast(speedrunner). Even I want dungeons done fast, just not ignore everything fast.

This must not happen under any circumstances. The only reason transmutes are granted for rnd is to keep the queues healthy, therefore they are earned for grouping up specifically. If someone can't be bothered to play with others, they also shouldn't be bothered with the respective rewards.

Story mode dungeons (with adjusted rewards, so no transmutes) are a fine addition, as they make content (not rewards!) more accessible for players of lesser skill. To form groups, which reflect our custom preferences, we already have guilds, chat and group finder. Use this options instead of trying to enforce soloism.

I agree with you about the rewards.

I do think it is worth noting that normal dungeons do not require much skill (and in most of them one experienced player can carry three players with zero skill!), so while what you are saying sounds nice, I don't think this is really trying to solve a player skill issue. That is what the normals do. It is exactly catering to the solo players, and re-creating content for people who dislike grouping or combat. It will be validation for all of the people who want PvP content without PvP. It will keep folks who needed to try group content a few times to enjoy it from ever trying group content. I also think it will reduce the amount of new content we could get, which is a shame because that is something everyone can enjoy, while this will only be for a subset of people... people who already have the most content available to them for the playstyle, by far, already. (Somewhere recently there was a letter where they mentioned the hours of story content, but I can't find it now.)

I am not against solo players - I have many alts and will venture out to enjoy the quests on my own. But I can accept that group content needs a group, and PvP content involves PvP, and in solo arenas I can't bring a friend or companion. Why are the dungeons any different?

I guess if ZOS is adding this to the roadmap, we will eventually get them, but it doesn't seem like a great addition to the game in my opinion. It would only be cool if there was something else to it that was special. Acting out alternate endings, seeing more of the villain backstories and motivations, finding additional secrets... idk. Something that makes it more than just "now you can do the dungeon without doing the dungeon."

Anyway ty for OP for posting the link as it is interesting.

Elsonso wrote: »

Syldras wrote: »

As someone who very much focusses on lore and stories, it's very noticeable that there was/is a decrease.

Agreed. Dungeon content was cut in half. Zone content was cut by about 1/3rd.

Yes, we got some QoL and bug fix stuff, but honestly, my assessment is that they should have been doing that every update. Things never should have gotten to the point where they needed to single out an update for the purpose, or even call out that they are doing it on the quarterly summary.

This year we get two companions and PVP content that is "not Cyrodiil" in the 4th quarter. The companions should have been in Update 42. The PVP content is taking the place of an entire DLC, like Infinite Archive, so I have very high expectations. Knock-your-socks-off level expectations.

While I can see your point for sure, to be fair to ZOS, this new yearly format was a good decision so that the map didn’t fill up quickly. I also doubt it’s a permanent change.

OtarTheMad wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Syldras wrote: »

As someone who very much focusses on lore and stories, it's very noticeable that there was/is a decrease.

Agreed. Dungeon content was cut in half. Zone content was cut by about 1/3rd.

Yes, we got some QoL and bug fix stuff, but honestly, my assessment is that they should have been doing that every update. Things never should have gotten to the point where they needed to single out an update for the purpose, or even call out that they are doing it on the quarterly summary.

This year we get two companions and PVP content that is "not Cyrodiil" in the 4th quarter. The companions should have been in Update 42. The PVP content is taking the place of an entire DLC, like Infinite Archive, so I have very high expectations. Knock-your-socks-off level expectations.

While I can see your point for sure, to be fair to ZOS, this new yearly format was a good decision so that the map didn’t fill up quickly. I also doubt it’s a permanent change.

I do think it is a permanent change. I think they have a new cadence and they will be sticking with it.

I think ESO Plus needs to catch up with their new cadence. It has less value in 2023 and 2024 than it had in earlier years. I know a lot of people like the crafting bag, but I also want the zone content. Right now, ESO Plus is not worth it for the whole year, so all my accounts that have it are currently "canceled".

I am not concerned about the map filling up too quickly. There are things they can do. They can branch out into one of the other continents. They can spend more time in Oblivion.

Elsonso wrote: »

OtarTheMad wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

Syldras wrote: »

As someone who very much focusses on lore and stories, it's very noticeable that there was/is a decrease.

Agreed. Dungeon content was cut in half. Zone content was cut by about 1/3rd.

Yes, we got some QoL and bug fix stuff, but honestly, my assessment is that they should have been doing that every update. Things never should have gotten to the point where they needed to single out an update for the purpose, or even call out that they are doing it on the quarterly summary.

This year we get two companions and PVP content that is "not Cyrodiil" in the 4th quarter. The companions should have been in Update 42. The PVP content is taking the place of an entire DLC, like Infinite Archive, so I have very high expectations. Knock-your-socks-off level expectations.

While I can see your point for sure, to be fair to ZOS, this new yearly format was a good decision so that the map didn’t fill up quickly. I also doubt it’s a permanent change.

I do think it is a permanent change. I think they have a new cadence and they will be sticking with it.

I think ESO Plus needs to catch up with their new cadence. It has less value in 2023 and 2024 than it had in earlier years. I know a lot of people like the crafting bag, but I also want the zone content. Right now, ESO Plus is not worth it for the whole year, so all my accounts that have it are currently "canceled".

I am not concerned about the map filling up too quickly. There are things they can do. They can branch out into one of the other continents. They can spend more time in Oblivion.

If it is permanent then that's fine with me. Maybe that's what Matt meant with his comment that years 1-9 were figuring the game out. He might have been referring to a good release format for content. To me, 2023 was probably the best year they've had since maybe Elsweyr. I get wanting zone content, I'll miss that too but I've always felt that they've been behind on bug fixes because the team is always making new content, which adds newer bugs so it was like a game of catch-up where you were never gonna win. With this change, a lot of annoying bugs can be fixed and with less content maybe that means better quality.

1. ZOS knows we want cross-save but they won't promise anything.

At least this wasn't a flat out no plans answer. ESO really needs Crossplay or at least some form of cross save because the game has way too large of an investment in time and money to just expect players to start over from zero if they want to change platform and you also can't play with friends on other platforms like you can other competing games.

Twohothardware wrote: »

1. ZOS knows we want cross-save but they won't promise anything.

At least this wasn't a flat out no plans answer. ESO really needs Crossplay or at least some form of cross save because the game has way too large of an investment in time and money to just expect players to start over from zero if they want to change platform and you also can't play with friends on other platforms like you can other competing games.

I interpret that statement along the lines of ZOS can't promise because it isn't their decision to make. I might be wrong, but I am going to guess that XBox and Playstation decide that.

SilverBride wrote: »

I just hope they give us the option to skip the Companion unlocking quests once we've completed it on one character. These quests keep getting longer and longer and less enjoyable.

Its almost like there is a need for more engaging content. Huh.

SilverBride wrote: »

Jammy420 wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

I just hope they give us the option to skip the Companion unlocking quests once we've completed it on one character. These quests keep getting longer and longer and less enjoyable.

Its almost like there is a need for more engaging content. Huh.

There is plenty of engaging content.

But companions have a lot of account bound features already, such as their level, their gear and skills, the outfits they wear etc.. Players should have the option to unlock these without the quests again, just like they already can with the Tales of Tribute tutorial.

Yeah, its great when there are options.

The map filling up quickly is easily resolved using a methodology ZoS used in their earliest Dungeon content (but seems to have been neglected since). That is a "II" version of any given zone when they run out of space.

They could easily implement this and it would in the long term actually afford them a greater potential to release content faster if the zone getting a second instalment was already made, and just needed to be changed to account for the passage of time or events therein. And then filled with new or existing NPCs with new quests and stories etc.

This approach would actually allow them to revamp the vanilla zones as future DLC and give us some expansion to the original faction story content without having to change what isn't broken (the original zones).

They could then also merge some zones in this fashion to broaden the potential stories they want to tell. So as an example we get a Grahtwood II/Greenshade II or Stonefalls II/Deshaan II "Megazone" (i.e. "Southern Valenwood" or "Central Morrowind" as a single new zone set after the events of the base game).

To add and this could be done even now, they could put the year the story is supposed to take place in the zone name to differentiate and make it more intuitive for new players to get to grips with the continuity of the content, as many players even now struggle to know what order to do zones despite it making no difference gameplay wise.

Presents a further opportunity for time jump/travel content if they really wanted, have an existing zone set 500 years in the future or in the past etc etc. So many possibilities.

Fata1moose wrote: »

The note on vet overland is massively disappointing. I hope they reconsider it as a priority. I know I’d find the chapters much more enjoyable with vet overland and I know I’m not alone.

Hopefully one day. 😔

I just cannot bring myself to play the story content until they decide to stop coddling one community over the other. I legit can be full of energy, and within five minutes be on the table sleeping.

SilverBride wrote: »

Jammy420 wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

I just hope they give us the option to skip the Companion unlocking quests once we've completed it on one character. These quests keep getting longer and longer and less enjoyable.

Its almost like there is a need for more engaging content. Huh.

There is plenty of engaging content.

But companions have a lot of account bound features already, such as their level, their gear and skills, the outfits they wear etc.. Players should have the option to unlock these without the quests again, just like they already can with the Tales of Tribute tutorial.

Yes. I agree.

I know many folks (myself included) feel that we've lost too much to the "account-wide" mindset, but to me the Companions are a weird line to draw. My own characters have their own names, builds, looks, class, and progress, and can only be used one at a time. But for those characters I now can't track if they do hard modes on dungeons or kill a world boss themselves. However companions, which are essentially glorified pet collectibles and there are hundreds of each out in the world at any time (many Mirris, Isobels, etc. out at once)... somehow THOSE collectibles are so intelligent they must be unlocked separately by each character? And again, let's remember that this is a level of nuance our actual characters don't get... characters who receive credit for killing a world boss simply by walking by it a second time! Companions are not only collectibles, but allies, and like the other allies they should come out for all characters on an account while they are unlocked.

I always thought a nice compromise (for the realism) would be that we could use the companions for all characters, but you can only build reputation/rapport with them if you go to where they are and do the quest. Tie the story progress to the quest, but not the ability to use them. I think that would be better than only being given the option to skip the quest when you first try to use them, because it might be you just want your companion out for a quick fight, but you want to go and do the story later.

rauyran wrote: »

Don't forget that ZOS consider ToT to be PvP

Because there is a PvP mode in ToT. They don't consider fighting the NPC opponents to be PvP.