Your Play Experience b/t Update 45 and Update 46 with Subclassing and Scribing In Base Game

Liukke · July 30

fufu_from_ps4 wrote: »

[*] Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46? no
[*] If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build? predominantly magsorc, but i could play all classes and specs.
[*] What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before? i swapped builds 3 times trying to make magsorc work in pvp, however it is now obsolete and is no longer capable of competing in pvp.
[*] What game content was it? pvp

overall the introduction of subclassing has rendered the majority of old classes obsolete. it has reduced build diversity to a small handful of builds (like i predicted before patch was launched as this was quite obvious). what this has done to the playerbase is this. small scale/solo/and ball group players who have fully embraced the system, and sorted thru all the classes to boil it down to what is the most powerful.... are dominating. their builds have been buffed by upwards of 75%, which has led to the casual player is getting destroyed. this has led to cyrodiil becoming a ghost town mostly.

the game was literally upended, we told you this would happen, you did it anyways.

the analogy i gave before is sadly the same as today. imagine zos is a soldier gone rogue, ignored all orders and advice, and is now standing on top of an anti personel mine. if you step off.... roll back the patch.... you will lose your leg. you wont die, but you're losing 30% of revenue immediately and there will be huge backlash.... bleeding all over..... but you live.

if you dont step off, and intend to ride this out.... you will end up starving in the desert slowly. slowly dieing as your faithful playerbase of 10 years reluctantly looks for other games that dont destroy themselves by not listening to the playerbase. this was such an avoidable issue but the EGO of the studio was too big to listen to filthy degenerate gamers.

this is such a bad design choice, and the studio has made so many choices while ignoring feedback.... it would be funny if it werent so sad.

even during the pvp event people arent playing. perhaps you can blame the public testing, and the pvp event before that for the lack of participation.... but let me tell you bro. i have a friends list with 100 SWEATS from pvp on it..... the majority of them have stopped playing daily. i used to have 20 people on every night in cyrodiil.... its around 4 people and usually not in cyro anymore.

with subclassing you now choose one of 3 pvp builds, and if you dont you are like 60% power and have no chance at winning. this means you either must throw away your class fantasy and play in one of those 3 ways, or quit. and the majority of pvp veterans have decided to quit.

Need to quote every word, especially the "we told you this would happen".

Deimus wrote: »

Ironically limitations in games creates more viable build diversity.

Super correct but I wouldn't say ironically...this is literally the reason why the game was cool

Why do we only have 5 skills per bar? This "limitation" is what makes the builds interesting (although thanks to subclass and scribing, 1-2 of those skills per bar are either banner or grim focus...yay).
If the game allowed us to use 10-15 skills on bar it would all boil down to a very specific rotation.

It takes a 5yo to understand that allowing everything doesn't give you more choice but instead lets you choose the few best options that would otherwise be unreachable.

Deimus wrote: »

Swapping out only one class line or subclassing a 4th line to the 3 existing class lines would have created more variety while still shaking things up.

Here however I have to partly disagree.
In the end you'd have the usual suspects, everybody would take out their tank/healing skill line for assassination or storm calling, since those trees literally buff generally regardless of class.
As an example look at ardent flame, that's the attack skill line for the DK. Look at those passives, they all buff either ardent flame skills only or flame/poison...who would ever take that when you can have flat crit chance (assassination) or flat damage (storm calling) even if you don't use any of those skills?

Adding the 4th line would be just the same, everyone would add ass/storm and the Arcanists would claim new records in the leaderboard :'D

Apollosipod · July 30

[/quote]Adding the 4th line would be just the same, everyone would add ass/storm and the Arcanists would claim new records in the leaderboard :'D [/quote]

I gotta tell ya, I truly fear what the power of the "ass storm" skill line would do to this game.

SnakeCrasher · July 30

As a PvP player, I can say that the subclasses are the worst thing you've ever done. I've been playing for 9 years, and I've never seen anything worse than the subclasses in this game. Don't you understand what you're doing? Maybe you should learn how to play your own game. PvP was already difficult before the introduction of the subclasses, because you improved the Sorcerer class for PvE, and as a result, it became extremely powerful in PvP, and you didn't do anything about it. Then, you introduced the subclasses, which made the situation even worse. Now, if a player doesn't want to play the sorcerer+nightblade+warden, they'll suffer. You've created a new, even stronger meta in both PvP and PvE. And now, with a high probability, you'll start nerfing classes, killing them even more and burying the possibility of playing a pure class. Well done.

duagloth · July 30

I didn't think the game could become more bland, but subclassing proved me wrong. No class has an identity now, had this been from the very beginning of the game and without a class system it would have worked. Not a fan of the usual, "punishment for asking" mechanic of needing 2 skill points per skill and passive either.

majulook · July 30

I was disappointed as others have stated the there are only a few subclasses to that make sense to choose.

Making free the whole reason most players purchased a previous chapter was also just a slap in the face.

I found that the whole subclass experience was not really rewarding or fun. I was hoping that this would be part of the Account Wide Achievements, but nope. Had to completely level again at the cost of 2 skill pints each the "SubClass" selected. So i only did one character out my full compliment of characters.

nb_rich · July 30

fufu_from_ps4 wrote: »

[*] Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46? no
[*] If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build? predominantly magsorc, but i could play all classes and specs.
[*] What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before? i swapped builds 3 times trying to make magsorc work in pvp, however it is now obsolete and is no longer capable of competing in pvp.
[*] What game content was it? pvp

overall the introduction of subclassing has rendered the majority of old classes obsolete. it has reduced build diversity to a small handful of builds (like i predicted before patch was launched as this was quite obvious). what this has done to the playerbase is this. small scale/solo/and ball group players who have fully embraced the system, and sorted thru all the classes to boil it down to what is the most powerful.... are dominating. their builds have been buffed by upwards of 75%, which has led to the casual player is getting destroyed. this has led to cyrodiil becoming a ghost town mostly.

the game was literally upended, we told you this would happen, you did it anyways.

the analogy i gave before is sadly the same as today. imagine zos is a soldier gone rogue, ignored all orders and advice, and is now standing on top of an anti personel mine. if you step off.... roll back the patch.... you will lose your leg. you wont die, but you're losing 30% of revenue immediately and there will be huge backlash.... bleeding all over..... but you live.

if you dont step off, and intend to ride this out.... you will end up starving in the desert slowly. slowly dieing as your faithful playerbase of 10 years reluctantly looks for other games that dont destroy themselves by not listening to the playerbase. this was such an avoidable issue but the EGO of the studio was too big to listen to filthy degenerate gamers.

this is such a bad design choice, and the studio has made so many choices while ignoring feedback.... it would be funny if it werent so sad.

even during the pvp event people arent playing. perhaps you can blame the public testing, and the pvp event before that for the lack of participation.... but let me tell you bro. i have a friends list with 100 SWEATS from pvp on it..... the majority of them have stopped playing daily. i used to have 20 people on every night in cyrodiil.... its around 4 people and usually not in cyro anymore.

with subclassing you now choose one of 3 pvp builds, and if you dont you are like 60% power and have no chance at winning. this means you either must throw away your class fantasy and play in one of those 3 ways, or quit. and the majority of pvp veterans have decided to quit.

Its interesting to read a PvP perspective. Cause im only a PvE person and it seems we have similar issues. No diversity in builds no more.

Its funny people say to just play how you like blah blah blah but like you mentioned in PvP your just so much weaker then others not using one of the main set ups.

For PvE the only good thing is you can complete content with pretty much any build, but for optimized groups, tanks and healers are not changing set ups for one or two people when everyone else is pretty much using the same class lines/skills. Arcanist was already over powered prior to subclassing but other classes had buffs or set ups like EC Crow that made every class still useful, now that is over with since everyone can just add whatever skill line they need with Fatecarver.

From a PvE perspective, I feel like if the Arcanist class did not exist, PvE players wouldn’t be having this discussion and peoples builds would be way more diverse.

fufu_from_ps4 · July 31

nb_rich wrote: »

Its interesting to read a PvP perspective. Cause im only a PvE person and it seems we have similar issues. No diversity in builds no more.

Its funny people say to just play how you like blah blah blah but like you mentioned in PvP your just so much weaker then others not using one of the main set ups.

For PvE the only good thing is you can complete content with pretty much any build, but for optimized groups, tanks and healers are not changing set ups for one or two people when everyone else is pretty much using the same class lines/skills. Arcanist was already over powered prior to subclassing but other classes had buffs or set ups like EC Crow that made every class still useful, now that is over with since everyone can just add whatever skill line they need with Fatecarver.

From a PvE perspective, I feel like if the Arcanist class did not exist, PvE players wouldn’t be having this discussion and peoples builds would be way more diverse.

bro i shudder to imagine what this has done to hardcore pve raids. cuz yea.... people can say play as you like.... but thats like telling someone who races motorcycles that he should take his 50 cc and race the 250cc's. no one would ever do that. they would just get on the 250 because obviously the 50cc is obsolete and useless.

my biggest concern is how does zos go forward from here? i honestly have no idea. maybe standardize all damage skill lines (1 per class) by giving them all 10% crit damage? but in my opinion, the trend of giving every skill every buff is ruining the game. so then what? take away all crit damage passives? probably the better choice. but there will be an uproar.

then we got other cans of worms

infinite sustain whle blocking (plar/den/cro).... so do you nerf the templar rune? the warden netch? and whatever the cro tether is? they can stack all 3 to regen while blocking. but in trying to balance that you further ruin solo classes and support builds. do we want to chase support builds off? does cro need another nerf? they cant even run their class currently because of the pet cap.

do you assign skill lines a role? and only allow 1 role per toon (no stacking 3 defence or 3 offence). i mean idk im just spitballing ideas.

this thing is a disaster and idk how you would ever balance it, without ruining all the other classes and dumbing the game down.

i dont think you can really roll it back at this point. they SOLD it as a feature sadly.

do you make everything the same? thats definately boring.

idk man i can tell you one thing tho.... would have been way easier to just listen to the community that this was a terrible idea.... but here we are..... hemorrhaging players at an unsustainable rate with no solution in sight.... and the majority of solutions im seeing thrown around are even worse than the initial problem and just compound issues.

fufu_from_ps4 · July 31

also if zos is actually reading thru all this stuff..... and want to hire someone who has intimate knowledge of the game and systems, someone who could give an educated opinion on how things will ripple thru the game and community.... BEFORE they launch them.... hit me up. id love to work on somthing i care deeply for.

diamondo · July 31

I agree with what people are saying, unfortunately you can’t roll back the clock and rid ourselves of subclassing.
I’m sure over time ZOS will balance and counter balance skills. Nerfing some buffing others that’s the nature of most games you make changes and players will always find a way to manipulate the stats, I’m thinking of that status effect build that rolled around PVP.

My main issue has always been the fact I do not want and will not subclass, but I’m PVP player. Now it’s pointless me being in Cyro 90% of players are slapping me down with skills from multiple classes. When I say 90% that’s not to say there’s a lot of players.

I think that there needs to be base level Increased damage/ healing buffs for players using their native stat lines. If you subclass even 1 line you lose that as your already gaining from mixing in skills that you would not have access to otherwise

Elvenheart · July 31

diamondo wrote: »

I agree with what people are saying, unfortunately you can’t roll back the clock and rid ourselves of subclassing.

Does anyone have a flux capacitor?

Sean3005 · August 1

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?

No. It has absolutely obliterated my ability to play in the content I used to enjoy.

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?

I had various builds depending of what was needed in my prog groups, typical arcanist dd for the most part, but with a quantum of diversity, bowplar, zenkosh dk, mkeccro, ...

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?

I did not touch their builds. I could complete the co tent before U46. I do not want to subclass. I liked the identity of my characters.

What game content was it?

Trial trifectas. We got SBS, PB and GS before U46. After the update released I was pushed out of the group for not wanting to subclass.

---

I still can't wrap my head around how U46 could have been released in that state. There has pretty much always been a rampant issue of powercreep along the years, which apparently was being addressed and appeared to be such a problematic issue that it lead to the infamous U35 Lost Depths update.

Now let's put into perspective U46, a 30% to 50% damage boost, if surrendering to subclassing, happened overnight, which apparently was an acceptable power bump.

Then there is the issue of diversity. The harder the content the less diversity. I'll admit this is to be expected to some extent, it is a hard task to balance everything and that some things will be better than others. Build diversity already took a blow when hybridisation was released. The distinction between magicka and stamina based builds was roughly determined by your spammable. Then arcanists were released, they became a must have unless you were extremely good in the other few required roles as DD. But now...? There is at most a handful (if not just a single one) of optimal DD build variations for endgame raiding. What is the point exactly now of having different toons with different base classes knowing that if they don't happen to have one of the few correct base classes they will forever be unfit for the gameplay I built and enjoyed them for ? Should that level of damage be maintained, a quick, easy and dirty fix would be to apply a flat 30-50% (adjusted to the best subclassed build per class) damage boost active only when pureclassing so that endgame players who do not wish to subclass could still enjoy the game the way they want to and be relevant.

Then I have to question why all the feedback the playerbase provided has been blatantly ignored. During the PTS cycle a lot of feedback was provided and yet we now know how U46 went live.

I will now quote a an excerpt from Steam's "ESO’s Developers Share Subclassing System Secrets" post :

In ESO, players can change their appearance, names, races, and even faction, but this has not been true with class

...the equivalent is a change token. There is no subracing, subfactioning etc. The subclassing equivalent to subracing would be taking the arms of a dark elf for the corresponding passive, the head of an orc, etc.

I used to enjoy raiding in eso, now I've basically stopped playing. I still do some daily endeavours and get the occasional event tickets, but I'm getting bored fast and I don't know for how long it will prevent me from moving on from eso entirely.

Personally I think U46 was singlehandedly the worst update that ever happened to eso. There are a few easy ways to mitigate the shortfalls of this update, but if nothing is done I'm afraid I'll simply move on from eso.

Ulfson · August 1

I was disappointed with the story line in 46. After just a few quests into it I stared the E-E-E stuff to blow by the script. Subclassing may be very useful but the time it takes to level up the subclasses is just too long and a very boring grind. As far as scribing I would like to make a skill but find the drops are not coming. And the instructions are abissmal. But thank you for not forcing me to redo the door quests. OMG they are gag-me-with-a-spoon quality.

randconfig · August 2

My primary complaint, the thing that will literally cause me to quit the game if ignored, is the Necromancer class remains bugged on Live and on PTS. For awareness, I am going to copy paste what I wrote there:

randconfig wrote: »

I just tested using only Necromancer class ability summons (Spirit Guardian, Skeletal Mage, Blastbones, and use Animate Blastbones ultimate to summon 3 more Blastbones) in PVE (where the pet limit cap is supposed to be 10), while using Flame Skull/Ricochet Skull and still am getting the "Failed to summon combat pet: Capacity reached.":

This should not be intended in PVE or PVP, as I'm literally just using my Necromancer class abilities as designed, but if it is, can devs talk to us Necromancer mains about what's going on with our class and if we may see a fix before U47 goes live?

diamondo · August 3

There’s. Lot of feedback here can the Devs at least give us some indication on plans around supporting players who do not want to subclass does not have to be massive just a yes we’re looking at redressing the imbalance especially in PVP

fufu_from_ps4 · August 3

diamondo wrote: »

There’s. Lot of feedback here can the Devs at least give us some indication on plans around supporting players who do not want to subclass does not have to be massive just a yes we’re looking at redressing the imbalance especially in PVP

its gonna be a minute. i think they're still shocked that this wasnt the smash success they thought it was going to be.

then im assuming everyone got fired and their side project that was leeching funds and devs away from us got scrapped because microsoft realized that they were so out of touch and so in left field, that they were just burning money.

thats my interpretation of what is going on here

so im assuming that it will take a few weeks for the new leads to sort thru the mess, and then make a list of things to prioritize.

they inherited a dumpster fire that is in full burn right now.... which is wild that one of the most profitable games in the history of the earth was allowed to be so mismanaged.

honestly tho.... this is the first time i have been optimistic in years. typically ANY dissenting opinion is INSTANTLY erased from the internet. Us being able to openly complain to zos tells me, that someone realizes it has gotten really bad, and they may finally be listening. it may be too late..... but im optimistic for good changes finally.

ceruulean · August 3

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
Yes, I did a vKA HM trifecta (Dawnbringer) in 2 pulls. To be fair, most of the team was fairly experienced in the HM trial, a healer used a shielding-heavy build, and vKA is considered one of the easier trials for DPS players even before U46. We were also lucky on the final boss. Usually, the the biggest cause of failure are the Torturer spawns on the 3rd floor. The torturers can come from any direction. It takes the OT 2 seconds to grab both of them. If group members fail to dodge a loose torturer in those 1-2 seconds, they die and fumble the trifecta. In our run, the torturers arrived on top of main boss, so they were highly visible to the group, already took cleave damage and died quickly. The final boss Falgraven fight was 6:58, so sub 7 minutes: https://www.esologs.com/reports/7Kr1hFCf9W4RGVc3?fight=34

For reference, a 4:10 min Falgraven fight was possible in u44 by top tier players, but that involves 10 DPS and supports also DPSing, instead of the usual 2 tank 2 healer 8 DPS composition.

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
I played templar and arcanist.

Here is a stamplar build from 2018: https://esoacademy.com/builds/2h-pve-stamplar/
Here is a u43 stamplar build: https://dottzgaming.com/build/the-knight-stamina-templar-pve-build/

In my opinion, for both mag and stam templar spec, the meta skills have remained the same over the years, 2018 and 2024, with staples: Jabs, Power of the Light, Dawnbreaker ult. The backbar has the same skills: Rearming trap, endless hail or some other weapon ground aoe, caltrops. Hybridization allowed classes to use a greater variety of class skills. I am fine with hybridization, but I hope ZOS consolidates the Weapon/Spell damage and critical stats so the game can be simpler. Having the stamina/magicka stat difference already makes ESO builds more personal and more complicated to craft compared to other MMORPGs.

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I use an Ardent Flame/Herald of the Tome/Assassination base arcanist since it does the most damage. I still sometimes play a templar with Assassination instead of Restoring Focus.

For tanks, I play fairly meta builds (Solder of Apoc/Earthen heart/Daedric summoning for MT, and gravelord/bone tyrant/ siphoning or a pure necro for OT). I mostly do vets trials and HM dungeons as tank, I don't do many HM trials.

I'm usually asked to play a healer, which is Green Balance/Siphoning/Restoring Light. In terms of differences between previous patches and u46, I feel like sustain is sometimes easier or harder depending on the choices I make.

I am a bit more concerned that the entry level to veteran content has more barriers. Now, HM rosters look like dissertations, with 3 skill lines, specific scribing skills, sets, and CPs dictated by the raid lead. I was okay with raid leads dictating sets and classes, which turns off some casual players, but it doesn't affect the character's roleplay that much. ESO has always needed spreadsheets and calculators to find the optimal penetration and crit damage. But now with rosters so convoluted, I find this kinda disgusting for what's supposed to be an RPG game. It feels like the I'm looking for a man in finance meme...

What game content was it?
I do HM dungeons and trials.

For vKA HM, powercreep made the trifecta easier to get. Damage was high enough that we only had 1 set of torturers to kill. In the past, most average trifecta groups dealt with 2 sets. Still, I was capable of getting Dawnbringer since several patches ago, but couldn't due to my schedule. The biggest barrier to completing trifectas is mainly social.

The difference between healer classes was already present before U46. Templars were known for being better raw healers in chaotic fights. Wardens brought the clutch tree ultimate, desirable Minor Toughness and Major Resolve buffs, but needed more discipline from their party members because their healing AoEs aren't as big. Now you can have both in a single healer.

As a warden healer, Lep Seclusa HM became easier when I swapped to a Restoring Light skill line. On the Noriwen boss fight, the room is honestly too big. If the tank gets chained and debuffed by Noriwen, I have to prioritize the tank, but I cannot turn around and heal skittish and sluggard DPS players as a regular warden. They typically die to a 1-shot fire tornado, or if I run out of mag due to excessive and inefficient healing. The extra healing done from the Restoring Light passive, the large circle from Extended Ritual, and the sustain from the Channeled Focus skill helped a lot in that fight. Barrier ultimate takes too long to build up, so the warden classic Healing Thicket was useful in this dungeon.

Without me subclassing as a healer, the DPS would not have been able to play as sloppily. They kept complaining about sustain issues even though I wore sustain boosting gear as a healer (Master Restoration staff and Symphony of Blades monster set). If the DPS stayed pure, they would have sustain from their normal class lines and not run out of stamina so easily. Overall, the experience was fairly annoying to me. People expect to bring their glass cannon trial builds to HM dungeons and clear easily. It is a social expectation that puts more pressure on supports to choose the correct skill lines, and less pressure on DPS to build properly, which is something I don't like.

In general, I think playing a healer is harder than before U46. Playing a tank became a little easier. Playing a DPS is about the same. If things are kept the way they are, training and finding a good healer will become the bottleneck for endgame content, if it hasn't already.

Estin · August 3

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?

I only now just touched the game after U46 launched, and I will say no to this. I grew weaker on the classes I played, and most everyone wants you to beam which is an entirely unfun playstyle. I played Magblade and MagDK in PvE. I knew the classes well enough that I could compete with pre U45 Arcanists in both ST and Cleave without much issue. Nerfs to DK sustain have made it harder to play, and NB receiving a PvE nerf in U46 and upcoming U47 is making the classes less bearable to play as if I'm forced to subclass. In PvP, I'm not feeling too much of a difference in my own abilities except against who I'm facing, especially in BGs. Everyone has access to streak which is annoying, and now that healing builds are even stronger, players can give up survivability skill lines in favor for more damaging burst combos to blow you up before you knew what happened.

Liukke · August 4

I generally want to reiterate how they nerfed many classes (DK is my main) so that subclass would not become so utterly powerful. I mean...nerfed single classes. All while blabbering bullcrap about class diversity and uniqueness...they killed stuff to force people to subclass in order to stay afloat. This is clear incompetence.

Sean3005 wrote: »

Then I have to question why all the feedback the playerbase provided has been blatantly ignored. During the PTS cycle a lot of feedback was provided and yet we now know how U46 went live.

I fear the reason is to please investors or show a nice boom.
Think about it, how many players did join since the arcanist introduction and the now possible subclass?
How many losers have come back because now they can do more damage despite being bad at the game...people talk about hemorraging players but in my opinion there has been a mega boost during the subclass introduction.

How is the state now? Who cares, they have a big boost to show to the upper levels and say "look, subclass worked!".

We are basically screwed

randconfig · August 4

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
PVP became more difficult because my Necromancer class summons became bugged/wouldn't summon and the issue still persists. Also why did the devs initially set the PVP pet limit to 5 when the Necromancer using only it's abilities alone, was intended to summon up to 6 pets at once?
If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
N/A, did not improve.
What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I was forced to main a new character, Arcanist, but then because I don't use the beam and the U47 is set to gut the crux generation of the class mastery, I have to change my main AGAIN. So instead, I'm playing the game with my original Necromancer main, even though my playstyle using Necromancer blastbones and animate blastbones often does not work because of these changes.
What game content was it?
The issues introduced by U45 U46 and soon U47, negatively impact my ability to use either Necromancer or Arcanist in both PVP and PVE and make me want to quit the game.

Liukke · August 4

randconfig wrote: »

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
PVP became more difficult because my Necromancer class summons became bugged/wouldn't summon and the issue still persists. Also why did the devs initially set the PVP pet limit to 5 when the Necromancer using only it's abilities alone, was intended to summon up to 6 pets at once?

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
N/A, did not improve.

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I was forced to main a new character, Arcanist, but then because I don't use the beam and the U47 is set to gut the crux generation of the class mastery, I have to change my main AGAIN. So instead, I'm playing the game with my original Necromancer main, even though my playstyle using Necromancer blastbones and animate blastbones often does not work because of these changes.

What game content was it?
The issues introduced by U45 U46 and soon U47, negatively impact my ability to use either Necromancer or Arcanist in both PVP and PVE and make me want to quit the game.

For as much as I hate subclassing, why do you feel "forced" to main something else?
As far as I know a necro subclass can destroy tons of stuff, easily doing 140k+ dps o_O and that's a dot build (notoriously slow). Why would you have to go through an arcanist? Yeah that's the peak of DPS and you need to have done only elementary school to use it but other classes are super viable. And besides, even with U47 do you think the Arcanist will become useless?
That's just stupid, you don't need to swing an entire character for just some % of meta.

There is a build out there for you o_o I've seen necros sweeping dungeons/trials pretty easily, subclasses are dumb but they don't force you to completely delete a character.

randconfig · August 4

Liukke wrote: »

randconfig wrote: »

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
PVP became more difficult because my Necromancer class summons became bugged/wouldn't summon and the issue still persists. Also why did the devs initially set the PVP pet limit to 5 when the Necromancer using only it's abilities alone, was intended to summon up to 6 pets at once?

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
N/A, did not improve.

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I was forced to main a new character, Arcanist, but then because I don't use the beam and the U47 is set to gut the crux generation of the class mastery, I have to change my main AGAIN. So instead, I'm playing the game with my original Necromancer main, even though my playstyle using Necromancer blastbones and animate blastbones often does not work because of these changes.

What game content was it?
The issues introduced by U45 U46 and soon U47, negatively impact my ability to use either Necromancer or Arcanist in both PVP and PVE and make me want to quit the game.

For as much as I hate subclassing, why do you feel "forced" to main something else?
As far as I know a necro subclass can destroy tons of stuff, easily doing 140k+ dps o_O and that's a dot build (notoriously slow). Why would you have to go through an arcanist? Yeah that's the peak of DPS and you need to have done only elementary school to use it but other classes are super viable. And besides, even with U47 do you think the Arcanist will become useless?
That's just stupid, you don't need to swing an entire character for just some % of meta.

There is a build out there for you o_o I've seen necros sweeping dungeons/trials pretty easily, subclasses are dumb but they don't force you to completely delete a character.

To utilize Necromancer Blastbones + Animate Blastbones ultimate, you need both the Grave Lord skill line and the Living Dead skill line, so I can only subclass out Bone Tyrant, which would be fun and I would be fine with that, if the Necromancer summons abilities from Grave Lord and Living Dead actually worked as intended, instead of constantly failing to summon all my blastbones (you can summon 4 blastbones if you use animate blastbones on 3 corpses and then use the regular summon blastbones ability) because of the new pet limit rules being 5 when Necromancer used to be able to summon 6 at a time in PVP (though whatever bug is causing this also prevents summoning 6 in PVE too even though the PVE cap is supposedly 10), corpses being considered pets and somehow prioritized/preventing me from summoning blastbones, and the reduced duration to corpses on the ground making it difficult to time a 300+ cost ultimate Animate Blastbones.

It's incredibly frustrating to be in an intense duel with another player, and it's like a near draw, but your ultimate is just now hitting 300, so you line up 3 corpses, and release your ult on them only for 2 things to keep happening:
1) one or more of the corpses literally expire as you cast your ultimate, so you lose at minimum one blastbones, but I've had it happen where all corpses expired and I literally summoned nothing for 300+ ultimate and lost the duel.
2) the corpses don't expire, my ultimate hits them, but still only one or two of them are summoned and in the top right of the screen it says, "Failed to summon, combat pet limited reached."

And a bonus is when the ultimate works to summon all 3 blastbones, but then the normal blastbones ability won't fire because "Failed to summon, combat pet limit reached."

It's so frustrating, it's like they just completely ignored Necromancer when making up these new rules for subclassing and destroyed the class. And yes, constantly losing 1 or more blastbones means your ultimate hits like a wet noodle, a huge DPS loss, hence why I'm forced to change my main that I've played since Necromancer released.

And when I finally get an understanding of the Arcanist class, and find a way to use subclassing/weapon skills using the class mastery script to generate crux to proc my passives and allow me to still use a crux consuming ability, tentacular dread, with 3 crux once every 15 seconds, they announce in U47 PTS that they're removing it, and their reason is to tackle passive crux generation playstyle, AKA spamming the beam. While my playstyle was anything but passive as I was using subclassed spammable abilities, light attack weaving, and still making use of my Arcanist class passives and crux consuming abilities other than the beam. That was fun to me, playing Arcanist just to use the beam, weave a single runecarver, beam again, repeat, and rebuff every 30 seconds, THAT'S NOT FUN, THAT'S NOT HOW I WANTED TO PLAY ARCANIST, AND THEY TOOK THAT AWAY TOO.

So yeah, I'm a bit frustrated with the game devs at the moment, but hoping the devs will fully fix Necromancer so I can play it in PVE and PVP and be able to consistently summon all my blastbones/skeletal mage/spirit mender, as the class that we paid for was designed to do. And that's why I felt FORCED to switch not once, but twice because of the updates U46 and the PTS U47 that is coming soon.

Asikoo · August 4

I’ll be blunt: I really dislike what Update 46 did to the game.

Subclassing completely destroyed class identity. I spent years (and money) developing my character into something that felt unique and powerful. Now, that entire identity has been wiped out. The only viable builds are strange Frankenstein classes and all the original class fantasy is gone. Out of 6 class builds, only 1 is remotely effective, the Arcanist. The rest feel underpowered or just filler.

It honestly feels like you intentionally traded the magic and fun that Elder Scrolls used to offer in exchange for something completely unrelated to what makes the game special. It’s like the entire system was designed not to improve gameplay, but just to force DPS balance through logs, mods and meta builds, at the cost of actual enjoyment.

Classes should be different and unique, but all capable of similar performance. Instead, you removed the uniqueness and replaced it with cookie-cutter Frankenstein builds. The result? Everyone either plays the one strong build or feels left behind.

For me, Update 46 didn’t add freedom, it erased the build I loved and made it feel useless.

fufu_from_ps4 · August 4

Liukke wrote: »

randconfig wrote: »

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
PVP became more difficult because my Necromancer class summons became bugged/wouldn't summon and the issue still persists. Also why did the devs initially set the PVP pet limit to 5 when the Necromancer using only it's abilities alone, was intended to summon up to 6 pets at once?

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
N/A, did not improve.

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I was forced to main a new character, Arcanist, but then because I don't use the beam and the U47 is set to gut the crux generation of the class mastery, I have to change my main AGAIN. So instead, I'm playing the game with my original Necromancer main, even though my playstyle using Necromancer blastbones and animate blastbones often does not work because of these changes.

What game content was it?
The issues introduced by U45 U46 and soon U47, negatively impact my ability to use either Necromancer or Arcanist in both PVP and PVE and make me want to quit the game.

For as much as I hate subclassing, why do you feel "forced" to main something else?
As far as I know a necro subclass can destroy tons of stuff, easily doing 140k+ dps o_O and that's a dot build (notoriously slow). Why would you have to go through an arcanist? Yeah that's the peak of DPS and you need to have done only elementary school to use it but other classes are super viable. And besides, even with U47 do you think the Arcanist will become useless?
That's just stupid, you don't need to swing an entire character for just some % of meta.

There is a build out there for you o_o I've seen necros sweeping dungeons/trials pretty easily, subclasses are dumb but they don't force you to completely delete a character.

you cant even run pure necro right now the skills dont cast.

goodluck hitting 140 when your blastbones doesnt work

even in pvp.... and knowing the bug so i ONLY use blastbones.... every second cast you have to SPAM the button its obnoxious. i cant imagine what it would be like to be hitting the pet limit.

ElysaDjinn · August 4

Did your ability to play and/or complete certain types of game content improve after the launch of Update 46?
Yes, absolutely. I have disabilities including difficulties with my hands, so being able to use some specific skills that I know work for me but on different classes is fantastic.

If so, prior to the launch of Update 46, what was your character build?
I have several characters, and have tried a variety of options. My condition fluctuates so it's been a matter of trying things out to suit how things are at different times. My solo character of choice beforehand was a Dark Elf oakensorc, which worked well for me except that holding down a mouse button for lots of heavy attacks was becoming a bit of a problem. In groups I prefer to heal, usually on a Khajiit warden.

What did you change to your character build when Update 46 launched that allowed you to play or complete content that you had trouble with before?
I've been able to add the arcanist beam to the oakensorc character so I have two options for doing reasonable damage, and am experimenting with various combinations on other characters - Templar, arcanist and more.
I don't yet know how healing is going to work out, but will enjoy experimenting once I've got my damage dealing sorted (I prefer to work on one kind of thing at once).

What game content was it?
Any PvE content

Thanks for asking for feedback. I've made mine very specific as I know you've had plenty of responses already in more general terms.

blktauna · August 4

PVP with this multi class nonsense is just the same warden, sorc, NB setup in groups rolling anyone who isnt a waeden, sorc, NB. Tedious and not fun.

Overamera · August 4

sadly I dont enjoy my fav playstyle in eso anymore which was magicka sorcerer with high magicka. this is because since hybrid ciritcal damage became way to strong and without rallying cry which most builds have you get hit way too hard. now witch subclassing everything else got a buff while normal shield magsorc got even more nerfed. magicka sorcerer have long been one of the most popular class but ever since this happened alot of players quit the game

Rhonemus · August 4

Except that the classes are not balanced, ESPECIALLY for "Pure" classes vs subclasses.

Subclassed skills should be a weaker...more "Watered Down" version of all non-class skills and abilities. Thus leaving "Pure" classes THEIR full strength skills/abilities.

Otherwise, there is no advantage too, or for any classes wanting to remain "Pure", as it is simply put, unfair to them.

Estin · August 4

Liukke wrote: »

I fear the reason is to please investors or show a nice boom.
Think about it, how many players did join since the arcanist introduction and the now possible subclass?
How many losers have come back because now they can do more damage despite being bad at the game...people talk about hemorraging players but in my opinion there has been a mega boost during the subclass introduction.

How is the state now? Who cares, they have a big boost to show to the upper levels and say "look, subclass worked!".

We are basically screwed

I know people dismiss steam charts because it's not the full player count, and because every year there's usually a big boost in June and a big dip in July, but this years trends are worse than last years with Gold Road, Server Issues, and Guild Store Changes. June 2023-25 was +36.9%, +17.1%, and +16%. July 2023-25 was -21.7%, -29.5%, and -35.1%. I'm certain official launcher, epic, xbox, and playstation share similar trends which will inflate the number of players gained/lost but not percentage. If I had to guess, I don't think multiclassing worked the way they were hoping it would which is why this thread was made.

The idea of multiclassing isn't bad, but its current execution is very bad for the health of the game. I wish they ran it like vengeance where they disabled combat related achievements and released it as a 1-2 week public test instead of dropping it on us and needing to spend several patches to fix it. The longer the current form of nerfing classes and existing systems (ult gen changes in week 1 PTS for U47) to balance subclassing is in the game, the more players will get fed up and leave for something else. Subclassing is absolutely mandatory if you want to compete anywhere in this game, and I know myself and many other players don't take too kind to being forced into a system just to compete.

Greensummer · August 6

I find the current class identifies so strong that it felt strange to me to subclass, although I'm glad that the option is there.

Scribing - there's so many crafting professions, I haven't been motivated to explore this, sorry.

diamondo · August 6

Rhonemus wrote: »

Except that the classes are not balanced, ESPECIALLY for "Pure" classes vs subclasses.

Subclassed skills should be a weaker...more "Watered Down" version of all non-class skills and abilities. Thus leaving "Pure" classes THEIR full strength skills/abilities.

Otherwise, there is no advantage too, or for any classes wanting to remain "Pure", as it is simply put, unfair to them.

Agreed I’ve discovered this in PVP subclasses builds have such an advantage. I’m sure some top tier players can make it work but I’m a middle of the range PVPer and have noticed a substantial drop in my ability to compete