Would you like next Season to have something like the Writhing Fortress?

Erickson9610 · 12:59AM

Feel free to pitch your ideas for future community events. For instance, maybe a future Season themed around the Thieves Guild has community members do a large-scale heist on a large castle or the like, using stealth mechanics to avoid detection. Or, maybe another Season has players sail to a new place through a storm, and they have to work together to keep the ship afloat and defended from enemies. What would you like to see from a future Season? Would you like the next Season to have content like the Writhing Fortress?

LunaFlora · 1:14AM

Other

only if it is permanent

FieryPhoenix · 1:18AM

No

I would like them to cease the season pass model and return to chapters again, but I realize this is likely a pipe dream at this point.

AzuraFan · 1:36AM

No

I don't like time-limited one-time events, titles, achievements, whatever. So it's not the writhing fortress itself, but something that only appears for a specific window of time and then disappears. I feel it's not a good use of development time, and it's also not fair to those who can't play during that time for whatever reason.

celeste_lavie · 4:43AM

No

I voted "No" just to the idea of having a once-in-a-lifetime event again, but I liked the idea of the community event itself. I felt rushed doing the Writhing Fortress because it was a one time only thing, and I was sad that there wouldn't be a chance for me to go back and do it again to really explore and get to know the mechanics a little better. It also seems like a waste of developement and design effort to just have something only appear once during a limited time and then never again. I think it ruins some of the joy of a game that leans too hard into FOMO to attract players. I would love to be able to revisit the Writhing Fortress over again with other toons and other friends in the future.

Nemesis7884 · 5:00AM

No

What you want is content that is high player impact for the development effort spent

The wall is exactly the opposite - the first 2 phases are ultra boring - and the only interesting phase is super high effort, highly bug prone and only lasts a very short while - this concept just makes no sense to me for an mmo especially if you want to attract new players and have limited resources...

cyberjanet · 6:54AM

No

Absolutely I don't want ill-thought-out untested content with that many bugs. At the moment it's all I can do to keep playing.

Jestir · 6:56AM

Yes

Yes but not time limited

Maybe also be limited to 12 players so a premade group can do it without randoms joining in, but at that point just make it a mini trial or dungeon

ApoAlaia · 7:59AM

Other

As it has been expressed already, yes if is a recurring thing.

Phase 1 and 2 were not quite what I was expecting (won't go into details because there are other threads for that) but the fortress, when working - which for me has been 'most of the time', probably because some hotfixes had been rolled out by the time I starting engaging with it - is good fun.

Feels like a bit of a waste to make it a 'once a done' thing.

Dock01 · 8:05AM

No

lol

daim · 8:16AM

Jestir wrote: »

Yes but not time limited

Maybe also be limited to 12 players so a premade group can do it without randoms joining in, but at that point just make it a mini trial or dungeon

This would instantly exclude a huge number of player base, the solo players. Not the direction they would probably want to take with the events.

Open dungeon was pretty cool experience tbh but you had to be able to join it in a specific time. There was sense of battle and some confusion (good kind of confusion) as you had to figure things out fast to not get behind of the group - and at the same time to try to help with the progress. So the base idea was pretty fun but the execution didn't quite hit the mark, especially for those whom experienced bugs and were not able to join the event in time.

Jaimeh · 8:18AM

Other

Only if it's not time-limited, and if it's group- instanced, like Nymics, so that you always start it from the beginning and have the opportunity to experience all of it in one go.

Poss · 9:26AM

Yes

I don’t get the hate. The Writhing Fortress was the coolest most epic thing I’ve ever experienced in this game. It was cinematic and fresh. Yes, it was buggy and not everyone got to experience it in its full glory so that’ll have to be addressed but honestly phase 3 as a whole was a massive W for me

I personally don’t understand the desire to have limited time events though. The devs clearly put a lot of love and effort into making the Writhing Fortress and they really nailed it (excluding the bugginess lol). From a devs point of view, all that work for a week long event to never see it again must be heartbreaking.

Danikat · 10:40AM

Other

As others have said only if it's not time limited.

Especially since temporary updates are always going to be rushed and have limited capacity for bug fixes, so it's very likely to be broken.

I went through this years ago with Guild Wars 2. They had some good ideas in their temporary updates but the best thing they did was switch to permanent releases and the second best was bringing back all the temporary stuff permanently.

KalevaLaine · 10:43AM

Yes

Yes, like a mini-trial or something. that would be fun.

Calastir · 10:46AM

No

No. I want Yokuda.

M0ntie · 10:54AM

Yes

I said Yes BUT if
- ZoS properly QA it before release. The amount of major bugs is completely unacceptable. ie. Having to restart the quest line for Eastern Soltice 5 times until I happen upon the exact sequence of doing thins that actually works, bugged instances of conquering the wall and no support who can ACTUALLY FIX THE PROBLEM is IMO in violation of some countries' laws for what are acceptable faults in a product.
- The drop rate for collectables is reasonable.
- The majority of the content remains for those who weren't able to do it at the time to complete. Maybe 1 award or trophy for those who did it at the time, but the rest achieveable at a later time.
- FINISH THE UNOPENED AREAS OF THE MAP. This dragging it out opening different areas that aren't even on the map isn't working. People are still leaving.

Syldras · 11:03AM

No

No to "seasons pass", no to one-time events.

robwolf666 · 11:40AM

No

No... the grind got boring very quickly. I prefer the Chapter way of doing things anyway. Still undecided whether I'll buy another season pass... they need to give more detailed info on what will be included and when. But, gatekeeping the second part of the story/zone behind WW isn't cool in my book.

DenverRalphy · 1:17PM

No

Even under the hypothetical that the whole WW event performed bug free from beginning to end, I still woulldn't want so much development hours and resources diverted to temporary content.

Sure, if it was bug free, Writhing Fortress is pretty cool. But if I'm being honest, it can't be left permanently in game because of the scale of participation required to complete it just isn't conducive to long term play. It would become a ghost town almost overnight as players would quickly tire of it.

So instead, I'd rather all those development hours and resources were focused on permanent content, QOL improvements, and most important of all Quality Assurance Protocols.

Destai · 3:26PM

No

Ideally, I want a return to Chapters. I'm thinking of Elsweyr, Greymoor, and Necrom as good examples.

But I don't think it's even a possibility for ZOS right now. This whole Season Pass thing feels like a rebranding induced by lower capacity at ZOS. Solstice feels like a Chapter zone split in half so they could stretch out the content over the year.

My biggest issue with the Writhing Fortress is its limited-time availability. The activity itself sounds cool - when it works - but I'm not doing it because it's time-limited. I don't want to contribute to their participation numbers. And there's no real reward outside of some title I'll never use. Would I want the WF on its own? Sure. Do I want it again as a FOMO event? No.

Destai · 3:29PM

No

Danikat wrote: »

I went through this years ago with Guild Wars 2. They had some good ideas in their temporary updates but the best thing they did was switch to permanent releases and the second best was bringing back all the temporary stuff permanently.

It's so interesting to see the parallels between these two games. By and large, GW2 is way ahead of ESO. Like you said, they tried these things and course-corrected after they didn't work out. I really wish Seals of Endeavors was more like Wizard's Vault; you can earn more. Keeps me playing. If ESO can somehow mimic or be inspired by GW2's zone events, then I think it'd be in a better place. But no matter what change ESO makes, it won't matter if the rewards aren't commensurate.

rothan117 · 3:47PM

No

The awful phase 1 and 2 grind? No way. The time limited public dungeon? No way, I do not trust it to not be a buggy mess given how every content release seems to be full of major bugs with the Fortress being a new low in buggy messes.

Veinblood1965 · 4:07PM

Only if they can include baby yoda, if they can't do that then forget it.

Melivar · 4:07PM

No

I wouldn't mind something like Phase 3 down the road but would rather see some fresh new ideas for the next couple seasons.

DoofusMax · 5:04PM

Other

I'm of mixed mind on that. Had Writhing Fortress worked as intended from the outset, then it would have sort of filled the same function as the purchaser-only event for the chapters, but it's way too big a deal to toss away after a week. There is also the idea of locking purchased content behind community completion (and very grindy community completion on top of that), which does not sit well in my head.

Kind of on the flip side of that, ESO is somewhat unique among MMOs in that content does not disappear. Everything that has been released is still accessible whether a player started at launch or came in years later. You might have to wait on it to reappear (houses and cosmetics, mostly), but it's all still there and still accessible. Writhing Fortress seems to be the first venture across that line and I'm not sure that I'm particularly thrilled with that idea.

If ZOS wants to go forward with these kinds of things, perhaps bringing it back for maybe a week at a time each year (with fixes, natch, but not as a full-on event) could be workable. The major reason in my head for not leaving it permanently on is that player populations will inevitably become insufficient for a clear after the novelty wears off. I'm already seeing much the same thing at siege camps, which are becoming very similar to Harrowstorms, Oblivion Portals, and Abyssal Geysers in terms of player attendance. On the whole, I'm not averse to the idea of similar large-group types of content, but there are some very real downsides which will arise over time.

Sordidfairytale · 9:32PM

Other

Dev controlled Bosses that reign terror on unsuspecting towns and areas until the players gather up enough resources/kill enough support monsters to take down the World Boss.

"Sorry! You can't do dailies in Belkarth today, the Mage has left her tower!"

This could also be done in Cyrodiil to allow players to defend the boss from other players. Thistledown style.

The Elder Scrolls Online

Would you like next Season to have something like the Writhing Fortress?

Would you like next Season to have something like the Writhing Fortress? 76 votes