The Days Are Too Long

Horace-Wimp · July 3

This has been on my mind for several months now.

What is Tamriel? Is it a continent? Is it the name of the planet that The Elder Scrolls exists on? I'd really like to know what it is specifically (other than something in several video games.)

Also, why are the days in ESO so LONG? I first noticed this more than a year ago. When it's daylight in ESO it is daylight for several hours. But when it's nighttime in ESO night barely lasts more than an hour. Granted, I have only been playing ESO for ~2.5-ish years but it seems really odd to me that the nights are so short and the days are SO LONG in this game. Why is that? Couldn't we have the days and the night be more equal in duration? I would love it if we had a little less daylight and a little more nighttime in ESO.

And the weather. Something else I have noticed. I keep all of my toons parked in Vivec City at the bank. On my main toon and first alternate toon the weather is usually identical when I log between them - bright and sunny or dark and clear. Occasionally it rains. But on my other alts - which are basically undeveloped (they're essentially level 50 with the bare minimum of Skill Points that it took to get to level 50) - when I log in on them it is almost always raining. Every time. No matter what time of day it might be in the game it seems ~95% of the time when I login on those toons it's always raining. And it remains raining for several minutes after I login on those toons. But if I switch to my main toon or first alternate it's not raining at all. And then if I switch back to one of those other alts it's raining...even though all of my toons are parked in the same spot in Vivec City. I can't figure that out.

And is there any zone anywhere in the game where it snows? I know it rains in many different zones but I cannot recall anywhere in ESO where I have experienced snowing or a blizzard. I recently went back to the MMO Rift and ran the dungeon Realm Of The Fae. In that dungeon when you get to area between the 2nd to last and the last bosses there is a blizzard that you have to go through and it can be difficult to see what's going on. Annoying but unexpectedly fun. And there are other zones in Rift where it snows like Iron Pine Peak and Tarken Glacier. I think it's odd that a DEAD MMO like Rift would have feature like that and not a vibrant living MMO like ESO. /shrug.

These are not complaints, just things I have been wondering about for some time. Thanx for reading.

prof-dracko · July 3

Tamriel is the continent, Nirn is the planet, Mundus is the "solar system".

Toanis · July 3

As for daylight:
Around here, the sun currently rises at 5 am and sets around 10pm, that's a day/night ratio of about 17 : 7 or 2.4 : 1

So either Tamriel is located similarly to northern Europe and it's always summer, or the sun god Magnus is an early bird.

loaganb16_ESO · July 3

It's just game design, because too many people don't like night settings. That said, the game is never even really dark anyway... dunno

BretonMage · July 3

I like the day-night balance as it is.

Also, it snows in the Western Skyrim, Eastmarch and Bleakrock Isle zones and IIRC Wrothgar as well. Basically if it's indicated on the map to be a snowy region, it will snow there.

FlameDark · July 3

To kinda help a bit more with geography of The Aurbis (the universe of TES), also known as the Gray Maybe, here's a good diagram I found and I've included descriptions of the various locations within the Aurbis.

So at the center is Nirn, the planet most of TES takes place. There are a number of continents, but the main one is Tamriel.

Just beyond that is the two Moons (Secunda and Masser), and the planes/ planets of the divines.

Go further out and you reach the realm of Oblivion where the planes of the daedra can be found.

Finally at the edge of the universe is Aetherius! The realm where magic comes from. The sun is called Magnus, and is named after the god that created it. It is not a floating ball of fire floating around Nirn. It is actually a giant hole in the border leading into Aetherius.

Short story: when Nirn was created Magnus was unhappy with how things went, rage quit, and blasted a hole into Aetherius to leave.

That massive rage hole is the main source of magic in the TES universe. When Magnus left, many other spirits followed him (Magna Ge) and they made they much more smaller, less rage induced holes when they left too (stars).

We know of some realms of Aetherius which are the afterlife worlds that many mortal souls will go to (there are obvious exemptions such as the Dreamsleeve, the Hist, the Daedric Princes snatching your soul instead, ect). But there are many many more planes within Aetherius that we don't know about. But the afterlife realms include; Sovngarde, the Far Shores, the Sand Behind the Stars (the imagery of the last one always makes me giggle, as where entry to other realms makes use of the cosmic star holes to pretty much beam them up from the Mundus to Aetherius, the khajiit use the twin Moons as a trampoline to launch themselves into the Sand Behind the Stars realm).

What other things are included in the TES universe? Many things. It's a very rich, very detailed bit of lore. There's even a parallel universe/ mirror image of Tamriel (Lyg). There's the interplay between Anu and Padomay in the creation of the universe (make a Ven Diagram, to the left is Padomay and pure void, to the right is Anu and pure unchanging infinite stasis, and the middle you have the Aurbis. Which is why it is also called the Grey Maybe, as it is the mixing of the two primordial forces that caused anything to be).

It's a very fun bit of lore to start to get into, and I hope this little bit makes it a bit easier to navigate!

FlameDark · July 3

For the game questions, day and night cycles were a game design thing. I don't mind the cycle speed.

If you're looking for places where is snows, it will snow in snowy zones (Eastmarch, Bleakrock, Wrothgar ect). But if you're looking for places that the snow actually will effect your character... there are only a few quest areas that happens. Sorrow in Wrothgar has avalanches, there's a mountain quest area in the Rift that you can freeze to death, and probably some more I'm forgetting. They're just quest areas though. ESO does not have dynamic survival weather across its maps.

Nemesis7884 · July 3

days in games are usually always longer than nights because most people vastly prefer to play during day time due to visibility and overall color fidelity

YffresTrill · July 3

I would actually prefer if the day-night cycle was client-side. I don't like questing during nighttime at all and in single-player games I sleep through the night whenever the option exists. In ESO, I often end up going and doing something else, even if I feel like questing, if it is nighttime in game.

If it was client-side, the cycle could be more realistic, and we could either choose to sleep through the night (or day), or play through it and have the night be longer, as you (OP) seem to prefer.

Regarding the weather, this is actually already client-side, which is why you can swap characters and the weather is different. I have been in a situation where I was hanging out with someone in-game and it was raining for one of us and not the other. It is kind of strange and unimmersive, but it does set a precedent for day-night cycle being client-side as well, since it already doesn't make much sense...

I do think the weather should be more intense and varied overall. I barely even notice when it is raining in game because it is such a light drizzle.

Ardriel · July 3

That’s why the Hourglass of Akatosh is one of the best items for housing fans, along with the weather control device. I have these in all my houses. I can enjoy starry nights whenever I feel like it and for as long as I want.

Gabriel_H · July 3

A whole day cycle is ~5.8 real world hours. 3.8 hours of day, 2 hours of night. i.e. a 2:1 ratio. This would put it on par with Europe in late spring/early summer.

While Arena & Daggerfall did have some basic seasonal weather, the later games did not have seasons like on Earth, despite the lore allowing for them.

While it would be great to have variable seasons in ESO, the issue would become the game clock. The game would have you believe that only a short period has passed from Base Game to Solstice, but the clock says it is more than 40 years.

So, should the seasons change with the game clock, or should it be ignored and the seasons match the real world clock. If the former it would highlight a passage of time faster than the stories, if the latter which hemisphere would they be set at?

It can get complicated quickly.

Glorious_Platypus · July 3

Nah, the night is too long.

tomofhyrule · July 3

You are severely overthinking this.

ESO's days are on about a 5:30 cycle. Converting that to a 24h clock, it's really only night from about 21:00-03:00. The obvious reason is that people generally prefer to play when it's light out, so they make day longer so more people can have light. That's it. It's not some weird conspiracy.

ESO zones are stuck in one time period for several reasons, so no you're not going to get snow if it's not a snowy region or set in winter. That's also why the Rift and the Weald are in a perpetual autumn - that's the setting they chose. Asking for a fully realistic weather/seasonal system in something that spans the entire real world and never officially shuts off is unreasonable.

Weather is client-side, so getting bad weather is just RNG (and it's very frustrating when I'm trying to take screenshots and it always rains). I'd love a weather toggle since it is just a client-side thing, but at least we have the furnishings to get it in housing.

16BitForestCat · July 3

Meanwhile, it seems like every darn time I want to take screenshots, it's night in game and too dark to get the shot I want. *Shrug*

LalMirchi · July 4

I would counter with "The nights are too long", I dislike night in ESO.

wolfie1.0. · July 4

The best part of rain in Tamriel is that it is really good at passing through solid objects like roofs and multiple floor buildings.

katanagirl1 · July 4

I hope they do not change to day/night cycle, if you are farming it is much easier on your eyes when it is not dark.

As for extreme weather, there is a quest in the northeast area of Western Skyrim where there is a blizzard until you complete the quest.