Item Set Testing in Vengeance

Artisian0001 · July 15

Imagine paying full price for a ticket to a theme park because you and your friends love the main rollercoasters. You've all been there several times before and you go for the highest, fastest ones.

Suddenly, management shuts down the rollercoaster, the water rides, the haunted houses, and every other reason you'd go. They get on the loudspeaker and say:

"Hey everyone! We noticed nobody is riding the new 'Unpadded Teacups' attraction in the back corner of the park. We really need data on whether or not it causes whiplash. So, we've closed all the rides you actually want to play. The Teacups are now mandatory if you want to be in the park today. Have fun!"

This is just sabotaging your own game, is that the goal? Just blow the whole thing up and watch it burn at this point? The fact that this isn't even just a passion project for fun with no guidance, but that people are actually getting paid to make these decisions AND the company is wasting resources on this, which could otherwise be put elsewhere is genuinely insane.

GulmarAvocado · July 15

forum_propagandist wrote: »

In the face of the recent layoffs I was anticipating that developer time would stop being wasted on Vengeance. How disappointing.

It is honestly unfathomable to me that the repeated failures of PvP development have seemingly resulted in no accountability and no change in direction whatsoever.

TheAwesomeChimpanzee · July 15

Artisian0001 wrote: »

Imagine paying full price for a ticket to a theme park because you and your friends love the main rollercoasters. You've all been there several times before and you go for the highest, fastest ones.

Suddenly, management shuts down the rollercoaster, the water rides, the haunted houses, and every other reason you'd go. They get on the loudspeaker and say:

"Hey everyone! We noticed nobody is riding the new 'Unpadded Teacups' attraction in the back corner of the park. We really need data on whether or not it causes whiplash. So, we've closed all the rides you actually want to play. The Teacups are now mandatory if you want to be in the park today. Have fun!"

This is just sabotaging your own game, is that the goal? Just blow the whole thing up and watch it burn at this point? The fact that this isn't even just a passion project for fun with no guidance, but that people are actually getting paid to make these decisions AND the company is wasting resources on this, which could otherwise be put elsewhere is genuinely insane.

Fully agree. STOP CLOSING THE MAIN CAMPAIGNS.

The fact that Vengeance immediately dies whenever Gray Host returns should be all the data you need. People are not choosing Vengeance when given the option.

Test whatever you want, but stop forcing the entire PvP community into a campaign they have repeatedly shown they do not want to play.

Ratzkifal · July 15

Before any Vengeance testing can continue, please give us a rundown on what this test and every test thereafter is supposed to accomplish in the long run.

I can see how putting item sets into Vengeance could potentially get us to the bottom of Gray Host's performance issues. But we still have the issue of players being confused what Vengeance is actually about.

Permanent Vengeance has quite obviously flopped, so what is the future of Vengeance? Is this an attempt to fix Vengeance now? Or is this pursuing the original goal of fixing Gray Host's performance?
Please communicate on this because at this rate you are making both the players of Gray Host/Ravenwatch and the players that actually like the lower build variety and "skill based" nature of Vengeance unhappy.

If you don't communicate this properly people will simply and purposefully not participate in this test either.

valenwood_vegan · July 15

This sounds horrible lol.

People who *like* Vengeance aren't going to enjoy the return of proc effects and broken builds and ball groups and godmode players.

People who *like* regular Cyro aren't going to enjoy whatever this is.

What is the point here?

aetherix8 · July 15

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

Nobody is playing Vengeance. Nobody is asking for more Vengeance development.

That is inherently false.

casparian · July 15

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Before any Vengeance testing can continue, please give us a rundown on what this test and every test thereafter is supposed to accomplish in the long run.

I know the team has a zillion competing priorities right now, but it would be really helpful to get some communication about the intended direction for PVP in the future.

TheAwesomeChimpanzee · July 15

aetherix8 wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

Nobody is playing Vengeance. Nobody is asking for more Vengeance development.

That is inherently false.

You’re right, 1 person is asking for further vengeance development. My bad.

CannedChicken · July 15

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

aetherix8 wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

Nobody is playing Vengeance. Nobody is asking for more Vengeance development.

That is inherently false.

You’re right, 1 person is asking for further vengeance development. My bad.

Vengeance relies on having a ton of people playing because the gameplay is super boring and simple without a lot of players. Plus 1vs2 is basically impossible for the 1 player. The gameplay is too simple for dueling to be interesting. I've gone in there a couple times a week and there are only like 5 people in the entire campaign.

CannedChicken · July 15

If they are doing this just as a performance test to see how sets effect performance then go for it, but don't continue development on this. Vengeance was always going to be stillborn.

Ostonoha · July 15

Artisian0001 wrote: »

Imagine paying full price for a ticket to a theme park because you and your friends love the main rollercoasters. You've all been there several times before and you go for the highest, fastest ones.

Suddenly, management shuts down the rollercoaster, the water rides, the haunted houses, and every other reason you'd go. They get on the loudspeaker and say:

"Hey everyone! We noticed nobody is riding the new 'Unpadded Teacups' attraction in the back corner of the park. We really need data on whether or not it causes whiplash. So, we've closed all the rides you actually want to play. The Teacups are now mandatory if you want to be in the park today. Have fun!"

This is just sabotaging your own game, is that the goal? Just blow the whole thing up and watch it burn at this point? The fact that this isn't even just a passion project for fun with no guidance, but that people are actually getting paid to make these decisions AND the company is wasting resources on this, which could otherwise be put elsewhere is genuinely insane.

Just missing the waiting an hour to sometimes three hour long que to ride. But yes.

But hey on the bright side in the long term the GH que might actually get lower bc of this as more people quit bc they are tired of this.

During this week I can go play X game and maybe it will keep me there. Wonder how many others that happens to each time they bring GH down

Artisian0001 · July 15

CannedChicken wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

aetherix8 wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

Nobody is playing Vengeance. Nobody is asking for more Vengeance development.

That is inherently false.

You’re right, 1 person is asking for further vengeance development. My bad.

Vengeance relies on having a ton of people playing because the gameplay is super boring and simple without a lot of players. Plus 1vs2 is basically impossible for the 1 player. The gameplay is too simple for dueling to be interesting. I've gone in there a couple times a week and there are only like 5 people in the entire campaign.

There are unironically more people on the forums who come to defend vengeance than people who actually play in vengeance .

Taggund · July 15

I'll be skipping this "test" as I do not enjoy Vengeance at all. They are probably thinking that using sets for build diversity is why people are not interested in Vengeance, when that is only one part of it. They changed too much about the overall gameplay of Cyrodiil with Vengeance, and Zerg vs Zerg is only briefly entertaining.

In the end, I think this "test" indicates the desire to remove Grayhost and Blackreach permanently, and I will be disappointed if that is the case.

CannedChicken · July 15

Artisian0001 wrote: »

CannedChicken wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

aetherix8 wrote: »

TheAwesomeChimpanzee wrote: »

Nobody is playing Vengeance. Nobody is asking for more Vengeance development.

That is inherently false.

You’re right, 1 person is asking for further vengeance development. My bad.

Vengeance relies on having a ton of people playing because the gameplay is super boring and simple without a lot of players. Plus 1vs2 is basically impossible for the 1 player. The gameplay is too simple for dueling to be interesting. I've gone in there a couple times a week and there are only like 5 people in the entire campaign.

There are unironically more people on the forums who come to defend vengeance than people who actually play in vengeance .

If all the people defending it actually played it then they might be able to field a 15vs15vs15. Instead its basically a 1vs0vs4.

MipMip · July 15

I don't understand why Gray Host and Blackreach have to be closed during the test.

This is a test for those who play Vengeance. This is a different group of players than those who play Gray Host.

I have never been in Vengeance (since it became permanent). I play in Grey Host every day. The same is the case for most people with whom I play.

MipMip · July 15

BigPlays420 wrote: »

Please, enough. The community is exhausted.

We don't want more Vengeance tests. We don't want our campaigns repeatedly shut down. We don't want to be forced into a ruleset that has consistently failed to retain players whenever alternatives exist.

Every single time we think we're finally done with Vengeance, it comes back again.

Just let it go. Please. Stop forcing this campaign on the PvP community and start listening to what your players have been saying for years. Enough is enough.

Thank you for saying this! Exactly my feeling - another week I can't play because something that I would never play is being tested

Radiate77 · July 15

I see we’ve already began glazing over the fact that we all have 50k health in Vengeance, and most procs are going to have very little impact on gameplay due to squished weapon/spell damage and inflated health bars.

As long as Max Health scaling procs aren’t putting in crazy work; this appears to be just another layer improving upon the experience in Vengeance.

That said; my biggest grievance with Vengeance, is in that skills are completely different from their original counterparts. Vengeance skills would be fine if instead of turning a summoned pet into a delayed burst skill, we made Power Extraction only apply Minor Cowardice and grant Minor Courage.

Skills don’t need to do 4 things each, and Vengeance is the lever to fix that, just gotta use it.

Marto · July 15

BigPlays420 wrote: »

Please, enough. The community is exhausted.

We don't want more Vengeance tests. We don't want our campaigns repeatedly shut down. We don't want to be forced into a ruleset that has consistently failed to retain players whenever alternatives exist.

Every single time we think we're finally done with Vengeance, it comes back again.

Just let it go. Please. Stop forcing this campaign on the PvP community and start listening to what your players have been saying for years. Enough is enough.

Since when does "listening to the players" fix fundamental performance issues?

Vengeance is the best chance the game has at having a performant and functional PVP experience.

The are two options:

Continued Vengeance development
Nothing.

What do you want?

Tra_Lalan · July 15

What is the point of this?
Current vengance version is the best one we had so far. Adding sets to it can't do any good.
It will not make the performance better, and it will bring all those things that are killing the fun in regular cyro.

Also shutting down regular campaings for those tests isn't a good idea, I mean those five people who play on grayhost/black reach and aren't bored yet will propably come here and express their anti-vengance feelings

YandereGirlfriend · July 15

Why are we doing this again?

Erickson9610 · July 15

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Why are we doing this again?

To make Vengeance as appealing to Gray Host players as possible. Eventually Vengeance will be nearly identical to Gray Host but with better performance under the hood.

SirLeeMinion · July 15

The permanent Vengeance campaign drew me back into ESO (on my main account, anyway). I've enjoyed the PvP there as it is now and have no interest in seeing sets added to Vengeance.

CatalinaWineMixer2 · July 15

Why put mythics in Vengeance? Restore Shattered Path and un nerf my Warden in GH first then. Everyone who didn't like that is unkillable now by the way. Vengeance is supposed to not devolve into Build vs. Build, like GH. Having proc sets does not sit well with me concerning this either. If these requests are coming from people who don't play Vengeance, why do so? That is what ruined GH in the first place.

That's how we got here today, a failing Build vs. Build campaign advertised by the same people every update with an exited and declining PvP population. And a prohibitive one for new players. The same broken record that calls for nerfs to everyone's characters and gear, except theirs.

@Zos, have you not learned your lesson with 1 shots chasing away every one of your new players and most of your tired and nerf weary Vets? If you ruin Vengeance, you will have a bigger exodus than you realize.

Skraggy · July 15

You guys really need to be clear on your intentions considering prior tests resulted in Vengeance becoming a permanent game mode and something you aim to actively develop.

Can you be clear that this is a test for server performance and ask people to join so that you can gather data? It seems somewhat clear to me that's the point, but not totally without being completely forward given the past.

Re-iterate what prior data collection has provided insight into and how you have made things better. Without that people are just not going to join in protest or just unsub as you deprive them of the sole mode they play the game for.

You're making both the vengeance and Gray Host side of things angry at this change.

TheAwesomeChimpanzee · July 15

Erickson9610 wrote: »

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Why are we doing this again?

To make Vengeance as appealing to Gray Host players as possible. Eventually Vengeance will be nearly identical to Gray Host but with better performance under the hood.

Yeah, 10 years from now, when the game has already spent 7 of them in maintenance mode.

tomofhyrule · July 15

Erickson9610 wrote: »

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Why are we doing this again?

To make Vengeance as appealing to Gray Host players as possible. Eventually Vengeance will be nearly identical to Gray Host but with better performance under the hood.

And this is the problem.

There seems to be this idea that "oh, if we just make Vengeance more like Grey Host, then all of the Vengeance enjoyers and the Grey Host enjoyers will both like it and they'll all play it and max it out!"
Sounds great, right? Unfortunately, we don't live in that world. In the real world, we have to find out what the playerbases we have want, not try to force them to fit some idea of what someone else wants, especially if that someone fundamentally doesn't understand the PvP playerbase.

Grey Host players don't like Vengeance. It doesn't matter how much they try to make Vengeance have set bonuses or whatever, they do. not. like. Vengeance. Period. They are not here to play a game with target caps or perks or different skills or anything like that.
Vengeance players don't like Grey Host. It doesn't matter how much they try to simplify the combat to have special loadouts or what not, they do. not. like. theorycrafted. PvP. Period. They are not here to play Excel Spreadsheets Online that require 10+ years of experience to get 3 AP.

Those playerbases will not mesh. It doesn't matter how much you try to put oil and water in a single glass and stir it up, you will still end up with two layers. This idea is more likely to drive both playerbases off instead of getting them to play together.

YandereGirlfriend · July 15

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Why are we doing this again?

To make Vengeance as appealing to Gray Host players as possible. Eventually Vengeance will be nearly identical to Gray Host but with better performance under the hood.

And this is the problem.

There seems to be this idea that "oh, if we just make Vengeance more like Grey Host, then all of the Vengeance enjoyers and the Grey Host enjoyers will both like it and they'll all play it and max it out!"
Sounds great, right? Unfortunately, we don't live in that world. In the real world, we have to find out what the playerbases we have want, not try to force them to fit some idea of what someone else wants, especially if that someone fundamentally doesn't understand the PvP playerbase.

Grey Host players don't like Vengeance. It doesn't matter how much they try to make Vengeance have set bonuses or whatever, they do. not. like. Vengeance. Period. They are not here to play a game with target caps or perks or different skills or anything like that.
Vengeance players don't like Grey Host. It doesn't matter how much they try to simplify the combat to have special loadouts or what not, they do. not. like. theorycrafted. PvP. Period. They are not here to play Excel Spreadsheets Online that require 10+ years of experience to get 3 AP.

Those playerbases will not mesh. It doesn't matter how much you try to put oil and water in a single glass and stir it up, you will still end up with two layers. This idea is more likely to drive both playerbases off instead of getting them to play together.

Very well said.

Erickson9610 · July 15

Vengeance was never intended to be its own thing, though. The solution to making a more performant Gray Host is to rewrite the entire thing from scratch, with PvP-balanced skills and changes to support the original population caps.

Vengeance finding its own audience due to its ruleset is an unintended side effect of designing the Cyrodiil experience differently this time around.

Ratzkifal · July 15

Marto wrote: »

BigPlays420 wrote: »

Please, enough. The community is exhausted.

We don't want more Vengeance tests. We don't want our campaigns repeatedly shut down. We don't want to be forced into a ruleset that has consistently failed to retain players whenever alternatives exist.

Every single time we think we're finally done with Vengeance, it comes back again.

Just let it go. Please. Stop forcing this campaign on the PvP community and start listening to what your players have been saying for years. Enough is enough.

Since when does "listening to the players" fix fundamental performance issues?

Vengeance is the best chance the game has at having a performant and functional PVP experience.

The are two options:
Continued Vengeance development

Nothing.

What do you want?

There are not just these two options here sadly.

"Continued Vengeance development" can take many different shapes. One could result in something that resembles Gray Host but with significantly improved performance, but it might also turn into something more closely resembling a class based shooter that's at odds with what PvP in this game looked like historically. Or something else entirely.

The discourse regarding the purpose of Vengeance seems very confused still, so I'm not surprised people are opposed to continued Vengeance testing, even when it's (supposedly) in their best interest.

BigPlays420 · July 15

Marto wrote: »

BigPlays420 wrote: »

Please, enough. The community is exhausted.

We don't want more Vengeance tests. We don't want our campaigns repeatedly shut down. We don't want to be forced into a ruleset that has consistently failed to retain players whenever alternatives exist.

Every single time we think we're finally done with Vengeance, it comes back again.

Just let it go. Please. Stop forcing this campaign on the PvP community and start listening to what your players have been saying for years. Enough is enough.

Since when does "listening to the players" fix fundamental performance issues?

Vengeance is the best chance the game has at having a performant and functional PVP experience.

The are two options:
Continued Vengeance development

Nothing.

What do you want?

What I want is simple: I want my main campaign and preferred game mode to remain available while I continue supporting this game.

It is completely unacceptable to me, and to many other players, that we are still being subjected to mandated Vengeance tests after everything that happened last year.

If you want to continue experimenting with Vengeance, fine. Add whatever changes you want to it. But let us keep Gray Host as an option and let players decide for themselves where they want to play.

Instead of spending resources, which are now more limited than ever, on this poor excuse for a PvP campaign, spend them on improving and balancing the main campaign, which is currently more popular than it has been in over two years.

There are countless issues affecting Cyrodiil right now that could likely be addressed with relatively small amounts of attention: broken queues, faction imbalance, and long-standing PvP concerns that players have been discussing for years.

Many of us genuinely thought these forced Vengeance tests were finally behind us. Apparently, we were wrong.