The adds respawn rate is ridiculously high; please nerf that. It's ridiculous.

@ZOS_Kevin

I'm sorry to interrupt all of your work on important Night Market related threads, but would it be possible to beg for an Ezabi forum Icon? She's my favorite character in all of ESO and her absence sorrows me.

Thanks for the consideration!

Athory wrote: »

Point 1

• https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/home

THIS IS ESO
Go anywhere, do anything, and play your way in The Elder Scrolls Online, the award-winning online RPG set in the Elder Scrolls universe.

Point 2

• The Night Market - Event Zone - The Elder Scrolls Online

So… are solo players excluded?

✔ From the core gameplay loop? Yes. The entire progression loop — bosses → keys → Gilded → Ordeal — is group‑only.
✔ From the rewards? Yes, indirectly. You can earn Favor solo, but at a tiny fraction of the speed and with massive difficulty spikes.
✔ From the intended experience? Absolutely. The zone is literally described as a “group‑focused PvE world”


The uncomfortable truth
ESO has always had:

• normal dungeons
• normal trials
• normal arenas
• normal world bosses
• normal story content
• Night Market breaks that 10‑year rule.

There is no normal mode.
No scaling.
No solo‑friendly version.
No alternative path.
If you don’t group, you simply cannot participate in the main loop.
This is why so many players, especially casuals, solo mains, and accessibility‑focused players, feel pushed out.

yes: solo players are excluded

So how do these two things fit together?
They don’t. It’s like saying: You can play your way…except here, where you must play our way.

Night Market is the first time ESO has:

• no normal mode
• no solo‑friendly version
• no scaling
• no alternative path
• no accessibility options
• no “play your way” philosophy

It’s a hardcore‑only event zone inside a game that advertises freedom.

4. Why this contradiction exists
Because: Marketing wants ESO to stay “play your way” They can’t change the slogan. It’s the identity of the franchise.
IT'S WRONG!

Athory wrote: »

Point 1

• https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/home

THIS IS ESO
Go anywhere, do anything, and play your way in The Elder Scrolls Online, the award-winning online RPG set in the Elder Scrolls universe.

Point 2

• The Night Market - Event Zone - The Elder Scrolls Online

So… are solo players excluded?

✔ From the core gameplay loop? Yes. The entire progression loop — bosses → keys → Gilded → Ordeal — is group‑only.
✔ From the rewards? Yes, indirectly. You can earn Favor solo, but at a tiny fraction of the speed and with massive difficulty spikes.
✔ From the intended experience? Absolutely. The zone is literally described as a “group‑focused PvE world”


The uncomfortable truth
ESO has always had:

• normal dungeons
• normal trials
• normal arenas
• normal world bosses
• normal story content
• Night Market breaks that 10‑year rule.

There is no normal mode.
No scaling.
No solo‑friendly version.
No alternative path.
If you don’t group, you simply cannot participate in the main loop.
This is why so many players, especially casuals, solo mains, and accessibility‑focused players, feel pushed out.

yes: solo players are excluded

So how do these two things fit together?
They don’t. It’s like saying: You can play your way…except here, where you must play our way.

Night Market is the first time ESO has:

• no normal mode
• no solo‑friendly version
• no scaling
• no alternative path
• no accessibility options
• no “play your way” philosophy

It’s a hardcore‑only event zone inside a game that advertises freedom.

4. Why this contradiction exists
Because: Marketing wants ESO to stay “play your way” They can’t change the slogan. It’s the identity of the franchise.
IT'S WRONG!

To be honest, ever since the beta test, I’ve always been annoyed by people whose only argument was that ‘it’s The Elder Scrolls’, ignoring everything else—what an MMO actually is, and so on. Please do take the time to learn what an MMO is in the first place, and how it differs from single-player games where you can do whatever you like. [snip]
[edited for flaming]

Athory wrote: »

So… are solo players excluded?

✔ From the core gameplay loop? Yes. The entire progression loop — bosses → keys → Gilded → Ordeal — is group‑only.
✔ From the rewards? Yes, indirectly. You can earn Favor solo, but at a tiny fraction of the speed and with massive difficulty spikes.
✔ From the intended experience? Absolutely. The zone is literally described as a “group‑focused PvE world”

- As many other players had repeated to you, the night market up to and including most of the bosses are soloable if you build for it. You don't even need difficult to gear to obtain. If you'd still rather complain than attempt to figure out what those people are doing different, at this point that's on you
-
- which rewards are you excluded from?

- well duh, if the intended experience is group pve, then anything else is not the intended way to play it. So if group content is not your way to play, there is like 99% of the rest of the game that's not group content. Do you complain that you haven't been able to solo even normal lucent citadel? It has a mechanic that forces the group to split and coordinate burn rate! Oh no! Guess I better quit ESO now. But if you haven't complained about the presence of trials, how exactly is NM different?

Thank you for the reply. I genuinely believe this topic matters for all ESO players.
But I need to be completely direct about the issues:

1) “We wanted to try something different.”
Excluding casual/solo players from participating should never be an “experiment.”
That is not innovation, that is exclusion.
And it’s simply wrong.

2) “This was not to alienate solo players, but to add a new way to play.”
ZoS team knows better than anyone that casual/solo players will never engage with hardcore‑only difficulty.
Yet they were still used to “feed” this new experiment.
That is wrong.

3) “We are an Elder Scrolls game, but also an MMO.”
ESO has been both since day one.
So why is the core experience for casual/solo players suddenly being changed now?
This shift is unnecessary and wrong.

4) “Some event content will encourage group play.”
If this means new Trials, new Dungeons, new Arenas, or new modes with multiple difficulty options, great.
Players will absolutely welcome that.
But if the only option is Hardmode‑only, then it’s not “encouraging” group play, it’s forcing it.
And that is wrong.

5) “There are players who come for solo content and players who come for group content.”
Correct, and this has been true since launch.
Nothing about the playerbase has changed.
So why is the design philosophy suddenly shifting away from solo accessibility?
That is wrong.

6) “Players asked for renewed gameplay variety and challenge.”
Thank you for listening players.
Challenge and variety are good.
But the Night Market does not offer variety or optional challenge, it offers Hardcore‑only gameplay.
That is not what players asked for.
And it’s wrong.

7) “We will have content throughout the year for both solo and group play.”
Good. That is how ESO should be.

Well… we both know this is coming, so…

8) “The team is looking at adjustments for the current and next Night Market.”
Let’s be honest: we both know what will happen.
The zone will eventually be made easier so solo\casual players can enter, not because it respects them, but because Hardcore players finish everything quickly, get bored, and leave.
Then the remaining playerbase has no one to group with, and the zone must be “normalized” so it stays populated.
This cycle is predictable, and it is disrespectful to solo players.


No hard feelings, @ZOS_Kevin, Team ask for feedback, and the only way I can give it is by being 100% direct and honest.


EDIT:
Next time ZOS decides to use casual players as fuel for hardcore content, then at least balance it out, make hardcore players serve as fuel to support normal content as well. Casual and new players would absolutely love to see that kind of fairness.

Athory wrote: »

You’re 100% wrong. I play the game every day, and every time I join… trials\dungeons. xD
Because the objectives there are the same for everyone: finish, get loot.

I refuse to “feed” your [snip] market just to make things easier for "you" by grouping with "you".
You like it? You like HardCore? That’s your problem, solve it yourself.

I’m perfectly happy not feeling like I’m being used. Very happy, actually.

if you play every day, have done at least one trial, and think the night market is "hardcore", this is 100% a skill issue on your part

This is an absurd and entitled overreaction to the standard q1 group content release cycle, but I can see there is no getting through to you. ZOS has been very transparent about everything else they are planning to release this year that is aimed at solo players and you have chosen to not seek out that information before venting on the forums.

Asking for a normal difficulty version of night market to be more friendly to solo players is also ignorant to the fact that many normal difficulty instances are not solo friendly either by design. This is not a flaw.

You play an mmo that has catered for a very long time to militant solo players. God forbid the multiplayer aspect be important.

Athory wrote: »

Excluding casual/solo players from participating should never be an “experiment.”

You weren't excluded - you're excluding yourself. Much of the content can be soloed.

You might be more interested in watching streamers play the game, since you seem to just want to watch the content without earning it.

Athory wrote: »

ZoS team knows better than anyone that casual/solo players will never engage with hardcore‑only difficulty.

It is a pity you have such revulsion at joining in comradery with others, that you seem to confuse an MMO with a single-player game.

Athory wrote: »

ESO has been both since day one.

Correct! It is an MMO set in the TES setting. Being a TES game doesn't exclude multi-player, guilds, teamwork.

Athory wrote: »

But if the only option is Hardmode‑only, then it’s not “encouraging” group play, it’s forcing it.

There's no Hardmode/Vet in the Night Market. It's comparable to a sort of freeform Trial (easier actually since we have the liberty to run around, explore, escape).

Athory wrote: »

So why is the design philosophy suddenly shifting away from solo accessibility?

It hasn't, this just isn't solo content. You seem to think group-content is mandated to take a specific shape.

Athory wrote: »

But the Night Market does not offer variety or optional challenge, it offers Hardcore‑only gameplay.

Incorrect.

You can sneak past many mob squads and/or run & self-heal.
Each zone has different mini-games, different layouts, different challenges.
I think I like it better than Trials - it's a breath of fresh air to see such an amazingly diverse group zone.

Athory wrote: »

The zone will eventually be made easier so solo\casual players can enter, not because it respects them, but because Hardcore players finish everything quickly, get bored, and leave. Then the remaining playerbase has no one to group with, and the zone must be “normalized” so it stays populated. This cycle is predictable, and it is disrespectful to solo players.

There's a strange entitlement here - but it's a group zone, not a single-player zone. And if you have so much disdain for group-content - then why does it sound you want anyone to group with?

It's just like Trials or Vet Dungeons - designed to encourage group play. Even the recipe fragments are faction-locked (meaning you need to trade with rival factions if you want to unlock it sooner). The Opulent Ordeal trial is especially group-oriented, as you carry the torch to other teams (you can't solo it). The 3 "Dungeon" Bosses are also group-oriented (their mechanics often need another player to liberate you).

It's all teamwork.

Athory wrote: »

Next time ZOS decides to use casual players as fuel for hardcore content, then at least balance it out, make hardcore players serve as fuel to support normal content as well. Casual and new players would absolutely love to see that kind of fairness.

What does this even mean? lmao

End-game players do normal content all the time. A better comparison would be PVP (which should also get PVP-specific content, they're like 2% of all the zones).

The response you've gotten from others should make clear that you're being hyperbolic. The Night Market is great.

Been watching this account while waiting for a Battlegrounds to pop and I notice that after every couple of mins it will will move left and right.

I don't get invites since I am blacklisted (lol) but I'm sure if I go make a new account and go to Vulkhel guard I will be invited.

Same guild, fresh level 4 character/account. Gotta be a joke at this rate!