So we all know that Leveling veteran ranks can be boring and tedious, however most people don't realize that leveling Vet ranks isn't
Hard, it's just
Slow. By all appearances, ZOS designed ESO to be "anti-grind", which means that grinding (which is by all means a valid, if not masochistic method) isn't what they wanted you to do.
How do we know this? Well there are several things we can look at:
- Enemies drop almost no gold/low xp/vet points
- Unless you are grouped, mobbing is next to impossible, especially in vet zones (mobbing = agro lots of enemies and then killing them off quickly with AoE bursts for fast xp)
- If you do manage to mob, enemies take a while to respawn
- Bosses in delves aren't rewarding, don't always drop loot and take minutes to spawn
So, ZOS has designed the game to be more quest based, and this can be troublesome. Most people, unfortunately, don't like to quest. Questing can be a bit boring, tedious, and many people just don't care about the story.
Well I have studied for a bit, and I have discovered a way that will eventually get you up in Vet Ranks. Unfortunately, this requires:
- Dedication
- 2-3 Hours per day (depending on if you group)
- Grouping (not required, but makes everything quicker and easier)
- Questing
Before I begin, I need to stress a few points. This guide does not include Craglorn or mention anything about it, mainly because Craglorn has become a grind fest and I am to avoid grinding as much as possible. Grouping will make your life 100% easier, so maybe set up before hand a time so you and your friends can get together to do this. Most importantly though,
This guide is designed to be causal friendly, which means that this will take several days. However, If you decide to follow this guide 100%, I can
Guarantee you V1-V12 in as little as 28 days, even faster if you are already over V1! So lets begin, shall we?
(I'll add a TL:DR to the bottom of each section, but I recommend reading the whole thing ;P)
Cyrodiil Daily Quests
I wanted to get the questing out of the way first. This is the main part of my guide, and therefore the most important. Yes, the quests are boring, watered down, easy, and annoying to do over and over again. However, that is what makes them a goldmine. First of all, set your guest campaign to any of the low population maps where your alliance is winning/owns most of the map. This will make travel faster, you will encounter less enemy players, and there are often other friendly players around that can somewhat assist you. There are 5 Quest hubs in Cyrodiil: Bruma, Cheydinhal, Chorrol and Weynon Priory (considered one hub, but there is a slight distance between the two), Cropsford, and Vlastarus. Each quest hub has 2 Npcs that offer you 5 quests each, for a total of 50 quests per day (+2 if you include Kill 20 players and the bounty missions). Each quest you complete offers you around 0.7%VP, which means that all 50 quests nets you around 35% of your needed VP per rank, not to mention all the vet points you get from killing mobs during the quests.
Not only will this get you great Vet ranks, but its also a fast way to level up your skills, and fatten your wallet (about 300g per quest times 50 =15K per day). Lets assume you want to level Restoration Staff. Just equip a Resto staff in your 2nd bar and when you go to turn in the quests, switch to the staff before turning in the quest. You can even slot low level skills you want to level/morph that aren't part of restoration staff on your 2nd bar to level them up fast.
After you have done each quest once, you will learn what each quests requires and locations of items/npcs. this means that the first day may be the slowest, but every day after should be faster, cutting your time by a lot. Don't forget to have Retreating Maneuvers slotted too ;P
Also, grab the 20 player kills and Bounty quests before you head out each day, then turn them in ask you complete them.
-+-+-TL:DR-+-+-
- Guest into unpopulated campaign your alliance is winning
- 5 quest hubs, 10 quests each, 50 quests total
- Quests are really easy (fetch this, kill that)
- Around 0.7% VP per quest = 35% per day + VP from mob kills
- Good for money (around 300g each quest)
- Quick skill leveling
- Grab the Bounty/20 Kills Quests before you start
Zone Completion
(Obviously completion is a one time thing, so no i don't expect you to "grind" each zone every day. This is just a way that offers you lots of VP, and you might as well knock it out)
Each zone offers tons of side activities. Dark Anchors, World Bosses, Dungeons, and Delves are everywhere. Each of these offers a nice break from the tedious questing in each zone, but they also offer a great deal of VP, close to 1% per. Just group up and set out, try completing the group challenges in the dungeon of each zone for a skill point and achievement too. However, keep in mind that you can't jump to the 3rd alliance until you have completed the main story quests in each zone. But no worries, just open your journal (J), select Caldwell's Almanac, and view all the required quests. Going as a group as you do these quests will help a lot too in most cases, but not all. I do NOT recommend rushing through these either, as each zone will be much harder than the last, and if you aren't prepared you will easily die and become frustrated. Keep in mind too that the Large VP gain for each location is only obtained
the first time you complete it, and will only give you mediocre VP afterwards.
-+-+-TL:DR-+-+-
- Complete Anchors, World Bosses, Dungeons, and Delves in each zone
- VP only awarded for first time completion
- Check Caldwell's Almanac for the main quests so you can advance to the 3rd Alliance
- Take it slow so you aren't overwhelmed in the later zones
Final Words
And that's it! That's all you have to do each day, and you are guaranteed V12 in a month. Note that this is ONLY if you don't do anything else at all, and therefore, you can reach V12 in a much faster time if you quest, PvP, and grind a bit as well. I hope that this eases your stress about leveling Vet ranks, especially for those of you who only play a few hours a day.
Thanks for reading, hope this helps ;P