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State of the Game - My Review
cjmarsh725b14_ESO
✭✭✭✭
Just thought I would put down all my thoughts about the game into one comprehensive post. Note that these are my personal opinions, but feel free to speak up with your own views on anything. Also, it's a wall of text.
Questing
One of the most interesting and well-done features of the game, the quests in ESO really surprised me with their depth and quality. It is extraordinarily difficult to make quests feel different in an mmo but it's pulled off very well here, up until a point at least. The one downfall is the bugs that really put a dampener on whatever you're doing when they crop up. With the dozens of fixes in the latest patches, however, you can tell that the devs consider this a high priority and that questing is something they want to see flourish. While the diversity of quest types and objectives was high, and there were some genuinely funny dialogs, some patterns did start to emerge at the later levels, (and most especially at veteran levels, although I'll come to that later) and soon I was skipping past the side quests to get to the main story lines. Overall, I'd say they did a fantastic job here, and I haven't seen better in any mmo.
Solo Dungeons
During questing you come across solo dungeons often enough, and if you were unfortunate enough to do it around early access, they were infested with bots and boss campers. Now, that's a lot less of a problem thankfully, and when everything goes right and you actually solo the dungeon then it's a pretty cool experience. The progression is always very linear and the boss is usually very predictable but there is usually some decent loot at the end, an achievement, and a skyshard so the sense of accomplishment is all there I think. Unfortunately, most of the dungeons are made in exactly the same way: one big square. You go around in a circle then exit through the locked door after killing the boss and grabbing the shard. A little more variety in those environments would have gone a long way I think. Also, when there are too many people in the instance it is far too easy and just becomes a run to go get your loot. Having solo dungeons be instanced to a max of a few people might be a good fix for that.
Group Dungeons
These dungeons are interesting and can be very fun or extremely annoying. The biggest problem they have is attracting the right kind of people. You either have too few people who want to do the quest and complete the dungeon or too many people who want to farm the mobs. Getting a group, or just tagging along with people, is really what the challenge is in these dungeons and I think there should be some way to encourage or enable grouping when you enter a group dungeon. Perhaps something as simple as an incentive to group, like a small xp or loot bonus for the number of people in your group, would help with this. Overall though, I like group dungeons, they have variety, challenge, and can be very rewarding when everything and everyone comes together.
Dungeons / Veteran Dungeons
The four man dungeons were extraordinarily buggy the first time I went through so my opinion on these is a bit biased. Even on the veteran dungeons, there are just too many 'cheese' techniques that groups use as a matter of course. In vet BC, I just remember thinking that half the bosses were easy and the other half were glitchy. When playing the dungeons the way they're meant to be played though, in a good group, it can be a great experience. I'd say the dungeons aren't bad, but they could use some work.
Veteran Levels
So veteran levels...nobody really likes them I guess. (Spoiler Alert) When I killed Molag Bal I felt like a total bad*** then I get a pat on the back and Cadwell says "Hey man, touch this crystal thingy to be a noob again!". Well, no wonder nobody likes veteran levels, you have to start all over again. It doesn't feel epic or end-game, like it should when you finish the main storyline quests. On top of that, having to do the basic errand-running quests as your new faction's (and former enemy's) peon makes you feel a sense of deja vu as the quests start to repeat a bit and the voice actors start to re-appear. It has a sense of "been there, done that" to it, and on top of that it feels like it takes forever because of the amount of xp needed. I know the devs are looking at changing this and that's a good thing, because it badly needs it.
Trials
Released with Craglorn as the end-game raiding content, these were surprising hard and are clearly designed with hardcore players in mind. A poorly organized group will no doubt wipe over and over and that leads me to the first problem. Since each group only gets a certain number of "souls" (revives) they have to leave the instance and disband then reform the group and re-enter before each try. That seems stupid to me. How about the group leader presses "R" in the group window to reset the trial? Other than that, the trials themselves are alright I suppose. I must admit, I am not a fan of beating on the same bosses over and over, so I am not the most unbiased reviewer in this category. I think the difficulty level is alright, but there's some bugs to fix and definitely some balancing changes in the classes to make.
Economy
Any successful mmo has to have an active trade economy. With ESO's unique move to guild stores the player to player trade is a lot higher than in other games I've played. When the game first came out the COD tax was incredibly high, prohibitively so, but in a recent-ish patch they lowered it to a much more reasonable amount and I think that has helped trade considerably. From what I've seen in my server there seems to be a veteran trade hub which is a good sign, since commerce gathering in one spot is good for everyone. Prices seem to have stabilized a bit, although motifs have been all over the place, and don't look like they'll be stabilizing for reasons I won't get into. The DC farm probably needs a fix or at least a nerf, but overall I'd say the economy is fairly healthy, which is a good sign.
Crafting
The crafting system in ESO is unique in that you have crafting skills that you can spend your skill points on instead of class skills. This is an interesting dynamic and I really like what that brings to the system. As for the professions, provisioning is too easy to level, has too many ingredients, the drinks should go on top of the food, and the veteran zones need their loot tables fixed. Alchemy is the next easiest to level, and a little too easy, the passives snake blood and medicinal use are broken, and the ingredients aren't balanced in terms of usage unless poisons are implemented. Enchanting takes way too long to level and Aspect Extraction is mostly useless. The big three are well done, although woodworking could use some more items.
Visuals/VFX
For the most part, I really like the graphical style of ESO. I am blown away by the quality of some of the environments and the detail for an mmo is just astounding for someone whose first mmo was Everquest on Playstation. Some of the effects for spells look pretty awesome and the only complaints I can think of are winged twilights in banks and that some don't like magelight. There do seem to be some issues with physics volumes (it looks like) having precedence in LOD calculations but other than that, I think ESO has been on the ball in the graphics department.
Writing
There is an absolutely incredible amount of lore written down in lorebooks and journals and notes and scraps of paper all over the damn place. Novels are there to be read and the quality of it is insanely good. One of the perks of the mage's guild is Eidetic Memory which lets you re-read everything you've ever read and I think that might be the best perk you can get. Between the random mail from a hireling that makes you laugh to the priceless comment from Cadwell in Oblivion, you'd be hard-pressed to find better writing.
Audio
The ambient sounds and musical scoring of ESO are great, and definitely do the elder scrolls name justice here. It's rare to find an mmo where you can actually listen to the music for hours without going nuts. Also, the voice acting is top-notch in my book. Some of the characters in the story lines were downright awesome and it was in large part due to the voices. There are a few abilities that could use a change (Harness Magicka, I'm looking at you) but otherwise, the sound is very good.
Cyrodiil
I saved this one for last because I feel rather strongly about it. There is so much potential in the open world experience that Cyrodiil offers that I am amazed it isn't a bigger part of the game. And that's the real problem, it doesn't feel like a big part of the game. There are a host of bugs that have been plaguing Cyrodiil but no fixes and not much concern shown for it so far. Bugged forward camps, bugged siege weapons, bugged repair kits, bugged doors, bugged map, bugged compass, bugged... well you get the idea. The thing is, pvp in Cyrodiil can be extremely fun when everything is working right. The basics are there, but the list of bugs is not short and as a whole, not minor. There are also some severe issues with farming (emperor, scroll, oil) and a disturbing tendency for tight-knit aoe zerging. These issues are leading to a particular play-style dominating all others, which never results in an attractive pvp environment. Cyrodiil is one of the two pillars of end-game content and in order to keep and promote a balanced end-game population you need to have both in working order. Right now, Cyrodiil is not in working order.
Well, that's my review of the game. If it was too long, and you didn't read it, post something witty and nonsensical below.
Questing
One of the most interesting and well-done features of the game, the quests in ESO really surprised me with their depth and quality. It is extraordinarily difficult to make quests feel different in an mmo but it's pulled off very well here, up until a point at least. The one downfall is the bugs that really put a dampener on whatever you're doing when they crop up. With the dozens of fixes in the latest patches, however, you can tell that the devs consider this a high priority and that questing is something they want to see flourish. While the diversity of quest types and objectives was high, and there were some genuinely funny dialogs, some patterns did start to emerge at the later levels, (and most especially at veteran levels, although I'll come to that later) and soon I was skipping past the side quests to get to the main story lines. Overall, I'd say they did a fantastic job here, and I haven't seen better in any mmo.
Solo Dungeons
During questing you come across solo dungeons often enough, and if you were unfortunate enough to do it around early access, they were infested with bots and boss campers. Now, that's a lot less of a problem thankfully, and when everything goes right and you actually solo the dungeon then it's a pretty cool experience. The progression is always very linear and the boss is usually very predictable but there is usually some decent loot at the end, an achievement, and a skyshard so the sense of accomplishment is all there I think. Unfortunately, most of the dungeons are made in exactly the same way: one big square. You go around in a circle then exit through the locked door after killing the boss and grabbing the shard. A little more variety in those environments would have gone a long way I think. Also, when there are too many people in the instance it is far too easy and just becomes a run to go get your loot. Having solo dungeons be instanced to a max of a few people might be a good fix for that.
Group Dungeons
These dungeons are interesting and can be very fun or extremely annoying. The biggest problem they have is attracting the right kind of people. You either have too few people who want to do the quest and complete the dungeon or too many people who want to farm the mobs. Getting a group, or just tagging along with people, is really what the challenge is in these dungeons and I think there should be some way to encourage or enable grouping when you enter a group dungeon. Perhaps something as simple as an incentive to group, like a small xp or loot bonus for the number of people in your group, would help with this. Overall though, I like group dungeons, they have variety, challenge, and can be very rewarding when everything and everyone comes together.
Dungeons / Veteran Dungeons
The four man dungeons were extraordinarily buggy the first time I went through so my opinion on these is a bit biased. Even on the veteran dungeons, there are just too many 'cheese' techniques that groups use as a matter of course. In vet BC, I just remember thinking that half the bosses were easy and the other half were glitchy. When playing the dungeons the way they're meant to be played though, in a good group, it can be a great experience. I'd say the dungeons aren't bad, but they could use some work.
Veteran Levels
So veteran levels...nobody really likes them I guess. (Spoiler Alert) When I killed Molag Bal I felt like a total bad*** then I get a pat on the back and Cadwell says "Hey man, touch this crystal thingy to be a noob again!". Well, no wonder nobody likes veteran levels, you have to start all over again. It doesn't feel epic or end-game, like it should when you finish the main storyline quests. On top of that, having to do the basic errand-running quests as your new faction's (and former enemy's) peon makes you feel a sense of deja vu as the quests start to repeat a bit and the voice actors start to re-appear. It has a sense of "been there, done that" to it, and on top of that it feels like it takes forever because of the amount of xp needed. I know the devs are looking at changing this and that's a good thing, because it badly needs it.
Trials
Released with Craglorn as the end-game raiding content, these were surprising hard and are clearly designed with hardcore players in mind. A poorly organized group will no doubt wipe over and over and that leads me to the first problem. Since each group only gets a certain number of "souls" (revives) they have to leave the instance and disband then reform the group and re-enter before each try. That seems stupid to me. How about the group leader presses "R" in the group window to reset the trial? Other than that, the trials themselves are alright I suppose. I must admit, I am not a fan of beating on the same bosses over and over, so I am not the most unbiased reviewer in this category. I think the difficulty level is alright, but there's some bugs to fix and definitely some balancing changes in the classes to make.
Economy
Any successful mmo has to have an active trade economy. With ESO's unique move to guild stores the player to player trade is a lot higher than in other games I've played. When the game first came out the COD tax was incredibly high, prohibitively so, but in a recent-ish patch they lowered it to a much more reasonable amount and I think that has helped trade considerably. From what I've seen in my server there seems to be a veteran trade hub which is a good sign, since commerce gathering in one spot is good for everyone. Prices seem to have stabilized a bit, although motifs have been all over the place, and don't look like they'll be stabilizing for reasons I won't get into. The DC farm probably needs a fix or at least a nerf, but overall I'd say the economy is fairly healthy, which is a good sign.
Crafting
The crafting system in ESO is unique in that you have crafting skills that you can spend your skill points on instead of class skills. This is an interesting dynamic and I really like what that brings to the system. As for the professions, provisioning is too easy to level, has too many ingredients, the drinks should go on top of the food, and the veteran zones need their loot tables fixed. Alchemy is the next easiest to level, and a little too easy, the passives snake blood and medicinal use are broken, and the ingredients aren't balanced in terms of usage unless poisons are implemented. Enchanting takes way too long to level and Aspect Extraction is mostly useless. The big three are well done, although woodworking could use some more items.
Visuals/VFX
For the most part, I really like the graphical style of ESO. I am blown away by the quality of some of the environments and the detail for an mmo is just astounding for someone whose first mmo was Everquest on Playstation. Some of the effects for spells look pretty awesome and the only complaints I can think of are winged twilights in banks and that some don't like magelight. There do seem to be some issues with physics volumes (it looks like) having precedence in LOD calculations but other than that, I think ESO has been on the ball in the graphics department.
Writing
There is an absolutely incredible amount of lore written down in lorebooks and journals and notes and scraps of paper all over the damn place. Novels are there to be read and the quality of it is insanely good. One of the perks of the mage's guild is Eidetic Memory which lets you re-read everything you've ever read and I think that might be the best perk you can get. Between the random mail from a hireling that makes you laugh to the priceless comment from Cadwell in Oblivion, you'd be hard-pressed to find better writing.
Audio
The ambient sounds and musical scoring of ESO are great, and definitely do the elder scrolls name justice here. It's rare to find an mmo where you can actually listen to the music for hours without going nuts. Also, the voice acting is top-notch in my book. Some of the characters in the story lines were downright awesome and it was in large part due to the voices. There are a few abilities that could use a change (Harness Magicka, I'm looking at you) but otherwise, the sound is very good.
Cyrodiil
I saved this one for last because I feel rather strongly about it. There is so much potential in the open world experience that Cyrodiil offers that I am amazed it isn't a bigger part of the game. And that's the real problem, it doesn't feel like a big part of the game. There are a host of bugs that have been plaguing Cyrodiil but no fixes and not much concern shown for it so far. Bugged forward camps, bugged siege weapons, bugged repair kits, bugged doors, bugged map, bugged compass, bugged... well you get the idea. The thing is, pvp in Cyrodiil can be extremely fun when everything is working right. The basics are there, but the list of bugs is not short and as a whole, not minor. There are also some severe issues with farming (emperor, scroll, oil) and a disturbing tendency for tight-knit aoe zerging. These issues are leading to a particular play-style dominating all others, which never results in an attractive pvp environment. Cyrodiil is one of the two pillars of end-game content and in order to keep and promote a balanced end-game population you need to have both in working order. Right now, Cyrodiil is not in working order.
Well, that's my review of the game. If it was too long, and you didn't read it, post something witty and nonsensical below.
17
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This was very well written! I feel the same about the gamr, except 4 men dungeons. Those I did like a lot and had no bugs in there.
Cyrodiil - I am very dissapointed with the level of lag when many player clash in one place. I usualy try to cast some skills but by the time I cast them I am actualy already dead on server side. This is making me feel really bad.
I also have huge problem with way too OP AOE spells. ZERG swarms are keeping in pack and spam AOE which leads to death of anything they come across.
I think AOE has to cost hell a lot of resource or deal minor dmg. I am not fond playstyle where you train and kill huge packs of mobs. I know it is common in MMOs, but this is tes... I don't really remember gathering ton of enemies in skyrim and killing them all together at once. (I was playing legendary difficulty, so even one enemy was hard to kill as hell.
I would rather see army to break and individual fights to start. Zerg would destroy small team anyway, but even this small team could hold them for a while. Running and aoe spamming does not sloe them down for even a second.
Still I like the game. But if at least the lag won't be solver during summer (I expect all PvE content to be done for me by that time. And PvP in laggy enviroment is not the way to go.Edited by sevcik.miroslaveb17_ESO on June 19, 2014 10:58AM0 -
Poxxerom✭✭✭Nicely written, agree with all of it. I'd have liked to see a comparison of the classes and the effect it has on levelling. It hurts when you're a legendary geared VR12 Templar and some VR1 DK in prison rags does 3 times your damage spamming fire-whip while self-healing continuously.0
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I like your review. It is good to see some constructive criticism. I would even like to see something more specific and in depth on more classes and skill lines (especially if you play alts.)
This shows that one can write a post that looks and both the positives and negatives of the game without just screaming about nerfs or "this games sucks!!"
Well done. *golf clap*0 -
Ser Lobo✭✭✭✭✭
✭I agree, by and large, with what the op has said. And will also add my two cents:
When a player reaches veteran ranks, he wants to continue his story as the hero of his home alliance. A couple new missions could be added as you progress, allowing you to get closer to you opposition leader and earn their trust, so that you can spy/betray them or even switch alliances. It should be up to you how you progress that story, and it doesn't need a massive rework. Still allow the player to work through the other alliance missions, just change their story a little and add some fluff.
Veteran ranks don't give enough reward. Already the buffs per level are minimal and apparently there's no extra skill point. Players need to feel that the extra work killing mobs is worth it. More loot drops, better crafting drops, more gold, achievements, etc, etc. As my signature says, players are dreading the next fight more than looking forward to the next reward, which is where the system fails completely.
Cyrodiil is awesome, but the keep system feels too 'easy'. I have yet to defend a keep, because I've yet to feel defending one was worthwhile. When the opposing zerg DOES march, everything falls before it. If taking a keep (especially those going further towards your alliance home) was more and more difficult, with more NPC support, etc? Pushing players to invest in the communities surrounding the keep, for quests, stories, dailies, etc.
Cyrodiil is large. Almost too large. More means to get to the fight right now! An NPC who teleports you to the 'front lines', 200m from someplace where action is currently happening. Special PvP abilities which allow group members to teleport to an anchored gate. Cheaper camps, that also allow teleportation. We need more methods to teleport to the front lines and get into the action, cause right now, the ride is longer than my commute to work.
Crafting needs some 'veteran' content. See the crafting forum for my concept. Level 50 passives to invest in. More 7 and 8 trait crafting tables with unique set bonuses. Titles, achievements, costumes.
Stores need content of their own. A way for players outside your guild to access your guild store. Search mechanics. Smarter menu's. Ability to sort by name, price, etc. Ability to sort by veteran, or level in general.
Merchant Skill line needs to be introduced, allowing us to have more slots to sell, reducing the cost of taxes, highlighting lowest cost items, increasing markup to vendor NPC's, etc.
Pet Peeves:
- Armor degrades in combat? Let my master crafter fix it himself!
- Armor degrades in combat? Cool, but if I'm dying, don't make me weaker and more likely to die. Don't lower an armors effectiveness till it drops below 30%.
- Stamina doesn't put out like magicka does, and melee doesn't have the oomph of ranged, and single-target is far weaker than AOE. Back-asswards.
Ruze Aulus. Mayor of Dhalmora. Archer, hunter, assassin. Nightblade.
Gral. Mountain Terror. Barbarian, marauder, murderer. Nightblade.
Na'Djin. Knight-Blade. Knight, vanguard, defender. Nightblade.
XBOX NARuze is a veteran of the PC Beta, lived through the year one drought, survived the buy-to-play conversion, and has stepped foot in the hells known as Craglorn. He mained a nightlbade when nightblades weren't good, and has never worn a robe. He converted from PC during the console betas, and hasn't regretted it a moment since.
He'd rank ESO:TU (in it's current state) a 4.8 out of 5, loving the game almost entirely.
This is an multiplayer game. I should be able to log in, join a dungeon, join a battleground, queue for a dolmen or world boss or delve, teleport in, play for 20 minutes, and not worry about getting kicked, failing to join, having perfect voice coms, or being unable to complete content because someone's lagging behind. Group Finder and matchmaking is broken. Take a note from Destiny and build a system that allows from drop-in/drop-out functionality and quick play.3 -
cjmarsh725b14_ESO✭✭✭✭Nicely written, agree with all of it. I'd have liked to see a comparison of the classes and the effect it has on levelling. It hurts when you're a legendary geared VR12 Templar and some VR1 DK in prison rags does 3 times your damage spamming fire-whip while self-healing continuously.
I don't have a lot of experience with other classes other than sorcerer so I didn't post anything on balancing, although I think it's obviously an issue. Personally, I think sorcerers are far too strong early on when leveling. Crystal fragments with it's spammable knockdown is just so powerful that I was shocked when I rolled an alt without it. I basically was able to ignore half of my class passives and skill line abilities all the way to the veteran levels and maxed my crafting since I didn't really find a need for them until later. In the end-game sorcerers can pull off very good dps, but the highest damage builds being used all employ animation canceling which is something the devs need to acknowledge and say whether or not they plan on changing it.
In pvp, the sorcerer has Crystal Shards, the most OP wrist flinging ability in the game. Seriously though, the ability isn't quite in the 'nerf me now' realm but it is a solid staple of the sorc. Crushing Shock, again with the animation canceling light attacks before it, is the crazy-high damage dealer at the moment, in pve and pvp, and it works devastatingly well in pvp since it interrupts and stuns anyone casting. Critical Surge increases damage from your weapon attacks as well, a huge boost when using the Destro staff. Streak is still as powerful as ever, and I don't think the nerf addressed the real problem with it, the aoe stun effect. Damage shields from Hardened Ward and Harness Magicka are really good, especially since the Harness Magicka absorption works on your Ward. Pets are currently useless in pvp and kind of a waste of an ability, but there are so many other strong abilities it definitely seems like the way it should be.0 -
nudel✭✭✭✭✭Fair points OP. I think the only thing I'd disagree with is 4-man dungeons. I may have lucked out and probably did, but I only encountered one buggy boss. For the most part, I think they're gorgeous and very fun. If delves were half as well designed as the 4-man instanced dungeons, nobody would complain about dungeons. My only issue with the 4-mans is that there really isn't much reason to play through them again, which is a shame because they are well designed. The rewards for them are lacking though.
Someone on these forums had suggested there be some sort of dungeon currency that you could collect from the 4-mans and maybe use that to buy special gear. It's not a bad idea. I'd also be all for having new set bonuses that can only be found in those dungeons. There are already PVP only ones that you get via AP and certain rare sets that only drop from Dark Anchors so why not dungeon-centric ones. Something more than gold and decon fodder though.1 -
Pretty close to my own feelings. I was one of those rooting for the game at launch and loved my trip from 1 to 50...0