The Road Ahead - July 8, 2014

nightwalkerrobin_ESO

I think a little more info on the werewolf would be appropriate. You still have not even implemented the removal of the Devour cool down. From all the player inputs that you have been given, there is much you can choose from to make werewolves much more fun to play.

And once you get the werewolf fixed, and all the other faulty coding errors from the last major patch fixed, how about adding a World skill?

A World skill that allows any class to have combat pets. I know it was in the list of features before the game came out, and with the bad planning of the Sorcerer pets that you actually have been trying to fix (and I applaud you there), I do have hope that we will see this World skill. Wolves, Senech Cats, Wamasu, Crocodiles, and the spiders all would make very cool combat pets. Please get this back onto the table of coming features.

Thanks.

arkansas_ESO

Can't say I'm a fan of the colors. Is there any chance to tone down the brightness across the board by about 20%?

I'm all for customization, but TES have never been 'bright' games except for when modded, and I feel as if these brighter colors break away from the TES mold in a bad way.



This is a good blue for the TES series.



This feels wrong.

Can we at least tone down the colors on plate armor? The shininess of the base armor added with the new colors feels too cartoony for TES, in my opinion.

HippieTheGreat

Dunno if its been pointed out, since this is at 5 pages now. But all the armor dyes at the end are comic book characters
Iron Man, Hawk Eye, Wonder Woman, Captain America, and Poison Ivy
hehehehe

drogon1

Very nice update from a barely hanging in there sub. Especially the part about PvP XP going up. This will provide leveling options for those that like to play alts and do not like playing vet content in other factions. Providing more incentive for players to PvP is a good thing in ESO.

Would like to see dungeon XP go up a bit also. The group instances are the best PvE the game has to offer, but they are under-used by players because of substandard XP and loot rewards.

ClikC

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Class Builds and Balance

I’ll take this opportunity to repeat an important point: we make class balance changes very slowly because they can have a big impact on your play experience. We’re making changes carefully, but we are always watching feedback about balance concerns. Recently, we adjusted stamina builds to help them become more competitive by making medium armor reduce the cost of stamina abilities and by improving the damage for several stamina-based abilities. In Update 3, ultimate abilities will scale from weapon damage or spell damage—whichever one benefits you the most. We’ll continue to make incremental changes to address balance issues.

Important part in italics.

Yes, But in the SAME patch you nerfed Hunding's Rage set bonus so that it is now worse (depending on your proximity to weapon damage soft cap) than it was when it only ever gave 5% increased weapon damage when using weapon abilities. You also nerfed/ broke Monumental Glyph of Rage, so instead of increasing power by 17% for 5 seconds, it now gives 2 (yes two) weapon damage for 5 seconds regardless of aspect rune used. These changes have SERIOUSLY harmed stamina/ weapon based builds, and you've not told us why you made these changes, or why they were prioritised! You giving with one hand, and taking away with the other, what's the deal?

On the subject of the change to the Wind Walker Medium Armour passive, you've given 2% cost reduction per piece of medium armour equipped. The corresponding passive in the Light Armour tree (Evocation) grants 3% cost reduction in the same way.

Now, lets consider this for a moment, Magicka is only used for Abilities, Stamina is used for Abilities AND things like CC/ stun break, dodge rolling etc. On a fundamental level inherent with that design choice, Light Armour will always be more valuable in terms of damage output in comparison with medium armour. Now while I feel the change is a step in the right direction, you could have easily made is 3% reduction in line with Light Armour equivalent, and in fact, you probably have gone to 4% due to the requirement to use stamina for CC/ stun break, dodge rolling etc. Even if you'd made it 4% reduction, instead of 2%, Light Armour would STILL be better for damage output just because of Concentration passive in the Light Armour tree, which grants that players spells ignore 6% of an enemies spell resistance per piece of light armour equipped.

If your serious about bringing medium armour builds in line with light armour builds in terms of damage output, you going to have to consider giving an equivalent passive ability to medium armour for Concentration. Something along the lines of ignoring 6% of an enemies armour per piece of medium armour equipped, probably re-working the agility passive, as the 10% attack speed is just terrible.

I appreciate that you want to make changes slowly as there is the potential to make stamina builds insanely OP, but I fear you will lose the player base before these meaningful changes occur, especially with regards my first point about making changes to aid stamina builds, but also making changes that harm stamina builds.

ClikC

Blackwidow

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Selique wrote: »

No word on Chat Bubbles yet? I know some people don't care, but I am curious.

Chat bubbles won't be in Update 3, but we are actively working on them.

Denaia wrote: »

@zos_ginabruno are the delve updates that where announced for update 3 in the previous road ahead also going to come? And what about the collectibles achievement that haven't been working since the start of the game?

Delve updates will start in Update 3, and will be an ongoing addition as we hit each area.

How come obtrusive spammy floating chat bubbles are considered fine as an option, yet nameplates and guild tags aren't?

/100% agree

Dagoth_Rac

clikcb16_ESO wrote: »

On the subject of the change to the Wind Walker Medium Armour passive, you've given 2% cost reduction per piece of medium armour equipped. The corresponding passive in the Light Armour tree (Evocation) grants 3% cost reduction in the same way.

This is because the weapon skill lines already have passives that drop the cost by 20%. Class skills do not have these passives. With 7 pieces medium and maxing out the passive in 2H, Bow, or your stamina weapon of choice, you are up to 34% stamina cost reduction.

A character in 7 light armor gets 21% magicka cost reduction. Templar and Sorc have passives to reduce another 4%-5% but those affect all abilities, both magicka and stamina. So you are looking at 25% magicka reduction in Light Armor for a Templar but 38% stamina reduction in medium armor for a Templar (Edit: that assumes both medium armor and the weapon skill line 20% reduction).

ZOS knew what they were doing making it only 2% instead of 3%.

Now, I still think stamina abilities don't do enough damage, regardless of how low you get the cost. But stamina cost reduction is not the problem. It is the dps of stamina abilities.

Darkonflare15

People complaining about stamina this and stamina that. Complaining about bright colors about build fixes and other stuff. Its just ridiculous,people been complaining about this for months and guess what its not here. Just wait for them to fix it in the future because your not getting it now you probably getting it in the future. Plus they said they already know and they are going to take their time doing it. I actually happy that they are finally working on vet stuff. At least be happy for what you get now.

Mortosk

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Arsenic_Touch wrote: »

So how much of this is actually coming with update 3 and what is going to be later down the "soon™" pipeline gina?

You'll find out soon!

Can they please tell us that crafted set bonuses won't suck as hardcore as they do currently? Especially the 8-trait ones.

Oblivion's Foe:
3-set +12 Magicka Recovery
5-set: Gives you 2 soul gems if you resurrect people once per hour. Pretty lame imo.

Kagrenac's Hope:
3-set +12 Stamina Recovery
5-set: Lets you resurrect players 25% faster. Ok well, if I was a healer doing dungeons, I might keep a 5-set in my bags so I could swap it out whenever I resurrect someone, provided I wasn't in combat. But I wouldn't wear this full time. And one question, why stamina and not magicka recovery?

Orgnum's Scales:
3-set +119 health
5-set +50% health regen below 50% health. Suppose this is good for tanks.

Eyes of Mara:
3-set +80 spell resist
5-set Reduce magicka cost of abilities by 3% when wielding a restoration staff. Useful for restoration staff users, especially healers. Bit exclusive of DPS though unless they are DPS'ing with a healing staff which isn't unheard of, but otherwise a decent bonus. Would be better if it had 3 bonuses though, and that goes for all the 8-trait sets.

Spectre's Eye:
3-set +105 Magicka
5-set Gain 20% dodge for 3 seconds after casting a spell that costs magicka (6 second cooldown). This seems useful enough, the cooldown isn't ridiculously long anyway.

Shalidor's Curse:
3-set +12 magicka recovery
5-set When attacking a target below 20% health, gain 15% health (30 second cooldown). I suppose it's nice to get a 15% health boost every 30 seconds. Seems a bit lackluster though for an 8-trait bonus. If the cooldown were shorter it would better.

Way of the Arena:
3-set +157 health
4-set +350 armor
5-set Reduce cost of CC break by 15%. Decent set bonuses. 3 different bonuses should be standard for all 8-trait crafted sets.

So, for 8-trait bonuses which take 25 days just for the last trait for each item type, I think these set bonuses are a bit lack luster to say the least. They all, at the very least, should have 3,4, and 5 set bonuses. And, the bonuses themselves, well, some of them are pretty lame imo.

Thejollygreenone

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Class Builds and Balance

I’ll take this opportunity to repeat an important point: we make class balance changes very slowly because they can have a big impact on your play experience. We’re making changes carefully, but we are always watching feedback about balance concerns. Recently, we adjusted stamina builds to help them become more competitive by making medium armor reduce the cost of stamina abilities and by improving the damage for several stamina-based abilities. In Update 3, ultimate abilities will scale from weapon damage or spell damage—whichever one benefits you the most. We’ll continue to make incremental changes to address balance issues.

It’s important to note that from now on, whenever we introduce a major change to a skill line, we will be offering a free respec to players who have invested points in that line.

Here are some other character and ability topics we’re looking at for potential balance changes and tweaks:

• The survivability of werewolves and the balance between their strengths and weaknesses may receive some adjustments.
• The effectiveness of Templars is being evaluated, particularly some specific builds that may be underperforming when compared to similar builds for other classes.
• Our previous changes to the Dragonknight class are undergoing review to ensure that the class is fun to play and still feels powerful.
• We’re continuing to make adjustments to the Nightblade. We believe that what we’ve done so far has helped, but there may be more on the way.

So... Where to start...

• The ultimate change is a bit against the foundation of how abilities calculate damage but I suppose I'm not complaining, it will help stamina builds certainly. There might be some unforeseen balance issues that arise from this but I suppose we can tackle that as it arrives.
  
• Overall, stamina builds are still going to need some drastic changes before we see it competing with magicka builds. 'Incremental changes' will just cause the process to take awhile. That is if the process can actually finish and we ever actually see balance between stamina and magicka builds. Better late than never, certainly.
  
• Now, werewolves. We need a little more certainty than 'may receive some adjustments'. If they don't receive adjustments then we won't see werewolves in trials or pvp, at least none pulling their weight and/or doing well. It's painfully obvious that werewolf form is inefficient in both defenses and offenses and, unfortunately, is mostly a flavor option. I'd really like to see that changed, and I'm not even planning on being a werewolf.
  
• Templars: If these specific underperforming builds are actually the ones underperforming, preferably focused on pve where they actually need some help. Because I must say, balance for templar will by a tricky thing, because there are a few templar builds that are exemplary in pvp. Wouldn't want them to get any stronger than they already are. So, by all means, improve underperforming builds, but make sure to leave the strong ones untouched. Wait, do this for every class! Why just templar? Every class has at least few significantly underperforming builds that in all rights should perform well.
  
• So the DK statement. As far as I can tell, DK still seems pretty darn fun to play, and if PvP is any indicator they are still pretty darn strong as well. In pve, they may (hell if I know though, it's been awhile since my build isn't trial-worthy) not be the absolute top dps right now, but they're close enough to still be desired in trials. As tanks, I haven't heard any legitimate problems, so it would seem they're doin alright in most walks of the game.
  
• Ah, and now the nightblade statement. This is a fairly valid statement imo, and I main as a nightblade. But if that just ends up being an empty statement to sooth the fears of the nightblades who choose to not pick the one dps build that is competitive right now, then I'm going to be mighty disappointed. If anything, fix nightblade invisibility. That ability is still buggy as hell. The fact that stealth detection potions allow you to see through it is a big red light. Get to it!

/EndWallO'Text

Sorry for the big post guys, but I feel the need to be thorough. Thanks to those who bother to read.

ClikC

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

ZOS knew what they were doing making it only 2% instead of 3%.

Now, I still think stamina abilities don't do enough damage, regardless of how low you get the cost. But stamina cost reduction is not the problem. It is the dps of stamina abilities.

That's open to debate, you've got to factor in typical uses of dodge rolls (hard data ZOS should have access to), CC breaks etc into a fight. They eat a LOT of stamina, way more than 20% reduction from weapon trees give, for a resource that is also used for damage output.

I agree stamina cost reduction it's not the problem, my point was to illustrate the disparity between the various benefits of light armour and medium armour passive abilities. My post also mentions a suggested method of upping overall stamina damage output, in line with an equivalent light armour passive.

Nazon_Katts

Folks, relax. You know ZOS is kinda slow on things. That's just their late contribution to April fools. They can't possibly be serious about comic strip heroes and Cylons, can they?!

http://youtu.be/vz1dSOq8Xm4

Satherius

Dyes are great, I'd rather they be more earth tones/metallic and less pastel, to keep with the lore.

Also please please please put in armor appearance slots, to include shield and weapon. Or gank the GW2/WoW/D3/Aion method of Transmoging one item's appearance to another.

Werewolves need a major overhaul, not just minor tweaking. From my experience of playing a werewolf, I want to love it, but there is just nothing fun about it. The time able to play in werewolf form is far too short, you are basically just an auto attack fiend, which is boring, your other active abilities cause the enemies to run which means you chase them which means you end up spending less time in wolf form. Hit box on the WW heavy attack is horrible, it's far too easy to miss the target. The decrease in ultimate cost was a step in the right direction. Now do more for us mangy dogs .

Arsenic_Touch

HippieTheGreat wrote: »

Dunno if its been pointed out, since this is at 5 pages now. But all the armor dyes at the end are comic book characters
Iron Man, Hawk Eye, Wonder Woman, Captain America, and Poison Ivy
hehehehe

A lot of people missed that point, haha.

Sapphy24

Thank you so much for communicating. I'm really excited about what is in store for the game.

DeLindsay

So much awesome in that post, thanks you ZoS.

zittylolb14_ESO

The issues that have peeved me off the most is the lack of mats you can use to upgrade at ever level....one can not upgrade any weapons or armor trying to extract from items or resources. Blah-blah about economy is the pat reply but because resources are so rare..you have to pay huge amounts of time and gold to buy mats. Armor mats and Wood working mats should be as easy to get as food mats...it is not.

I have maxed out Provisioning and it should be the same for all the other profession. I stopped doing enchanting because there is no list of items you can make or what you have learned so far...It is always a guessing game. Lack of information is also making this game way to hard to figure out.

I have also complained about lvling up being way to hard....it reminds me of EQ grinding away you whole life...this needs to end now.
There is also a lack of recipes as you only get the same old junk ones.

The pvp zone dungeon are not soloable as the closer you get to a skyshards the more mobs hang together and work as a team...Not even a V12 can take on 10 level V5 and adds on to boot. Plus the lack of information about the level of the dungeon is not there. The are numbered but what does the number mean?
So basically we are still playing beta and paying for it?
I have played pvp since the latest patch and I for sure see an improvement in the frame-rates..but it is still there as I notice the slowing down still.

Mordria

Hlaren_shortsheath wrote: »

please dont put pink, and baby blue and stuff like that into elderscrolls online.
asking nicely please just dont do it.
please.

Yes. This. We just need man colors like... dirt and maybe blood. But that's it.

EQBallzz

I think most of the obvious stuff with stamina builds and class balance and dyes etc.. have been covered so I won't parrot more of those topics but there are a couple things regarding the guild enhancements I noticed that are missing from the letter and comments.

@ZOS_GinaBruno

The letter states that:

Bank: guild leaders can set permissions to allow members to withdraw gold from the guild bank based on their rank.

Just to be clear..that means we will be able to allow gold deposits into the guild bank? I just found it odd that the statement mentions the ability to withdraw gold for members when there is no option to withdraw or deposit gold by members or officers or anyone at present so the statement seemed to be somewhat confusing unless you make assumptions which I try to avoid doing.

There is also no mention of the guild bank stacking issue or the horrible guild bank performance ("Retrieving items..." constantly when trying to access the guild bank). What about guild bank storage upgrades? Will there be any options to upgrade the size of the bank so people don't have to run two guilds to get adequate guild bank space. The same could be said for allowing an upgrade to the number of items that can be put up for sale on a guild store. An option to purchase an upgrade to sell more items in a store would be nice for crafters or others selling large quantities of items.

I know this isn't game breaking stuff but it has been highly annoying and time consuming to deal with as a guild leader.

So to sum up..can you confirm or deny any of the following?
-guild bank stacking issue resolution?
-guild bank access performance resolution? ("Retrieving items...)
-guild bank size upgrade options?
-guild bank gold deposits/withdrawals with appropriate permissions?
-guild store listing total upgrade options?

VinnOmniusVeritas

Thank you ZOS for the encouraging news, especially the Vet changes. I'm one of those customers (apparently there are more like me than I thought) that started on pre-order day 1, took my first character to 50, then said "WTF is this???" when I got to VR level 1. I was stymied by the abrupt change in playability and said to myself "Well, at least I can do 1-50 two more times." Turns out, I will now be staying as a subscriber for the long term as VR levels have now become fun instead of work.. Nothing but good changes coming it sounds like. Thanks for listening to the customers.

txfeinbergsub17_ESO

RazielSR wrote: »

PLEASE...This can't be happening...that colours are HORRIBLE!!!

THIS IS ELDER SCROLLS!!!! WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!?????

Seriously, sorry for the caps, but this can't be real. This is gonna absolutely destroy the TES franchise seriousness. I understand you should add new colour possibilites, but cmon that pinks and blues!!! NO PLEASE NO!!!!!

NOOOOOOOOOO!!


The rest of the letter is great. Anyway, could you please let us know if when you talk about the changes in phase 2 and 3...one can think that is better to park your pre-veteran char until this happens? Is there gonna be some changes about the story or some new quests in the other faction zones?

Too bad for you, I love the color choices.

quakedawg_ESO

You had me at Guild Tabards! Heck yeah!

Please (for the love of all things holy!) make the Group Leader icon somewhat useful! Change the color, make it larger, make sparks fly from his/her head, light them on fire .......anything!

zittylolb14_ESO

FYI: update on more penalties we have to endure????
Ok you have sort of fixed the slower frame rate and laggyness????

Well I now can't get on Wabbajack and there is a waiting list now. So I tried doing a guest on another server....you don't get credit for doing anything as a guest? Why again a penalty?

BAG and or INVENTORY space is lame that you have to spend 20k to get yet another lame amount of only 10 spaces in your bank. Another 20k to upgrade your bag?...WFT.

You are not making any points here to improve your chances that I will re-up my sub...at this point no I will not.

Extraction rates for 100 pieces of Maple are lame....
Same with iron, steel, ebony, etc.

You make it so you have to sink gold into buying others stuff so you can gain exp but again no mats to speak of....and I mean the stuff you need to upgrade, like pitch..and the lame gambling setup is LAME,LAME..this isn't Las Vegas dah?
Oh you want lost-gold not lost wages....

And you hardly get any exp for making your own stuff..again a penalty debuff on exp. I don't want to play EQ ever again or DAOC, or WOW because they are all grind-fests to lameness....and you copy them to the T....shame on you zenimax.
I am totally disappointed that you go from Skyrim to Wow-lame-ness in yet another boring MMO...that for me is killing my desire to play any MMO ever again.
Sorry I bought a 6 month sub...really sorry....I'd rather play skyrim and in fact I am starting to play that again...that is how boring you have made TESO.
BORING....boring...boring.

_subjectnamehere_

@ZOS_GinaBruno‌

I am going to go ahead and ask it although I know most players don't care, but...

FISHING? Is it still bugged? Are we going to see a fix for this so I can start collecting rare fish? (I hear the achievement is earned, but you cannot bag the fish)?

I know sometimes they fix things and don't document it...

Fuzzylumpkins

Will wait a few months and see how it pans out. Learned my lesson believing the "words" about what will happen and what fixes will bring. Been burned 2 to many times thus far to blindly accept this is what will come to pass.

LrdRahvin

Fuzzylumpkins wrote: »

Will wait a few months and see how it pans out. Learned my lesson believing the "words" about what will happen and what fixes will bring. Been burned 2 to many times thus far to blindly accept this is what will come to pass.

Welcome to the dark side...We've been expecting you

ZodiacDragon

Ok again you say you read the forums why are you guys seem like your mainly focused on making vet rank better idk what's up but why has the Dark Brotherhood or the Thieves Guild not been incorporated or the Justice system what about new classes or maybe a new race or two why no spell creation I really wanna see bloodmage class and necromancy class and a Druid class and a Monk class it would be awesome to see a few new races but that might be asking to much I'm just wondering I really do hope you guys read this these are what me and several others would love to see

LrdRahvin

ZodiacDragon wrote: »

Ok again you say you read the forums why are you guys seem like your mainly focused on making vet rank better idk what's up but why has the Dark Brotherhood or the Thieves Guild not been incorporated or the Justice system what about new classes or maybe a new race or two why no spell creation I really wanna see bloodmage class and necromancy class and a Druid class and a Monk class it would be awesome to see a few new races but that might be asking to much I'm just wondering I really do hope you guys read this these are what me and several others would love to see

WTB punctuation

Rhoric

@ZOS_GinaBruno

What about an option to allow players to group up for solo only content. I have been stuck on Molag Bal for months. Being able to group up with guildie would be a great help to those of us that are having problems. I have seen people leave out of frustration over not being able to group up cause it is set as solo only.

timidobserver

My two take aways:

1.If I understand the ultimate change correctly, they are going to scale based on whatever your primary attack method is. So, if your spell damage is higher they will use that and vice-verse. If my understanding is correct, this is a very good thing. I wonder if they are going to adjust the crit as well to be based on whichever is higher?

2. Hopefully this new veteran system won't have to be redone by those that are already V12. I'd rather stay max level, rather than redoing it because a few people are unhappy. The possibility of me having to redo the new veteran experience aside, the changes look good to me.

3. Auction system looks good to me. Now I can ditch my trading guilds and actually get to join a decent PVP or PVE guild.

4. Meh to guild tabard. I hated those in GW2 because some guilds wanted to force their members to wear it. They will likely be lame and I probably will not wear it unless it gives me some kind of active boost.

5. I am looking forward to any changes that occur for the Templar. It is about time that they noticed that, other than the 1-2 outliers that are going to flame me saying that their Templar dps is over 9001 and doesn't need any help, Templar PVE dps is extremely sub-par compared to all other classes in the game.

Also, Templar abilities tend to cost my resources than anyone elses. There are some good Templar tanks out there, but regardless, they are are at an immediate disadvantage to other tanks thanks to no reliable aoe hard cc. Compared to the somewhat excessive Syrabanes synergy + Green Dragon Blood for DKs, Templar resource management is pitiful. DKs can spam reflect as much as they want and it returns magicka on to of that, but they feel the need to disable my magicka regen when I use blazing shield.

Sorcs can spam teleport across the map as much as they want with no delay, but ZOS felt the need to first add a delay to biting jabs and then revert that and increase the resource cost of it(note, I do not use biting jabs as primary dps, I am just pointing out the idea that someone at some point at ZOS thought that biting jabs needed a delay but an instant teleport doesn't.)

6. For a mega super duper guild extravaganza update, what I read seems pretty sparse as far as a guild update goes. Everything there is very good, but I was expecting a bit more.