The obligatory DOOM thread.

Ralathar44

I'm going to say right now, with a sad heart and no malice, that I predict the death of ESO. By death I mean significant decline of course, not actual servers shutting down. I've watched a great many people do this and laughed. I would have never believed I'd ever be the one prophesying doom for a game. But here I am lol. They just don't get some of the fundamentals of MMORPG's That's why they were able to do some great things with the game, but it is also why they had so many bad things and are not trying to finish killing it.

This is not based off of my personal feelings. I like this game and alot of the things it has done. ALOT. I enjoy it. I'm semi-burned out on it partially due to some of it's failings but that's not why this is here. This is here based on my understandings of MMORPG's and their mechanics that I have learned over the course of 15 years of playing and dissecting MMORPG's starting with Dark Age of Camelot and including many many others.

I watched the quake con presentation and some of the new changes are going to kill the game. But I don't expect you to really believe me, half of you are so committed to the game that you wouldn't believe me if it was on fire with you in the middle of it. But for the other half of you I'll try to explain why I think this.

Believe me or not, that is your choice. All I ask is that you stop and really think about each of these points and what they mean for the game. For you, for your friends, for your guild mates. AFTER the shiny wears off of em.


Now the really controversial part, where your initial reaction will be that these are all good things:


1. Grouping updates.

Yes, they did mention this in their presentation. However they said it would be fixed over the course of a few updates. That could be as late as early 2015 to fully fix it (if it's rolled out incrementally).

This should be their #1 priority in the game right now. It's the biggest problem that is costing the game population and it needs to be fixed now, within 1-2 months. There are alot of quests and code is hard, I understand that, people that cannot team with their friends ultimately don't care.

2. Justice System:

I actually think overall that this is really nice overall. However I think there is about a 1 in 3 chance that something significantly bad is going to happen because of the justice system. I'm not sure if it'll be griefing or an oversight that negatively effects the economy, but after their presentation I was left with a heavy feeling that there will be a significant loophole that will cause alot of problems.

That being said, this is only a chance and it could be minor, it's not near as big of a worry as the other points.

3. Stamina Builds:

Yes they are looking into them, however even if they implement the changes they mentioned without issues or bugs in the current state of the game stamina builds will still be easily inferior to magicka builds.

At least it'll be better but there are a good amount of people whose patience really is running out. I like my stamina builds, they are my favorite builds honestly, it still bothers me that I cannot build viably without magicka abilities and that won't change so long as most non-weapon skill lines are magicka based. Because they have all the utility they we need AND they use a separate resource pool.

Oh, and now we have spell crafting to make stamina builds even LESS competitive.

4. Spell Crafting:

PVE and PVP balance completely destroyed. Simple as that. PVE balance is already bad , PVP balance is still completely broken. This addition would be enough to easily break a balanced game, this one isn't even close to balanced.

PVE will still be playable and fun, don't get me wrong, but the balance is going to be even worse borked than it currently is.

5. Plans to implement a battleground.

This will kill Cyrodil populations. They are aware of that, they say they will find away to implement it where that will not happen. This is simply not possible. If you implement alternative PVP and people play it, you will lower Cyrodil populations. The better and more rewarding that alternative PVP is, the more people will leave Cyrodil. Especially because it will be instant action and balanced vs having to find it and possibly being outnumbered.

There is literally no way to implement alternative PVP without lowering the open world population, it's as simple as that.



Don't get me wrong, it's not all bad. Facial animation, new armor sets, dungeon scaling, veteran rank improvements, champion levels, improved character customization and specialization, combat responsiveness, werewolf buffs, solo being included in end game, weapon swapping.

These are all good things. But the points listed are major things that will break an already half broken game.



P.S. In case I actually get moderated for presenting my opinion supported by points that DO at least have SOME merit, I have copied this thread and saved it in a word file and will spread it in sites beyond just this forum and reddit. But I'd like to keep it very focused and exercise my free speech without undue censorship if at all possible. Regardless of whether you consider me right or wrong.

Enkil

A nice Devil's Advocate post to throw into the mix with all the praise and excitement brought on by the QuakeCon panel... okay...

kimboh

Thought this was going to be about Doom 4.

Madval

It's not about Doom 4 ? At least while waiting for Doom 4 I have teso one of the best game ever made ! Fabulous time !

Ralathar44

Enkil wrote: »

A nice Devil's Advocate post to throw into the mix with all the praise and excitement brought on by the QuakeCon panel... okay...

I don't expect it to be popular or agreed with lol. I've just put a bullseye on myself and dressed in a full suit of firecrackers. But it's my honest opinion on things despite liking the game and not wanting to believe it.

Hopefully I'm wrong. But I don't think that was the case. I'm used to it though. I got laughed at for calling SWTOR a bad game after trying it. I got laughed at for telling people not to buy D3. I got laughed at for predicting a major subscription decline of WOW right before it started to bleed subs everywhere. I'll be laughed at here too.

/shrug. There are no winners here.

Eatitapple

Ralathar44

Eatitapple wrote: »

You sir, are a god amongst men .

kevlarto_ESO

Time will tell, but I am seeing more people that seem to be happy about the changes than the doom and gloomers, they will not make everyone happy the best they can do is hope to make most people happy at best.. /shrug

Ralathar44

kevlarto_ESO wrote: »

Time will tell, but I am seeing more people that seem to be happy about the changes than the doom and gloomers, they will not make everyone happy the best they can do is hope to make most people happy at best.. /shrug

Oh don't get me wrong, people will likely be happy (outside of PVP which will be one big ball of rage..so normal for the PVP situation in ESO lol), but they will still end up elsewhere.

It'll be kind of quiet evaporation of population rather than people rage quitting NGE style. Even quieter than all the population leaving to date because most of them had large grumbles. Though with all the free copies of the game they gave out at Quakecon we ought to see a large population spike currently.

Xabien

Ralathar44 wrote: »

Snip

Wow, that really sucked the fun out of my day.

You're completely entitled to your opinion of course, and your arguments have obviously been given some consideration, but on the whole I don't agree.

Grouping - yep it could come a lot faster, but will it kill the game if it takes a little time? I think if that was the case, the game would already be dead four months in.

Justice system - not entirely sure what the concern is here, and I'm not sure you're clear on it either. Just a gut feeling that something bad will happen? My only reservations are a lowering of crafting mats if they need to be stolen, and quieter towns if all npcs are regularly killed, they'll need very short respawn times. In all though, I think this system is fantastic, it'll introduce true open world PVP for those that want it, as well as thievery which in turn will become a (minor) revenue stream for some.

Stamina builds - yep they do need fixing, I agree with this completely. Especially as spellcraft is on the way. I've never understood it, but it does seem like most of the love goes to magicka and stamina is made to suffer. Having said that, I'm still sticking to my stamina builds, I've never, ever played a mage in any game because it doesn't interest me one bit.

Spell crafting - as above.

Battleground - yep, it's inevitable that there'll be some rebalance of the Cyrodiil population off of the back of this. BUT, we're also going to have less full campaigns and a handful of shorter campaigns. Hopefull the population rebalance won't be too bad. Personally I'll probably split my PVP time between the two - arena sounds interesting but I do love grouping with my guild for PVP!

AlexDougherty

Ralathar44

Xabien wrote: »

*snip*

On the whole you disagreed but you agreed with stamina, spell crafting, and battlegrounds...which is 3 out of 5 points. I could be wrong but that does seem somewhat contradictory. I'm not trying to be snarky mind you, just trying to understand.

Grouping is a thing that has cost our guild many members and many people who played the game have quit because of. This was of course exacerbated by veteran content problems as well as Cyrodil continually breaking. This on top of all the bad press they got in beta and at release. I'll be the first to say that alot of that bad press was total BS as they vilified the game for things they conveniently ignored about many other MMORPG's.

The Justice system is kind of in a grey area as for as logical support, just as you say. A combination of knowing how that sort of thing can fail, their effectiveness in this game to date, and personal instinct.

They definitely lost alot more people than they should have in the first 3 months. MMORPG retention rates are normally stellar anyways but this was worse than normal by quite a bit.

Ralathar44

AlexDougherty wrote: »

*delightful doom imagery*

Let nobody say that I'm not a cheerful doom monger with a sense of humor .

Nox_Aeterna

Nah , there is no need to worry until the console release atleast , the fact that they launched this on steam also means they will keep grabing a lot more sales from now on.

Like you , i dont trust the road ahead yet , i first want to see it in game. Anyone can make amazing promises to the future , now keeping them is another story.

These system need to be not only implemented , but well implemented and atleast until now with each update , zen has show they are better at adding bugs than fixing them.

Crisscross

Nox_Aeterna wrote: »

Like you , i dont trust the road ahead yet , i first want to see it in game. Anyone can make amazing promises to the future , now keeping them is another story.

QFT. There were much bigger promises and much bigger hype back in 2013, and look how that turned out. If actions are anything to go by, then we should know that Zen is fantastic at making things sound great on paper but play poor on a hard drive. All of these upcoming changes do sound great, but to be honest there's just so much room for error here... I just can't bring myself to jump for joy quite yet.

Ralathar44

Nox_Aeterna wrote: »

Nah , there is no need to worry until the console release atleast , the fact that they launched this on steam also means they will keep grabing a lot more sales from now on.

Like you , i dont trust the road ahead yet , i first want to see it in game. Anyone can make amazing promises to the future , now keeping them is another story.

These system need to be not only implemented , but well implemented and atleast until now with each update , zen has show they are better at adding bugs than fixing them.

Addressed below.

Crisscross wrote: »

Nox_Aeterna wrote: »

Like you , i dont trust the road ahead yet , i first want to see it in game. Anyone can make amazing promises to the future , now keeping them is another story.

QFT. There were much bigger promises and much bigger hype back in 2013, and look how that turned out. If actions are anything to go by, then we should know that Zen is fantastic at making things sound great on paper but play poor on a hard drive. All of these upcoming changes do sound great, but to be honest there's just so much room for error here... I just can't bring myself to jump for joy quite yet.

I want to be clear that the real problem is not the buggy implementation of their ideas. That's something that has plagued every MMORPG, though people are quick to forget that. Though there is NO EXCUSE for the crash bug still being in the game. It's not common but it's not rare either.

Their problem is that they have issues at a fundamental and foundational level with key ideas and then the bugs complicate that. Perfect examples: Phasing being released the way it is and veteran content being a night and day difficulty change from the rest of the game, delivering the same kind of content. Both of those problems should have been seen ahead of time, they shouldn't have needed testing. Just like the D3 auction house didn't need testing for me to know it was a bad idea. They are fundamental flaws.


Though I will give them credit, it's their first MMORPG and they are doing better than Cryptic post City of Heroes. Cryptic did one MMORPG well, sold it, tried to do better, and has been failing hard since by showing they do not understand MMORPG combat mechanics because they left all their good people at Paragon Studios. (RIP City of Heroes *sniff*)

Ralathar44

In counterpoint to myself in my last post I want to say that they have done the most amazing job on shadows and atmosphere. I don't give a crap about shadows and this game made me stop and say woah, that's awesome. They have also done a great job in story and exploration, best in the MMORPG field. SWTOR spiked higher, but SWTOR story was either good or crap and anything not main quest or starter area was crap. Normal level dungeons were also done pretty darn well. Nice and challenging, healers and tanks help but are not required.

As well the idea of morphs is a great idea. One I think they should have taken one step further to where each skill could morph twice.

Crafting was different and not bad but not great. Combat was decently executed to well executed. Healing was done pretty darn well IMO, only flaw is it's a bit too resto staff reliant, but it's actually really fun for a change.

SteveCampsOut

Troll posting with a threat to spread the negative opinion far and wide on the internet tacked on at the end. Yeah. Whatever. I might have thought more about what you said til you tacked on that threatening PS at the end. You just sound like someone with an axe to grind now.

mndfreeze

kimboh wrote: »

Thought this was going to be about Doom 4.

TL;DR and this time a million. I was really really really sad we were not going to discuss the new doom, because, well, doom. Also: ID software. yeah. sexy. Though for a while there near the end they were starting to lose it. Its time for an ID software come back to retake the entire field of 3d gaming like the olden days of yore.

Sangeet

What means spellcrafting? Further buffs for the destro staff and class skills?

Vahrokh

Well, I'll just leave this here.

Raash

Hmm, if i remember correctly i saw in a dev video long before launch that it would be possible to make really really powerfull build and class combinations and that some builds wouldnt be as powerfull - and that was ok. and if it indeed was so i think thats all good. Not everything need to be equal in games. And as i said, I might be wrong but i bet there are lots of people that can correct me if that is the case

Edit: im speaking about pvp imbalances

Shergar

[/quote]P.S. In case I actually get moderated for presenting my opinion supported by points that DO at least have SOME merit, I have copied this thread and saved it in a word file and will spread it in sites beyond just this forum and reddit. But I'd like to keep it very focused and exercise my free speech without undue censorship if at all possible. Regardless of whether you consider me right or wrong.[/quote]

Seriously though what is this all about, it's a computer game and you are willing to go to such lengths like as if you caught someone having an affair and now you have the seedy video tape to show to everyone if they don't comply with what you want, aye ok seriously go outside for fresh air take some deep breaths come back in and look at what you have wrote and ask yourself was that really necessary.

Unbelievable.

Ralathar44

Sangeet wrote: »

What means spellcrafting? Further buffs for the destro staff and class skills?

The spell crafting system will require you to spend alot of time exploring and grabbing individual tablet pieces. But when you get enough you can literally make spells like lightning bolt and the n tack on one of 6 unique modifiers like ultimate, enduring, and AOE. For instance AOE would make it chain lightning.

These are spells any character can learn and there are quite a few. It means we will have quite alot of fun toys to play with. Unfortunately as a side effect it's going to destroy the little remaining balance in the game. But at least it'll be really fun once you've spent a long time scrounging up some tablets.

Ralathar44

SteveCampsOut wrote: »

Troll posting with a threat to spread the negative opinion far and wide on the internet tacked on at the end. Yeah. Whatever. I might have thought more about what you said til you tacked on that threatening PS at the end. You just sound like someone with an axe to grind now.

That was only if I was censored. I don't personally believe Zenimax would do it, but there are quite a few game companies out there that will forcibly try to control opinion through moderation. Consider that a kind of pre-emptive to ensure that you got to mock and insult me as is your right.

I don't have any personal animus, I actually like this game and want the best for it. That means I have to sometimes make hard calls and decisions. This was one of those. As stated in a comment above I also predicted the decline of WOW, the auction house problems of D3, and after playing it around 2 weeks to a month I judged SWTOR as a bad game.

I was mocked and insulted for all of those as well. /shrug, this is kind of expected.

Shergar wrote: »

Seriously though what is this all about, it's a computer game and you are willing to go to such lengths like as if you caught someone having an affair and now you have the seedy video tape to show to everyone if they don't comply with what you want, aye ok seriously go outside for fresh air take some deep breaths come back in and look at what you have wrote and ask yourself was that really necessary.

Unbelievable.

I'm actually completely calm. I'm not angry, I'm not upset, perhaps slightly disappointed but that's my own fault because I kind of knew better.

It's not a spectacle, it's a prediction based on game design and game mechanics. An unpopular one to be sure, but it was also unpopular when I defended ESO while it got tons of bad press it didn't deserve. I don't take sides even if I might personally want to.

The spectacle only comes in when people cannot simply disagree and have to sensationalize something to try and demean it. This is my honest and sober opinion despite my like of the game and is based on 15 or so years of MMORPG's played across a variety of games with an eye for WHY things work the way they do.

I'd honestly rather be wrong, I just don't believe that to be the case and even if you are not polite to me and characterize me as what you wish I can be polite to you without painting you out to be anything.

Phinix1

This thread... WHY?



P.S.: Nobody cares.

Enkil

Ralathar44 wrote: »

I don't have any personal animus, I actually like this game and want the best for it. That means I have to sometimes make hard calls and decisions. This was one of those. As stated in a comment above I also predicted the decline of WOW, the auction house problems of D3, and after playing it around 2 weeks to a month I judged SWTOR as a bad game.

I was mocked and insulted for all of those as well. /shrug, this is kind of expected.

Are you trying to become a game prognosticator or something? Maybe get your opinions out there for some future "I told you so" moment? At first, it seemed to me you just want to present a countervailing opinion but after rereading and noticing this part...

Ralathar44 wrote: »

I have copied this thread and saved it in a word file and will spread it in sites beyond just this forum and reddit.

... I am left wondering what your motivations are???

Phinix1

SteveCampsOut wrote: »

Troll posting with a threat to spread the negative opinion far and wide on the internet tacked on at the end. Yeah. Whatever. I might have thought more about what you said til you tacked on that threatening PS at the end. You just sound like someone with an axe to grind now.

I agree. I have a very hard time taking how seriously the OP takes themselves seriously. I almost suspect that this thread was a joke and not meant to be taken seriously.

More doom-saying mountains out of molehills on the ZOS forums. O.o

I haven't even had my coffee yet.

Vanathi

ALOT is not a word.

Ralathar44

Raash wrote: »

Hmm, if i remember correctly i saw in a dev video long before launch that it would be possible to make really really powerfull build and class combinations and that some builds wouldnt be as powerfull - and that was ok. and if it indeed was so i think thats all good. Not everything need to be equal in games. And as i said, I might be wrong but i bet there are lots of people that can correct me if that is the case

Edit: im speaking about pvp imbalances

This is a fair point, in fact the concept of perfect imbalance is something that games should honestly strive for:




However that being said the range still has to be kept in check. Otherwise builds and classes end up getting ostracized for content. Nightblade for instance has felt that pretty harshly.

As well part of what makes this game shine when it is working properly is that it is a little bit more difficult than many/most MMORPG's on the market atm, especially in dungeons. This is a strength of the game. If everyone suddenly gets more powerful then the content conversely becomes less challenging. I'm not going to give them the benefit of the doubt when it comes to balancing for that because veteran levels happened, which was a huge disconnect in the realities of difficulty progression.

I've already written off PVP in this game as a lost cause. We were getting to the point that there was hope in the future for it, albeit likely far away, but the combination of battlegrounds and spell crafting blitzed that utterly.

Though honestly, the PVP mechanics in this game lacked the same compelling nature of GW 2 and Dark Age of Camelot. I don't blame that on them. It just didn't work with the combat mechanics that they made, though the mechanics themselves were generally sound. It was fun, but the combat and abilities just didn't work out well. That's likely something they could not have predicted or planned for.

Ralathar44

AlienDiplomat wrote: »

This thread... WHY?
P.S.: Nobody cares.

That's counter-logic. You cared enough to post here. and so did others.

Enkil wrote: »

Are you trying to become a game prognosticator or something? Maybe get your opinions out there for some future "I told you so" moment? At first, it seemed to me you just want to present a countervailing opinion but after rereading and noticing this part...

... I am left wondering what your motivations are???

To be honest, this is a good question. Likely better than you realized when you asked it. Because to be honest they CAN'T fix it now even if they 100% agreed with me because they already promised all these things. The community would hang them. It's quite literally out of their hands now to fix.

Your post made me stop and consider and double check my motivations to be sure. Because I'm not above reproach either and it never hurts to stop, take a second, and make sure. What I came back with is knowledge. I want people to know, developers included, if things do end up happening as I say what potential problems to avoid next time. I don't care about pride. I started life as a nerd when that was considered an insult and an outcast, I'm a furry, and I've watched My Little Pony and enjoyed it though I'm not a fanatic of the series or anything. I'm willing to state this right now even though it will get me judged based on ignorance. Welcome to life right?

It's not about pride. It's not about being right. Kitten both of those concepts. I don't matter. This game does. It's the product of loving devotion from developers, it's something that many people have loved and enjoyed, and it sets a precedent and a benchmark for future projects on what to do and what not to do.

That is what is important. Not some stupid little nerd on the internet (me). If things go down as I said they will, I never want to see these mistakes made by another game again if possible.