The ESO Community: Small? Inactive?

Maverick827

Does anyone else feel like the community in this game is small or, at the very least, disproportionately inactive compared to other MMOs?

This sub-forum is really the only one that gets any traffic. If you go to the other sub-forums, you'll see posts from more than a week ago still on the front page. Threads in any sub-forum rarely get more than a few pages worth of replies.

All of the fan sites are dead. TamrielFoundry's class/mechanics discussions go back 2+ weeks, with most threads dying out barely answered or entirely unanswered. Dulfy only posts the headlines, and only occasionally. ESOHead hasn't been updated in months, and never had a great database of items to begin with. The ESO Reddit tends to have many posts a day still, but most go largely undiscussed anyway.

ESO Live is really the only thing that makes it feel like this game has an active community.

yodased

most people are on Redit tbh

Loneshard

yodased wrote: »

most people are on Redit tbh

Yep

SteveCampsOut

Loneshard wrote: »

yodased wrote: »

most people are on Redit tbh

Yep

Probably because they get away with more trolling there....

Maverick827

Yeah, but looking at the so-called "hot" threads, they don't have many comments:

14
34
20
3
5
6
12
15
2
0
0
...

Take into account replies from the same posters and even the ESO Reddit seems to be very inactive.

yodased

I think the game garners a different type of main player though. If you are comparing this community with other MMO communities its tough. The crowd here is typically older and more into the game than the internet in my experience.

Most younger folks multitask a lot better than the older crowd, so discussing the game, tabbing into the forums while waiting for the porting to a dungeon is common. Here is more laid back and calm IMO so you have less need to discuss the game and more need to play it!

Plus its new and people are still figuring out the systems and idiosyncrasies of the game world.

That or the sky is falling and the game will be F2P by Christmas

Nebthet78

Head on over to Reddit, that is where the real official ESO forum is.

Armitas

Yeah it does seem unusually small. Even after the forum update it still seems like an underdeveloped forum*. Not sure why it doesn't get much attention. I came from Lotro and their forums are lively and well done. They have also won "best community" awards for several years.

Why do people use reddit?

(*To give an example, even though I have selected English, I still have to select the English alliance war section)

Csub

I don't use redit and I mostly use this forum when I am traveling and bored so I check it out on my phone. Most people I know don't use the forums at all.

deepseamk20b14_ESO

Whenever I log in there are always people, so I am happy. If they one day made it so people could cross faction group or something it would seem WAY more populated.

Lord_Kreegan

Relative to early start and release, no, the game doesn't have as many active players (and thus contributors to the forums).

However, implicitly, general discussion forums always have more participants than forums targeted at specific subject areas. First off, general discussion forums inevitably include the subject material expected to be targeted in those forums, so there's no need to go there. Second, human nature being what it is, people are pack animals and will go where the pack is located... in the general discussion forum.

Beyond all that, the majority of people in any game do not participate in forums, although many will come to forums to search for answers to issues they've encountered (although they still will not say anything).

Given the large number of fanbois and jerks that typically inhabit forums, I'm not surprised that people don't participate. If they want obtuse arguments, it's easier to just get married.

AlnilamE

If I had time to be in game right now, I would not be here.

If I'm playing, I'm not posting. It's that simple.

Pendrillion

As far as I hear from the folks ingame. Not many do care for the forums. Or even know they have an account there. When I told some of my friends that there is even a stream show, they were baffled. I guess the age argument counts some. Other than that. Zeni doesn't exactly advertise its community functionality.

And I also think some folks find it redundant to check Boards. Well maybe except for customer service.

kevlarto_ESO

I know several people that don't even come to the forums, I am sure they are not the only ones, I have some friends that only read and never post. Maybe it is a good thing..:)

Koga

yodased wrote: »

I think the game garners a different type of main player though. If you are comparing this community with other MMO communities its tough. The crowd here is typically older and more into the game than the internet in my experience.

Most younger folks multitask a lot better than the older crowd, so discussing the game, tabbing into the forums while waiting for the porting to a dungeon is common. Here is more laid back and calm IMO so you have less need to discuss the game and more need to play it!

Plus its new and people are still figuring out the systems and idiosyncrasies of the game world.

That or the sky is falling and the game will be F2P by Christmas

Us old folk enjoy playing the game and figuring out how to adapt more than whining about what they. Changed in the most recent patch.

While 90% of our guild is complaining about forward camps, the old timers are collecting undaunted gold keys and re making guear to. Accommodate boss sholders and helm sets

Alphashado

Forum population is still a reflection of game population. Say only 2% of active subscibers come to the forum. If 100k people were playing, then that would be 2k forum dwellers. 400k-4k etc.

The game population is OK. That's all. Nothing spectacular, but it isn't dead. All of the lower lvl zones are still packed with people.

1-50 is an amazing game and enough to attract new players and retain some old ones.

VR1-VR14 is what is killing this game. Hands down. Once the average new player comes to realize that lvl 50 means NOTHING, and that the grind has only just begone... well... the population of the VR zones speaks for itself I guess.

This game has amazing potential. Maybe the champion system will make everything post lvl 50 seem like less of a grind. Time will tell.

Audigy

I think we must look at the other forums "quality" first before we can consider ESO dead.

WOW is full of troll topics, as Blizz doesn't moderate their forums anymore. It has been ages that I was at EA´s but back in the days there wasn't a real discussion going on there either.

Sure there are gaming forums that have more posts / hour but real conversations almost never exist.

At ESO we have a mod team that filters trolls and rude behavior and because of this it looks more empty than others and in my opinion they could mod it even stricter here, as some trolls still crawl into each thread and leave their nonsense there


Besides that yes, ESO has elder players and they don't spam forums as they also have to work or fight with the wife / husband over diner Elitism is thank god very small so this also leaves a specific type of player out, not someone I miss to be honest.

So no, the game isn't dead. That said, Reddit should never be the main target group of ZO, its a third party website and nothing else.

shawnpreub18_ESO1

These forums are difficult to use, for one. They spam you with various languages right off the bat, although they know what language you speak. It's annoying and makes using these forums unpleasant. I'm sure it doesn't help for community building.

Loneshard

Audigy wrote: »

I think we must look at the other forums "quality" first before we can consider ESO dead.

WOW is full of troll topics, as Blizz doesn't moderate their forums anymore. It has been ages that I was at EA´s but back in the days there wasn't a real discussion going on there either.

Sure there are gaming forums that have more posts / hour but real conversations almost never exist.

At ESO we have a mod team that filters trolls and rude behavior and because of this it looks more empty than others and in my opinion they could mod it even stricter here, as some trolls still crawl into each thread and leave their nonsense there


Besides that yes, ESO has elder players and they don't spam forums as they also have to work or fight with the wife / husband over diner Elitism is thank god very small so this also leaves a specific type of player out, not someone I miss to be honest.

So no, the game isn't dead. That said, Reddit should never be the main target group of ZO, its a third party website and nothing else.

Very well said!
Thanks

WraithAzraiel

Those "hot" threads you're referencing aren't hot. They were ones with the most recent posts. Unless a "hot" thread has had someone post within recently it won't show up.

Nestor

Maverick827 wrote: »

This sub-forum is really the only one that gets any traffic. If you go to the other sub-forums, you'll see posts from more than a week ago still on the front page.

The Structure of the forums have more to do with that than the population. Plus they tend to not move threads that should be in those sections from General to those sub-directories.

We also don't need 6 sub-categories under PvE, 7 sub categories under Combat and Skill Lines, things like that. If those were consolidated, they might look more active, or perhaps actually be more active.

Erock25

Small compared to what? This forum's activity blows away my former MMO, Age of Conan.

Vyle_Byte

I don't understand why people use Reddit, its terrible! Really ugly setup imo. I don't think the ESO community is dead, I think there are a multitude of people who simply don't forum lol!

On a side note, I prefer to look at the forums by hitting the 'recent discussions', its the only way I like to browse.

Nestor

Vyle_Byte wrote: »

I think there are a multitude of people who simply don't forum lol!

On a side note, I prefer to look at the forums by hitting the 'recent discussions', its the only way I like to browse.

Yes, the number of views is vastly more than the number of responses here. I think a lot of people participate in the forums by clicking on the Agrees etc rather than posting.

And yes, Recent Discussions is really the best way to find active threads.

Armitas

One of the big things this forum is lacking are guides. Real comprehensive guides. How to do dungeons, tanking, healing etc. There is very little in the way of support here, it's more like a complaint, request, bug report forum. That could be one of the reasons no one comes here.

babylon

Armitas wrote: »

One of the big things this forum is lacking are guides. Real comprehensive guides. How to do dungeons, tanking, healing etc. There is very little in the way of support here, it's more like a complaint, request, bug report forum. That could be one of the reasons no one comes here.

Pretty sure there's a guide forum, hidden away somewhere under about three different layers of main section - section - language section - subsection...at least I think I saw it once...

spryler

The registration process is not a sure thing on this forums. It asks you for your invitation code, which I didn't have. I had to email ESO with my username and they set up an account. That may prevent some people from using these forums.

Personally I love these forums - there are no adds or pop up videos. Not only is that less annoying, but my work doesn't block this website! I participate in the forums only while I'm at work.

Nestor

Armitas wrote: »

One of the big things this forum is lacking are guides. Real comprehensive guides. How to do dungeons, tanking, healing etc. There is very little in the way of support here, it's more like a complaint, request, bug report forum. That could be one of the reasons no one comes here.

babylon wrote: »

Pretty sure there's a guide forum, hidden away somewhere under about three different layers of main section - section - language section - subsection...at least I think I saw it once...

It's a sub section of the General Discussion Section, it right at the top of the list of topics for General

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/categories/EN-player-guides

Although this is sometimes done in the New Player section, which is also a sub section of General.

Armitas

Nestor wrote: »

Armitas wrote: »

One of the big things this forum is lacking are guides. Real comprehensive guides. How to do dungeons, tanking, healing etc. There is very little in the way of support here, it's more like a complaint, request, bug report forum. That could be one of the reasons no one comes here.

babylon wrote: »

Pretty sure there's a guide forum, hidden away somewhere under about three different layers of main section - section - language section - subsection...at least I think I saw it once...

It's a sub section of the General Discussion Section, it right at the top of the list of topics for General

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/categories/EN-player-guides

Although this is sometimes done in the New Player section, which is also a sub section of General.

I have one of my own guides there, I know where it is, and that we have a player guides section. It's just that there is nothing useful there other than a few builds. There are a few really good guides there but nothing like you would find in other games. We need a guide section with sub sections like dungeon, quest, builds etc. Those sections need to be monitored so that only helpful on topic guides are there, not posters asking questions or reporting bugs. And then we actually need guides in those sections which is up to the players. Or they could leave things as they are and add an "official guide section" where guides that are ZOS approved are placed for easy access.

It will be successful when someone who gets stuck on a dungeon boss can pop open the forums, go to the dungeon guide section find the appropriate guide quickly and see how to get past boss X. Right now it's like asking for a folder at work, to which they point to a file cabinet bursting at the seams and they say, "yeah it's in there somewhere". You go through the file cabinet and it's not alphabetized, and nothing is in a folder.

Potenza

You have 5 stars and you think this community is not alive? You posted this thread at 1:00 and at 5:00 your still getting replies.
This community is very much alive.

abigfishy

Alphashado wrote: »

Forum population is still a reflection of game population. Say only 2% of active subscibers come to the forum. If 100k people were playing, then that would be 2k forum dwellers. 400k-4k etc.

The game population is OK. That's all. Nothing spectacular, but it isn't dead. All of the lower lvl zones are still packed with people.

1-50 is an amazing game and enough to attract new players and retain some old ones.

VR1-VR14 is what is killing this game. Hands down. Once the average new player comes to realize that lvl 50 means NOTHING, and that the grind has only just begone... well... the population of the VR zones speaks for itself I guess.

This game has amazing potential. Maybe the champion system will make everything post lvl 50 seem like less of a grind. Time will tell.

I think this post is very wise. 1-50 is amazing. The V grind is a killer. I can't speak of what everyone wants but what I want is a reasonable climb to 50 then to feel like everyone is equalish in terms of power. Then I can go hunting achievements, rare equipment, do PvP etc but feel like my character is competitive. There should still be TONS of things to do and achieve, still skill points, still Undaunted, Fighters and Mages skills to unlock etc. But if everyone was fixed at max level 50 or if V1-14 wasn't so *** awful the game would be much better.