Devs confirm Vet levels here to stay (until sometime after console release)

wraith808

Cazic wrote: »

They should just remove the term "Veteran Ranks", add one more level and increase the total level cap to 65. That way there's no need to redo the gear and item progression, and we get a nice complete sounding number like 65 instead of 14.

That would be even stupider. There is a definite cliff when you reach 50/VR1 to get to VR2. Making that 50-51 would be a monumental mistake.

Lord_Draevan

What it should be, and what I think the plan for Phase 4 will be, is to make the max level 50 and beyond that all you earn is Champion Points.

NewBlacksmurf

Cazic wrote: »

They should just remove the term "Veteran Ranks", add one more level and increase the total level cap to 65. That way there's no need to redo the gear and item progression, and we get a nice complete sounding number like 65 instead of 14.

I've been saying this since April....apparently its somehow not the same.
But clearly its the same....bad design...we started something that we can't finish.
AND NOW WE HAVE ADDED MORE CRAP....CP levels too this

Game longevity = VR level expansions and CP level both gained by exp in the same VR content zones...

August 2015 = NEWS!!! We have added more content to the game....VR max is now VR16 and CP up to 90.

SMH...this is madness....Where is a Daedric Prince when you need one?

clocksstoppe

Nothing to discuss really. History will repeat itself. 80% of the players gained from the relaunch in march will quit after one month because they will reach VR1 and realize what they have to go through...

RedTalon

I'm shocked, stunned and kidding!

Focus will be cash shop and other paid for things till they going deep into making money, then we will see an expasion every year like with TOR but the rest of the time money money!

There is a vast console market out there to hook in and fleece

Rezzy64

I always thought it was funny that Veteran Ranks were considered to be horizontal end game progression... last time I checked I'm still grinding my characters in a vertical fashion with little to no change in the play style in order to hit my mins and maxes. As others have said, it might as well just be level 65.

I don't hate the Veteran Ranks, they just seem redundant to an already properly developed leveling system. If anything it's as others have pointed out, flawed compared to our already properly set level progression system.

I always felt like the main difference between normal level progression and Veteran Ranks is the experience curve. It's like the developers thought it was important to design the game from a casual point of view where the max level can be achieved within two months or less and then when Veteran Ranks are achieved the experience curve is changed to progress slower to imply you are now playing the game on hard mode or something.

Veteran ranks are not really all that much of a challenge, and I've played MMO's with much steeper experience curves, where the max level would be in the hundreds and it would take you three months just to hit level 30. The steeper experience curve allowed slower progression which in turn made the environments and content more memorable because you would often spend an entire month in a single environment. Also the rewards from level progression felt more valuable because when you leveled up through such a steep experience curve, the new statistic and skill gain felt extremely valuable and rewarding.
I can understand how some people would argue against this style as to it being slow and discouraging, but in the MMO's I've played they were quite successful with their slow experience tables because the players legitimately felt like they worked very hard for their current progress on their character which also allowed players to become more attached to their characters and made them feel like they were truly being rewarded for their skill builds where as other players who found it too hard would give up and find another style to try to progress in until they would finally achieve their comfort zone for a character within the game.

I honestly at this point have no real idea where this game is going anymore. Before the B2P announcement I thought I had a pretty good idea of where this game was going and even put a lot of faith in it's direction... but now, I feel like this game has become a religious following, everyone who is still playing including myself is just holding on to their faith in hopes that in the end everything is just going to somehow work out for the better. Out of all the MMO's I've played, I've never felt so blind in the dark grasping at straws as I do with ESO.
I still heavily enjoy the game, I can hop onto the game and immediately enjoy everything that is there... but when ever I look towards the future of this game, all I see is mystery and uneasiness.

rophez_ESO

clocksstoppe wrote: »

Nothing to discuss really. History will repeat itself. 80% of the players gained from the relaunch in march will quit after one month because they will reach VR1 and realize what they have to go through...

Yeah, but ZOS will already have their money from the B2P purchase, and enough will still be leveling to see the first DLC. The rest of us who are already done with everything are the ones getting the stiff arm. I'm just going to put the game on a shelf for 6 months or so, I guess, and see what ZOS has in store for people with their DLC. Unless I get wrapped up in another MMO in the meantime...

Lied

This really seems like a huge mistake. I can't see why history wouldn't repeat itself for the console.

For the PC, even with CP to earn in 1.6, gearing is a large part of the entertainment/content a lot of people play these types of games for. Now you have people flying in a holding pattern because they don't want to invest time in an area of the game that is going to change drastically in the "near" future.

Not to mention I can't even imagine the frustration of balancing/tolerating balance issues that 1.6 introduces in PvP only to know that sooner or later they're going to have drastically re-zero the scope in all over again.

I mainly came back to the game because I heard they were removing VRs since I thought that meant they might have stopped smoking crack.

Gyudan

Cazic wrote: »

They should just remove the term "Veteran Ranks", add one more level and increase the total level cap to 65. That way there's no need to redo the gear and item progression, and we get a nice complete sounding number like 65 instead of 14.

That cosmetic change would achieve absolutely nothing.

The veteran ranks add about 130-150 mandatory play between level 50 and max level. In the meantime, mid-veteran players still have access to veteran and normal pledges, that are the only real content scaling to their level.

VR1-VR13 are missing out on:
- Trials (AA, Hel Ra, SO)
- Dragonstar Arena Normal and Veteran
- Access to the best item sets
- Incentive to upgrade their gear to legendary, since they'll outlevel it a few hours later
- Fair fights in PVP

Suggestions for @ZOS:
- Allow level scaling of the first 2 trials (Aetherian Archive and Hel Ra Citadel) and Dragonstar Arena Normal to group leader level, down to VR1. Downscaled completions shouldn't count towards leaderboards.
- If the console version is successful enough, add a PVP campaign limited to VR10, in addition to the non-vet campaign.

Alphashado

I called this right after the b2p announcement. So it's no surprise to me. All I can say that I haven't said already is at least they finally came out and made an official statement instead of leaving us to speculate. For whatever that's worth.

Metrobius

This is just more proof that ZOS has No concern for current players. The more I learn about the way they run this game, the more irritated I become.
They have been lying to us about their plans so we stayed subbed to their retail beta test and we all fell for it.
And anyone who says that we got what we paid for is either a troll or just masochistic, because ZOS sold us this game with all of their promises of content and game systems thag would be added right after launch. Instead we got an incomplete game that still has bugs that we reported during closed beta, along with a lot of lies and excuses about why all of our content was delayed again and again.
now we know the truth. They werent working on our content, they were working on their cash shop and lying about it.

WraithAzraiel

Neizir wrote: »

Very, very stupid move on ZOS's part.

Veteran Ranks are a nuisance and shouldn't even be in the game in the first place. They do absolutely nothing except for causing massive disparity issues in PvP and segregating content.

Is it so hard to implement something like level scaling, especially considering you're using it in the DLC zones? There are other ways to provide a sense of progression besides inhibiting content by levels.

Veteran Ranks were always ever a stop-gap measure. They were meant to force us to take time, to allow the Dev's time to release content.

What was the cap before Craglorn was dropped? V10? Then once Craglorn came out? V12? or did it jump straight to V14?


Carrot on a stick.

Now that carrot's leading us on a 7+ month journey to what? a new solo zone? MAYBE Imperial City? Probably not Dark Brotherhood or Thieves' Guild content,

Orsinium? (Which supposedly used to be called Wrothgar, but if I'm not mistaken they were BOTH separate zones during the QuakeCon video, Wrothgar would be coming long before Orsinium. So what? Did they can one of them? Was 3 zones too much? The other one, what was it? Black Marsh? That got tabled too looks like.)

We need a man(or woman) on the inside. We need a mole to tell us what's really going on.

Send in the drones! Spy vs Spy!

RSram

First, I agree this is a big mistake, but I really think it is more of a huge technical issue that can't be resolved before the console release.

If the VR system is removed, what do you do about all the VR level gear that players are using? Do you down grade them to level 50? Or do you respect ALL the gear and items from level 1 through VR14 to keep the VR players happy?

If level 50 is the maximum level, how do you respect the difficulty in the Cadwell's Silver and Gold quests to make each zone successively difficult? Cadwell's quest are a grind already, but can you imagine how much more boring it would be if every zone had a level 50 difficulty. At least with the current system, the VR level of difficulty increases in each zone.

What about lower and upper Craglorn? Do you respect them to level 50 also?

The point of adding new content is to give the players something new and challenging? How do you do this if new content is capped at level 50?

I'm not defending their decision, but the game designers created a game structure that will not be easily changed without putting months of design effort into doing this, but the bean counters want the consoles to make more money - now.

Once the game goes B2P in March, I plan to cancel my subscription because, I won't used the crown store, the the 10% passives won't give me any advantage I feel is worth $15 a month. As for the DLC's, I rather have the subscribers beta test them first, and then I will buy them as needed. Since it will most likely be six months or more before a DLC will be available, I will save money by not subscribing and buying the DLC.

My prediction is that after the initial console sales, that ESO will fade away into mediocrity. Although there is a lot that I like about ESO, the lore, music, sound, graphics, and combat mechanics, the game misses the most important reason why I was initially excited to play: Group play while doing quests in a Skyrim like game.

I could continue, but then I would bore you as much as ESO is boring to me.

BBSooner

Veteran levels would be far more tolerable if it wasn't part of the deal that you had to go through the other factions. Perhaps they're going for the whole:

"Veteran levels are sticking around for a little while ... but hey if you don't want to run Cadwell's buy this DLC for some new storylines! "

bosmern_ESO

Only things that bother me is no small scale pvp and no new endgame content.

Right now (no matter how much ZoS has tried to get rid of grinding) players can get to max level in 2-3 weeks tops. Right now there isn't much you can do endgame, you can do:

PvP
Trails
Daily pledges
DSA

With no new endgame content scheduled from march to the end of the summer, All the new and returning players that come in March and in June wont be staying around for long.

The champion system is amazing, but when everyone else comes to play and ZoS has said there will be nothing new coming out they will more than likely drop the game the second the have other thoughts about it or get bored.

The reason why a good amount of players have stuck around is because we are all looking forward to the future updates, I haven't heard anyone on this game say "I like how the game is currently, I wish it would stay the same" But I always hear people saying things like "I can't wait until march, update 1.6 is what ESO really should've been"

dodgehopper_ESO

Cazic wrote: »

They should just remove the term "Veteran Ranks", add one more level and increase the total level cap to 65. That way there's no need to redo the gear and item progression, and we get a nice complete sounding number like 65 instead of 14.

This just sounds so OCD. I think occasional raises in the bar are not such a bad idea. I personally like the notion of many small updates to huge ones you wait six months to a year for. I don't really see what the big deal is.

Winnower

The real way to fix "veteran ranks" is to change the scaling of the xp needed to get a level to be consistent with Levels 1-50, rename them 51-64, add 6 more to make it go to 70 (just to be arbitrary).

Plus that will help move one step closer to becoming a nice generic World of Wonder: The One Ring Clone Beet Wars Neverquest Game rather than being a game that immerses you in The Elder Scrolls with Moon Sugar, etc.

It was all just a personal dragon-break, move along, nothing to see here.

Der_Deutsche_Hase

Sallington wrote: »

Focus is on the cash shop and new buyers. Standard B2P/F2P practice. OGs get shafted.

Get used to it. This comes with all B2P/F2P games. Since no more subscription fee to play, things like P2W comes. If they don't do things like this however, they would have no money at all to release any content.

kieso

well I hope they do go away eventually; can't stand them. Thanks a whole lot for VR levels beta testers.

Alphashado

kieso wrote: »

well I hope they do go away eventually; can't stand them. Thanks a whole lot for VR levels beta testers.

I was there during beta tests. We weren't allowed to test anything besides the starter zones and the lvl 1-15 zones. They might have opened the level 20 zones during the last beta wknd if I recall.

Nobody had any idea how much the veteran grind sucked until people started getting there and began posting on the forums about it.

technohic

Yeah, i'm sitting here thinking about it and I will be done with them on my main so all it means is I will not bother with an alt so when I get bored with my main, its time for a new game.

k2blader

Heruthema wrote: »

Not sure why this is a surprise to anyone. They said a long time ago, before they released the information regarding the console release and b2p, that 1.6 was only phase three of the champion system and that vet levels would stay until phase four.
Not sure where anyone got they idea that vet levels were going away before 1.7 and phase four (1.7) will not be released until after the consoles are released with 1.6.

Roping folks along. Yeah, not a surprise. I'm actually kind of glad it's going F2P because that means my decision is made for me-- I spend less (no) money on this amusement.

Rosveen

Alphashado wrote: »

kieso wrote: »

well I hope they do go away eventually; can't stand them. Thanks a whole lot for VR levels beta testers.

I was there during beta tests. We weren't allowed to test anything besides the starter zones and the lvl 1-15 zones. They might have opened the level 20 zones during the last beta wknd if I recall.

Nobody had any idea how much the veteran grind sucked until people started getting there and began posting on the forums about it.

PTS beta testers had access to the rest of the game.

Maverick827

I would say that veteran levels will become sort of an MMO design parable after ESO shuts down, like NGE SWG, but I don't even thing ESO ever reached high enough to even become a passing reference on a non-ESO-dedicated medium.

This game had zero word of mouth after it launched. People are talking more about indie MMOs than they are about ESO.

Yusuf

dharbert wrote: »

They just added VR10 recipes in 1.6. Vet levels aren't going away anytime soon.

Your old v5 recipes are the new v10 recipes and there are no blue v10 recipes either. They also pale in comparison to the current v5-recipes in regards to effectiveness.

I don't see any improvement there.

Robocles

Rodario wrote: »

dharbert wrote: »

You should be thankful they aren't removing veteran ranks. You think 1.6 is a big change? Removing veteran ranks would be even more of a monumental challenge. Everything about ESO would have to change. Every weapon set, every jewelry set, every armor set, all quest rewards, all food, all drinks, all potions, everything would have to be redone and balanced. I'm sure ZOS knows this and that's why it's going to be a long time before that happens, if ever.

The question is: Why didn't they realize this from the beginning? Surely the players can't have been the only ones to ask "What will happen to VR gear, mats and consumables?".

This issue with this group isn't confined to the 1.6 release or the transition to a no sub model or the removal of vet ranks... it's been an issue from a fairly early part of beta. They just don't listen... they try to convince you they know better.

As soon as they announced that they were adding the two consoles, many of us realized this was the path they would take. There was never any way in hell they could possibly move Microsoft to waive their fees for Gold access. Ever.

This swap to a cash shop takes a good amount of time to implement... and they've been sitting on the information for at least the better part of 6 months.

So, those of us that played and believed this company, oh well... now we know.

No new content until after summer makes it easy to decide if they get any more money, right?

Robocles

Der_Deutsche_Hase wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Focus is on the cash shop and new buyers. Standard B2P/F2P practice. OGs get shafted.

Get used to it. This comes with all B2P/F2P games. Since no more subscription fee to play, things like P2W comes. If they don't do things like this however, they would have no money at all to release any content.

Agreed.... but we didn't buy a B2P game... we bought a game the President of the company promised would never become one.

Vunter

@nerevarine1138 Well, I did say to not be so hopeful...

Lauradana

Everquest Next is beginning to look REAL good now that I have just read this.
This lot is not getting another penny out of me or the wife, we both had 2 x 6 months subs which we both cancelled and now we are just waiting for the beta of EQ Next to see if they are really going to deliver a sandbox game like they promised, if they do that then this game is so dead for me you would not belive it and I and the wife were real hardcore fans of this game, but too much lying (yes the devs listen to the players my aunt Fanny) and not going back on promises have killed it for us.

SirKeka

I just hope the good people at Zenimax clear their head and get their priorities straight. Murdering the Veteran Ranks should be on top of the list. All 14 of the [snip].

[Moderator Note: Edited per our rules on Cursing & Profanity]