Best faction

Hamztein

What is the best faction to play? And why?
meaning great maps, quests, etc, fun in general... please reply if you played in all 3, and not just to defend your own.

Cagro

I have done a few of the DC and EP's quests, and unless I missed a quest by mistake, I did ALL of the AD's quests. The AD story is okay and the areas are nice. Some people think, including myself, that the AD's quests can be done faster than the others because of its starting areas' design (only one starting island and everything is close by). AD's story deals with some High Elf's racists that want to dethrone the queen, Khajiits' drug problems, and Bosmers' death penalty for anybody who hurt a plant (but killing and eating your foes is okay). I kind of favor the DC story myself but again I had only done a few of its quests.

PBpsy

BloodStorm

Factions really don't mean anything other than pvp. You can play them all on one character. 1-49 I would say Ebonheart because Eastmarch and The Rift are my favorite zones. I do like Auridon and Ravenspire though.

TheSunAlsoRises

the thing i like about AD is that from early on, questing is easy and you can level fast because everything is nearby. but i hate elves.

Nestor

All the Factions are good. You will play all the factions at some point anyway.

I have characters in all 3 Alliances.

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Rylana

PBpsy wrote: »

As a former STO player, that made me giggle.

MCMancub

I thought AD had, by far, the worst, most boring storyline of all 3 factions. DC and EP are pretty close in my opinion.

Also, other than Auridon, I hated the AD zones.

TheSunAlsoRises

i thought the EP faction story was the best of the 3. i hate ayrenn and emeric.

StaticWax

Isn't AD where the old people play?

lecarcajou_ESO

Our starting zone's a bit sooty, but you can't beat the EP for gloom and doom.

TheSunAlsoRises

dark elves also have the best butts.

dodgehopper_ESO

PBpsy wrote: »

Qapla!

Draxys

Anything but EP, jorunn sounds like he has anger issues and an iq of 12

TheShadowScout

I prefer the EP story, and not only because I am an incorrigable dunmer player ever since TES:Daggerfall...

I just like how the EP story gives you decent reasons to have go at the other factions in cyrodil... some serious grudgework here. While for the other two, "enemy incursions" are more like small and easily foiled things...

Mr_Nobody

I find DC being a very noob-friendly faction/alliance cause of all the medieval looks, you dont have to deal with endless forests and volcanos however, same goes with PvP, if you plan to play it only every now and then in large groups, you will find yourself getting wrecked by numbers equal and usually lesser two to three times of EP/AD. Covenant pugs are definately the worst thing that could ever be, way worse than all these random Albs in DAoC. Specific factors include Tunnel Vision of approx. 20 degrees; lack of general understanding of what a keep or tower is, neither how it has to be taken or defended properly (you will find youself losing keeps to 20ish enemies while you had approx. 50 guys defending it; Wanna-be Havoc randoms that run around spamming aoe spells with a stack 3-4 people and then complaining how imbalanced the game is after they get wrecked by some solo guy ~ The list would go on but these were the first thoughts that came to my mind!

All in all, if you plan to PvE alot, DC is very cool!

Robo_Hobo

As far as quests and storylines go, DC is my favorite - but to be fair I still have to complete the Rift's storyline and the side quests for all of EP.

As far as culture for the races and their histories, AD is my favorite, because the Khajiit are very interesting to me, and the Bosmer are very...different, it's fun to explore their land and see how they live.

As far as environments go, EP is my favorite, for the variety of biomes it has. Snowy Eastmarch, Temperate Rift, Volcanic Stonefalls, the swamps of Shadowfen.

Daemons_Bane

I'd say EP, since I've always been a Nord.. AD are some sick freaks :-)

Iluvrien

Ebonheart Pact is superb in every detail except the man who leads it. Jorunn needs to be dropped in a hole.

...It says something that I was in two minds about who I wanted to win in the final quest in the EP main quest line. I ended up favouring the current leader only because I didn't want the other citizens of the Pact to suffer.

Ffastyl

As far as content within factions go...
Daggerfall Covenant has good stories that stick, a recurring crew of characters that may or may not be related to a quest(s) in each zone, and desert. Desert isn't a big draw for me --actually, it's a minus-- but Daggerfall Covenant is the only faction with a desert (Aldmeri Dominion has a Sevanna. Close, but not quite). I also enjoy the wooded areas of the Daggerfall Covenant quite a lot. And Darien Gautier.

Aldmeri Dominion has the beautiful Auridon, interesting side quests (the most memorable quest ingame is found in Grahtwood), a likeable main character or sidekick (no one can pick which), and interesting cultures. The Altmer are isolationist at the core, the Bosmer are... weird for lack of a better word, and the Khajiit are... also weird. But in a different way from the Bosmer. The one big minus to the Aldmeri Dominion is it is 4.5 zones of forest. Sure the first zone is a colorful forest, and the rest go through varying shades of green and brown, but it elicits environmental fatigue by zone 3 - Greenshade. The last 0.5 is sevanna.

Ebonheart Pact has a variety of environs from ashlands to Morrowind proper to the swamps of Black Marsh to the snow, forest, woods, and mountains of eastern Skyrim. While the other two factions can cause environmental fatigue in some fashion and degree (Upper half of Glenumbra for Daggerfall Covenant), the Ebonheart Pact has drastic biome changes even within single zones! Also, the Argonians are weird (in a different way from the Bosmer and Khajiit), the Nords are either jovial drunks or a-holes, and the Dunmer... after visiting Morrowind for the first time, I hate Dunmer.

So which one is best? Either Daggerfall Covenant or Aldmeri Dominion. I have not made a character aligned with each faction, but through the Veteran Zones I have played through the content of all three on one. I would like to create a character in a different faction so I may experience the Daggerfall Covenant as Veteran Zones. Veteran Zones have more replayability due to less power gap between levels. So while I feel nostalgia for the zones of Daggerfall Covenant, I am more familiar with the zones of Aldmeri Dominion and Ebonheart Pact. Daggerfall Covenant and Aldmeri Dominion both have their share of environmental quests (ones triggered without an explicit Quest Giver or are triggered by environmental interaction. e.g. not talking to an NPC.), and said quests were memorable for each faction. The two most memorable for each faction made me regret taking virtual life, to different effects. The main quests were better in Daggerfall Covenant, and the cultures more intriguing in Aldmeri Dominion. Breton, Redguard and Orc cultures are similar enough to Earthen cultures that parallels can be drawn while the Bosmer are complete alien entities.

Culture is a spark for conversation, but the stories are what are to be enjoyed most, and Daggerfall Covenant wins in that department.
It was... unconventional to see 'villains' I had slain on Nirn appear in Coldharbour, their thoughts changed by death. It gave an unexpected depth and connection for them, knowing the part you played in their fates and the part you continue to play.

In regards to playerbases, all I know are the general numbers:
Ebonheart Pact is more populated than Aldmeri Dominion which is more populated than Daggerfall Covenant.
I am not fit to judge them in terms of the players that inhabit each faction.

TL;DR Daggerfall Covenant b/c better story + recurring characters.

AngryNord

Ebonheart Pact. Because Nord.

Aballister

StaticWax wrote: »

Isn't AD where the old people play?

Don't think so, I'm only 38

leshpar

Fight for the Pact or die by my sword.

(The Pact has argonians. Nuff said)

Moonshadow66

I played all alliances' zones several times, and I'd say they're all great and nicely done.

But my favorite is the Pact. 7 of my 8 characters are Pact members, 1 is a DC character and now finally in the Gold zone (Stonefalls/Pact), I never can get enough of that

No matter what you do and which alliance you choose to start with, you can always play and complete all alliances' zones with 1 character.

Moonshadow66

leshpar wrote: »

Fight for the Pact or die by my sword.

(The Pact has argonians. Nuff said)

Pact FTW^^
But, what if every single player would be a Pact member? Wouldn't it suck in Cyrodiil?

Korah_Eaglecry

Ive played through EP and a part of DC. And while it was nice to see DCs areas. The story just fell flat for me. EP was a step above it but over all I think the story is not as compelling as past Elder Scrolls games.

So with that in mind. It really is just about preference when it comes to the Race you choose and whether you want them to represent said Faction they would normally be apart of.

I personally like the EPs back story. But its interesting to see that even within all of the Factions theres a very thin line that each group kind of walks. Where at any moment things can come to blows even between allies (DC Storyline really highlights this well).

F7sus4

StaticWax wrote: »

Isn't AD where the old people play?

Weren't there a population statistics website that actually showed AD has the most 18-21 players of all factions?

Moonshadow66

StaticWax wrote: »

Isn't AD where the old people play?

That would be the Pact^^

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Earelith

@Ffastyl Great overview of the Factions. Since I love forests a lot, I don't have a problem with AD In wow I was in an RP server and in a Night Elf RP guild that we were protecting Ashenvale (a forest area). I was spending the majority of my time there without a problem

What tires me a lot is desert areas or volcano ones. In general I am Forest > Meadows > Snowy Mountains > rest.