Hello ESO Forums,
I posted this on my website but I know ZOS reads these forums so I figured I'd share my thoughts here. I'm one person the sea of awesome people that love this game. With the announcement of increase in Veteran Ranks I'd like to leave my feedback whether you agree or not. And here's what I have to say about the problem and fixing it.
Before I start I want to make clear where my opinions come from. I make my living playing THIS video game only. Not only that, but it's my primary means of socialization. Over the past two years (including beta), I've been infatuated with the idea of a multiplayer Elder Scrolls Game. Not to mention the help that ZOS has personally given me. I still love ESO, but I'm not going to blindly follow a games growth that does not fit my needs. Just realize the passion I have for this game, it's community and developers runs deep.
VR 16?
Within the same breath, Eric Wrobel said they still have long term plans of removing Veteran Ranks (VR), but for the new content they are increasing it by two thus making end game VR 16. At this point, I think it's clear that Veteran Ranks aren't going away, ANYTIME in the future. I have eight VR 14s and the problem I have with this isn't the time investment to re-level all those characters, or the fully legendary gear, but the constant deception about not adding more Veteran Ranks. We as customers have a right to voice or opinions and/or a right to stop being customers. For me, it's time to pick one and voicing seems to be the best option.
I have defended their decisions as a business model constantly but this is one I cannot ignore. Adding Veteran Ranks is not content, it's busy work. Content is intractable quest, dungeon diving finding worthwhile rewards with friends, a working PvP system giving flexibility and choices. Yes, I know Imperial City is coming with this additional Veteran Ranks, but why increase the cap? "Deltia to increase the contents difficulty," well that's true in most MMOs but not ESO and that's due to the Champion System.
Champion Progression
Most games have a level cap that once reached, one works on optimizing gear and your individual skill for increased performance. However, ESO has the Champion System rendering time in game collecting XP as account progression. So take the most skilled PvPer in the world (let's say Sypher) vs. someone with 1,000 more champion points. Skill is irreverent at this point. Thus removing one of the core reasons I play MMOs and video games alike. Busy work trumps constantly improving yourself. Grinding mobs and CP is the new meta, not skill.
Take another game for instance, you have fully maxed out gear and have been playing for four years. Once a level increase hits, most players will be on an even playing field in terms of gear. So, there is some possibility of catching up to those folks that spend eight hours a day in game. Not ESO, there is no Champion Point catch up mechanic. The person at level 10 might be more powerful than someone at VR14 due to CP. Without a catch up mechanic or a way to limit zombie grinding macros and bots, you'll have a runaway performance gap the size the Grand Canyon.
The Fix
Someone like me benefits significantly from the Champion System. Having alts, grinding mobs and skills, etc just makes me VERY powerful. But it does not help new players, inexperienced ones nor the overall game. My good friend Parfax had an excellent suggestion, simply have seasons for Champion Points. Meaning, every three months or so, you could gain 100 CP. Once you reach that number, you have to wait for the reset. No more 100 v 1,000 CP fights. If that doesn't work, why not make CP have diminishing returns? So the first 300 are very easy to obtain, but everything beyond that is harder (similar to Alliance Ranks).
I'm all for account wide progression, but at what cost? At the cost that people grinding zombies ultimately win? At the cost that skill and performance are removed out of the game? I want to one day challenge Sypher in PvP without out grinding him. With skill, learning, getting my face kicked in by him over and over just to beat him one day with pure skill. Until this changes, the easier way for me to beat him is out grind him. Obtain such a mathematical advantage that no amount of skill can compensate. And that is the day that ESO dies.
Why I Give a ****
No I do not plan on leaving the game. I still love the combat, the people and the developers. But I'm no longer a bushy eyed fan-boy. I don't want to leave this game, this is my absolute favorite thing to do (well besides you know what). I've have (not had) such an emotional attachment to the land of Tamriel that I won't let it go just yet. But I'm not going to sit back and let another level increase happen without a true fix to the underlying problem, the Champion System.
I do not think even a 1000 champion point lead will = win. Give an advantage? sure, but that's the point isn't it?
I also think they should just shelve getting rid of the VR levels, they add a great way to experience the other alliances, and instead of spending resources turning the game upside down and inside out trying to remove them could be used to expand/improve/bug fix the game. Do they take a long time? yeah, and it took me a very long time before my first max character. (I like alts) That's ok, it's an mmorpg. It should take a while to reach max level.
I personally hate the idea of veteran ranks, but I think most people are overreacting. I am actually reassured that they do still plan on getting rid of VRs. And this is coming from a guy with multiple tinfoil hats in his limited wardrobe.
ZOS needs to get true content out there soon, but addressing the problems of vet ranks would only delay this.
Everyone wants new content with improved gear, but how do you suggest improving gear without new veteran ranks? Sure, we all have our own ideas/opinions of how to do this. You could scrap the VR system now and create a new system for gear itemization, but that would take more time when people are already furious about the length between true content patches. Or you could choose the lesser of two evils by temporarily adding 2 veteran ranks (vs. more time before true content) in order to provide a good content update including Imperial City and tons of new gear options.
Sure, they could have kept this as VR14, but the “gear grind” is inevitable. They have already stated that gear would incrementally increase in power/stats as each “season (aka content patches)” rolled around. Adding 2 more VR levels is truly no different and this (gear progression) is exactly the reason they have added the levels. The fact that they are significantly reducing the time to level to max veteran rank (more xp for quests AND reduces xp to level) argues against any criticisms of it being purely "busy work."
I would prefer to never have to grind another level, EVER, again. I would love to have a VR14 of every class, but the grind is far too taxing for many of us.
With that said, the real issue with the game in its current state is the CP system. The only real area you notice it at this point is in PvP. Eventually it will close in on PvE as characters blow other characters DPS out of the water. There are already DPS requirements some guilds go with for trial runs, which are not easily obtained without having many champion points.
At this point I'm sitting around 200 champion points. Which I thought was quite good until talking with some of my other friends about it. Most of them are sitting 300, 400 or even over 500 already.
While not being picked to do a dungeon, trial or DSA run due to my lack of DPS doesn't bother me, the soon to be blatant gap in PvP does. With one of the most well known ESO PvP players coming in here and telling you he is already concerned with the CP difference, I hope you guys there at ZoS don't just brush this all off your shoulders.
PS; the incoming nerfs are completely ridiculous too.
Sithisvoid wrote: »...
Sithisvoid wrote: »...
AlienDiplomat wrote: »...
Sithisvoid wrote: »... The system is available to anyone. Put in the time you gain the rewards. Sounds fair to me.
AlienDiplomat wrote: »...
Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Time=Rewards and so far this is the only MMO really getting that. If they gank out Champion points and vet ranks this game turns into a single player elder scrolls game with a bland story, not much replay-ability and people like me moving on asap. I mean why stick around after that? For gear? Not that much floating around to keep me going years. New content? Not much being released. And then we all catch up to each other. Then what? we all skip around playing rock paper scissors until someone says a skill needs re-balancing? Then nerf and buff wars. I'm not ahead of anybody either. My highest character is a vr3 and i have 16 champion points. Know what i was going to do? Grind
Other MMO's reward time invested with better raid/pvp gear. The only difference is, they don't just allow the people with the most free time to run away with it to INFINITE extremes. They cap progress by seasons, expansions, raid tiers, etc., as it should be to maintain any semblance of fair play.
What is this "reward" you are talking about with regard to time spent? The unfair advantage over new players that have no hope of ever catching up? Sounds great for the person with no job or responsibilities that sits there and grinds 24/7, not so great for the majority of players. But I guess if you only think about yourself, it's a wonderful system.
I am sorry if the only joy some people get is to mindlessly invest "time" grinding in a troll cave in Cyrodiil until they have achieved the "reward" of a ridiculously imbalanced TTK and un-killable defenses against the average player, but I don't think we should throw away a great game to cater to people that need that sort of sense of "achievement" in order to justify playing.
I would rather see the game remain FAIR and BALANCED, and if that means these minority that need to have an unfair advantage gained by ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SKILLFUL WHATSOEVER OTHER THAN GRINDING FOR MONTHS ON END IN A CAVE will leave, then so be it, good riddance. Good luck finding ANY game that allows that sort of ridiculous unsportsmanlike unfair advantage. As you say, this broken CP system is the only game that got it "right" (TM).
Personally, I would rather keep the 90% of players that are happy with a reasonable season/tier/time-based limit to CP gain which maintains a FAIR and BALANCED gaming environment.
Good luck? well i FOUND the game it's called ESO so QQ more.AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Time=Rewards and so far this is the only MMO really getting that. If they gank out Champion points and vet ranks this game turns into a single player elder scrolls game with a bland story, not much replay-ability and people like me moving on asap. I mean why stick around after that? For gear? Not that much floating around to keep me going years. New content? Not much being released. And then we all catch up to each other. Then what? we all skip around playing rock paper scissors until someone says a skill needs re-balancing? Then nerf and buff wars. I'm not ahead of anybody either. My highest character is a vr3 and i have 16 champion points. Know what i was going to do? Grind
Other MMO's reward time invested with better raid/pvp gear. The only difference is, they don't just allow the people with the most free time to run away with it to INFINITE extremes. They cap progress by seasons, expansions, raid tiers, etc., as it should be to maintain any semblance of fair play.
What is this "reward" you are talking about with regard to time spent? The unfair advantage over new players that have no hope of ever catching up? Sounds great for the person with no job or responsibilities that sits there and grinds 24/7, not so great for the majority of players. But I guess if you only think about yourself, it's a wonderful system.
I am sorry if the only joy some people get is to mindlessly invest "time" grinding in a troll cave in Cyrodiil until they have achieved the "reward" of a ridiculously imbalanced TTK and un-killable defenses against the average player, but I don't think we should throw away a great game to cater to people that need that sort of sense of "achievement" in order to justify playing.
I would rather see the game remain FAIR and BALANCED, and if that means these minority that need to have an unfair advantage gained by ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SKILLFUL WHATSOEVER OTHER THAN GRINDING FOR MONTHS ON END IN A CAVE will leave, then so be it, good riddance. Good luck finding ANY game that allows that sort of ridiculous unsportsmanlike unfair advantage. As you say, this broken CP system is the only game that got it "right" (TM).
Personally, I would rather keep the 90% of players that are happy with a reasonable season/tier/time-based limit to CP gain which maintains a FAIR and BALANCED gaming environment.
Good luck? well i FOUND the game it's called ESO so QQ more.In fact all I see here is a bunch of "wah I don't want to put the time in."
Either you are incapable of seeing the point or worse, you just flat out refuse.
Every professional MMO realizes the need to have seasons and tiers and expansion stages for gear progression. You refuse to acknowledge the need to institute incremental caps on CP gain and believe that people with no job should just be allowed to mindlessly grind an activity which requires no skill whatsoever in order to gain a completely unfair advantage over new players.
You keep saying people that express concern over this real problem just "don't want to put in the time." That is a total BS answer and you know it. Or maybe you honestly don't? Really, nothing would surprise me on these forums anymore. But try for just a moment to put yourself in someone else's shows. I know it is difficult, but try.
A new player comes to the game a year after CP is released and people with no life that grind 24/7 are sitting on over 1000 CP. How can you possibly argue these new people just don't want to "put in the time?"
Should they magickally go back in time and grind out that year of CP at the mindless rate these grind zombies have been doing it (24/7, which would take a sane person with a job and a life more than twice that long) before they "earn" the right in your eyes to a fair and competitive PVP experience.
No sane person would tolerate that from a service they have paid for.
All I see is a bunch of crybabies whining about two levels, sorry. Also, as previously stated, I AM a new player way behind. Do you see me crying like a newborn about how people put in time and got farther than me?
Insults are a poor substitute for an actual argument.
Explain to me why exactly an activity that requires no skill, is exclusive to new players or 90% of the player base which has a life and responsibilities, and grants a completely unfair advantage destroying any semblance of fair play is a GOOD THING.
Try to avoid points like "you're a poopy head sissy man" and if possible, use big words.
The system is available to anyone. Put in the time you gain the rewards. Sounds fair to me.
Keep ignoring the new player problem as if you just don't understand.
Your assumption that the system is open and anyone can do it is completely ignorant of the facts. That is what people are complaining about: The lack of a catch-up method.
Grinding CP is a LINEAR PROGRESSION. That means it requires X amount of hours/days/weeks/months to grind out those 1000 CP.
For a new player that joins the community a year after CP released, it has NOTHING to do with not wanting to spend the time. It has to do with the LINEAR CURVE. Do you get it yet? Let me elaborate.
In that year the people that have been 24/7 grinding now have 1000 CP to the new players 0. Even if that new player started doing nothing with their time in Tamriel other than mindlessly 24/7 grinding like these people have been, in say 1 month they will have only achieved 100 (or whatever) CP, yet that crowd that had been grinding are still grinding, and now have 1000 + 100.
The new player makes NO PROGRESS to catch up to the old 24/7 grinder.
Until you can address this problem I will assume you are just playing dumb on purpose to avoid talking about the obvious critical flaw in Zenimax's design.
If you don't have the time to invest maybe MMO's aren't for you.
AlienDiplomat wrote: »...
ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »Thank you, everyone, for taking the time to give us your feedback, and for keeping it constructive. We'll be sure to pass this along to the appropriate teams to read over.
AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Time=Rewards and so far this is the only MMO really getting that. If they gank out Champion points and vet ranks this game turns into a single player elder scrolls game with a bland story, not much replay-ability and people like me moving on asap. I mean why stick around after that? For gear? Not that much floating around to keep me going years. New content? Not much being released. And then we all catch up to each other. Then what? we all skip around playing rock paper scissors until someone says a skill needs re-balancing? Then nerf and buff wars. I'm not ahead of anybody either. My highest character is a vr3 and i have 16 champion points. Know what i was going to do? Grind
Other MMO's reward time invested with better raid/pvp gear. The only difference is, they don't just allow the people with the most free time to run away with it to INFINITE extremes. They cap progress by seasons, expansions, raid tiers, etc., as it should be to maintain any semblance of fair play.
What is this "reward" you are talking about with regard to time spent? The unfair advantage over new players that have no hope of ever catching up? Sounds great for the person with no job or responsibilities that sits there and grinds 24/7, not so great for the majority of players. But I guess if you only think about yourself, it's a wonderful system.
I am sorry if the only joy some people get is to mindlessly invest "time" grinding in a troll cave in Cyrodiil until they have achieved the "reward" of a ridiculously imbalanced TTK and un-killable defenses against the average player, but I don't think we should throw away a great game to cater to people that need that sort of sense of "achievement" in order to justify playing.
I would rather see the game remain FAIR and BALANCED, and if that means these minority that need to have an unfair advantage gained by ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SKILLFUL WHATSOEVER OTHER THAN GRINDING FOR MONTHS ON END IN A CAVE will leave, then so be it, good riddance. Good luck finding ANY game that allows that sort of ridiculous unsportsmanlike unfair advantage. As you say, this broken CP system is the only game that got it "right" (TM).
Personally, I would rather keep the 90% of players that are happy with a reasonable season/tier/time-based limit to CP gain which maintains a FAIR and BALANCED gaming environment.
Good luck? well i FOUND the game it's called ESO so QQ more.AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »AlienDiplomat wrote: »Sithisvoid wrote: »Time=Rewards and so far this is the only MMO really getting that. If they gank out Champion points and vet ranks this game turns into a single player elder scrolls game with a bland story, not much replay-ability and people like me moving on asap. I mean why stick around after that? For gear? Not that much floating around to keep me going years. New content? Not much being released. And then we all catch up to each other. Then what? we all skip around playing rock paper scissors until someone says a skill needs re-balancing? Then nerf and buff wars. I'm not ahead of anybody either. My highest character is a vr3 and i have 16 champion points. Know what i was going to do? Grind
Other MMO's reward time invested with better raid/pvp gear. The only difference is, they don't just allow the people with the most free time to run away with it to INFINITE extremes. They cap progress by seasons, expansions, raid tiers, etc., as it should be to maintain any semblance of fair play.
What is this "reward" you are talking about with regard to time spent? The unfair advantage over new players that have no hope of ever catching up? Sounds great for the person with no job or responsibilities that sits there and grinds 24/7, not so great for the majority of players. But I guess if you only think about yourself, it's a wonderful system.
I am sorry if the only joy some people get is to mindlessly invest "time" grinding in a troll cave in Cyrodiil until they have achieved the "reward" of a ridiculously imbalanced TTK and un-killable defenses against the average player, but I don't think we should throw away a great game to cater to people that need that sort of sense of "achievement" in order to justify playing.
I would rather see the game remain FAIR and BALANCED, and if that means these minority that need to have an unfair advantage gained by ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SKILLFUL WHATSOEVER OTHER THAN GRINDING FOR MONTHS ON END IN A CAVE will leave, then so be it, good riddance. Good luck finding ANY game that allows that sort of ridiculous unsportsmanlike unfair advantage. As you say, this broken CP system is the only game that got it "right" (TM).
Personally, I would rather keep the 90% of players that are happy with a reasonable season/tier/time-based limit to CP gain which maintains a FAIR and BALANCED gaming environment.
Good luck? well i FOUND the game it's called ESO so QQ more.In fact all I see here is a bunch of "wah I don't want to put the time in."
Either you are incapable of seeing the point or worse, you just flat out refuse.
Every professional MMO realizes the need to have seasons and tiers and expansion stages for gear progression. You refuse to acknowledge the need to institute incremental caps on CP gain and believe that people with no job should just be allowed to mindlessly grind an activity which requires no skill whatsoever in order to gain a completely unfair advantage over new players.
You keep saying people that express concern over this real problem just "don't want to put in the time." That is a total BS answer and you know it. Or maybe you honestly don't? Really, nothing would surprise me on these forums anymore. But try for just a moment to put yourself in someone else's shows. I know it is difficult, but try.
A new player comes to the game a year after CP is released and people with no life that grind 24/7 are sitting on over 1000 CP. How can you possibly argue these new people just don't want to "put in the time?"
Should they magickally go back in time and grind out that year of CP at the mindless rate these grind zombies have been doing it (24/7, which would take a sane person with a job and a life more than twice that long) before they "earn" the right in your eyes to a fair and competitive PVP experience.
No sane person would tolerate that from a service they have paid for.
All I see is a bunch of crybabies whining about two levels, sorry. Also, as previously stated, I AM a new player way behind. Do you see me crying like a newborn about how people put in time and got farther than me?
Insults are a poor substitute for an actual argument.
Explain to me why exactly an activity that requires no skill, is exclusive to new players or 90% of the player base which has a life and responsibilities, and grants a completely unfair advantage destroying any semblance of fair play is a GOOD THING.
Try to avoid points like "you're a poopy head sissy man" and if possible, use big words.
The system is available to anyone. Put in the time you gain the rewards. Sounds fair to me.
Keep ignoring the new player problem as if you just don't understand.
Your assumption that the system is open and anyone can do it is completely ignorant of the facts. That is what people are complaining about: The lack of a catch-up method.
Grinding CP is a LINEAR PROGRESSION. That means it requires X amount of hours/days/weeks/months to grind out those 1000 CP.
For a new player that joins the community a year after CP released, it has NOTHING to do with not wanting to spend the time. It has to do with the LINEAR CURVE. Do you get it yet? Let me elaborate.
In that year the people that have been 24/7 grinding now have 1000 CP to the new players 0. Even if that new player started doing nothing with their time in Tamriel other than mindlessly 24/7 grinding like these people have been, in say 1 month they will have only achieved 100 (or whatever) CP, yet that crowd that had been grinding are still grinding, and now have 1000 + 100.
The new player makes NO PROGRESS to catch up to the old 24/7 grinder.
Until you can address this problem I will assume you are just playing dumb on purpose to avoid talking about the obvious critical flaw in Zenimax's design.
I disagree. First that grinder is capped at XXXX CP. There is a max. Also, CP has diminishing returns, meaning that a player becomes exponentially more powerful with significantly less time invested. ESPECIALLY when they first enter the CP and initially begin to gather points.The new player makes NO PROGRESS to catch up to the old 24/7 grinder.
Joy_Division wrote: »The second has been here since launch: it was always more advantageous to nuke zombies and AoE spiders to increase your power than actually playing the game as intended (i.e. doing content such as quests, dungeons, trials, etc.). In my "raid" guild, ostensibly there for people who enjoy raiding, we had members not join our Sanctum Raids because they were too concerned about falling behind the power curve because they could be nuking goblins in Crack Wood Cave instead. Ridiculous state of affairs.
Well it seems my big-ass comment got deleted, and I can't remember anything that I wrote. And now my fingers hurt. I think the main points were:
1. Parfax's solution - Needs a bit more of a boost to the new players or else there's going to be a constantly increasing gap of people getting 100 CP and new players getting maybe 20 or 30 CP.
2. VR16 - I did a maths calculation regarding the 15% decrease in XP gain you need, so from VR1-16 you actually only need 13.6m XP rather than 14m XP, so they've tried to make it easier. To what avail I don't know.
3. VR16 - For Orsinium I presume. This is the one factor I actually agree with, as we need to see some kind of progression for this new area. I'd still be going even if it wasn't increased (lore-wh*re/completionist all the way), but I fear the grind-y players won't agree
Feel free to argue with this, I might remember some points in the replies