Some things to make Cadwell's Silver & Gold more bearable.

ZOS_RichLambert

/lurk

Cuyler

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

/lurk

I'd just like to replay my home alliance at vet levels. This may be a crazy idea but what about an option when completing gold to reset and play through every zone at v16 with no gating restrictions?

I agree as well that being forced to do Silver is rather disappointing after doing it 4 times. Now on my 5th and I just dread it.

Snit

Most people who want to skip silver simply want to proceed directly to the gold zones to grind.

Cadwell's stuff will never be universally loved. I like it, as it lets me see the entire game without rolling alts, and I think the quests are well done and worth doing. TESO's writing and voice acting are top-notch. But many folks don't enjoy questing, and they simply want the best XP/ Hour. That's not a divide that can really be bridged.

[Deleted User]

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Divinius

I actually love Cadwell's Silver and Gold, and would be very upset if they removed them.

However, I completely understand why some people hate feeling forced to level through through areas, and very much agree that there should be other equally viable options for progressing through the VR levels.

Cuyler

Snit wrote: »

Most people who want to skip silver simply want to proceed directly to the gold zones to grind.

Cadwell's stuff will never be universally loved. I like it, as it lets me see the entire game without rolling alts, and I think the quests are well done and worth doing. TESO's writing and voice acting are top-notch. But many folks don't enjoy questing, and they simply want the best XP/ Hour. That's not a divide that can really be bridged.

You clearly didn't read the OP, subsequent comments or you're misinformed that everyone "simply wants to skip Silver to grind". This is about "playing how we want" a concept that a lot of players want to tread on because THEY think they can dictate what's best for others.

The reality is that Cadwell's puts players on a rail traveling in one direction like a train before you can unlock the next area. This is counterintuitive to the "exploratory" nature of eso and every other part of the game-play experience.

AlnilamE

MornaBaine wrote: »

AlnilamE wrote: »

MornaBaine wrote: »

3. Just open up both factions at once. Scale all quests to level and be done with it.

I'd say this one, but leave the level spread so that "Silver" is still lower level than "Gold". Though if we are moving to V16 and they are upping quest XP, they really need to rescale all the vet zones upward. I'm always overleveled when I do Silver/Gold because I do other stuff, not just questing.

I'd be okay with that so long as I didn't have to do the main quests in order to unlock Gold. Then at least I could blow crowns on XP scrolls and race through it.

Yeah, that's how I meant it. Once you beat Molag Bal, you can travel to both Daggerfall and Vukhel Guard and find our way through there (from an EP PoV, here). No requirement to do the quests, but you still could because of all the skill points.

Sharee

I believe the main problem people have in the Cadwell's zones is that instead of getting an average of 10 levels per zone, they get 1 'level' per zone(if that). People just love to hear the "ding, you're more powerful now", and in this regard, the gold/silver zones are a real drag.

Xendyn

Divinius wrote: »

I actually love Cadwell's Silver and Gold, and would be very upset if they removed them.

However, I completely understand why some people hate feeling forced to level through through areas, and very much agree that there should be other equally viable options for progressing through the VR levels.

This^
Nothing wrong with the zones themselves, it's being forced through in a linear fashion with no other options.
We need more variety in how to get to endgame. A choice so it's not exactly the same thing every single time.

Elsonso

MornaBaine wrote: »

So apparently this terrible excuse for "end game" isn't going away any time soon nor is it being replaced by anything that would be a viable alternative to the horror we all know as Cadwell's Silver and Gold. So here's a few ideas on making it....not so awful.

1. Allow players to choose which zone they unlock first as Silver. All my characters are DC. This means Silver for me is AD. No offense you snobby Altmers and insane, "Are you....eating a SALAD? DIE!!!" Bosmers but I REALLY hate that faction. I love Elswhyr and getting to learn about the khajiit but overall the idea of dragging yet another character through that zone makes me want to run amuck at ZoS headquarters with a rusty chainsaw. And the real agony is that because you HAVE TO DO ALL THEIR MAIN STORY QUESTS you can't just grind to get the heck out of there! In fact, grinding will not help you AT ALL. You can pop double XP potions and overlevel yourself all you want...you are not escaping from Cadwell's Silver one second earlier. Now, once you get to Gold there's nothing left to unlock so you can pretty much just do whatever you want there to level. You can even IGNORE their Main Story quests because not doing them will not adversely affect you at all. So you can grind or explore the fun side quests as this is just now a few more levelling zones. Please ZoS, for the love of all that is holy, let me chose EP as my Silver zone.

2. Remove the Main Story quests requirement for both factions. Just let us grind or do interesting side quests that maybe don't have us turning traitor to our own faction and level just as we did in our own faction for 1-50. Just don't MAKE us do those quests to get the heck out of there. This doesn't negate Cadwell's premise of having us "see the other side" at all, it still lets us see the war from the perspective of the other side without having to kiss Ayrenn's arse. Is that really so much to ask?

3. Just open up both factions at once. Scale all quests to level and be done with it.

Any or all of these things would make things sooooo much better.

This is a good start. Ideally, once Veteran Ranks are gone, the could just open up the entire world and let us roam freely, so to speak, doing whatever we want and leveling in any way that we see fit. That could be questing, alliance quest stuff, dungeons, or whatever.

Ideally, I would like to see a way that there could be one Tamriel for everyone instead of one Tamriel per Alliance. The idea is that, after the main quest, the character can freely travel to the native zones and mingle with the native NPCs and players for that zone. This means that a "veteran" EP in Glenumbra would see characters of all levels from any alliance. This might be too much of a technical challenge, not to mention it rips apart the whole separation of Alliances thing.

Attorneyatlawl

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

/lurk

THE LURKS HAVE RETURNED!!!!! @ZOS_RichLambert... where will he strike next? Maybe this: http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/160517/user-interface-and-quality-of-life-problems-eso-2-0-is-good-lets-make-it-better/p1 ?

Divinius wrote: »

I actually love Cadwell's Silver and Gold, and would be very upset if they removed them.

However, I completely understand why some people hate feeling forced to level through through areas, and very much agree that there should be other equally viable options for progressing through the VR levels.

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

Elsonso

Pman85 wrote: »

Enodoc wrote: »

Pman85 wrote: »

lol @ thinking silver and gold are endgame. i stopped reading after that

I don't see how technical accuracy is laughable. Silver and gold are technically endgame, so there's nothing wrong with saying so.

while my previous post may be on the troller side. Endgame cannot be established when there are levels left. Any game made before this day, endgame happens after the leveling stop. When your focus shifts from the number by your character to things like gear, collections, achivements then my friend, you have started the endgame.

My VR4 is currently focused on achievements. I have gear, but obviously not the best gear. I am somewhat hampered by the fact that an entire Alliance is blocked off to me, but I can travel freely in two of the three alliances.

It is true that doing quests gets me levels and champion points, but I am VR4 and have been for months and I have 22 (twenty two) CP as I write this. It should be obvious that I don't care what my veteran rank is, or how many champion points I have. Both are a side effect of just being in the parts of Tamriel that are open to me. My main source of XP is actually opening chests.

So, yeah, I am in Cadwell Silver and am currently in the end game.

Snit

Cuyler wrote: »

The reality is that Cadwell's puts players on a rail traveling in one direction like a train before you can unlock the next area. This is counterintuitive to the "exploratory" nature of eso and every other part of the game-play experience.

The entire game does this. It's not Cadwell -- the questlines have a linear, on-rails story progression starting two seconds after character creation. You leave cold harbor, you progress through your faction's areas, then back to cold harbor. Yes, in theory you could head straight to the level 40 areas at level 5 and... I don't know what you'd actually do there. But so what?

TESO is not a "go anywhere, do anything" sandbox/ exploration game. It's a typical story-based progression MMO. It happens to be a pretty good one

Gidorick

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

personally, I would like them to be a more meaningful part of the story....

tinythinker

A big issue with opening up Alliances while vet ranks are still around is the scaling, with silver geared from VR1-VR5 and gold to VR6-VR10.

Part of making silver/gold more worthwhile is looking at what it offers/unlocks upon completion. There have been suggestions for better gear. I forget who suggested it, but I get the impression that it would be a set (2-3 piece) for finishing each. That's cool, but there could be much more.

What's Old is New Again

With or without vet ranks, it would be nice if completing an Alliance opened a new questline, perhaps starting in that same Alliance's old zones and ending by taking you to a new zone.

The new EP questline could take you in the end to some place like (or near) Akavir, or perhaps back in time to the Akavari invasion that lead to the formation of the Pact to play an anonymous but pivotal role in the turn of the war.

The new AD questline could take you to Thras (home of the Sload) or to Pyandonea (home of the Maormer) to recover something/someone, gather intelligence, pursue rumors of a strange new weapon, etc.

The new DC questline could take you to Yokuda (original home of the Redguard, either in its present state or to the past before the migration) or even into the future at the time of ES II: Daggerfall, thanks to the Warp of the West, and make sure that some horrible version of events doesn't manifest from the Dragonbreak.

Again, there would be unique rewards at the end. Because much of the new content would be recycled from old zones (even though new areas would be added like the addition of the hideouts) the basic models for landscape, architecture, NPCs, etc would already be in available, except for the trip to the new zone at the end.

New "Craglorns" for VR1-5 and VR6-10

For those who don't want to do Silver/Gold, even with extended content, what about a zone where you have one-time quests, questlines, delves, repeatable dailies, etc, that have areas that range from roughly VR1-2 in one spot, to VR3-4 in another, and then challenges/mini-raids at VR5 scale? Then do another zone in similar style for VR6-10. Two new zones for people who want to quest grind/mob grind without "being a traitor" or playing through five to ten additional zones?

Snit

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

You're not forced to do them. You can head right to Craglorn, or just stick to Cyrodiil. You'll miss some great content, but it's completely optional.

The only tangible rewards for Silver and Gold are a skill points and access to some new grind spots. Most builds don't need 300 skill points, and the best grind spots are in Cyrodiil now

Enodoc

Snit wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

You're not forced to do them. You can head right to Craglorn, or just stick to Cyrodiil. You'll miss some great content, but it's completely optional.

The only tangible rewards for Silver and Gold are a skill points and access to some new grind spots. Most builds don't need 300 skill points, and the best grind spots are in Cyrodiil now

I think a better wording would be feel forced to do them, based on the fact that they are the only V1-V10 content, and to get into the Gold zones for the skyshards and exploring you need to complete Silver first. Open them both up at once, and remove the linearity of the Veteran ranks, and then they will truly be optional.

AbraXuSeXile

Make cadwell optionable, let us grind.

tordr86b16_ESO

JesterH wrote: »

Silver and gold isnt so bad. I like being able to see all sides of the war

Seeing it... for the 100'th time? You have no idea how much more potential these zones could bring if they just removed veteran ranks, and gave us something more meaningfull to do in these zones.

*cough*
WORLD PVP!

Tavore1138

I like Silver and Gold but its not perfect.

The good:

It makes the questing side of the game 3 times longer than it would otherwise be given that the ammount of work for ZOS to create 10 areas worth of sobotage & spying quests would be vast... awesome, but impractical.

I don't have to roll alts in other factions... My PvP & PvE friends are in DC and this way all my toons can fight on the same team.

The bad:

It would be great if the rewards for doing it (apart from the reward of the play experience) were something that you could use... The necklace was meh. Even a unique cossie would be better.

It blocks exploration, people should want to do it for fun, skills points, shards, achieves and even rewarding items but all that gets overlooked because they feel compelled. Post MB everyone should be able to get to the vr1 & vr6 areas and explore from there. If they choose to grind mobs or get wiped in areas they are not ready for let that be their call.

Overall my bet is that if the feeling of being compelled to do it is removed many people will still do it but there would be far less complaining about it.

The other aspect is that levelling options need to exist for those that truly hate to quest beyond 50, ideally challenging grind areas that don't interfere with questers and perhaps more options around solo dailies other than Cyro and crafting writs.

Preyfar

Cuyler wrote: »

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

/lurk

I'd just like to replay my home alliance at vet levels. This may be a crazy idea but what about an option when completing gold to reset and play through every zone at v16 with no gating restrictions?

I'd also like to see some vet quests added to earlier zones in your alliance. The story ends at Molag Bal's demise. My main issue with Silver and Gold is my participation in the Daggerfall Covenant ends as well. From that point on, I'm pretty much AD... and then EP.

I think if faction specific quests were added to Silver and Gold to break it a bit it'd be more interesting. Perhaps one of Cadwell's associates were to contact you upon completing certain quests, and go "Something in the timeline doesn't seem quite right, and we need you to investigate." it'd give them more depth. As it is, your faction just kind of... ends. Craglorn has zero faction specific quests.

The limit to my being DC at that point exists in two forms: what players I can play with and what side I am in PVP.

TheShadowScout

I enjoy cadwells, very much so. With all my alts. Despite all my alts. Yes... it does get a bit boring sometimes... but hey, I play an hour for daily enlightment in cadwells, and then spend the rest of ma gamingtime on my main doing whatever I feel up to, be it PvP, gathering in craglorn hoping for some red stuff, roleplaying, whatever.

And I suppose once they are finally ready to implement the final phase of the champion system, silver and gold will both be optional and likely run in parallel instead of sequential too.

What I would love to see though was something done with the alliance home regions. Making them viable for high-to-endgame content, creating a "updated" version of them to go have fun in...

Like, once you finish cadwells (or maybe the main story if/once cadwells becomes optional), you unlock a veteran version of your homelands, which are slightly different from the mainstory versions, in that any "things going on" during the old mainstory quests are all over with, and replaced by what follows.

(Say, for example, in the first pact home regions the DC invasion of bleakrock, bal foyen and stonefalls would have been defeated, all the DC troops are gone, the damage done by them and the fallout is being repaired, the DC mobs are replaced by "area-specific" mobs or friendly NPCs as applicable, the dolmen all quiet, no daedra pop up, but all mobs are, say, V11... maybe have all the resources be a mix of all levels though, so highlevel players can still have access to low level resources and thus can craft for guild and friends... and the second map would then be V12, until V15 for the last homeland map... all already unlocked of course, so those people who really, truly cannot bear questing can proceed to the last map and grind dwelves to their hearts content... the milk-drinking... -remainder of the sentence censored to uphold forum rules- )

And while the original quests of course will all have been done (shame on any who skip quests! ), the whole thing might be made interesting by offering daily repeatable quests akin to the crafting writs, possibly following the old "random" quests from Daggerfall... you know, "go to dwelve -x-; kill boss / interact with object / talk with NPC; go back for reward" or "go to area on map; find NPC/object/monster; interact/talk/kill; come back for reward", or "find -number- of -object/monster- in map area; collect/kill; come back for reward"... stuff like that which may take the player all over the (newly dangerous again) maps, just with more randomness then the cyrodil daily quests... the fighter guilds bounty quests would also be interesting (the "kill -number- of -mob type-, find them yourself")

And then... there might even be larger questlines that might take playes over several maps through their completion. I'd like to see a daily "bard" quest that just required to play a music emote in five different inns on five different maps... or a messanger quest that requires delivering five letters to five people in different maps... and I am also very much hoping for a eventual dark brotherhood quest that is not just "go there, kill that one", but requires first tracking down your target, asking people all over different maps, and following the hints until you find the hiding place. At least every now and then (would be neat if you never knew what kind of job you'd get... one day it might be a lengthy hunt, the other a quick assignment...)

And finally... there might even be minor world PvP added. There could be a special wayshrine other faction players might use to sneakily enter your homelands veteran version, though if they do they get flagged as enemy to all homefield players, as well as attacked by all the justice guards... and these spies would then get daily "spy/sabotage" type missions, with the home players having repeatable "spycatcher" missions and thus incentive to keep their eyes open for any intruders... and then there could even be special disguises that might fool players (though only in the "flagging friendly" way, they might still figure it out by noticing that supposedly friendly character is wearing the "infiltrator disguise" outfit...), but not guards and were lost at Any kind of combat...

Just some thoughts...

Elsonso

Snit wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

You're not forced to do them. You can head right to Craglorn, or just stick to Cyrodiil. You'll miss some great content, but it's completely optional.

The only tangible rewards for Silver and Gold are a skill points and access to some new grind spots. Most builds don't need 300 skill points, and the best grind spots are in Cyrodiil now

You don't actually miss zone content by skipping Cadwell. You can easily create two alts and run through the other Alliances up to Coldharbour and you will have seen it all.

What you really miss are the materials used to create mid range Veteran equipment and armor. Mahogany comes to mind.

AshTal

I so agree with the OP - I hate doing Cadwell Silver and gold as a pact member (all my characters are pact) I hate being forced down the main quest helping the enemy. I understand this was a cheap way to double the content but it really sucks going from being a loyal member of the pact to killing my own side, helping the enemy and talking to dead men even though I know they are dead.

I would have been happy to play through as a character from each faction for the story but I wouldn't have played through each faction 3+ times.

What I would like to see is the main quest changed so we still work for our faction but its tweaked. It would have been very easy to explain some actions as "Greater good we must aid XXXXXX because XXXXXX is a servant of Molag Bal and we need them removed even if this means helping the enemy." or "Go in and look like your helping but return to me before collecting your reward and I will swap out the plans for the battle ship we will get them while they spend months building ships which will sink in minutes of touching water". We could then have been given choices.

Cadwell Silver and Gold may have been fun once but by 3rd play through its just a waste of time and breaks the story.

tinythinker

AshTal wrote: »

I so agree with the OP - I hate doing Cadwell Silver and gold as a pact member (all my characters are pact) I hate being forced down the main quest helping the enemy. I understand this was a cheap way to double the content but it really sucks going from being a loyal member of the pact to killing my own side, helping the enemy and talking to dead men even though I know they are dead.

I would have been happy to play through as a character from each faction for the story but I wouldn't have played through each faction 3+ times.

What I would like to see is the main quest changed so we still work for our faction but its tweaked. It would have been very easy to explain some actions as "Greater good we must aid XXXXXX because XXXXXX is a servant of Molag Bal and we need them removed even if this means helping the enemy." or "Go in and look like your helping but return to me before collecting your reward and I will swap out the plans for the battle ship we will get them while they spend months building ships which will sink in minutes of touching water". We could then have been given choices.

Cadwell Silver and Gold may have been fun once but by 3rd play through its just a waste of time and breaks the story.

I don't mind doing the quests as if I was in another faction, it would just be nice if it led somewhere. In addition to the expansion I described above, there definitely needs to be an adventure/zone that unlocks once you've been silver and gold. Not just extensions to a particular alliance story line, but traveling to face the kind of threat Meridia claimed to be preparing you for.

VilhelmValhalla4

Better yet, revamp the whole thing so that all provinces are open from the start (with different modes of travel to reach each one). Instead of being forced into an alliance, you'd pick your starting zone and from there the quests and enemies level with you. To take part in PvP, you'd enlist at one of the Cyrodiil war camps and be bound to that faction (you could still explore as you want). Everyone already ranked in PvP would retain their status and be bound to the faction they already fight for.

mtwiggz

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

/lurk

/reloadui

tinythinker

ZOS_RichLambert:

/lurk


mtwiggz:

/reloadui

/stuck

Preyfar

Snit wrote: »

You're not forced to do them. You can head right to Craglorn, or just stick to Cyrodiil. You'll miss some great content, but it's completely optional.

The only tangible rewards for Silver and Gold are a skill points and access to some new grind spots. Most builds don't need 300 skill points, and the best grind spots are in Cyrodiil now

The problem is there's no fast way to get to VR14 without doing Silver/Gold unless you're grinding. If you're not a grinder you're out of luck. Yes, you can get XP through PVP, but that's going to take ages to do. Silver/Gold aren't skippable for the vast majority who want to get to end game for PVP, etc.

MornaBaine

Gidorick wrote: »

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

No one's looking for them to be removed... we just don't want to be forced to do them.

personally, I would like them to be a more meaningful part of the story....

And they could be but this would require new quests, which they apparently weren't either willing or able to do. If you experienced the other factions via quests FOR your faction I would be so freaking jazzed to do those!