Please make IC access restricted in some conditions, in all campain

contact.opiumb16_ESO · October 2015

I really enjoy the content of IC, and the fact that it is IN Cyrodil and pve/pvp oriented.

At launch I thinked that IC should be a good argument to PvErs for coming in PvP... and it works !

The problem is the perma acess to IC. Now we have dead campains with full populations.People come in Cyro yes, but just to take a ride from base camp to IC acess, and they don't really care about Cyro. Drops and rewards are way better in IC than in Cyro, you don't have to ride for ages etc...

I think IC needs an acess in some specific conditions like :
. you can go in IC only if your faction have homekeeps + keeps in front of the enter of IC (example : Chal + brk for the EP side
. when you are in IC you can stay inside as long as you want until you die
. when you die, if your faction still have their homekeeps, you respawn in IC, if your faction don't have homekeeps anymore, you respawn in your base camp

With this logic, in all campain people don't have choice to alternate between Cyro and IC and that's a good thing ! More cyro fights, a good reason for anyone to fight for his faction.

What do you guys, my PvPers friends, think of it ?

altemriel · October 2015

I dont like the idea that the access to IC would require to conquer the keeps. it sucks when I want to go to IC, but I can not, because the keeps are not conquered.

Vyle_Byte · October 2015

Lol! I cant tell if you're serious or not...

Strange that you had this "idea". So did the devs. Forever ago lol! On PC we have one campaign with gated access, like your um, idea... ya know what? Its dead. Always dead. I never see more than 1 bar of population for each faction there. They asked for it, got it and now its empty lol!

On a side note, I did read somewhere that the pvp team is thinking of making access like this on all servers.

ZOS_BrianWheeler · October 2015

That's expressly the point of making all Campaigns gated however @altemriel

If it sucks that you can't get in, then get a group together and get access back. The act of taking keeps back will produce foot traffic in Cyrodiil, gives another "keep meta-game" of Cyrodiil play besides transit lines, and may ignite a battle that otherwise wouldn't occur with open access.

Dakrana_Thrazvoth · October 2015

I don't agree the idea to make make IC access restricted in some conditions for all campaigns, because I've seen the result on axe of belharza (EU), every faction just coming to capture their homekeeps, and they disappear inside IC, and after we have no fight anymore. And with your idea it will be the same situation.

Darlgon · October 2015

@ZOS_BrianWheeler Please pass the word to Wrobel that lack of AP having a meaning, due to Cyrodiil AP vendors having only VR14 gear is another reason mainland Cyro is empty. And, not the one trick pony sets that are in IC, the real AvA sets like Hawks Eye, Light of Cyrodiil, Curse Eater, etc. I see on ESO Academy they still wont be updated with Wrothgar.

Thanks.

altemriel · October 2015

well yes and no, I agree that it could make more trafic in Cyrodiil, but:
- what if people just capture the keeps and then dissapear into IC and the trafic in Cyrodiil is then gone?
- what if I just want to play in IC and do not want to spend hours of keep fightings before that?

Galbsadi · October 2015

Or....."what if I play as a minority faction that almost never has control...why should I be completely limited from IC just for the crime of not being AD on every toon?"

One person typically cannot take a keep.

myrrrorb14_ESO · October 2015

It's a grand idea to lock IC, but chances are people just won't bother.

To a PvE player, they just want to get in to see and do the PvE stuff, gather mats, maybe play around a bit with PvP lite. If it's gated the PvE player will just move on to something else and gripe about how they can't play content they purchased.

To a PvP player. Well they are a bit different. Small scale (compared to cyrodiil) is attractive, but if the free kills (sorry, PvE players) are gone that is less incentive. Plus where are the rewards in IC for PvP? If people want to PvP they will most likely stay in Cyrodiil, where they can capture resources, earn tons of AP, earn Emperor, and use siege weapons. IC offers very little once you have ground out those items that you desire.

I recognize there is a problem with population. Maybe have separate pops for cyrodiil and IC. I just think that having gated access to IC will kill what's left of IC.

contact.opiumb16_ESO · October 2015

. considering that if you die in IC while their faction don't have homekeeps anymore you will respawn in base camp, you can't "just" take homekeeps and vanish in IC for ages
. IC is a pvp oriented DLC, so you know, behind in IC and jsut fight mobs is not what a Cyro Dlc is supposed to work

vortexman11 · October 2015

Have I ever told you how much I like you?

Sadly though Brian, the time to do this has already passed. Imperial City is mainly empty, people have gotten their gear and moved on. Maybe if it was gated from the beginning, a certain player base may have gained an appreciation for PvP, but now we'll never know.

Instead, said player base had free access to go into the IC in which their only PvP experience was getting ganked, thus making them hate PvP. They'll now never experience the amazing view as you run your trebuchet knocking down keep walls along side of 15 friends, or the rush of running through a battlefield dodging counter-siege and purging people.

Worst of all, they'll never feel the love of Our Lord and Protector Dee Tick.

KerinKor · October 2015

Lousy idea.

It was fatuous for ZOS to put PVE content into PVP areas in the first place, to gate PVE content by PVP state would be even more fatuous.

Aquanova · October 2015

How about no Brian? I paid to have access to that zone when I want, not when I can get a group together that MAY be able to take all those keeps back and spend what could be hour's just for someone else's enjoyment of having someone to fight. Before you make gated access figure out how to balance population first. Don't tell me population caps achieve this, I'm talking about 1 faction having at least 5 to 1 people playing at any given time that gives them a clear advantage especially during off prime time hours. I like how you say so nonchalantly " If it sucks that you can't get in, then get a group together and get access back" I challenge you to do that very thing and see how easy/difficult it could be, especially when the other factions will probably pvdoor those keeps to restrict access so that their pve'ers can farm and quest at their leisure. Don't think it'll happen? Guess what? Already heard people talking about doing that when gated access was going to come out with IC. So what will this accomplish? Revive pvp? There's pvp going on right now even without gated access. You know i came over from EP to DC because I really didn't like playing with myself lol, which is what all EP from ThornBlade were doing from March 2015 till about May, after we rolled over AD and DC's combined effort to clinch a win in that campaign, so I know what EP's capable of. Ifor you want to encourage pvp around IC then have an objective in their that contributes to the overall campaign scoring. Make becoming Emperor involve controlling the districts or something so it's not so easily achieved since you must defeat a crap ton of NPC's on top of killing other player's. If you do make gated access then refund everyone's money who payed to play that zone since announcing IC to be open access may have influenced their choice to buy the DLC. You guys really need to stop making drastic changes to this game after the fact. Just look at the amount of people that quit from some of those changes you made. Hope you guys see what a bad choice this will be that just annoys player's that want to game in that zone rather than enticing them.

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO · October 2015

@ZOS_BrianWheeler This is all well and good but means nothing if when IC is gated players can perma respawn as normal. When it is gated players should only be res-able and should be forced to respawn out in open cyro.

tengri · October 2015

Too late, that ship has sailed... or sunk to be more exact.

As soon as the PvE train leaves for Orsinium so does any attention IC had... gate the access, wall it up, set it on eternal pink fire - no one cares anymore.

Darlgon · October 2015

I think your concerns were addressed here...

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/2378631#Comment_2378631

Frawr · October 2015

There are too many campaigns resulting in balances of population on different servers as each faction seeks to take the path of least resistance and farm on a 'safe' campaign.

There is a problem with selfish players who say 'I've paid for it, I want to access it'. This attutide is what leads to the current system and makes the exercise pointless by negating the reason to fight in the first place.

People will always take the easiest route. Giving them an easy route is not going to necessarily help the life of the game.

That said, I am not convinced that gating them now would solve much

IC has sadly proved to be an empty grind and, as so many players have already completed it, there is no reason for those players to re - enter and, therefore, no reason to ' open the gates '.

It is really a shame. I cannot think of a solution to that.

As a bigger issue, it feels as though you are trying to make an MMO but with the 'single player' as your target audience. The result of this is dissatisfied players in both camps.

Perhaps better to focus more on 'MMO in the world of tamriel' rather than 'single player game with optional coop mode'.

Maulkin · October 2015

Agreed.

And as I have said by keeping IC un-gated has led to over-farming of the content and a big percentage of the PvP population has little reason to delve in there any more. Holding access to IC is not being seen as a reward in itself any more.

There needs to be a further AvA-related incentive for the faction to keep access to IC open. Even for those that have no incentive/reason/will to go in it. A strategic benefit to having access or control of IC that plays into the AvA side of the game, if you will.

Turelus · October 2015

Which is why we the PvP community (who @ZOS_RichLambert said this update was for) were so angry that you did a 180 on gated campaigns.

Hopefully you've learnt from it and we will see future updates planned in a better way.

Tallowby · October 2015

@ZOS_BrianWheeler Idea...

Change gated access to restrictive access...

If the keeps required for access are not held by the faction.

You can still access IC. BUT then all mobs and roving bosses have a 4x larger detection radius for that faction when in IC until the keeps outside are taken.

Also like the forced respawn outside of IC if not revived.
.

Starshadw · October 2015

I already talked about this elsewhere but I'll say it here, too.

Until and unless you stop allowing people to travel to campaigns that are neither their home nor their guest, gated access is not going to solve the problem and in fact, is going to result in even more faction population crowding. My guild is homed in Axe, and I can tell you the situation is just as much of a mess there as it is on the non-gated servers. There's very little true PvPing at all. It used to be that at least, the map would get zerged, and then go dead, as the zerging faction headed into the sewers. Heck, because there's no mechanic in place that kicks people out if their faction loses access, we often saw people not even defending - they don't care if their faction gets locked out because they're already in IC.

But recently, Axe became a 100% AD buff server for all intents and purposes - had the same AD emp for more than 10 days. You could count the number of reds and blues you'd see, either in Cyrodiil or IC, on one hand. We'll see if that switches to a different faction this week.

IC is currently the only means of obtaining v15/16 mats - be that by farming drops and decon'ing them, or by accruing stones and spending them. People don't like losing stones - which means when they farm, they don't want to get ganked/zerged. Which means most folks want to farm 1) with PvP buffs and 2) on a campaign where their faction is dominant so they don't have to worry about running into a zerg while in the sewers.

If you make all servers have gated access with things as they stand right now, it will mean the full return of the Buff Servers, where even the tiniest bit of opposition results in a massive zerg steamrolling so that they can go back to their uncontested IC access with their PvP buffs. And then, because you've not done anything to prevent people from traveling to whatever campaign they want, the PvP zergs will just continue to do what they do now: travel to another server that isn't their buff server when they want to try and find someone to fight.

Orsinium, depending on how plentiful the resource nodes are, may go a long way towards alleviating the problem simply because there will be another way to obtain mats, so people won't be confined to IC. But note the word "plentiful" there - if Orsinium operates like Upper Craglorn used to, with node farmers running around competing for nodes, then people are still going to look to IC as the primary means of obtaining mats, and that means they aren't going to want to be on a campaign where they have difficulty getting into the sewers.

I don't envy you right now, because the PvP situation is a Hot Mess and I'm not sure what, if anything, can fix it. I never thought I'd say this, but it might be time to consider some sort of auto "reset" when it comes to keeps in Cyrodiil, especially if you're going to make all servers have gated access. Meaning that every 24 hours (or whatever), keeps reset to whichever faction they traditionally belong, somehow.

usmcjdking · October 2015

Hey bro, PVE carebear here.

Gating access won't stop me from playing IC, just keep switching campaigns until I find a suitable one.

Then buff servers will be reborn.

myrrrorb14_ESO · October 2015

All of this I agree with. Except the first bit. We can no longer travel to campaigns that we are not guest or home campaign and you still get the same results. Giant zergs just reassign their campaigns and move on like locust

Vyle_Byte · October 2015

Yeah because thats always possible. *rolls eyes*
I get on at 8 am my time and there isn't a friggin soul in sight. Since this is the case, I take my sleepy ass to IC, grind up some, maybe get ganked maybe kill the ganker, ect.

Now, throw in gated access everywhere. I get on 8am my time... still not a soul in sight because ITS 8 AM! Then I look at the map and see that an enemy faction took everything over night and I cant get a mother effing group bc its early and no one will be on in my faction for another 6 damn hours so guess what? I don't get to play. WTF is that?

Seriously though, all campaigns? Why on earth would you want that? Have you taken a look at the one you made gated access?? No one plays on it. And dont give me that, well its bc there are servers w/o. Those that asked for a gated server got one and they dont even use it.

What I think, is that this will be the final blow for IC. Its already mostly dead, with full access. Most people have their sets and stuff and have no reason to go back. I get we want people to come back to Cyro to play, you gotta give them incentive not restrictions. I love PVP, I want it to grow and become what it could be. However, I dont think this gated access idea is going to work.

Maulkin · October 2015

Here's the thing. Buff servers require population imbalance. If there are few campaigns and these campaigns have high population, it will be hard for one faction to completely dominate it.

Also you need to acknowledge the opposite effect of your action....

When you hop campaigns and find one where your faction has access to IC and then dive into it, you will be reducing your faction's capacity in cyrodiil by 1. If many "carebears" do the same as you, your faction will be pop-locked with the majority of the pop in IC. The other factions will then outnumber yours in Cyrodiil and the tables will turn.

At least that's how it should work in theory. I could be proven wrong but so could you and at this point, it's worth trying it. IC was intended as a PvP mechanic in the first place anyway, as the devs suggested.

Quaffio · October 2015

I agree with all campaigns being gated off. You can easily set your guest campaign to a server that is "owned" by your faction so you always have access to IC while making your home campaign set one where there is constant high populations and battles taking place in Cyrodiil. Then you get the best of both worlds.

There is always at least one server that is dominated by one faction, just deal with having to set it as your guest campaign if you want access to IC whenever you want.

On Xbox NA, I know for a fact that Haderus and Scourge are packed with all 3 factions and there is a constant fight in Cyrodiil for Emperor and scrolls. If you want action, those are your best bets.

AshTal · October 2015

I would like to see the IC and Cyordil populations split. WE often see a large population on all factions but the battle for cyrodil is so one sided it is no fun. Why because all the Pact and AD are in Imperial city while the daggers dominate the map.

xaraan · October 2015

This is as it should be. Just remember that for this to work it requires population/campaign balance as well. If you have, what is commonly referred to as, a buff server, then you are talking about trying to assemble a group that is currently on a pretty low population to fight a possibly full population (or at the very least a full raid) that already has every PvP bonus imaginable plus emp bonuses. If you are successful you have spent hours working to open access (even minimum access) just to get into a city that will be closed again shortly after you and your friends enter (assuming you have any play time left to play after that). Not to mention you will be greatly outnumbered once inside IC and easily zerged down and killed if the other side wishes and no way now to get more players in because they will have taken their keeps back.

I for one agree with limited access and don't even go to IC much anymore, so I don't have any issues with gating; but do understand the other side of the equation. I'd rather be the guys spending the time opening up access since we mostly enjoy Cyro fighting, but am well aware of how much work and time it takes to open up a one sided campaign (we often go to those fights that require all that work b/c we want to have something to do). The issue really is population imbalance at all hours. I don't think some players will mind the work to open it up (some will sure cuz they hate pvp, or some like us will want to stay in cyro cuz we prefer it) but even those players that go either way will get burned out on having to do that amount of uphill work to open it briefly every single time they want to go to IC for anything.

It will be interesting to see how you address this as I saw you talking about pop caps and campaigns in the other thread and upcoming changes. Personally, I think you should base the number of campaigns available on whatever the lowest populated faction is at all hours (which would mean like two campaigns not counting a non-vet I'd bet) and make the faction with the most pop sit in long queues. But to be fair, you guys should add the ability to buy faction switching in the crown store at the same time.

altemriel · October 2015

you know what, it is not fair, when not even mean, that I have bought a DLC, that has supposed to open me the access to IC, there was no decided information, if the gates will be open for all or open restricted, just said, they are going to test it out and now it should be restricted? No, I have bought the DLC to have full time access to what I have bought!

I like to do mostly PVE, but sometimes I have lust to go to PVP, but I can not go to IC, because my campaign is not winning there, wth??
I am just newly first time a member of a guild, I mostly solo, my friends here are just strangers met in the game, which characters I liked, they are not my real friends. I know some people that play the game, but none of them for my faction.
So now what, do I have to forcefully PVP in Cyrodiil until I finally get to IC, then play few hours there, wanna play more there, but get kicked out of IC, because my faction is loosing the keeps? That is utter non-sense!!

I strongly disagree with the restriction!

Maybe the ZOS could leave it to the players to decide for themselves, just set a button switch in the game setting menu for people to turn the restricted access on or off how they like it!! that would be the most fairest version of this I would say.

@ZOS

Lorkhan · October 2015

if we coud buy the best gears in the game with AP, cyrodiil would be alive again

Manoekin · October 2015

Reduce campaigns the 3, restrict IC access to home non-corner keeps(maybe make one of the campaigns require an enemy keep as well!), and introduce PvP incentives into IC. Restricting access will not work without either of the other two imo.

If population isn't condensed it will just result in each faction having its own server (which would result in guilds going there, taking arrius/glade/fare and farming the hell out of the PvErs). With population being packed more tightly the odds will be more favorable and no side should be at an inherit disadvantage.

With no PvP incentives, all that's going to happen is it will become a wasteland. I'm already imagining it being that way once Orsinium comes out anyway. Bringing PvP players into IC is what's going to create a new keep meta whatever over IC access/fighting over IC districts/sewers.

What should be targeted is a sequence of updates condensing the campaigns, then adding PvP incentives(or both at once if you have it ready), and then restricting IC access.

I used to think restricting access would be great, but now I can't see why I would care if my access was restricted since I have a lot of the gear I would want already. I also don't see it funneling players out of Cyrodiil and into IC allowing my faction to capture our keeps back any easier because those same players that would leave for IC are already currently in IC. I don't see how it changes anything in that regard.