[Discussion] ESO's questing: off-putting grind or epic pastime?

petraeus1

One of the regular praises ESO gets is how its quests are so story-driven compared to the standard in the MMO industry. At the same time, when reading feedback of players who've quit on Reddit a.o., a regular complaint is 'the endless amount of boring quests', that are all similar and not very fulfilling or immersive. Solo-content in a game that due to the constraints of being an MMO don't live up to expectations.

I recognize this too: having played through my own faction's zones I'm now on the brink of Cadwell's Silver, but can't be bothered. I have two mid-level alts in the other Alliances, and despite my initial urge to explore Tamriel, I lost interest: I wanna see the vistas, but feel like quests are simply a gate, a gauntlet I need to go through to get the levels to do that. They bore me.

Having read an article on MMOgames.com about questing in MMO, I wonder: does ESO suffer from the MMO syndrom as described in the article - that is, having become the main vehicle for leveling, being task-like more than epic? Is this a problem, and if yes, how can ZOS address it in future DLC or retroactively for the base game?

Edit: this discussion on Reddit.

LiquidSchwartz

Quests in eso are fun the first time around, personally. But, anything after once is absolute misery. No replayability in my opinion. After the first time, I grind everything up with mobs and don't do any quests.
Areas like shadowfen are so bad I almost skipped it if I wasn't a completionist.

Reb

First time through its really great ..after that not so much so

It really all stems from the changes they made due the very vocal whingers during beta, VR levels where not supposed to exist in the first place ...originally you had to make a character in a different alliance if you wanted to play those quests..

sadownik

Quests in ESO... There is sure a lot of them, they are surly all fully voiced, they are also very repetitive, often boring, much too often silly or pushing some kind of agenda in much too obnoxious way.

I get it - you cant write well over 1 k of interesting quests. Then why not cutting the number drastically and invest in quality?

One of the most annoying thing in ESO is, that story telling is so black and white. Everything must be clear from ethical point of view, even if you are allowed to make a choice that is not goodie goodie you are told very clearly that you were indeed a bad boy/girl.

But i think most important part is - ESO is MMO. I play mostly this kind of games for well over 15 years not because of storytelling but because of interactions between players. When i first heard of TES MMO i thought it could be a great idea to let players freely roam and interact in TES universe. I surely didnt expect to get a slightly TES painted typical theme park.

Oldmanlawlor

I liked the DC quest line.. Other than that, it's a boring grind for me. How the quests are 'delivered' doesn't capture my attention. I just spam A when it comes to quests now.

I much prefer how Mass Effect 2 delivered their speech.

petraeus1

If the diagnostics that quests are a vehicle for leveling (to provide XP, to learn new players the ropes, to guide people around) without much replay value is correct, how should we evaluate another one of those regular praises of ESO, its voice-acting? An effort to facelift content that in and of itself isn't worth it? The stand-out feature that makes questing fun?

petraeus1

And another question comes to mind: which quests in ESO did you feel were actual quests, and which would you rather have seen left out, altered, etc.? What are features you feel are missing from quests in ESO?

To me the linear build up of zones and the repetitive nature of quest objectives is off-putting. Quests come down to solving minor local issues and you hop from one issue to the next. There's no thinking or preparation required, no epic reward or interesting journey. Run around and press E in a couple of places would be an accurate description of 80% of the vanilla quests.

Orsinium did it much better: battle-leveling allowed me to travel all over the zone, there were puzzles, sneaking around, interesting boss-fights, good use of tools to create an intense atmosphere. Still all pretty linear and cake-walky, but hey. A lot of zone-wide story arcs are similar, but as said, because they guide the leveling process, they all feel like steps on a ladder I kinda gotta climb, without them having interesting mechanics, fights, build-up. They occasionally have a fun story, but the similarities between story arcs in zones become clear after you've done a few.

petraeus1

Oldmanlawlor wrote: »

I liked the DC quest line.. Other than that, it's a boring grind for me. How the quests are 'delivered' doesn't capture my attention. I just spam A when it comes to quests now.

I much prefer how Mass Effect 2 delivered their speech.

Care to elaborate on speech delivery? You mean cut scenes?

petraeus1

LiquidSchwartz wrote: »

Quests in eso are fun the first time around, personally. But, anything after once is absolute misery. No replayability in my opinion. After the first time, I grind everything up with mobs and don't do any quests.
Areas like shadowfen are so bad I almost skipped it if I wasn't a completionist.

I haven't been to Shadowfen yet on my EP alt, what's wrong with that zone in particular? How could ZOS address replay value of quests?

Tabbycat

The problem is every time ZOS puts in alternative ways for players to gain XP, players tend to find a way to exploit it and level much faster than intended.

Oldmanlawlor

petraeus1 wrote: »

Oldmanlawlor wrote: »

I liked the DC quest line.. Other than that, it's a boring grind for me. How the quests are 'delivered' doesn't capture my attention. I just spam A when it comes to quests now.

I much prefer how Mass Effect 2 delivered their speech.

Care to elaborate on speech delivery? You mean cut scenes?

Not entirely cut scenes. I just mean communication in game in general.

Reznique

Grinding goes better with this badly made engine imo.

• Recalling the BBW and the way she dealt with the rocks after she got her stuff back. (2nd mission of the main quest)

petraeus1

Tabbycat wrote: »

The problem is every time ZOS puts in alternative ways for players to gain XP, players tend to find a way to exploit it and level much faster than intended.

Is leveling faster than intended bad? Many PvP'ers and fervent PvE end-game players would love to skip the questing entirely!

How do you feel about the game holding your hand when questing continuously? Should it tell you what to do at every given point or rather open up a plot and have players figure out the next step for themselves (with hints in dialogue, journal entries etc.)?

CherryCake

I like the main quests the most, however most other side quests are boring, bring back that lost person, go fetch something and then go fetch something else etc. Some say "like in every mmo" and that is true, but its definitely not like in any RPG, where you can feel they put a lot of thought in each quest.
Sometimes the voice actors are also terrible, making you think they just hired some friends to say some lines here and there.

But we also have to keep a realistic thought, that its as if they made 3 games where they had to come up with a bunch of side quests, and of course they cant make them all unique or exciting.

As about solo quests, after doing them once, it can get pretty boring.

Tabbycat

petraeus1 wrote: »

Tabbycat wrote: »

The problem is every time ZOS puts in alternative ways for players to gain XP, players tend to find a way to exploit it and level much faster than intended.

Is leveling faster than intended bad? Many PvP'ers and fervent PvE end-game players would love to skip the questing entirely!

How do you feel about the game holding your hand when questing continuously? Should it tell you what to do at every given point or rather open up a plot and have players figure out the next step for themselves (with hints in dialogue, journal entries etc.)?

Already played that way with Morrowind (and a few other games as well). It's not as fun as you think it'd be.

Besides, players just look up how to do it instead, or they install third party quest tracking programs so it doesn't really matter in the end.

petraeus1

SerenaAnastasia wrote: »

But we also have to keep a realistic thought, that its as if they made 3 games where they had to come up with a bunch of side quests, and of course they cant make them all unique or exciting.

Did they really have to though? Couldn't they have adjusted the leveling to a smaller amount of but higher quality quests? Or are these side quests necessary to provide 'content', to flesh out the landmass, to space out the leveling?

Can you give examples or suggestions as to what kind of quests you'd like to see from ZOS in new DLC? (Maybe in terms of plot, game mechanics, scale, reward, difficulty of mobs/bosses/preparation/figuring things out on your own, outcome etc.?)

mistermutiny89

Just because the quests are story driven, does NOT mean that ESO's quests are enjoyable. It's not so much the quests themselves but how they are delivered. Let's look at your basic quest in ESO.

1. Talk to this person. (Quest received)
2. Talk to the person beside that person
3. Talk to the first person again
4. Go collect item
5. First person appears, wait for this person to talk
6. Person disappears and tells you to meet them 100 yards away so they can speak to you (rage intensifies)
7. Quietly sob and pray for death
8. Talk to that person
9. Go kill someone
10. Talk to the first person again. (Quest finished)

That's a 15 min quest where 10 mins is spent chasing after people just for them to tell you a bunch of rubbish during every step of the quest that is in no way immersive or exciting or even necessary.

I know the quest givers can't talk to us over the phone but *** does Tamriel need them. Quest delivery and contact with quest givers needs to be streamlined. Because as of right now it's a bloody joke. Look at games like borderlands, or dare I say Destiny and warframe, I can't remember the other Scrolls games making me want to go do five laps in a pool of razor blades!

I have 7 vet characters, mostly levelled via questing.. I complete these by putting the game on silent and having my laptop out with a tv show on. People I've introduced to the game feel the same and just button mash through the text after the first map. Which is kind of sad when I know people like Bill Nighy and Kate Beckinsale were involved in the game.

petraeus1

Tabbycat wrote: »

petraeus1 wrote: »

Tabbycat wrote: »

The problem is every time ZOS puts in alternative ways for players to gain XP, players tend to find a way to exploit it and level much faster than intended.

Is leveling faster than intended bad? Many PvP'ers and fervent PvE end-game players would love to skip the questing entirely!

How do you feel about the game holding your hand when questing continuously? Should it tell you what to do at every given point or rather open up a plot and have players figure out the next step for themselves (with hints in dialogue, journal entries etc.)?

Already played that way with Morrowind (and a few other games as well). It's not as fun as you think it'd be.

Besides, players just look up how to do it instead, or they install third party quest tracking programs so it doesn't really matter in the end.

The quest journal could be a bit better designed than Morrowind's. At least you wouldn't be a robot following orders, but using brainpower!

And doesn't the internet-argument go for everything? Why do I go to university when there's Wikipedia? Maybe a bad analogy, but still. The people who look it up or use add-ons are likely the ones who aren't interested in questing at all, more in the end-game. If that's the majority population, why have questing at all? But there's also people who like the idea of epic stories, journeys, with challenging puzzles and fights in a consistent and continuously expanding world, that can't get their fix in the current generation of MMO quests.

Tabbycat

petraeus1 wrote: »

Tabbycat wrote: »

petraeus1 wrote: »

Tabbycat wrote: »

The problem is every time ZOS puts in alternative ways for players to gain XP, players tend to find a way to exploit it and level much faster than intended.

Is leveling faster than intended bad? Many PvP'ers and fervent PvE end-game players would love to skip the questing entirely!

How do you feel about the game holding your hand when questing continuously? Should it tell you what to do at every given point or rather open up a plot and have players figure out the next step for themselves (with hints in dialogue, journal entries etc.)?

Already played that way with Morrowind (and a few other games as well). It's not as fun as you think it'd be.

Besides, players just look up how to do it instead, or they install third party quest tracking programs so it doesn't really matter in the end.

The quest journal could be a bit better designed than Morrowind's. At least you wouldn't be a robot following orders, but using brainpower!

And doesn't the internet-argument go for everything? Why do I go to university when there's Wikipedia? Maybe a bad analogy, but still. The people who look it up or use add-ons are likely the ones who aren't interested in questing at all, more in the end-game. If that's the majority population, why have questing at all? But there's also people who like the idea of epic stories, journies, with challenging puzzles and fights in a consistent and continuously expanding world, that can't get their fix in the current generation of MMO quests.

Tomb Raider II was quite possibly one of my most favorite games. I had a lot of fun playing through that, on my own, without looking anything up. But I don't think it would be as much fun to do in an MMO environment. I think puzzle games that make you solve things are far more fun in a single player setting. That's just my opinion of course.

I think, what you really need, is some kind of mod that does that type of editing to the quest tracker for you. I don't think you'll see ZOS do it. There's already been so much complaining that the UI is as minimalistic as it it. I think the majority of the player base would revolt if the quest tracker was removed.

LadyNalcarya

sadownik wrote: »

One of the most annoying thing in ESO is, that story telling is so black and white. Everything must be clear from ethical point of view, even if you are allowed to make a choice that is not goodie goodie you are told very clearly that you were indeed a bad boy/girl.

Pretty much this.
But on the other hand, there's a ton of interesting lore in ESO, and I really enjoy it.

Lolssi

I'm in 3rd zone of Silver and still loving it. Sure many quests aren't different under the hood but as a Nightblade I just skip most of the trash mobs so it goes pretty fast. I enjoy most of the stories how they're linked to bigger agenda. Sure the wonder of exploration is gone a bit when I can pretty much look at empty map and tell pretty much where different quests are. Also npcs vanishing in thin air is let down.

I'm player that plays for the journey not for the destination. If I get new gear nice but that ain't the reason for me. Also my faction is AD and now playing EP. So far EP seems bit weaker questwise but not much. I also don't create alts so I don't get bored because of that.

I'd say overall ESO has best MMO quests. Sure SWTOR might have better ones but they have so much horrible filler and most boring MMO combat to date that it isn't even competition at this point. Also ESO's quests are better than Bethesda has given us this decade, which I understand isn't saying much.

MarrazzMist

I agree there might be little too many quests. It is difficult to enjoy the storylines, when you are doing quests simultaneously.

I'm going through cadwels gold with my alt, only playing the main story, and I appreciate it much more this way. Now I can actually remember what I'm doing and what led to this.

b92303008rwb17_ESO

I personally think that most of the boring and grinding experiences come from the compulsory Cadwell's silver and gold after max level. First times doing each faction's quests can actually be quite interesting and rewarding.

One of the differences between ordinary RPGs and MMOs is that people often take their time and enjoy questing when playing solo RPGs. No matter how amazing the quests or stories are, it is going to be boring if you keep doing them for 10 hours straight a day 7 days a week. The problem is that in MMOs, max level and the subsequent dungeon farming are the ultimate goal and you are, to some level, kind of forced to keep questing in order to reach that goal. Now is it really that surprising that people feel losing interests when they rush so hard to the level cap only to find that there are two more factions to do?

The good news is thanks to the incoming removal of VR and improvements in zone and quest design that have been implemented since Imperial City and Orsinium, I believe things are going to be better.

Lysette

b92303008rwb17_ESO wrote: »

I personally think that most of the boring and grinding experiences come from the compulsory Cadwell's silver and gold after max level. First times doing each faction's quests can actually be quite interesting and rewarding.

One of the differences between ordinary RPGs and MMOs is that people often take their time and enjoy questing when playing solo RPGs. No matter how amazing the quests or stories are, it is going to be boring if you keep doing them for 10 hours straight a day 7 days a week. The problem is that in MMOs, max level and the subsequent dungeon farming are the ultimate goal and you are, to some level, kind of forced to keep questing in order to reach that goal. Now is it really that surprising that people feel losing interests when they rush so hard to the level cap only to find that there are two more factions to do?

The good news is thanks to the incoming removal of VR and improvements in zone and quest design that have been implemented since Imperial City and Orsinium, I believe things are going to be better.

It will - because all the future DLC areas will be scaled - so this content becomes more open world than to be a level-gated theme park. I am looking forward to this, because I think it is a step into the right direction. I want to explore Tamriel, not bash on a myriade of monsters just because they are standing in the way. Less mob in the field and more interesting ones in delves would be a lot better, IMO. Better than to one-shot a lot of mobs when I want to pick some flowers and look for raw materials, treasure chests and other interesting things to find - every few meters I have to 1-shot one of those mobs. I cannot even cast agony on them and then just pick flowers and go away - that counts as being in combat and even that monster cannot move for another 30 seconds, I cannot pick this flower but have to kill that monster - every few meters - its annoying.

Volkodav

Oh my God,..I cant believe you guys are all this bored with ESO.If so,then why do you still play it? Really.
I dont mean to sound like one of those "go to another game then",..but,..perhaps if it does bore you that much,you need a new game. If you arent having fun you are wasting your time and your money.
I've been playing since 2013 and still havent gotten bored with but one tiny quest. The Phophet's first one where you have to walk forever up and down that damn bridge thingy.There should be a prompt that says:
"do you want to skip this?" like with the Prison.
Once you've played that you dont have to anymore.
I dont keep playing to wait for better things to come either.I dont keep playing in hopes that one day it will be what I want.
It already is.

Lysette

Well, criticism does not mean, that we would be displeased with the game, just that we think, it could be better in one or the other context. If it would be really bad, we wouldn't be playing it. It is actually that it is so good, that we want it to be even better and that is the reason why we speak our minds about certain features, which we want to be changed. Everyone wants something different to change, that makes it a bit complicated, but the Devs can take this as suggestions or ideas for their own ideas to how the game should evolve. In the end it is their game and they decide. But we can still speak our mind.

Edit: I think, that ESO might be the last Elder Scrolls game for a very long time. Todd Howard said, that they are working on a lot of projects but they would all be different from what they did before, even those will be Bethesda style games - this implies to me, there is no new Elder Scrolls game in the making. That is why I care that much about ESO and that it evolves into the right direction - there might never again be a single player TES game and we are stuck with ESO - so any effort put into making it better is worth it.

petraeus1

Volkodav wrote: »

Oh my God,..I cant believe you guys are all this bored with ESO.If so,then why do you still play it? Really.
I dont mean to sound like one of those "go to another game then",..but,..perhaps if it does bore you that much,you need a new game. If you arent having fun you are wasting your time and your money.

I have moved to another game! It was just an issue I wanted to raise for people to think about. What does questing look like ideally? What does ESO do well and where can it improve? I like this game for many reasons and wanna come back to it. Feedback on things that people dislike, if presented constructively, should be welcomed, even if you disagree. Think with me on this instead of against me!

AlnilamE

@petraeus1 you know you can disable quest markers in your settings and just go by what is in your journal, right?

Before that was an option, I had a friend who used PinKiller addon to do that for him so he could discover things.

Personally, I'm wrapping up Cadwell's Gold on my sorc and I have really enjoyed the quests in Malabal Tor and Reaper's March (sill doing that zone).

I also really liked the questing in Alik'r. I felt it gave great insight into Reguard culture. And Bangkorai wasn't bad either.

I've done all EP on 4 characters by now. There are some quests that I look forward to each time. There is one quest in Stonfalls that I just skip after the second time, because I really hate the outcomes.

petraeus1

AlnilamE wrote: »

@petraeus1 you know you can disable quest markers in your settings and just go by what is in your journal, right?.

I know! That helped, but doesn't clear my feeling that most quests in ESO don't feel questlike at all, more like content that repeatedly have the same mechanics and objectives but different stories and mobs attached. The diversity in story helps, there are many great stories in ESO, but these quests are still very easy and simplistic and become boring when repeated use of similar objectives (say 'interact with 5 objects in this area') detract and distract from the story they try to tell.

Volkodav

Lysette wrote: »

Well, criticism does not mean, that we would be displeased with the game, just that we think, it could be better in one or the other context. If it would be really bad, we wouldn't be playing it. It is actually that it is so good, that we want it to be even better and that is the reason why we speak our minds about certain features, which we want to be changed. Everyone wants something different to change, that makes it a bit complicated, but the Devs can take this as suggestions or ideas for their own ideas to how the game should evolve. In the end it is their game and they decide. But we can still speak our mind.

Edit: I think, that ESO might be the last Elder Scrolls game for a very long time. Todd Howard said, that they are working on a lot of projects but they would all be different from what they did before, even those will be Bethesda style games - this implies to me, there is no new Elder Scrolls game in the making. That is why I care that much about ESO and that it evolves into the right direction - there might never again be a single player TES game and we are stuck with ESO - so any effort put into making it better is worth it.

I was just reading all those who think it is boring,not those who have complaints about the problems with the game.If someone is bored,why play a game?

Volkodav

petraeus1 wrote: »

Volkodav wrote: »

Oh my God,..I cant believe you guys are all this bored with ESO.If so,then why do you still play it? Really.
I dont mean to sound like one of those "go to another game then",..but,..perhaps if it does bore you that much,you need a new game. If you arent having fun you are wasting your time and your money.

I have moved to another game! It was just an issue I wanted to raise for people to think about. What does questing look like ideally? What does ESO do well and where can it improve? I like this game for many reasons and wanna come back to it. Feedback on things that people dislike, if presented constructively, should be welcomed, even if you disagree. Think with me on this instead of against me!

Oh,no.I dont mean you shouldnt speak about it. I simply got a bit stunned that so many people in the thread stated that they were "bored" with ESO.I cant think why anyone would continue to spend their time doing something that bored them so much.
That's all.I wasnt trying to indicate that you have no right to talk about your thoughts.
What game did you go to,if I may ask?
:}