Half a year of ESO - the good, the bad and the ugly

Carbonised

Alright ESO, it's been about 7 months ago since I bought your game, I bought ESO+ like 5-6 months ago, and I've been playing the game extensively in that period of time, so I thought I should leave you some feedback on what I like, what I don't like, and some suggestions for further development.

First, a bit about me so you know where I'm coming from, as it probably makes my review make more sense. I'm a huge RPG fan, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Final Fantasy, and of course Elder Scrolls and Skyrim. I have done some online RPG games as well, but not really any MMOs. I'm more of a single player type of RPG gamer, who enjoys the atmosphere, the storyline, the immersion. I do also enjoy finishing content, the competition, and the challenge to some extent. In my 7 months of ESO, I'd say I have done about 98 % of your content, and gotten about 94 % of all achievements. That includes all veteran dungeons, veteran trials, DLCs and some pvp. Thus, I believe I have at least some experience with most of what your game has to offer. Now, let me tell you what I think.

Visuals, graphics, design
First of all, let me congratulate your design team on their areas and dungeons. I'm an old Skyrim player, I play it modded, and visuals and the feel of a setting is very important to me. Even with the limitations of an MMO, your game has to look good, it has to have those 'wow' moments that take your breath away. Whether it's the rocky cliffs of Wrothgar, the volcanic lava streams of Stonefalls, or the desolate crags of Rivenspire, your game looks good. I really hope you're paying your design team enough, 'cause their work is really what keeps me in this game. I also like that you seem to be getting better and better. The original areas are fine, but the newer areas of Wrothgar and Hew's Bane are even better. This is definitely one of the things you pull off the best in your game.
There is one thing I'd like to mention though. As a Dragonknight, many of my abilities look very cool. All the fire breathing and such, and there are also the lightning abilities of the Sorcerer, the destruction staff ones etc. All very well made. Yet most of the buffs and heals in the game look awful. It's like the usual RPG christmas tree sparkles and bubbles. Heavy armor skill, what happened there? Vigor? Regeneration? It's all laser beams and christmas tree sparkles. Couldn't you have designed something a bit more taseful and subtle? When you have a raid going or a pvp group, the amount of eyesores is just too large to ignore. I'd have liked you to have payed more attention to this, in a game that otherwise has nice aesthetics.

Music, soundtrack
While we're at the positive, let me mention the music of this game. Again, I sincerely hope you're paying your composer enough, 'cause the soundtrack of ESO is awesome. Living up to Jeremy Soule's work of the older Elder Scrolls game can be difficult, but ESO manages that same level. The original game has a very nice score, but the scores of Orsinium and Dark Brotherhood are even better. This is definitely one of the best RPG soundtracks, alongside games like Morrowind, Skyrim or Age of Conan. Good work.

Lore
Moving on to another positive aspect of ESO, the lore. Any Elder Scrolls game ought to be full of lore, of books, of things associated with the Elder Scrolls history and setting. I believe ESO pulls that off in a good way too. There are many things to read, many stories to follow, and it really feels like an Elder Scrolls game with all that pertains to that. I wouldn't have minded some kind of journal system, where you got a book or a journal entry for every major story arc you finished, with a short write up of it, like the story arc of the Imperial City, White-Gold Tower, or the main quests. Simply because often you have to rush through group content (like veteran dungeons), and don't have the time to fully immerse yourself in what's going on. Having a journal system or a book with short summaries of what just went on, would help me immerse myself a bit more into the setting, instead of it all just being about slash slash stab kill mobs and done.

Gameplay, balance
Alright, moving on to some of the more ugly things in ESO. Even if you've only been here 7 months, you cannot help but see that this game has some huge gameplay and balance issues. Just look at these forums, a vast majority of the posts and topics here are about race and class imbalances, and you've spent a great deal of the last patches to change things around hugely. Even more changes have been made in the past, such as the no stamina regen while blocking, the dynamic ultimate regen and the skills and morphs you change on a whim. ESO, ZOS, this is not good enough. Many, many players are frustrated with your changes and the imbalances that still plague the game, and it really seems to many of us that your gameplay design team has no idea what they're doing, and just blundering in the dark trying out random stuff as they go. This is extremely problematic. However you put it, people are unhappy about many aspects of your gameplay, and the team behind the gameplay and class/race balance is simply not doing their job good enough.

The chief executives of ESO and ZOS really ought to consider if they have the right people on the job, when so many players have issues with this aspect of your game. Simply changing things around dramatically every patch isn't making people more content either. I know I will eventually be fed up with the uncertainty and simply move on. I play a magicka Dragonknight myself, Dunmer, and am of course based around fire. I bought the fire horse from your store, a fire pet, and made all my equipment associated with fire. Now, had I been a stamina Dragonknights last patch, I would have become really frustrated and angry with you, changing my whole theme and class feel around from fire to some kind of poison spitter. People invest in their characters, you know, they build them around themes, abilities, feelings. And you just changing things like that drastically on a whim makes people frustrated. Know where your game is heading, have some kind of plan and direction, and involve people, us, in that plan. And have respect for the time and effort people have invested in their characters.
Balance and gameplay is a huge deal in an MMO, especially when you count PvP into the equation, it's something that needs to work from the get go, not something you still struggle to create years from launch.

This goes hand in hand with set items, new equipment introduced, and the magicka/stamina balance. Like I said I'm a magicka Dragonknight, and really, you introduce set after set for stamina, loot table sets, craftable sets, something worth grinding for in trials and vet dungeons, while my best in slot is still Julianos from Orsinium DLC, Willpower set and Skoria. Seriously, ZOS? And next patch is two monster sets, one for stamina one for tanks, and several new set items useless to me as a MagDK. I already have my best in slot, there is nothing for me go go after anymore, and you really, really need to work on that. Why does the Burning Spellweave from CoA not scale to my level? Why did you nerf Sun Silk so it's useless for me compared to Julianos, why does nothing drop from SO and MoL for me as a magicka DD, while you get nice stamina sets from SO? Unless I get something else to aim after in this game other than doing daily crafting writs and daily pledges, for gold keys I don't need, then I'll probably get bored and leave rather soon.
Or take a look at the CP system. As stamina, you have so many CP passives to look forward to, to aim for. As magicka, I get a few passives unlocked quickly, then nothing after that is useful to me. Look at the mage constellation, top passive is that when I kill a mob, someone near it will get a little magicka. Seriously? Compared to that, break free as a stamina, and your skills cost only 20 % for a few seconds. The Lord passives that are great for a healer, several passives dependant on dodge rolling or blocking, but nothing for a magicka, and nothing for a dps build. The passives I looked forward to the most were the master gatherer and plentiful harvest ones. Very disappointing ZOS.
Having a class that everyone agrees is bottom lowest tier for open world PvP is also quite disappointing. You shouldn't force me to have to make alts in order to enjoy PvP, or face objectively harder terms than other classes do.

I guess we can throw the whole animation canceling/weaving into the mix here as well. I'm not a fan. I mean, having to do something completely nonintuitively, that makes my character seems like she's having an epileptic seizure, and which requires me to cramp my hands from mashing buttons faster than an ADHD-person on caffeine overload is required to make my DPS acceptable in endgame content. Not to mention how the lag and server issues makes this a tedious effort to do, as my bar swapping etc is often ruined by lag spikes and stutter. That you haven't made a more smooth combat system that is dependant on visual cues instead of half-hidden insta-abilities that you barely see but still take effect is inexcusable. I know too much water has probably passed under that bridge for it ever to be fixed, but it makes your game appear amateurish and half-baked.

I must also say I'm not a great fan of the whole damage stacking meta you've had going for a long while now. Everything is about stacking damage on damage, to such an extent that every dps is a walking glass cannon. A boss farts in your general direction and you die. Everyone is so fragile. Sure you can spec for more mitigation or health, but every time you do that, you loose DPS, and since endgame content like vWGT, vICP and vSO and vMoL are geared towards having huge DPS, that's really not an option. It also pigeonholes everyone into specific roles and builds, with no leeway for hybrid builds or other options if you want to do the most demanding endgame content. To be honest, I would rather see caps on damage stacking as well, or at least a diminishing returns, to make hybrid builds or alternative builds viable too, other than just spec'ing as a glass cannon DPS just like everyone else. Maybe then we can also get rid of the huge damage numbers in PvE that requires bosses to have immense amounts of damage and health, or in pvp that can make someone oneshot you or combo you down in like 2-3 skills. Whatever happened to ESO's original vision about resource management? Right now it's only stack stack stack damage, burst burst and burn it down in a minute, and the game has several mechanics that support this very playstyle.

Crafting
Now, I'm a master crafter, I have almost all traits researched, I know all motifs, and I enjoy crafting and hoarding components. Always have done that in games. I think ESO manages to make crafting mostly interesting. One thing that's a little frustrating is that it's easy to max out on crafting. My services are rarely required, most people can make most things themselves. It's pretty much only trait research that holds people back, and the costs of motifs. Maybe you want every player to be completely self sustained in terms of crafting, but I actually prefer crafting to be a skill some excel at more than others, so they can offer/sell their services. I mean, some people rock at trials or vet dungeons, they get equipment they can sell on to others, some fish all day and sell roes/ambrosia, and some like to spend a lot of effort and gold on crafting, to craft for others

Having a 10th research trait, more requirements to pick up material nodes, to refine materials and to make usable items like food and potions would be nice, so your services would be more in demand. Also, the crafting system really needs more attention. I mean, this patch you made Sharpened the best trait on most weapons, and no one uses Nirncrux on neither weapons nor armor. Still Nirncrux are extremely rare and valuable, while not being close to being best trait on items. Who really thought this was a good idea? Of course having Nirncrux so rare, they should be better than sharpened or the armor traits in most cases. Also, writs should take you to Craglorn in the end, not Orsinium. Why on earth would I want the chance to collect pieces of Casiterite stone, when I could get Nirncrux in Craglorn? I know you did it to promote your new DLC, but that is long ago. Pull writs out of Wrothgar and back to Craglorn. I also see that void material is no longer required for max writs in the next patch, that is good, but should have happened long ago. And yet you still collect half void half ruby mats on your surveys? Seriously? I hope that is something you overlooked and will fix, for come on, it makes no sense.

Also, why are writs so easy and boring to do? Couldn't you have more complex potions required for a writ, some that required 3 ingredients, and some of the new poison ingredients? And purple food for writs, green, blue and purple glyphs for writs, and having to make armor and weapons with different traits, and in different motif styles for your daily writs. Crafting writs could have two options, one 'basic' like they are no, and one 'advanced' that required more skill, for better rewards. Crafting should feel more fleshed than it is now.

And fishing, another thing I feel is more like an appendix than a real activity. The adding of Perfect Roe was at least a step in the right direction, but why not add even more rare ingredients and components. For provisioning and for alchemy. That way fishing would feel much more rewarding and worth of the time you put into it, instead of simply being a way to pursue roe and the fisherman title and achievement. As it is now, doing writs, being a crafter and fisherman, isn't really something you want to do most of the time, as it could be a lot more fun and elaborated than it is at this time.
And why is it that there are some alchemy ingredients that are very much in demand, and thus valuable, for potions, while there are many others that are simply trash, like many of the mushrooms, nirnroots and some of the new poison ingredients. At least make them somewhat useful, so they have value. Don't introduce trash ingredients. Same goes for enchanting runes. Why do I still get a million Ta's, and green, blue and purple runes? They're useless, I can't even sell them to anyone. Let them be upgradable like 50 Ta's to one geen, 50 green to one blue etc or something along those lines. At least make them have some kind of use. Make me upgrade potency runes with the right skill and materials. What am I going to do with me 500+ shock runes or lightning runes? Don't introduce more trash materials in the game, there is plenty as it is. And why do I still pick up loads and loads of VR15/CP140-150 equipment and materials from dungeons and areas that are CP160, like normal dungeons, vet dungeons and IC? Seriously, as a CP160+ I should only find CP160 materials when I play in CP160 areas. You're giving me too much stuff that's not even worth selling or decon'ing.

And seriously, why do we not have motif preview (like those you have in the Crown Store) yet, as well as the possibility to change motifs (like those on set item drops that only come in one, specific motif). This should have been a thing from launch of the game, people.
This also goes for the Master weapons and Maelstrom weapons. Seriously, these must be some of the most ugly looking weapons in the game, at least for staves. There is no way I'm grinding for a Maelstrom or Master staff, as that would ruin my look compared to the nice Akaviri staff I have now. Equipment you can change through costumes (like the horrible Skoria set I'm wearing now. Neon orange? Really?), but weapons keep their looks. You should seriously consider making these weapons, that are supposed to be best in slot weapons in this game, ableto change motifs according to the ones you already know.

This also leads over to the whole bind on pickup thing. Why? Why do you even have this in your game? And why are some sets, that are arguably pretty bad, like Briarheart and Pariah, BoP while many of the best sets in the game are not? Makes noe sense. I think all sets should be sellable, so you have access to equipment with gold, if you can't get it the usual way. You have already gone down this path with the buyable monster masks set and next patch with tradable BoP in your group. Might as well go all the way and remove the BoP altogether.

DLCs
Alright, let me finish off by talking about your DLCs. First of all, again, the music and the design of these places is just awesome. I love the shattered Imperial City, the sewers, Wrothgar, and even the small lands of Hew's Bane and Gold Coast. But there is a thing that bugs me a bit. IC was fairly big, Wrothgar was very big, and then you produce these very small DLCs with very small areas. Hew's Bane is so tiny you can see from one end to the other. Two small delves and two world bosses. Same with Gold Coast, which is barely larger than Hew's Bane. And next DLC is going to be pretty much just two new dungeons and that's it. ZOS, you need to make larger scale DLCs with large landmasses and much more content, like Wrothgar. I hear Vvardenfell is coming out, and I sincerely hope that will be something like that. I'm fed up with tiny DLCs that are finished in a week or two. Wrothgar I still return to on a daily basis, Hew's Bane and Gold Coast I barely go to. Please make your new areas larger, put more content into them, make them hubs of your game, not appendices. The beautiful areas you design and the epic music in them deserves more space.
I'm also disappointed that your last two DLCs were nothing but sneak content. Great if you're a vampire nightblade, but really frustrating if you're a dragonknight mage, or even a sorceror or templar I imagine. So much stealing, sneaking, sacraments, all geared towards somebody wearing medium armor, and having access to Nightblade cloak. It's really not fun having messed up your 100th heist for some stupid achievement or motif piece.
And add more alchemy ingredients, more craftable set stations (something good, not like the rubbish you've added so far. I mean, people still consider Julianos, Hundings and Twice-Born Star best in slot for most craftable gear. And I never hear of anyone using the crafted sets from Thief Guild DLC or DB DLC, they're just not that good) and more unique content into your DLCs. Once 'One Tamriel' goes live, why not diversify areas and harvests more. I love that Nirncrux is only found in Craglorn, that you can get specific motif stones in Hew's Bane, Wrothgar and soon in Gold Coast, it makes areas unique and feel special. Why do I find Stinkhorn, Cornflower and Nightshade all over the world from Ice wastes to volcanoes and meadows? It would be really nice if you spread out ingredients and materials more to specific areas, so every place has a feel of its own.

Alright, this is my feedback from an extensive 7 months of ESO. I hope you have the time to read at least some of it, even if it turned out to be a very large post. Cheers.

// Carbonised aka. Indira Indoril, Dunmer Dragonknight of the Alith guild.

akredon_ESO

Very good read and i think you bring up a lot of points people have been talking about. I my self have gotten a little bored with the game. I really enjoy cyrodiil but due to a lot of imbalances and bugs/latency i feel that the competitive play of Cyrodiil is literally a turd circling the drain.

Carbonised

Hey, and thanks for your reply, Akredon. I have been lurking these forums for the last 5-6 months, so I know I'm not alone with many of the opinions that I've shared.

I too enjoy Cyrodiil and the pvp aspect of the game, but like you say, the huge class/race balance issues, not to mention the horrible lag/stutter/fps issue often leaves me with a more sour taste in the end.
I probably should have mentioned Cyrodiil lag as a specific topic in my post as well. But it's not like ZOS isn't aware of the issue, we just have to conclude that they either cannot or will not fix the issue, as it has been brought up on a daily basis in like forever.

TheHsN

I play the game Since BETA...

This is a game IT supposed to be FUN...

But it is lately just anger and stress...

* i go home after work like seven open game like 8 and get in cyro...Just the beginning latency is 500+ so you cant play..
* then open Vmsa 1 hour run and there is stupid items with useles traits or just a ring that u never use in game..
* many bugs in pve no class balance
* now would enjoy with race change or look. THEY ARE JUST TOOOOOOOOO expensive...AND change looking should be with gold in game not with real money...

dont know how they dont see those issues that making the game unplayable...they should reset the all game

ShirleyShine

Great post!
Many things I agree with, and informative on some things I haven't done.

I've not done trials or any PvP to speak of other than IC.
My ping is problematic and the frustration made it something I gave up on doing a long time ago.
Grouping for dungeons was frustrating for me and group, solo only a real option.
Duo a little better, so honed a character to play with a duo partner, very successful as we can do 6 man dungeons now.

I love the crafting.
What I would like is to be able to actually see what something I learn to craft looks like without wasting mats by making one and equipping it to really see the end result.

Saved up enough Tainted Blood to make a trial Assassin style set, and any crafter knows what that sacrifice is like.
It is not a 'given' that you receive it all back when you deconstruct, not to mention that things do change appearance depending on level.
Put 130 Rubydot ingots into a sword to see it properly and return = 1, maybe 2!?

I would love to see more go into fishing. From launch I wanted the fairly rare, Master Fisher achieve.
Something special for the exploring, taking time to stop and smell the roses sort of game style, and I looked forward to the promised special fishing rod that never materialized.

I agree with all you say as regards harvesting.
What I would really like to see would be fields of provisioning items that could be harvested without it being considered theft if we got them.
I also agree with what you say about writs, and about moving them back to Craglorn.
I do see that surveys could be problematic though.

A dream zone for me [Oblivion nostalgia] would be extending the Gold Coast zone to accommodate fields to farm, being able to eventually have a home there, and maybe a neutral town/city that is not just a kill zone for wannabe assassins/thieves.

Iove

When they removed soft caps, I was sure they would soon do racial balance to adjust for how suddenly racial bonuses mattered so much more, and how some races got so far ahead without soft caps while some got worse. Something that stood out to me was how weak the Breton's 3% magicka reduction passive was after soft caps were gone. I can't believe, 1 whole skill point is still to be wasted per 1% magicka reduction? And this is a top tier racial passive?

Nhilandra77

good read, I agree with many points.

I believe the reason they keep bringing stamina after stamina items out is basically stamina as it is is broken. compare with magicka who only need magic to fight stamina to move, stamina builds need stamina for everything, fight dodge, run everything. it all started for me when they removed stamina regen from blocking. ever since they have been trying to fix and repair bad nerfs, cover cracks and in some cases replace entirely now useless things.

Volrion

Nice post man. Was a good read, and I think you have some nice insights. I hope somebody at ZOS gets a chance to check this out.

Carbonised

Thank you for the positive feedback. I also hope some people at ZOS will read this, though they do seem to get an awful lot of feedback, without nothing much really changing (just look at the PTS forum for example).

Easily_Lost

I like everything I read. I do not do PvP, so I can not say one way or the other.
What I especially liked was the way you stated some of the problems without slamming or calling ZOS that they are stupid or other derogatory names. You kept it constructive and to the point.

itehache

After you finish the Mages Guild main quest though every important book/journal you find gets registered as a lore book and you can read it afterwards, that's what I do with journals in dungeons because, as you said, while doing group content generally you run towards the last boss haha

Carbonised

itehache wrote: »

After you finish the Mages Guild main quest though every important book/journal you find gets registered as a lore book and you can read it afterwards, that's what I do with journals in dungeons because, as you said, while doing group content generally you run towards the last boss haha

Well, yes, I know that. But what I wanted was more a journal system with small write-ups of some of the storylines. Even reading the various notes, books and such that you have access to, doesn't really give you the whole picture.

RiitumTai

Carbonised wrote: »

Lore
Moving on to another positive aspect of ESO, the lore. Any Elder Scrolls game ought to be full of lore, of books, of things associated with the Elder Scrolls history and setting. I believe ESO pulls that off in a good way too. There are many things to read, many stories to follow, and it really feels like an Elder Scrolls game with all that pertains to that. I wouldn't have minded some kind of journal system, where you got a book or a journal entry for every major story arc you finished, with a short write up of it, like the story arc of the Imperial City, White-Gold Tower, or the main quests. Simply because often you have to rush through group content (like veteran dungeons), and don't have the time to fully immerse yourself in what's going on. Having a journal system or a book with short summaries of what just went on, would help me immerse myself a bit more into the setting, instead of it all just being about slash slash stab kill mobs and done.

Carbonised wrote: »

Well, yes, I know that. But what I wanted was more a journal system with small write-ups of some of the storylines. Even reading the various notes, books and such that you have access to, doesn't really give you the whole picture.

Hey if you are playing on PC and use addons you may want to check this addon out. It is called Harven's Quest Journal and it may be exactly what you are looking for.
http://www.esoui.com/downloads/info580-HarvensQuestJournal.html

Here are a few pictures taken from esoui:

Kravinoth29

This is a great, well analysed post.

I've been thinking about the possibility of changing the motif of a equipment for a long time too. I mean, having to remake your entire equip set just to change its motif is bad. Worse if you think that there are new motifs been released regularly.

I completely agree when you say writs are easy and boring, repetitive. Last time I did them, I was in Wrothgar and realized that half of my alchemy writs required nirnroot. So I just bought a pack of 200 and that is it. All I had to do is deliver them daily. Writs really need more variety and challenge ( scaled, of course)

The merging/upgrade of enchanting runes is an awesome idea. It's not new (Blizzard did a long time ago) but it's a really better way to manage runes. And also make them more valuable.

Also a new way the spread the alchemy mats, into more specific areas, will be an awesome way to make people return to areas that they only visited a long time ago and also make the mats more valuable. The way the game is right now you, once you finish the quests, will be stationary in one area alone depending what you wanna do: Undaunted areas if you want pledges, Cyro if PVP, DLC areas if you haven't finished them yet, Crag if you wanna do trials. What about the other areas in the game?

(English is not my native language, so please be patient and politely correct me if I wrote something wrong)

Carbonised

RiitumTai wrote: »

Hey if you are playing on PC and use addons you may want to check this addon out. It is called Harven's Quest Journal and it may be exactly what you are looking for.
http://www.esoui.com/downloads/info580-HarvensQuestJournal.html

Ah cool, I'm going to have a look at that, thanks.

Jaybe_Mawfaka

josefcifkaeb17_ESO

Ah, people play a game for a few days and already feel uber important that they have to share every fart they let loose.

Want to change something? Find what sucks about the game, find the topic about it (because 99% of things are here already) and post there to keep the topic going. Nobody is changing the game based on a single individual's opinion and I doubt any devs or mods have the time to read through humongous walls of text.

WatchYourSixx

Heya, just thought I'd drop by and leave a comment or two..

First things first, you make a lot of great points, and as a player who's been here since September 2013, 100% fanboy, I have to agree with most of what you said.

However, I don't agree with a major point you make about the ugly. The gameplay and balance has consistently improved over the course of the game. Most every change they have made has been for the better. This last dlc in particular fixed a ton of major issues with stamina that just made it plain not viable.. The dlc before that fixed a ton of magicka issues and balanced classes to be very close to each other. Now I can't speak much for pvp, as I don't spend hardly any time in cyro, but for pve? The max possible dps for all 4 magicka classes are extremely close to each other. As for stam, I know nb and do are neck and neck but haven't personally seen anyone try stamplar or stam sorc. However, id also like to point out something. If the game is perfectly balanced, why keep playing after a while? If every thing stays the same, why play? Change is good. I know personally that each change they make to tanking is a thrill for me. Having to change my gear to suit my new need is part of playing a mmo. I would hate to be in the same gear for years. That would drive me away from the game actually.

But regardless, very nice post and very nice points.

Also, there are way better options than julianos willpower Skoria for a pve magicka DK.

altemriel

Jaybe_Mawfaka wrote: »

exactly, like "too long, did not read "!!

Carbonised

Jaybe_Mawfaka wrote: »

(...)

Game is down, so you can't really play it anyway for the time being.

I wanted to write a comprehensive review for my experience with ESO, if you don't want to read it, then I'm not forcing you. Plenty of other things to waste your time on I'm sure.

There are also several paragraphs and headlines, if one wishes to dive into a specific topic and not read the others.

As for wall of text, you might want to try it out some time, I think they are called 'books'.

Carbonised

WatchYourSixx wrote: »

Heya, just thought I'd drop by and leave a comment or two..

First things first, you make a lot of great points, and as a player who's been here since September 2013, 100% fanboy, I have to agree with most of what you said.

However, I don't agree with a major point you make about the ugly. The gameplay and balance has consistently improved over the course of the game. Most every change they have made has been for the better. This last dlc in particular fixed a ton of major issues with stamina that just made it plain not viable.. The dlc before that fixed a ton of magicka issues and balanced classes to be very close to each other. Now I can't speak much for pvp, as I don't spend hardly any time in cyro, but for pve? The max possible dps for all 4 magicka classes are extremely close to each other. As for stam, I know nb and do are neck and neck but haven't personally seen anyone try stamplar or stam sorc. However, id also like to point out something. If the game is perfectly balanced, why keep playing after a while? If every thing stays the same, why play? Change is good. I know personally that each change they make to tanking is a thrill for me. Having to change my gear to suit my new need is part of playing a mmo. I would hate to be in the same gear for years. That would drive me away from the game actually.

But regardless, very nice post and very nice points.

Also, there are way better options than julianos willpower Skoria for a pve magicka DK.

Thank you for your comments.

Hvaing spoken to quite a few people in game, in and out of my guilds, I think it rally boils down to whether you are a single player RPG kind of person, or an MMO person. That is really the great divide among the player base as I see it.

MMO players are more about the competitiveness, 'winning' the game, having the best parses on trials, the largest kill vs death ratio in pvp, 'beating' the game in the best way possible and so on. We RPG people, however, are more about the setting, the RPG aspect of the game, the visuals, the feels, the music, and the overall enjoyment of whatever it is we are doing in the game.

Often I have hear people say ESO is a good MMO (often in comparison to WoW and such), and yet at the same time, I hear some people like me saying that while it might be good for an MMO, it's sort of bland and mediocre for an RPG.
I also think this is what separates people like you, who like all the changes, you get to do your math equations all over again, make spreadsheets about what points to put where in order to maximise your numbers to the current meta, from people like me, who are more used to the single player kind of RPGs where the overall frames remain the same, and you can instead spend time developing your character, and lose yourself into the universe and the setting.

Off topic, but for gear, no, not really. Sure in trial runs with warhorn up you could switch to TBS for a minimally better DPS on bosses, and you can also go Kena instead of Skoria if your rotation is perfected. But for those of us who don't really care about perfect rotations and the best parses, Juli/Skoria/Will is pretty much the best setup, yeah. And I also have the full KEna set lying around, so don't really need to grind for that one either (in fact, I have done lots of vWGT runs just to help my mates and finish the achievements. But again I don't need anything from there, after gaining my first 2-3 Kena helmets, so it's sort of just a waste of time again).

MrJKurayami

I really agree with your post OP. In pretty much all of it. I feel though the graphics are great, but the color palette, is washed out and dull. Not compared to other MMO's, but just compared to real life. After the first 4 areas, everywhere looks the same and is sleepy and mostly boring to look at. Granted there are places where if you wait for hours, the lighting can eventually make a screen shot compare to the hundreds I've made in Skyrim everywhere, at all times of day. Skyrim was bleak, but it wasn't washed out. However, all the DLC areas look very nice, I just wish the sky in ESO as a whole didn't look so bad.

It sucks that a lot of these people can't read. I guess that is why they are satisfied with how ESO is. Low intellect. Oh well. I had no trouble reading the OP's post in about 5 minutes. And if you think reading for 5 minutes is strenuous, I can see why you enjoy the 100% voice work for the game.

S1ipperyJim

"my best in slot is still Julianos from Orsinium DLC, Willpower set and Skoria"
you lost me right there, sounds like you stopped playing prior to 1T

I agree about disliking the change to alt poison theme for DKs though

Kendaric

reapthetempestrwb17_ESO wrote: »

"my best in slot is still Julianos from Orsinium DLC, Willpower set and Skoria"
you lost me right there, sounds like you stopped playing prior to 1T

I agree about disliking the change to alt poison theme for DKs though

You do realize that this a thread from July/August, yes?

I know some people want a necromancer class badly, but does it need to extend to forum threads?

MakoFore

i think the things you mention are very good points and points that almost come up daily on the forums, the complaints about
1. technical issues,
2. 2.balance issues
3. the moving away from xp skills like crafting and crafted sets
4. the favouritism of sharpened, divines and impen.

its clear what Zos need to do. you've summed it up nicely. i d be happy if the developers read this out at the next meeting. we complain about the same things every day- they need to attend to the mid to long term gamer here if this game is ever going to survive and be worth the investment of time money and love that developers and gamers have put into it.

Doctordarkspawn

The ballance section is on point. The current dev team has many great -idea's- but an inability to think in different ways and make different playstyles viable.

To stay nothing of tank rolls and support rolls. The lead combat designers distain for tanks is legendary.

Prof_Bawbag

I just began playing PvP intensively over the last week or so and I have no idea how some people can put up with the lag long-term. Not only is it a visual issue with me, but it gives me a headache after a couple of hours if I'm constantly in large scale fights because of the screen stuttering whenever you're near an enemy keep. I couldn't imagine playing like that for over 2 hours.

Prabooo

[quote="Carbonised;281204"
Why does the Burning Spellweave from CoA not scale to my level?[/quote]

What do you mean by this? As far as I am concerned all loot scales your level

Prabooo

Carbonised wrote: »

Why does the Burning Spellweave from CoA not scale to my level?

What do you mean by this? As far as I am concerned all loot scales to your level

altemriel

This one enjoys Tamriel pretty much, yes. This one got to a place lately, where a lot of vampires are, so she got a vampire bite too . Now she sneak and hide, spells and magic is what this one like. A lot of treasures there to be found, like Necropotence set for example. This one feels more magic the more pieces of that set this one wear. Magical .
Ok so to the point here, the worst it was for this one around that time, when the thieves guild got opened in Hew`s Bane again. Not sure now, where those weird sound glitches were occuring, A friend of this one, a Redguard told her, that she was at some bay and a ship was rocking there and making that rocking sound of a wooden ship and then after she moved someplace else, that sound of that wood rocking stayed and looped, awesome
fortunately got fixed then. Now this is ok, also Elder pink online bug was fun, horse pink, land pink, trees pink, funny, also got fixed. Some bugs got fixed pretty fast.

This one has found this lately a nice piece of decoration, this one hopes she can put it to her house to decorate it inside, hopefuly it will become true next year, when this one is getting home from here long trip from her journey of adventurerrrrrrr.


http://i.imgur.com/7K9TJmJ.jpg


Yours Furry
Maoimii

TheBonesXXX

I would have rather seen this game seamless, open-world, and a lot simpler then what they have made it.

I really wanted Oblivion with improved graphics and a huge map, lol.