HoN's 2017 Imperial City Issues & Suggestions

HeroOfNone · January 2018

Hello gankers and city dwellers!

This time I’m here to discuss some issues and suggestions from Imperial City in 2017. This list is based on my own biased opinion and is in no way a complete list of issues, just some items I feel we can address in the upcoming 2018 year. Most suggestions presented are brain storming ideas, and balancing and adjustments will likely be necessary if implemented. Some ideas here may also conflict with others, so take and go with what you like.

Imperial City Issues

Lack of opposing population there seem to be few PVP fights going on and most are short ones.
There is a lack of risk/reward, death lacks impact. Players will suicide gank with no stones to steal what they can and respawn. Players make large groups and share the same amount of stones for doing portal events and accept the occasional death.
The Imperial City population counts for Cyrodiil when neither impacts the other. Despite this AP you gain and the population lock is still affected by players in IC.
Players can escape the death penalty to turn in their Telvar most go to different campaigns or go into pve zones like WGT/ICP to avoid having to go back to base.
there are few incentives to PVP, its more about PVE grinding. the best rewards come from telvar merchants and opening vaults with daedric embes, all from PVE.
The lack of siege gives no equalizing factor for new players. Most low levels are actually a burden to groups as they take away from the mob loot.
The sewer feels under utilized, having many dead ends and only a few congregation points. of note, most will go to farming loops to PVE grind or to the middle looking for a major reward from the Molag ball fight.

Imperial City Suggestions

Set a cooldown for using your base ladders after death . This is similar to a forward camp, though the length of time that would have significant impact. My feeling is it should be around 10 to 15, so it’s a severe enough penalty to make you regret dying, but I’m sure others might find that too harsh.
Force death release after a certain amount of time. coupled with the cooldown for using your base ladder, players wouldn’t be allowed to wait for their friends to rez them, forcing teammates to fight or abandon them.
Setup extraction like zones that can only be used by so many players in the districts . These would become flash points for fights and would require an alliance guard their deliveries. The limit for how many telvar they can handle at one time could be another factor.
Remove telvar from players if they don’t return to base or use an extraction point (see above) and they leave IC. This puts the emphasis on collecting telvar and turning it in without cheesing the system. This might be rough for those that disconnect, but so many abuse disconnects anyway it seems a necessary balance point.
Separate players in IC from Cyrodiil’s population and remove their campaign bonuses . Any Imperial Physique build is already powerful enough without a full set of campaign bonuses or possible emperorship. This will also make IC viable for any faction even when the outside of controlled by one faction.
Redesign the sewer to have capture points & different routes to get them. If we remove buffs from Cyrodiil, we can add buffs from things that actually happen inside the city, points that players capture and hold. Add in the roaming boss factor that could clear those flags, players will have to be active in the area to get those bonuses.
Give separate leaderboards for Imperial City. its own set of rewards to challenge folks to fight. I would like to say that it should be AP based for now, since a telvar based system could easily be abused suicide trading with others.
Allow players to buy into Imperial City with AP. Access would be given through tickets purchasable in the sewer. Tickets would consumed when players use base doors, base ladders, or respawning in a district. Without a ticket, players would be only able to go into their base area to use telvar merchants. Coupled with the auto release and zone control suggestions, dying or leaving will have real consequences, encouraging survival. Tickets will not grant access to the Dungeons or the main story for Imperial City. This would help boost the population while still giving value to players to get ESO Plus or buy the DLC.

These are just some of my issues and suggestions based on IC in 2017. I hope we can see some improvements on this in the coming year. I’d also be interested in hearing more ideas how to equalize lowbies inside IC without adding siege into the mix.

Thanks for reading and happy New Year!

KingExecration · January 2018

My favorite dlc is imperial city but the only sets that I could see viable is powerful assault and imperial physique. The others just seems to be rubbish or really lack luster. If they were revamped and made useable so they could be sold and used more frequently people could see more reason to go there instead of just getting alchemy mats.

You are right with the boss loot sharing, in no cp when I'm on my tank with my buddy, randoms will just barely attack so they get stones and loot so I might "lose aggro" so they're not just free loading off me and my buddy doing most of the work. I don't mind it very much when they're doing some real damage but a guy at maximum range light attacking with a staff just to get loot doesn't make me wanna share.

Publius_Scipio · January 2018

For some reason I could never really get into Imperial City PvP (I did enjoy the storyline). The length of the sewers maze and then the zergs in the (rather small) districts above can make playing there feel like a chore. It is my opinion that Imperial City would have fared better if it was seamlessly tied into the battles in Cyrodiil. Imperial City is a bunch of load screens. If alliance war game performance could significantly improve, then Imperial City should have been open where you can grab a scroll in Cyrodiil and run into the city if you wanted as an example. Maybe to crown emperor you should have needed to also control imperial city.

incite · January 2018

Yes plz, I read a lot of nice suggestions. I can add more to the list but I rather have them confirm they wanna do some rework on IC dlc than falling upon deaf ears...

But to OP, + over9000