What was the argument againts the Soft Cap system back then?

GazettE

Wouldnt soft cap solve all the problem about 'balancing' that we are facing today?

There will be more diversify build and the extreme differences between magicka and stamina dps would be resolved?

Any thoughts?

Kodrac

I think removing them just made it easier for the devs. They took the lazy approach.

DHale

I was far more powerful when soft caps were around than I am today. I wore warlock and Seducer and hit spell damage soft cap. The game wasn’t even close to balance a DK could drop a standard one right after another I could bats five seconds later another bats then another.

GazettE

Kodrac wrote: »

I think removing them just made it easier for the devs. They took the lazy approach.

I know right

The game was more fun back then, because there wasnt glass canon build and most of the ability was really utilised very well.

And actually from the dev side, they can design the skills more diverse without thinking which skill for which build (stam or mag).

GazettE

DHale wrote: »

I was far more powerful when soft caps were around than I am today. I wore warlock and Seducer and hit spell damage soft cap. The game wasn’t even close to balance a DK could drop a standard one right after another I could bats five seconds later another bats then another.

Well they just need to do a little bit adjustment. Just dont remove the soft cap completely

Vaoh

DHale wrote: »

I was far more powerful when soft caps were around than I am today. I wore warlock and Seducer and hit spell damage soft cap. The game wasn’t even close to balance a DK could drop a standard one right after another I could bats five seconds later another bats then another.

Soft caps and dynamic Ult gen aren’t the same thing.

FloppyTouch

They should bring back soft and hard caps back just change the values from where they use to be I remember having almost all stats in the yellow area soft cap.

GazettE

FloppyTouch wrote: »

They should bring back soft and hard caps back just change the values from where they use to be I remember having almost all stats in the yellow area soft cap.

Exactly. Thats what i thought too.

Just bring back soft cap and adjust the value then it would resolved all the balancing issue.

Just dont understand the logic behind removing the soft cap

Rohamad_Ali

Soft caps made for more interesting builds and some hybrids that were not half bad at all . I would very happy to see their return . I

Kendaric

Rohamad_Ali wrote: »

Soft caps made for more interesting builds and some hybrids that were not half bad at all . I would very happy to see their return . I

° This. I'd love to see return of soft caps.

ESO was built with soft caps in mind, removing them was a mistake.

Ch4mpTW

Kendaric wrote: »

Rohamad_Ali wrote: »

Soft caps made for more interesting builds and some hybrids that were not half bad at all . I would very happy to see their return . I

° This. I'd love to see return of soft caps.

ESO was built with soft caps in mind, removing them was a mistake.

Huge mistake. The era of soft caps were truly amazing times. It’s sad how so many people will never get to experience such glorious times in ESO history... All they can do is watch clips of those times (if they’re lucky enough to find said clips) on YouTube.

GazettE

Heres a good input discussion to consider @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert

Beardimus

Game was alot worse with caps. No thanks

When i started I didn't realize cap existed, when i learned that i nearly left. It just flattens builds built to peak

GazettE

Beardimus wrote: »

Game was alot worse with caps. No thanks

Did you even play the game when there was soft cap?

I see u're member since nov 2015 lol

KeiruNicrom

The problem was with people being able to soft cap so many things. I remember seeing a post of somebody reaching softcap in all stats completely solo. That kind of jack of all trades thing just made every build seem pointless. Why specialise and focus on certain stats and effects when you can have all of them? glares at CP system

Chilly-McFreeze

GazettE wrote: »

Beardimus wrote: »

Game was alot worse with caps. No thanks

Did you even play the game when there was soft cap?

I see u're member since nov 2015 lol

Joined date doesn't matter. Mine says Jan 17, but I played in beta and then again since Feb 16. I justed missed to register in the forums.

Kendaric

KeiruNicrom wrote: »

The problem was with people being able to soft cap so many things. I remember seeing a post of somebody reaching softcap in all stats completely solo. That kind of jack of all trades thing just made every build seem pointless. Why specialise and focus on certain stats and effects when you can have all of them? glares at CP system

The numbers can be tweaked though.

Soft caps are infinitely better than the system we have now, where you're forced to go one stat or go bust. It would also reduce the constant complaims about racials.

GazettE

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

GazettE wrote: »

Beardimus wrote: »

Game was alot worse with caps. No thanks

Did you even play the game when there was soft cap?

I see u're member since nov 2015 lol

Joined date doesn't matter. Mine says Jan 17, but I played in beta and then again since Feb 16. I justed missed to register in the forums.

Well thats not my point.

If you wasnt around when soft cap still around, then how are u gonna discuss the differences with today's situation.

KeiruNicrom wrote: »

The problem was with people being able to soft cap so many things. I remember seeing a post of somebody reaching softcap in all stats completely solo. That kind of jack of all trades thing just made every build seem pointless. Why specialise and focus on certain stats and effects when you can have all of them? glares at CP system

Like i said, they just need to adjust some of the value.

GazettE

Kendaric wrote: »

KeiruNicrom wrote: »

The problem was with people being able to soft cap so many things. I remember seeing a post of somebody reaching softcap in all stats completely solo. That kind of jack of all trades thing just made every build seem pointless. Why specialise and focus on certain stats and effects when you can have all of them? glares at CP system

The numbers can be tweaked though.

Soft caps are infinitely better than the system we have now, where you're forced to go one stat or go bust. It would also reduce the constant complaims about racials.

^

Plus we would have more balance between both stam and mag. As well as pvp and pve.

On top of that, your resources both mag and stam will be fully utilised because both stam and mag abilities are balanced no matter what class or build you play.

Carbonised

Half the people who post here don't seem to realise what soft caps actually mean. Then they go on to talk about other things that were present in ESO when it had soft caps, things that are completely unrelated to caps, such as dynamic ultigen.

News flash, we already have soft caps, aka diminishing returns, which we got a few updates back with the CP rework, which means that the more points you pump into a specific point yields diminishing returns, which again encourages you to spread your points out over more stars instead of just stacking on a few ones.

The CP system itself is a power creep tool full of giant holes, but at least the diminishing returns update curbed some of the most blatant power creep. It's just a pity that so many of the stars still only spell out "moar DPS", just a matter of more regen, more crit, more penetration, or more direct damage. The end result is still the same.

But at least it goes to show that the devs have realised that a diminishing returns system or soft caps is important for the gameplay balance of pretty almost every RPG game. Heck, even old school AD&D realised this way back then, just a pity the ZOS devs only seemed to re-discover that old wisdom recently.

And instead of offering the obvious solution, which is diminishing returns or soft caps on stacking stats (mag/stam) or spell/weap power, they instead try to highly incentivize people in investing on branching out builds with hybrid sets, skills that scale off other stats pools and what not. And it isn't working, since the min/maxing is still not curbed by any sort of diminishing returns.

Again, D&D was a more superior system, where damage scaling was kept to a single stat and perhaps a few other modifiers, whereas in ESO damage scales off a billion factors, and you're able to pretty much max out on any and all of them without any drawbacks. The CP system being the sole exception, and as I already said, even if you cant max out a single star for min/maxing, you can still spread out your points over various damage stars that effectively brings about the exact same end result - people even make elaborate spreadsheets to show the most efficient min/maxing of the CP system to provide the better damage overall.

In ESO, more complicated is definitely not more enjoyable or more balanced, and the whole system actively encourages an extreme amount of min/maxing since the drawbacks are effectively non-existant.

Slurg

I just miss playing the hybrid builds, which were actually viable back in the soft cap days. Try rocking up to a group situation today using a hybrid build and prepare to be kicked and/or have a forum post made complaining about you.

smacx250

Mostly, people just wanted "Mor' Power"!

GazettE

Carbonised wrote: »

Half the people who post here don't seem to realise what soft caps actually mean. Then they go on to talk about other things that were present in ESO when it had soft caps, things that are completely unrelated to caps, such as dynamic ultigen.

News flash, we already have soft caps, aka diminishing returns, which we got a few updates back with the CP rework, which means that the more points you pump into a specific point yields diminishing returns, which again encourages you to spread your points out over more stars instead of just stacking on a few ones.

The CP system itself is a power creep tool full of giant holes, but at least the diminishing returns update curbed some of the most blatant power creep. It's just a pity that so many of the stars still only spell out "moar DPS", just a matter of more regen, more crit, more penetration, or more direct damage. The end result is still the same.

But at least it goes to show that the devs have realised that a diminishing returns system or soft caps is important for the gameplay balance of pretty almost every RPG game. Heck, even old school AD&D realised this way back then, just a pity the ZOS devs only seemed to re-discover that old wisdom recently.

And instead of offering the obvious solution, which is diminishing returns or soft caps on stacking stats (mag/stam) or spell/weap power, they instead try to highly incentivize people in investing on branching out builds with hybrid sets, skills that scale off other stats pools and what not. And it isn't working, since the min/maxing is still not curbed by any sort of diminishing returns.

Again, D&D was a more superior system, where damage scaling was kept to a single stat and perhaps a few other modifiers, whereas in ESO damage scales off a billion factors, and you're able to pretty much max out on any and all of them without any drawbacks. The CP system being the sole exception, and as I already said, even if you cant max out a single star for min/maxing, you can still spread out your points over various damage stars that effectively brings about the exact same end result - people even make elaborate spreadsheets to show the most efficient min/maxing of the CP system to provide the better damage overall.

In ESO, more complicated is definitely not more enjoyable or more balanced, and the whole system actively encourages an extreme amount of min/maxing since the drawbacks are effectively non-existant.

Exactly

The soft cap that they introduced back then was more effective than the diminishing return that they are applied now and i dont understand why, they still dont realize it.
I understand that the game has to be evolved and thats the reason that the CP system is existed today. However, they actually can always adjust the original soft cap values rather than completely removing it to balance out the new things that they introduce.

It can be seen from the fact that the game was more balanced, more diversified, and of course the motto that they introduced as the game launch "play whatever you want" was correctly applied.
While nowadays, you have to rely on build that posted in the internet and have exactly same playstyle as those min/maxer or else your character wont be able to perform in vet dungeons, trials,etc.

Turelus

When they removed them they said there would be a new cap, that cap would be "all the slices of the pie/cake" adding up from other area and how if you wanted to go full damage you would be much weaker elsewhere. (source: Guild Summit)

However since then they've just made the slices of cake bigger each update and I still don't see myself being weaker for stacking as much damage as I can.

pmn100b16_ESO

I just enjoyed being able to watch your health go down and react, rather than the panic dodge roll, shield spam you have to do now the moment a smidgen of health is gone.

Carbonised

pmn100b16_ESO wrote: »

I just enjoyed being able to watch your health go down and react, rather than the panic dodge roll, shield spam you have to do now the moment a smidgen of health is gone.

The amount of one-shots and instakills in DLC dungeons and trials have also exacerbated this issue a lot. A min/maxed glass canon will die to a one shot mechanic just as well as a 28k health DD with nice resistances. The min/maxer will deal twice the damage as the one who build for a bit of defense, though.

I find this type of playstyle very uninteresting and hectic compared to a more tactical gameplay, where you actually have to react to what's going on and incoming damage, instead of simply punching your rotation and avoiding one shot mechanics.

The amount of defenses that scale off damage ressources is also to blame (heals scale off magic stats, shields scale off magic stats, dodge rolling and blocking requires a large stam pool etc), and many DPS skills also come with inherent heals, baked into your rotation, at least 2-3 for every class out there, and even a few with weapon skill lines.

All this together highly encourages a min/maxing playstyle where health and defense is unimportant, anything that's dangerous is a one-shot anyway, and healers and tanks spend most their time adding to group dps with buffs, and often just going with 3 dps and a tank since a healer is unnecessary for much of the content outside vet trials.

All of this should really be adressed in a combat update, but I believe that ship has long since sailed, and we're stuck with what we have now. ZOS has adapted to the DPS meta as well by introducing way more one-shot mechanics instead of relying on an attrition system where you take incoming damage, decide whether to keep damaging the enemy or skip damage by casting some defense skills or heals, while at the same time keeping watch on your resources.

I'm sorry, but that's the type of old school RPG combat system I'm used to in pretty much every computer or tabletop setting, and I find the ESO system severely lacking in that, in favour of frantic and hectic gameplay where reaction skills are valued immensely higher than tactical ones. But perhaps that's what the kids want these days.

At least I miss the days in D&D games where you actually had to consider your health, the enemy, the amount of spells you had available at the given time, whether you would need those spells later in the dungeon, and what other items or skills you had available, and /then/ make a decision on what to do next, instead of ESO where you just keep mashing your 2-3 damage skills that all come with a bunch of self heals and a multitude of buffs and procs.

Carbonised

Turelus wrote: »

When they removed them they said there would be a new cap, that cap would be "all the slices of the pie/cake" adding up from other area and how if you wanted to go full damage you would be much weaker elsewhere. (source: Guild Summit)

However since then they've just made the slices of cake bigger each update and I still don't see myself being weaker for stacking as much damage as I can.

Agree, the cake keeps getting bigger. Also, "being weaker elsewhere" means nada and zero these days, outside pvp that is. With everything being a one shot, it doesn't matter if you have 17k health or 27k, doesn't matter if you have absolute minimum resistances or half the resistances of a tank, you're still gonna die to every 1 shot mechanic and every heavy attack from a boss (or evern large veteran trash mobs).

This reasoning from ZOS only has merit in PvP where you really have to think about spending your points in a more spread out way, or in overland content that's so easy you could do it without even CP to begin with.

Violynne

Ch4mpTW wrote: »

Huge mistake. The era of soft caps were truly amazing times.

I'm quite sure the history of discussions on this forum would certainly disagree with this statement. Even I remember the backlash the earlier game received for its design. Hybrids were good? Since when, considering stamina was the absolute worst back then?

I'm getting the feeling these memories are based on the characters people chose to stick with, rather than actually playing any alts they (found) to be weaker than their main.

magSorcs anyone? Back in the Veteran days, this was pretty much all people played.

And let's not kid ourselves to think soft caps were beneficial, because there is *always* that group who will push the limits on those diminishing returns to gain even a marginal percentage in (often) more DPS.

Games like this *always* have been influenced by the 5% (and I'm being generous here) who dedicate their time to building the "ultimate" character. These are the players who spend time making spreadsheets, and broadcasting builds to help others achieve the same goal.

In other words: if the minimum keeps influencing the majority, the game will never be "balanced".

Hard caps were introduced to stifle this, and this is why it makes sense. The trade off, of course, is now the classes are hard-locked for the very same freaking outcome: max DPS that *everyone* can now achieve and remain "balanced" as no one can squeeze out the marginal difference even if it only amounts to 0.005%.

This dynamic has plagued every MMO since their creation. It's literally impossible to achieve this "balance" players believe exists in games. It can't exist.

To sum this up, imagine the most simplest of games: Rock, Paper, Scissors. Simple. Easy. Anyone can play it.

However, soon, it'll be quick to discover the majority will side with Rock, because it's the strongest. Eventually, the shift will be to Paper once it's discovered it can beat Rock. Then everyone becomes Paper. Finally, Scissors gets its 15 minutes of fame.

Don't take my word for it. Take a look at the majority of consistent builds in the history of the game since launch. We're seeing, right now, a dynamic change as more players are restoring their stamBlades because the game was shifted again.

Hybrids have *never* been viable in this game. I should know. I have one sitting in my alt library, which I bring out every time the game changes to see if it has a chance. My poor Khajiit is dying to see battle, but instead, lounges on the shores of Khennarthi's Roost waiting for the day she can join in the fight.

Forthcoming, ZoS will make yet another change, perhaps even restoring soft caps with a heavier diminished return, but this still doesn't remove the fact that even if the diminishing return is penalized, it's basically a hard cap system.

The CP system is probably the best example of this because, for each point spent above 75, we can clearly see our loss taking its toll.

But do you want to bet I can promise there are many who still dump the max into the pool despite the loss? Sure, there are others, like myself, who are trying to diversify, but even I can clearly see for myself what a difference 10% can make.

The reality is, in order to make a "balanced" game, means to remove PvP from the game, which I'm quite sure would anger many people, even those who don't go for max DPS. To them, this is their enjoyment of the game.

But as long as PvP remains, we'll always see two build types for players: PvE and PvP, and you can bet the latter will always push the bounds of "maximum" DPS.

Now I'll change gears a bit and speak from personal experience. This game does need more work in order to bring back balancing of SKILLS, not classes. I'd love to play a hybrid character, but the reality is this build will not work in the game until the skill system is changed from the ground up.

The biggest problem I see with the game is its reliance on damage output built upon our attributes, which is NOT A SKILL. When a skill's base damage is derived from an attribute, that attribute will always be exploited.

The game needs to separate the skills from attributes, and use other modifiers (armor, weapons, and jewelry) to increase the overall output. With this, I definitely have NO ISSUE with softcaps being applied, even if the dedicated 5% will grind to gain a marginal 2%.

This would be fair and it would definitely restore more balance.

Until ZoS break away skills from attributes, our pools will always remain max magicka or max stamina.

technohic

Seeing as half the time I see people complain about others being too tanky, and other times complaining about one shot kills and I know both are possible. Yes; I think soft caps would be a good idea.

Joshuagm1991

What is hard and soft cap? And I'm being serious.

Kanar

Wasn't heavy armor pointless because you could get all you need from light armor? I played during soft caps, but not a lot. Stamina just sucked then and had no options so I quit playing pretty early, like in May. I remember I could hit volatile armor and be at the point of diminishing returns.

You guys sure the nostalgia isn't just making things seem better than it was?