Suggestion: Allow us to choose our own starting/tutorial area

Puking_Panda

Currently your starting area is always that of the latest expansion you bought. However it might be the case that this isn't your preferred starting area because you don't like the quest or for role-playing reasons and the starting area that you do like is now no longer accessible due to the purchase of the new expansion. Basically by buying new content you're getting locked out your old content, even if it is only just the tutorial quest.

My suggestion is that at the Character Creation screen a new option will be added to choose where you start, sort of like this:


Clicking on these options would then also change the current background to that of the expansions so the Coldharbour prison for base game, boat for Morrowind, ruins with the elven statue for Summerset and the Khajiit study room for Elseweyr.

It's still possible to play through the old tutorials if you haven't purchased the newer content so it's not like these starting areas have been removed. My only suggestion is thus that these other starting areas are re-enabled for people that own the later expansions.

pdblake

Yes please.

rotaugen454

This is a QoL change that I can support.

old_scopie1945

Spot on, yes please.

TheShadowScout

Agreed.

Heck, as I said elsewhere:

TheShadowScout wrote: »

I myself always think it would have been so much better of they had not made the new "tutorials" as -tutorials-, but... added them as "expansion intro".
Like... the first time your character goes to Vvardenfell, they cannot just wayshrine, but need to take the boat, which shipwrecks on firemoth isle... the first time your character follows queen Ayrenns invitation to summerset, they get intercepted by sea-sload magic and end up in the mind trap... the first time your character goes to elsweyr, they get caught in a dragon attack and end up rescued by some friendly khajhiit... etc.

...so to clarify, I would all be for making the old coldharbour tutorial the "default tutorial" and all the others into "expansion intros"; make all the "classic" story progression the default as well... and then give people the -option- to go and bypass all the old in case they want to start with the new if they really want to (just like you have story starters for other things in your collections).

Alas... paths not taken.

Puking_Panda

TheShadowScout wrote: »

Agreed.

Heck, as I said elsewhere:

TheShadowScout wrote: »

I myself always think it would have been so much better of they had not made the new "tutorials" as -tutorials-, but... added them as "expansion intro".
Like... the first time your character goes to Vvardenfell, they cannot just wayshrine, but need to take the boat, which shipwrecks on firemoth isle... the first time your character follows queen Ayrenns invitation to summerset, they get intercepted by sea-sload magic and end up in the mind trap... the first time your character goes to elsweyr, they get caught in a dragon attack and end up rescued by some friendly khajhiit... etc.

...so to clarify, I would all be for making the old coldharbour tutorial the "default tutorial" and all the others into "expansion intros"; make all the "classic" story progression the default as well... and then give people the -option- to go and bypass all the old in case they want to start with the new if they really want to (just like you have story starters for other things in your collections).

Alas... paths not taken.

It would be better if there was more of a welcoming to the expansions. Now you can just fast travel and POOF, ur in the expansion, now go figure it out yourself. So I do agree with you there.

The tutorial quests however are really just tutorials going off the presumption that you're basically a weak and useless nobody so it would require quite a bit of work to change that and Zenimax is unlikely to do so. My suggestion is to basically just enable something exactly as it already is in game.

LadySinflower

People brand-new to the game would have no idea why they were being asked to choose a starting area. I remember going through character creation and the tutorial on my first character. I just stumbled through it and blindly took any advice offered on-screen because I didn't know any better. I think this would just be one more thing to confuse new players.

Ermiq

This is probably the most requested QoL on the forums, yet ZOS totally ignores all these threads.

essi2

Yes, this now!

sionIV

pdblake wrote: »

Yes please.

Puking_Panda

LadySinflower wrote: »

People brand-new to the game would have no idea why they were being asked to choose a starting area. I remember going through character creation and the tutorial on my first character. I just stumbled through it and blindly took any advice offered on-screen because I didn't know any better. I think this would just be one more thing to confuse new players.

It's an extra option. The default(instead of the only) choice could simply be the latest expansion and if you want to change that you should have the ability to do so. It would really be better for newer players that immediately bought all the expansions too as they'll have other choices if they don't like talking cats and a desert.

Reverb

Yes please.

ZeroXFF

First they have to make sure though that people starting in wailing prison get an additional skill point that people starting in chapters get. Also add that skill point to old characters. It's been over 2 years and they still haven't addressed this.

NotaDaedraWorshipper

I think this has been requested monthly for years, because it is something we should have.

Reistr_the_Unbroken

I’d be for this + better lighting

RaddlemanNumber7

Yes, please. Give people the choice and tell them what effect the choices will have on their experience of ESO story lines, either start at the beginning or start with latest chapter they've bought into. Letting players play as they want to play really has be based on players being able to make informed decisions.

dannymcgr81b14_ESO

Yes, please. No more "Here's another trap!"

TheShadowScout

Puking_Panda wrote: »

The tutorial quests however are really just tutorials going off the presumption that you're basically a weak and useless nobody so it would require quite a bit of work to change that and Zenimax is unlikely to do so.

True. But not that much work - a bit of rewording, and removing the "combat tutorial" scenes (since those would already have happened in coldharbour)... and the rest of it can go as standalone intro easily enough.

Puking_Panda wrote: »

My suggestion is to basically just enable something exactly as it already is in game.

Which would be nifty for those who know what's going on.
The new arrivals to ESO on the other hand...

That's why I would prefer a setup that works for anyone, the new ones can follow the story as its supposed to unfold, and the old hands can just skip ahead as they like...

Miaura

Yes please I never got to do the Summerset starting quest!

kargen27

ZeroXFF wrote: »

First they have to make sure though that people starting in wailing prison get an additional skill point that people starting in chapters get. Also add that skill point to old characters. It's been over 2 years and they still haven't addressed this.

I would give up a skill point to be able to start a character where I want. Plenty of skill points in game. If the holdup is how to allocate one single skill point there shouldn't be a holdup.

Ogou

I don't understand why it doesn't work that way yet.

LanteanPegasus

LadySinflower wrote: »

People brand-new to the game would have no idea why they were being asked to choose a starting area. I remember going through character creation and the tutorial on my first character. I just stumbled through it and blindly took any advice offered on-screen because I didn't know any better. I think this would just be one more thing to confuse new players.

Easy solution for that: Give a hint in the menu.
Starting Zone:
- Coldharbour (Base Game, Original Tutorial)
- Morrowind (1st expansion)
- Summerset (2nd expansion)
- Elsweyr (3rd/current expansion)
Or call it "chapter" or whatever instead of "expansion". Grey out the ones they don't have, but leave them there. (Who knows, maybe that will even bait them to buy the others as well. ;-) )
That way even a hapless new player would be able to judge at which point in a potential story they enter the game. I'd expect someone who starts playing an RPG (even a multiplayer one) to at least have heard of the possibility that there's some kind of basic story/chain of events involved.
You could even add some explanation by adding a tooltip that tells you what's up in that zone.
Like "Join the mysterious Companions, stop the Plane Meld, and save the world from the machinations of Molag Bal."
"Help Vivec to wrest back his stolen powers and save Vvardenfell from a dire fate."
"Follow the Tribunal's revelations about dark plans of the Daedric princes to Summerset, ancient home of the Altmer, and repel the attack of the Sloads."
"Reunite with one of the former Companions to stop the return of the dragons and defend Elsweyr, home of the Khajiit."
Something along that lines.

So: All in favour of OPs suggestion !!

baratron

I'm in favour of this for second and subsequent characters. I do feel that new players should always do the most recent tutorial, because it's usually the best one for actually teaching you how to play the game. The Elsweyr tutorial is particularly strong. In contrast, I started with the Coldharbour tutorial, and had probably been playing over a year before I knew what those little lines coming off enemies meant. "Oh, interrupt? What's interrupting?"

Elsonso

Yes. Tutorial selection should be a thing at character generation. It is time. They can do it with the 2020 chapter, if they want.

Puking_Panda

lordrichter wrote: »

Yes. Tutorial selection should be a thing at character generation. It is time. They can do it with the 2020 chapter, if they want.

They could do it with the next patch really. All I'm really asking is that they simply enable existing features.

I'd really like this feature as I want to start a Necromancer but I don't want to buy Elseweyr and play a character that starts in the Elsewyr dragon crisis BEFORE the Player Character, Abnur and the Companions finish their quest agianst Molag Bal.

Holycannoli

Wailing Prison should always be the tutorial, dumping you off in your faction's first (or AD, only) starter zone.

Expansion tutorials should be introductory quests for those expansions, doable at any level whenever you want to do them.

Why was it changed in the first place?

And yes to the extra skill point.

Puking_Panda

By the way, now that I think about it, the game prefaces the whole expansion with Abnur Tharn having found the Wrathstone and accidently unleashing the dragons.

If you bought the latest expansion and thus start with the Elseweyr tutorial it will be in the aftermath of Abnur's unleashing of the dragons which means your character is by default going to be cut out of large chunks of the story, namely the Wrathstone DLC dungeons and The Demon Weapon prologue quest, doing them later with your Elseweyr character is just gonna be awkward from any sort of role-playing perspective, not to mention the way it convolutes Abnur's role in the whole Planemeld storyline.

Not only that but you're now essentially forced into starting like this.

Starlock

Narrative continuity went largely out the window with One Tamriel. Adding some rails back on by allowig a choice of starting zone would be very, very welcome.

Puking_Panda

Starlock wrote: »

Narrative continuity went largely out the window with One Tamriel. Adding some rails back on by allowig a choice of starting zone would be very, very welcome.

True but you at least had the opportunity to complete all content and still have your own narrative mostly make sense if you wanted to. With Elseweyr that's just not possible like it is with the tutorial of the base-game, Summerset and Morrowind.