Official Discussion Thread for "Developer Deep Dive – Let’s Talk About Class Identity in ESO"

Arciris

[quote="l

Edit:

Arciris wrote: »

Greetings Developers,
Thank you for the communication, much appreciated.

Just a few things:

1. This is a 5+ years old game. Your article reads like a game in a development/ beta phase. More concerning than reassuring,

Previous statements by the studio indicate that this is deliberate and how they want to run the game. They want to view the game as not being finished and being continually expanded and added to. I have always taken this to mean more than paid DLC content. I have taken this to mean the entire game, including the base game.


[/quote]

It's awesome that they want to add and expand. Its terrible when they outright remove things (and sometimes rewriting means removing something).
I'm pretty sure adding is possible without removing first.
But the history of Combat in ESO is marked by more removals than additions of Play.Patterns (not just rendered less viable but simply deleted) meaning the game's combat is getting poorer overtime and that is concerning.

Starlock

A question that occurs to me as a follow-up to this development direction.

Has your team thought about doing a survey of some sort of how the players understand the identity of their characters? This might give the development team a better idea of the kinds of ideas players are putting together when crafting their "power fantasies" and "play patterns." I suggest "character identity" rather than "class identity" because class is just one component of character identity. Looking at character identity overall might shed light on how players are weaving together their class skills and other skill lines to create their fantasy or play patterns. It could even include "what is a power fantasy or play pattern you would like to be able to do but can't do right now within the game?" I know some players feel their play styles have been eliminated over the years with gameplay changes and that could help reveal some of those for consideration. All of this would mostly be about gathering ideas, not suggesting what changes should be made to enhance class identity and how other skill lines and things like item sets play into that.

anadandy

Kalle_Demos wrote: »

*Bosmer players waiting for a Developer Deep Dive...or anything at all really...on Racial Identity in ESO*



#GiveBosmerTheirStealthBack

Right? You know what my "power fantasy" and "play pattern" was? Playing a sneaky Bosmer.

XomRhoK

Some thoughts and suggestions.

1. With class identity and overall combat changes, in my opinion, you need to focus on:
   Interesting mechanics, reactive or combo skills. I like mechanic when you block or interrupt enemy you set him off-balance and after you can knock off him with heavy attack. Such interactions i found interesting and this game lacks it. Class mini games like Crystal Fragments and Molten Whip are good in my opinion, but there must be severeal or they must be not obligatory, becacuse if i don't like class mini game i don't need to suffer.
2. Heal and damage now scale from same sources that leads to situation when so called "Glass cannons" can self heal for crazy numbers. If developers find this a problem i have several suggestions how to fix it without redoing stats:
   • Remove critical from heal, and adjust coefficients accordingly. So if you want self health sustain build you go for weapon damage and stamina for example. If you want go for highest damage you go for critical chance and critical damage, you will do high damage, but your heal skills cannot crit, so you will lack healing.
   • Other way is to adjust set bonuses. Use more healing done, damage done and less universal weapon/spell damage.
3. You want to get skills to a certain standarts to have more clear rules and ability to make changes easier for development.
   • But i don't understand why you can't do it ALL "on paper" first. It's not hard task, you set the rules: pick some skill you think is doing great, dissect it and set spammables do X damage for Y resources, single target DoTs A damage for B resources and so on. Add coefficients to adjust power because of different factors (melee, range, additional buffs/debuffs, class skill etc), boom and thats done, you get your standarts and from that you can start tuning you standarts and coefficients. All this done in some table with "Export all" button and boom all this in PTS build (if you don't have such table or button do it). Why you split this work, i don't understand. First you do class skills, then non class, they tied, you need do it all together it's not much of rebalancing after all, but getting to certain standarts/rules.
   • And why your standartisation is so standart!!? Especially DoTs, all of them have same length, cost, damage. You need similarity in overall power of the skill not similarity in all aspects of the skills. You can make more bursty DoTs or DoTs with long length, good at triggering some effects by just ticking. All this easily fit in your standartisation by proper coefficients, for example 5% more cost from standart for each second reduced length with same overall damage and so on. With different DoTs length will be harder do make only DoTs rotation even with overpowered DoTs like in U23, it will help with diversity of the builds.
4. Use your PTS servers not only 20 weeks a year, use it whenever you need it. If you lack time to test combat changes just use PTS all the time. I am sure there will be 50-100 people interesting in PTS even right after Chapter release. Now you run PTS 5 weeks before release, 2 first weeks no changes, last week not changes, so you have 3 attempts to adjust your changes, and even if you realise that you done something wrong you are committed, you can't just cancel everything. So once again, use you PTS servers more often.

ZarkingFrued

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

"We consider these changes to be stop-gap measures while the team evaluates more holistic improvements for each class in the future."

Oh God...

I agree. THIS IS THE PROBLEM ZOS. What are you talking about? Seriously none of this is your final solution? You have changed everything, and we're supposed to keep going through these types of changes? Dont implement temporary changes. Live is not an extended PTS. Gamers dont want sweeping changes every 3 months.

Araneae6537

Raideen wrote: »

I cant stand that all classes can do all roles. It completely destroys identity.

Mages are not tanks.
Tanks are not rogues.
Rogues are not Warriors.
Warriors are tanks.

I prefer it when classes cater to their strengths, not "everyone can do anything". Its simply not how anything in the universe works, even at the atomic level.

But couldn’t they do this in different ways? Tanking for instance — I would expect a warrior-type class to be able to stand and take the damage better than other classes while rogues would rely on being able to dodge and mislead attacks with trickery, shadows, etc. For a mage it could be similar — magical shields/protection, using magic to mesmerize or mislead the enemy, etc.

Perhaps I am less bothered by it after having played GW2 where, ironically, none of the heavily armored classes make good tanks (I don’t think armor class defined anything beyond your style options in that game) while the lightly armored mesmer (a class characterized by misleading and, as the name suggests, mesmerizing the enemy) were favored and necromancers could also do well because of their sustain options. Whether you like GW2 or not, I think everyone agrees that the classes feel very different from one another with very different play styles.

Edit: @Arciris makes very good points. I only recently started ESO and so don’t know what the classes used to be like. I enjoy how the game is now but retaining/restoring unique strengths, weaknesses and abilities for each class is definitely something I would like to see.

Giraffon

The way they are messing with things, they really should bring class changes into the game and probably give us a few free ones.

Orpheaus

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

A lot of vocal forum complainers are actually not interested in power identity. They are interested in numbers.
Whatever the devs do, they will go to an online guide that has jig-sawed a rotation based on NUMBERS they can parse. Then they will say there's no class identity but really they are saying they can't hit the biggest number with their class, or in order to get a big number they have to do this-that-and-the-other-thing and don't have any choice.

So only people actually playing the game and experiencing all the content are interested in what the devs are doing. People who want to try something else than the rubber stamped clones from build guides, maybe because it simply looks fun and can still be effective for what they want to do.

People interested in pushing buttons to get the biggest numbers will complain when they have to change their build, or when those numbers go down after a patch. The same people who complain that such-and-such PvE content is too easy when they don't even bother looking at anything in the game other than the target's health bar and how quickly it goes down.

Sounds like the devs are saying they want to make a game that looks cool, looks fun, and can still complete their content as long as you are not totally stupid and just use light attack while standing in red.
And they are not very interested in everyone just running clones of online builds. Even though they are willing to support people who do want to do that -- as evidenced by their posts highlighting community builds.

So I think people who want a good look and feel while they experience the story should be supportive of the changes during this transition period.
And people who just want the biggest numbers should go play a tap-clicker game. The faster you tap, the bigger the numbers! That's what bunny hopping and animation cancelling is all about, right? Tapping faster than the other guy?

Nope. You've clearly not read the complaints nor played the PTS because if you had you wouldn't say this. Not only have they dumbed down the rotations (Max DPS rotation is 4 unused skills for passives and a spammable and you just hit over and over with light attacks) they've also actually made the fantasy less entrancing. Mastering rotations that include more than one skill can make a player feel like they're becoming a master of their class and their weapon lines from slicing and dicing to raining arrows. However, if these changes go through the optimal way to play will be to stack a bunch of skills you don't use on your bar for max passives and then just sit there hitting the same spammable over and over. So if you're enjoying this patch perhaps you are the one who should go try the tap-clicker game. And in terms of how combat "feels" well it feels worse when you only use one skill. And one of their main "Class identity" sells in this patch was stonefist. Which is a high cost low reward skill that literally looks like you're throwing a ball of mud at someone. Hard pass.
Sadly ZoS will probably pick your comment out of the sea of constructive criticism and claim that loads of people "love the new system."

tinythinker

Well, I can see comments getting lost in a flood of replies, but I will be adding to this space over the weekend and beyond. Here's what I have so far (it will grow over time and is a work-in-progress/last updated 9/30/2019):

Details, details, details...

Please ZOS, share what you think are the core elements of power fantasy and play patterns for each class. It's hard to make suggestions beyond "this feels clunky" or "this is over-/underperforming in X context" if we don't know what your vision is. I keep seeing posts that are supposed to be about giving us insight but we need more to go on. Not to be greedy, just to understand how things are meant to fit together. That will allow more helpful feedback and assist the combat team in making things fun for the players.

- - -

A version of what I mean (with my own preferences of interpretation based on my personality and long-term gameplay):

Dragonknight

In-Game Description: "These skillful masters-at-arms use the ancient Akaviri martial arts tradition of battle-spirit, and wield fearsome magic that pounds, shatters and physically alters the world around them."

Comments: My first character was a DK. I never played Argonian in other TES games, but the Saxhleel models for ESO and the idea of a fire-breathing lizard were too tempting. So, yeah, a lot of dragon themes of course with this class, but also the idea of being really good with weapons comes to mind from the official description.

Traditionally they have been a melee-focused class that forces enemies to come close to engage, and then use a myriad of crowd-control options to lock down enemies while DoTs do their work. For this to be useful in play patterns, the CC has to be real enough for the DoTs to do their work and the DK herself needs to be able to take a bit of beating while that happens. Hence using Reflective Scale ("Wings") to force ranged attackers in close then things like Talons and Petrify to hold enemies in place. Plus the latter have the nice synergy with Lava Whip (especially the Flame Lash morph) while the Iron Skin passive, Spiked Amor ability, and Magma Armor passive help with the "taking a beating" part.

There have always been concerns though that if DKs could lock you down indefinitely, block ranged attacks too much, or had super strong DoTs, that they would be OP even while lacking a class execute, hence a particular pattern behind many of the past 5 years of nerfs.

Power Fantasy: The current power fantasy is centered around dragon imagery, and originally it was just fire and stone for damage effects. But when stamina morphs were added the poison theme with green vapor/gas was introduced for those. Of course non-stamina class abilities are still fire, with a common theme of "burning" from fire and from poison. While modeled after the Akaviri fighting style, since that has never been represented in a TES game there is not particular template to follow.

Play Patterns: As mentioned, CCs and DoTs at melee range (tanking, damage dealing) traditionally define DK combat, though with the use of ranged weapons and non-class skills a DK can be turned into a ranged fighter or healer.

Thoughts: Looking at combining the Power Fantasy and Play Patterns of the DK, concerns have revolved around damage mitigation, CCs, and DoTs. Make those things too strong, and DKs can become unstoppable killing machines. Make them too weak, and the lack of inherent mobility and an execute makes DKs sitting ducks.

The thing I keep coming back to is "staying in melee range". The CCs and damage mitigation of the class are about forcing and maintaining that range in combat, and it also fits the class fantasy. So the play and counter-play have to a large extent revolved around the range issue. Again, sure, you can custom-build a range DK. But looking at the base model, if you will, why not expand on this?

Lets get into triggering method and effect behavior. Lately the combat team have been adding "stacks" as a mechanic for ESO. Not a new thing to the genre, but not too common in ESO player abilities. Picture Inferno (base ability in the Ardent Flame line), or perhaps a passive in that line, giving stacks to enemies within melee range over time. Now picture these stacks increasing the effect of the DK's class DoTs. For PvE it is straight forward. If you use class DoTs, stay close to the mobs/boss. If not, it's irrelevant. But in PvP a DK would be thinking about how to stay close, as once outside of the range of the stack effect any established stacks begin to fade. So not only basic CC but also Leap and Chains would be crucial. In return, CCing a DK and using things like Streak, Cloak, etc. to gain distance periodically to reset the stacks would be a priority. Oooops, the DK's target got out of range, rest the stack counter, and is either jumping back into melee or staying at range. Or the DoTs got purged so the stacks are irrelevant.

That isn't to say such stacks are key to class identity, but the concept highlights how the different class mechanics can be tied together in a defining way. And the same concept can be applied to tanking and healing, with a healing buff for being closer to a healer or skills like Obsidian Shield being more effective when allies can stay closer to the caster. For example, getting a buff that lasts for so long but weakens over time unless refreshed by coming back into proximity. Charge up as many stacks (to maximum) as you can and try to recharge when you can. And by having "proximity to the DK + gaining/losing stacks" as part of the core identity (to use one example), it's easier to look at changes to abilities (or replacing abilities) and passives to judge whether they fit the standard. Tossing it back to other aspects of Power Fantasy and Play Styles, DKs healers could be more of a shield class (building on both Flames of Oblivion, Magma Shield, and Obsidian Shield in creative ways).

In this example, people know what to expect and how to be more effective as a DK ally or opponent in whichever role they are playing. DKs might rival other classes in healing *if* DKs and their allies can maintain max stacks, whereas a Templar has no such concerns (when it comes to healing), or perhaps has her own way of maximizing effectiveness (for example let's say healing comes easier for Templars but other roles might require some synergy or ramp up for best results).



Templar

In-Game Description: "These traveling knights call upon the powers of light and the burning sun to deal massive damage to their enemies while restoring health, magicka, and stamina to their allies."

Comments: Templar was the third class I tried, because when I tried Sorcerer second I initially thought it was weak and stupid and didn't even get it to level 10 (I found out how to play it later and it was not weak after all). Templar has become my most played class, and I still miss the stun on Blazing Spear and the old skill Blinding Light (especially the Blinding Flashes morph).

In terms of class identity, Templar has kind of struggled from launch. I mean, yeah, a kind of holy priest/paladin type of theme to be sure, and of the original four classes the only one with a healing skill line, but after that? Because it was, well, light and sun. So sometimes you got plain magic damage, sometimes a burning effect. But the kit itself has always been in conflict with itself when it comes to intra-class synergy. We have the only class-base charge attack but our knockback spear didn't push us or foes back enough to use it? And there was this weird kinda-melee, kinda ranged thing going on.

I guess we drop circles on the ground like Radial Sweep ultimate, Spear Shards, Nova ult (more of a sphere with a circular ground effect), Cleansing Ritual, and Rune Focus. But they don't have any consistency among them and they make a pretty shoddy house to live in. I mean technically our old reflect Eclipse was supposed to make ranged attackers come in closer while we pounded ranged enemies with Sun Fire and Solar Flare before getting tired of waiting and charging toward them to make it a melee fight? Well, yeaaaah... no. I mean variety in a kit is fine for accommodating different styles of build but Plars have a lot of room to make their kit work together in a satisfying way. More than being a generalist who's really, really ridiculously good looking at healing.

Power Fantasy: So the Sun and Light are big themes, and abilities also talk about Aedra, godlike stength, holy power, etc. Again, a kind of ESO version a holy priest/paladin/warrior cleric variety of archetype. And it's the same thing for both magicka morphs and stamina morphs, which is OK I suppose but doesn't do much for a theme difference. What to do?

The opposite of Light is Darkness, but Darkness is kind of a Nightblade thing (with Eclipse being an obvious and appropriate exception). So staying with the Light in general, there is still room for other celestial bodies such as the moons and/or stars for stamina-based play. After all while Eclipse is still solar-based (no sun=darkness) it does invoke the moon as well. And speaking of Light vs. Darkness, I get the solar thing with burning but what about giving Light and Darkness some of their own flavor in mechanics? I mean, chilled can still be a buddy to Darkness like burning is to light but let's make these distinctions more impact and interesting. What status effects, stacks, or whatever could they bring to the table to make gameplay more interesting and unique?

Play Patterns:

Thoughts:

Nightblade

In-Game Description: "Nightblades are adventurers and opportunists with a gift for getting in and out of trouble. Relying variously on stealth, blades, and speed, Nightblades thrive on conflict and misfortune, trusting to their luck and cunning to survive."

Comments:

Power Fantasy:

Play Patterns:

Thoughts:

Sorcerer

In-Game Description: "Sorcerers can use conjuration and destruction spells to hurl lightning bolts and create shock fields, wield dark magic to snare and stun, and summon Daedric combat followers from Oblivion to assist them."

Comments:

Power Fantasy:

Play Patterns:

Thoughts:

Warden

In-Game Description: "Wardens are defenders of the Green, master storytellers whose nature tales become magical reality. They wield frost spells against enemies and summon animals to aid them."

Comments:nature vs undeath

Power Fantasy:

Play Patterns:

Thoughts:

Necromancer

In-Game Description: "Necromancers are masters of elemental damage that protect themselves with bone and flesh shields while buffing themselves and others with powerful Living Death magic.

Comments:

Power Fantasy:

Play Patterns:

Thoughts:

ToniWinter

What we need would be class change brands and what we do not need is that all classes can fill all three roles. What for? Most are based on the meta.
My personal classification.

Dragon Knight and Necromancer
Tank / DD

Guardian and Templar
Healer / DD

Wizard and Nightblade
Healer / DD

Lumsdenml

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

and the press is abysmal.

IGN gave Elsweyr 8 of 10....

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/05/the-elder-scrolls-online-elsweyr-review

Philtho

Not sure I agree with how they are tackling this. Allowing everyone to fill every role is a bad idea. It's going to cut replayability off at the head. People like exploring other classes, but if they're too samely with "optimal roles" only being slightly better, no one is going to bother long term.

You mention that some classes will be optimal for specific roles, and if that's true, that better mean they are heads and tails better at those roles. If you have an optimal DPS build, they better be putting the hurt down a lot more than anyone else around them, not just marginally.

Araneae6537

I disagree that making all classes able to fill any role discourages people from making alts.
1) Even if all your characters were healers, for instance, each class should feel different and might be optimal in different scenarios.
2) Changing from one role/build to another costs gold and time to reallocate skills, attributes and CP points and you’d need to haul around all that gear — Do you really want to do that??? I have three Nightblades because I’m using different builds on them and it also gives me the opportunity to have different characters with different looks, which I enjoy. I know I’m not the only one who feels this way; in GW2 you can change your build freely and still many people create alts for different builds.

Numerikuu

Lumsdenml wrote: »

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

and the press is abysmal.

IGN gave Elsweyr 8 of 10....

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/05/the-elder-scrolls-online-elsweyr-review

Because they were paid to, and have been for many years. As are all the mainstream 'gaming news media' outlets. This is old news lol.

Elsonso

.

Lumsdenml wrote: »

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

and the press is abysmal.

IGN gave Elsweyr 8 of 10....

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/05/the-elder-scrolls-online-elsweyr-review

Only the bad reviews count...

thegreatme

SipofMaim wrote: »

We need another magicka weapon option, or every class needs more skills, or all the skills need more morphs. I would hate the "Everybody should be able to do everything!" philosophy you're pushing a lot less if we got some breathing room. That'd be appreciated.

I actually started playing a magDK and I found the magicka build to be a lot nicer than I thought it would be, as I normally play Stam classes. Unfortunately I have to either have a Destro or Restro on my backbar just to keep up resources, which isn't really in line with the "play how you want" theory.

TES has had spellswords in the past games and it would be pretty nice to see them make a more solid return in ESO's gammit of playstyles, even if its as a new Class. Even doing things like Absorb Magicka enchantments on sword&shield doesn't really do anything to help with that, so your weapon choice is pretty deeply limited.

I've thought about doing a magBlade many times but the stave limitation is a real turn-off.

Rungar wrote: »

for dps your pretty much screwed and i will tell you why as i dont believe anyone else will. All dps in this game sub 50 use their class skills but for endgame content they use whatever skill provides the most dps and is easiest to animation cancel. It doesnt matter what you add to the game those two rules will always apply because the combat system stinks. if you start making class skills more viable the rules will still apply and you will end up with everyone playing whatever class is deemed the best. Then the crying class x is overpowered, and trials filled with one class type, then nerf cycle, then repeat. You cannot win this game by adding anything to the classes as long as those rules are in effect.

the dps role in this game is far too reliant on the animation cancelling mechanism for dps and if your not willing to acknowledge that and do something about it at least get some bang for your buck and focus your changes on healers and tanks who will benefit without the drama.

Even with animation canceling and attack buffs, my stamblade with mostly-class skills only tops maybe 25k on the very best day, and I'm pretty sure that's running with buffs from other support role players (granted there are some things on my gear to improve but both my 5piece sets give great weapon damage and weapon crit). An average day is more like 10-20k consistently.

I'm constantly having other Stamblade players ask me how to hit those high 60k+ numbers, because they can't seem to get higher than 20k at best either, if that. The simple answer is: unless you're following an endgame guide to the letter with the very best Trial sets on gold quality for everything including jewelry (good luck with that, with how jewelry crafting works), I don't know. I can tell you though that before a few major nerfs ago my DPS was better by base design. Now its just kinda meh.

And playing to the endgame meta for that super high DPS just doesn't feel fulfilling outside of pulling big numbers. The skill bars I have set up do, nice combat flow visually and mechanically. They're fun. The meta is not. And even then, the meta got nerfed too, so even if you follow it you're not going to be as good as previously, or by the time you catch up to fulfilling the meta it will have changed again. So I guess I'll just stick with being "okay but not great", which seems weird because as an Assassin class your first impression would be "Squishy but heavy hitting" and that just doesn't ever seem like the case. A shame because there's some achievement goodies I really wanted you can only get from completing certain vet Trials, like the Elsweyr dragon statues, but no capable Vet Trial group I know of is going to take my cruddy DPS into Sunspire just to get them 👌

I'll just stick to my RP corners where at least the curve balls are fun to get hit with. Maybe go play some more of the F2P MMO I've been trying lately that has a solid assassin class identity that feels every bit and then some like the fast-hitting rogue I expect it to be without sacrificing the fun of compelling combat.

colossalvoids wrote: »

And again, there are loads of unused skills that can be made great. Jungle some from one skill tree to the another if it makes sense passive/theme-wise but to butcher already well used ones is not "exciting" for older players that can't redo their build from the ground up every couple of months and feel nothing towards their previously beloved char/gameplay.

I have a guildy who does primarily PvP and every major buff/nerf update they come back complaining how their toon they worked so hard on doesn't do anything they're supposed to do, based on how they built that character to perform, and trash it for a fresh start on an entirely new class. Its gotten to the point they've reset whole toons for PvP so many times that I never see their toons make it past level 50 anymore before the next nerf trashing their build and having to restart. Personally I'd never be able to just trash my toons every time there's a nerf update but its definitely disheartening when something you enjoyed gets stripped down like that.

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

I suggest you engage people that can help the current dev team understand this because its clear they do not. You go through in great detail explaining what identity and why its important yet we just spent the last 6 months destroying nearly every bit of identity the classes had.

While its more race identity than class identity, I'm still waiting (in vain) for someone to fix the PvP-only niche Hunters Eye bosmer passive that breaks 25 years of solid TES lore for "diversity" and totally destroyed all the bosmer sneakthief builds so many of us loved and relied on for gold grinds (I'm still not changing to a cat just for this), and instead gave us all a passive that's generally useless to PvE and detrimental to PvP. People said they didn't want it when it first hit PTS. ZoS ignored it and pushed it to live.

More than half a year, several threads, and a locked almost-90 page protest thread about it later: nothing. Considering how minor of a change it would be to change Detecting-Others to Not-Being-Detected-Yourself, which we used to have (and not even getting into all the other racial changes to other races that made no sense lore-wise and made a lot of people unhappy), not convinced understanding people's playstyles and maintaining anything's proper identity is really on their priority list so much as "doing it the way ZoS wants it and everyone else just has to deal with it."

It didn't seem to be a priority with racial changes. I don't think it will change much with class changes. I'm prepared to be pleasantly surprised but I won't hold my breath either.

lordrichter wrote: »

Sadly, ZOS either did not have a firm class identity rule in place from the start, or they decided to toss it and create a new one. Multiple times. I have come to expect that ZOS is going to change the class identity whenever they feel they want to.

^Exactly. I hope this is a step in the right direction, but we'll see. A lot of changes they've made because its their "vision" of improvement. When their clients didn't see their vision the same way, in a lot of cases they just ignored it and moved on to the next thing. The racial changes were a rather blatant example of that.

To me it feels like they had ideas and they said "People will love this!" and when people didn't they just shrugged and said "Well I love it." and left it at that. Not having people be on-board for what you thought would be awesome sucks but in the professional world " 'I' thought it would be great" doesn't always work.

Kalle_Demos wrote: »

*Bosmer players waiting for a Developer Deep Dive...or anything at all really...on Racial Identity in ESO*



#GiveBosmerTheirStealthBack

anadandy wrote: »

Right? You know what my "power fantasy" and "play pattern" was? Playing a sneaky Bosmer.

Oh good I'm not the only one

VaranisArano wrote: »

More seriously, I took Emma_Overload's point to mean that there are a number of snobs who treat any non-meta build as automatically not viable, even though it's perfectly adequate for the content. Those snobs can be at any level, too, not just elite groups. I've met them in dungeons, when the meta gear/class is just not necessary in order to complete the content in a more than adequate manner. In that light, its nice to see the devs acknowledging that you don't have to run the meta class in order to be viable for a given role.

Oh yeah, I love having people tell me my builds are "trash" in no unclear terms because they didn't come out of an alcast guide and tell me I'm stupid for not using it.

Same people though that when their build isn't updated they sit their staring at their screen whining about how to fix their latest nerfs because the guide hasn't updated and now what will they do with no one to hold their hand on how to navigate the changes! Maybe use your own head for once?

lordrichter wrote: »

There is no "half way" in my mind. I can provide feedback and suggestions, but I am under no mental fantasy that suggests that they have to meet me half way. Any part of the way, actually.

This would fly if the game was entirely Free To Play, as in you go to a website, download it, it costs you nothing. If you invest money into their game, they SHOULD be trying to meet halfway. Yes you can buy the base game and go without subscription, without crown store, yada yada. There's a lot you can do in the game without subs or without dlc or without expansions, there's also a lot you miss out on if you don't have any of those. A lot of dungeons and a few Trials which give you Optimal, and sometimes Viable gear are locked behind a paywall of SOME kind. You can't trade for Dungeon or Trial sets at things like traders, you have to actually do those dungeons or trials to get them at all.

So yes, ideally, ZoS will try to meet people halfway because this game isn't a totally-free favor given to the public out of the goodness of their hearts, its a product and a business that you pay money for and expect it to perform. Its like if you go to a restaurant and order chicken and instead they bring you a plate of shrimp, and they didn't even ask you ahead of time if a substitute was okay. Of course you're not going to be happy, its not what you paid for.

XomRhoK

Philtho wrote: »

Not sure I agree with how they are tackling this. Allowing everyone to fill every role is a bad idea. It's going to cut replayability off at the head. People like exploring other classes, but if they're too samely with "optimal roles" only being slightly better, no one is going to bother long term.

You mention that some classes will be optimal for specific roles, and if that's true, that better mean they are heads and tails better at those roles. If you have an optimal DPS build, they better be putting the hurt down a lot more than anyone else around them, not just marginally.

It's not bad that all classes could fill every role, but they must have different mechanics and flavor. For example tanking: DK could be better at blocking damage, Sorc at using damage shields, NB at avoiding damage by invisibility and shadows, Necrs at distribution incoming damage to pets or allies, Templar at mitigation, the lower health the higher mitigation and some kind of 1 second invulnerability at 0 HP, Warden at mass maim and self regeneration. But it must be real difference in playstyle, not just same skills with different color. This approach will keep replayability.

eso_lytw8

lordrichter wrote: »

.

Lumsdenml wrote: »

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

and the press is abysmal.

IGN gave Elsweyr 8 of 10....

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/05/the-elder-scrolls-online-elsweyr-review

Only the bad reviews count...

Poor word choice on my part, I was referring to player press, what we are saying about the game. I think what we say is far more important than what a professional critic is saying. Unfortunately we are loosing a lot of long term players, these players help maintain and teach others and often recruit new players. Its clear that many people are finding the game less fun to play because of loss of the class identity. If this weren't true we would not have this thread. Unfortunately what I am writing now is just another example of more bad press.

ESO is one of the most incredible games I have ever played and my game playing predates the PC, I started with pong. The zones, npcs, dungeons and trials created have truly been a masterpiece. These designers deserve a ton of credit. My first VMA clear was the best moment I ever experienced in a game. Its unfortunate that all this is overshadowed by removal of class identity in just two updates. I hope they continue to prioritize getting class identity reestablished.

thegreatme

eso_lytw8 wrote: »

ESO is one of the most incredible games I have ever played and my game playing predates the PC, I started with pong. The zones, npcs, dungeons and trials created have truly been a masterpiece. These designers deserve a ton of credit. My first VMA clear was the best moment I ever experienced in a game. Its unfortunate that all this is overshadowed by removal of class identity in just two updates. I hope they continue to prioritize getting class identity reestablished.

Agreed. ESO is one of the only games I can play and play and play and still want to play more. I haven't been playing since beta but at least since Morrowind launched. How the game used to be is what hooked me. What the game is turning into is a little disheartening because its a great game being bogged down by trying to force it to be what it's not, changing it for the sake of change, even if its bad change, and justifying it with fluff. If its not broken, don't fix it, and if it is broken, at least don't break it more.

Emma_Overload

VaranisArano wrote: »

Vapirko wrote: »

Emma_Overload wrote: »

My favorite part of this piece is the author's correct usage of the terms "viable" and "optimal".

PvE endgame/trial snobs must be so triggered at the suggestion that optimal and viable are NOT the same thing!

Emma’s idea of balance = bring everyone down to my level. If people are better than me nerf their stuff.

Wait....you mean to tell me I don't get better by nerfing the opposition? But how else will I win at PVP/get invited to all the top trial guilds?
Aww, I liked that plan!



More seriously, I took Emma_Overload's point to mean that there are a number of snobs who treat any non-meta build as automatically not viable, even though it's perfectly adequate for the content. Those snobs can be at any level, too, not just elite groups. I've met them in dungeons, when the meta gear/class is just not necessary in order to complete the content in a more than adequate manner. In that light, its nice to see the devs acknowledging that you don't have to run the meta class in order to be viable for a given role.

Yes, that's exactly what I meant, thank you.

Emma_Overload

Vapirko wrote: »

Emma_Overload wrote: »

My favorite part of this piece is the author's correct usage of the terms "viable" and "optimal".

PvE endgame/trial snobs must be so triggered at the suggestion that optimal and viable are NOT the same thing!

Emma’s idea of balance = bring everyone down to my level. If people are better than me nerf their stuff.

Why wouldn't I ask for nerfs? ZOS relentlessly nerfs Sorcs every patch. Asking for buffs falls on deaf ears. ZOS only likes to nerf. So it is perfectly logical to ask for nerfs for other specs. If that's what it takes to achieve balance, so be it.

The whole forum is full of people asking for nerfs every day. Even the friggin' class reps are asking for nerfs, LOL. Why single me out for insults? Some of you guys act like I've got a secret backchannel to the ZOS devs. Do you really think they're removing the stun from Dizzy at my command? I wish!

thegreatme

Emma_Overload wrote: »

Why wouldn't I ask for nerfs? ZOS relentlessly nerfs Sorcs every patch. Asking for buffs falls on deaf ears. ZOS only likes to nerf. So it is perfectly logical to ask for nerfs for other specs. If that's what it takes to achieve balance, so be it.

The whole forum is full of people asking for nerfs every day. Even the friggin' class reps are asking for nerfs, LOL. Why single me out for insults? Some of you guys act like I've got a secret backchannel to the ZOS devs. Do you really think they're removing the stun from Dizzy at my command? I wish!

ESO community challenge: spam the forums with threads telling ZoS to buff the guy they keep killing in PvP because its not fair to the other guy instead of spamming the forums with "Nerf this because I keep losing" threads. I'll wait XD

Rungar

thegreatme wrote: »

I'm constantly having other Stamblade players ask me how to hit those high 60k+ numbers, because they can't seem to get higher than 20k at best either, if that. The simple answer is: unless you're following an endgame guide to the letter with the very best Trial sets on gold quality for everything including jewelry (good luck with that, with how jewelry crafting works), I don't know. I can tell you though that before a few major nerfs ago my DPS was better by base design. Now its just kinda meh.

And playing to the endgame meta for that super high DPS just doesn't feel fulfilling outside of pulling big numbers. The skill bars I have set up do, nice combat flow visually and mechanically. They're fun. The meta is not. And even then, the meta got nerfed too, so even if you follow it you're not going to be as good as previously, or by the time you catch up to fulfilling the meta it will have changed again. So I guess I'll just stick with being "okay but not great", which seems weird because as an Assassin class your first impression would be "Squishy but heavy hitting" and that just doesn't ever seem like the case. A shame because there's some achievement goodies I really wanted you can only get from completing certain vet Trials, like the Elsweyr dragon statues, but no capable Vet Trial group I know of is going to take my cruddy DPS into Sunspire just to get them 👌

I'll just stick to my RP corners where at least the curve balls are fun to get hit with. Maybe go play some more of the F2P MMO I've been trying lately that has a solid assassin class identity that feels every bit and then some like the fast-hitting rogue I expect it to be without sacrificing the fun of compelling combat.

Sounds pretty typical to me. Same with the rejection of it. It will likely shorten your stay here. Your assessment is incorrect because theres lots of guys around that can hit big numbers in crafted sets like hundings rage or easy to get sets like mothers sorrow with just gold weapons. Your doing it wrong either your not cancelling correctly or your rotation is bad. You dont need to do vet to get any of the gear but it wont help much anyhow.

This is a good illustration of why i dont like this system. I have no interest in what 5-8% of players can do ( or how they achieve it). im interested in the next 45%% down can do which i imagine is where you fit in. Its a demonstration of something not working and a select group doing everything they can to keep it going. Not because its good or fun, but because of the advantage it confers. bad antiplayer exploitable design will have bad antiplayer exploitable results.

Adernath

For me class diversity is the fact that some classes can do things other classes can not do -- and that these things are effective enough to be used.

Because ESO had a class system from day 1, everyone of us had to make a decision of how the rough direction will be while choosing their class.

This means that we would have to discuss about what class we expect to shine most in. This does not mean that classes must exclusively be played like this, but their main focus of unique abilities would be.

Unique abilities usually come with specific playstiles. Therefore class diversity and game balance are linked together.

In ESO we have a stamina and a magicka variant. Then we have AOE and single-target abilities and finally we have ranged and meele abilities. On top of that we have 3 different types of armor which affect how abilities are working and the damage mitigation.

In my opinion, before one address how classes get unique abilites, one should first create a common setting in which there is a natural balance between the above various forms and their playstiles. Then classes will get access to unique subspaces of these configurations, thereby making them unique.

The first point I would like to be addressed is the net
damage mitigation vs.
damage (or healing) output vs.
mobility

This handling should be simplified or carefully looked into so that there are clear rules what will be possible and what will be the respective tradeoff.

Otherwise one can introduce more and more 'unique' abilities and one never get either a game balanced or a unique character experience due to certain 'meta' builds.

chrisw_63_ESO

Templar Post Incoming...

Rungar wrote: »

this is an insane quest. I will explain tanks and healers and leave dps for last as its a special case.
if you choose a tank as your role you must either choose one handed and shield or destruction staves or both, thus weapon skills provide the BASIS of your role. Your class does not provide the basis of your role but instead the fluff like buffs and look.
Same thing for a healer you must choose destro or resto staves or both and this does the same thing. Weapon skills provide the BASIS and your class fills the gaps.

This is absolutely true. I've played healers as my main character in MMO's pretty much exclusively, just as a little background. I'll also reference this quote from Mr. Garrett's article: " While all healers might have an objective of "prevent ally health from reaching zero," you can achieve this through several effect behaviors: direct heals, heal over time, damage shields, and damage reduction, to name a few. .... Direct heals, for example, can quickly replenish an ally who is low on health, but you have to wait until the ally has taken damage to use it and risk a loss of cost efficiency if you overheal."

You say class abilities should define the class. Templars effectively have two types of class heals, Direct and HoT ground(area)-based. There is one Ultimate AE heal that may as well be ground based, since it's on the Templar and they can't move. There is one, Purifying Light, that is attached to an enemy. Templars have zero HoT's that go on an ally, single or group (not self). As a Templar I have a ton of Resource restore-over-time options for my group. I have several shield/ward options for myself, but none for an ally. I have a passive that buffs group damage, but none that buff any group defense. (Templar Class abilities, remember...)

Now, don't get me wrong, with the added abilities from other lines and armor sets, I can heal just fine. But as group boss difficulty has ramped up, they move - hell they port - way more than 12 meters (the largest Templar ground HoT radius, non-ultimate). The hardest bosses require us to move out of the Templar's Best Healing (your definition) abilities' range. Templars must use Restoration staves and/or other ability lines to get their best healing. Healing, which is their role. Even resto-staff HoT abilities are ground based, but they're more efficient in resource usage. The supposed 'class-extending' abilities are better in efficiency in the healing role than the Templar's own chosen life-devoted abilities.

BEFORE I get a bunch of responses that say, "I heal great, what's YOUR problem???" I have to stress that this is a direct response to the article's assertion that class abilities should define the class, that other ability lines should extend the class to other roles, not FIX the class (my words, but I believe that's what the article was saying).. Also, the example of HoT's and damage reduction being more efficient than direct heals (truth!), and my opinion that we don't have class group damage reduction and ground-based HoT's aren't ideal (and the newest changes made it even less so) when the boss fights are... Rooms full of mobs, bosses designed to move/port across those rooms, dual bosses at opposite ends of the room...

This is NOT a whiny "I can't heal" kinda post. Because I can, and I know you can. That said, one decent HoT or damage reduction that I could put on a Tank (or that guy that must range from the back of the room!), while I turn around and heal the rest of the group trying to stay out of AoE's, or fighting the other mobs that can't get close to the boss, or the other boss, or... would be nice. Just sayin'.

idk

VaranisArano wrote: »

I was terribly amused to read the redefinition of "Play the way you like" as "any class can fulfill any role: tank, DPS, support/healer" with the caveat that any class should be viable but not necessarily optimal in the role.

Zos has said as much before. They said it in a show (ESO Live maybe) when discussing the addition of the Warden a couple years ago.

Maryal

thegreatme wrote: »

While its more race identity than class identity, I'm still waiting (in vain) for someone to fix the PvP-only niche Hunters Eye bosmer passive that breaks 25 years of solid TES lore for "diversity" and totally destroyed all the bosmer sneakthief builds so many of us loved and relied on for gold grinds (I'm still not changing to a cat just for this), and instead gave us all a passive that's generally useless to PvE and detrimental to PvP. People said they didn't want it when it first hit PTS. ZoS ignored it and pushed it to live.

More than half a year, several threads, and a locked almost-90 page protest thread about it later: nothing. Considering how minor of a change it would be to change Detecting-Others to Not-Being-Detected-Yourself, which we used to have (and not even getting into all the other racial changes to other races that made no sense lore-wise and made a lot of people unhappy), not convinced understanding people's playstyles and maintaining anything's proper identity is really on their priority list so much as "doing it the way ZoS wants it and everyone else just has to deal with it."

It didn't seem to be a priority with racial changes. I don't think it will change much with class changes. I'm prepared to be pleasantly surprised but I won't hold my breath either.

I agree.

BennyButton

You sort of went about this entirely backwards - Weapon skills need to be developed AFTER class skills, because that way they can become synergistic to each class. Right now you made changes with weapon skills, basically ensuring everyone uses the exact same build for each class. All mag classes use the same basic skill setup (8-9 DoTs); all stam classes use the same basic skill setup (vMA Daggers/ST DoTs).

For example: @ZOS_BrianWheeler suggested the following:

ZOS_BrianWheeler wrote: »

Heyo gang!
Please also remember that we've introduced some new abilities to help offset the loss of things such as Healing Springs stacking, with abilities like Ring of Preservation, or the large increase to Cleansing Ritual.

Here's a freebie example of what you could have done: assuming you changed the templar's ritual (easy example); after changing the way templar's ritual worked, you wanted to change/audit (whatever you're calling it these days) resto staff abilities, you could then make one morph of springs imbue yourself with an AOE heal around you (not a ground AoE, more like an aura) which would then allow you to place a ritual in one place, while you heal everyone around you in another.

Instead, you made it so movement is limited or even impeded due to changing how springs work (multiple cannot be placed in a path to allow mobile healing and there's no alternative allowing this). This is an example of how you went about it leading to less and less class identity.

Lady_Arikel

I think for most classes, magicka and tank roles have well defined class identity. So it seems the important thing to discuss is how to translate that into stamina roles.

I know my idea is too ambitious and it would probably be very unlikely implemented. But here's how I see it.

Magicka skills deal with the lore concept of magicka. They're the ones which are flashy and clearly supernatural.

Stamina skills are primarily physical and, when they are flashy and borderline magical, they come from some form of natural affinity with an element/force or they're powers granted by the divines/daedra to their champions.

That being said, I'd love if they would use this approach and completely redesign the class skill lines so we have 2 skills that are magicka and will have 2 magicka morphs. 2 skills that are stamina and will have 2 stamina morphs. And 1 skill that can start as magicka or stamina and have 1 morph of each.

And once that is the goal, they should think of physical attacks or buffs that follow what a stamina skill should be like.

Because, if you don't read the tool tips and you only look at the animation, what makes Bound Armaments (or many of the stamina necro skills) a stamina skill? How can you justify that a more physically able character who can run for longer, dodge more times etc... is the one who casts those daggers better than a dedicated spell caster? And lorewise, doesn't that skill make it look like the Ansei (sword singers) were quite ordinary?

So, yes, I know it's very unlikely, but I'd love if they would try to think of stamina morphs as skills meant for a warrior and make they truly unique and with powerful animations of their own, instead of re-colouring the magicka morph or creating an animation that doesn't involve much the armature of the character. Stamina roles should be physical. I want to see my characters moving like powerful warriors as they do in other games.

thegreatme

Rungar wrote: »

Your assessment is incorrect because theres lots of guys around that can hit big numbers in crafted sets like hundings rage or easy to get sets like mothers sorrow with just gold weapons. Your doing it wrong either your not cancelling correctly or your rotation is bad. You dont need to do vet to get any of the gear but it wont help much anyhow.

That's the thing. I'm running some sets that are at the very least decent for damage if not outright good, but obviously not great (Hundings + Unfathomable Darkness (there are better sets than Unfathomable but its not outright bad and somewhat of a meme set for me, but its stat boost focus is all on damage, crit, and penetration). I'm running Divines traits + The Lover. I run buffs like Siphoning Strikes and Merciless Resolve (grim focus morph), and properly weave light/heavy attacks with things like Surprise Attack and Killer's Blade. I still cap at around 20k. Half my gear is gold and the rest is purple.

There are better builds and rotations I'm sure. Of course I've also tried other rotations like the ones in alchast guides, and I can tell you the difference in those skills and my preferred skills is only about 2k damage. Certainly not enough to bump it from that 10-20k range up into those huge 55k+ ranges that vet Trial groups expect to see. Which, as your next thing seems to follow the same line of thinking as mine...

Rungar wrote: »

This is a good illustration of why i dont like this system. I have no interest in what 5-8% of players can do ( or how they achieve it). im interested in the next 45%% down can do which i imagine is where you fit in. Its a demonstration of something not working and a select group doing everything they can to keep it going. Not because its good or fun, but because of the advantage it confers. bad antiplayer exploitable design will have bad antiplayer exploitable results.

Something in the system is fundamentally flawed and severely limiting if they try to push the "play as you like" narrative but all these things stacked up that theoretically should produce results is, frankly, rather lacking.

Or maybe my problem is just I main a bosmer, in which case if the answer is "play a better race" there again is a flaw in this supposed "play as you want" system, even moreso considering the racial changes that took away one of our only playstyle niches that was superior to other races, with exception to khajiit, which was being really good sneakthieves.