newb strikes again

Owondyah

So you are telling me I can do missions "against covenant" as a covenant character on ebonheart pact teritory... LOL ????

jircris11

Yup, prior to one tamriel it made sense, you would need to talk to Cadwell who would let you experience another factions story, same with gold. But now they let anyone go anywhere. I always make my characters non loyal to any of the crowns. My khajiit us an assassin, my warden is a wanderer ect.

L_Nici

The explanation for that would be that Cadwell tells you: "How do you think the story would have gone if you stranded somewhere else. But be careful no one will remember your previous achievements." Well at least thats close to what he says.

Back in the day that would have been the only way to get to the other alliances territories.

Owondyah

it just makes 0 sense and ruins immersion...

These new mmos just don't care about the FEEL... it's just lets "catter to everyone and everything"

Gythral

More "try this out instead of rolling an alt or leaving, 'cos we're a bit short of more content today"
(which was the 4.5 years ago)

Long before (the now very nerfed) Craglorn or even champion points, let alone One Tamriel

CassandraGemini

You can always elect just not to take advantage of that. With the first three toons I made that were, in that order, part of AD, DC and EP, I just played through their respective alliance storylines and DLCs that I felt would suit them and their background, like playing Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood with my Bosmer NB or Morrowind with my Dunmer MagDK. None of them ever did a story quest for one of the other alliances, I just find that kind of weird, if it doesn't fit the backstory I have made up for them.

If the toon in question is more of a mercenary type of character that doesn't have any loyalties to anyone, I just play whatever I feel like with them. Gold is gold, no matter who pays it

VaranisArano

Owondyah wrote: »

it just makes 0 sense and ruins immersion...

These new mmos just don't care about the FEEL... it's just lets "catter to everyone and everything"

That would be what happens when you do everything out of order, yes.

Mind you, the alternative wasn't that great. Before One Tamriel, you could expect to be railroaded through the Covenant questline with level locked quests, then railroaded through the other faction quests thanks to the handwave when you finished the main quest. You couldn't ever quest with your friend's character on a different faction, zones you outleveled were pointless, and woe betide you if you were higher level than your friend or you played the DLCs before you finished the base game because then you'd outlevel your quests.

Pre One Tamriel was immersive...and also a pain in a lot of ways.

If you want things to make sense, your best bet is to just play in chronological order. You can still do that.

Owondyah

if you have to avoid stuff to fit in the lore... *** that sheet man

tinythinker

VaranisArano wrote: »

show previous quotes

Owondyah wrote: »

it just makes 0 sense and ruins immersion...

These new mmos just don't care about the FEEL... it's just lets "catter to everyone and everything"

That would be what happens when you do everything out of order, yes.

Mind you, the alternative wasn't that great. Before One Tamriel, you could expect to be railroaded through the Covenant questline with level locked quests, then railroaded through the other faction quests thanks to the handwave when you finished the main quest. You couldn't ever quest with your friend's character on a different faction, zones you outleveled were pointless, and woe betide you if you were higher level than your friend or you played the DLCs before you finished the base game because then you'd outlevel your quests.

Pre One Tamriel was immersive...and also a pain in a lot of ways.

If you want things to make sense, your best bet is to just play in chronological order. You can still do that.

Or they could throw out a small bone regarding this issue. I've reposted it many times, but suffice to say without reposting it again: they could have a mysterious voice telling you that you have strayed into enemy lands but that an interested greater power is shielding your identity. If you ever make it to the Cadwell's Silver prompt you figure out who that mysterious benefactor is.

SeaGtGruff

Think of it as being mistaken for a spy for the enemy.

"But I'm a card-carrying member of the Daggerfall Covenant! I saved High King Emeric from assassins! I saved Camlorn from werewolves! I'm your bro, bro!"

"Yeah, yeah, sure, you're the fiftieth guy we've seen today who claimed to have saved High King Emeric, so we're pretty sure you're just a spy from the Ebonheart Pact. Die, spy!"

caesarvs

Seeing all the answers here, it feels like "let's do some mental work (imagine this, background that, I'm not loyal to anything, although flag on character selection screen says otherwise) to pretend that zos didn't mess up with something that made sense before. The whole story of "playing with your friend, etc etc" works in other mmo without sacrificing logic, just providing a reasonable argument, instead of leaving the mess at it is.
Well, just another reason, for me, to not questing in this game anymore.

AMeanOne

L2P

SeaGtGruff

Clearly you've never walked up to an army base in a foreign country during wartime and tried to introduce yourself as a fellow patriot of whatever country the army base was from, because I'm pretty sure they wouldn't believe you unless they'd already received a dispatch from headquarters telling them to expect you. Okay, I've never done that, either-- which is perhaps why I'm still alive to tell you that-- but I'm pretty sure that's how it would work. And if you're actually going to be recruited by an enemy alliance and talked into going on the offensive against your own alliance-- well, your loyalties are obviously questionable. It's not mental gymnastics to try to make sense of things, it's actually pretty reasonable as it is.

Marcus684

If you want to RP as a faction loyalist and not do Cadwell’s silver and gold that’s your call. I like the extra skill points.

Ardaghion

Some of my characters started in Vvardenfell, Summerset, or Elsweyr, they hold no allegiance to any faction. So they are mercenaries and will help anyone, for a price. Even if they run through the MQ, they don't care for your faction loyalty.

VaranisArano

caesarvs wrote: »

Seeing all the answers here, it feels like "let's do some mental work (imagine this, background that, I'm not loyal to anything, although flag on character selection screen says otherwise) to pretend that zos didn't mess up with something that made sense before. The whole story of "playing with your friend, etc etc" works in other mmo without sacrificing logic, just providing a reasonable argument, instead of leaving the mess at it is.
Well, just another reason, for me, to not questing in this game anymore.

You can still quest in chronological order if you want and things will make sense, including fighting against your original faction. You just aren't railroaded into it any more.

Or you can choose to only play a certain faction's base game zones per character. ESO was originally designed for you to complete your base game faction zones and then you went straight to Cyrodiil to fight for your faction. PVP as end game.

Point is, you have options. If your choice is to go "whelp, I won't quest unless I get railroaded through it", that's your decision.

Chronological Order, just add Dragonhold at the end:

ChunkyCat

Makes sense if you’re traitorous scum.

SeaGtGruff

Ardaghion wrote: »

Some of my characters started in Vvardenfell, Summerset, or Elsweyr, they hold no allegiance to any faction. So they are mercenaries and will help anyone, for a price. Even if they run through the MQ, they don't care for your faction loyalty.

Hmm, all of my characters started in Vvardenfell, Summerset, or Elsweyr. I've never even seen the original beginning of a new character. I'm so envious of everyone who's seen the start of the game as nature ZOS Molag Bal intended it

MrGhosty

I actually like the freedom of one Tam, I started a guild when game launched and we were AD but then we started getting more DC and wanted to try and accommodate as many people as we could so then I had to roll a DC alt, then eventually same happened with EP (though I ended up leaving by that point) I had ran every single questline so many times I could nearly recite the dialogue. It made repeating content painful and tedious, not to mention all the practical issues like overleveling etc etc. Now when I roll a character I decide their faction (for purely pvp reasons) then build out a character and then do the quests in any order or location I want as suits each individual character. It's like a choose your own adventure story, once you hit DLC/Chapter zones no one really cares about your faction which further facilitates this new approach. I've even found that characters you meet that show up in other parts of the game will recall you (at least in the newer chapters, not sure about old content).

I would imagine that there isn't much incentive for zos to go back and rework the old content just for the sake of immursion. That said, I have always wanted them to do a second pass of the vanilla game's zone quests with new story or a "sequel" of sorts to tell us what happened after we came through the last time, with some tweaks to what mobs are around the game, maybe some wrecked areas being restored to their former glory (looking at you bleakrock). It's content I'd be totally willing to pay for if it meant more stories to experience and getting to reconnect with characters that were fun and we only got to see them once.

Owondyah

ok... thats all fine and what not...

I own the game up to morrowind expansion... + imperial city dlc.

WHY am I starting in morrowind when its in the MIDDLE of current order of events??

I mean... how do you defend THAT stupidity lol?

VaranisArano

Owondyah wrote: »

ok... thats all fine and what not...

I own the game up to morrowind expansion... + imperial city dlc.

WHY am I starting in morrowind when its in the MIDDLE of current order of events??

I mean... how do you defend THAT stupidity lol?

From a marketing perspective, putting players into the latest Chapter they own is a great way of letting them immediately play the content they paid cash for and hinting that ESO isn't like other MMOs where you have to grind up through old story to experience the latest expansion.

From a gameplay perspective, it lets ZOS update the gameplay tutorial. I dislike the concept of starting in Elsweyr, but I have to admit that the Elsweyr tutorial was the best at explaining the basics of combat so far and actually superior to the original tutorial in that regard.

From a storytelling perspective where you want a coherent storyline, its silly. It was worse with Summerset, when new players started with Part 3 of the Daedric Wars arc.


Some new players are happy to start in the new chapter. If you aren't, the usual method is to wayshrine to your alliance's starter city and talk to the Hooded Figure to start of the Main Quest, which will take you through the original opening sequence.

JKorr

Owondyah wrote: »

ok... thats all fine and what not...

I own the game up to morrowind expansion... + imperial city dlc.

WHY am I starting in morrowind when its in the MIDDLE of current order of events??

I mean... how do you defend THAT stupidity lol?

So, basically you started 5 years late. Starting a new character in Morrowind makes perfect sense for players who've been here since early release.

If, the Divines forbid, the devs made it mandatory that every new character start the original game/story, people would be ranting about being railroaded and forced to do old content and how could anyone defend that stupidity..... People wanting to be able to do content in any order is why One Tamriel happened. Makes sense for long time players, confuses the heck out of newbies.

Brand new players who know nothing about anything might be stuck starting in the newest dlc. If they do any checking at all, or ask in game, people will tell you to go to the starting zone of your faction, and meet your mysterious benefactor. Everything will fall in place at that point. You can still do quests/stories wildly out of order if you want, but there is a main story you can follow if you want.

Ohtimbar

I would like to see the timeline progress and the alliance war end. Leave it as a vestigial feature for Cyrodiil and IC. I never liked the idea of the war to begin with, and 1T for all its flaws allowed me more freedom to do as I please. None of those things will happen, of course.

daemonios

Owondyah wrote: »

it just makes 0 sense and ruins immersion...

These new mmos just don't care about the FEEL... it's just lets "catter to everyone and everything"

It's been that way since before launch. ZOS changed it during beta as people made it clear they wanted to experience all the zones on the same characters, regardless of faction choice. That's how we got Cadwell's silver and gold, and then One Tamriel.

Then again, the game is just a storefront for the clown store. Who cares about "feel" as long as the cash keeps coming in, amirite?