ESO 2020 Skyrim - spell crafting?

Tommy_The_Gun · December 2019

Tbh. I wont be surprised if spell crafting will be introduced in 2020, but when it comes to spell crafting, there are 2 major issues:

1st - game balance & class identity:
We already have seen some good examples this year. Fear (better version in fact) was introduced as a skill available to everyone in fighters guild (Turn Evil). Previously it was exclusive for NB as a class identity skill, and if some one REALLY wanted it, it was still available as a Werewolf skill (every one can become one).
Same for ambush style "teleport" gap closer - Flying Blade in Dual Wield skills. Also sorcs got all of the sudden a copy-paste Grim Focus with different animation as their class identity... lol. Same for Dragonknight - Stone Giant... as a class identity even bigger lol.

I simply fear that since it will be new content, they will make spell crafting too strong, and we will have some broken combinations, like wardens having access to copy-paste streak, or sorcs having access to copy-paste cloak... I mean if it happens, then some class will simply die off as there will be no reason to play those since other class + costume spell will be WAY better.

2nd - Crafting process:
If you noticed, how jewellery crafting was done, it was designed deliberately to use as many crafting materials as possible. Not only ZOS did not re-used trait materials (that are shared between all previous crafting skills), but they also added raw-trait materials that you have to refine. If Spell crafting will be designed in similar thing in mind - to artificially use as many crafting materials as possible, and take up as much space as possible - then it will be RIP for vast majority of ESO players who just casually do crafting dailies as they will struggle with inventory juggle mini-game even more. (Tbh, it might not fit in the bank lol).

Anyway, it all depends on how they will execute it. If they do this right, it might be "okay". But seeing what they have done things this year, my prediction is it will be a disaster....

MLGProPlayer · December 2019

Spellcrafting would completely break game balance, which is already extremely fragile.

Juhasow · December 2019

Personally I think that spell crafting will be released in 2021 as part of the 2nd part of Skyrim. My theory is that they'll split Skyrim into half and release it as separate year long stories in years 2020 and 2021 with western skyrim and blackreach in 2020 and eastern skyrim in 2021. Current size of skyrim is simply too massive to release it as one chapter zone. It's basically like the size of Morrowind and Summerset combined and keep in mind Skyrim also had plenty of delves which are increasing the size of explorable area. In my theory in 2020 we'll get part of skyrim with cities like Solitude , Morthal and maybe Markharth (Solitude is name dropped in Dragonhold and lately released teaser trailer shows karth valley) and in 2021 we'll get Whiterun and Winterhold. That way current pace and general structure of ESO maps wont be disrupted because map so big as skyrim is would also require completly new approach and change of few key aspects that all maps already present in the game are sharing like amount of guild traders , public dungeons etc. With so huge size and so many important cities map itself would become decentralized (and all current maps are mostly centralized) or ZoS would have to make some important and well known cities from TES V irrelevant for the sake of the general map design.

That is why I think they'll split it into 2 separate year long stories especially that in 2021 TES V will celebrate its 10th anniversary so getting Skyrim key elements like Whiterun and Winterhold college with spellcreafting in it in 2021 would be perfect marketing move. In the middle of 2019 Rich Lambert also said that spellcrafting is something they're not actively working on and they have to 1st get game performance into good state. Their road map of performance improvements already have plans surrounding update 25 and 26 which is new chapter and certain parts of those plans are already being delayed so it's highly possible we'll not see all planned improvements before next chapter release. Spell creafing is also system that would require current game balance to be way better and their current plans for balance improvements are too close to the release of spellcrafting if the release would happen in 2020. There would be too high risk of breaking the game balance with final batch of base game balance changes and spellcreafting being released in one update.

MattT1988 · December 2019

The_Drop_Bear wrote: »

MattT1988 wrote: »

Royaji wrote: »

I'll be really disappointed. But this time around I can actually see Spellcrafting happening.

Why else would they run every single skill through a boring spreadsheet? Sort skills into neat categories. Spammable, AoE, DoT. Same damage, same cost. Boring and pointless. The Era of Wheeler.

You will get your Spellcrafting. Have fun "crafting" the exact same skills, just with different animations and side effects.

"Woohoo. My WoE looks different. It is still mechanically the exact same skill I had before but I've added a pretty pink glitter to the animation. Damn do I love spellcrafting!"

I’m starting to suspect Winterhold and the hold surrounding the city might end up being the smaller DLC zone that normally drops in the last quarter. Just got a feeling.

Hopefully not as at this time winter hold should be a large city which served as Skyrims capital

Smaller end of year DLC doesn’t always have to equal smaller city though. The city can still be big, just not as much surrounding area that you would get in chapters.