Veteran content, story mode, rewards

Olauron

TLDR is in one of my previous comments and is the following:

'More difficult modes obviously should give more rewards' is misconception. Some developers have made such a mistake in the past, they gave better rewards and more character experience on higher difficulty levels. The results were actually not surprising: higher difficulty modes we exploited so much that became easier as better rewards were outweighing higher difficulty.
The opposite is actually true: players who are good enough to beat higher difficulties do not need better rewards that would widen the gap even more. They need handicaps.

I think it is better to give more explanations. What is difficulty? When someone is talking about difficulty, whether it is easy content or non easy content, he is talking about relative difficulty. He is not talking (and likely doesn't care) about absolute difficulty. That means that he is talking about difficulty for him. When someone wants more difficulty, he wants more difficulty for him (because now it is too easy for him). If someone wants less difficulty, he wants less difficulty for him (because he struggles through the content). That relative difficulty is best described as effort.

What is effort? Effort can be described as a difference between absolute difficulty and character effectiveness. At the same time character effectiveness consists of two parts: mechanical effectiveness (character stats and everything that modifies them including equipment, food, portions…) and player skill.

The first part of the following text will contain the main principle and an illustrative example without direct relation to ESO. The second part will describe how to use it in ESO case.

So, first.
We have mechanically weak character at the beginning (almost zero mechanical effectiveness) and a new player (almost zero player skill). We have a period of time that will be named 'game' but it can be scaled to parts of game with precautions. We will see how later. During that period 'game' mechanical effectiveness will rise. At the same time player skill will rise too. We will have something like fig. 1.

Fig. 1

Some notes: first, don't ask the numbers. They are for illustration only. Second, it is definitely not a straight line in any real progression. We need this line as a base line as all others will be shown relative to this line. It can be a curve – and likely will be a curve – but we know that it is an increasing curve. As such the most simple and easy to understand is straight line.
That is character effectiveness, that changes from the beginning of the 'game' till the end. There is also some desired effort for normal difficulty. The normal difficulty is red on fig. 2.

Fig. 2

Effort for normal difficulty is a difference. Usually this effort is approximately constant through the 'game'. Sometimes effort is lower at the end (for example, fight with Molag Bal is easier than fight with Mannimarco). Sometimes effort is higher at the end (for example, fight with the last boss in the dungeon is usually harder than previous fights). Both situations can be achieved either by changing absolute difficulty or by changing character effectiveness (mechanical effectiveness to be more precise). Since changing of player skill during the course of the 'game' can be different for different players, that will also affect the perceived value of effort.

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Those are some of the examples. In future figures I will use only fig. 2 as a reference, but any of those can also be used instead.

Now we imagine not a new player, but a player who already has skill. He may have skill from other similar games or from playing this game once or more. That will place his starting point somewhere above the starting point of the new player. That will give us also a starting point of the new difficulty with the effort likely bigger than the effort of normal difficulty. Our desire then to get approximately the constant effort through the game. We know how absolute difficulty will change. For example, fig. 6.

Fig. 6

Green line is new difficulty. Yellow line is new desired character effectiveness. The main problem begins here. This is only a desired effectiveness. Everything can go wrong.
For example, lets imagine that difficulty was increased by increasing of health and damage of the enemies and we use learn-by-doing system for leveling up skill experience after every successful skill usage (that is not an exact reproduction of ESO of Skyrim system, it is more simple model). Since health of the enemies is now bigger and damage of the enemies is bigger too that means that player will need to use attack skills and defense skills more. That means that usage of skills increases. That means that skills level up faster. Now we have two different situations. In the first situation character level depends on character experience. In the second situation character level depends on skill levels. That means that in the first situation character level will increase at the same level as in normal difficulty if we give the same experience (sit. 1a). That also means that in the second situation character level will increase much faster than in normal difficulty (sit. 2). The same will be if in the first situation we will give more experience in harder difficulty (sit. 1b). If we have some kind of level scaling that means that in 1a situation we will rapidly overlevel enemies (skill effectiveness increases faster that character level), fig. 7.

Fig. 7

As you can see, effort on higher difficulty decreases, becomes zero and becomes negative.
In 1b and 2 situations with level scaling we will get that, first, an absolute difficulty increases faster than expected (fig. 8), and second, that at some time we will hit the level cap. If we need five times more skill uses to defeat an enemy then we we get level cap five times faster.

Fig. 8

Now what if we don't have level scaling? Then in situation 1a character effectiveness rises faster than we expected (due to increased skill level ups) while initial changing of the difficulty was rather simple and automated. Now we need to adjust that changing to find a balance and likely change something else that will change character effectiveness line that will force us to change difficulty again… We are now in the iterative process much like the same as for normal difficulty that needs to be done separately. In situations 1b and 2 we have both problems at once: first individual tuning, then level cap.

That's not all. The discussed problems were the result of mechanical effectiveness changes. Now remember that we also have player skill. And since player needs more time to kill an enemy, he needs more skill usage, he will learn faster. Not five times faster if five times more usages, but it is still an increase that cannot be ignored.

Fig. 7 will be something like this

Fig. 9

Fig. 8 will be something like this

Fig. 10

The situations without level scaling will not become better too. They will become worse. As I said earlier, changing of player skill during the course of the 'game' can be different for different players. With increased difficulty it is much more visible. Even if there is balance with good constant effort for some medium rate of player skill changing, there will be those who are not so fast in learning a game and will suffer from increased effort (much more increased than from the same problem on normal difficulty) and there will be those who are faster than medium and will say 'easy' (even earlier than with the same problem on normal difficulty).

Note that only character experience (to keep the same or to increase) was discussed as an impact factor. Add 'better rewards' to the harder difficulty and you will have even worse results.

So, the second. What about ESO? ESO has two discussed problems, overland difficulty and dungeon story presentation. What do we know about overland? That new player can start from any story (chapter) and will not suffer from difficulty. All of them are level scaled to the new player. That is unlikely to change due to marketing reasons. That means that an ideal player will get something like this (fig. 11)

Fig. 11

Where blue is 1st story (chapter), red is 2nd story (chapter), yellow is 3rd story (chapter) and green is 4th story (chapter) in the order of playing selected by player, upper lines are absolute difficulty. If we level scale without taking into account changing of player skill (in addition to mechanical effectiveness), we will get slightly increasing lower lines that may or may not cross upper lines. If we take changing of player skill into account and player is not ideal (has another changing of the player skill), then lower lines may go either up or down. That is for new player and new character.

What if player is not new? What is character is not new? The problem may be described by fig. 12.

Fig. 12

Here player is not completely new so he starts upper, yet still below the proposed difficulty. Then he goes for dungeons – trials – PvP and returns to 2nd story (chapter), after that he again goes for dungeons – trials – PvP and returns… and again. Character effectiveness increased. You say, 'but level scaling', right? That will not help much. Level scaling will try to balance mechanical effectiveness (based on such a simple thing as character level). It is not almighty already. But there is also player skill. And you will likely get something like fig. 13.

Fig. 13

And if gaining player skill through stories is not taken into account in level scaling, you will have something like this.

Fig. 14

That is because level scaling doesn't take into account gaining player skill through other (potentially endless) activities.

Another problem are dungeons. The problem of difficulty of dungeons is even worse as it is repeatable content (that's why we can use the first part for reference but should remember that player skill changes every run while absolute difficulty is not). Not only player can do dungeons in any order (just like chapters), player can also repeat them. The first result is player skill that again is not taken into account (it is assumed by character level that is far from correct). The second result in unexpected mechanical effectiveness. Unexpected (or out of control) mechanical effectiveness is the result of the better experience and better rewards. Lets remember, base game normal dungeons are expected to (have absolute difficulty) to be done with crafted or at most overland equipment. Base game veteran dungeons are expected to be done with the addition of set equipment from normal dungeons. Then we have 'better rewards'. We have an addition of monster helmets. We have significantly increased player skill from numerous runs of veteran dungeons (to get right monster helm and get keys for right monster shoulder) and significantly increased mechanical effectiveness. The results are 'its too easy' (it needs no effort, the character effectiveness is higher than absolute difficulty) and DLC dungeons as an answer. With even better rewards. Then even better 'better' trial rewards are used in the same dungeons, even more increasing character effectiveness and even more increasing need for raising absolute difficulty of new dungeons. That is power creep as a book example!

And then – surprise – the same over-the-top absolute difficulty dungeons became part of the story of the same chapters that are at the very bottom and are also prequels to those chapters! Wrathstone to be done before Elsweyr that is done by new player new character. Harrowstorm to be done before Greymoor that is to be done by new player new character. And that is not working good.

So, third. Conclusions. Results.

Equality of stories (chapters) and level scaling are extremely unlikely to change. Any solutions should take that into account. Absolute difficulty change from normal to hard or vice versa should be done without iterations that appear when change of effort leads to change of character effectiveness. Mechanical effectiveness is the part that can be controlled the most. Change of mechanical effectiveness because of change of effort can be minimised or removed (speaking of the example above, 5 time more usages of skills on higher difficulty should not make skills level up faster than on normal). Influence of effort on player skill (and vice versa) almost cannot be removed (even with V.A.T.S.-like system that will not work with ESO there are choices in using sets and using skills that are a result of player skill).

If players are advocating changing difficulty because they don't like the effort they should advocate level scaling done better. Level scaling that takes into account player skill. Level scaling that takes into account not only one character but all characters of that player. Level scaling that knows the difference between 810CP from trials and 810CP from crafting. One of possible ways to do this is taking into account all corresponding achievements account wide.

Then, since level scaling changes player character stats and not enemy stats, players should be ready that level scaling may not only increase but also decrease player character stats to match needed effort.

Then, since extra character experience and better rewards need even more level scaling, players should be ready for 'various but not necessary better' rewards.

Last, this should be optional.

Conduit0

That is a very long winded way of saying, "I want free gibs because I can't be bothered to get good at the game."

Olauron

It is extremely easy to see what people claiming to desire increased difficulty really want. Some of them sincerely desire increased effort and better immersion. The others care only about rewards and ego. I say we as a community should support the former in any way possible. At the same time we as a community should not support the greed of the latter especially since it is detrimental to the game.

When talking about support of one change or the other we should not forget about financial side. The lower the cost of the change to the developer the higher the chance that such change will be implemented. That means that any change under discussion should be as simple as possible to do while it still fulfils its purpose.

Conduit0

Disincentivizing those who put the most time and effort into the game is an excellent strategy for player retention.

Olauron

The most time and effort? Debatable. Let's look at dungeon runs.

Upper red, yellow and green are absolute difficulty of the same veteran dungeon. Lower purple, orange, dark red, light blue and dark blue are absolute difficulty of normal dungeon. We have player one (upper light blue, gray, light green) and player two (lower blue, red, yellow, green, maroon). Player one has more character effectiveness because he has better player skill (knowledge from other games or from the same game, better reaction, better ping) and better mechanical effectiveness (trial gear, monster set, likely golded). Player two has less character effectiveness due to lower reaction, worse ping, no prior knowledge and due to his crafted and overland sets likely purple or blue. Those differences may be inflated by one being in the premade group while two being in group of randoms.

Number one having better player skill learns fast on simple bosses and a bit faster on last boss. He gets new helmet and due to 'better rewards' his effectiveness inflates. On the second run his effectiveness is bigger than absolute difficulty on most part of the dungeon (except last boss), that means his effort is negative. He learns more on last boss and in the third run his effectiveness even bigger while dungeon is the same. His effort is either negative or close to zero.
At the same time player two does normal dungeon. He learns not so fast, though he learns faster on the last boss. His effort becomes negative only on 5th run on the first boss. Since it is unlikely he will get dungeon set ('better reward') in full that fast his mechanical effectiveness remains the same.

Who of the two players put the most effort? Player whose effort becomes negative rather soon or player whose effort almost always positive? Who is likely to remain longer as he is not bored by 'too easy' content?


Then we can talk about overland. The only realistically possible way of implementing different absolute difficulties is with proper level scaling. Exclusive veteran zones were tried and failed. That means that both veteran and new player will play in one zone and can fight one enemy. Every player landing a hit on enemy receives loot as a reward (if number of players less than 12 or so). Only one hit is enough. That means that the most work of killing an enemy may be done by the new player while veteran will do only one hit to qualify for loot. Is it fair to give him better rewards in this case? No, it is not fair. Implementing loot by effort segregation in overland so that the most damage dealer receives 'better rewards' and others receive normal will not work. That will be unfair for healers and tanks and that will stimulate loot trolling. As such loot rewards in overland must remain the same regardless of difficulty.


Now if we speak about effort and not the rewards what can be done? Level scaling algorithm can be changed to take into account not only mechanical effectiveness (as now, in part, as it doesn't take into account equipment but should) but also player skill. That skill is easier measured by achievements. Arena achievements, dungeon achievements, trial achievements are good indicator of player skill.

Giving veteran players desired effort is possible through level scaling – of the character, not the enemy – check achievements and modify character stats and abilities. Stats are rather clear as that modification will lower damage output, lower sustain and lower number of dodge-rolls. Without changing enemies at all (without changing enemy stats and enemy AI) it is possible through level scaling implement additional abilities that will require more effort to overcome. More effort is good as it is the goal. What are those abilities? For example, block effectiveness is lowered when achievements X, Y and (or) Z qualify character for this change. More damage may come through block. Sometimes block is broken completely. For example, status effects are placed when achievements P, Q, R qualify character for this change. Snare on 66% of health. Stun on 33% of health. Again all this can be done without changing enemies and that means that this change is rather simple and fast.

The result is those who want it will be rewarded by harder content.

Conduit0

Craglorn failed as a zone because there was insufficient rewards to justify the effort. Your entire premise is nonsense, only a tiny fraction of players will run harder content purely for the challenge, the overwhelming majority of players run harder content to get better rewards. Just look at non-DLC dungeon hardmodes, no one does them outside of pledges. Why? Because there is no reward for doing them otherwise. Also this idea of self nerfing in order to the make the game more challenging is a complete nonstarter, people can do that already by removing their CP and using crappy gear, but no one does it because self gimping isn't fun.

PS. Your little charts mean jack, the better skilled player will always be the one who puts in more effort because they're the one who actually dedicates the time to tweaking their build, learning how to light attack weave, and perfecting their rotation.

Dusk_Coven

Conduit0 wrote: »

Craglorn failed as a zone because there was insufficient rewards to justify the effort.

*Parts* of Craglorn failed because there was insufficient rewards. Apparently some people believe Spellscar and Skyreach (IF you can overpower them fast enough to justify) are good XP farms.

And for this same reason, all veteran zones will always fail -- People will look at whatever is available across the entirety of ESO and decide which *parts* of it has the highest reward-to-time ratio for them based on the effort they want to put in.
Want to watch Netflix while clicking occasionally? Go to Alik'r -- so we also see that veteran zone is NOT the criteria. Craglorn doesn't fail simply because it is a veteran zone. It fails because it's got very little that's good for farming anything.
So do people actually want ZOS to create an entire new zone.. only for a CHANCE that some small PART will be used by mindless grinders?

If a fancy new veteran zone that ZOS puts out doesn't have a superior farm it'll get ignored after people finish the 1-time things like quests. Meanwhile all that effort into making it veteran would just turn off people who actually want to experience it and not just farm -- current and future new players. So why bother making any zone veteran? Instead, make it accessible.
Because after you finish story, there is only grind. And grind is optimized by looking for a good reward-to-time ratio. Theoretically you can replay a lot of Craglorn… but why? As you said, insufficient rewards to justify the effort. You've seen the story, so you don't care anymore.
Problem is, Craglorn was made "veteran zone" so new players who are trying to see the story will have a tough time and they will encounter apathetic people who don't want to invest their precious time helping out -- same problem with dungeons and one of the reasons why people want Solo Story Mode.

All the top players who want "challenges" are selling carries for veteran hardmodes. That is, they are good enough and group with other good enough people for that content to no longer become challenging. For them, that's a good reward-to-time ratio I guess.

Sevn

Conduit0 wrote: »

only a tiny fraction of players will run harder content purely for the challenge, the overwhelming majority of players run harder content to get better rewards.

Yep, which is why a request for a vet overworld will continue to recieve massive pushback. It's not about the lack of challenge but about access to better rewards.

1mirg

Veteren = Purple Loot.
Normal = Blue Loot.
Story = White Loot.

"But you can just upgrade it!" I hear someone shouting.

Yeah, and you can do the same thing for normal mode dungeons loot too; yet people are still running Vets more. Infact some got enough cp/gear to solo most normal mode dungeons too. So again If they got the mats to upgrade a white to purple then im sorry but that shows they earned that upgrade as well. This whole argument over Story mode dungeons in ESO, the game were literally most of the playerbase is running through a long solo quest chain until they hit the "wall" in quest content then have to either do PvP or Arena or Trials/ Dungeons. So this whole debate over loot drops in Dungeons Is just amusing to me because if your angry over something like this then you'd prob get really angry over someone solo'ing a world boss in the game since they drop loot too.

Contaminate

Sevn wrote: »

Conduit0 wrote: »

only a tiny fraction of players will run harder content purely for the challenge, the overwhelming majority of players run harder content to get better rewards.

Yep, which is why a request for a vet overworld will continue to recieve massive pushback. It's not about the lack of challenge but about access to better rewards.

Because players putting in more effort while being able to experience a narrative that doesn’t fall apart because you sneezed in the “big bad”’s general direction and he died deserve more reward.

People ask for overland to be more engaging, more difficult that starter islands with a bit of logical progression requirements, but people just want the same rewards for minimal effort. That’s why people shifted to a separate vet overland suggestion, because people don’t want to have any requirements to succeed in their questing.

phermitgb

It's a video game. No one DESERVES rewards for playing a video game. Now, it is ALSO a video game that makes it's money by subsciption and paid content - getting people to WANT to pay you money often involves some kind of reward.

So, from an ethical standpoint, I agree with OP generally - every time I hear someone claim that they DESERVE better rewards because they "work" harder at a video game, I roll my eyes. I do enjoy "challenge" about 50% of the time. I do enjoy, when I'm in the mood for it, video game content that tests my abilities - speed, ingenuity, adaptability. Sometimes. Sometimes, I just want things to woosh woosh bang bang kablooey.

But yah, people who think that they are OWED greater rewards for greater effort in a quasi-communal video game bother me.

But, like I said - it's also a pay-for-various-kinds-of-content-so-we-can-continue-to-support-and-profit game, and so getting people to pay money does involve some kind of reward or utility, so...there's that.

Sevn

Contaminate wrote: »

Sevn wrote: »

Conduit0 wrote: »

only a tiny fraction of players will run harder content purely for the challenge, the overwhelming majority of players run harder content to get better rewards.

Yep, which is why a request for a vet overworld will continue to recieve massive pushback. It's not about the lack of challenge but about access to better rewards.

Because players putting in more effort while being able to experience a narrative that doesn’t fall apart because you sneezed in the “big bad”’s general direction and he died deserve more reward.

People ask for overland to be more engaging, more difficult that starter islands with a bit of logical progression requirements, but people just want the same rewards for minimal effort. That’s why people shifted to a separate vet overland suggestion, because people don’t want to have any requirements to succeed in their questing.

Stop. As I stated in another thread, that "extra" effort would only apply the 1st few times for hardcore players leaving them free to reap all the rewards for harder content that is no longer hard all while having damn near entire zones to themselves to farm mats with little competition.

I have no problem with players looking for new shinys, just don't state it's about challenge when it clearly is not.

Dusk_Coven

Contaminate wrote: »

That’s why people shifted to a separate vet overland suggestion, because people don’t want to have any requirements to succeed in their questing.

Veteran OVERLAND will never succeed because of how people grind.
Look at dragons in Elsweyr -- just bring more people and it'll be easy.
Veteran overland dragons, if they drop better loot will just attract even more people. If they don't, people will stick to normal dragons.

That is why the most satisfying challenging content for PvE will always be trials and dungeons -- because the devs can control the number of participants.

Contaminate

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

That’s why people shifted to a separate vet overland suggestion, because people don’t want to have any requirements to succeed in their questing.

Veteran OVERLAND will never succeed because of how people grind.
Look at dragons in Elsweyr -- just bring more people and it'll be easy.
Veteran overland dragons, if they drop better loot will just attract even more people. If they don't, people will stick to normal dragons.

That is why the most satisfying challenging content for PvE will always be trials and dungeons -- because the devs can control the number of participants.

We don’t even need a vet overland if the basic game was more difficult than a tutorial. I don’t even want extra rewards, I just want the base game brought up to something actually engaging, but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Dusk_Coven

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Contaminate

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

Dusk_Coven

Contaminate wrote: »

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

Still have to see proof of your claim either. Can you quote from the forum?

If someone wants a veteran zone, fine. But at least be honest about WHY. Challenging combat already exists so that can't be the reason.

Sevn

Contaminate wrote: »

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

Then you don't spend much time in overland. I see it all the time, players struggling with 3 or 4 mobs that die if I sneeze in their general direction.

You already stated why, it's a tutorial for low or inexperienced players. It is what it is. Dungeons/trials/pvp is specifically aimed at players who seek challenging content. Yes, the majority of the game is aimed at casuals as they do indeed make up the majority of the population.

Quick question, have you completed all the content designed for vets yet?

Galwylin

Actually the reasonable thing to do is if you feel the game is too easy then play a different game. I don't think games should be catering to those that want harder content any more than those that want easier content (story mode dungeons and the like). The game is the game and if its not what you want then the solution should be apparent.

To me, the game is fine. Overland is the way it is because we don't have a progression system (any more). Its the way it is because all new content must be available to play by brand new players. Those that want more challenge have veteran and trials. Besides everyone will eventually get to this more difficult content and if it proves too much then they'll want it brought down like the rest of the game so what's the point of it.

Look at poor Cragstone (or whatever its called). Its always so empty because people don't want that level of stuff. Apparently those that do are either not being truthful and they don't want harder content (like many do and have) and requests like this are some sort of humble brag. Or they already did it. Well, a good portion of this game is repeating the same content over and over so just do it again. No one needs ZOS to direct them to it.

Personally, I like when games have levels. It lets people know they are at the beginning of the game and when they've reached the end of it. Making everything scale just homogenizes everything so it can feel like a slog you're pushing through for some reason. But if we had levels, newer content could come out that adds on to the tail end of the current content keeping everyone pushing towards more difficult play. Not going to happen with the current business model. Its apparently a popular one cause just about everyone is going with this scale type system. If their original RPG had been scaling I don't think anyone would even know who Bethesda is today. Dunno why they had to jump on this bandwagon. Had they kept it we might have Veteran 20 or 30 by now (and that would probably have the same complaits).

Dusk_Coven

Sevn wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

Quick question, have you completed all the content designed for vets yet?

Do they even have to do that to find challenges? Bittergreen. Thorondor. Pretty much all the Summerset world bosses.... Fire Monk. The list of overland non-Veteran zone is long but they turn a blind eye to it.
Either they are being obtuse or they actually need to play the game first.

Contaminate

Galwylin wrote: »

Actually the reasonable thing to do is if you feel the game is too easy then play a different game. I don't think games should be catering to those that want harder content any more than those that want easier content (story mode dungeons and the like). The game is the game and if its not what you want then the solution should be apparent.

To me, the game is fine. Overland is the way it is because we don't have a progression system (any more). Its the way it is because all new content must be available to play by brand new players. Those that want more challenge have veteran and trials. Besides everyone will eventually get to this more difficult content and if it proves too much then they'll want it brought down like the rest of the game so what's the point of it.

Look at poor Cragstone (or whatever its called). Its always so empty because people don't want that level of stuff. Apparently those that do are either not being truthful and they don't want harder content (like many do and have) and requests like this are some sort of humble brag. Or they already did it. Well, a good portion of this game is repeating the same content over and over so just do it again. No one needs ZOS to direct them to it.

Personally, I like when games have levels. It lets people know they are at the beginning of the game and when they've reached the end of it. Making everything scale just homogenizes everything so it can feel like a slog you're pushing through for some reason. But if we had levels, newer content could come out that adds on to the tail end of the current content keeping everyone pushing towards more difficult play. Not going to happen with the current business model. Its apparently a popular one cause just about everyone is going with this scale type system. If their original RPG had been scaling I don't think anyone would even know who Bethesda is today. Dunno why they had to jump on this bandwagon. Had they kept it we might have Veteran 20 or 30 by now (and that would probably have the same complaits).

I like Crag. I solo’d all of the group delves and found it actually, finally, a nice level of difficulty. The only one I wasn’t able to solo was due to getting bugged and perma chained until dead by two adds.

The problem with that is it isn’t rewarding and the story content is limited

Galwylin

Contaminate wrote: »

The problem with that is it isn’t rewarding and the story content is limited

Well I personally don't think much in the game is rewarding. There are some but I'm used to where most of the things you use and wear in games are things you earn not buy. This one has a huge store with a massive ingame advertising budget. If I'm not mistaken, most of that story takes place bottom entrances then towards the west and its is much smaller than you'd expect in that size zone. I didn't mean it as being a smart mouth but really its time for a new game when the content isn't for you. Not every game can be every thing for every one. Craglorn just represents what we could expect if they take the time to add or adjust things. People by and large won't play it. Its just the unfortunate truth.

Sevn

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Sevn wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

Contaminate wrote: »

but people cry about how it’d be too hard to have to block every once in a while

Where?

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

Quick question, have you completed all the content designed for vets yet?

Do they even have to do that to find challenges? Bittergreen. Thorondor. Pretty much all the Summerset world bosses.... Fire Monk. The list of overland non-Veteran zone is long but they turn a blind eye to it.
Either they are being obtuse or they actually need to play the game first.

Oh I agree. I myself do a variety of things to make easy content more challenging, but I'm in it for the challenge, not increased rewards that's going to trivialize the challenging content much sooner than later.

Olauron

Conduit0 wrote: »

Craglorn failed as a zone because there was insufficient rewards to justify the effort. Your entire premise is nonsense, only a tiny fraction of players will run harder content purely for the challenge, the overwhelming majority of players run harder content to get better rewards. Just look at non-DLC dungeon hardmodes, no one does them outside of pledges. Why? Because there is no reward for doing them otherwise. Also this idea of self nerfing in order to the make the game more challenging is a complete nonstarter, people can do that already by removing their CP and using crappy gear, but no one does it because self gimping isn't fun.

PS. Your little charts mean jack, the better skilled player will always be the one who puts in more effort because they're the one who actually dedicates the time to tweaking their build, learning how to light attack weave, and perfecting their rotation.

I was not talking about Craglorn. The veteran zones that were before the One Tamriel failed.

If players will do harder content only for the rewards then they don't deserve it. I can understand those who want more immersion while doing quests and giving them more effort is a good thing.

If you don't understand the chart then say so. The more player plays the game, the more skill a player has, the less effort he does. That is basics. That is literally 'first you work for skill, then skill works for you'.

Contaminate wrote: »

People ask for overland to be more engaging, more difficult that starter islands with a bit of logical progression requirements, but people just want the same rewards for minimal effort. That’s why people shifted to a separate vet overland suggestion, because people don’t want to have any requirements to succeed in their questing.

You don't understand. If you want more challenge then better rewards are counterproductive. Better rewards simply undermine that challenge. Challenge (effort) is the difference between absolute difficulty and character effectiveness. Better rewards increase character effectiveness. Absolute difficulty is not changing. The result is challenge decreases because you have better rewards.

Contaminate wrote: »

Every single thread about trying to make overland slightly more difficulty people complain how they “see new players die all the time”. Still yet to see any proof of that

I don't know what proof do you need. Screenshots? Videos?
I have done all the veteran overland content (except Craglorn) on one character before One Tamriel. Alone. Because there were no other players in the zone except once in a while in towns. Still when levelling new characters now I know that it is possible to die if you have wrong skills (like no healing skill, or only support skills and no good damaging skills), if you have no stamina to block or dodge (you will have no stamina after sprinting), if you have no magicka to cast skills (without CP and proper sets with enchants skills cost a lot). It is quite possible to die to groups of 3-4 enemies in Halls of Regulation (a lot of crowd control from enemies), Ashalmawia (waves of enemies are not good when you have bad resource restoring numbers), etc. And the thing is players will have bad skills, bad numbers, etc as they are levelling skills.