Update 26 Combat Preview

siddique · April 2020

Just when you think what else can they ruin they come up with a new plan.

It's like whatever they touch turns to dust. Please stop.

Dojohoda · April 2020

Will (normal) Maelstrom weapons adversely impact low level PVP (assuming the weapons will drop in the player's level)?

I play vet PVP, but I always think about lowbie PVP first. Good memories there, I guess.

Some changes look ok. Will all of the changes will be on the PTS in a few days? I'd like to see them before I say much, but I'm not feeling excited about needing to grind those 2 arenas again.

Darktrox · April 2020

I think this is the only MMORPG I play that I'm scared of future patches. Like, every patch it comes, ZoS threads the players somehow. I'm just sad.

FierceSam · April 2020

Clearly a major shafting for anyone who has got vMA weapons

There is no fair reason why players shouldn’t have their weapons upgraded automatically... as @code65536 says, they can redo the content... but really they shouldn’t have to

I can’t see this generating any goodwill whatsoever.

Although maybe ZOS will take their fingers out and fix some of the bugs in MA

This_0ne · April 2020

I also want to remind you that we have not received a new arena in the Dragonhold. I don’t want to go old arenas forever!

shaielzafine · April 2020

As usual, you guys have no respect for the time and effort long time players have poured into their builds.
I'm very disappointed in you, ZOS. I came back to this game after your promise of performance changes, and after I figured your huge nerf / unnerf / wtf patches were over for now. Now people have to run vMA again for random perfected weapons. For no good reason. And everyone else that can't clear vet mode will have our current weapons. Most of us farmed for a long time to get specific weapons, after so many runs you're telling us we won't be getting them upgraded. More effort, less reward. For people that don't have them yet, they'll be doing less effort in nMA and get the same reward. If you want to introduce a grind, introduce a new grind with new content. Not make us keep doing the same thing over and over again for less rewards. You could make a 3rd difficulty tier or a whole new thing like a relic weapon grind. I'm very disappointed in your combat devs and very disappointed that your game's performance still isn't any better.

offbymyself · April 2020

We obviously obtained our current weapons on vet. How hard could it be to just make the ones we all currently have 'perfected' instead of making your player base farm for new staves? I've had terrible RNG and it took me a long time to just get one inferno staff. If you're going to make us rerun vMA, are you going to at least increase the chances of getting a weapon suited for the type of character we clear on (like a stam toon may be more likely to get a bow, a mag toon more likely to get the inferno)? Or offer double drops? Or something to make farming more appealing?

Mez · April 2020

I've spent the past few weeks gearing up, tweaking my build and working toward my first vMA clear. I got to stage 8 and was really hyped about continuing. I guess now I have to STOP and wait until next update to continue, so as not to miss a lucky drop. *Sigh*

olsborg · April 2020

Yea exactly, everyone who has dsa weapons atm have done it on vet mode, why shouldnt it be updated to perfected versions? Prove me wrong.

Zymcio · April 2020

Ok bro but for ppl who done vMA for 2 weeks tripel drop.

mav1234 · April 2020

leave it to ZOS to make some great changes but screw up the implementation

come on guys, we shouldn't need to re-farm the gear we already earned.

roflcopter · April 2020

[snip]

The RNG is atrocious.

Good luck to all who are gonna go through these trash heaps for the 300th time to get the same thing they farmed 300 times to get the first time.

I am tapping out on this one.

[Edited for loving too much]

Nairinhe · April 2020

Ok, so, I'm going to get eaten alive for this, but...
You all already have you vMA weapons. What changed is that you will be able to get better version doing same content and potatoes like me will be able to get old stuff easier (but we will still have to farm it, and believe me, there are tons of player who struggle even with nMA)

Edit: I do get that removing bonuses first and then making players re-farm is unfair, but it's been quite some time ago

Derra · April 2020

@ZOS_RichLambert - if somebody were to make such a statement regarding the issue with old arena weapons:

Wouldn´t you agree that this is kind of a slippery slope?

I mean the equavalent would be that the 2018 car that you bought is now discounted at 10% of the original price (you can earn it in normal mode) - effectively devaluing what you earned massively.

It would also mean that the car company at some point went and downgraded your engine from 200 to 150 horsepower for standardization reasons (took away 1p bonuses of existing arena weapons).

Then the company came up a year later with the same car you bought in 2018 - that you no longer have because they then downgraded it in 2019 - and said you can buy it again for the original 2018 price as the all new 2020 model?

In the real world calling that a scam would probably the nicest way to put it no - heh

ninibini · April 2020

I would only find this acceptable if they added a token system for VMA weapons along with it.

RGambit · April 2020

all transmute crystals bottleneck RIP

siddique · April 2020

Maelstrom weapons should drop from vet.
Perfected weapons should drop from hardmode vet. Like every other trial.

Put in some effort and make a hardmode so there is something to do instead of fall asleep farming that place again.

Final boss health should be increased so it can't be nuked in hardmode without going upstairs.

Upstairs crystals should randomly spawn a crem guard/colossus. Something new. Something challenging.

chimneyswift_ESO · April 2020

Looking forward to all of these changes EXCEPT the DSA and Maelstrom weapon changes. You mean to tell me I spent ALL THAT TIME grinding vMA endlessly (and I mean endlessly) only to FINALLY receive the items I wanted, then a while later have them nerfed and stripped of their added Weapon or Spell damage, and now I'm being told I have to re-farm them all over again just to get a "perfected" version back again? That's just unnecessarily cruel. I already did the vet content. Unless you completely change what vMA is, then not upgrading people's current vMA weapons to "Perfected" is just completely unfair. And I rarely say that for things cause I understand the desire to drive a player-base back to content that was already created...I mean heck, sometimes it's fun. But driving people back to vMA after some have done it hundreds of times and not automatically upgrading their current weapons to "perfected" is honestly super cruel.

Looking forward to the rest of the changes discussed here tho.

WrathOfInnos · April 2020

Awesome changes! Thanks for posting.

To anyone complaining that they don’t get free upgrades to perfected arena weapons, nothing is changing with your current weapons, and farming perfected will not be mandatory. It’s just an option for those that want to squeeze a few hundred more DPS out of their build and don’t mind returning to vMA or vDSA. Incentive to do old content is a good thing IMO. New patches should gradually release better gear, and putting a little effort into getting it is part of the fun.

Also glad to see PvP adjustments being done through battle spirit so PVE healing is unaffected. And looking forward to seeing the rest of the monster set changes (please let Zaan work on large enemies like dragons).

Malthorne · April 2020

What if we got an upgrade token that could be used make an old vMA weapon “perfected?”

InvitationNotFound · April 2020

lol a late April Fools' joke?

Forcing people to farm arenas again?

Adjusting healing in pvp may only result in people stacking more healers (/players)? How was it with performance and people have to spread?

And anyone here wants to bet on how bad impen is getting messed up?

just wtf...

SilverKatz · April 2020

1. The changes in imp and battle spirit is something to lookforward . good call
2. New WW , nice, i would love to see how it goes.
and....

So does it means that all efforts and time from players who cleared it and countless farmes is meaning less to you ?
We earned them by hard works and wipes. How could you dimishing our time spend here !!

Shame on ZOS.

technohic · April 2020

Uhh So giving crit resist in battle spirit could be nice and help get new players a little easier transition into PvP by not being blown up, at least any more than anyone else; but the nerf to impen gear concerns me. Will there be anything provided to allow for transmuting those pieces at least?

EDIT: Thinking about having to re-gear all impen and redo VMA weapons, it sure looks like the intention is to give us a treadmill rather than fix and add content.

spoqster · April 2020

Yeah that's not right. I'm all for giving new and inexperienced players access to normal MA weapons to bridge the gap. But it's just not right to force people to go back in to farm again.

I know people who had to clear vMA fifty times or more to get an inferno or bow. Forcing them to go back in to do it all over again is just a slap in the face. The current vMA weapons should be transformed into perfected versions because people actually cleared MA on vet to get them.

If you want people to do the old content again, then add a hard mode, add new achievements, add account-wide achievements for clearing it on different characters, add hard modes for each bosses. There are so many possibilities for making old content interesting again without causing so much frustration among players.

Zyva · April 2020

We farmed the vet content! That time should be honored, with the reward at vet level. Simple as that. I spent hours farming vsa and vdsa for weapons so I wouldn't have to do that again, have one of every type sitting in chests at my house. And now you are saying all that time and effort is worth exactly nothing.

goldbond2000 · April 2020

I'd like the design team to reconsider this decision and I'd like to offer some motivation as well as reasons to reconsider. I 100% agree that these arenas should offer perfected versions. Well done and good decision. You should not lose weapon bonuses for a backbar set like the maelstrom bow/staff. It also makes vDSA weapons more viable since many of those items have collected dust. I like the idea of opening builds up so much that there are many alternatives to the meta.

The obvious downside here is that for all of us that have spent hundreds or even thousands of hours (think pre-transmute era) farming the correct item and trait it feels incredibly bad to know that existing weapons won't be upgraded. One of the things that I've really enjoyed about this game is that the game designers have introduced so many quality of life improvements to make the game less grindy. I enjoy being able to spend more time in new content. I would love to see less new content and more performance improvements so the game works well and I can spend even less time grinding new sets.

However, if you tell me I've got to grind again just to get a better version of a weapon that I already spent time and effort grinding on veteran then I will have officially reached my "tap out" moment. I'm not going to do that. This isn't because it will be difficult for me to do, but it's because it's something I shouldn't have to do. I'd rather just move on and cut my loses, because honestly I'm not the only one close to reaching a "tap out" moment.

DjMuscleboy02 · April 2020

I imagine the limits on upgrading weapons has to do with the naming of them. When they removed the spell damage and stuff from vma weapons in the past, the names remained the same. Since there are normal and perfected versions now - we all currently have what will be normal versions - the names would need to be changed for every existing weapon. I don't think it's as feasible as we would like to think.

rafaelcsmaia · April 2020

Amazing decision mate, truly baffling. I'm pretty sure every single person that left the game will go back to it because of the new grind and the current active ones will be delighted with having to spend 2h a day to get useless crap in the end of VMA.

You guys either have no clue or take us for clowns, hell did you bring the Fallout 76 team to ESO? This is ludicrous.

T3hasiangod · April 2020

This literally makes no sense. We already need to finish both arenas on Veteran to get our current sets. To get the new Perfected versions, we need to clear the arenas on Veteran. So shouldn't we just get our current weapons upgraded to the new Perfected versions?

Honestly, I suspect that you can't do this because you don't know how to do this without possibly breaking the code of the game.

As Code said, it's not that we can't do this. It's that we don't want to do this. Many of us only log in to raid because there's nothing else for us to do in the game. If this change is to revitalize old content, this isn't how you get old players to play old content...

Shantu · April 2020

There you go. Why make devoted players happy when you can just *** them off instead? Brilliant.