Why You Should Play ESO in 2020 & 2021

Milli_Rabbit

Like all MMOs, many new players will love it while many long time players will have complaints and/or be done with the game. People blame MMOs for this, but honestly, for many, it is just that you are done with the game. If you've played a game for 6 years, there is a high chance of boredom and complacency. This is expected.

maxjapank

I mostly pvp. And I'm downright tired of the lag and things like "stuck in combat" bug. Some of the decisions by the combat team have even been laughable.

But for the price of ESO and the amount of content available in game, I'd recommend it to anyone. For newcomers experiencing the graphics and tons of different dungeons, normal and vet, what is not to recommend. They could definitely raise the difficulty or let players choose a difficulty level. But again, for the amount of things to do, even going around pick-pocketing or using the blade of woe or playing around with different sets (proc sets included), I can see a newcomer being fully satisfied with hours, months, years of play and still enjoy it.

SeaGtGruff

I don't know that now and the near future are better times to play ESO than prior years were, but I had actually been thinking of making a thread about why I think that ESO is the best TES game. I'm not talking about performance-wise, just overall concept and game design (not storyline).

Tandor

I get why some might not want to recommend the game to someone they know to be either a diehard PvPer or else just generally ultra-competitive as the performance issues will be a serious factor for those sorts of players, but then there's a question mark over whether ESO (or any other PvE-centred MMORPG) is the right game for diehard PvPers anyway. For everyone else, however, such performance issues as they may or may not experience won't be game-breakers and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the game.

As with all games, I'd also recommend that they don't sink all their free time into it to the exclusion of other games and other things in life because that only leads to the kind of boredom and burnout that lies behind an awful lot of the negativity on the forum. Whilst I'd happily recommend they play the game, I'd also recommend they stay well away from the forum.

Delgent

Taloros wrote: »

- The circle of buffing and nerfing is tedious to follow. You have to constantly change your characters as one ability, equipment piece or class or the other got destroyed or buffed to high heavens. There's no visible direction, just change for change's sake, which makes updating your characters just busy-work.

This is what is sapping the enjoyment out of the game for me. I work full time, have a house to maintain, and family responsibilities. I enjoy trying to push the envelope in what I can achieve in ESO, which requires that I put together effective armor sets and learn proper rotations. I generally don't run the "latest and greatest", but rather solid sets that allow me to compete and complete.

Lately, it seems when I'm finally able to gold out an armor set and put in the practice to be able to properly use my skills, the Devs come along and negate the work I put in to getting better. Changing the "Git G'ud" target every few months is disappointing and tiring. It's the very thing that caused me to leave WoW after 10 years, and what has me considering my options after 5 years here. I expect the impact this next patch has on whether I have to start grinding out more armor sets and upgrade materials, will determine whether or not it's time to pack up and see what the world has to offer...maybe go back and see some old friends, if nothing else, it'd be cheaper.

I want to continue to love ESO, but change for change's sake is getting old. Or worse yet, changes to items you newly introduce to get people to purchase your new content, to then almost immediately nerf, tells me either your pre-release testing and tweaking is trash; or your business ethics are really starting to show, in a way I want no part of.

xclassgaming

Yes. Greymoor was really good and this year was great, however if you asked me last year i would say no.

Elsweyr was the worst chapter yet, i doubt anyone really played it if they think greymoor was bad as greymoor is leaps, miles and bounds better then Elsweyr was.

Nairinhe

xclassgaming wrote: »

Yes. Greymoor was really good and this year was great, however if you asked me last year i would say no.

Elsweyr was the worst chapter yet, i doubt anyone really played it if they think greymoor was bad as greymoor is leaps, miles and bounds better then Elsweyr was.

What's so bad about Elsweyr? I enjoyed it greatly

JTD

I'm here until something better comes along - I enjoy the gameplay - I enjoy the people I play with - I however do not enjoy the lack of focus on the group part of being an MMO. That includes server stability and performance but also having 1 new trial once a year? It baffles me that are able to push out 2 or more bigger style group content each year.

Do i recommend this to friends? No, I am honest and I am biased. If they can pickup the game through a greymarketreseller or at a discount by al mean try it out. Just don't buy ESOplus as its not worth it.

Sarannah

I have always loved TESO, but quit for a few years after I felt cheated by how they went B2P. When I finally returned, the game was still fun.

Over the recent years, they have added alot of content. The thieves guild, dark brotherhood, and now antiquities all add a new dimension to the game. Making it really awesome.

Just this month alone ZOS gave away a free promo pet to those subscribed to receive e-mails, and a free bundle of goodies. (Thanks ZOS) Earlier this month I was in doubt if I should buy a few stacks of crown crates, and getting the free bundle got me over the edge. With some very mixed results, sadly. hehe
The fact that they are giving stuff away means they are either doing really well, or really bad. My guess is they are doing really well, especially on EU.

Lysette

ZOS has added a whole lot of new stuff throughout the years, not just new regions, but as well new features, even in the PvP sector, it is just not true that nothing has changed there - battlegrounds were added for example. But than again one shouldn't forget that ESO is not a pvp game in the first place, but an MMORPG which has pvp content as well, but the main focus is on the story-driven part in good old TES tradition. Game mechanics were never really consistent in the Elder Scrolls series, a lot changed from game to game and a lot is all the time changing in ESO as well - for better or worse though.

If someone wants to play this game for the pvp content only, he might not turn out to be happy with his choice in the end, but if someone expects an Elder Scrolls game in a TES way of playing it - now being able to do that together with a friend or two - he will find what he is looking for and a massive amount of content as well - it really depends on what you are looking for.

Well, I should add, that the RPG part of the game is best experienced by not leveling up quickly but rather do it slow paced - grinding somewhere and level to 50 within a couple of hours or days is counterproductive to enjoying the RPG parts of the game later on - they won't be enjoyable "later on" - just do it slow paced with slow leveling and all will be fine.

agegarton

+
It really is a brilliant game if not the best - you can kill hours - days - ok months! - here and never regret it.


-
The state of the server (EU) is laughable.
The state of Cyrodiil is laughable.
The fact they've both been a state for years is tragic.

Elsonso

xclassgaming wrote: »

Yes. Greymoor was really good and this year was great, however if you asked me last year i would say no.

Elsweyr was the worst chapter yet, i doubt anyone really played it if they think greymoor was bad as greymoor is leaps, miles and bounds better then Elsweyr was.

Really. Elsweyr introduced the first really good overland group content improvement since launch. Given that they went back to the old standby for Greymoor, I am not sure they realize this. That is sad, because there is still work to be done and it could take decades before ZOS wanders back around to it.

IAmBones

For all those looking for the PERFECT game... Play Chess. There is no perfect MMO, there never will be. The ESO community, FAR OUTWEIGHS, any other game issues.. Hands Down.

TineaCruris

Milli_Rabbit wrote: »

Like all MMOs, many new players will love it while many long time players will have complaints and/or be done with the game. People blame MMOs for this, but honestly, for many, it is just that you are done with the game. If you've played a game for 6 years, there is a high chance of boredom and complacency. This is expected.

I don't think I've heard anyone say they are bored with the game. What they say is they are infuriated with the performance, and not being able to play the game after logging in, and that it's been getting worse for years, not better. Everyone still loves the game. They just want it to work.

Lannharr

I'll play until my subscription will expire (2021) but I don't know if I will renew it due to unsolved performance issues.

Besides that, boring PVE side questing, easy delves and linear exploration, lack of overland challenges I can say that I enjoy more PVP and Dungeons.

Galwylin

I think there's much to like from this game. Its made by a new developer to the MMO space so they are still having growing pains (and more pains and more). But for the casual gamer, its pretty good. If you play things as released there's not enough to say this is your main game though.

I think many have mentioned why you might not should subscribe which I would probably agree with. My biggest con though is there is no progression in this game. You just collect things. Lots and lots of things. But once you reach level 50 and 160 cp progression (as much as there was from 0 cp) has grinded to a halt. That's very unforgivable to me. While you never feel like you leave old content behind due to character power, it also has the most damaging aspect of making each new release feel like everything before it. Going to someplace new doesn't have the thrill it should have. You are going to find as much to see and do going through Cadwell's Silver and Gold if you haven't and save money to boot. Just going through what's available to base game now is more than enough, even too much, to feeling like this game is finished for you.

Its a game you should play but it falls into a treadmill once you've maxxed each class. Which really doesn't take long.

Galwylin

Nairinhe wrote: »

xclassgaming wrote: »

Yes. Greymoor was really good and this year was great, however if you asked me last year i would say no.

Elsweyr was the worst chapter yet, i doubt anyone really played it if they think greymoor was bad as greymoor is leaps, miles and bounds better then Elsweyr was.

What's so bad about Elsweyr? I enjoyed it greatly

Same here. I'm waiting to make a final verdict on Greymoor but so far its pretty bad. If it weren't Skyrim (a little part of it at least) I think it would be widely panned. I can't believe they wasted the release of a chapter just to set up a future DLC (at least I hope there's some payoff here). I think they should have taken the Elsweyr approach and made each release a complete one that tied together instead of doing.... this. Maybe done a proper chapter release for Skyrim and made Blackreach the DLC. Nothing was well done and the whole area just feels kind of dead (pun not intended). Just traveling between towns leaves you with large stretches of nothing. Granted snowy wastes aren't the biggest population centers but it almost felt like a little Cyrodill where you trot between empty areas trying to find something to do.

Nairinhe

Galwylin wrote: »

Nairinhe wrote: »

xclassgaming wrote: »

Yes. Greymoor was really good and this year was great, however if you asked me last year i would say no.

Elsweyr was the worst chapter yet, i doubt anyone really played it if they think greymoor was bad as greymoor is leaps, miles and bounds better then Elsweyr was.

What's so bad about Elsweyr? I enjoyed it greatly

Same here. I'm waiting to make a final verdict on Greymoor but so far its pretty bad. If it weren't Skyrim (a little part of it at least) I think it would be widely panned. I can't believe they wasted the release of a chapter just to set up a future DLC (at least I hope there's some payoff here). I think they should have taken the Elsweyr approach and made each release a complete one that tied together instead of doing.... this. Maybe done a proper chapter release for Skyrim and made Blackreach the DLC. Nothing was well done and the whole area just feels kind of dead (pun not intended). Just traveling between towns leaves you with large stretches of nothing. Granted snowy wastes aren't the biggest population centers but it almost felt like a little Cyrodill where you trot between empty areas trying to find something to do.

I woudn't say Greymoor is bad. More like it's more of a generic Skyrim + generic edgy vampire stuff and very-very raw and unpolished. Northern empty-ish and bleak scenery kinda fits well and Blackreach was beautiful, so can't complain here. Quests are also nice (when not broken, lol). But that's, like, my taste.

Everest_Lionheart

Delgent wrote: »

[quote="Taloros;c-6880626"

- The circle of buffing and nerfing is tedious to follow. You have to constantly change your characters as one ability, equipment piece or class or the other got destroyed or buffed to high heavens. There's no visible direction, just change for change's sake, which makes updating your characters just busy-work.

This is what is sapping the enjoyment out of the game for me. I work full time, have a house to maintain, and family responsibilities. I enjoy trying to push the envelope in what I can achieve in ESO, which requires that I put together effective armor sets and learn proper rotations. I generally don't run the "latest and greatest", but rather solid sets that allow me to compete and complete.

Lately, it seems when I'm finally able to gold out an armor set and put in the practice to be able to properly use my skills, the Devs come along and negate the work I put in to getting better. Changing the "Git G'ud" target every few months is disappointing and tiring. It's the very thing that caused me to leave WoW after 10 years, and what has me considering my options after 5 years here. I expect the impact this next patch has on whether I have to start grinding out more armor sets and upgrade materials, will determine whether or not it's time to pack up and see what the world has to offer...maybe go back and see some old friends, if nothing else, it'd be cheaper.

I want to continue to love ESO, but change for change's sake is getting old. Or worse yet, changes to items you newly introduce to get people to purchase your new content, to then almost immediately nerf, tells me either your pre-release testing and tweaking is trash; or your business ethics are really starting to show, in a way I want no part of.

[/quote]

The thing is you can hang tough with a few basic sets in the game at least for DPS anyway. Hundings + Briarheart/Spriggans depending on whether you PvE or PvP on on stamina toons are tested, tried and true and have aged well despite whatever the new flavour of the month is. On the magicka side you have Julianos + Mother’s Sorrow/Spinners for the same basic formula.

You have other interesting sets you can pick up or craft in starting zones like Red mountain and ashen grip which give good enough procs to carry you through tons of content and are quite fun to play. Magicka side the sets are quite as sexy but you can throw on seducer and sustain for days or pick up Alfiq from Elsweyr and get crazy high magicka numbers.

There are that make good bridge sets as well like war maiden from Vvardenfell and you even get a fire staff from a quest like mother’s sorrow lightning staff. Now find a group to help farm for your ilambris and you’ve created a quite formidable magicka toon whether they nerf the sets or not, however they actually boosted war maidens next patch so hold on to your hats and dust off some old gear everyone said was trash because it’s playable now, though not BiS.

Trail gear is trail gear, not really needed except on veteran trials anyway. You can get by with the staple sets I mentioned at the top and a couple 1pc monster sets if you choose. Maelstrom normal is dropping maelstrom weapons now too and the old BiS weapons are fantastic. Vet boost on those is negligible so go grab those tried and true weapons, though you’ll be farming for weeks for that inferno staff before it drops in the wrong trait!

So with all that my suggestion is keep that basic gear and a few other sets i mentioned on an alt toon or in your bank for future use and worry less about the flavour of the month. Though I must admit some changes like mad tinkerer in the upcoming patch have me thinking about using it and yes I’ve been hoarding the set for months now in case I had the chance!

Galwylin

Nairinhe wrote: »

I woudn't say Greymoor is bad. More like it's more of a generic Skyrim + generic edgy vampire stuff and very-very raw and unpolished. Northern empty-ish and bleak scenery kinda fits well and Blackreach was beautiful, so can't complain here. Quests are also nice (when not broken, lol). But that's, like, my taste.

All that generic stuff is why its bad to me. This is a fine area for the base game. But its been years and this was everything they've learned? Terrible. The vast empty areas are fine in a game like Skyrim because its got so many quests a breather is appreciated. This is just lazy to me. Its just not okay to charge people for something that is so unfinished. Is this the direction they are taking or a bump has me questioning the idea of pre-ordering anything from now on. That's me. For the folks that love it, I'm happy for them but recommending this game with this direction of ESO to someone? That's why I think its great to play but don't put money (beyond initial purchase) in it cause its apparently not going towards the game.

Chevaliemew

Everyone has his/her/its special reason to play. For some explanation that there is nothing else that suits me better is sufficient, that's true. WoW, GW2, BDO and others are considered superior and based on what other told me, that might be true. Yet ESO is after all an Elder Scroll game. It's overloaded with ton on lore and that will always keep average Skyrim player come by to get through new Chapter.

It's combat system that makes me enjoy the game. It's "how" you play the game is actually important. When it comes to that matter, quality of combat system only decreased over the years. Const. skill nerfing, changing mechanics for law values and worst thing: class homogenization. Like it wouldn't be enough, even when every class can play any role relatively well, there are no tanks and healers for typical 4 keys groups no more. People simply realized that you can just 4x DD them. That is mostly because vanilla veteran dungeons are laughably easy. You can easly make vet dungeon with 4x 160 CP DDs. Well...
Coming back to combat quality, I can't stress enough how Zenimax likes to screwing any sort of Animation Canceling. Block canceling isn't smooth anymore, and those pesky ultimate casting times, ugh.

While I tend to speak about ESO in supelatives to other people, I never recommend it

BRogueNZ

Play it now because within a year or so it will have some serious competition, finally.

Lotus781

genjutsu_kami wrote: »

"Its so good to be playing right now"

This is often the conversation I have with myself when I play ESO. I wanted to share this to the community and with players that have maybe took a hiatus. The game feels amazing at the moment and not for the reasons you may think.

Let me elaborate. Ever since playing at launch in 2014 (on PS4), I've been part of a community that not only has a passion for what they play but the knowledge and lore around Elder Scrolls. I have seen the game evolve and change for better and worse depending on your perspective of course. However, one thing stays true.... I am always drawn back!

The new addition of Mythic Items, Classes, skills and content always makes me feel like I am getting the 'best bang for my buck' (if I have butchered that saying I apologise). ESO as an MMO is the best in the PS4 market right now.

I am enjoying making content for the game again and I am looking forward to the rest of 2020 & 2021. Next Gen is here! and that only screams desirable possibilities. Most importantly, one thing I wanted to add... This community is certainly the most friendly and inviting community I have ever experienced in my 20+ years of gaming. I have been in many gaming communities and ESO is the most, friendly, kind, mature community I have personally experienced and that is a big part of the enjoyment of the game.

I have tried my best to explain this on a video I made today. Link below.


Final thought - For anyone thinking about getting back to the game......Yes!! do it, there is so much to do and achieve and more to come.

I would love to hear anyone else's thoughts on coming back to the game. Equally if you have taken a hiatus I would like to know why that is. Also what are you looking forward to the most



https://youtube.com/watch?v=nY49wXFt6Vs&t=1s

"This was a paid for presentation by Zenimax"

buttaface

ESO is the best casual, roleplay, questing, messing around in the world MMO ever designed by a longshot. The problems arise in intermediate play and above, performance, balance, etc. so the question becomes whether how serious one is about MMOs. My opinion is that one shouldn't be too serious about these games, they aren't a job, a high end tactical/parkour game, or some Esport, and for the vast majority of people who feel that way, ESO is outstanding. For those who take their video games really seriously, ESO is likely not going to ever give those what they want.

Dovakhan

IDK nor care about any other MMO-specific reasons, but if you love TES lore, then this game is just MANDATORY for you. Heck, it may easily be already the new standart on that regard.

Plus, most questlines are interesting and their dialogues and characters are superb.

craybest

Because it's one of the best MMOs out there. Probably in the top 5 of the world.

LovesCoffee

me and my wife got no big reasons to play ESO, we've got rest of achievements and tryed every aspect of this game, we got bored, there is no real things to do in ESO when u got everything, the only thing that took us back is really awesome housing, outside of housing all we're doing is testing all time changing classes/sets and doing random trials/collecting new (or changed) sets we may need, but this getting boring really fast (and annoying at the same time, ZOS team can't balance pve and pvp for years and ppl have to suffer because of it), as for pvp we don't like it much.

There is MMO's around with much more diversity, much better relations between devs and players, stable balance etc etc, without lags and such long downtimes, which we're playing for some time already, but ESO housing is really unique even if it requires a lot of investment.

JacksonCarter13

The amount of negativity on these forums is ASTOUNDING. ITS NOT A PERFECT GAME OR A PERFECT WORLD. If you dont like it and want to complain all day go somewhere else or just keep your mouth shut unless you have something constructive and well thought out to say. It is seriously obnoxious to come see a good post about someone and their community who enjoy the game and then just pure negativity. They are literally trying to fix Cyro admitting AOE's are causing problems and doing a live test to try and get more data. Changes and implementations on this scale take time... People need to stop [snip] complaining my god...

[Edit for Censor Bypass.]

Shokner

Well I'm aiming to play 2021 today's maintenance looks like it's going to take a while longer.

Dovakhan

Everest_Lionheart wrote: »

Dovakhan wrote: »

"Even worst Diablo 3 like system which make your DPS useless if you don't have the current meta set, for example, my DPS with full weaving was capped at 38k with crafting gear as a stam NB, just got so called 5/5 lok and 5/5 relequen, boom, same rotation and I am doing 65k. aka from 0 to hero mechanics, no skill difference involved."

That actually gives me hope on my stamsorc. I'm stuck at 40k with no Trial gear whatsoever as well (not even Maelstrom's Bow).

Anyway, better gear gives you a big DPS boost. Surprise surprise :P

"Diablo 3 like leveling system, you literally do 20% more damage by going from 600 cp to 810 cp."

And what do you want/expect? It's merely 600-800 after all. In fact, 20% extra damage is a quite nice boost.

"If you do not have friends or struggle to find community, this game is as dead as a solo game, even when seeing tons of players next to you."

If you don't bother to socialize ON A MMO, then it's your problem. A big one, involving lack of logic at that.

If anything, I with it was easier to share story quests in order to do them together with someone else. Would be great for healers and tanks who doesn't want to spend half an hour killing every enemy without reespeccing.

And anyway, you can just go on your own questing, enjoying the stories of the game solo, and treating the game as if it was a SP without any issue (thou I recommend a DD for that). And that means the solo content is "dead"...how exactly? :P

"In order to find a proper guild, you need the said above gear."

If you go for ultra-competitive guilds, then it's your problem as well. Fortunately, not everybody has the need to be in one of those elitist ones (curiously, something you complain about as well), and there are plenty of guilds suited for all kind of tastes and skill caps.

"World content such as world bosses, that are near impossible to solo for no reason without a group or being high CP, so you have to wait forever for someone to help you kill it, luckily sometimes you see some shiny player coming and then 1 shotting it without even doing its mechanics from being super pumped."

Because they're NOT supposed to be done solo, as stated by the very description of them in the in-game map?

Seriously....

I’m got 3 DPS toons no trial gear, 1 with monster, one with maelstrom lightning staff. CP480 as of this post.

Magplar is the lowest of the bunch at 32K DPS but he’s got the staff. Running double lightning as well so I also know why the DPS is held back in addition to no monster set. He is mostly a solo build though wearing Julianos/MS not even gold except weapons and blue jewelry. It performs well in trials, feeds spear synergies to my tanks and can manage to stay upright 99% of the time because it’s a super easy class to play.

My Stamwarden pushes 36K. He’s got Hundings/Briarheart with the Kra’gh monster set. This is my main, generally a solo player as well. Holds his own in trials because of survivability. The kind of utility DPS that picks to people up off the floor, bashes to interrupt mechanics and runs across the room to deal with dangerous adds.

Finally my MagDK comes in at 42K. Also wearing Julianos/MS. No monster set, no maelstrom staff. Double inferno staff for better damage. Purple jewelry on this one and gold weapons. Much more squishy in trials even with a generic 2pc health set so I can’t run around and grab adds away from the group. I have to stay very disciplined with her and stick to the script. Parse, parse, parse, get out of stupid, rinse and repeat.

I rotate between the 3 often depending on what I’m farming or which trail we are doing. But the point is even without all the maxed CP and best sets builds can still be viable. As for the BiS gear I am always farming for it but have it the worst time getting the proper traits to drop. RNG is a cruel mistress. On a related note nobody ever needed 3 embershield gauntlets of the exact same trait on a CoA run ever. 5 runs of CoA yesterday and 2 BSW pieces in undesirable traits of course. RNG is playing with my emotions.

So, 40k is pretty normal for builds without godly gear? Nice to know ^^

I'm not in a real hurry to get Trial gear TBH. Too much of a pain to get. And I do just fine on Veteran dungeons, so...I'm not gonna kill myself for what counts for about 1% of the game (Trials) and ridiculous skins that I'm not gonna use.

I'm probably just gonna farm The Maelstrom's Bow and be done with it. I can do nMA No Deaths, so it's easy enough to get.