im about a month old, question on questing

Darkspecialist

I would like to do all the quests on my first serious toon i made..the problem is when i start to do quests i get overwhelmed in feeling im missing something if/when i follow the main questline.

so currently i made a new toon and i just decided to do all the quests the game put me in which was western skyrim. well come to find out thats a few xpacs and dlcs away from the start. the next thing i did was start the main questline and was introduced to one or so npc i already met in western skyrim. A few quests in it had me move through a zone called stros m'kai..now im not entirely sure but i think there was an actual step to be had here and now the main story wants me to move on but this zone has all these side quests to be done.

stros mkai may have nothing to do with the main story again but i feel the need to do those side quests and that feeling will continue with every zone i go into.

please dont link guides i have seen them like that step by step from start to finish questing guide..everyone seems to mention that.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/525351/a-clear-step-by-step-guide-to-playing-eso-in-chronological-order

if i were to follow that i not sure i would get every zone like i want. is my only option is to do all quests in the zone as i travel into them?

Ashryn

If you bring up your map, there is a guide to the things you can do in a zone...I'm on PC , so it is usually on the left side of the screen. Part of that guide shows the quests you have done in the zone and shows how much you need to do. I generally use this for every zone before I leave it to be sure that I haven't missed much. Also, look to the achievements tab in your journal and notice what achievements you've gotten for that area. If you do find yourself going out of a zone for some quests, you can always backtrack to totally complete the zone.

If you do a search online, there are also mentions by players of the order of the zones for each Alliance faction. (Stros M'kai being one the first area for the Daggerfall Covenant, I believe.)

VaranisArano

Generally speaking, ESO is designed for you to do all the side quests in a zone before you move on to the next. This can get very, very confusing when you go to a major city and all manner of quest givers start bombarding you with requests to help them that will take you to other zones.
"Do you know how long I've been looking for you?!"
"Dragons, in your own homeland!"
"A mysterious benefactor wants to meet you!"
"Comrade, the guild has need of your help!"

Yeah, it can be overwhelming. It was a lot easier to navigate pre-One Tamriel because all the quests were level locked and you progressed in a very linear way according to your alliance. Now, every quest and zone is the same level, so you can go anywhere and do anything...but the quests are all still in the original chronological order.


My methodology is as follows:
A. One zone at a time. Quests that lead me to other zones can usually wait.
B. Walk to the next quest giver and try to do everything I see along the way. Yes, it leads to some odd situations where Khamira is impatiently waiting for me to deal with some dragon raids while I was off exploring some delve I found along the way, but hey, she can wait.
B. Finish an area before I move on. Most of the quest areas have a symbol like a town or a ruin. It starts out black and when I've done all the quests in the area, it turns white.

I did this with Summerset and was pleasantly surprised at how well the Devs led me around the map. I had to go back and hit a few areas, but overall I got most of the quests done.


If you question was about the Main Quest in particular, the MQ was originally designed to progress through your Alliance zones as you leveled up. If you want to rush the MQ, you absolutely can do so without having to finish your alliance zones.

Danikat

I suppose the first thing to say is you cannot permenantly miss something. If you do skip a quest, intentionally or by accident, it will be available for you to go back to later on. The worst you can do is play them in a different order to what you or the writers intended, but the game is designed to allow that option for people who want it.

If you're looking for a way to chain all of the quests in the game together into one logical storyline you won't find it, because this game doesn't work like that. It's intended to give you lots of options and then it's up to you what you do and in what order.

There's 7 groups of quests you'll encounter:

1. Main story quests - these are almost entirely done in solo instances and whilst the later ones do link to your alliances story and the Mages and Fighters guild quests they can also be done independantly. New quests will become available immediately after you finish one so you could do the whole thing in one go if you want to.
2. Alliance story quests - these start on the island the main story drops you onto (in your case Stros M'kai) and lead you through all the Alliance's zones. (You can actually play them out of order, if you go to a later zone you'll be able to pick up the first quest in it's storyline immediately.) Once you get to the end of your Alliance's story it will tie into the ending of the main quest and after that it will prompt you to go to another Alliance and start their story. You can also play the other 2 Alliances stories at any time by going to their starter islands (Khenarthi's Roost and Bleakrock) or any of their maps.
3. Guild quests - Specifically the Fighter's Guild and Mages Guild. All characters can join both and will get the oppertunity to do so in the first mainland map for their Alliance (for you this is Glenumbra). These are stand-alone stories which move through your Alliance's maps and at the end they also tie into the main quest and the Alliance quest.
4. DLC/chapter story quests - In general these work like the Alliance story quests, but only take you around one map. There's also a prologue to each one which is usually picked up in your Alliance's main city which leads you to the map. (Note: for this purpose Craglorn counts as a DLC map even though it's included with the base game.)
5. Side quests - These can be found on all maps and are short, stand-alone stories that can be done at any time and in any order. Sometimes they reference things going on in the maps main story (for example someone is having trouble with the same group of villains) but they don't directly tie into it.
6. Dungeon quests - These are very much stand-alone quests. They're found inside dungeons, completed entirely inside the dungeon they're found in and only have loose associations to quests found in the open world maps.
7. Daily quests - These are marked with blue arrows and are usually found in cities. They're also stand-alone quests, often fairly basic (e.g. 'kill a world boss', 'kill a delve boss', 'collect 5 McGuffins from a location' etc.) and only really useful for the rewards, not something you need to worry about for story purposes.

I'm not sure why you don't like the guides because it seems like that's exactly what you're looking for. It shows you the writers intended order for the quests which do relate to each other, so you can follow it if you want to. Side quests, dungeon quests and (if you want to include them) dailies can be done along the way whenever you find them and DLC or chapter quests can be left until after you've completed your alliance and main story.

If you want to do everything the best way is to get out of the tutorial, travel to a major city, pick up the Soul Shriven in Coldharbour quest from the Hooded Stranger, complete the original tutorial and then go around the map it drops you onto doing every quest you find. Eventually one of those will lead you to another map and you then repeat the process there and keep going until you get to the end of the storyline (don't worry you'll know it when it happens). You'll need to decide when you do the main story quests because they'll always be available to you and always start from the same location. You can space them out or do them all in one go as you prefer.

If you don't want to do that then do whatever it is you want instead. The game is designed to allow that and there's no wrong way to do quests. Some things might not make as much sense, but if you're happier picking quests to focus on and ones to skip for now that's better than forcing yourself through something you find overwhelming and less enjoyable.

Taleof2Cities

Nice write-up, @Danikat.

That kind of info helps us veteran players, too, where it's not our first questing rodeo ...

Nestor

The whole problem the OP is experiencing is the devs insistence that new players are insulated from the rest of the game. OP is concerned that starting out in Stros Makai will somehow cause him to miss content. Where, really the content starts in Stros Makai. The Original Alliance Zone quests dove tail with the games Main Quest and if done side by side, you end up in Cold Harbor having followed a coherent story.

All the Chapters and DLCs are adjuncts to the main game. If you pay attention as go through the game, all the side content will make itself available to you.

Darkspecialist

havent read replies yet but i just figured this out..the main story i keep reading is the vanilla part of the game..so main story, mage guild fighters guild and alliance quest are the vanilla game. i then found a website that listed the release dates of all the dlc's and xpacs.

I guess i was under the assumption the main story ran through everything that has been released so far. Im sure in some way it does or has but now at least this way with writing down all the dates of release i know what part to start next after the last thing i had quested through.

Darkspecialist

Danikat wrote: »

I'm not sure why you don't like the guides because it seems like that's exactly what you're looking for.

the problem is was i just didnt understand what i was looking at..like that link i put up there in the OP. the first 3 parts of that guide is the three alliances..i just started at the top which was not my alliance and when it started to not make sense i would get my self all worked up about it.

i got it now though.

idk

Ashryn wrote: »

If you bring up your map, there is a guide to the things you can do in a zone..

.I'm on PC , so it is usually on the left side of the screen. Part of that guide shows the quests you have done in the zone and shows how much you need to do. I generally use this for every zone before I leave it to be sure that I haven't missed much. Also, look to the achievements tab in your journal and notice what achievements you've gotten for that area. If you do find yourself going out of a zone for some quests, you can always backtrack to totally complete the zone.

If you do a search online, there are also mentions by players of the order of the zones for each Alliance faction. (Stros M'kai being one the first area for the Daggerfall Covenant, I believe.)

There is there which is a benefit over what we had when the game launched.

However, I will note that I had a friend that started the game at launch as I did and ended up missing a lot of quest areas outside of the main zone quest because he did not explore the map and open it all up. Essentially, if you see a sizable empty area if the map there is likely something there. That something is going to be a quest hub, delve, or an exploration point. Zos pretty much fills up the map.

I say this because it seems you do not want to miss anything.