Enough with Overland content that's difficult to do alone/small group

volkeswagon

Man I hate Harrowstorms. They are a chaotic mess of too many adds and powerful hitting bosses and one shot atttacks from the sky. Can't count how many times I've died only to die again as soon as I respawn because of an attack out of the sky. Not fun at all. Next time when they make a world event it should be based on things other than extreme combat, such as puzzles and learnable patterns. I find it much more satisfying killing a high health boss with less damaging attacks that I can survive against as opposed to a lower health boss with hard hitting one shot abilities. Harrowstorms would be funner if you reduced the number of bosses that can spawn and reduce the damage inflicted by the sky attacks and doubled the health of the pikes. I won't be doing them anymore accept maybe Saturday night during prime time. They're just too tough with low reward.

Slyclone

I would totally play with you all if nothing I say or do is used against me in anyway.

Which is pretty hard to find these *cough* 2020 *cough* days.

Toughen up. Nothing MMO about a bunch of greedy griefers who can't communicate without being offended.

^^ The only reason I play solo.

So I feel the OP has a good point. I tried "MMO"

Lasted a week before having to leave behind a bunch of good people so that they could keep the wuss.

spartaxoxo

Recapitated wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

No. This content legit gets abandoned. People who want real difficulty don't do Overland and people who want casual content don't do trials.

What if they just made the content worthwhile for non-casuals? People who want real difficulty do casual content like random normals when it's worth it.

And the easy overland content that isn't a complete faceroll is also mostly abandoned — dolmens, world bosses.

Why exactly are you trying to farm dragons?

I want Elysweyr recipes, leads, and the reagents that come from them same as I want from Harrowstorms.

MasterSpatula

Olen_Mikko wrote: »

Dude, 99 % of Overland is ridiculously easy. Not much of a challenge even for my level 5 magblade, so they shouldn't nerf the only part that's even remotely challenging

Yeah, and the ones who don't feel this way are the ones stuck doing the content designed to make you happy.

spartaxoxo

Nairinhe wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Just saw a little while ago a bunch of players celebrating they aren't coming back to Skyrim again now that the event is over. Lovely.

That's downright unhealthy. If someone farms to burnout, to the point where they hate the content, that's not the content that's the problem.

They did that because it's the only time it will probably be for years that Harrowstorms aren't unpleasant to do. They want the drops but they don't want to pull teeth for half an hour trying to do it with too few people. This content just released and already it's down to maybe 3 people at a storm when it spawns. At least they are all still being done, unlike Elysweyr.

Making the content only pleasant to do once a year encourages people to farm until they burnout out while they can. And then even more people have abandoned the content because now they have what they want and never have to do it again.

Contaminate

MasterSpatula wrote: »

Olen_Mikko wrote: »

Dude, 99 % of Overland is ridiculously easy. Not much of a challenge even for my level 5 magblade, so they shouldn't nerf the only part that's even remotely challenging

Yeah, and the ones who don't feel this way are the ones stuck doing the content designed to make you happy.

Sorry to break it you but decent players do play in overland all the time. Not everyone who quests is terrible at the game.

Stinkyremy

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

Rudrani

OP has got a serious problem.

Cireous

Please never stop adding content like this to Chapters. It's even more fun when the content dies out and there are only a handful of people to help. Feels like the challenge level is right were it is supposed to be at, finally.

Thechuckage

Stinkyremy wrote: »

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

So far there has been one WB that had mechanics that either needed another player, or being able to burst down. The Hunger WB in vvardenfell. All the other world bosses, no problem.

Unless something new dropped with greymoor, don't see the issue.

renne

My only complaint about harrowstorms is how imbalanced the Shrike's attacks are. If one is up guaranteed it's what kills me every time since you take so much damage the instant the aoe spawns under you, you can't actually do anything about it. Love to step or dodge roll out immediately and die anyway.

That said, I've also completed a harrowstorm with just one other person and I'm certainly not endgame quality.

Australia timezone so not hugely busy on PS4 NA at night here yet if I ask for help at a WB, dragon or harrowstorm, someone almost always turns up. Zone chat can be rubbish some of the time, but it'll also get you assistance when needed.

JTD

Are we playing the same game here?

Most of this game is oriented towards the 'skyrim' crowd and thus solo content. Here ant there you can find a sprinkle of mmo in the world (WB/Dragons/Events/Public Dungeon?). Let this 'group' oriented content be what it is in what is otherwise a very face roll overland.

The only thing i could see is for ZOS to make 'older' group overland content more appealing is rewarding or a roulette daily systemish. Is there even an older mmo where older expansion content is relevant like in this one?

One might even wonder... are you even looking for an mmo?

lozq

Cireous wrote: »

Please never stop adding content like this to Chapters. It's even more fun when the content dies out and there are only a handful of people to help. Feels like the challenge level is right were it is supposed to be at, finally.

This a thousand times over. I love the overland being sparsely populated outside of towns - it's more realistic for a start, and it let's you go 'single-player mode' when you're not in the mood for dungeons/trials/other group content.

Hard stuff is meant to be hard - you either need to git really, really gud or find some people to help. And like everyone has said, in the entire overland it's really just dragons and harrowstorms that aren't soloable. They don't even drop particularly exciting loot, so you can safely ignore them unless you feel like a challenge.

Nairinhe

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Nairinhe wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Just saw a little while ago a bunch of players celebrating they aren't coming back to Skyrim again now that the event is over. Lovely.

That's downright unhealthy. If someone farms to burnout, to the point where they hate the content, that's not the content that's the problem.

They did that because it's the only time it will probably be for years that Harrowstorms aren't unpleasant to do. They want the drops but they don't want to pull teeth for half an hour trying to do it with too few people. This content just released and already it's down to maybe 3 people at a storm when it spawns. At least they are all still being done, unlike Elysweyr.

Making the content only pleasant to do once a year encourages people to farm until they burnout out while they can. And then even more people have abandoned the content because now they have what they want and never have to do it again.

Nothing that drops from HS is worth a burnout. You may be better off farming gold somewhere you enjoy and buying whatever you wanted. And during event you could just get same things drop from the purple box.

spartaxoxo

Nairinhe wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Nairinhe wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Just saw a little while ago a bunch of players celebrating they aren't coming back to Skyrim again now that the event is over. Lovely.

That's downright unhealthy. If someone farms to burnout, to the point where they hate the content, that's not the content that's the problem.

They did that because it's the only time it will probably be for years that Harrowstorms aren't unpleasant to do. They want the drops but they don't want to pull teeth for half an hour trying to do it with too few people. This content just released and already it's down to maybe 3 people at a storm when it spawns. At least they are all still being done, unlike Elysweyr.

Making the content only pleasant to do once a year encourages people to farm until they burnout out while they can. And then even more people have abandoned the content because now they have what they want and never have to do it again.

Nothing that drops from HS is worth a burnout. You may be better off farming gold somewhere you enjoy and buying whatever you wanted. And during event you could just get same things drop from the purple box.

That's a lot easier said than done. I've seen a recipe from there go for a million coin, because they were new but people were barely farming them. So finding the recipe at all to buy in the first place was difficult. The event decreased the prices quite a bit, but they are still quite expensive.

Deathlord92

I like playing solo myself 100% just chilling doing my own thing but it would certainly be nice if there was a way to up the difficulty of overland content even a little bit even if it’s just giving trash mobs a little more health

Runaerian

Please God no. Leave SOMETHING in the overland that doesn't die from being hit with a wet noodle. Not sure where you are that you think dragons are abandoned content. I spend a couple of hours a day chasing dragons in elswyr and a whole group of at least 10 people are there all the time, constantly moving from one dragon to the next. By the time we've killed that one the next one has respawned. My main issue is always getting there before they kill it. Where are you playing that has so few players? Also anyone can join in. All you need is one hit to be able to loot after the group kills it. I'm doing this on my level 10 stamina DK. It's probably the easiest gear farming to jump into in the game.

It makes the overland more exciting when you know there are some enemies that will kill you if you get to close or try to take them on on their own. 90% of overland content in this game is RIDICULOUSLY easy. Leaving the 10% of things that provide some challenge, thought or cooperation doesn't seem like a big ask. Coming from WOW I find gear farming and drops in this game ridicuolously generous. Don't make an already faceroll overland even more mind numbing.

spartaxoxo

JTD wrote: »

Are we playing the same game here?

Can we stop treating the base game like it's brand new and casual players have been getting content the entire time?

The repeatable farmable content that drops items people will consistently want is as follows: chapter dolmen equivalent, daily quests, trials, arenas, and dungeons.

And none of that has been casual friendly outside of the repeatable delve daily for years now. The base game is only treated like its still majority content because for years now, casual players have been content starved. The last time they got something new for them to consistently farm was Geysers, two years ago.

And the non-casual players spend most of their time in the far more rewarding instanced content.

The result is abandoned content that is not reflective of how people are actually playing the game. Casuals don't want to do it because it's too difficult, and less casual/hardcore don't want to do it because it's not as rewarding or even challenging as trials/dungeons etc. Nor should it be because it's easily leeched.

etchedpixels

spartaxoxo wrote: »

JTD wrote: »

Are we playing the same game here?

Can we stop treating the base game like it's brand new and casual players have been getting content the entire time?

To a lot of people the base content is new or newish because a lot of the current players have not been playing since 2014 and done every quest and achievement on both servers.

The repeatable farmable content that drops items people will consistently want is as follows: chapter dolmen equivalent, daily quests, trials, arenas, and dungeons.

As a mostly solo player the main thing that drops items I want is guild stores ;-). Farming/grinding is just one of many play styles. I'm happy people like collecting and filling guild stores with stuff so I don't have to farm it or deal with nonsense like fishing.

In other words - there are many many play styles and none of them are "right" or "better"

And none of that has been casual friendly outside of the repeatable delve daily for years now. The base game is only treated like its still majority content because for years now, casual players have been content starved. The last time they got something new for them to consistently farm was Geysers, two years ago.

I've been playing somewhat over 2000 hours according to steam. I've yet to do Murkmire and I've got some other bits to wrap up. In comparison Skyrim + DLC is about 500-600 hours. So there is a lot of non daily repeatable content unless you've been playing a long time.

The result is abandoned content that is not reflective of how people are actually playing the game

I see very little abandoned content when I am playing except maybe IC. Much of the quieter content also seems to be about direct equivalents - so everyone does the Southern Elsweyr dragons because it's easier, likewise the crazy Alik'r dolmen circle.

The dragon farming is well worth it because of the perks from the dragonguard daily quest achievement unlocks. It's also a great way to learn important stuff for harder content including not standing in the AoE, not standing directly next to a tank, and not running ahead and poking bosses.

Magdalina

Are you serious? These things are the only fun left in all of open world of Tamriel for those of us who do enjoy a bit of challenge. Leave them alone. None of them are necessary for your immediate progression, absolute majority of them can easily be 2 manned, very easily 4 manned if you are paying attention and running some semblance of coherent build (note - it is absolutely fine to, say, RP a naked drunk nord and fist fight your way through things, well, naked if that's your thing. But to expect a naked drunk nord to beat a dragon is beyond unreasonable). The sheer challenge of these fights - also Ri-Atahrashi WB fight, this one deserves a mention here - alone kept me coming to these zones for months, doing dailies just for the fun of it. I spent hours at Ri with a friend just figuring his mechanics. Afterwards I brought all my friends in to watch them gloriously die there:D These type of things are the only thing you can do with friends in open world (yes, I am aware of group content in this game. But why must all and any challenge be limited to dungeons, trials and arenas? Why can I not just randomly team up with a friend for an open world daily that won't have us yawning?).

You say no one is doing these things since Greymoor came out/at all - firstly, it's not 'no one', I'd been getting my dragon dailies done after Greymoor just fine (not lightning-fast, sure, but it's not impossible), secondly, it's natural for older zones to get emptier as newer things come out. Or at least it's natural in ESO - reward-wise, there isn't really enough incentive to redo older content non-stop. People finish things there and move on. Let's have a look at, say, Shadowfen or Malabal Tor or whatever - dolmens you can solo with closed eyes and WB which, while slightly more challenging, are a lot easier than dragons/HS and can be soloed with enough attention. No dragons, no HS. Do you see Shadowfen/Malabal Tor bursting with people any more than Elsweyr?

If you're struggling with certain content and feel you need more people for it, well, you have a wide variety of tools at your disposal. Join a helpful guild and ask them for help. Ask friends. Find like-minded people. If all else fails, make a thread here looking for people to team up with - there're seem to be so many people claiming they can't find group for this content it's really surprisingly that you guys haven't been able to form a group of your own. And of course last but not least - look up a guide, practice a rotation and get to where you can at least 2 man this stuff without needing 10 people for backup.
If none of these options work for you, well, looks like you'll be missing out on some fun, but absolutely unnecessary content. Fortunately, there's still the other 99.99% of open world for you to enjoy. Leave the 0.01% that has some challenge to it for the people that do enjoy it.

Stinkyremy

Thechuckage wrote: »

Stinkyremy wrote: »

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

So far there has been one WB that had mechanics that either needed another player, or being able to burst down. The Hunger WB in vvardenfell. All the other world bosses, no problem.

Unless something new dropped with greymoor, don't see the issue.

There are quite a few that I can think of that are either complicated or pretty much impossible on your own. RI'at(can't pronounce) in southern elsweyr and the one WB in murkmire with the totems that heal him are the 2 main ones I am thinking.
RI can be done solo but very difficult. That murkmire boss I'm not sure if I am missing mecs but he can jump back to full health very easy.

Ratinira

Thechuckage wrote: »

Stinkyremy wrote: »

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

So far there has been one WB that had mechanics that either needed another player, or being able to burst down. The Hunger WB in vvardenfell. All the other world bosses, no problem.

Unless something new dropped with greymoor, don't see the issue.

Can you show your strategy about soloing Walks-Like-Thunder in Mirkmire? The one that summons healing totems that heals to 100% in seconds?
Because I was trying to solo it and I have no idea how to one-shot totems that are even out of range. And after seconds boss is fresh and brand-new again...

Brrrofski

You can do dragons with as a duo. Done north and south dragons with one other person before. Challenging, but you can do it.

There's like 2 world bosses you can't do solo.

Dunno what the minimum to do harrowstorms are, only really done them on release and they were getting zerged. I reckon 4, maybe even 3 people could do them though.

Magdalina

Stinkyremy wrote: »

Thechuckage wrote: »

Stinkyremy wrote: »

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

So far there has been one WB that had mechanics that either needed another player, or being able to burst down. The Hunger WB in vvardenfell. All the other world bosses, no problem.

Unless something new dropped with greymoor, don't see the issue.

There are quite a few that I can think of that are either complicated or pretty much impossible on your own. RI'at(can't pronounce) in southern elsweyr and the one WB in murkmire with the totems that heal him are the 2 main ones I am thinking.
RI can be done solo but very difficult. That murkmire boss I'm not sure if I am missing mecs but he can jump back to full health very easy.

I haven't done Murkmire WB but Ri'Atahrashi WB in Southern Elsweyr is 100% soloable and not even that hard if you know what you're doing, it's purely a mechanics thing. Here is a thread I made about it on this very forum.

Brrrofski

Magdalina wrote: »

Stinkyremy wrote: »

Thechuckage wrote: »

Stinkyremy wrote: »

I am getting quite frustrated at doing world bosses that are so OP you need a full group to do them. it wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't daily quests and the unique loot from doing the daily quests.
Thing is a lot of people in the game are unsocial, they don't share quests, wont help others ect.
I like the challenging content like dragons and harrowstorms, they are good and unique, though world bosses should be able to be done solo.
It would be better if the storms dragons and bosses had a finite amount of health that doesn't respawn if there is a wipe, that means even if you are on your own you could eventually kill it even if after 100 deaths!

Tbh though they are making content that is trying to replicate the game as it was on launch. We couldn't do world bosses or dark anchors on our own at launch, harrows specifically remind me of the dark anchors at launch. People we writing in zone chat when one starts.

So far there has been one WB that had mechanics that either needed another player, or being able to burst down. The Hunger WB in vvardenfell. All the other world bosses, no problem.

Unless something new dropped with greymoor, don't see the issue.

There are quite a few that I can think of that are either complicated or pretty much impossible on your own. RI'at(can't pronounce) in southern elsweyr and the one WB in murkmire with the totems that heal him are the 2 main ones I am thinking.
RI can be done solo but very difficult. That murkmire boss I'm not sure if I am missing mecs but he can jump back to full health very easy.

I haven't done Murkmire WB but Ri'Atahrashi WB in Southern Elsweyr is 100% soloable and not even that hard if you know what you're doing, it's purely a mechanics thing. Here is a thread I made about it on this very forum.

The Murknire boss was a bug I think. The healing totem things had 10x more health than intended, do you couldn't burst them down in time.

Eirikir

What we n÷d is like a party finder like ffxiv has.

Starlock

Three things that would help make overland boss content better:

• Add Transmute Crystals. With the upcoming changes to the transmute system, we still lack a source of overland crystals. If the developers insist on keeping transmute crystals to group content only, then add them to overland events that require multiple players to complete, like dragons, geysers, and harrowstorms. This would be a huge incentive to run them for players who don't PvP or don't enjoy group dungeons that much.
• Reverse Set Changes. In what is easily the most disappointing gameplay change of the year for me, most support sets were altered so their effects only apply to group members. This is all well and good for PvE that requires grouping already (dungeons and trials) but is terrible for overland boss content where players are trickling in dynamically without forming groups. I enjoy helping people on the fly with difficult overland content, but when my support sets no longer work to help them, that is really discouraging.
• Add Engagement Indicators. This is something implemented with dragons but for some reason hasn't been applied to the rest of the game. This was a fantastic change and should be implemented for geysers and harrowstorms at the very least, if not also world bosses. If I know someone is already at a boss fight, I'm more likely to want to go and help since I am less likely to be wasting my time.

AlnilamE

spartaxoxo wrote: »

JTD wrote: »

Are we playing the same game here?

Can we stop treating the base game like it's brand new and casual players have been getting content the entire time?

I've been playing since 2014 and I have not yet caught up to content. And if you have alts, you eventually want to complete all that stuff again on other characters.

The repeatable farmable content that drops items people will consistently want is as follows: chapter dolmen equivalent, daily quests, trials, arenas, and dungeons.

And none of that has been casual friendly outside of the repeatable delve daily for years now. The base game is only treated like its still majority content because for years now, casual players have been content starved. The last time they got something new for them to consistently farm was Geysers, two years ago.

None of the casuals that I know "consistently farm" anything outside of maybe daily writs. Even if they are interested in content like dragons (when they are working on achievements or getting the motifs completed), they will do it semi-regularly, mostly waiting for a guild event to do it.

And the non-casual players spend most of their time in the far more rewarding instanced content.

The result is abandoned content that is not reflective of how people are actually playing the game. Casuals don't want to do it because it's too difficult, and less casual/hardcore don't want to do it because it's not as rewarding or even challenging as trials/dungeons etc. Nor should it be because it's easily leeched.

Oh, so you want people to do this content that you say they aren't doing, but heaven forbid they are not up to your standards and are "leeching"... There are so many lowbies at dragons, and they die all the time, and that's OK. Everyone is welcome!

ArchMikem

spartaxoxo wrote: »

alenae1b14_ESO wrote: »

Is this a joke?

No. This content legit gets abandoned. People who want real difficulty don't do Overland and people who want casual content don't do trials. Instead of trying to force the issue, which is obviously not working, they should leave casual content to casuals.

I consider myself a Casual yet I also decided to "git gud" enough to solo some world bosses and group dungeons. Sure if you're fighting the Dragons and Storms alone you certainly can't farm them but it is possible, given enough survivability and time spent, you could possibly solo them.

In my view personally, these events shouldn't be something to farm. They're meant to be group encounters that take a good chunk of time to defeat, hence the numerous enemies and large health pools. It's an experience. Back during the save cats event when scores of players were just annihilating Dragons every couple minutes, that was disgusting.

Jpk0012

Harrowstorms are a silly, bad design. Garbage rewards. Only there to get daily motifs. I agree that the should be harder than Dolmens, but I don't think 20 people should get one shot every minute or so.

Can't say I have ever fought a dragon. I guess, it's no surprise that I've never heard people in zone looking for Dragon groups if it's as "fun" as Harrowstorms.