PTS Update 30 - Feedback Thread for Companions

code65536

anadandy wrote: »

Gaius_Marius wrote: »

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/59961

"A Breton mage named Bastian Hallix is asking questions about gambling dens in Leyawiin’s harbor districts"
"You will know Bastian when you see him. He is a fit, red-headed Breton mage of thirty years or so, and he appears to exist in a constant state of annoyance—I don’t think he’s happy being sent to fetch a wayward Silvelle. "




Is Bastian meant to be an Imperial or a Breton as it doesn't seem like you've made up your mind or that you changed it last minute because ZoS like every other TES game post TES2 just hates the Nedes of High Rock?

Ha, guess I wasn't the only one. It's an error, they're updating the article.

Edit: Except all they did was take out the word Breton.

He has a Breton name, though...

Cireous

I agree, the stickerbook is an absolute requirement for this system

Rkindaleft

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

This is the official feedback thread for Companions. Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

• General
  • Which areas or zones were you in with your companion?
    Bangkorai
  • What types of gameplay were you doing with your companion?
• Dungeons and Overland/Quests
• Interaction
  • Was it clear how to access the Companions interface?
  • It was confusing.
  • Was the Companion ability system clear and intuitive to use?
  • No
  • Did your companion use the slotted abilities as you expected them to?
  • Vaguely, I saw skill animations now and again but they so such little DPS that you kill groups of adds in quests before they do anything.
  • Did you feel the companion talked too much or too little in various circumstances?
• It was fine.
• Combat
  • What did you think of the Companion combat abilities in general? Were there any that felt too powerful or not powerful enough?
  • They are awful.
  • Were you able to configure your companion to perform the role you wished?
  • Hardly
  • Were you able to effectively utilize keyboard/gamepad shortcuts to direct companion target behavior? (Hold Y and left click to attack vs Hold Y and right click to hold off)
• Customization/Progression
  • How did the companion progression feel in terms of time to level up, advance skills, unlock abilities, improve rapport, or acquire equipment? Was the progress clear in terms of how to access everything?
  • Yes
  • Was the companion cosmetic customization experience clear and function as expected?
• No
• Rapport
  • Did you understand how to influence your companion through the rapport system?
  • No
  • Was it clear when rapport was being adjusted and why?
• No
• Do you have any other general feedback?
• I do apologize for not answering every question or formatting this well. Companions, from what I've seen are only good for roleplay purposes. Even the most casual of players don't struggle with overland quests. I took my Companion (Bastian) into nFG1 and got 2-shot by the first boss, on NORMAL. He taunted 1 enemy in the first add pull, of five or six. They spend more time dead than actually doing anything, I wanted to take a companion into normal Stone Garden but they can't even survive 1 overland mob by themselves.

Merforum

The guild quests still don't work for me on PTS. I did like 5 mage, fighter, bolgrul quests and neither Bastian or Mirri unlocked any of those.

As someone else said going to the front door of Deshaan mage guild gives Mirri negative rapport but the side door is OK.

I upgraded Bastian to full strength and purple gear, and I don't think tanking is going to be possible in these companions current state, just not smart enough to do mechanics. I haven't tried them as healer but I think that might work.

I think the main function will be ranged DPS. If you use a tank or solo toon, and keep bosses and adds OFF companions they are actually quite usable, although their level of DPS appears to be about 3-5K which is probably too low, even when my tank/dps can do about 5-10K. If you have a full tank with low damage, things would be tough.

Also I don't like that they only single target abilities and most melee. If they had a few ranged aoes that would be great and/or their light attacks damage should be increased. Ideally I think they could scale damage (and maybe health) depending on which area your are in. It's OK now for overland about 3-5K DPS, for normal dungeon/trial/arena it should be increased to 5-10K DPS and VET 10-20K would be good.

I tested many delves, public dungeons, dolmens and normal dungeons and companions are OK as ranged DPS, also dragon star arena. They are pretty useless in 'black rose prison' too many adds everywhere. I did run a no death on Vet FG1 by just keeping kragh far enough away from bastian that red carpet never gets him (so if you can taunt and move the boss away from companion they will never die).

I think 2 human and 2 companions could do some Vet dungeon with human tank, human DPS and either 2 companion ranged DPS or 1 and 1 healer. The only problem with healing is the skills have long cooldowns and appear to go off even when criteria isn't met (like some say they'll go off is you or companion are below 75% health but they go off instantly when battle starts). If they fix that it might work.

BTW one more thing, skills ONLY work when someone is in range, if a skill says 5 mtrs and companion is at 18 m. they will NOT cast that skill. Even staff wall skill is 20m but if companion is at 28 it won't go off but moving boss into range and it will work. So the trick is to keep bosses in range of skills but out of range of boss 1 shot attacks.

BoloBoffin

I still got nothing from taking Bastien to Eyevea. However, I got a rapport boost taking him to Artaeum. Perhaps that's what the achievement is meant to be for? It still didn't complete for either island, but the rapport boost going to Artaeum makes me think the programming is confused here.

HumbleThaumaturge

Companion XP went wonky.

Just got Companion (Mirri). Was riding along and fought some drop-out-of-the-sky daedra. Entered resulting Portal at end of fight and found ourselves in The Deadlands. After lots of mob fights and one boss fight, got a bunch of onscreen messages that Companion had leveled-up. Checking Companion, she has (I kid you not) 4,294,966,732/3,500 XP (12271335%). What's up with that? Will attempt to submit in-game Report with Screenshot.

HumbleThaumaturge

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

Companion XP went wonky.

Just got Companion (Mirri). Was riding along and fought some drop-out-of-the-sky daedra. Entered resulting Portal at end of fight and found ourselves in The Deadlands. After lots of mob fights and one boss fight, got a bunch of onscreen messages that Companion had leveled-up. Checking Companion, she has (I kid you not) 4,294,966,732/3,500 XP (12271335%). What's up with that? Will attempt to submit in-game Report with Screenshot.

As Mirri and I continued our adventures, Companion level reset from 4,294,966,732/3,500 XP at the top end of Companion level 3 to the bottom end of level 3, with XP 0/3,500, where XP then increased normally (self-correcting, sort-of).

HumbleThaumaturge

1. On the Companion Menu under Skills, Fighter Guild, it says "Complete a Fighters Guild daily quest to unlock this skill tree."

My new Companion (Mirri) and I completed a Fighters Guild daily quest, but Mirri did not get the Companion's "Fighters Guild" skill tree. Maybe there is some other requirement?

2. On the Companion Menu under Skills, Mages Guild, it says "Complete a Mages Guild daily quest to unlock this skill tree."

My new Companion (Mirri) and I completed a Mages Guild daily quest, but Mirri did not get the Companion's "Mages Guild" skill tree. Maybe there is some other requirement?

HumbleThaumaturge

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

Companion XP went wonky.

Just got Companion (Mirri). Was riding along and fought some drop-out-of-the-sky daedra. Entered resulting Portal at end of fight and found ourselves in The Deadlands. After lots of mob fights and one boss fight, got a bunch of onscreen messages that Companion had leveled-up. Checking Companion, she has (I kid you not) 4,294,966,732/3,500 XP (12271335%). What's up with that? Will attempt to submit in-game Report with Screenshot.

XP "bug" happened again. Received several, repeated onscreen messages that Companion had leveled-up. Using Companion Menu, Mirri shows 4,292,962,732/12,500 XP (34349697%), with Companion level at upper-end of level 5. Also recieved message that a new Companion ability slot was available, but new slot was not available. Immediately after, I turned in a Quest and Mirri's level reset to the bottom of level 5, with 0/12,500 XP. This (auto correction) occurred the first time also. Perhaps "bug" occurs when a Companion's level hits next level (level 4 hitting level 5 in this case, level 2 hitting level 3 in previous case)?

HumbleThaumaturge

HumbleThaumaturge wrote: »

1. On the Companion Menu under Skills, Fighter Guild, it says "Complete a Fighters Guild daily quest to unlock this skill tree."

My new Companion (Mirri) and I completed a Fighters Guild daily quest, but Mirri did not get the Companion's "Fighters Guild" skill tree. Maybe there is some other requirement?

2. On the Companion Menu under Skills, Mages Guild, it says "Complete a Mages Guild daily quest to unlock this skill tree."

My new Companion (Mirri) and I completed a Mages Guild daily quest, but Mirri did not get the Companion's "Mages Guild" skill tree. Maybe there is some other requirement?

3. On the Companion Menu under Skills, Undaunted, it states "Complete one of Bolgru's Undaunted challenges to unlock this skill line." Mirri and I completed the daily Undaunted quest, but Miri did not get the Companion's "Undaunted" skill tree.

Cabot

Arpenia Delve, while doing the quest regarding the Crow clan, (just back story not the issue...), I had Mirri tagging along with me.

During some of the fighting Mirri leveled up, (to level 6), so after that little battle, I used her upgrade to use that new ability Slot on her, (nice).

As we continued, the quest in the Delve, every time she it a foe, the Message came up saying

COMPAION LEVEL UP
Mirri Eendis
Ability Slot Unlocked

And I mean, every time she hit anything, for the whole time we were in the Delve.

It only stopped after we left the Delve. Nothing changed other than leaving the delve.

She actually leveled up to 7 while in there, and the message still kept popping up.

Kaivalya

"Complete a Fighters Guild daily quest to unlock this skill line." Has this not been implemented? I did one, as well as an Undaunted daily and a Mages Guild daily. No indication of any progress in any of the skill lines. The bars are still completely empty. Regardless of how the text is worded, there needs to be some sign of progress.

"You can find companion gear when you are participating in content while your companion is active." Like a lot of official ESO documentation, that's obscenely vague. I didn't get any companion equipment while doing the quests that failed to progress the companion's guild skill bars, didn't get anyway while doing a bunch of other stuff either. That's a lot of kills to not get anything. If they are rare drops, switch to a token system instead. The possibility of doing something but making zero progress was already on its way out when ESO came out, and it is and always has been unethical design. Besides, it's in your own interest to set a fixed minimum and maximum number of kills/runs/whatever that it takes for a player to get something. Give between X and Y tokens per attempt, with X being at least 1. Probably better for the minimum to be higher, so that the first increase in luck isn't twice as much luck. Set Y based on the extent to which you want luck to be a factor, and then accordingly set the number of tokens needed to create or purchase items.

"Was it clear how to access the Companions interface?"
I don't recall being shown or told, but I found it easily enough. It wasn't "clear" until after I figured it out.

"What did you think of the Companion combat abilities in general? Were there any that felt too powerful or not powerful enough?"
Once you've sufficiently tested the companion leveling system, give us fully leveled companions so we can test this.

"Were you able to effectively utilize keyboard/gamepad shortcuts to direct companion target behavior?"
I didn't try. I don't recall anything mentioning this. Did you expect most of us to look through the entire Keybinds menu to see if there's anything new?

"Was the progress clear in terms of how to access everything?"
Nonsensical question. Was it clear how to progress _____? Was it clear how to access _____? With the blanks filled-in wisely, those questions would make sense. If the OP question is actually parse-able, I'd like to know how.

Sable751

• General
Only been playing for about six hours over two days with Mirri. I’ve maxed out her armour etc (purple) kept her with a bow, but her progression has purely been through the game, she’s about level 6 now with only 3 skills open on her bar.
o Which areas or zones were you in with your companion?
Alik'r Desert
Reaper's March
Western Skyrim
Stormhaven
Glenumbra
Deshaan
o What types of gameplay were you doing with your companion?
I’m a Solo player:
Delves
Dolmens
Public Dungeons – Bad Man’s Hallows
Group Dungeons- Wayrest Sewers
World Boss - Lesser Circle and Lost Caravan
• Interaction
o Was it clear how to access the Companions interface? Yes
o Was the Companion ability system clear and intuitive to use? Yes
o Did your companion use the slotted abilities as you expected them to? Yes
o Did you feel the companion talked too much or too little in various circumstances? Found that I raised the level to max, it would be nice if you could swap out the standard response she makes with patches or new chapters so they don’t get stale.
• Combat
o What did you think of the Companion combat abilities in general? Were there any that felt too powerful or not powerful enough?
Delves – worked well
Dolmens – generally killed in the first wave quite quickly
Public Dungeons – worked well
Group Dungeons- worked well and stayed alive against the solo bosses, but died very quickly in mob fights
World Boss – Survived to the halfway point with the first, died quickly with the second. Noticed that although I’m tanking the World Boss they tend to go after the Companion
o Were you able to configure your companion to perform the role you wished? For the most part yes, but would like them to stay alive a bit longer against mobs.
o Were you able to effectively utilize keyboard/gamepad shortcuts to direct companion target behavior? (Hold Y and left click to attack vs Hold Y and right click to hold off) No, it wasn’t explained and didn’t know how to use it until I read this.
• Customization/Progression
o How did the companion progression feel in terms of time to level up, advance skills, unlock abilities, improve rapport, or acquire equipment? Was the progress clear in terms of how to access everything? I would say yes
o Was the companion cosmetic customization experience clear and function as expected? Yes, I understand why no helm but it would be nice to customise their hair.
• Rapport
o Did you understand how to influence your companion through the rapport system? Yes
o Was it clear when rapport was being adjusted and why? Yes, and I know some people are saying its too slow, but I don’t want it to be maxed out in a couple of sessions. For me it feels right.
• Do you have any other general feedback?
o It would be good to see their attribute points in health/stamina/magic perhaps with the opportunity to adjust them
o After being resurrected after Dolmen fights, she was unable to use her mount, happened every time. Even though I deselected it and choose another, again she wouldn’t mount.
o The Dark Brotherhood skill ‘Shadow Rider’ doesn’t seem to extend to them, so I can avoid the overland creature, but she was constantly getting attacked. Which negates the skill. If you have to stop and wait for them to finish the fight. Otherwise, you’re going to have to deselect them as you cross county and then reselect at the destination, which is a pain.
o Again some people said the getting companion gear has been a problem, I found a purple staff in my first session, and a green amulet in my second.

Sable751

A few further things:

1. Combat levelling seems to be broken. Did a Dolmen and got the on screen message that Mirri was now Level 7 and an additional slot was now available. But when I opened the menu she was on Level 6 (with no additional % experience). Fought some more overland creatures and she got to Level 6/4% did some more and checked and she'd gone backwards and was at Level 6/2 %.

2. I've done two days worth of fighter and Undaunted guild quests, so far no progression on the skills bar and no skills.

3. Minor point, but could you stop her from standing in exactly the same spot as my character. I use first person, and I look all round and can't find her, only to zoom out and see we're merged

Merca

If companions are a nps, then they need to give a little more health. Like some mini boss. 100k life.

AerunSun

I'm just wondering if having companions couldn't resolve intro a performance issue. I mean, what if only half of the players have a companion runnning beside them, overland, dungeons, trials..??

Or all known performance issues will be solved with patch 30 ...

Lugaldu

AerunSun wrote: »

I'm just wondering if having companions couldn't resolve intro a performance issue. I mean, what if only half of the players have a companion runnning beside them, overland, dungeons, trials..??

Aren't most of the preformance problems related to Cyrodiil? There will be no companions there.

tomofhyrule

That line in the Patch Notes about potentially despawning Companions at high-pop things like Dragons or Harrowstorms got me thinking...

What happens when, if a Companion is specced as a tank, it taunts a boss that a player tank is holding? Can it be set up that a Companion ability will not override a player's taunt?

Imagine four players go up to a dragon, each with a companion. Player A is a tank with a DPS Companion, the other players are all DPS with Tank Companions. Player A starts by taunting the dragon, at which point all four players and their Companions are in combat. Player B/C/D's companions all then taunt the Dragon off of Player A, causing it to go wild. Player A is trying to hold it in place, but the Companion AI is not holding it still and the Dragon ends up overtaunted and rampages. Things are finally back under control once Companions B/C/D are finally dead so Player A can get control again.

It's bad enough in a dungeon when someone taunts a boss off a tank (and then complains that the boss is chasing them), but to have someone's combat pets do that? Especially since, if you're just coming by a Dragon or something, you don't really have time to respec your Companion if you see there is a tank there.

Icy_Nelyan

- General
- Blackwood overland and public dungeon, stonefall public dungeon
- trying to killing bosses

- Interaction
- It was clear how to summon or unsummon companion via UI
- The companion ability system is clear to use
- the rotation to use abilities (from first slot to the last and from left to right) it was as I expected
- I don't feel my companion talk too much ortoo little at all

- Combat
- About abilities power I think they mostly are ok, just two of them I felt not enough powerfull "Crimson Font" and "Life Siphon" (Mirri Soul Thief skill line).
- I was able to configure my companion to play the role I wished, but the result wasn't what I was expecting and it was buggy: all the time she (I just played with Mirri) used abilities which doesn't require any target before the other ones (on the first slot I slotted the "Provoke"skill and on the fourth slot I slotted "Crimson Font", at the start of every single fight she first used "Crimson Font"and other target free abilities like "On Guard"and", then she engaged in close combat starting with a rotation which seemed correct). To prevent any possible oversight with cooldowns I've always waited at least 2 minutes between fights
- Sometime I wasn't unable to comand my companion (using Y and left click or right click), sometime it seems she didn't received an input from my comand resulting in her keep attaccking while I was tryin to call her back using Y + right click

- Customization/ Progression
- Can't really talk about this section since I didn't tryed anything in this field

- Rapport
- Can't really talk about this section since I didn't tryed anything in this field

- Feedback
- With Mirri fully elvelled up and with all skills unlocked, I found there are some bugs with two skills which are meant to heal her AND me: "Reverse Entropy" and "Crimson Font"; those abilities clearly states that should affect "themselves and an ally" but still they only affects me and not Mirri at all. Same seems to be for "Life Siphon" which seems to not affect Mirri at all. The heal from those abilities correctly affects me but not Mirr (neither Bastian for the Reverse Entropy and Crimson Font which are common from guilds).

Seems that If I'm a bit far from my companion she won't cast "Reverse Entropy" at all, once I get close enough to him/her immediatly use that ability.

As a plus neither Mirri or Bastian want to dodge roll at all in any possible circumstances with sword and board equipped (they are equipped with a full heavy armor and half items are "Bolstered"and the other half are "Vigorous"), they mostly don't block any attack aside from the Heavy attacks from enemies, so basically they takes all the damage 90% of the time.

With Restoration staff equipped they remember they are capable to dodge roll, but with sword and shield there is no way, it seems way more possible to let them tank with resto equipped and "Savage Instinct" over a common sword and board.

Everything stated works in the same way with Bastian, so I guess the abilities are bugged or the tooltip states uncorrect infos, at least for the common abilities coming from guilds, weapons and such.

NoxiousBlight

Do you have any other general feedback?

Companions still desperately need damage mitigation, especially AoE. The improved blocking doesn't help when they won't move 5 feet to the side in order to get out of a red circle. In all cases it is better just to ignore your dead companion and continue the fight. Which shouldn't be the case - I want them to be my battle buddy, not my always dead on the ground buddy.

If you won't reduce the damage they take then at least make them auto-rez after 10 seconds or so.

As for the gearing, a suggestion:

If the gear won't be added to the sticker book, then let us learn the companion traits as a crafter. Let the timers be long if you need to, but the gear is better if it can be player sourced and sold. Finding purple gear is near impossible and with having to grind up both companions I am dreading finding enough purple gear (not to mention purple gear in the right traits) in order to fill them both out.

Kuratius

NoxiousBlight wrote: »

Do you have any other general feedback?

Companions still desperately need damage mitigation, especially AoE. The improved blocking doesn't help when they won't move 5 feet to the side in order to get out of a red circle. In all cases it is better just to ignore your dead companion and continue the fight. Which shouldn't be the case - I want them to be my battle buddy, not my always dead on the ground buddy.

If you won't reduce the damage they take then at least make them auto-rez after 10 seconds or so.

It would help a lot if they fixed guard (alliance skill line) not targeting companions properly.

Congrolios

Grandchamp1989 wrote: »

Hack getting some awesome results Tanking on Bastian:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWyodKbcsrk&ab_channel=HackTheMinotaur

How do you get "awesome results" from this video? Vet FG1 is very easy to solo, and even with a lot of work on Hack's part Bastian couldn't stay alive. Just a liability, would be easier and faster to solo without him. He even used low slash for minor maim and he still couldn't stay alive.

radiostar

I never saw either companion dodge roll, run out of, or try to jump from red aoe. And they died fast.

crazepdx

The Portal to the deadlands shows as a public dungeon and it is daedric. However it doesn't update the part of Mirris favor requiring you to visit a daedric delve or public dungeon with her.

Aliyavana

Please buff companions, they die whenever someone looks at them funny. This is the feature that is advertised as one of the main selling points for this chapter, please make it worthwhile.

crazepdx

Aliyavana wrote: »

Please buff companions, they die whenever someone looks at them funny. This is the feature that is advertised as one of the main selling points for this chapter, please make it worthwhile.

Not gonna happen, I fear. Unless a streamer with a big following makes a video of them dying over and over and standing in red. It took someone making a video of them soloing a boss in Cyrodill not using any skills or attacks other then to agro it, to get them to do something about Crimson Twilight.

RaddlemanNumber7

We really need an easier way to resurrect Companions. When I take them into a Public Dungeon, or try to do a Dolmen they spend at least half of every fight dead on the ground. This includes fights with PD trash packs.

Wouldn't it be better if they didn't actually die, but just knelt on ground till they got some healing, just as quest companions like Lyris and Sai do?

crjs1

RaddlemanNumber7 wrote: »

We really need an easier way to resurrect Companions. When I take them into a Public Dungeon, or try to do a Dolmen they spend at least half of every fight dead on the ground. This includes fights with PD trash packs.

Wouldn't it be better if they didn't actually die, but just knelt on ground till they got some healing, just as quest companions like Lyris and Sai do?

Agree. They should either resurrect themselves or act as previous quest companions I.e. kneel on ground for a bit.

As it is it’s easier, and generally more worthwhile just to leave them dead which is really disappointing.

SantieClaws

This one will have a khajiit companion one way or the other!

Yours with paws
Santie Claws


Santie and Bastian Claws

Xebov

After 2 Patches i still find their performance poor. The system has potential, but the pieces dont fit together well.

The problem with gear is still that we can only loot it. No Collections, no upgrading. Given the amount of gear available and the low drop rates it will easily take months to gather fitting max quality gear and we will need lots of bank space, again, to keep stuff in case we want to respec them. This gear has either to go into collections and has to be printable or craftable and upgradeable so we can gear and respec them the same way we do our characters.

The overall combat performance is poor. Combat with them feels boring, due to high ability cooldowns. Besides thzat why does only 1 of their class skill trees come with an ultimate? Damage and tanking/healing capabilities feel below decent even if highly supported and geared.

The problem with the current concept is it requires alot of efford to level and gear them, but offers nearly nothing in return. My original expectation for this system was that it could supplement players with something they lack. For myself that would be some decent DPS to supplementing my tank and allow me to simply use tank gear instead of having to build and maintain DD setups to deal with questing and overland. With the current state of this system its faster, cheaper and easier to simply maintain DD setups for myself than to invest any time with compagnions.

I dont realy get what the target for compagnions is.
If the target is casual or new players then the whole leveling, gearing and skilling part is overkill because these players already have to much to do with their characters so they need something thats simply ready to go. By the time these players finished dealing with compagnions they likely no longer need them.
If its targeted to supplement players than they have to be beefed up alot in the dps, tanking and healing compartment to be able to deliver performance thats fitting for the efford needed to build them up.
The whole discussion when to auto dismiss or hide them in high load situations also doesnt help. Generally take a look at SWTOR, they have powerful compagnions that are always available, no auto dismiss on low reputation, rounded skill sets and no leveling or gearing needed. They are just there and helpful.

If the system stays as it is now with high efford and low reward than its simply not worth it to put any efford into it.