Only ZOS would have the gall...

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

To cut the majority of CP passives in half, and claim that they are "listening to feedback".

The audacity. The absurdity.

The power loss is negligible, it is the claim that they are giving players what they want that is infuriating.

redspecter23 · April 2021

I believe I heard players asking for a look at the green tree. They must be getting different feedback on a much larger scale than the players see.

Daraklus · April 2021

From the sounds of it, there were some players that had some complaints about it. Namely how they felt like they'd need to grind for a really long time in order to get to a more competitive level. Which Iwill have to agree with, it's rather staggering seeing that I need to get around 800 more CP in order to feel like I have a good chance of doing things.

The nerf would apparently make it so you don't need that much CP... But if you ask me, it would be better to just reduce the cost of these Stars by half, so instead of 50 points per star you'd need 25.

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

Daraklus wrote: »

From the sounds of it, there were some players that had some complaints about it. Namely how they felt like they'd need to grind for a really long time in order to get to a more competitive level. Which Iwill have to agree with, it's rather staggering seeing that I need to get around 800 more CP in order to feel like I have a good chance of doing things.

Yes, we all understand that many people felt that it was too much of a grind to max out their passives.

But solving the issue by halving the power of those passives is clearly not what people wanted. Halving the cp required for maximum effect, while keeping the actual effect the same would have been in line with players' wishes.

This is such a blatant misrepresentation of what people were asking for that it feels like ZOS is showing actual contempt for their players for daring to have complaints.

If they'd simply said "we think there is still too much power in the cp system", I'd still be salty, as no one likes losing power they grinded for, but at least it would feel honest. Saying "this is what you asked for" is a slap in the face.

Kalik_Gold · April 2021

People failed to realize you were good at 1200 CP... per most of the number crunchers.

VaranisArano · April 2021

Kalik_Gold wrote: »

People failed to realize you were good at 1200 CP... per most of the number crunchers.

ZOS did pretty well with PVE group content. But I think they failed to realize that some of the stuff I think they figured was "QOL" is actually pretty important in PVP. Stuff like fall damage reduction is rarely needed in PVE, but is a literally a life-saver in PVP where I might be jumping off the top of a keep or a resource.

I'm not sure what the number crunchers at ZOS expected to be the goal for CP PVP. I know it was 800-1100 for PVE leaderboards according to the CP 2.0 FAQ, and the forum theorycrafters were saying around 1400 for CP PVP.

On the other hand, I think nerfing the CP passives was the wrong approach to deal with it taking a long time to be competitive. If ZOS wanted to make them more readily available at a lower CP level, they could have lowered the number of CP necessary without touching the power level. That gives them more room to add the various QOL passives later in the trees they've talked about wanting.

But that's not what ZOS did. And since they've talked about wanting to nerf PVE player power further in the CP 2.0 FAQ, I can't say I'm that surprised.

Sylvermynx · April 2021

VaranisArano wrote: »

But that's not what ZOS did. And since they've talked about wanting to nerf PVE player power further in the CP 2.0 FAQ, I can't say I'm that surprised.

Yeah, well.... I don't have enough "PVE player power" to nerf. Love this game.... but satellite isn't kind to the combat here. So looks like I'll be dying a lot if I do anything but housing and writs. Across both accounts, both PC megaservers, my highest CP is 555 as of this morning. The rest are 458, 257, 156.

Am I going to spend the few millions I have to grind CP using master writs? Nope. I don't do grinds of any kind.

Ah well. I'm adaptable. I'll have fun with housing. Really love that Water's Edge house....

Avoranti · April 2021

I think a lot of this could have been avoided in one of two ways, or both.

First, adjusted players current cp to reflect the new xp required to gain a level. This would have made the grind less daunting and maybe given the players a sense that they didn’t lose any power since they would have gained the difference in additional cp.

Second, raised the cp cap in smaller increments rather than all out 3600cp. Like making the new cap 1200 up from 810. Then at a later patch, 1800. Up from 1200. Something like that.

I think these wold have at least reduced the anger and frustration players are feeling.

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe · April 2021

Agreed. It honestly feels like it's a deliberate poke in the eye... there's no way anyone could have looked at that feedback and thought, oh, people aren't happy about being weaker than they were before and having to grind cp? That must translate to they want more nerfs! Any player base request = nerf I suppose!

oregonrob · April 2021

How about at least going a year with the new CP system before nerfing it? I am almost at 1100 now and am dying to bosses that I easily handled at 810. To cut offensive and defensive stars by up to 35% means that I will be functioning below 500 under CP 1.0. I have been playing the game for 4 years and have thousands of hours invested in it. It was bad enough to regrind, but to regrind for less? That is not smart marketing.

Yellow_Monolith · April 2021

They need to make the craft cp more into passives and don't cut their power in half.

trackdemon5512 · April 2021

I read the forums for weeks during the testing for CP and after. It was filled with people griping non-stop that the CP grind was too much and the combat potential differential between low and high was too great. Multiple forum posts about this topic and how in perfect fights the little differences in CP always mattered and as such no matter the skill of the player the high CP would always come out on top.

I constantly argued that your skills, gear sets, playing ability, etc were always more important but was constantly shot down by the pure stat analytics who wanted to further crunch CP power, get rewarded with CP for past experience grinding (that’s not how the system calculated CP btw, X amt of XP = Y amt of CP).

And now we get a combat performance CP max dropped to around the 1600s from the 2000s and blue/red CP stat bonuses cut.

It’s not wrong to say the forums asked for this and they’re getting exactly what they wanted.

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

It’s not wrong to say the forums asked for this and they’re getting exactly what they wanted.

It is if you aren't injecting a whole lot of intellectual dishonesty into your interpretation of the spirit of the complaints.

The people complaining clearly wanted to reach the maximum potential of the new system faster. Not have the maximum potential slashed.

redspecter23 · April 2021

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

I read the forums for weeks during the testing for CP and after. It was filled with people griping non-stop that the CP grind was too much and the combat potential differential between low and high was too great. Multiple forum posts about this topic and how in perfect fights the little differences in CP always mattered and as such no matter the skill of the player the high CP would always come out on top.

I constantly argued that your skills, gear sets, playing ability, etc were always more important but was constantly shot down by the pure stat analytics who wanted to further crunch CP power, get rewarded with CP for past experience grinding (that’s not how the system calculated CP btw, X amt of XP = Y amt of CP).

And now we get a combat performance CP max dropped to around the 1600s from the 2000s and blue/red CP stat bonuses cut.

It’s not wrong to say the forums asked for this and they’re getting exactly what they wanted.

I don't think too many people wanted to grind more cp than they currently had in order to be weaker than they were before the new system was introduced.

People did say that the grind was too intense. That much is for sure, but I don't believe too many people were asking for a reduction in grind to also include a reduction in power at the same time.

Players just wanted to go into the new system with a similar vertical power level to what they already had at 810cp with the opportunity to gain more cp to allow for the promised horizontal progression options.

trackdemon5512 · April 2021

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

It’s not wrong to say the forums asked for this and they’re getting exactly what they wanted.

It is if you aren't injecting a whole lot of intellectual dishonesty into your interpretation of the spirit of the complaints.

The people complaining clearly wanted to reach the maximum potential of the new system faster. Not have the maximum potential slashed.

Either you accelerate people to grind/play more to get to that maximum CP (which wasn’t going to happen as you still need to get players to invest a certain amount before they get appropriate rewards) or you nerf the combat potential down significantly and adjust the max potential gap between players. Looks like ZOS went with the latter.

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

Or you just reduce the number of cp required per passive while keeping the power the same. Which is what nearly every person who has commented in a thread on this topic agrees would have been in line with player desires.

And this is coming from someone who went into CP 2.0 already with enough CP to grab everything they cared about getting and never cared about further grinding.

Zenzuki · April 2021

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

Or you just reduce the number of cp required per passive while keeping the power the same. Which is what nearly every person who has commented in a thread on this topic agrees would have been in line with player desires.

And this is coming from someone who went into CP 2.0 already with enough CP to grab everything they cared about getting and never cared about further grinding.

While also completely ignoring the green tree issues which was what they majority of complaints with 2.0 were about.

trackdemon5512 · April 2021

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

Or you just reduce the number of cp required per passive while keeping the power the same. Which is what nearly every person who has commented in a thread on this topic agrees would have been in line with player desires.

And this is coming from someone who went into CP 2.0 already with enough CP to grab everything they cared about getting and never cared about further grinding.

I came into CP2.0 like you with more than enough CP to get whatever I wanted. I could clearly see stats were crazy high. 24k base health on DPS allowing for green foods to be used in combat. Amazing sustain from CP skills that constantly gave resources back. Besides the DPS nerf that happened last patch the increase to survival stats made the damage nerf moot basically.

VaranisArano · April 2021

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

Or you just reduce the number of cp required per passive while keeping the power the same. Which is what nearly every person who has commented in a thread on this topic agrees would have been in line with player desires.

And this is coming from someone who went into CP 2.0 already with enough CP to grab everything they cared about getting and never cared about further grinding.

I came into CP2.0 like you with more than enough CP to get whatever I wanted. I could clearly see stats were crazy high. 24k base health on DPS allowing for green foods to be used in combat. Amazing sustain from CP skills that constantly gave resources back. Besides the DPS nerf that happened last patch the increase to survival stats made the damage nerf moot basically.

This argues in line with ZOS' stated intent from the CP 2.0 FAQ that this was done to reduce player power...not that the forum complaints were asking to have their power nerfed. Most of the ones I saw weren't asking for their future CP to be reduced - after all, eventually, most of us would hit the point where we'd be benefitting too. The question was how long would it take us to get there.

Most of the player complaints I saw wanted less grind, because the grind is really what makes the disparity between players - between new and experienced, between players with lots of free time and those with little.

nwilliams2107b16_ESO · April 2021

Just change it back please, that is all.

blkjag · April 2021

It would be nice if they just focused on fixing bugs and performance vs nerf after nerf every patch. Can’t access my craft bag that I pay for with out issues, but the good news is the crown store works just fine.

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

I came into CP2.0 like you with more than enough CP to get whatever I wanted. I could clearly see stats were crazy high. 24k base health on DPS allowing for green foods to be used in combat. Amazing sustain from CP skills that constantly gave resources back. Besides the DPS nerf that happened last patch the increase to survival stats made the damage nerf moot basically.

I'm of the (unpopular) opinion that CP 2.0 is an improvement over CP 1.0. And like I said, if ZOS wanted to reduce player player power further and were upfront about it I could be more understanding. It was always a foregone conclusion that further balancing changes would be coming down the line. But don't use this half contemptuous half obfuscatory language implying people wanted these specific changes to the system. It is corporate speak that reeks of smarm and disingenuousness.

[snip] They supposedly worked on CP 2.0 for two years before it going live, but a month after release they realize all combat related passives were twice as strong as they should have been?

[edited to remove bashing]

SilverBride · April 2021

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

To cut the majority of CP passives in half, and claim that they are "listening to feedback".

The audacity. The absurdity.

The power loss is negligible, it is the claim that they are giving players what they want that is infuriating.

Maybe they were listening to feedback... from the multiple threads all complaining that the game is too easy.

YandereGirlfriend · April 2021

The classic Monkey's Paw play by ZOS.

It's the same sort of change as when the players were saying: "Please reign in specific sets in PvP" and then ZOS went ahead and deleted all but 19 sets from Cyrodiil for 4 months.

Faded · April 2021

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

I'm of the (unpopular) opinion that CP 2.0 is an improvement over CP 1.0. And like I said, if ZOS wanted to reduce player player power further and were upfront about it I could be more understanding. It was always a foregone conclusion that further balancing changes would be coming down the line. But don't use this half contemptuous half obfuscatory language implying people wanted these specific changes to the system. It is corporate speak that reeks of smarm and disingenuousness.

I agree. It's a move they've been using for a while that keeps player outrage about unpopular changes mostly focused on other players rather than the people who decide on and make the changes... and the gear, and every facet of the combat system, and the content, etc. I'm not sure if that's the point or it's just a reflex to deflect responsibility.

BejaProphet · April 2021

Obviously this is my opinion but...

There is no mystery. Their goal was to lower power, and secondary was their choice to do it in a way that also lowered the cp we need.

Also, the actual nerf was minimal. At this point the real risk is not the power loss, but the danger of trivializing the whole system. We don’t want CP to become irrelevant.

However, by leaving the slottable nodes alone they avoiding trivializing the whole system. There yet remains meaningful buffs, and horizontal progression remains in our swapping them around.

So I can live with what they did even though I wish they hadn’t done it.

YandereGirlfriend · April 2021

BejaProphet wrote: »

Obviously this is my opinion but...

There is no mystery. Their goal was to lower power, and secondary was their choice to do it in a way that also lowered the cp we need.

Also, the actual nerf was minimal. At this point the real risk is not the power loss, but the danger of trivializing the whole system. We don’t want CP to become irrelevant.

However, by leaving the slottable nodes alone they avoiding trivializing the whole system. There yet remains meaningful buffs, and horizontal progression remains in our swapping them around.

So I can live with what they did even though I wish they hadn’t done it.

It's still a pretty dismal failure if they were actually intending to present players with horizontal progression from the slottable stars.

Why would anyone ever take the pitiful +150 Weapon/Spell Damage or +1300 Magicka stars when they could instead pick +10% single-target damage or a cumulative +35% to Critical Damage (which is still reigning as the meta for PvE).

Those values need to be increased by several factors of themselves if they ever want to present alternative choices to simply stacking Critical Chance and Damage. Ballparking the values, but the aforementioned stars would likely need to be something like +550 Weapon/Spell Damage and +6000 Magicka in order to realistically compete for a spot on someone's bar.

Iccotak · April 2021

SilverBride wrote: »

ThoughtRaven wrote: »

To cut the majority of CP passives in half, and claim that they are "listening to feedback".

The audacity. The absurdity.

The power loss is negligible, it is the claim that they are giving players what they want that is infuriating.

Maybe they were listening to feedback... from the multiple threads all complaining that the game is too easy.

then they weren't reading because no one pointed at CP as the problem.

In fact it was repeatedly stated that CP was irrelevant to Overland content, because you could have Zero CP assigned and it would still be unengaging.

because the problem was incapable enemies, with very little skills - who would sit still from 3-5s doing nothing before taking a swing at you, while also doing negligible damage.

Shantu · April 2021

Here's a news flash: PLAYERS LIKE VERTICAL PROGRESSION!! They just don't like investing a few years of their life to get there. And the idea of horizontal progression is meaningless if there is nothing of comparable value to progress to. Having no other option than to invest points into things that have no interest to you is progressing nowhere.

There seems to be this fallacy that if you let people reach their maximum power too soon, they'll have no reason to keep playing. "Getting there" is not the goal. It's the sense of empowerment and fun you can have once your there that's the broader appeal.

I've been watching this heavy-handed, nerf-happy "balancing" act for over 2 or 3 years now. The end is still nowhere in sight. It might be a sign that it's not working.

ThoughtRaven · April 2021

Shantu wrote: »

Here's a news flash: PLAYERS LIKE VERTICAL PROGRESSION!! They just don't like investing a few years of their life to get there.

qft

BejaProphet · April 2021

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

BejaProphet wrote: »

Obviously this is my opinion but...

There is no mystery. Their goal was to lower power, and secondary was their choice to do it in a way that also lowered the cp we need.

Also, the actual nerf was minimal. At this point the real risk is not the power loss, but the danger of trivializing the whole system. We don’t want CP to become irrelevant.

However, by leaving the slottable nodes alone they avoiding trivializing the whole system. There yet remains meaningful buffs, and horizontal progression remains in our swapping them around.

So I can live with what they did even though I wish they hadn’t done it.

It's still a pretty dismal failure if they were actually intending to present players with horizontal progression from the slottable stars.

Why would anyone ever take the pitiful +150 Weapon/Spell Damage or +1300 Magicka stars when they could instead pick +10% single-target damage or a cumulative +35% to Critical Damage (which is still reigning as the meta for PvE).

Those values need to be increased by several factors of themselves if they ever want to present alternative choices to simply stacking Critical Chance and Damage. Ballparking the values, but the aforementioned stars would likely need to be something like +550 Weapon/Spell Damage and +6000 Magicka in order to realistically compete for a spot on someone's bar.

I think you are missing what they envision for the horizontal progression. They aren’t thinking about swapping around the various DPS nodes.

It would be things like...

Oh, this boss has a nasty aoe. Let me remove a damage node for the 10% aoe resistance node.

Oh, you guys are full on DDs? Let me swap off my damage nodes and into my healer nodes and equip a restro staff.

This fight drains resources hard? Let place the regen node.

It’s about that kind of character flexibility. They aren’t trying to get you to swap the damage nodes around with each other while always being 100% damage spec’d.