Overland Content is so Easy I lose interest

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

I've been around off and on since launch, though I routinely take long breaks for years at a time. And the main culprit is always that the overland story content is too easy.

I haven't played the game since the start of Morrowind, and when I installed a few days ago my characters at 300cp (ish) could still just yolo through everything even without looking at builds or putting any thought into the character besides picking class skills I liked.

To be clear, I understand that Overland content can't truly be *difficult*, and that's fine. But I can literally put up a few dots and just watch pack after pack of mobs melt with no thought whatsoever.

To some extent, all MMOs suffer from this problem (swtor, gw2, wow) but boy, it feels even worse here. In WoW, i don't care about the story so I just want to mulch through obnoxious world content as quickly as possible, but in ESO the game IS the story....and I can't get invested because it is so trivial.

SWTOR suffers the same problem where the bosses in your class story can be effortlessly soloed by your companion.

Khenarthi

Sounds like a personal problem.

Overland difficulty is fine

Cirantille

I actually enjoy how relaxed questing environment is so I can go around read stuff, learn about lore and chill

I'd do some vet stuff or pvp if I am looking for more challenge

zvavi

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

I can't get invested because it is so trivial.

This

Elsonso

I don't do overland content for the challenge. If I want a challenge, I go solo some 4 player dungeon, do VMA, or something like that. I do overland content to revisit the stories.

Castagere

Overland is fine the way it is.

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

Khenarthi wrote: »

Sounds like a personal problem.

Overland difficulty is fine

I mean yeah, that's the point of the post! It is boring so I always end up quitting pretty fast.

I'm probably not alone! But maybe

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

Elsonso wrote: »

I don't do overland content for the challenge. If I want a challenge, I go solo some 4 player dungeon, do VMA, or something like that. I do overland content to revisit the stories.

Challenge may be the wrong way to look at it. I just want to need to pay attention. When nothing in the game feels remotely threatening, I can't even buy into the stories. Also any choices I've made on my character made 0 difference.

Elsonso

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

Khenarthi wrote: »

Sounds like a personal problem.

Overland difficulty is fine

I mean yeah, that's the point of the post! It is boring so I always end up quitting pretty fast.

I'm probably not alone! But maybe

You are not alone. There have been threads talking about "face-roll" overland, and even some talking about "veteran" overland.

Tandor

There are games where the challenge is more important than the story, and there are games where the story is more important than the challenge. You seem to want both to be equally important, and I for one haven't yet found the game where that is the case. Then again, I'm not really looking for such a game as to me it would seem to be full of contradiction.

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

I played original Vet and thought it was mostly fine. The problem was that the world wasn't scaled properly so you had to be super linear (veyr boring to replay), and a lot of the skill design was worse than now so stuff was super awkward.

We have had vast power increases since then. And if you fixed the other issues, having optional more challenging content seems like it would have worked out well.

Dream96

Same problem here, I have stopped doing overland content because is too easy and the immersion is destroyed. I mean I cant do a quest where I have to kill a very strong mage in that very dangerous dungeon and then you insta kill him in 3 seconds... The problem is that I love the lore, but the immersion in more important for me. So after a bit I get very bored because I fell like half of the content in every update is not playable for me.

Kiralyn2000

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

I don't do overland content for the challenge. If I want a challenge, I go solo some 4 player dungeon, do VMA, or something like that. I do overland content to revisit the stories.

Challenge may be the wrong way to look at it. I just want to need to pay attention.

It's always a big pain when story stuff is interrupted by Hard Content. Because I have to pay attention to the fights/etc, meaning I can't pay attention to the story.

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

Kiralyn2000 wrote: »

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

Elsonso wrote: »

I don't do overland content for the challenge. If I want a challenge, I go solo some 4 player dungeon, do VMA, or something like that. I do overland content to revisit the stories.

Challenge may be the wrong way to look at it. I just want to need to pay attention.

It's always a big pain when story stuff is interrupted by Hard Content. Because I have to pay attention to the fights/etc, meaning I can't pay attention to the story.

Would having an end boss fight for a quest chain that lived more than 5 seconds really make it impossible to pay attention to the story?

Anonx31st

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

I am in the same boat. Been playing since beta, my longest break was probably 7-9 months, and to be candid, I am barely playing currently. I havent played any new quest content since Clockwork City unless there is something specifically that I need and its gated behind a quest. PVP is great when it works, ZOS can certainly design engaging 4 man dungeons, arenas, and trials, but the overland quests might as well just be an audiobook.

There was a chapter story boss I believe in Morrowind that caused some rage threads due to its difficulty. I think I killed it in 3-5 global cooldowns? I certainly dont want stories to be on par with Veteran HM difficulty, but there is zero challenge to any overland quest in this game. Some of the quest bosses at least should require an ounce of thought to kill, but NONE of them do.

I am also convinced that this is one of the biggest factors behind the skill gap they keep trying to shrink. You can quest all the way through Cadwells gold with one skill and have literally no idea how to play this game from a combat standpoint at the end of the process.

Agenericname

Anonx31st wrote: »

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

People get mad when you tell them what to wear in trials or how much DPS you want them to do.

Anonx31st

Set a challenge for yourself to do all the overland content naked and with no attribution points spent. I bet it will be difficult then.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Anonx31st wrote: »

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

I am sorry, but that is the worst solution imaginable. It's on par with, dont slot CP. Why would anyone play an RPG designed around character building and then just completely neglect that aspect of the game? Should we also not slot skills, perhaps tie one hand behind our backs?

And here is the kicker, it still wouldn't matter. Overland content is that easy.

Sorbin

I've said it before, but literally all of my IRL friends that have played this game largely gave up because overland got faceroll easy long, long before it was time for them to start vet content. Apparently overland is balanced for people who have had a lobotomy at some point in their lives.

wazbaumukerb14_ESO

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Anonx31st wrote: »

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

I am sorry, but that is the worst solution imaginable. It's on par with, dont slot CP. Why would anyone play an RPG designed around character building and then just completely neglect that aspect of the game? Should we also not slot skills, perhaps tie one hand behind our backs?

And here is the kicker, it still wouldn't matter. Overland content is that easy.

Agreed 100%. You are asking for core character progression in an RPG to be completely meaningless. It's actually kind of incredible.

I think people sometimes mistake this criticism for some crazy elitism where the person is asking for content that only 1% of players could defeat, which is not the case at all. I'm asking for something that actually makes it feel like my character growth and decisions have some impact.

Literally even just giving overland quest mobs like twice the health and 10% more damage would be something. They literally melt from two spells. You can't even do one set of a rotation on anything.

Raegwyr

Anonx31st wrote: »

Set a challenge for yourself to do all the overland content naked and with no attribution points spent. I bet it will be difficult then.

I just did that, overland morrowind main quests + side ones with only purple weapon, no armor and two abilities (no cp spend). It was as easy and boring as before. This advice is bad and wont help with a fact that overland is trivial and insult intelligence.

Elsonso

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Anonx31st wrote: »

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

I am sorry, but that is the worst solution imaginable. It's on par with, dont slot CP. Why would anyone play an RPG designed around character building and then just completely neglect that aspect of the game? Should we also not slot skills, perhaps tie one hand behind our backs?

I suppose that depends on the character that you are playing. Are they the type that feels confident in their ability to run off and do a naked run, just to do a naked run?

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

Agreed 100%. You are asking for core character progression in an RPG to be completely meaningless. It's actually kind of incredible.

I think people sometimes mistake this criticism for some crazy elitism where the person is asking for content that only 1% of players could defeat, which is not the case at all. I'm asking for something that actually makes it feel like my character growth and decisions have some impact.

Literally even just giving overland quest mobs like twice the health and 10% more damage would be something. They literally melt from two spells. You can't even do one set of a rotation on anything.

That is actually one of the problems with this game. It really isn't about the character progression, like it should be. One Tamriel sort of threw that out the window. Player skill and knowledge makes up the majority of what the character can do. This makes it very difficult for an experienced player to fail at a large portion of the PVE content. If the player can keep the character alive, there is a whole lot of content that they can finish.

jaws343

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Anonx31st wrote: »

Someone posted a great solution to your problem in another one of these threads from a few days ago. Just do overland content without any armor. Problem solved.

I am sorry, but that is the worst solution imaginable. It's on par with, dont slot CP. Why would anyone play an RPG designed around character building and then just completely neglect that aspect of the game? Should we also not slot skills, perhaps tie one hand behind our backs?

And here is the kicker, it still wouldn't matter. Overland content is that easy.

Agreed 100%. You are asking for core character progression in an RPG to be completely meaningless. It's actually kind of incredible.

I think people sometimes mistake this criticism for some crazy elitism where the person is asking for content that only 1% of players could defeat, which is not the case at all. I'm asking for something that actually makes it feel like my character growth and decisions have some impact.

Literally even just giving overland quest mobs like twice the health and 10% more damage would be something. They literally melt from two spells. You can't even do one set of a rotation on anything.

I think people just need to accept the fact the overland content isn't meant for dps progression. It's meant for story play and new players.

MrDenimChicken

Yeah seems like overland content is designed for very nooby people who are playing on levels 1-14's (before they can weapon swap) and those players don't have a heal on their bar.

I think overland content difficulty is properly tuned for that situation. But once a player learns the game and has a heal on their bar, it becomes laughably easy. It would be nice if zones had more variable difficulty monsters. Like you have your pawns that are super easy, than you have more mini bosses that are actually difficult for one person, and then you have those big zone bosses that can't be solo'd.

Jeremy

wazbaumukerb14_ESO wrote: »

I've been around off and on since launch, though I routinely take long breaks for years at a time. And the main culprit is always that the overland story content is too easy.

I haven't played the game since the start of Morrowind, and when I installed a few days ago my characters at 300cp (ish) could still just yolo through everything even without looking at builds or putting any thought into the character besides picking class skills I liked.

To be clear, I understand that Overland content can't truly be *difficult*, and that's fine. But I can literally put up a few dots and just watch pack after pack of mobs melt with no thought whatsoever.

To some extent, all MMOs suffer from this problem (swtor, gw2, wow) but boy, it feels even worse here. In WoW, i don't care about the story so I just want to mulch through obnoxious world content as quickly as possible, but in ESO the game IS the story....and I can't get invested because it is so trivial.

SWTOR suffers the same problem where the bosses in your class story can be effortlessly soloed by your companion.

I agree with you, and so do many others. This is something that comes up frequently on here. Hopefully the developers will listen to us one day and implement an optional veteran version for landscape content so experienced players can have fun while questing too. Because you're right, it's way too easy right now to the point that it teeters on becoming tedious.

jaws343

MrDenimChicken wrote: »

Yeah seems like overland content is designed for very nooby people who are playing on levels 1-14's (before they can weapon swap) and those players don't have a heal on their bar.

I think overland content difficulty is properly tuned for that situation. But once a player learns the game and has a heal on their bar, it becomes laughably easy. It would be nice if zones had more variable difficulty monsters. Like you have your peons that are super easy, than you have more mini bosses that are actually difficult for one person, and then you have those big zone bosses that can't be solo'd.

it's also tuned for new players running with found, mismatched gear. People running through overland wearing trial dps or even solo dps sets are obviously going to smash the content. But a new player, or even a new alt, using no CP and incomplete, underleveled sets (a normal occurrence for normal overland play from a new player) already struggle in areas of overland questing.

ArchMikem

Elsonso wrote: »

I don't do overland content for the challenge. If I want a challenge, I go solo some 4 player dungeon, do VMA, or something like that. I do overland content to revisit the stories.

Soloing the new group dungeons on Normal is plenty of challenge for me as well, though I will agree the overland difficult is, lacking, to be enjoyable. I don't mind the common mobs being easy, my problem is with the Quest Bosses. They usually only have 100k or so health and I can get that down in seconds. I'm constantly defeating villains mid monologue, and if they have health percentage triggered mechanics I blow right past them.

All ZOS would need to do is bump the health pools of Quest Bosses, other named enemies up higher, to make the fights last longer.

BlueRaven

We just had a poll about this.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/567984/its-time-to-make-this-game-more-challenging/p1

66% feel overland is fine the way it is.

Grandchamp1989

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am in the same boat. Been playing since beta, my longest break was probably 7-9 months, and to be candid, I am barely playing currently. I havent played any new quest content since Clockwork City unless there is something specifically that I need and its gated behind a quest. PVP is great when it works, ZOS can certainly design engaging 4 man dungeons, arenas, and trials, but the overland quests might as well just be an audiobook.

There was a chapter story boss I believe in Morrowind that caused some rage threads due to its difficulty. I think I killed it in 3-5 global cooldowns? I certainly dont want stories to be on par with Veteran HM difficulty, but there is zero challenge to any overland quest in this game. Some of the quest bosses at least should require an ounce of thought to kill, but NONE of them do.

I am also convinced that this is one of the biggest factors behind the skill gap they keep trying to shrink. You can quest all the way through Cadwells gold with one skill and have literally no idea how to play this game from a combat standpoint at the end of the process.

I agree with this.

You can quest 500+ hours and never learn a thing about the combat system short of a right click.
They're never going to "lower the ceiling while raising the floor" before they either gut their current combat system or teach players how to play their game. 3 patches of sledgehammers nerfs doesn't seem to have done the trick, so the core problem seem to be painfully obvious. Either get rid of weaving or teach "the floor".

Raegwyr

BlueRaven wrote: »

We just had a poll about this.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/567984/its-time-to-make-this-game-more-challenging/p1

66% feel overland is fine the way it is.

You just linked an example of really biased poll when you can even find ppl voting that content is fine only to write that they would like harder overland but dont want to vote in biased poll lol.
Do you even read the comments there?