I returned to ESO a week ago. Here's my story.

Alucardo

For those who don't like reading, here's a short summary right off the bat.

PvP - Broken / Somehow performance is worse
PvE - Broken
Balance - Broken
Antiquities - Surprisingly enjoyable. Good job.

Purchasing
Well, for starters, I knew I wanted access to the antiquity system. I tried it out on Greymoor PTS and it was actually pretty cool, and obviously the mythics are incredibly powerful. I noticed on the ESO website that Greymoor, while listed as a DLC, did not come with ESO+. Big red flag in my honest opinion, but at least you were open about it. So I bought Blackwood for £50 because I'm pretty far behind on chapters. It wasn't until after I bought it I randomly stumbled upon a comment saying that antiquities are now available to ESO+ subscribers. I still don't know if that's true, or if it's clearly listed somewhere, but I only noticed on some reddit page.. maybe make it more clear???

Champion system overhaul
I realise it received a lot of complaints because people lost power, but I don't actually hate it. While it was confusing at first, I soon come to appreciate it. I normally play on no CP pvp campaigns, so it didn't affect me much at all anyway. Overall though, I really like the direction you took it.

Gearing up
Obviously returning after a long hiatus I was really far behind with all the new sets that have since come out. Obtaining gear hasn't changed much at all, so that's good. I managed to get my first mythic from the antiquity system within 2 days (including levelling scrying/excavation to 7). Not going to lie, but it was a fun experience. It's not just a turn-your-brain-off set of puzzles. If you don't pay attention, there's a good chance you're not going to get what you want, especially at the higher levels, and uncovering bonuses felt really rewarding even though they were generally useless stuff.
I noticed for the last piece of Malacath's Band I needed to venture into IC and kill the upper city bosses. This was pretty cool, and I got quite lucky. When I arrived in IC, DC had already captured every zone and a small group were killing bosses so I just joined in. Managed to drop the lead on my second kill. When I finally got the band I felt satisfied and enjoyed the ride.
Kudos on the antiquity system. Gets a big thumbs up from me, which is not something I was expecting.

PvP
The main reason for my last break was due to the overall performance of Cyrodiil. Balance wasn't great, but it was bearable at least. But the performance made playing during prime time, well, infuriating.
I was gone for maybe a year, and it's actually worse, even after I heard about all the tests and whatnot you've been carrying out. I'd like to list a few problems I ran into during ONE SESSION of PvP. This happened on no cp and Gray Host (problems were more prevalent on GH).

• Heavy attacks get stuck. Only able to light attack
• Excessive lag making the game completely unresponsive
• Skills not going off (It took 8 key presses to get merciless resolve to react)
• Weapon swapping not functioning at times
• Entire ability bar greyed out so no skills were able to be used
• Random dismounting
• Stuck in combat, making you have to run on foot for several minutes even when there's nothing attacking you

I'm sorry, but this is just not acceptable. I understand PvP isn't your major revenue stream, but if it's part of the game, it still deserves the care and attention you give everything else. You've no doubt heard this before, but the PvP in ESO is probably the best you're going to find in an MMO, but only when it works.. which is usually around 5-10am in the morning.
Please do something about it, even if it means breaking Cyrodiil up into instances somehow. ie: when you go through a mile gate you load into a new instance, meaning everything happening on the other side of the wall won't affect your performance at all.
PvPers are paying customers too. We deserve an enjoyable experience just like everyone else.

Balance
I was hit with a 10k surprise attack and 20k whirling blades. Make of that what you will. Never have I seen these numbers before. Now I know what overland mobs feel like.

PvE
I don't do a lot of this, so I can't comment too much. Though when I was frustrated with Cyrodiil I decided to farm a dungeon for some gear (Tempest in Malabal Tor). A mob had somehow got itself stuck on the top of a wall and was not able to be targeted. It kept me in combat so I couldn't proceed through the next door. When you're over half way through a run this is rather frustrating. Fortunately this is not a common occurrence, but being stuck in combat is.
If it helps at all, the stuck in combat bug (which happens in Cyro too) happens more often when I play Magblade and Stamplar, especially Stamplar.

Conclusion
Elder Scrolls Online is not worthy of a AAA title. It's a broken mess, and has been for many years. Older bugs that were fixed are reappearing somehow, and PvP is in a laughable state. Personally, I'd be ashamed. Your only saving grace is you don't technically need to pay a monthly subscription, though if you don't you're really hindering yourself.
I'm not happy to say this, of course. I love the game, and it's the one MMO I always find myself returning to, only to be disappointed by its lack of progress. By progress I don't mean CP overhauls or new mini games - no - I mean the game working as intended with limited game breaking glitches. It makes me sad, truly.
It's been in this state for so long now I have lost faith it will ever be repaired, so my will to return is at an all time low. But hey, great work on the antiquity system, I guess.

I hope this feedback was useful in some way.

Peace.

iksde

for sure if not TES title in it this game wouldnt pass furher after beta or just after few months of release at best
title is literally all of this game what is keeping it alive, take away it and in just moment this game will die as less casuall we be looking at it and more poeople will be quetting seeing how bad this game is outside casual questing

Grandchamp1989

lolol that small summery at the beginning. I don't mind long posts, but it sure i is appreciated if they also add a short summery XD Gave you a like for that.

Alucardo

iksde wrote: »

for sure if not TES title in it this game wouldnt pass furher after beta or just after few months of release at best
title is literally all of this game what is keeping it alive, take away it and in just moment this game will die as less casuall we be looking at it and more poeople will be quetting seeing how bad this game is outside casual questing

Absolutely. I have no doubt it's The Elder Scrolls name that has carried it this far. I really hope they can become worthy of the title, though. There's actually so much potential there, and it saddens me to see it not live up to it.

Alucardo

Grandchamp1989 wrote: »

lolol that small summery at the beginning. I don't mind long posts, but it sure i is appreciated if they also add a short summery XD Gave you a like for that.

Haha yeah, I realise not everybody likes long posts, and the long text was more feedback for the developers of the game. Glad you liked it

iksde

Alucardo wrote: »

iksde wrote: »

for sure if not TES title in it this game wouldnt pass furher after beta or just after few months of release at best
title is literally all of this game what is keeping it alive, take away it and in just moment this game will die as less casuall we be looking at it and more poeople will be quetting seeing how bad this game is outside casual questing

Absolutely. I have no doubt it's The Elder Scrolls name that has carried it this far. I really hope they can become worthy of the title, though. There's actually so much potential there, and it saddens me to see it not live up to it.

yep there is so much potential in this game, game itself is great but how it is managed it is horrible and sad how it is even possible to "milk" this so "effective"

DonHardstyle

I love the piece you wrote ! Its so true tho !

The game indeed isnt realy performing well. And it acutaly never had. When i still played on Xbox, it was in an bad condition and it still is. I remember how they tried to solve the "this is an un usual long loading screen" thing by removing that line of text from the loading screen, it was funny:p

Since i play on pc now it has it ups and downs. I started on the laptop, and crashed alot, but since i play on an proper gaming desktop, for me it works well.

I stopped playing pvp, cous of the reasons you also mention. Especialy when they started limiting sets, i only pvp with events now.

For the Cp thing, yeah that was an bummer. I was sad, Went from 96k Dps, to about 88-89K dps. But i did like it that when i gained an new cp lvl i acualy had an use for it, it does feel more rewarding for me, About 200cp later, i do 95k again, and 100k on my stamsorc. It took an while to get used to, but i cant complain no more.

The thing that stings me the most about this game is the number of bugs, There are sooo many. Some are not adresses for an huge amount of time ( Horn achievement on HRC for example ) Stuck in combat bug, is an very anoying one and is also there for an while. I do like the new DLC's and other additions made to the game, But i rather see them fix the huge list of bugs first. And test there stuff an bit better before they launch it.

I dont know if the only reason this game is alive is becous its an TES game like @iksde says. Maybe it helps, But beside it being an TES, its still an good game. ( if you are able to look past the bugs, slip ups, Downtimes, and other bad stuff)

Joy_Division

ZOS doesn;t even have a full time PvP dev and hasn;t had one for over two years now. PvP players maybe paying customers, but all of their dollars goes to funding other aspects of the game.

Wolf_Eye

Alucardo wrote: »

Purchasing
Well, for starters, I knew I wanted access to the antiquity system. I tried it out on Greymoor PTS and it was actually pretty cool, and obviously the mythics are incredibly powerful. I noticed on the ESO website that Greymoor, while listed as a DLC, did not come with ESO+. Big red flag in my honest opinion, but at least you were open about it. So I bought Blackwood for £50 because I'm pretty far behind on chapters. It wasn't until after I bought it I randomly stumbled upon a comment saying that antiquities are now available to ESO+ subscribers. I still don't know if that's true, or if it's clearly listed somewhere, but I only noticed on some reddit page.. maybe make it more clear???

Just in case this was a question for us to answer: Antiquities comes with the Greymoor chapter. Every year, you have to pay extra for the newest and latest chapter because it does not come with ESO+. But once the next year rolls around, the chapter from the previous year gets added to ESO+. Since Greymoor is no longer the newest chapter this year (that honor goes to Blackwood), it is now part of ESO+ and you can access it just by having an ESO+ subscription.

Once next year rolls around, Blackwood will be added to ESO+ and whatever next year's chapter will become something you have to pay extra for.

Since Greymoor came with the antiquities system, this now means that everyone with an ESO+ sub has access to the Antiquities line.

Celephantsylvius_Bornasfinmo

There are great aspects to ESO and I'll be the first person to recognise it, otherwise I wouldn't still be here!

But I do agree with OP -> Current state of the game in +12 player situations are not acceptable, be it PvE or PvP...both aren't up to par, but of course PvP is far worse and I can confirm all the bugs and frustrations you have listed as do all my guild members. We truly are a nice community I think to still accept it without proper or well timed implications from our producer.

paulychan

I came back to no proc bombing. I dug the antiquity thingy. it filled the time. now I'm a SD stacked bomber and life is so rad. I mean, bombs are hard to pop.Now, they really proc Bahamas. when is mayhem?