Overland Content Feedback Thread

Sylvermynx

Well, we don't know what might happen, do we? None of the devs are addressing any of this. Who knows, once the re-architecture is done, they may be able to do wonderful things.

LashanW

spartaxoxo wrote: »

So they gave us a ton of power and very few opportunities to use it. That's a game design issue not a player taste issue.

This right here. Most casual players here don't realize just how high player power has gotten atm.

It's insane how much self healing is available right now for a solo player WHILE you are dealing damage. They are not even active heals. Jabs, nightblade spammables, Crit surge, Ring of the Pale order and Reaving Blows CP star, just naming a few. If you use brawler with a two handed weapon you are practically immortal during questing. If you have the vDSA 2h weapon and use brawler with it, well then. You are pretty much a god.

Damage output across the board is also getting higher and higher. But still most quest enemies have the same low health they had years ago.

Things are not that different when it comes old endgame content. Asylum Sanctorium trial for example (content released 5 years ago). Trifecta here requires hardmode completion without deaths in 15 minutes. And last week I completed the hardmode there in 5 minutes with my progression group.

But ZoS do keep the ever increasing player power in mind when releasing new endgame content. For example for the Godslayer achievement (trifecta for Sunspire trial which released 2 years after Asylum Sanctorium), you have to complete veteran sunspire hardmode without deaths in 30 minutes. This 30 minutes barrier is the hardest one to break. Even with current player power levels it's still very challenging to beat this timer.

So the endgame crowd keeps getting more and more powerful and the tiny amount of endgame content they get per year is properly adjusted to it. But new overland quest content does not seem to change at all when it comes to difficulty. Even optionally.

So when endgame players come back to overland for questing? We are met with 31k hp enemies most of the time. Our spammable's tooltip is almost 10k damage. Adds crits, enchantments and light attacks and ofcourse quest enemies don't last 2 seconds. Immersion is just gone. Just a visual novel at this point.

There's too much power and not enough places to use it. And it won't get any better after next update. Skill hybridization will increase player power even further.

LashanW

SilverBride wrote: »

A separate veteran overland would have to duplicate every overland achievement to reflect having completed them in veteran mode. In light of account wide achievements being implemented I very much doubt that this would happen.

Why? Is it impossible to create content without related achievements? I personally don't care one bit about achievements when I'm in overland. They are mostly just participation trophies anyway.

Arunei

To everyone wanting a Vet version of overland content...I think their explanation about why they're implementing AwA the way they are is going to kill any option of that. They're claiming they need to reduce data so they can add new content and so the game performs better (or at least, they CLAIM the game MIGHT run better). If they're reducing data by getting rid of most character-specific achievements, I genuinely cannot see them adding in huge amounts of data for Vet versions of each zone when most people would likely ignore them. And for the people who do want harder content, once they go through the Vet stuff enough and it no longer poses a challenge, will they want even harder stuff added that would take more data ESO apparently can't afford to spare and fewer people would bother with?

Unless they're going to add some sort of toggle or slider or something people can use to tailor their own experience, I'm not entirely sure we'll be seeing any increases in difficulty. And even with that, how would content be balanced if people with different difficulty settings are doing the same thing? How does the game make a boss both super hard for a person with max difficulty and also make it easier for someone with minimal difficulty if they're fighting it at the same time? The only way that would work is if the slider affected each player's stats, by raising or lowering them depending on your difficulty.

The reason we don't have this problem now with level 10 characters fighting bosses alongside seasoned vet players is because of battle scaling for characters under level 50. All the overland enemies are scaled to CP160 and so is every character until they hit level 50, so the game doesn't have to try and scale one enemy to several different players' levels. I don't think bosses are scaled to CP160, but they also don't scale in power depending on a player's level, it stays the same regardless of whether it's a fresh level 3 or someone with max CP.

With any optional way of increasing difficulty, it can realistically only affect each character rather than trying to affect the world, because the game literally cannot make the same boss both easier and harder for a group of people fighting it (or for any enemy really) with different difficulty settings. But that takes us back to the problem with adding that functionality to the game when they're apparently trying to save data for all-new content and systems. Honestly their explanation makes no sense because it implies that in order to continue releasing new things they'll have to axe old stuff, rather than just...adding to their database. I really don't know if they're going to want to add something like this if they're going to start getting super stingy with data.

Iselin

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

I'm 72 now and have been playing MMOs since Asheron's Call at the end of the 20th century Even then I was older than most of you today - in my late 40s when I started playing MMOs.

I was already mellowing then and have continued to do so. I was always a very competitive person and I craved difficulty in games back then as a measuring stick of my ability. I still do to some extent and solo content like Maelstrom feels good to complete. It's still an ego boost to complete difficult content but...

I play more just for casual enjoyment these days and I appreciate following good story lines in zones where difficulty is actually totally irrelevant to me. As a matter of fact, for me, higher difficulty in that content would probably get in the way of my enjoyment.

I like the fact that ESO offers a variety of content and a variety of difficulty and I like that it's "segregated" in the sense that you don't just run into high difficulty (or PvP) accidentally. I'm perfectly fine making the choice to ramp things up by playing against other humans or vet content and trials when I want to and it's totally my decision. That, IMO, is the inclusive MMO development formula that works best: different content with different difficulty when and if a player wants it.

You need to play games that don't offer that in order to appreciate the choices that ESO provides.

I spent a couple of months recently playing New World. Beautiful world, fantastic surround soundscape... but very limited in your ability to choose to play it different ways. Many people have left that game in droves for many reasons but for me it was that nagging feeling that I was being led in one direction and one direction only that soured me to the game pretty quickly.

TLDR: I have nothing to prove at my age with respect to my ability to handle tough content in games. Been there done that. I certainly don't need it in 99% of my ESO play time. I know there is some high end stuff to do when and if I feel like it and very easy stuff to enjoy too. It's probably the #1 reason I'm back here and not still doing ten 50 v. 50 wars per week in New World.

casparian

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content. The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

This isn't about having something to prove or being Mega Chad Gamers who want TES to be Dark Souls. It's about many of us simply finding the quest gameplay unimmersive and disconnected from the rest of the game's systems, which prevents us from enjoying the stellar quest [i[writing[/i].

spartaxoxo

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content.

They are talking about different content types, so their comment is accurate.

Overland is a single content type out of many. And all other forms of content provide a challenge.

Overland, Arenas, Dungeons, Trials, Battlegrounds, Cyrodiil, Dueling, and Sewers are the main content types. And they all have challenging content to be found. Overland's challenge currently comes from bosses primarily, though there's also a few world events as well that are meant to be challenging.

casparian

spartaxoxo wrote: »

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content.

They are talking about different content types, so their comment is accurate.

Overland is a single content type out of many. And all other forms of content provide a challenge.

Overland, Arenas, Dungeons, Trials, Battlegrounds, Cyrodiil, Dueling, and Sewers are the main content types. And they all have challenging content to be found. Overland's challenge currently comes from bosses primarily, though there's also a few world events as well that are meant to be challenging.

The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

spartaxoxo

casparian wrote: »

All we're asking for

I know what you're asking for and literally asked for the same thing.

But it's just a fact that the game developers previously made the decision to move the Overland difficulty into things like World Bosses, and that other challenging content does exist in this game.

Facts are facts whether they are inconvenient to our opinions or not, and we can acknowledge them and still hold our opinion.

I want story bosses to be harder and don't care that group bosses exists because those are disconnected from the story. But at the same time, I can acknowledge that it's an accurate statement that there is already a variety of content in this game that provides a challenge. I have already laid out why that content is inadequate in quantity in an earlier post. You should give it a read.

Iselin

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content. The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

This isn't about having something to prove or being Mega Chad Gamers who want TES to be Dark Souls. It's about many of us simply finding the quest gameplay unimmersive and disconnected from the rest of the game's systems, which prevents us from enjoying the stellar quest [i[writing[/i].

Most single player games have a variety of difficulty settings ranging from 3 or 4 all the way to 150 settings as is the case with Diablo 3. Those settings typically tune the amount of damage a mob does to you and how many HPs they have although some adjust other things like aiming stability and things like that.

ESO could implement something similar by doing it player side with a debuff toggle, maybe with different settings, you can turn on or off accomplishing the same thing. The problem would be grouping with players for overland content who have theirs set differently. That could be handled by making a requirement of groups to have the same setting (set by the group leader?)

Anyway, in case you don't know, low level players in ESO get 2 buffs, not one. I was on the PTS cycle just before the implementation of full level scaling and for the first couple of weeks that extra buff to the damage you do and damage mitigation was shown on the character sheet. This is in addition to level scaling that happens below CP160.That extra buff is only active from levels 1 - 33 and decrease by 3% per level. From level 34 until CP159 you just get the base level scaling buff.

I only mention that factoid to illustrate the possibility of having per character buffs/debuffs as if that wasn't already obvious from the CP system. The only thing missing is the ability to debuff yourself explicitly with toggles other than, obviously, choosing to not use any CP (or just a few) for your character as well as other solutions for controlling how buffed or not your character is. You could also, for example not use gold gear with the best traits.

But yeah I get it. Deliberately under gearing and debuffing yourself through CP adjustments would be a pain having to re-allocate your CP and change gear when you want to do a vet trial. It would be a way to make content more to your liking since the end result - more difficulty - is exactly the same whether you debuff yourself or the game buffs up the mobs, but a clunky and awkward way to do it.

I'd be all in favor of giving players an individual toggle, or better yet, a slider to adjust the content difficulty to their personal preference. That would work and should be relatively easy to implement since the tech for individualized buffs already exists in the game. Debuffs shouldn't be much of a problem.

No whining though when a level 25 next to you, who chooses not to debuff themselves, kills things faster than your debuffed CP 1500 character.

SilverBride

@ZOS_Kevin

In light of 94 pages of opinions and debates, and now the recent concern with data storage and performance, may we please receive an update on whether or not any of the requests and suggestions are possible?

Thank you.

Korteez

Of the suggestions that I've seen thus far, I'd like to offer my humble opinions.

Simply changing overland content will not likely happen as there are players that like it the way it is.

Vet overland and difficulty sliders would likely cause an overhaul of all overland content. That would be a huge task that I doubt devs would undertake; no matter how favorable it would be with players. I think they would look for alternative solutions.

Adding debuffs to the game for players is an appealing option. Whether in the form of gear or a consumable, it has the potential to solve player challenge issues. However, I personally do not like this option as the end result is it weakens your character. I think that we, as players, would prefer to see our characters being powerful. Plus I think would be annoyed seeing my dps drop to like 2-3K, even knowing full well that I did it intentionally.

So buffing content is likely to be too much work. Debuffing players is easier, but I believe it would lead to less satisfaction. What I think would be a doable option that doesn't involve changing a bunch of content would be an in-game toggle to what I will call a "nemesis". At random intervals after an overland creature is killed, a shadowy figure spawns to exact revenge. A little more work would allow for the respawning of creatures that have been killed, but a simple shadowy figure should suffice. As I am not a ZoS dev, I don't know if my assumption about the difficulty of my suggestion is on point. I just believe that adding something like this would be feasible and would add to a player's challenge if so desired.

Another option would be a new companion that players could acquire. This companion would occasionally go berserk after seeing you kill someone/thing and side with your foes. The companion would do damage to the player and possibly heal your enemies.

Arunei

Thinking about it, the only other thing I can think of beyond sliders or toggles that affect an individual's stats would be a new zone sort of like how Craglorn was originally, but without the need of an actual group to progress with the story (is that still part of Craglorn? I haven't come anywhere near finishing the zone story so I'm not sure if they removed the part where you needed other players to actually progress said story). Craglorn originally failed because it was TOO hard for most people, as well as the group aspect making it harder for solo players to finish the story.

The only problem with this is it would be an amplified version of an issue we have now, that being people getting locked out of a story. As it is now every year we get dungeons that expand on and add to the story of the Chapter, and people miss out on said stories because they have a hard time doing these dungeons, even in groups. Making an entire ZONE harder would just lock out a big part of ESO storytelling for the people who can't complete it.

At the end of the day I think people may have to accept that the overland and its stories are meant for everyone to enjoy, not just the people who are good at the game. The people who have a hard time due to age, physical/mental health, or things like lag and ping deserve to be able to actually play the game they paid for.

Someone mentioned that there aren't enough places to use your gear and skills when you get to a certain level, but look at what a lot of endgame sets are made for. A lot of BiS sets tend to be trial gear, which gives your group buffs against trial and dungeon bosses. That right there tells you that gear is meant to be used in other endgame content, NOT for overland. Of course these stronger sets are going to make overland seem trivial. There ARE plenty of places to use your strong gear and the skills you've gained, though; trials, dungeons, BGs, IC, Cyrodiil, single and 4-man arenas. Overland is just one part of the game and claiming there's not enough content to essentially "be powerful" in is quite a stretch.

I'd also like to touch on the opposite side of this argument, which I'm not sure is a point anyone has made. If people can claim the game is too easy and it thus ruins their enjoyment, can we also then say there are things that are too hard ruining peoples' enjoyment?

Uvi_AUT

Overlandcontent is the reason I stopped playing this game. Its 90% of the content, yet it poses no challenge, at all. Most enemie dont even survive the first clobal cooldown. Its boring.
There need to be a Veteran and a Mastermode, like in SW-TOR.

LashanW

Arunei wrote: »

I'd also like to touch on the opposite side of this argument, which I'm not sure is a point anyone has made. If people can claim the game is too easy and it thus ruins their enjoyment, can we also then say there are things that are too hard ruining peoples' enjoyment?

True. There's plenty of threads about those. A story mode for dungeons and trials (I fully support this btw), PvE versions of IC and Cyrodiil. Then there's the numerous nerfs to DLC dungeons (especially on normal) and some trials over time. Btw normal difficulty setting exists for that reason. So people can experience content without things being too hard. ZoS even added weapon set drops from normal version of the arenas for the same reason.

Arunei wrote: »

At the end of the day I think people may have to accept that the overland and its stories are meant for everyone to enjoy, not just the people who are good at the game. The people who have a hard time due to age, physical/mental health, or things like lag and ping deserve to be able to actually play the game they paid for.

A solution that raises overland difficulty across the board is not acceptable, yes. Most of us agree on this.

Arunei wrote: »

Someone mentioned that there aren't enough places to use your gear and skills when you get to a certain level, but look at what a lot of endgame sets are made for. A lot of BiS sets tend to be trial gear, which gives your group buffs against trial and dungeon bosses. That right there tells you that gear is meant to be used in other endgame content, NOT for overland. Of course these stronger sets are going to make overland seem trivial. There ARE plenty of places to use your strong gear and the skills you've gained, though; trials, dungeons, BGs, IC, Cyrodiil, single and 4-man arenas. Overland is just one part of the game and claiming there's not enough content to essentially "be powerful" in is quite a stretch.

"Using BiS trial gear is a main reason for overland to be trivial" <- This is a common misconception. Like you said, some of their unique effects are literally disabled outside of group content. And most of these BiS gear (sets like Kinras, Tzogvin, Advancing Yokeda, Relequen, Yandir and formerly Siroria) have atleast 5 seconds of ramp up time to get their full power (and then keep on fighting to keep those stacks). Quest enemies barely last 3 seconds against an experienced player.
Sets like Bahsei requires you to stay low on magicka to get the most out of it. I don't think people are keeping their magicka pool below 50% while questing. I certainly don't bother. Most of the time I have false god and Medusa with wild hunt ring when I'm in overland.

Want to feel really powerful in overland? Don't use trial gear. Use a combination like New moon Acolyte + Mother's Sorrow/Julianos/Hundings with a sharpened weapon. Could even use Spriggans/Spinners. These are overland and crafted sets btw. You'll absolutely decimate quest enemies just by using a spammable.

Arunei wrote: »

There ARE plenty of places to use your strong gear and the skills you've gained, though; trials, dungeons, BGs, IC, Cyrodiil, single and 4-man arenas. Overland is just one part of the game and claiming there's not enough content to essentially "be powerful" in is quite a stretch.

What do you do if you are pretty much done with current group content? PvP? With its abysmal performance and busted sets like Dark convergence? No thanks.

There's 10 trials and 4 arenas. Can complete all these on normal over a weekend (assuming you have a group).
There's 46 dungeons. Can complete all of them on normal over a weekend and maybe one more day. (though you'll need play a lot).
How long will it take to complete all quests in overland? I doubt it can be done in a couple of days. There's over 35 zones and no idea how many quests.

Sure overland is just one part of the game. But it's the biggest part. And it's the only part left for a solo PvE player after the 2 solo arenas.

SilverBride

I've said everything I need to say on this topic. I just hope we get some feedback soon.

LashanW

Arunei wrote: »

To everyone wanting a Vet version of overland content...I think their explanation about why they're implementing AwA the way they are is going to kill any option of that. They're claiming they need to reduce data so they can add new content and so the game performs better (or at least, they CLAIM the game MIGHT run better). If they're reducing data by getting rid of most character-specific achievements, I genuinely cannot see them adding in huge amounts of data for Vet versions of each zone when most people would likely ignore them. And for the people who do want harder content, once they go through the Vet stuff enough and it no longer poses a challenge, will they want even harder stuff added that would take more data ESO apparently can't afford to spare and fewer people would bother with?

That's a frightening thought. Why is ESO in such a bad state in terms of resources? Funds not being directed where it's needed? I don't know. I don't want this game to be a sinking ship where we have to detach parts of the game just to stay afloat a while longer.

Yet they are introducing a brand new card game system with its own leaderboard/rankings, custom decks and probably achievements too. No concerns over resources then.

Arunei

LashanW wrote: »

True. There's plenty of threads about those. A story mode for dungeons and trials (I fully support this btw), PvE versions of IC and Cyrodiil. Then there's the numerous nerfs to DLC dungeons (especially on normal) and some trials over time. Btw normal difficulty setting exists for that reason. So people can experience content without things being too hard. ZoS even added weapon set drops from normal version of the arenas for the same reason.

Plenty of people can't do even the normal versions, though, and there are numerous Personalities and Skins locked behind harder content that many people can't do. My point was that if people can say X is too easy and this ruins peoples' enjoyment, the very same thing can be said about harder content not being able to be completed ruining other peoples' enjoyment.

LashanW wrote: »

A solution that raises overland difficulty across the board is not acceptable, yes. Most of us agree on this.

But again, how do you account for optional sliders and toggles if people with different difficulty settings are fighting the same enemies? The only way those optional methods would work is if they affected individual players somehow, but most people seem against self nerfs. You can't have optional settings affect the world itself because if someone with minimum difficulty is fighting the same WB someone with max difficulty is, then which of those is the game supposed to apply? It can't do both at the same time.

LashanW wrote: »

"Using BiS trial gear is a main reason for overland to be trivial" <- This is a common misconception. Like you said, some of their unique effects are literally disabled outside of group content. And most of these BiS gear (sets like Kinras, Tzogvin, Advancing Yokeda, Relequen, Yandir and formerly Siroria) have atleast 5 seconds of ramp up time to get their full power (and then keep on fighting to keep those stacks). Quest enemies barely last 3 seconds against an experienced player.
Sets like Bahsei requires you to stay low on magicka to get the most out of it. I don't think people are keeping their magicka pool below 50% while questing. I certainly don't bother. Most of the time I have false god and Medusa with wild hunt ring when I'm in overland.

Want to feel really powerful in overland? Don't use trial gear. Use a combination like New moon Acolyte + Mother's Sorrow/Julianos/Hundings with a sharpened weapon. Could even use Spriggans/Spinners. These are overland and crafted sets btw. You'll absolutely decimate quest enemies just by using a spammable.

My main point with that one was people saying overland is too easy with endgame stuff. There are a lot of good sets that AREN'T endgame, that's true, but ultimately either way gear isn't the main thing that determines strength. It's just one part of what determines how "good" a person is and how much damage they can put out. Things like a solid rotation, using the right Food/Drinks and Potions, CP allocation, Attribute point allocation, light attack weaving/animation cancelling, Traits and Glyphs, and Mundus Stone all play a role.

I know a lot of people claim that they can go naked and not use Food or Potions and have no CP allocated and all that and overland is still too easy. I don't doubt that, but what a lot of people don't want to acknowledge is they also have knowledge and skills that comes with having played the game for a while. Yes, there have been people over the years when this has come up saying the game is too easy for them even as newer players, but I have genuinely seen that claim only a handful of times compared to the number of people who struggle with it as it is now. As someone who's been playing since closed beta, I can easily get overwhelmed and killed on new characters, even ones with crafted sets and all their CP allocated, if I'm not paying attention or get too cocky.

LashanW wrote: »

What do you do if you are pretty much done with current group content? PvP? With its abysmal performance and busted sets like Dark convergence? No thanks.

There's 10 trials and 4 arenas. Can complete all these on normal over a weekend (assuming you have a group).
There's 46 dungeons. Can complete all of them on normal over a weekend and maybe one more day. (though you'll need play a lot).
How long will it take to complete all quests in overland? I doubt it can be done in a couple of days. There's over 35 zones and no idea how many quests.

Sure overland is just one part of the game. But it's the biggest part. And it's the only part left for a solo PvE player after the 2 solo arenas.

Overland is also the part of the game with the most stories and quests, as you said. The point of overland content isn't meant to make anyone feel particularly powerful, it's to deliver stories.

Now I'm not saying people have to be happy over how things are. Hell I even agree that story bosses like Bal are definitely pushovers, all things considered. But making these bosses harder might very well lock out a lot of people from completing those quests and stories. I remember the one Dragon "boss" you have to beat during the Elsweyr tutorial was too hard for a lot of people back when it first came out. He did too much damage I believe it was, or one of his mechanics was too overtuned, I can't remember now. But it does happen that people can't complete these things.

All that being said, if ZOS can figure out a way to implement an optional difficulty increase thing then I have nothing against that. If they decide it's worth it to make Vet versions of each zone then go for it. However I personally don't think they would be willing to do the latter since that whole "we're running out of space" thing for why they're doing AwA the way they are. I also just don't see any way they can introduce an optional slider/toggle without it being a self-nerf that lowers stats or something.

LashanW wrote: »

That's a frightening thought. Why is ESO in such a bad state in terms of resources? Funds not being directed where it's needed? I don't know. I don't want this game to be a sinking ship where we have to detach parts of the game just to stay afloat a while longer.

Yet they are introducing a brand new card game system with its own leaderboard/rankings, custom decks and probably achievements too. No concerns over resources then.

I think it's because the card game is a new system, which is what they're allegedly freeing up data for. I honestly can't explain why they think deleting current stuff is an acceptable solution to needing more data, since like I said, that implies that down the road they're going to start getting rid of other stuff. No one has been able to figure out why ESO's database is in such dire straits, and there's been a bunch of discussion on it over in the AwA Feedback thread on the PTS board.

And for anyone who hasn't read it and wants to see for themselves that ZOS essentially said the game is running out of data:

Q&A thread

CP5

SilverBride wrote: »

A separate veteran overland would have to duplicate every overland achievement to reflect having completed them in veteran mode. In light of account wide achievements being implemented I very much doubt that this would happen.

Duplicating achievements would be pointless, and since some thought seems to be there, they wouldn't be duplicating zones either. Their 'explanation' for AwA was weak, and since every single dungeon in the game already has 2 'rule sets' that instances are created from, a similar function shouldn't break the camels back. And if it would, then that's an issue they need to fix, not an excuse to not do anything more, because if we're using that as justification to not do something, then we can apply it to everything.

spartaxoxo

SilverBride wrote: »

A separate veteran overland would have to duplicate every overland achievement to reflect having completed them in veteran mode. In light of account wide achievements being implemented I very much doubt that this would happen.

Not really. I'm not in favor of a separate game mode, now more than ever with the issues they were talking about with data, but this is not really a concern. They wouldn't need to give us all of the same achievements in the vet version. They don't do that in dungeons and they wouldn't need to do it in Vet Overland either.

Snamyap

Arunei wrote: »

Thinking about it, the only other thing I can think of beyond sliders or toggles that affect an individual's stats would be a new zone sort of like how Craglorn was originally, but without the need of an actual group to progress with the story (is that still part of Craglorn? I haven't come anywhere near finishing the zone story so I'm not sure if they removed the part where you needed other players to actually progress said story). Craglorn originally failed because it was TOO hard for most people, as well as the group aspect making it harder for solo players to finish the story.

You can solo Craglorn. They removed all the group dependent mechanics. And nerfed the difficulty to abysmal low levels, it feels even easier than regular overland/quest content. There are still a few delves, ones that weren't part of the storyline, that have the old difficulty.

While I'm very much in favor of an optional harder version of quest/overland content, the question is of course: how hard. I would be perfectly fine with normal vanilla group dungeon difficulty, but I am sure that there are people who will find that too much, and people who still considered that trivial.

emilyhyoyeon

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content. The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

This isn't about having something to prove or being Mega Chad Gamers who want TES to be Dark Souls. It's about many of us simply finding the quest gameplay unimmersive and disconnected from the rest of the game's systems, which prevents us from enjoying the stellar quest [i[writing[/i].

exactly this. I personally don't even mind too much easily killing wolves and other petty enemies; it's the 100-200k HP quest bosses with no damage that really bother me. I think having a toggle for a veteran version of bosses alone would drastically improve questing.

LalMirchi

emilyhyoyeon wrote: »

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content. The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

This isn't about having something to prove or being Mega Chad Gamers who want TES to be Dark Souls. It's about many of us simply finding the quest gameplay unimmersive and disconnected from the rest of the game's systems, which prevents us from enjoying the stellar quest [i[writing[/i].

exactly this. I personally don't even mind too much easily killing wolves and other petty enemies; it's the 100-200k HP quest bosses with no damage that really bother me. I think having a toggle for a veteran version of bosses alone would drastically improve questing.

Yes, totally agree.

Also the loot for these big bad dangerous creatures is very often green useless gear and measly amounts of gold. This makes defeating these so called bosses rather demeaning to the player. The rewards are rather underwhelming.

spartaxoxo

LalMirchi wrote: »

emilyhyoyeon wrote: »

casparian wrote: »

Iselin wrote: »

I appreciate the fact that ESO has a range of content for many different types of players and players of different abilities.

But it doesn't, not when it comes to quest and storytelling content. The only way to engage in the quest content in this game -- the vast, vast majority of content -- is to play on Super Easy Novice difficulty. All we're asking is a way for quest content -- again, by far the largest portion of the game, and a major selling point of each expansion -- to be made enjoyable "for many different types of players and players of different abilities". Right now it's all tuned to one type of player at one level of ability.

This isn't about having something to prove or being Mega Chad Gamers who want TES to be Dark Souls. It's about many of us simply finding the quest gameplay unimmersive and disconnected from the rest of the game's systems, which prevents us from enjoying the stellar quest [i[writing[/i].

exactly this. I personally don't even mind too much easily killing wolves and other petty enemies; it's the 100-200k HP quest bosses with no damage that really bother me. I think having a toggle for a veteran version of bosses alone would drastically improve questing.

Yes, totally agree.

Also the loot for these big bad dangerous creatures is very often green useless gear and measly amounts of gold. This makes defeating these so called bosses rather demeaning to the player. The rewards are rather underwhelming.

I don't expect quests to have great rewards for the most part, because they are just the story part of the game. Like most mmos, the real rewarding content is the group content. I have never felt demeaned by any of the quest rewards in the game.

S0Z0H

Hard Core Mode is what the overland needs. Call it Elden Scrolls Online

vsrs_au

Having progressed my character to the point where the other zones are pretty easy combat-wise, I recently finished a zone and chose Craglorn as the next one, and have had a positive experience so far. The difficulty for the overland content is more than the other zones I've done (I've still only done a minority of all the zones, though, so I'm no expert on this), and it's challenging me enough to keep my interest.

Some of the scenery is quite spectacular, too: yesterday, I made numerous screendumps of the Na-Totembu tomb delve, because I like to have ESO and Skyrim screendumps for my PC desktop backgrounds.

I think it would be nice if we could have another zone (or a few of them?) with similar difficulty to Craglorn.

NVNNN

Veteran players have nothing to do in overland zones.
Having listened to NPCs explaining how a big a threat this upcoming quest challenge is, defeating a boss with a few skills is just anti-climactic.
All overland should be on the same level as craglorn and new content (chapters) should offer progressive challenge.
Alternatively, an toggleable option to scale the overland to grant higher challenge and higher rewards would please all categories of players. Don't want any trouble and want to just experience the story? Here you go - every mob is oneshot. You're a living human being who wants to have fun playing the game? Sure, buddy, here's Craglorn + for you.

Abigail

So, a fair example of my alts goes something like this:

Gear: Mother's Sorrow/Julianos/Zaan/Ring of Pale Order (or Wild Hunt). All legendary.

Champion Points: thoroughly researched and tweaked.

Companion: Fully maximized and all purple gear that is well balanced.

Setup this way I can do overland content in a much-preferred non-stressful way. Delves and Public Dungeons are quite doable.

I have quit doing DLC dungeons altogether, and I'd never consider Trials or PvP. Those things are either too stressful or well beyond my capability or game expectations.

I am 80 years old, recovering from multiple strokes, severe tremor and rheumatoid arthritis. Obviously on the very low end of the spectrum. I just quit playing SWTOR because its 7.0 expansion screwed over people like me -- because a lot of min-max players in raid-level gear complained content was too easy. Don't want to be forced to quit this game AGAIN because players wearing end-game armor think overland content is too easy.

NVNNN

Abigail wrote: »

So, a fair example of my alts goes something like this:

Gear: Mother's Sorrow/Julianos/Zaan/Ring of Pale Order (or Wild Hunt). All legendary.

Champion Points: thoroughly researched and tweaked.

Companion: Fully maximized and all purple gear that is well balanced.

Setup this way I can do overland content in a much-preferred non-stressful way. Delves and Public Dungeons are quite doable.

I have quit doing DLC dungeons altogether, and I'd never consider Trials or PvP. Those things are either too stressful or well beyond my capability or game expectations.

I am 80 years old, recovering from multiple strokes, severe tremor and rheumatoid arthritis. Obviously on the very low end of the spectrum. I just quit playing SWTOR because its 7.0 expansion screwed over people like me -- because a lot of min-max players in raid-level gear complained content was too easy. Don't want to be forced to quit this game AGAIN because players wearing end-game armor think overland content is too easy.

I don't want a single piece of content to be designed around a certain group of people. This is why we have varying difficulties (normal - veteran - veteran hardmode), so that people can decide how "stressful" they want their content to be. I think making the same commitment to the overland wouild benefit big time.

[snip] Although i do recognize that certain aspects should be adjusted around disabilities, but they should never be designed around.

[edited for baiting]

Abigail

NVNNN wrote: »

[snip] Although i do recognize that certain aspects should be adjusted around disabilities, but they should never be designed around.

Yeah, getting old sucks. Fifteen years ago, in another game, my healer was in great demand for raids. I'd get compliments like "Pro" or "You've got mad skills." Now, it's mad cow skills and [snip] of the group.

I don't expect the developers to cater to people like me -- even I like to be challenged a bit, but here's the deal ...

There are quite a few of us who are condemned to the shallow end of the pool for various reasons, but we're always contending with Olympic swimmers griping that end of the pool should be made deep, too.

[edited for profanity bypass & to remove quote]