Anyone else disappointed with the aesthetics of this new expansion so far?

Ditronus

I was expecting knightly armor and steel armaments everywhere you look (like much of the cinematic was). And yet we got Davy Jones of the Pirates of the Caribbean, where everything is covered in shells and rainbow corral. [snip] Yea, I get there's some sea-faring stuff going on, and maybe some features other than a card game could've complemented that, but plastering everything with every color under the ocean and mixing it with some seafoam doesn't make much sense.

Not sure why I post on the forums, though, feedback hardly gets through and I'm pretty sure they won't get a good return on their artist's work via the crown store. It's clear from cinematics and marketing material that at least some people in this studio knows what looks cool and vibes well with their player base, but that never translates into the game; granted, sometimes it seemingly can't translate into the game due to their outdated engine, like capes or any cloth physics at all.

The direction just feels out of place, usually. People criticize the static combat (i.e. buff, dot, spam, repeat x10) and character animations more than anything outside performance. I don't see criticisms for lack of another digital card game (there's a reason why Elder Scrolls Legends isn't a thing anymore). Developers with close communication to their fanbase seem to do well and succeed, like Apex. Ah well, great game, with great potential that will probably go untapped, even under Microsoft.

(Sidenote Rant: I can't believe the necromancer class was so poorly designed. Why do I summon edgy tombstones, throw Halloween skulls from my finger tips, or summon a skeleton that...blows up in green goop(?), much less having to do that EVERY 2.5 seconds to do optimal damage. People love pets, which is why you see most sorcs with pets and almost every Warden with a bear; why would the one quintessential pet class not have a permanent summon (and don't throw "lore" at me), or at least one that's a bit more satisfying as Mr. Bones leaping to a poorly-animated green explosion? Here's an idea: instead of blastbones, why not summon an ancient, 2-handed axe-wielding draugr at the target's location that cleaves enemies in front of him for 6 seconds before crumbling to dust? Would it look better? Most likely? Would it feel better in combat to cast a move with an interesting animation every 6 seconds instead of a bad animation every 2.5 seconds? Heck yea. Does it make more sense than an exploding green skeleton? Why is the skeleton exploding, anyways? There's just some design decisions that are absolutely maddening. The team could learn a lot from WoW's team, and, to be sure, vice-versa. WoW needs a better world worth exploring and more content outside of competitive group content (we're tired of raiding); ESO needs better combat (buff, dot, spam, repeat) and class identity (most builds are comprised of the same exact skills regardless of class).

[edited for minor bashing]

jasonhunter

I used to play Guild Wars 1 back in the day, the Necromancer there was amazing... you could summon an army of undead minions and that big one that actually wielded an axe.
This one does seem quite a bit off.

tsaescishoeshiner

It sounds like you went through a lot of topics lol, but the preview stream made me excited for the Chapter design! Beautiful jungle and sunflower-pasture biomes, ornate furniture, cool castles and stonework. Plus, did you see that druid village? And the new Hircine-looking humanoid enemy?

I do prefer when we get something more unique like with Elsweyr or Summerset, but the visuals this year look much cooler to me than they sounded at first.

FeedbackOnly

It's so much better then dark, gloomy swamp thing like that was blackwood. It got me excited to explore again

spartaxoxo

I love this aesthetic so much that I purchased Seaveil, the furnishing pack, 2 5k crown crate packs, and the Easter dye to put on my crate costume because it looks coral-y. It's one of my favorite, most underused looks across video games. I never spend that much. I LOVE WATER!

SammyKhajit

This one is very excited about adventures with Ember.

FaylenSol

Hard disagree, the aesthetic looks great. I also love the Necromancer, two of my three main characters are Necromancer (one tank, one DPS).

DarcyMardin

I’m looking forward to seeing a beautiful, green, Mediterranean-style landscape again, after the gloominess of Greymoor and Blackwood. The new companions sound good, too.

Snamyap

Instead of complaining about the aesthetics of this zone or that zone you could also simply appreciate the variety.

colossalvoids

Zones esthetics are the only thing that I've liked personally.

rbfrgsp

I was talking with the gf about the latest Endeavour mounts last night. The consensus was that they are laughably crap. And the barnacles trigger that thing where you get a phobia of tight circle clusters.

LesserCircle

Castles looked very much like blackwood, everything else looked fine to me. I agree about necro tho.

YstradClud

DarcyMardin wrote: »

I’m looking forward to seeing a beautiful, green, Mediterranean-style landscape again, after the gloominess of Greymoor and Blackwood.

Yes. The Mediterranean Daggerfall spinoff is much welcome after the Deadlands. It's Daggerfall but not as gloomy. I am surprised the Imperials didn't get the Mediterranean theme but instead ended up neighbouring the Black Marsh with a zone filled with Daedra.

robwolf666

Ditronus wrote: »

I was expecting knightly armor and steel armaments everywhere you look...

What's wrong with pretty coasts etc? I like pretty...
Besides, after all the darkness of the recent expansions, it's nice to have something different.

Coatmagic

Ditronus wrote: »

[snip]

Thank for that LOL

[edited to remove quote]

Kisakee

Pirates!

kaushad

YstradClud wrote: »

I am surprised the Imperials didn't get the Mediterranean theme but instead ended up neighbouring the Black Marsh with a zone filled with Daedra.

Maybe they didn't in Blackwood, but they have the Gold Coast too.

Sidereum

No, I'm not disappointed. I'm really excited and I love the aesthetics. Both the piratesque and the medieval fantasy aesthetics. In fact, The Elder Scrolls "alien" and "peculiar" fantasy was starting to become overwhelming, we really needed some refreshing basic traditional medieval fantasy. I'm really looking forward to High Isle.

Khenarthi

I think it looks nice, a bit like Summerset but with less grumpy elves.

Jaimeh

From the preview it seems that the new area is a little bit all over the place: a little bit Medieval, a little bit of Summerset, a rain forest, and the sun flower fields (which were lovely, but I hope it doesn't mean we get just massive empty areas like Blackwood). I think the architecture of the buildings was nice, and the coastal areas will be pretty, but I didn't get the feeling of a place that meshes together well. I think the last time they did a well constructed, interesting, and unique landscape was Elsweyr.

Rex-Umbra

Astetics look perfect to me. Revamped and improved Breton. They should improve Daggerfall and Eayrest with it.

LalMirchi

Looks very nice. I love sunflowers & pirates and I I have a young Breton Templar in storage as a mule who's raring to go when this breaks in June.

redlink1979

I'm just disappointed with the new system being Legends 2.0.

Pevey

Mediterranean, beaches, pirates, druids, bards, spies, noble houses and class conflict… from an aesthetics and theming perspective, I think the expansion sounds awesome.

Sylvermynx

Oh heck no! I love the looks and potential in the questing - loved Blackwood too, but this will be really fun for me as NO DAEDRA!

Guys, I still don't know that there's going to be a lot of pirates.... unless that was in the stream? I don't have data to watch streams.

emilyhyoyeon

Completely agree with the necromancer thing, and I sort of agree with the expansion thing. I think High Isle was done well actually. I realized the reason I was slightly disappointed was because what I was really imagining with the chapter was basically an overhaul of the base game Breton zones. I wanted to see medieval style breton cities with lots of magic to them, but High Isle isn't the place for that from what I can tell, since it is an island at sea far from the main continent. High Rock is the place to see the heavy medieval inspired magical cities, which means an overhaul of base game. I do wanna see a lot of druid stuff though.

Commandment

redlink1979 wrote: »

I'm just disappointed with the new system being Legends 2.0.

Except legends, have cooler art IMO, Someone said it was like MTG, or Yugioh, it doesnt seem to have any of those aspects since there is no summoning.

BloodyStigmata

The aesthetics are the only thing looking good from this chapter so far.

ectoplasmicninja

The current crates go with the dungeons, which are both very aquatic in theme, but if I'm not mistaken Ascendant crates have been datamined and will have a more classic Breton theme. They did discuss knightly orders and such, and the zone looks like it will be beautiful.

I love a good Daedric plane and a good worldending story as much as the next person, but a pretty Mediterranean resort island with some political drama sounds quite refreshing.

kojou

The thing about ugly armor sets is that they are cosmetic and you can ignore them. There are plenty of "knightly" armor sets in the game so I don't think we are missing out on anything here, but maybe I am easy to please... I do like interesting things for my characters to wear and that is the one thing I will still spend money on in this game, but all of that is personal preference based, so I don't expect them to release something I like with every new content release.

I actually like how the preview of the new zone looks, and the story itself sounds promising. Hopefully they can execute it well. My favorite quests up to this point are not the "epic save the world from evil" quests, so having the main quest be more of a political affair makes me hopeful.

I'm not even going to comment about the side rant because that seems out of context with the subject of your post.

Vaoh

Disregarding the card game feature, High Isle is setting up to be a really interesting chapter imo. I do think High Isle will be better than Blackwood especially in terms of the zone.

But to disregard the chapter’s major feature is a huge problem...... oh and the Dreadsail Reef trifecta titles are pretty weak lol. “Swashbuckler Supreme”