Combat introduction overhaul - the combat academy

CameraBeardThePirate · July 2022

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

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Sync01 wrote: »

I agree that there should be more information in game about how combat works but I'm not sure an in-depth tutorial is the answer. Partly because it would be a lot of information in one go that you might not remember much of later, and partly because I assume it would get outdated pretty fast.

There is a lot of community created content (both relevant and outdated) so the information is available somewhere, but the difficult part is getting that info to players who are only looking at info in game, and don't know what they're missing.

I'm not sure if the basic combat information as proposed would become outdated, unless they change how dots or barswaps work. We will always have things like set bonuses, traits, potions etc.

Exactly this. Teaching someone the basics of a parse (i.e. Buff>Dots>Spammable>Repeat) will never get outdated, the only thing that will get outdated is which skills specifically to use; however, teaching people the basics would only serve to prop up the players at the bottom. There are so many players that don't even understand that most of your damage should come from skills and not lights/heavies.

etchedpixels · July 2022

From what I see in more casual guild stuff this is all based on the delusion that anyone but a small minority care.

Most folks have no desire to learn about meta builds, or the internal machinations of this months combat system. They turn up, they have fun, maybe dip their toes into dungeons a little, do the overland stories and enjoy themselves. If you look at the steam data on hours played it's very hard to interpret them in any way that makes sense other than that most players actually play under 200 hours ever.

Sync01 · July 2022

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

show previous quotes

Sync01 wrote: »

I agree that there should be more information in game about how combat works but I'm not sure an in-depth tutorial is the answer. Partly because it would be a lot of information in one go that you might not remember much of later, and partly because I assume it would get outdated pretty fast.

There is a lot of community created content (both relevant and outdated) so the information is available somewhere, but the difficult part is getting that info to players who are only looking at info in game, and don't know what they're missing.

I'm not sure if the basic combat information as proposed would become outdated, unless they change how dots or barswaps work. We will always have things like set bonuses, traits, potions etc.

Things like having a rotation probably won't change but why you run certain skills is a lot more complicated and does change between patches. Overall I think it would good to have a better tutorial than we have today, but not going into the how and why.

UtopianWarrior88 · July 2022

I'm not suggesting we show specific builds, there's no reason for that and we have plenty of players like Skinnycheeks who can take that as it changes per patch; it's really about getting people to understand the concept of frontbar, backbar, dots and spammables, and how to get better at those basic things.

Sync01 · July 2022

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

I'm not suggesting we show specific builds, there's no reason for that and we have plenty of players like Skinnycheeks who can take that as it changes per patch; it's really about getting people to understand the concept of frontbar, backbar, dots and spammables, and how to get better at those basic things.

You did write "8) Gear traits and enchants and how it can help you - For DDs its very straight forward, but it is still nice to be aware WHY we run what we run, rather than just copying a build".

I'm with you on the basics, but how far you can push things is a bit of a grey area.

UtopianWarrior88 · July 2022

A guide can tell you that divines will increase the effect of a mundus stone, while sturdy decreases cost of blocking. A simple quiz style quest (similar to how the Kotor sith academy worked) is doable, with some books to read on traits.
"What traits would you use when blocking a lot" or "what trait enhances the effect of your chosen mundus". Nothing ground breaking but again something to draw attention to it.

CameraBeardThePirate · July 2022

etchedpixels wrote: »

From what I see in more casual guild stuff this is all based on the delusion that anyone but a small minority care.

Most folks have no desire to learn about meta builds, or the internal machinations of this months combat system. They turn up, they have fun, maybe dip their toes into dungeons a little, do the overland stories and enjoy themselves. If you look at the steam data on hours played it's very hard to interpret them in any way that makes sense other than that most players actually play under 200 hours ever.

I dont disagree with this. Clearly a majority of players are casual. However, if the entire reason for the light weaving changes is to close the gap, the change is ill-informed. Nerfing everyone's light attack damage won't close the gap - the gap exists for a myriad of reasons and having tools in the game to teach players about basic things (that currently go completely unlearned) would help "close the gap" much more than changing some numbers will.

karekiz · July 2022

Players shouldn't be able to que vet w/o passing a test for their desired role. Want that nice monster set? Get a pre-formed group or at least learn the basics.

UtopianWarrior88 · July 2022

karekiz wrote: »

Players shouldn't be able to que vet w/o passing a test for their desired role. Want that nice monster set? Get a pre-formed group or at least learn the basics.

Gatekeeping is not the solution

jecks33 · July 2022

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

Basically, it would be something like "combat academy" split up into a selection of lessons to assist newer players in understanding how combat works in ESO. .

Agree 100% and the group finder should be disabled untill the completition of this academy

Lumsdenml · July 2022

I think this would be a pretty cool idea! I mean, there is a general tutorial in the beginning, why not an advanced one once you hit lvl 15 and can bar swap?

karekiz · July 2022

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

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karekiz wrote: »

Players shouldn't be able to que vet w/o passing a test for their desired role. Want that nice monster set? Get a pre-formed group or at least learn the basics.

Gatekeeping is not the solution

An optional tutorial that casuals will never see, bother with, nor care about will work either. You really think with all the info we have now all of a sudden they will immediately turn around and learn what a rotation is? There are people queing that don't even know what a Bash is.

If something like a combat tutorial becomes an optional thing to progress I 100% bet it will be ignored for a quick EZ que.

UtopianWarrior88 · July 2022

karekiz wrote: »

show previous quotes

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

karekiz wrote: »

Players shouldn't be able to que vet w/o passing a test for their desired role. Want that nice monster set? Get a pre-formed group or at least learn the basics.

Gatekeeping is not the solution

An optional tutorial that casuals will never see, bother with, nor care about will work either. You really think with all the info we have now all of a sudden they will immediately turn around and learn what a rotation is? There are people queing that don't even know what a Bash is.

If something like a combat tutorial becomes an optional thing to progress I 100% bet it will be ignored for a quick EZ que.

It'd be pretty simple to bypass this. If an NPC for the cardgame can be slapped in EVERY major city, so can be a recruiter for the combat academy.

Klingenlied · July 2022

jecks33 wrote: »

show previous quotes

UtopianWarrior88 wrote: »

Basically, it would be something like "combat academy" split up into a selection of lessons to assist newer players in understanding how combat works in ESO. .

Agree 100% and the group finder should be disabled untill the completition of this academy

And you really think that will help? This will make people move away from the game instead of continuing forward.
The systems are freakin' unintuitive! Face the damn reality, a combat system is bad when you can not catch on naturally. Souls titles? No problem. Almost every generic action title? No problem. Black Desert? Easy. FFXIV? No problem!!

Now in regards to FFXIV you can say: but it has some very in depth tutorials and missions where it teaches a lot of details. Yeah, that's right. But it still is limit to basics. Rotations, possible cancels and weaves - that is still stuff that the community learns and teaches itself. And it does work fine. And yea, giving some more / better optional tutorials would be beneficial.

In the end though, nothing will change the fact that a system where you are rewarded for pressing a button a blink of an eye after another button press to skip an animation every second over and over and over again is the worst. That's the reason people hate on ESO's combat system. Not those here on the forums of course, because here you primarily find the hardcore audience that sticks with the game through the good and the bad times. But who is active here is just the tip of the iceberg.

So yea, I guess I will stay with my opinion that the combat is bad, light attack weaving feels bad, combat feels "weak" and the current system in itself is what repels newer players and denies ESO the possibility to fight for the MMORPG-throne. Cuz, that is something rather likely - if ESO had fun & engaging combat that visually was appeasing, numbers would be soaring.