Why is ZOS obsessed?

aurelius_fx

I need someone to explain in minuscule details to me. Are they purposefully trying to get people who care about end game to quit? It makes no sense, game design wise or even economically wise.

There are a multitude of players [snip] with hundreds if not thousands of hours in experience both in PvE and PvP who would go through all of those changes [snip] out of sole passion for the game they play. Yet they insist on changes no one asked for, save for the occasional minor helpful tidbit. Why?

[edited for baiting]

doesurmindglow

It's shaping up to be a classic example of a business sticking with a bad decision too long.

Lykeion

From the results, I personally think that the changes in 8.1.4 are acceptable. Many players and I have pointed out in the forums the problems with the previous Dark Cloak, which has been adjusted in 8.1.4, so I appreciate the dev.

However, ZOS must recognize the problem that the 8.1.0 adjustments were too large and out of touch with the player base, including plenty of adjustments that were not requested and had no clear reason for modification. In fact, most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0. ZOS needs to explain in more detail what happened with 8.1.0, who led this part of the design, who was responsible for it, what his/her rationale was for making these changes, and whether it has changed since the end of this terrible public test, rather than being more vague. I believe this is the only way to regain player confidence. Losing player confidence is a disaster for any game.

redspecter23

This is a question I keep asking myself. If anyone comes up with a good answer, please let me know. I'm completely missing the logic in the decision, but that might be my mistake.

IZZEFlameLash

This is what happens when they target the top end players while only looking at spreadsheet [snip]

[edited for baiting]

Jaimeh

aurelius_fx wrote: »

I need someone to explain in minuscule details to me. Are they purposefully trying to get people who care about end game to quit? It makes no sense, game design wise or even economically wise.

There are a multitude of players [snip] with hundreds if not thousands of hours in experience both in PvE and PvP who would go through all of those changes [snip] out of sole passion for the game they play. Yet they insist on changes no one asked for, save for the occasional minor helpful tidbit. Why?

[snip]
-They have other agendas that indirectly impact combat changes, like trying to fix performance, enticing new players, etc.
[snip]

These are my guesses. I don't think anyone would deliberately harm their own product, [snip]

[edited for baiting/conspiracy theories]

chessalavakia_ESO

aurelius_fx wrote: »

I need someone to explain in minuscule details to me. Are they purposefully trying to get people who care about end game to quit? It makes no sense, game design wise or even economically wise.

There are a multitude of players [snip] with hundreds if not thousands of hours in experience both in PvE and PvP who would go through all of those changes [snip] out of sole passion for the game they play. Yet they insist on changes no one asked for, save for the occasional minor helpful tidbit. Why?

Virtually all of the changes occur in areas where people asked for adjustments. The adjustments they made just don't happen to align with what the players necessarily wanted to have happen.

While I'm sure many of us might be willing to give alternative patch notes, I think you'd find that most of us would be making patch notes that would not really work that well for people across the board in the long run. Yeah, in the short run somebody could probably make notes that would be universally more popular by being more conservative but, it's likely long term people wouldn't have the restraint. I've generally found that as little as I like developer patch notes, the ones many of the top tier players are far worse in my view.

Lots of people are also assuming that the staff at ZOS don't know the game. I'd question if that's true.

The person that wrote the below:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/612574/update-35-pts-combat-feedback-upcoming-changes/p1

is the same person that wrote the below

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/243441/end-game-stamina-nightblade-build-pve-dps-updated-for-clockwork-city/p1

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/263237/an-in-depth-look-at-the-maw-of-lorkhaj-trial-sets-are-they-even-worth-it/p1

VaranisArano

They honestly think that this update either fits into their long-term plan that's good for the game or that they can fix the worst of the Live pain points in three-six months. They don't think they're ruining ESO.

Also, remember that most players in the Live playerbase aren't nearly as frustrated as the players paying attention to the PTS, and thus are much more likely to keep playing in hopes of getting those fixes instead of quitting outright.

Like, the Devs know that reception is going to be negative, but their gamble here is that the average player who's not paying attention to the PTS won't be frustrated enough to quit outright as long as they promise fixes and shiny new stuff in the next Updates.

And they're probably right to make that gamble.

Aardappelboom

They might have a bigger plan that's controversial and believe that going step by step eases the pain.

If for example (and it's just an example, an unrealistic one I might add) they'd want to remove classes, knowing that current skills aren't fit for such a change, changing them now in return for some uproar might, in their minds work better to transition into their vision later.

In reality though it's often just better to communicate, tell players what you are going for and take it from there.

I don't believe for a second anyone at ZOS hates their own game, I also don't believe they don't play their own game, I really think communicating just isn't their strongest point. They are probably working towards something but just struggle with how to communicate about it.

Necrotech_Master

VaranisArano wrote: »

They honestly think that this update either fits into their long-term plan that's good for the game or that they can fix the worst of the Live pain points in three-six months. They don't think they're ruining ESO.

Also, remember that most players in the Live playerbase aren't nearly as frustrated as the players paying attention to the PTS, and thus are much more likely to keep playing in hopes of getting those fixes instead of quitting outright.

Like, the Devs know that reception is going to be negative, but their gamble here is that the average player who's not paying attention to the PTS won't be frustrated enough to quit outright as long as they promise fixes and shiny new stuff in the next Updates.

And they're probably right to make that gamble.

on the bolded part, its very likely that 40-60% of the player base doesnt even read the forums or even knows much about the upcoming changes outside of guild chatter through discord/in game

another 20% are the players who have paid attention and are still waiting to see what hits live and will adjust/adapt

the remaining 20% of players are ones who follow the PTS, but are actively saying they are no longer going to play anymore

Dagoth_Rac

Aardappelboom wrote: »

I don't believe for a second anyone at ZOS hates their own game, I also don't believe they don't play their own game, I really think communicating just isn't their strongest point. They are probably working towards something but just struggle with how to communicate about it.

I think ZOS are like a team designing a race car engine. They have all these spreadsheets about the necessary acceleration and momentum and torque needed. And they drive in circles on a test track and it feels good to them. But then a real pro race car driver comes along and tells them it feels like garbage and won't work in actual race conditions and so on. And that stinks to hear. And definitely bruises your ego. But it is just the case that you rarely find a mechanical engineer who is also a world class race driver. You need a good working relationship between both to get a solid final product.

In most industries, this back and forth creative iteration is done behind the scenes and not visible to the consumer. With ZOS, they literally use the consumer for this. Ideally, ZOS would have some players and groups, of various skill levels and focused on different parts of the game, that are part of the internal testing team. But that is probably more expensive and time-consuming than just dumping it on PTS, adjusting on the fly before live, accepting it will still be problematic on live, but hey we'll adjust again in next update in 3 months.

So I doubt ZOS devs hate the game or hate the players. They probably just have cheapskate executives who ask for large scale changes while providing small scale resources.

Necrotech_Master

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Aardappelboom wrote: »

I don't believe for a second anyone at ZOS hates their own game, I also don't believe they don't play their own game, I really think communicating just isn't their strongest point. They are probably working towards something but just struggle with how to communicate about it.

I think ZOS are like a team designing a race car engine. They have all these spreadsheets about the necessary acceleration and momentum and torque needed. And they drive in circles on a test track and it feels good to them. But then a real pro race car driver comes along and tells them it feels like garbage and won't work in actual race conditions and so on. And that stinks to hear. And definitely bruises your ego. But it is just the case that you rarely find a mechanical engineer who is also a world class race driver. You need a good working relationship between both to get a solid final product.

In most industries, this back and forth creative iteration is done behind the scenes and not visible to the consumer. With ZOS, they literally use the consumer for this. Ideally, ZOS would have some players and groups, of various skill levels and focused on different parts of the game, that are part of the internal testing team. But that is probably more expensive and time-consuming than just dumping it on PTS, adjusting on the fly before live, accepting it will still be problematic on live, but hey we'll adjust again in next update in 3 months.

So I doubt ZOS devs hate the game or hate the players. They probably just have cheapskate executives who ask for large scale changes while providing small scale resources.

...so the class rep program that got canned? lol

Melivar

[/quote]

on the bolded part, its very likely that 40-60% of the player base doesnt even read the forums or even knows much about the upcoming changes outside of guild chatter through discord/in game

another 20% are the players who have paid attention and are still waiting to see what hits live and will adjust/adapt

the remaining 20% of players are ones who follow the PTS, but are actively saying they are no longer going to play anymore[/quote]

I'd bet your closer to 70-80% that doesn't read the forums and less than 10% perhaps less than 5% that's disgruntled and ready to walk away.

I myself fall into the wait and see because I don't have time to get into the PTS. Keeping ESO+ is the question I will determine once I get a feel for the live version

Mazio

I think there's an awful lot of ego and self importance in the ZOS team, you can almost taste it the way they talk and the comments they make.
Feels like there is a culture of superiority over the players/customers, and they absolutely refuse to give us anything we want without it 'coming at a cost'

Necrotech_Master

Melivar wrote: »

on the bolded part, its very likely that 40-60% of the player base doesnt even read the forums or even knows much about the upcoming changes outside of guild chatter through discord/in game

another 20% are the players who have paid attention and are still waiting to see what hits live and will adjust/adapt

the remaining 20% of players are ones who follow the PTS, but are actively saying they are no longer going to play anymore

I'd bet your closer to 70-80% that doesn't read the forums and less than 10% perhaps less than 5% that's disgruntled and ready to walk away.

I myself fall into the wait and see because I don't have time to get into the PTS. Keeping ESO+ is the question I will determine once I get a feel for the live version

very possible, either way the amount of disgruntlement on the forums would only be a drop in the bucket compared to when this hits live lol

Thecompton73

VaranisArano wrote: »

They honestly think that this update either fits into their long-term plan that's good for the game or that they can fix the worst of the Live pain points in three-six months. They don't think they're ruining ESO.

Also, remember that most players in the Live playerbase aren't nearly as frustrated as the players paying attention to the PTS, and thus are much more likely to keep playing in hopes of getting those fixes instead of quitting outright.

Like, the Devs know that reception is going to be negative, but their gamble here is that the average player who's not paying attention to the PTS won't be frustrated enough to quit outright as long as they promise fixes and shiny new stuff in the next Updates.

And they're probably right to make that gamble.

I'd argue that people already active in the game but who are not users of the forums will feel blindsided by the changes and are more likely to just play other games when they log in and find the fun of combat has been stripped away by the update.

boi_anachronism_

My thoughts as someone who is a vet raider and yet is still relatively new to the game- when I started raiding I started reading patch notes. Training guilds I'm in, new raiders hear about this stuff from us because it effects them tremendously. They are seeing rosters falling off and guilding hunkering down and they want to know why. The proposed changes were so radical that I can pretty much guarantee that even more casual players would start wandering the Internet to figure out what happened because it will be noticable for everyone. Like the cp nerf last patch? I'd bet you 95% of the player base didn't even know it happened: it didn't effect them too much and as far as vet and endgame folks it was kind of whatever. Personally I didn't see a huge issue with it. These changes, however, will be felt across the board. Its going to change the feel of combat completely. Even a newbie will sit there an go wait, why is my skill 20secs now? And want to know why.

boi_anachronism_

One further thing to consider. We need vet raiders not to quit. They are the ones that foster new generations of raiders, they help players understand mechs and impart build knowledge. Without us most folk either- do not know how to get involved in a raid, what it actually is, and would ultimately get overwhelmed and/or frustrated and quit. Folks are real quick to be like end game players leaving, who cares but it's going to have a huge impact on the game in a way that can't be shown in a spreadsheet. A gm who leads a training guild, end gamer helping train new raiders, let's say the guild has 30 active players (mine have way more). What happens to those folks when their gm and officers throw in the towel. It's a ripple effect.

ZOS_Suserial

Greetings all,

Please remember that while it’s all right to disagree and debate with each other. Provoking conflict, baiting, inciting, mocking, being rude, etc. To community members, devs, and others is against our forum rules and not in the spirit of our game and is never acceptable in the official The Elder Scrolls Online community.

Any questions regarding such please see the Terms of service and Code of Conduct
terms-of-service code-of-conduct


Thank you for your understanding.

FlopsyPrince

A risk is that while people won't quite for any one thing, they may finally reach a point where they leave in mass and the game shuts down. I think that is far more of a risk than many companies realize.

Note that many companies do things that have no logical base, other than harming their own users, even though it is not clear how they came to that conclusion. (Except for some marketing campaigns where the marketing team was clueless about the true audience.)

How many devs play the game? I would bet few have the time or motivation to do that and it would explain a lack of understanding/connection with the players.

Management wanting more than is reasonable for the cost is also far too common in modern business.

karekiz

My thoughts as the only sane reason:

ESO was dying. It was losing more subs than gaining. So they *****Knee Jerked***** a response to fix the bleeding. It won't work, but I have played other MMO's that had the exact same thing happen after they started losing players.

CP 2.0 system turned out to be lackluster slot the same 4 things and thats it while at the same time increasing grind for newer players and offering no unique gameplay for it at endgame.
Companions are well not going to keep people playing
New trials are something most people do a couple times and never again.
Chapters with card game as feature.

We have essentially gotten nothing big since Elsewyr.

Marto

Lykeion wrote: »

However, ZOS must recognize the problem that the 8.1.0 adjustments were too large and out of touch with the player base, including plenty of adjustments that were not requested and had no clear reason for modification. In fact, most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0. ZOS needs to explain in more detail what happened with 8.1.0, who led this part of the design, who was responsible for it, what his/her rationale was for making these changes, and whether it has changed since the end of this terrible public test, rather than being more vague. I believe this is the only way to regain player confidence. Losing player confidence is a disaster for any game.

That's exactly what the PTS is for, no?

It's for releasing adjustments that ZOS themselves know aren't perfect. But they aren't sure which way to go about them.

I doubt anyone in the combat team felt 8.1.0 was perfect. Some devs probably thought removing the scaling of LA was over-nerfing. Some devs probably thought that having 2s ticks on ground AoE was not going to make a noticeable difference. They probably had the exact same arguments we forum users had.

It's why it was released for testing. It's why they asked for feedback.

And 8.1.2 , 8.1.3, and 8.1.4 are the answer to that feedback.

ZOS' answer was :

"You're right, oakensoul was overnerfed in mid to end-game PVE. We'll follow your suggestion and add slayer and aegis to it."
"You're right, light attacks not scaling is too much of a nerf for low-tier players. We'll make them scale again, but with different calculations."
"You're right. Making everything 30s makes the combat to slow. But we think having some things be 30s does help accessibility a lot. Plus, we think having some abilities be short and some long makes the game less repetitive."
"You're right, reducing damage of LA/HA makes HA builds too weak. Here's a reworked empower to help with that. But now it only works with HA, since we think the damage of LA on 8.1.3 is on a good spot."

You're saying "most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0." as if that's a bad thing. When that is exactly how the PTS is supposed to work.

VaranisArano

Marto wrote: »

Lykeion wrote: »

However, ZOS must recognize the problem that the 8.1.0 adjustments were too large and out of touch with the player base, including plenty of adjustments that were not requested and had no clear reason for modification. In fact, most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0. ZOS needs to explain in more detail what happened with 8.1.0, who led this part of the design, who was responsible for it, what his/her rationale was for making these changes, and whether it has changed since the end of this terrible public test, rather than being more vague. I believe this is the only way to regain player confidence. Losing player confidence is a disaster for any game.

That's exactly what the PTS is for, no?

It's for releasing adjustments that ZOS themselves know aren't perfect. But they aren't sure which way to go about them.

I doubt anyone in the combat team felt 8.1.0 was perfect. Some devs probably thought removing the scaling of LA was over-nerfing. Some devs probably thought that having 2s ticks on ground AoE was not going to make a noticeable difference. They probably had the exact same arguments we forum users had.

It's why it was released for testing. It's why they asked for feedback.

And 8.1.2 , 8.1.3, and 8.1.4 are the answer to that feedback.

ZOS' answer was :

"You're right, oakensoul was overnerfed in mid to end-game PVE. We'll follow your suggestion and add slayer and aegis to it."
"You're right, light attacks not scaling is too much of a nerf for low-tier players. We'll make them scale again, but with different calculations."
"You're right. Making everything 30s makes the combat to slow. But we think having some things be 30s does help accessibility a lot. Plus, we think having some abilities be short and some long makes the game less repetitive."
"You're right, reducing damage of LA/HA makes HA builds too weak. Here's a reworked empower to help with that. But now it only works with HA, since we think the damage of LA on 8.1.3 is on a good spot."

You're saying "most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0." as if that's a bad thing. When that is exactly how the PTS is supposed to work.

Kind of, sort of, not really?

Another way to look at it is that ZOS very quickly realized that their original patch notes were going to hit their goal of lowering DPS but weren't going to hit the mark of improving accessibility.

They made changes to improve accessibility, but the problem is that those were sweeping, nonstandardized, bandaid fixes. They are the sort of quick fixes that ZOS can ship on August 22nd to tide players over until Update 36.

Example: skills and sets that grant Empower were not rebalanced nor standardized to account for the new buff effect. PVPers just get zero buff vs other players, which is not taken into account in skill costs.

Example: a flat 10%(ish) health nerf to Vet bosses and bannermen in dungeons and trials, which does not take into account Arenas, hugely varying difficulty of Vet content i.e. Fungal Grotto vs DLC dungeons, or the feedback of end game players pointing out the real sticking points in some of these encounters.

These aren't thoughtful, standardized fixes that are "done right the first time." We can all see where these fixes leave skills, sets, and content in bad shape that's going to mean further fixes and more change fatigue in future updates. Update 35 needs more time in the oven, but the Devs are very likely to serve it up Live.

Marto

VaranisArano wrote: »

Kind of, sort of, not really?

Another way to look at it is that ZOS very quickly realized that their original patch notes were going to hit their goal of lowering DPS but weren't going to hit the mark of improving accessibility.

They made changes to improve accessibility, but the problem is that those were sweeping, nonstandardized, bandaid fixes. They are the sort of quick fixes that ZOS can ship on August 22nd to tide players over until Update 36.

Example: skills and sets that grant Empower were not rebalanced nor standardized to account for the new buff effect. PVPers just get zero buff vs other players, which is not taken into account in skill costs.

Example: a flat 10%(ish) health nerf to Vet bosses and bannermen in dungeons and trials, which does not take into account Arenas, hugely varying difficulty of Vet content i.e. Fungal Grotto vs DLC dungeons, or the feedback of end game players pointing out the real sticking points in some of these encounters.

These aren't thoughtful, standardized fixes that are "done right the first time." We can all see where these fixes leave skills, sets, and content in bad shape that's going to mean further fixes and more change fatigue in future updates. Update 35 needs more time in the oven, but the Devs are very likely to serve it up Live.

Well, I'm not really arguing about whether a specific change or answer to feedback is good or not. The point of what I'm saying is that it's fine for 8.1.0 to be flawed, incomplete, and need of tweaks. Because what the PTS is for.

ZOS probably had many different drafts of what could have become 8.1.0. They had to choose which to release for testing. Does it make more sense for them to release what they believe is the "better" and "more complete" draft? Or the draft that's more internally more controversial and in need of changes? The latter, of course.

I'd be far more scared if ZOS released an 8.1.0 that in their mind was "perfect", and 8.1.1 - 8.1.4 changed nothing. That would actually be a sign of a developer who is unwilling or unable to respond to feedback.

On regards to things like Empower or the nerf to Bosses... Yes, I think those changes were definitely rushed, and needed more time.

The change to Empower is actually pretty dang smart, if you look at how it was implemented.

Here's the situation. I'm going to just use some rough numbers to make the math clearer.

Live:

• Light attacks deal 100 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With empower (+40% LA and HA damage):

• Light attacks deal 140 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 280 damage

These are the numbers that ZOS has to deal with, and they find to be too strong. 8.1.0 makes all of these values not scale, which turns out to be too much of a nerf.

For the upcoming 8.1.3 patch, they decide to re-introduce scaling, and start to look at it internally. Let's call this internal version 8.1.2.9

8.1.2.9

• Light attacks deal 62 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With Empower (+40% LA and HA damage):

• Light attacks deal 87 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 280 damage

Now here's the problem: 62 damage for the unbuffed LA is too low, but 200 damage for unbuffed HA is perfect.
87 damage for buffed LA is too much, and 280 damage for buffed HA is too little.

And here is the solution ZOS came up with.

8.1.3

• Light attacks deal 74 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With New Empower (+80% HA damage)

• Light attacks deal 74 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 360 damage

ZOS essentially baked-in half of the damage of Empower into light attacks. Which improves accessibility by ensuring low-tier player with few buffs still have access to good LA damage, even if they can't reliably get empower, but ensures high-tier player don't get too much LA damage.

And this buffs HA damage builds (which ZOS thought were underperforming, even in Live).

But you are right. As smart as this change was, it was rushed. Sets and skills were not adjusted accordingly, and ZOS forgot to account for medium attacks, which really shouldn't be buffed, if they want the change to accomplish what was intended.

I think ZOS was in a bit of a predicament. They had two options.

A ) Release 8.1.2.9, and create a situation in which empower is still too strong, and HA builds are too weak. High-tier thrives. Low-tier suffers. HA builds suffer more. The game is less accessible. We'll have to wait until november to fix this.

B ) Release 8.1.3, and ensure that LA damage is well tuned for all tiers. High-tier is brought down. Low-tier is brought up. And HA builds are now strong. But a lot of item sets make no sense, and there's accidentally a weird interaction with medium attacks.

ZOS decided to go for path B. They considered that to be the lesser of two evils.

chessalavakia_ESO

Marto wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

Kind of, sort of, not really?

Another way to look at it is that ZOS very quickly realized that their original patch notes were going to hit their goal of lowering DPS but weren't going to hit the mark of improving accessibility.

They made changes to improve accessibility, but the problem is that those were sweeping, nonstandardized, bandaid fixes. They are the sort of quick fixes that ZOS can ship on August 22nd to tide players over until Update 36.

Example: skills and sets that grant Empower were not rebalanced nor standardized to account for the new buff effect. PVPers just get zero buff vs other players, which is not taken into account in skill costs.

Example: a flat 10%(ish) health nerf to Vet bosses and bannermen in dungeons and trials, which does not take into account Arenas, hugely varying difficulty of Vet content i.e. Fungal Grotto vs DLC dungeons, or the feedback of end game players pointing out the real sticking points in some of these encounters.

These aren't thoughtful, standardized fixes that are "done right the first time." We can all see where these fixes leave skills, sets, and content in bad shape that's going to mean further fixes and more change fatigue in future updates. Update 35 needs more time in the oven, but the Devs are very likely to serve it up Live.

Well, I'm not really arguing about whether a specific change or answer to feedback is good or not. The point of what I'm saying is that it's fine for 8.1.0 to be flawed, incomplete, and need of tweaks. Because what the PTS is for.

ZOS probably had many different drafts of what could have become 8.1.0. They had to choose which to release for testing. Does it make more sense for them to release what they believe is the "better" and "more complete" draft? Or the draft that's more internally more controversial and in need of changes? The latter, of course.

I'd be far more scared if ZOS released an 8.1.0 that in their mind was "perfect", and 8.1.1 - 8.1.4 changed nothing. That would actually be a sign of a developer who is unwilling or unable to respond to feedback.

On regards to things like Empower or the nerf to Bosses... Yes, I think those changes were definitely rushed, and needed more time.

The change to Empower is actually pretty dang smart, if you look at how it was implemented.

Here's the situation. I'm going to just use some rough numbers to make the math clearer.

Live:

• Light attacks deal 100 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With empower (+40% LA and HA damage):

• Light attacks deal 140 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 280 damage

These are the numbers that ZOS has to deal with, and they find to be too strong. 8.1.0 makes all of these values not scale, which turns out to be too much of a nerf.

For the upcoming 8.1.3 patch, they decide to re-introduce scaling, and start to look at it internally. Let's call this internal version 8.1.2.9

8.1.2.9

• Light attacks deal 62 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With Empower (+40% LA and HA damage):

• Light attacks deal 87 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 280 damage

Now here's the problem: 62 damage for the unbuffed LA is too low, but 200 damage for unbuffed HA is perfect.
87 damage for buffed LA is too much, and 280 damage for buffed HA is too little.

And here is the solution ZOS came up with.

8.1.3

• Light attacks deal 74 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 200 damage

With New Empower (+80% HA damage)

• Light attacks deal 74 damage
• Heavy attacks deal 360 damage

ZOS essentially baked-in half of the damage of Empower into light attacks. Which improves accessibility by ensuring low-tier player with few buffs still have access to good LA damage, even if they can't reliably get empower, but ensures high-tier player don't get too much LA damage.

And this buffs HA damage builds (which ZOS thought were underperforming, even in Live).

But you are right. As smart as this change was, it was rushed. Sets and skills were not adjusted accordingly, and ZOS forgot to account for medium attacks, which really shouldn't be buffed, if they want the change to accomplish what was intended.

I think ZOS was in a bit of a predicament. They had two options.

A ) Release 8.1.2.9, and create a situation in which empower is still too strong, and HA builds are too weak. High-tier thrives. Low-tier suffers. HA builds suffer more. The game is less accessible. We'll have to wait until november to fix this.

B ) Release 8.1.3, and ensure that LA damage is well tuned for all tiers. High-tier is brought down. Low-tier is brought up. And HA builds are now strong. But a lot of item sets make no sense, and there's accidentally a weird interaction with medium attacks.

ZOS decided to go for path B. They considered that to be the lesser of two evils.

You might want to double check that. My testing seems to indicate light attack damage was moved down across the board rather than increased at the base with reduced scaling. PTS is on Europe Mode so my testing isn't a direct character copy and I might have messed up but my tank on live seems to out damage my tank on the pts with light attacks.

aurelius_fx

Marto wrote: »

snip long post

nerfing light attacks does not makes the game more accessible to anyone
heavy attacks was an issue in PVP because of a very specific playstyle

PTS could have been way more productive if it wasnt just about 3 weeks of just fixing all those uncalled outrageous random changes that happened at week one, players still asking for even more to be reverted

sure, it's meant to be used for testing, but common sense needs to desperately come into play, especially after your entire community immediately rejects the entire idea - instead, time was wasted going in circles, still half baked and undesired

Jaraal

People have been asking for harder overland for years. Well, this is ZOS’s answer. Tie one hand behind your back and get back in the fight.

IZZEFlameLash

Jaraal wrote: »

People have been asking for harder overland for years. Well, this is ZOS’s answer. Tie one hand behind your back and get back in the fight.

I was just thinking this too, maybe this is their answer perhaps just like how they just flat nerfed HoTs because many people didn't even bother mentioning 'crosshealing' being the actual problem. Still doesn't make it ok though.

Circumfission

It is almost as if we are dealing with a dev team that [snip] edits or deletes user posts to remove criticism points they're afraid of addressing

Glantir

Zos kinda forgot

https://imgflip.com/i/6pllaw

prof_doom

Marto wrote: »

You're saying "most of the work from 8.1.2 to 8.1.4 was spent on fixing the massive damage caused by 8.1.0." as if that's a bad thing. When that is exactly how the PTS is supposed to work.

The problem is that they cut off your arm, and now they're sticking band-aids on the stump, and then act surprised when you're not happy about it.