Targeting system

USarmydrew09

I just love how after 2 years. I can stand there trying to do a heavy attack. And my character will just twitch left and right. Or when I have to push the button 4 or 5 to get to do anything. As I said in my comment yesterday I thought it was from PlayStation 4. So I upgrade to a five and still having these major issues. It's no wonder I can't get half the achievements that I go for. Like No death. In some of the dungeons and trials. When I use certain abilities when they actually take A good example, my ultimate. I can see the AA. We light up on the ground but it doesn't do anything. I have to cast it two or three times. And yes I have quick castability on. It's just sad that it's been broken for so land there's only so many times you can report the issue. Can you guys please fix this crap. This is not a bashin this is not to hurt anyone's feelings. Because god knows I posted enough of these here and in get help or even Called. Enough is enough fix it. Fourteen thousand hours of gameplay is what I have and I still can't get some of these achievements

Turtle_Bot

It's not just console, I have this happen regularly on PC as well. Abilities don't fire, light/heavy attacks either don't visualize or don't work, etc.

It is definitely something that gets exacerbated significantly by ping/lag and spikes/instability in those.

Zodiarkslayer

I have these problems as well, on PC. After I switched my Sorc to heavy attack build, I really noticed how bad targeting works for ranged weapons and how dependent it is on camera positioning and objects in line of sight.

However, I adopted by tweaking my camera settings to allow me to better aim with the mouse. For example, with less horizontal offset, the hand-eye-target-coordination works much better for me. It is basically a problem of your brain not using the reticle, but the position your weapon is animated.

Also eleveation. The higher your camera position is above your character, the more you are likely to miss HA/LAs.

The problem with line of sight is that you often cannot determine why your attacks do not land. It's not because you didn't aim well, its usually because an object is blocking the direct line between the reticle and the enemy.

SickleCider

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

I have these problems as well, on PC. After I switched my Sorc to heavy attack build, I really noticed how bad targeting works for ranged weapons and how dependent it is on camera positioning and objects in line of sight.

However, I adopted by tweaking my camera settings to allow me to better aim with the mouse. For example, with less horizontal offset, the hand-eye-target-coordination works much better for me. It is basically a problem of your brain not using the reticle, but the position your weapon is animated.

Also eleveation. The higher your camera position is above your character, the more you are likely to miss HA/LAs.

The problem with line of sight is that you often cannot determine why your attacks do not land. It's not because you didn't aim well, its usually because an object is blocking the direct line between the reticle and the enemy.

I don't think that's quite true, or at least, it's not the full story. I've observed that even when the reticle is on an enemy, skills won't fire. The problem seems to be that the "target" doesn't cover the entire model. It'll be a small zone on the enemy, and as far as I've seen there doesn't seem to be any consistency in the size and location of the target zone.

The symptoms can be quite silly. I often fail to "target" enemies that are the size of a barn because I haven't yet found the target zone on it. I have to float my cursor around on the enemy model until I find it.

I regularly play a Breton and a Bosmer. I find I struggle even more with my Bosmer than my Breton because I have to angle the cursor on an extreme UP on larger enemies. If the cursor is on the feet, knees, or lower torso, it isn't a valid target acquisition.

The absolute worst enemy I can think of is the giant snake in Bad Man's Hollow. The only way I can kill it is by relying solely on ground AOEs. I think there must be some tiny vertebra somewhere in its upper body that counts as the target. It's a real dastard to find.

EDIT: I want to add that interrupts are also difficult to pull off. There seems to be an unforgiving donut zone around enemies. You can fail to initiate an interrupt by being too close to the enemy, and the distance isn't as close as you would think.

@ZOS_Kevin Hey, I'm sorry to tag you here, but as I've been typing this all up I've realized this has been hampering my enjoyment of this game for years. Unfortunately I can't tell you when it started. I do recall, however, that following a patch I asked guild chat if they noticed targeting was really difficult and I received a lot of solemn nods.

I'm on PS5. I was experiencing the same issue on the PS4 as well.

USarmydrew09

I can tell you right now it's been going on 4, 2 years. I have complained about at several times. There's a lot of issues with this game. Some that i've been there since the beginning. For example, if you pick somebody up while you were doing so, an n p c can walk by you and simply push you out the way, but not actually interact with you. This will stop you from picking somebody up. Day one it's been like that.

jtm1018

How about you getting locked out of all your skill, your just locked in a heavy attack posture and nothing is happening.
You try to fire skill, no.
You try to roll dodge, no.
Just nothing no, you just have to die.
Tyvm gg.

Ardriel

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

It's not just console, I have this happen regularly on PC as well. Abilities don't fire, light/heavy attacks either don't visualize or don't work, etc.

It is definitely something that gets exacerbated significantly by ping/lag and spikes/instability in those.

I also often experience that skills don't fire or are delayed. (Pc) Often the appropriate sound effect is played, e.g. the character roars during the ultimate, but nothing happens. Or you hear the potion sound, but no potion is consumed, the mount whistle sound after you hit "h", but you don't mount. Once it was really weird with the healer. I pressed the Ulti button - heard the war horn, but nothing happened. I had to change weapons and then the barrier was cast. I experience the wrong ulti firing relatively often. When it's really bad, I have to press almost every button twice. Doing decent dps is impossible that way. This happens most often in raids. I'm never quite sure whether it's just the server or my computer. Or both.

katanagirl1

Yes I see this too on PS5.

I swear that during trials if other players are between me and the boss that they block my ability to use skills.

I don’t know if this is intentional, but if it is it doesn’t seem right. I have a ranged mag build.

SickleCider

katanagirl1 wrote: »

Yes I see this too on PS5.

I swear that during trials if other players are between me and the boss that they block my ability to use skills.

I don’t know if this is intentional, but if it is it doesn’t seem right. I have a ranged mag build.

Exacerbated by when a trial lead wants everyone to stack up. Okay, let me just spend five minutes finding the already difficult target zone through all the team mates and twilights, thanks. (I no longer do trials for obvious reasons.)

I was in LoM last night and realized that Maarselok's target is his knee. Sure. Why not.

Alinhbo_Tyaka

I think a lot of the skill misfire problems started to occur when ZOS added Stadia support. This moved a number of client functions to the servers making it easier for the server and client to get out of sync for conditions that wouldn't have been a problem before the changes. Since Stadia is dead as a doornail it might be time for ZOS to unburden the servers by returning some of the combat functions back to the client.

madman65

I have had the problem of looking directly in front of me with a target in my reticle and the game would send my skill attack to the left or right. I have been asking over the years for ESO/ZOS to look at the problem but now(maybe?) they will read.

xXCJsniperXx7

This is why you use the Force, not a targeting system.

Necrotech_Master

SickleCider wrote: »

katanagirl1 wrote: »

Yes I see this too on PS5.

I swear that during trials if other players are between me and the boss that they block my ability to use skills.

I don’t know if this is intentional, but if it is it doesn’t seem right. I have a ranged mag build.

Exacerbated by when a trial lead wants everyone to stack up. Okay, let me just spend five minutes finding the already difficult target zone through all the team mates and twilights, thanks. (I no longer do trials for obvious reasons.)

I was in LoM last night and realized that Maarselok's target is his knee. Sure. Why not.

certain enemy models definitely seem to have hitbox issues, usually the larger enemies and usually from the sides (daedric titans, dragons, argonian behemoths)

the worst enemy ive seen for targeting is probably the skeleton boss in graven deep that gets larger if he absorbs the sacrifices, at max size he becomes almost impossible to target with direct attacks

USarmydrew09

I also will note that since the new patch it has gotten worse. Trying to get some of these achievements and my abilities will not proc, Resulting in my death is very frustrating, especially after eight or nine years of this game.

Janni

This is another big part of why I think certain weapons are vastly more popular right now. Since I started playing I noticed a lot of weird and subtle changes in the character controller in general and especially in the targeting of certain abilities. The most annoying to me is light and heavy attacks with 2 handed weapons. Like, I can stand still directly in front of a practice dummy and sometimes miss a heavy attack and then the very next will land. Meanwhile it feels like dual wield and sword and 1 hand light and heavy attacks miss without fail every single time. Destro staves are a mixed bag that sometimes feel consistent but then the skills themselves don't seem to weave properly or just don't seem to sense a target that is directly in line and under the cross hair.

There is also the really constant and annoying problem that the raycast for targeting starts at the CAMERA which means you can actually target things standing behind your toon.

Then there is the fact that corpses seem to have their hit boxes grow to many times their size when an mob dies. I guess this is to help with looting corpses. But it really makes it annoying when I want to see a player's name or health bar but instead the entire field of view is covered by that one dead bug. I don't care if that bug has 0 hp. In fact I generally don't care about ANYTHING or ANYONE with 0 hp unless I'm looking directly at them in order to resurrect them.... speaking of which. It gets really frustrating when you start to res someone and then slightly shift your camera (something you do naturally because it means you are vulnerable and there is obviously danger nearby) and this causes the res to cancel.

I could go on and on about this stuff all day honestly. But I guess dealing with UI/UX as part of my day job makes me notice it a lot more lol

USarmydrew09

I am doing the endless archives. My gear is not working correctly. It keeps acting as if my five *** isn't on so I have to reset it. It does this during a fight. I thought they were gonna fix it when they shut down the servers no. Instead they fix it to where people were not getting double drops. I was just in there and it kicked me out of the dungeon. After spending two hours in there. I was getting ready to get on to level 4 1 2. Had only 1 death And when I went through a portal It put me back in the original zone that I was in. Is when I complain about this to zos Or things like this. It gets to the point where I get angry when nothing has been done for a while. And the only response I ever get from them is that I violate their stupid code. By not talking nicely. I make it removed from the forms. Because there's something in here they may not like to hear. But I don't know how many achievements i've just not been able to do and still can't in eight years because of broken mechanics.

SugaComa

There is a targeting system, for me if I hold square that enemy gets a white halo now certain skill I fire will find that target and not be obstructed or intercepted

Northwold

SugaComa wrote: »

There is a targeting system, for me if I hold square that enemy gets a white halo now certain skill I fire will find that target and not be obstructed or intercepted

Not playing right now so I might be wrong on the key but I think on PC this is tab targeting. Trouble is that it doesn't fully work. It stops you from targeting other enemies within the same line of sight, but it doesn't really seem to let your attacks "home in" on the targeted enemy automatically unless they're already correctly targeted in the reticle. So it works more to stop you accidentally hurting the wrong thing than to help you hurt the right thing.

I do find it weird that in a world of magic you'd have to be staring at your chosen, target locked enemy with a laser sight fixed precisely on their hitbox for your spell to hit them.

But there are other problems. Eg it's not clear why, using tab targeting, we can't hold the mouse button down while moving and have the attack fire when the enemy comes into the right position. As things stand, the skill/weapon will only fire if you press the button AFTER they're in the right position, and that is often not obvious so you press the button and nothing at all happens.

MidniteOwl1913

On the console, I too have noticed this. I can't seem to get my staff to target so I fire off a skill and thin BAM, it all works just fine. Happens pretty regularly.

USarmydrew09

MidniteOwl1913
November 18
On the console, I too have noticed this. I can't seem to get my staff to target so I fire off a skill and thin BAM, it all works just fine. Happens pretty regularly.

When it happens when you are trying to go for an achievement like a no death it can mess up you're whole day. This and a few others has cost me a good amount of achievement over the years. I don't think I am asking to much for them to fix it but when I do I get banned like I am now. Temporarily ban can't post new posts just comment on old ones.

USarmydrew09

SugaComa wrote: »

There is a targeting system, for me if I hold square that enemy gets a white halo now certain skill I fire will find that target and not be obstructed or intercepted

Does not always work that's the problem

CameraBeardThePirate

USarmydrew09 wrote: »

SugaComa wrote: »

There is a targeting system, for me if I hold square that enemy gets a white halo now certain skill I fire will find that target and not be obstructed or intercepted

Does not always work that's the problem

This. Everyone saying "JuST tAB TaRgeT" is being disingenuous at best. The tab target system does very little in terms of actually directing your attacks.

There's an addon called "Target Focus" that will put a square around your crosshairs if the enemy you've tab-targeted is actually going to receive your attacks. You'd be surprised at how often you can have an enemy tab targeted but not actually target that enemy.

It's why things like Chokethorn and Engine Guardian end up being so good in PvP; they soak up way more damage than they have any right to, even when using tab targeting.

USarmydrew09

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

USarmydrew09 wrote: »

SugaComa wrote: »

There is a targeting system, for me if I hold square that enemy gets a white halo now certain skill I fire will find that target and not be obstructed or intercepted

Does not always work that's the problem

This. Everyone saying "JuST tAB TaRgeT" is being disingenuous at best. The tab target system does very little in terms of actually directing your attacks.

There's an addon called "Target Focus" that will put a square around your crosshairs if the enemy you've tab-targeted is actually going to receive your attacks. You'd be surprised at how often you can have an enemy tab targeted but not actually target that enemy.

It's why things like Chokethorn and Engine Guardian end up being so good in PvP; they soak up way more damage than they have any right to, even when using tab targeting.

I'm on the ps5 system. I thought the issue was the p s four so I upgraded. The targeting system does nothing when I highlight the target. And I'm still trying to attack that target. And there's Add in the way it'll still attack the other Ads. I don't know once like on the p c. But that is one of the main issues and abilities. Not working ward when you hit the button once it does ability twice. Or hit the button and the ability doesn't do anything. Or use an ultimate in it just disappear for no reason. Again it's been going on for 3 years If not more it is just stupid at this point.

Alphawolf01A

I've also had these same problems.

But, my personal pet peeve is when a skill, lightning heavy attack or bow shot will veer 90 degrees to one side to hit the 1HP "decorative" critter with ZERO attack ability, because it "clearly" was a higher priority target. (Or it was just closer to me than the real enemy.) And even then, the inconsistency with attack damage, that the "decoratives" are immune to AOEs but every direct attack will almost actively seek them out. Some sort of "Target Priority" needs to be in place so that only targets that are a "threat", IE can actually do damage, will be targeted first. Then, after they have been dealt with will the "decoratives" be allowed to be targeted.

I still get a mild chuckle about the time I was running dolmens. I was in werewolf form and leapt at an enemy, only to sail clear over it's head and land 6 feet behind it, squishing a 1HP centipede. Poor bug never saw it coming!

USarmydrew09

Alphawolf01A wrote: »

I've also had these same problems.

But, my personal pet peeve is when a skill, lightning heavy attack or bow shot will veer 90 degrees to one side to hit the 1HP "decorative" critter with ZERO attack ability, because it "clearly" was a higher priority target. (Or it was just closer to me than the real enemy.) And even then, the inconsistency with attack damage, that the "decoratives" are immune to AOEs but every direct attack will almost actively seek them out. Some sort of "Target Priority" needs to be in place so that only targets that are a "threat", IE can actually do damage, will be targeted first. Then, after they have been dealt with will the "decoratives" be allowed to be targeted.

I still get a mild chuckle about the time I was running dolmens. I was in werewolf form and leapt at an enemy, only to sail clear over it's head and land 6 feet behind it, squishing a 1HP centipede. Poor bug never saw it coming!

Oh I love it when you hard Target the add and you hit your meteor and it does the same thing Squishes the poor little centipede does not even near the group.