Not impressed with Infinite Archive

FlopsyPrince · February 11

Tedious activity I was forced into since I wanted the endeavors and don't do Trials nor hunt horrors in Imperial City.

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest. Not impressed.

I dislike it less than Tales of Tribute, but that is not saying much.

Pixiepumpkin · February 11

I feel the same except I enjoy ToT more (against NPC's, not players, I wont play against players).

It was fun for about two weeks (not playing every day, probably 5 runs) then it just got old. I legitimately do not see the appeal. Its the same mobs, same fights, same drab look.

And what I don't understand are things like this:

"Cant have wayshrines in homes because we wont see players"
"Cant have writ dudes in homes because we wont see players"
"Cant have Brahgus playing ToT in homes because we wontt see players"

Lets make a dungeon that keeps people inside of it for 8 hours at a time, so we don't see players.....

Ph1p · February 11

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest.

Was that a dragon by any chance? You need to block the conal "fus-ro-dah" heavy attack to avoid the knock-back. Just in case you change your mind about IA or are funneled back into it by endeavors or something else...

Dragonredux · February 11

Ph1p wrote: »

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest.

Was that a dragon by any chance? You need to block the conal "fus-ro-dah" heavy attack to avoid the knock-back. Just in case you change your mind about IA or are funneled back into it by endeavors or something else...

Could also be Rakkhat with him having the design of running to the gold pads near the edge of the arena and him having one Knockback move.

The boss arena is truly the one big design of IA I don't like. I feel like they put many bosses with as many knockback abilities as possible so you get a cheap death falling off the platform. It's even worse with the 3 dragons because they take 80% of the platform and all it takes is one mistimed block from the Unrelenting force or the wing slap.

AvalonRanger · February 11

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Tedious activity I was forced into since I wanted the endeavors and don't do Trials nor hunt horrors in Imperial City.

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest. Not impressed.

I dislike it less than Tales of Tribute, but that is not saying much.

100% agree. Boring and meaningless.

I slay the 4th arc boss and finished it with my nice DD partner as the tank.
But most of IA set is really terrible than other set. Only arcanist set is meaningful for me.
Actually say, overland set or dungeon gear are far more useful.

Only house decoration item Lead was good.

Sarannah · February 11

Love the IA, and I'm not even a meta or endgame player! It's just fun to see how far you can go.

I do get the IA is not for everyone though, but nothing really is.

PS: Kind of indifferent about ToT, don't really love it and don't really hate it. Made it to max rank, and now I'm done with it. Can be fun at rare times though. (only played against NPC's)

Kite42 · February 11

I tried it for the first time today. Finished the first bit (killed a boss and got a chest) and then got called away by the missus. Come back and I'm timed out of the game. What?!

So you can't leave it, but also can't save your progress. Terrible design. Remove from endeavours, please.

XSTRONG · February 11

I think IA is fun and I play it alot but its lacking rewards for those that are not housing players, most are just furnishing.

ToT i have played like 1 or 2 matches since they release it dosent interest me at all.

fizzylu · February 11

I got sick of IA within the first couple days of it's release. Meanwhile, I surprisingly do ToT stuff relatively regularly.... but that's because I do at least find the rewards from it and it's achievements worth the time. All of the IA rewards are pretty meh, even the stuff from the achievements, and the new outfit styles that will start dropping there being class restricted is just another reason to not do it.
I also think ToT is just a far better done feature.... IA feels messily thrown together and like it's missing something because I just kind of mentally check out after doing it for a bit.

OsUfi · February 11

I get it, and could enjoy it if it didn't take so much time. Took my an hour and twenty minutes to finish the second tho'at. So to get a weapon from the sets that'd be about two hours of just IA. I get 30 minutes of game time weekdays, a couple of hours Fridays and Saturdays. So it's a once a week run, at best. Until there's a save state like arenas, it's just a no go for me.

Flipside is, I get that a game that caters so well to casuals could do with more endgame content like this. It's just not for me.

ToT, I went from not minding it when I could patron grab my way to victory against NPCs to utter hatred of it when they made NPCs start using patrons. I can barely beat the novice NPCs. Absolutely not my cup of tea. Did instantly cure me of my completionism though, as I'll never get any of the ToT achievements.

AcadianPaladin · February 11

Like Arenas, I find IA tedious. Not hard because I can't get over the tediousness long enough to last more than about 5-10 minutes. Hard to describe I guess. I love soloing nonDLC dungeons on normal and soloing nonDLC WBs and can do that all day but arenas and IA are just not enjoyable at all for me. Oh well. There's so much good stuff to do in ESO that I don't mind if some types of activities are not for me. I gather a fair number of players like IA so that's good. Same with ToT - tried it and judged it very much not for me.

BlueRaven · February 11

XSTRONG wrote: »

I think IA is fun and I play it alot but its lacking rewards for those that are not housing players, most are just furnishing.

ToT i have played like 1 or 2 matches since they release it dosent interest me at all.

I think that is what is most infuriating about IA. Most housing enthusiasts I know are not capable of doing IA (I just refuse to), so putting housing rewards there feels a bit mean spirited.

Dragonredux · February 11

IA is decent midcore content. It just going to not be much longevity if there's not much to be sold using the fortunes on.

I like it but I think most of the grief is the knowledge gap between bosses. Compounded with the fact like I mentioned above, the boss arena isn't the greatest.

harvey07 · February 11

IA and ToT are useless to me as well. i tried the starter quest for both but never completed either of them because i thought was too long and boring and especially since the rewards in IA did not match the time spent....and i still never even completed the starter quest after being in there for so long.

i just skip anything that requires them.

Treselegant · February 11

I occaisionally run IA so I can get companion armour when the merchant there has the right type but I have to listen to a podcast or have something else on in the backround because it's pretty boring. I've never gotten past arc 3 because the mobs suddenly have way more health and having to slog through that isn't fun for me and I rapidly lose all my threads due to inattention. Also, by the time I've gotten to arc 3, my hands are starting to ache and my backside has gone numb, so add that to the boredom factor.

As for ToT, I prefer to pretend it doesn't exist.

KlauthWarthog · February 11

The idea is fine, but I still have not bothered trying to grind it because there are just way too many trash waves between bosses.

BloodyStigmata · February 11

It needs a lot more enemy variety and a helluva lot more visual variety for it to maintain my interest. Maelstrom Arena does both of these things better and it should be the other way around since IA is "infinite."

Four_Fingers · February 11

I found it OK except for the small boss platform with a dragon taking up the whole platform and falling to my death a lot.
If they would fix that one thing by making the platform a little larger would make a huge difference.

nwilliams2107b16_ESO · February 11

I did it 50 times to get the mount for my Arcanist, will never set foot in there again!

FlopsyPrince · February 11

Four_Fingers wrote: »

I found it OK except for the small boss platform with a dragon taking up the whole platform and falling to my death a lot.
If they would fix that one thing by making the platform a little larger would make a huge difference.

My end wasn't the dragon, but the nasty guy who kept blasting the entire platform and bouncing me off. Maybe I could have jumped (?) to avoid that, but it is non-trivial and very annoying/frustrating.

Perhaps I will care about the mount later, but I have enough mounts now so probably not.

Ph1p wrote: »

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest.

Was that a dragon by any chance? You need to block the conal "fus-ro-dah" heavy attack to avoid the knock-back. Just in case you change your mind about IA or are funneled back into it by endeavors or something else...

It wasn't a dragon, but maybe I should have blocked.

Some prince I recall. VERY annoying.

FlopsyPrince · February 11

Sarannah wrote: »

Love the IA, and I'm not even a meta or endgame player! It's just fun to see how far you can go.

I do get the IA is not for everyone though, but nothing really is.

PS: Kind of indifferent about ToT, don't really love it and don't really hate it. Made it to max rank, and now I'm done with it. Can be fun at rare times though. (only played against NPC's)

You love it but are indifferent and don't play it?

fizzylu · February 11

BlueRaven wrote: »

I think that is what is most infuriating about IA. Most housing enthusiasts I know are not capable of doing IA (I just refuse to), so putting housing rewards there feels a bit mean spirited.

As someone who loves housing and takes combat very seriously, IA is still a miss for me and the other housing enthusiasts in my life. Most (if not all) of the furnishings are not that great since Zenimax had to go so hard on the Apocrypha/Arcanist theme with all of it. It's really a feature that has little to offer in general, I'd say. Even the weekly vendor doesn't have a great selection usually. They might have one thing I want per week, most of the time not even that though.

ElderSmitter · February 12

I've only stepped into IA once when someone wanted to show me it. I love Dungeons and Trials and even Solo daily content but for some reason have no urge whatsoever to visit IA. It does nothing for me whatsoever but Cheers to those who Love it! I would even rather run an Arena b4 IA.... At lease in an Arena, you can get a Perfected Weapon. I have no use for the IA sets either. They are terrible.

MidniteOwl1913 · February 12

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Tedious activity I was forced into since I wanted the endeavors and don't do Trials nor hunt horrors in Imperial City.

And the one I just faced that ended me is one where it kept knocking me off the platform before I could finish the 4th cycle, I assume resetting my quest. Not impressed.

I dislike it less than Tales of Tribute, but that is not saying much.

I don't like IC either but I tried it to avoid the IA. Turns out there are a lot of regular PVPers there on a Saturday night. The ones in my alliance weren't interested in the horrors and although I can solo them I can't do that while avoiding enemy players. So IA it was. It's been awhile for me but still sooo boring, still so frustrating. Boss 4 was forgotten the bugged, still bugged. I was hiding behind the pillar, still died. Hiding behind the pillar he killed me thru the pillar! That's never happened before. So I had to start over. I was going to do the daily but at that point I had run out of time and only did the one boss to finish the endeavor. Honestly I don't think it was worth it. I don't need 15 seals that much.

Smitch_59 · February 12

I hate IA because I suck at combat. I can't do it, nor can I do vet dungeons or trials. Been playing since 2015 and I still suck. I hate that I can't complete any difficult content. It makes me want to quit the game altogether.

SeaGtGruff · February 12

I haven't been as enamored with the Infinite Archive as I originally hoped I'd be, mostly because my two main characters aren't "gud enuf" to kill all of the Arc 1 bosses and the first Tho'at-- most of the time I don't even get to the first Tho'at.

It doesn't help that my approach is to leave once I lose my first thread, treating IA as a sort of "perma-death" challenge, since I'm not into grinding the same content to figure out mechanics. I'm happy to wait to fight a given boss another day-- unless I'd gotten it down to 20% or less of its health before it wiped me, in which case I might rez and immediately try again.

Ironically, I've had fun fighting the Arc 1 mobs and the bosses I've been able to kill, which seems to be the part of IA that most players seem to hate because they think it's too easy and boring.

Last night I finally managed to kill the first Tho'at. The fight took a long time because of how little damage I do, but now I think I'll at least be able to enjoy IA a bit more.

On the other hand, I died during the first mob fight of Arc 2 after a Marauder appeared. I did manage to stay alive for a while, but I wasn't putting much of a dent in the Marauder, so that wasn't much fun. Arc 1 seemed a lot more fun to me.

The_Boggart · February 12

Is there somewhere that explains the IA.

What are the objectives
What are the rewards

belial5221_ESO · February 12

The_Boggart wrote: »

Is there somewhere that explains the IA.

What are the objectives
What are the rewards

Objectives - clear each stage
Rewards - mostly set gear can find in zones and junk,rarely new sets that are only usable by certain classes

FabresFour · February 12

Well, for me it has been a fun activity since its launch. Generally challenging myself, together with a friend of mine, tends to be an extremely rewarding activity and the weekly rewards on the watchling store are very good. From Monster Masks that are super expensive, to leads that are quite boring to acquire normally.

Not to mention the mount and the pet that you can get inside the archive, which made me very happy.

shadyjane62 · February 12

I tried to get in once. Couldn't figure it out. Decided it was not for me.

Araneae6537 · February 12

I mostly enjoy it — the Archive relaxes me in a way, clears my head of other things. I like that I can go however far I go I get currency so it doesn’t feel like I HAVE to do a lot or it’s not worth it. That said, to me, the only worthwhile rewards besides the currency are the furnishings and plans — which is fine for me since I’m not only into housing but like the Apocrypha aesthetic. The gear though… I feel like more gold or currency or transmute stones or something would be better than overland gear and I wish the class sets were better — maybe even meta for a particular role on a class — and didn’t have the VFX.

Those saying it is too hard — it really does get easier if you keep at it and if you’re not doing it with another player, having a companion tank really helps a lot! I had trouble getting to and past Tho’at 1 at first and switched to a much tankier build, but then the other day I accidentally went in with a more glass cannon dps build and was amazed at how much easier it was than when first I tried, primarily because I know what to expect, what enemies hit hardest, etc.