The year of silence

Aldoss · February 20

I was curious to see whether or not I was missing the communication from ZOS and maybe it was just the few echo chambers that I've been frequenting the made me feel like ZOS had stopped interacting with their players on this forum. The Dev Tracker is a really helpful tool to gain insight into this, so I hit it up and sat through page after page to see if maybe I was at fault for not giving ZOS the benefit of the doubt.

However, it seems like that's not the case. Here's the results on the Dev Tracker for our current PTS cycle:

That seemed off. I know that ZOS used to interact much more on these forums, but the years kind of blend together sometimes and I couldn't remember when it was that I noticed a lot of great communication from ZOS. So I sat there clicking "next page" to see when the last time was the ZOS actually interacted with us on these forums to say anything other than make threads or give insight for missed tooltips or answering bug reports...

It's been 12 months exactly since any dev has interacted with the Combat and Classes threads for any patch. And it's not like nothing happened! In the past 12 months, we've seen numerous changes to game mechanics. In no particular order:

"While slotted on any bar" was added to game
Weapon passives were changed dramatically
Melee range was adjusted from 5m to 7m
Arctic Blast was (once again) reverted to a delayed stun
DKs were given access to Major Bezerk
NBs were buffed. All. 4. Patches
Sorc shields were changed to scale off of max hp

This list is only focusing on combat and class skills, too. Many changes to sets have been seen in each of the last year's patches that have dramatically changed the way some of them were used and yet, no ZOS employee ever interacted with the players regarding them. The stark drop off in communication seems particularly odd, especially considering how much public talk there was coming from ZOS regarding their poor communication and their desire to improve it. And by stark I mean stark. Look at how many threads were interacted with by Kevin back in Feb 2023:

There has been a few pop ins by ZOS since then, but the quality of interaction is nowhere near Feb '23 numbers.

Here, in May '23, @ZOS_Kevin clarified some questions about perfect roe and the new filleting mechanic at provisioning stations:

Here, in July '23, Kevin thanks players for finding a missing note on azureblight and jabs:

In August '23, @ZOS_JessicaFolsom responded to a bug thread in the PTS forum:

In September '23, @ZOS_GinaBruno responded to some feedback about the Infinite Archive:

In October '23, Kevin also entered the IA feedback thread:

And finally, on January 30th, Gina entered threads to clarify about siege kits and discuss a bug concerning Cyrodiil:

And that's it for this year! Kevin interacted with more threads in February '23 than ZOS did in the entire 12 months after, leading up to today. These interactions pale in comparison to how this forum used to be treated in the past. It would appear that ZOS has shifted to ONLY interacting with players on the PTS forum via Dev Comments on the changes that they make. This approach, while "easier" in the same sense that texting is sometimes "easier" than speaking on the phone with someone, causes numerous communication issues, a primary one being that Dev Comments only come AFTER they've made a change. Interacting with the players testing these skills via weekly patch notes only serves to obscure and diminish the feedback being given. The literal murder of Stalking Blastbones is the perfect example of this right now. I don't know that many players who play necro, and the ones I've discussed this change with all think that the skill is a joke and a complete failure of a half-baked idea.

It's important to reiterate, sometimes acknowledgement is all that is needed during conflict. Take this comment from Kevin during WEEK 1 of the infamous Update 35 PTS:

Is that not the most refreshing thing to read right now? We're into Week 4 of this PTS and there's some serious, legitimate concerns about some of the skills being forced through this patch. Siphoning Strikes is the most unbelievable buff I've ever seen to an already OP and highly populous class in Cyro. I'd be livid as a sorc main.

[Snip]

Actions speak louder than words and the actions of ZOS leads me to believe that the PTS forum is no longer of any concern of theirs. As a player who wants to see this game succeed, I'd appreciate just being told outright that ZOS no longer cares about my feedback. If that's not true, then I'd love to know why the drop off happened and what will be done to correct it as ESO crosses into its 10th year.

I love this game and I want to see it succeed. I don't expect a direct reply from ZOS every time I, or anyone posts, but it would be really great to be periodically reminded that someone at ZOS sees us, hears us, and is relaying info as it's shared. I'm really frustrated to see necro get crushed for yet another patch cycle and it brings me no joy to open a spoiler on a patch note and be left feeling like whoever wrote it clearly didn't read anything the players posted the week(s) prior to that note.

[Edited for Conspiracy Theories]

acastanza_ESO · February 20

100% Support this thread. Except for tiny tiny adjustments, it really feels like they've completely ignored feedback this cycle.

Estin · February 20

They probably skip the forums because it's so rabid here, but it's only rabid because there's no communication. If they make an unfavorable change and the community provides feedback but they don't listen to it, or when a bug is brought up on Day 1 PTS and it's brought over to Live for several months (Block Bug), it just makes the players more rabid here because it's clear to them that there's no effort to communicate with the player base. I would like to be proven wrong and that they actually do listen to the players real concerns that are mixed in with loud complaints about minor issues like cheese builds getting nerfed, but I've been proven right more than I have been wrong.

Vahndamme · February 20

Gotta talk with the wallet to make them interact. It's sad but it's true. From the time I've been playing till now, it feels like they never ever listened nor actually took real feedback into question.

If they'd just reply that they are working on set problem(s) then the playerbase will already be more satisfied. But they do not. They just let it all go and russian roulette if it actually changes or not.

Aldoss · February 20

Vahndamme wrote: »

Gotta talk with the wallet to make them interact. It's sad but it's true.

FWIW I'm very vocal about the fact that, in 2022, my wife and I spent well over $500 on this game. In 2023, I spent $0.

I will happily open the wallet again when ZOS debuts something worth it.

RoxyPhoenix · February 20

If ZOS was your car servicing station:

ZOS: "We have carried out some repairs on your car:
- You will no longer be able to lift up your seat but we have lowered the suspension so it won't matter.
- We have removed the screen wipers, however, for your convenience, we supplied you with a set of clean cloths.
- We have noticed the car could potentially reach the national speed limit, therefore we've added a speed limiter. [spoiler: you'll still be able to reach the national speed limit if you go downhill]
- Many of the car's QoL features have been adjusted. For instance, the default radio station is now the Country Music station. [yeeehaaaw.]

YOU: Ooookay.. what about the oil leak I've mentioned and the gearbox acting up?
ZOS: ....
YOU: I've also pointed out the left front tire is losing air and the reverse light is burned out.
ZOS: ....
YOU: handbrake, passenger mirror, indicators, any of that fixed ?
ZOS: ....
YOU: ....
ZOS: Thank you for using our service station, that'll be 325$. Come again!
YOU: ..sigh.

Turtle_Bot · February 20

Aldoss wrote: »

Is that not the most refreshing thing to read right now? We're into Week 4 of this PTS and there's some serious, legitimate concerns about some of the skills being forced through this patch. Siphoning Strikes is the most unbelievable buff I've ever seen to an already OP and highly populous class in Cyro. I'd be livid as a sorc main.

Believe me, us sorc mains are livid about this change, especially since it's not the first time this has happened either.

- Major Prophecy/Savagery added to Shadowy Disguise. (Something sorcs have asked/begged to be added to their class kit, for quite literally years now considering how the class HoT functions, and sorc still doesn't have it).
- Spec Bow stacks lasting indefinitely, even out of combat. (Bound Armaments was completely gutted in U35 and the QoL change seemed like a cool way to have BA get its own identity over spec bow, until spec bow got quite literally the same but better QoL treatment.
- Offering, sorcs have been asking for actual non-pet heals ever since ZOS decided shields were too problematic to balance and left them in the gutter for soo long (until U37/now), any time shields got any sort of buffs, there was a nerf to sorc to counter it (streak ramping cost, etc), then NB gets full powered burst heal that is 25% cheaper to use than every other burst heal in the game, and not a single nerf to cloak, let alone any other part of the kit.
- refreshing shadows passive, 15% to all 3 recoveries for merely existing, doesn't even require slotting anything, sorc has to have 2 passives and slot an ability from a specific skill line to get 20/20/10% to their health/stam/mag recoveries respectively.
- Bar space, something that sorc has complained about ever since the removal of overloads 3rd bar, NB keeps getting buffs and secondary effects as well as effects that work on either bar added to their abilities that has given them one of the most efficient bar space in the history of this game. To the point now that NB has literally 1 and a half skill lines worth of passives worth of secondary effects that apply when an ability is slotted on either bar. NB is basically playing with 4.5 skill lines worth of passives while most classes barely have 3 skill lines worth of functional passives.
- Movement speed, this is supposed to be sorcs defense (well used to be), both major + minor expedition on already very loaded skills as well as the generic increase to the ease of access to movement speed completely eroded this option for sorcs and NB has been one of the biggest offenders here when they made movement speed generic on concealed instead of limited to only when in stealth.

And now NB is getting what is essentially dark deal + crit surge rolled into 1 ability that has had all of the downsides
of those abilities removed, while the cost given to siphoning attacks isn't even really a cost considering everything NB has in its overall kit and the fact that its cost gets removed if you don't just spam the ability.

Even many NB mains have questioned why this change is being made, that's how bad the change is and yet still not a peep about it.

I made a thread on the blatant bias/favoritism being shown towards certain classes over the past few years (ever since a certain unnamed dev joined the team).

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/651313/feedback-important-zos-we-need-to-talk-open-direct-and-honest-communication-needed-here#latest

It quite literally asks for communication and genuine discussion on this issue (even in the title), not even a resolution to it, but at least talk to us about it, but literally not a peep from ZOS except to move it from general to PTS.

Many other threads got made over this particular change to siphoning attacks as well, yet nothing but complete silence on those threads too. Not even a "We are aware of these concerns, but this is the direction we want to take these 2 classes" on those threads.

gariondavey · February 20

Excellent post.
@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin please read this thread.

Faulgor · February 20

ADarklore wrote: »

[snip]

Considering that Starfield kinda fell flat, it better be, because ESO is gonna be their cash cow for the foreseeable future.

[edited to remove quote]

Panderbander · February 20

Faulgor wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

[snip]

Considering that Starfield kinda fell flat, it better be, because ESO is gonna be their cash cow for the foreseeable future.

Different studio handling the single player games, but there has been rumor for some time that ZOS has put a significant chunk of resources towards a new MMO. Whether or not that's true, there has been a noticeable decrease in the attention given to ESO.

[edited to remove quote]

Galeriano · February 20

Faulgor wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

[snip]

Considering that Starfield kinda fell flat, it better be, because ESO is gonna be their cash cow for the foreseeable future.

Starfield and ESO were made by two separate companies. Starfield was made by Bethesda, ESO was made by ZoS. They're sister companies both belonging to Zenimax Media which belongs to Microsoft but still not the same company.

When it comes to ZoS they're working on their new triple A IP which will most propably be an open world MMO since like 2018 but we still don't know any more details on what game it will be and when it will be released. Currently it's still in early development stages and they're making new engine for it.

[edited to remove quote]

CrazyKitty · February 20

Jammy420 wrote: »

[snip]

So much this. Thank you. I'd post the "Waaaa waaa waaa" video again if I didn't fear the repercussions for posting the proof, and that's only one example.

[edited to remove quote]

Aldoss · February 21

Please don't get this thread locked by contributing only bashing comments.

I spent a lot of time writing this and actually do want a response from ZOS on it. The more inflammatory the comments get, the more unlikely that result will be.

ZOS used to interact with us. They used to respond in the combat and class skills thread. They haven't for over a year. I'd really like to know why that shift was taken, especially as drastically as it's been. It's like a friend you used to hang out with often, only to find out that they randomly dropped their old number, got a new one, and didn't tell you for a year and you've been texting no one asking what's up.

Turtle_Bot · February 21

Dekrypted wrote: »

Aldoss wrote: »

Please don't get this thread locked by contributing only bashing comments.

I spent a lot of time writing this and actually do want a response from ZOS on it. The more inflammatory the comments get, the more unlikely that result will be.

ZOS used to interact with us. They used to respond in the combat and class skills thread. They haven't for over a year. I'd really like to know why that shift was taken, especially as drastically as it's been. It's like a friend you used to hang out with often, only to find out that they randomly dropped their old number, got a new one, and didn't tell you for a year and you've been texting no one asking what's up.

I wish you the best of luck in getting a response. I've made countless threads and seen countless threads go unanswered. It all seems odd, especially when a new patch comes around and doesn't deliver at all.

Second this, best of luck to OP with this thread. Fingers crossed to see some open communication here.

xDeusEJRx · February 21

I maintain the opinion that the Public Test Server is not in fact made for testing, it's just a "preview" into the patch's testing phase to help ease you into it.

The actual testing goes on the live server because that's usually when rollbacks or changes end up happening.

ZDunlain · February 21

I can feel the OP words one by one, lets see if ZOS read this, butit is very unlikely to happen as it happened before with hundreds of feedback threads.

xNeros · February 21

I hardly ever write or comment anything on the forum despite following quite a few of the threads that go on here, but...

[Snip]. 100% agree, forums and especially the PTS subsection feel completely neglected by ZOS.

Please please, for the love of the RNG-balance-god and the success of this game, interact with your costumers and take feedback seriously. @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin

[Edited for thread bumping]

Jsmalls · February 21

I'm not saying there shouldn't be communication because there should be. And there is a lot of honest she great feedback in this forum.

But this forum probably represents 0.001% of their playerbase. This entire community forum is dead compared to how active it was 5-7 years ago. Id be surprised if there were over 1000 active users on this forum. Let's be real its the same names on every forum page.

Granted it's players that are passionate and care about the game.... But it's hard to commit labor hours (they are a business as well) to such a small portion of their playerbase.

Iuppiterr · February 21

Jsmalls wrote: »

I'm not saying there shouldn't be communication because there should be. And there is a lot of honest she great feedback in this forum.

But this forum probably represents 0.001% of their playerbase. This entire community forum is dead compared to how active it was 5-7 years ago. Id be surprised if there were over 1000 active users on this forum. Let's be real its the same names on every forum page.

Granted it's players that are passionate and care about the game.... But it's hard to commit labor hours (they are a business as well) to such a small portion of their playerbase.

I agree with your points, but maybe thats the whole point. There no people in here because nobody reads it anyway.

gariondavey · February 21

It is a cycle. People feel their input isn't read or considered, they stop using the forums and/or game. Fewer people are there using the forums and/or game, so less input is given.

ItsNotLiving · February 21

I just wish they would explain themselves more. The tiny two sentence explanation on such a massive change to the Necromancer playstyle is definitely not enough. If something is coming with scribing (which I’m 100% sure is why this change is coming) then tell Necro mains there’s something to be excited about. All in all this might actually be worse than the Templar jab changes but maybe not since more people play Templar. Just changing for the sake of changing on their end. I liked the idea SacroBones but the ability is doing way too much and the buff isn’t enough to prop up the whole class full of dead skills.

Jestir · February 21

So my only question is why post this on the PTS and not the general section, you would get far more eyes on it there and this absolutely something that should get more eyes on it?

Panderbander · February 21

gariondavey wrote: »

It is a cycle. People feel their input isn't read or considered, they stop using the forums and/or game. Fewer people are there using the forums and/or game, so less input is given.

Better watch it, I got an official warning for positing this exact sort of thing before. Like almost word for word. It's a conspiracy theory, apparently. I await my next warning for discussing discipline, now lol.

Jestir wrote: »

So my only question is why post this on the PTS and not the general section, you would get far more eyes on it there and this absolutely something that should get more eyes on it?

The PTS section is the section you would most likely expect dev interaction because it is literally the TEST server forum, meaning they should be looking for feedback and info from the players. Otherwise what's the point?

RemoryAzure · February 21

Aldoss wrote: »

I love this game and I want to see it succeed

ZoS might not interact much but they definitely read this forum. they literally implemented someone's feedback for soulcleaver last patch, and this patch they took my and topic starter's idea for damage shields' mechanics.

but it wont succeed, bro, face a reality. this game is too niche and too old. its dying. the only reason its still being played is because there were no big releases in the last years, but thats gonna change in about 2 years. u better have fun now, until its too late

KainedED · February 21

To be honest starting to think social media might be a better way to curate responses with Devs. It's been working wonders with the classic WoW team.

Not comparing apples to oranges but these forums have become an empty echo chamber for the player base where the development team seems content watching people scramble about in a dark room.

I'm going to be honest, in terms of game direction and giving player feedback these forums are practically worthless & pointless it feels.

Best thing these forums are good for is scraping together information and other player findings.

Gray_howling_parrot · February 21

Aldoss wrote: »

Please don't get this thread locked by contributing only bashing comments.

I spent a lot of time writing this and actually do want a response from ZOS on it. The more inflammatory the comments get, the more unlikely that result will be.

ZOS used to interact with us. They used to respond in the combat and class skills thread. They haven't for over a year. I'd really like to know why that shift was taken, especially as drastically as it's been. It's like a friend you used to hang out with often, only to find out that they randomly dropped their old number, got a new one, and didn't tell you for a year and you've been texting no one asking what's up.

I don't believe that many comments are inflammatory. It's just the nature of it - just like in the original post. ZOS simply is devoting more of its resources to things outside of communication. Communication is primarily in the form of developer comments, but not engaging with feedback directly. Don't expect that to change personally.

tincanman · February 21

I've always seen their communications as edicts from the ivory tower. And the forum, I expect, is regarded as a necessary evil tolerated by zos and occassionally useful for 'emergency' data (maintenance, unexpected outages etc - except that one notorious time...), crown store sales, event notifications etc.

But I wouldn't expect much this year other than those pronouncements from on high - I'd imagine they're pretty busy focusing on 10th anniversary stuff to be much bothered with a forum with a narrow subsection of the playerbase represented.

Also the pts always has been and always will be driven by their specific feedback requests for specific data with every other feedback at best 'noted for future reference'. Once something is on pts, it's pretty much going live with minor tweaks - the best players can get out of it is working out what still works or will work going forward; streamers get to use it for their previews of changes and, I suppose, there's always those that are looking for the next exploit way to leverage the incoming changes.

Anyway, this year I'd expect 'feedback' in more diverse formats (social media especially) than forum limited/specific/first because of 10th anniversary stuff.

Other than that, 'communication' is one of those words that clearly has radically different meanings between zos and us, their customers.

ZOS_Kevin · February 21

Hi All,

Just wanted to chime in here. So the dev team does read the forums often, especially during PTS. Over the last few cycles, we've tried communication via the developer commentary sections in the patch notes as it's helpful to address the philosophy around choices being made.

However given the feedback in this thread, while we will continue to do the developer commentary notes, the desire to have more of your direct questions answered is something everyone values. We want to meet this request to go back to some of the direct communication during PTS cycles, so we will do so with the U42 PTS cycle. To set expectations, while we won't be able to answer every question, we will find some of the more commonly asked questions and get those answered. And the bigger bulk of answer will come following week 1 and week 3 of PTS, as those are the weeks most changes occur.

Outside of the PTS cycle, we do answer questions pretty often, however a good portion of them tend to be either specific to the user or contained within a thread, like the Whitestrake's Mayhem blog. However, if there is a greater desire to see some of those conversations in the Dev Tracker, we can accommodate that. It still won't have everything as we also want to make sure those who have alerts tied to the dev tracker are not getting a ton of pings, but we can make a greater effort to have some conversations more visible there.

Lastly, we are working on some additional communication related items for later this year, so we'll update on those when we are closer, but we have some of this on the horizon.

Thanks again for your feedback thus far. Feel free to leave any additional feedback here and we'll review. Thanks!

StihlReign · February 21

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

To set expectations, while we won't be able to answer every question, we will find some of the more commonly asked questions and get those answered.

However, if there is a greater desire to see some of those conversations in the Dev Tracker, we can accommodate that. It still won't have everything as we also want to make sure those who have alerts tied to the dev tracker are not getting a ton of pings, but we can make a greater effort to have some conversations more visible there.

This will be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

CameraBeardThePirate · February 21

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Hi All,

Just wanted to chime in here. So the dev team does read the forums often, especially during PTS. Over the last few cycles, we've tried communication via the developer commentary sections in the patch notes as it's helpful to address the philosophy around choices being made.

However given the feedback in this thread, while we will continue to do the developer commentary notes, the desire to have more of your direct questions answered is something everyone values. We want to meet this request to go back to some of the direct communication during PTS cycles, so we will do so with the U42 PTS cycle. To set expectations, while we won't be able to answer every question, we will find some of the more commonly asked questions and get those answered. And the bigger bulk of answer will come following week 1 and week 3 of PTS, as those are the weeks most changes occur.

Outside of the PTS cycle, we do answer questions pretty often, however a good portion of them tend to be either specific to the user or contained within a thread, like the Whitestrake's Mayhem blog. However, if there is a greater desire to see some of those conversations in the Dev Tracker, we can accommodate that. It still won't have everything as we also want to make sure those who have alerts tied to the dev tracker are not getting a ton of pings, but we can make a greater effort to have some conversations more visible there.

Lastly, we are working on some additional communication related items for later this year, so we'll update on those when we are closer, but we have some of this on the horizon.

Thanks again for your feedback thus far. Feel free to leave any additional feedback here and we'll review. Thanks!

Always good to see a Kevin reply.

I think the big irk most have had with this PTS cycle is the seemingly non-chalant nature of not addressing concerns over something as big as the Necromancer change.

Blastbones, and specifically Stalking Blastbones, was the crux of the class. Developer comments in the patch notes addressed 2 things:

1) Wanting to provide a less intensive rotation for Necromancers as an alternative to Blastbones.

2) Wanting to keep the current playstyle of Necromancer intact.

Tons and tons of Necro players gave feedback that neither of these goals have been met. Necro rotations are even more difficult because you now have to jump through hoops for corpses and keep track of Skull stacks before casting DoTs, and the current burst identity of Necromancer was not kept intact with the loss of the much higher damage of Stalking Blastbones vs Blighted - both morphs are now pressure-based instead of the previous Burst vs Pressure choice.

Developer comments in the patch notes have not addressed these concerns. While I appreciated the comments pertaining to corpse generation, the comment completely ignored the feedback pointing out that the rotation was now much more difficult than the previous Blastbones-every-3-seconds. They also have not addressed the copious amounts of feedback that Necromancer's burst identity is being heavily neutered.

The failure to address these two concerns, which are two of the most prevalent ideas in the feedback given on the Necro change, has been rather agonizing since it makes it feel like the team is taking a "We'll deal with it later" approach.

Thanks for the comment @ZOS_Kevin , I know the amount of stuff you sift through on here must be tiresome.

FlopsyPrince · February 21

Dekrypted wrote: »

A great thread. I've made a couple trying ro get any kind of feedback, but their silence speaks louder than anything else at this point.

I'd go from being able to drop 4 to b 8 hours a day to 5 minutes IF I feel like opening the game. Truly I'm matching their energy.

I still violate my own realization at times, but this is (in my view) a serious flaw to ESO and ZOS. Players and participants here (significant overlap) don't really feel like they have any input back into the process.