West Weald - that's all to explore for the next 12 months?

Shadowbinder7

Warhawke_80 wrote: »

Soarora wrote: »

WhiteCoatSyndrome wrote: »

Soarora wrote: »

SkaiFaith wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

If it was not for the scribing feature it would feel EXACTLY like a Q4 zone DLC.

Also much of the questing involves having completed Necrom beforehand which makes it feel even smaller, it does not feel like an expansion at all.

Soarora wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

If it was not for the scribing feature it would feel EXACTLY like a Q4 zone DLC.

Also much of the questing involves having completed Necrom beforehand which makes it feel even smaller, it does not feel like an expansion at all.

I’m convinced that’s exactly what it is— a Q4 DLC with a little extra padding. This isn’t what we asked for when we said we wanted story arcs, ZOS. Connection to characters is better than with year-long stories but you’re still afraid to kill people and honestly I don’t even like any of the npcs like how I did with Summerset.

Remember that in 2022 with the High Isle and "year story" outrage, when people weren't happy, Zos shifted immediately so we could get multi-year stories.

Necrom + West Weald at that point was likely already developed so it's fair to assume that West Weald was in fact a Q4 DLC, so the "strange dimensions" fit with how we got here.

My theory is reinforced by the fact it has an epilogue quest and everything ends here - no part 3 of the story, it seems... So we have to hope that from next year going on we'll start having more proper Chapters.

That’s exactly what I think happened as well. That said, I edited my post with a rant about Summerset versus Gold Road and honestly, I don’t think story arcs are exactly what we need. What we need is better writing. Summerset is a part of a 3 story arc, yes, but I played Summerset /first/ and it still had a huge impact. Wrothgar I see many people love too (havent done it myself) and that’s also one DLC.

Agree. We got an entirely new Daedric Prince in this story arc and the best I can call it is ‘middling.’

Mhm. We did all that questing just for the world to just be the exact same as before. I had hopes for Necrom, I liked it. Torvesard at least had something to fight for. Yet, now it all blurs together and I don’t even really remember what happened except for a few moments.

That is the problem with ESO more lately than ever...there just is no "consequence" in anything you do.

Log in
do your dailies because you finished the content in a couple hours
Log out

What excitement!

Why can't we have a living breathing world where consequential things happen?

Exactly. We know ESO is an MMORPG, not Skyrim or Fallout 4…

But it’s still a game. As well as trials, dungeons and pvp…

The stories, exploration, interaction, decision making, even most basic quests should be… FUN. Interesting and engaging. Minimising the grinding and “fetch quests”

Relying on the latter to sustain the mmo is, again imho, a recipe for long term decline and sooner rather than later, failure. I’m sure many players like myself don’t want that to happen because we love Elder Scrolls

Shadowbinder7

xclassgaming wrote: »

LucyferLightbringer wrote: »

Expansions keep getting smaller and smaller

no they dont

The past 5 years of evidence says otherwise, see previous comments

tsaescishoeshiner

Players specifically asked for bug fixes and QoL updates instead of new content. Last year, we got the Archive, which is cool repeatable content that we were told might get updated in the future. If they focus on introducing new systems and things to do instead of zones, that would be okay with me. I'm certainly okay with ditching Q3 dungeons if it means more cooler stuff.

Last year seemed thin, and this year seems particularly thin unless the Q3 and Q4 features update housing and PvP in such a way that they make them more playable or rewarding.

I like new zones and dungeons, but ultimately what matters to me is having things to do year-round.

Syldras

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

Players specifically asked for bug fixes and QoL updates instead of new content.

Some. And some others voiced that they find it a shame that regular content is replaced by bugfixes which should normally be done on the side.

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

Last year, we got the Archive, which is cool repeatable content that we were told might get updated in the future. If they focus on introducing new systems and things to do instead of zones, that would be okay with me.

And I would probably still quest a bit on one or two alts, then leave. I participate in other activities, I sometimes run dungeons and Archive (although I don't find it that interesting because it is always the same, and that sentiment won't change for me even if they keep adding new chapter bosses and backdrops each year), I do housing, but that's side activities for me. Without new story content and lore at all, I'm not sure why I would stay.

AzuraFan

dcrush wrote: »

It seems like this DLC is ESO’s version of “shrinkflation” - reducing content but charging consumers the same price.

That's the main thing I don't like about Gold Road. The price.

For me, the amount of content feels similar to High Isle, but only because of the scribing quests. I thought a lot more effort was put into the Gold Road zone itself, in terms of the art and the locations. It's an improvement over High Isle and Necrom, IMO.

Having said that, High Isle and Necrom were skimpy in content compared to Morrowind, Summerset, Elsweyr, and Greymoor. Also Blackwood, to some extent. But the price remains the same,

As far as Firor saying in a letter that they were doing away with the Q4 DLC so they could do better chapters, I never believed that, because very little that Firor says in his letters actually happens. So I take them with a huge chunk of salt.

But the zone itself (West Weald) is well done and I'm enjoying the content that's there. As I said, I think it's better than Necrom and High Isle. However, the amount of content isn't on par with pre-Blackwood chapters, yet we're still being charged the same. That's the only thing that bothers me about it, especially as an ESO+ subscriber who is not getting a Q4 DLC anymore. At least charge a fair price for the annual smaller chapters.

LittlePinkDot

AzuraFan wrote: »

dcrush wrote: »

It seems like this DLC is ESO’s version of “shrinkflation” - reducing content but charging consumers the same price.

That's the main thing I don't like about Gold Road. The price.

For me, the amount of content feels similar to High Isle, but only because of the scribing quests. I thought a lot more effort was put into the Gold Road zone itself, in terms of the art and the locations. It's an improvement over High Isle and Necrom, IMO.

Having said that, High Isle and Necrom were skimpy in content compared to Morrowind, Summerset, Elsweyr, and Greymoor. Also Blackwood, to some extent. But the price remains the same,

As far as Firor saying in a letter that they were doing away with the Q4 DLC so they could do better chapters, I never believed that, because very little that Firor says in his letters actually happens. So I take them with a huge chunk of salt.

But the zone itself (West Weald) is well done and I'm enjoying the content that's there. As I said, I think it's better than Necrom and High Isle. However, the amount of content isn't on par with pre-Blackwood chapters, yet we're still being charged the same. That's the only thing that bothers me about it, especially as an ESO+ subscriber who is not getting a Q4 DLC anymore. At least charge a fair price for the annual smaller chapters.

One word...inflation.
Before covid everything was cheaper. Now ZoS is doing shrinkflation of chapters because they can't raise the price to what it would need to be to give us summerset sized chapters.

AzuraFan

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

One word...inflation.
Before covid everything was cheaper. Now ZoS is doing shrinkflation of chapters because they can't raise the price to what it would need to be to give us summerset sized chapters.

Nah. People pay the same amount (or more!) for houses and cosmetics, so I doubt many would protest if ZOS had to raise the price of a chapter a reasonable amount, as long as the chapters are on par with Morrowind and Summerset. I'd be more than happy to pay a bit more. At least I wouldn't feel like I'm being overcharged.

ArchMikem

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

I am not convinced scribing will be a long term interest.

I'm already over it. I thought the system would allow you to add additional affects onto existing skills, not creating new ones from scratch, which then you'd have to change up your already limited skill bar to find a place for. Solely because of that I have no real interest on using Scribing. I have my Builds sorted to how I want them.

I'm already "done" with West Weald. Only things left are Daily Broker jobs and Antiquities. There's not even that much to explore, like what even is Broken Promises Cave? It's a marker in the middle of a field, there's no Cave! And Rock Bottom Caverns is just an unusable door. Were these put in simply for Oblivion Nostalgia? Why weren't they actually put in the game if you were going to point them out on the map? Exploration is a corner stone of Role Playing Games, I WANT TO EXPLORE.

FlopsyPrince

Shadowbinder7 wrote: »

Warhawke_80 wrote: »

The content...to dollar ratio is making it not worth the purchase going forward... I'll wait for the expansion to go on sale next time.


Really ZoS you should have known that a paltry amount of content in the expansion would be a huge issue for most of us...and that will effect the number of units you sale next time because who wants to shell out Fifty bucks for a couple hours of content? Without enough to do people leave...it's that simple.


Edit: I also want to note that throwing a bunch of AI generated fetch quest at us isn't content...so please don't come back and tell us about the "Hours" of quest you put in. A half-measured expansion such as this should at the very least have sweeping bug/graphic and quality of life fixes...seriosuley what have you guys been doing?



I usually am positive on this forum...but this was a let down

Wow another one, fully agree.

It is my humble opinion, ZOS developers, you should really be scrutinising threads like this and adapting your upcoming expansion/story/content plans to basically…

“Attempt to give more bang for a player’s buck”

Otherwise I feel, simply due to my lore loyalty, I may well be walking in all zombie game zones in less than a year. In other words, more and more players will leave than new players joining. And people will play the game for a shorter period before giving up.

All really sad if you ask me

I have the feeling that ZOS management (who decide what devs should work on) only have this forum as an outlet, not as something they spend much time considering.

FlopsyPrince

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

AzuraFan wrote: »

dcrush wrote: »

It seems like this DLC is ESO’s version of “shrinkflation” - reducing content but charging consumers the same price.

That's the main thing I don't like about Gold Road. The price.

For me, the amount of content feels similar to High Isle, but only because of the scribing quests. I thought a lot more effort was put into the Gold Road zone itself, in terms of the art and the locations. It's an improvement over High Isle and Necrom, IMO.

Having said that, High Isle and Necrom were skimpy in content compared to Morrowind, Summerset, Elsweyr, and Greymoor. Also Blackwood, to some extent. But the price remains the same,

As far as Firor saying in a letter that they were doing away with the Q4 DLC so they could do better chapters, I never believed that, because very little that Firor says in his letters actually happens. So I take them with a huge chunk of salt.

But the zone itself (West Weald) is well done and I'm enjoying the content that's there. As I said, I think it's better than Necrom and High Isle. However, the amount of content isn't on par with pre-Blackwood chapters, yet we're still being charged the same. That's the only thing that bothers me about it, especially as an ESO+ subscriber who is not getting a Q4 DLC anymore. At least charge a fair price for the annual smaller chapters.

One word...inflation.
Before covid everything was cheaper. Now ZoS is doing shrinkflation of chapters because they can't raise the price to what it would need to be to give us summerset sized chapters.

That is just an excuse in this case. I would expect the same would have happened without any of the factors you note, as this has been the direction for quite some time.

TheNuminous1

Meh im cool with it