Studio Director’s Message Key Points
Maintenance for the week of April 7:
• ESO Store for maintenance – April 10, 12:00PM EDT (16:00 UTC) - 3:00PM EDT (19:00 UTC)
• ESO Store for maintenance – April 10, 12:00PM EDT (16:00 UTC) - 3:00PM EDT (19:00 UTC)
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BlueRaven✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭A lot of red flags for me in that letter. Basically dropping the only thing that I care about (new zones) while emphasizing things that I don’t.
I pay for eso+ AND get the new chapter every year. And now…? What am I here for exactly?
What am I supposed to do in this game now? Just farm things seasonally? In areas I either cannot nor wish to solo because of difficulty?
Ugh… [insert expletive.]20 -
OtarTheMad✭✭✭✭✭
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Just to clarify, no one said we are not doing things like this anymore. They just won’t be packaged under a chapter. We still plan on story content, music, world activities, etc. We’ll have more info to share in April.
Thanks for clarifying but honestly I think this is the one time where being more vague and trying to hype up some information in April might be a wrong move. We need more information because this is a huge change. So many questions and 4-5 months to wait for answers?
Just my opinion though.18 -
LadyGP✭✭✭✭✭
✭A lot of red flags for me in that letter. Basically dropping the only thing that I care about (new zones) while emphasizing things that I don’t.
I pay for eso+ AND get the new chapter every year. And now…? What am I here for exactly?
What am I supposed to do in this game now? Just farm things seasonally? In areas I either cannot nor wish to solo because of difficulty?
Ugh… [insert expletive.]
Content is still coming, the game will get more difficult, and new "experimental" things will be added to the game.
Just because they are adding/doing things you don't care for doesn't mean the rest of us don't.
Shoot, look at the PvP community. 6 years with now new Cyro content. A lot of old school pvp'ers are already talking about coming back in some discords I'm in. There is "hope" again.. so to speak for some of us. Yeah, some people have long moved on and won't come back but.. for those of us who are still here... we are stoked.
No change they make will make 100% of people happy. But for as tough on ZoS as I have been the last year or so I'm going to give them credit - this is a nice change and I'm really excited to see what comes of it.LadyGP/xCatGuy
PC/NA5 -
LonePirate✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭I am intrigued by the Cyrodiil changes. New class specific skills for PVP is a lot of work given there are seven classes. A new class requires 15 base skills, 3 ultimates and 12 passives. I would estimate at least 3 new skills per class. These changes and all of the necessary back-end work with the new campaign/disabling current skills is probably the reason there is no 2025 chapter. Keep in mind they have previously said that chapter work begins up to 2 years before it goes live so they have been working on the new content delivery schedule for at least six months. Or they will be reallocating work on the now cancelled 2025 chapter to other areas.
Having played the game and Craglorn at launch, I am not convinced this tougher content is anything more than a monkey’s paw for players. Regular players largely hated the higher Veteran level zones and Craglorn was certainly not new player friendly. I think increasing the difficulty of end bosses for delves might be good but looking at how infrequently world bosses in the chapter/DLC zones are played now, I am skeptical that wide scale tougher content is a good idea.
I guess we’re not getting Q1 dungeons this year so it will be over a year for new dungeons when the next ones (one?) arrive. The end game player loss will pick up if that remains true. The same goes for a June trial if it is delayed. It sounds like they have plans for new quest content which is good but the health and growth of end game content (both PVE and PVP) will make or break the game from a longevity perspective.
It’s certainly clear to me now why they cancelled the 10 year US meet up.5 -
Personofsecrets✭✭✭✭✭
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Just following up on this. We have new content coming in 2025. We have our normal Q1 content for 2025 (we’ll touch on that next month), and April will have details for the rest of 2025. So it will not be a write off regarding content.
New Tales of Tribute confirmed. I'm still working in a Dibella patron to share.3 -
BlueRaven✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭DenverRalphy wrote: »
Where was it mentioned that they're dropping new zones?
“ 2025 will be a mix of old and new as we move the dev team towards creating smaller bite-sized pieces of content.”
Yeah, great. New “bite sized” zones I suppose.with a smaller bite sized development team, I guess. Terrific. Exactly what I was looking for. /sarcasm18 -
Lyraen_Skyforge✭✭✭✭✭
✭Personofsecrets wrote: »
New Tales of Tribute confirmed. I'm still working in a Dibella patron to share.
score!!!
that’ll definitely bring in hoards of new players!3 -
LadyGP✭✭✭✭✭
✭LonePirate wrote: »I am intrigued by the Cyrodiil changes. New class specific skills for PVP is a lot of work given there are seven classes. A new class requires 15 base skills, 3 ultimates and 12 passives. I would estimate at least 3 new skills per class. These changes and all of the necessary back-end work with the new campaign/disabling current skills is probably the reason there is no 2025 chapter. Keep in mind they have previously said that chapter work begins up to 2 years before it goes live so they have been working on the new content delivery schedule for at least six months. Or they will be reallocating work on the now cancelled 2025 chapter to other areas.
Having played the game and Craglorn at launch, I am not convinced this tougher content is anything more than a monkey’s paw for players. Regular players largely hated the higher Veteran level zones and Craglorn was certainly not new player friendly. I think increasing the difficulty of end bosses for delves might be good but looking at how infrequently world bosses in the chapter/DLC zones are played now, I am skeptical that wide scale tougher content is a good idea.
I guess we’re not getting Q1 dungeons this year so it will be over a year for new dungeons when the next ones (one?) arrive. The end game player loss will pick up if that remains true. The same goes for a June trial if it is delayed. It sounds like they have plans for new quest content which is good but the health and growth of end game content (both PVE and PVP) will make or break the game from a longevity perspective.
It’s certainly clear to me now why they cancelled the 10 year US meet up.
Reading the section in Matt's letter he said "PvP-specific (and more performant) skills". I am not reading this as "new skills" - although they could add a few.
To me this means they know that certain skills are causing the degraded performance. There was a period there where Azureblight bombs would literally cause my machine to bluescreen under specific conditions. Throw in heal stacking and what not.. there are just so many calculations going on at one time.
So take a bunch of skills out of the mix that cause problems, bump up some current skills so they work better in pvp groups, etc. and what not.
No doubt there is going to be a lot of work here. I'd love to see them really utilize battle spirit and add it to sets. This would allow them to balance sets for pvp and pve differently. I'd also like to see them remove like... 50% of the sets no one uses anymore or anything. Free up even more server space/calculations.
Either or.. the fact they moved to seasons and have opened the gates to experiment is awesome. It's going to take time.. things are going to work.. some are going to go very bad.. but they are trying and I appreciate that.
One thing I would ask is when they try new things.. if they decide to take it out... they communicate in depth the reason behind it. What worked about it what didn't etc. Solicit feedback and outside ideas from people who play the game daily.
Expand into the communication.. embrace it and dive deep into it. Some conversations may be hard... but overall I think we are headed in the right direction and I'm pleased with this letter.LadyGP/xCatGuy
PC/NA4 -
licenturion✭✭✭✭✭
Just to clarify, no one said we are not doing things like this anymore. They just won’t be packaged under a chapter. We still plan on story content, music, world activities, etc. We’ll have more info to share in April.
Well that is good I suppose. So are you going to sell a ‘year pass’ instead of an expansion? Are seasons like Diablo where you have to restart every season to get the rewards? So many things are not explained here...
However this is very bizarre way of communicating. You drop basically a bomb shell of news on the community and will clarify the details in 4,5 months?
The fact that you had to post several times in a short span about this clearly shows this was not the way to deliver news of this kind of magnitude. Especially when clarifications are almost 5 months away. This just gives people a reason to speculate for months or don’t invest financially if there is an uncertainty. Just my 2 cents…Edited by licenturion on December 17, 2024 8:19PM20 -
LadyGP✭✭✭✭✭
✭licenturion wrote: »
Well that is good I suppose. So are you going to sell a ‘year pass’ instead of an expansion?
However this is very bizarre way of communicating. You drop basically a bomb shell of news on the community and will clarify the details in 4,5 months?
The fact that you had to post several times in a short span about this clearly shows this was not the way to deliver news of this kind of magnitude. Especially when clarifications are almost 5 months away. Just my 2 cents…
I think Matts letter a nice PR way of addressing current challenges this year has faced and a way they plan on handling them.
It's a "hey we want to give you a heads up this is coming.. but as for the specifics of the content we want to wait to do our global reveal". Global reveals/season reveals are important for PR and pushing new players into the game. If they didn't give anyone heads up and dropped the bomb on us then everyone would be asking questions like they are right now instead of focusing on the specifics of the content that was unveiled - which would not drive new players.
As for them coming into this thread.. this is them improving communications. They are immediately stepping in and clearing up any confusion before it goes off the rails - something we all have been asking for.Edited by LadyGP on December 17, 2024 6:17PMLadyGP/xCatGuy
PC/NA3 -
Destai✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭Just to follow up here. The changes here are to make us more agile and produce more engaging and varied content. So from our prospective, it is not us "going into maintenance" but rather being able to address several concerns the player base has noted over the years.
For the record, I don't consider this maintenance mode. To me, that's what happened with Guild Wars 1 and I don't think we're there. Yet.
But, I can see why this is worrying for some, which I'll detail in a reply to Matt's letter.
Definitely different perspectives to be had on what "maintenance mode" means. The whole "more agile" thing indicates smaller team sizes needing a better fitting release cadence. At least in my experience. And, if things are done using Agile methodology, things are usually broken down into smaller deliverable chunks. That delivery method federates through the release cycle where there's no more monolithic, waterfall like releases.
So, simple question, and maybe it's more for Matt, but...has the team size increased, decreased, or stayed the same?1 -
the1andonlyskwex✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭"Seasons" feels like a code word for less real content, more FOMO, and a good excuse to switch to a different game.20 -
LadyGP✭✭✭✭✭
✭
For the record, I don't consider this maintenance mode. To me, that's what happened with Guild Wars 1 and I don't think we're there. Yet.
But, I can see why this is worrying for some, which I'll detail in a reply to Matt's letter.
Definitely different perspectives to be had on what "maintenance mode" means. The whole "more agile" thing indicates smaller team sizes needing a better fitting release cadence. At least in my experience. And, if things are done using Agile methodology, things are usually broken down into smaller deliverable chunks. That delivery method federates through the release cycle where there's no more monolithic, waterfall like releases.
So, simple question, and maybe it's more for Matt, but...has the team size increased, decreased, or stayed the same?
I think I remember reading somewhere that some of the original ESO devs have been put on the next game so I'd assume that there is a much smaller dev team compared to when this game launched.
Total assumption on my part there and I doubt we would ever get an official acknowledgment but yeah... the teams got to be smaller now, right?LadyGP/xCatGuy
PC/NA5 -
OsUfi✭✭✭✭✭
✭I am here for this and absolutely stoked.
New Dark Brotherhood and Thieves Guild content? Yes please!
New Cyrodiil, absolutely!
Overland difficulty tweak, yes yes yes!
Craglon V2 mini edition, give it to me!
Heck, even improving the crumby Guild system, yes yep yar!7 -
BenTSG✭✭✭✭LatentBuzzard wrote: »Moving to seasons is a big red flag as if they're not selling an annual chapter upgrade, they're going to be trying to make that money up elsewhere. So how are they going to try and monitise seasons ? Via battlepasses ? If they start monitising via battlepasses then does that mean they're going free to play ? What's the alternative ? That we suddenly have to start paying for individual seasons several times a year ?
You raise a very good point. After reading the letter, I am on a mixed bag about this. On one hand, having new things being added to exsisting zones and the possibility of expanding on exsisting things like DB and TGs to name two potentials seems quite fun and a nice way to potentially lead the world 'forward' in a sense of the world progressing. On the other hand, the thought of *how* this will happen worries me an awful lot. I never even considered the cost, but I can tell you one thing for certain, these seasons best be perminent additions to the game, and if they are going to charge to access them, it best be a fraction of the cost of a full chapter.
Much like with everything else ZoS has said, we can only wait with baited breaths to see how well it's implemented.2 -
colossalvoids✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭More agile development is what was asked for quite some time already, especially in the light of companies like ggg for example getting exposure lately and how quick to action those are, not being afraid with difficult implementations etc. people want companies to actually do something, that sounds pretty far from maintenance mode, last 4-5 years felt more like it honestly with stuff pre baked for 2 years ahead.4 -
sarahthes✭✭✭✭✭
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Reading the section in Matt's letter he said "PvP-specific (and more performant) skills". I am not reading this as "new skills" - although they could add a few.
To me this means they know that certain skills are causing the degraded performance. There was a period there where Azureblight bombs would literally cause my machine to bluescreen under specific conditions. Throw in heal stacking and what not.. there are just so many calculations going on at one time.
So take a bunch of skills out of the mix that cause problems, bump up some current skills so they work better in pvp groups, etc. and what not.
No doubt there is going to be a lot of work here. I'd love to see them really utilize battle spirit and add it to sets. This would allow them to balance sets for pvp and pve differently. I'd also like to see them remove like... 50% of the sets no one uses anymore or anything. Free up even more server space/calculations.
Either or.. the fact they moved to seasons and have opened the gates to experiment is awesome. It's going to take time.. things are going to work.. some are going to go very bad.. but they are trying and I appreciate that.
One thing I would ask is when they try new things.. if they decide to take it out... they communicate in depth the reason behind it. What worked about it what didn't etc. Solicit feedback and outside ideas from people who play the game daily.
Expand into the communication.. embrace it and dive deep into it. Some conversations may be hard... but overall I think we are headed in the right direction and I'm pleased with this letter.
I see it as every nb has the same, curated skillset in PvP. Same with every sorc and every dk and necro etc.
They just need to add in curated gear for PvP and then it would be good.2 -
o_Primate_o✭✭✭I read it on full. I'm hopeful. Hopefully seasons will be something engaging for the full season and not something that can be completed in a weekend. I'll shut down my negativity until then.Xbox NA as o Primate o2
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o_Primate_o✭✭✭I hope they shake up the holiday events with new quests. Thanks for harder overland content. Some ppl say they'll leave bc of it, so maybe consider a overland hard mode setting that maybe has its own instance?Edited by o_Primate_o on December 17, 2024 6:55PMXbox NA as o Primate o2
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zaria✭✭✭✭✭
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Only played WOW seriously as in other MMO but the standard way is to release new expansions every second year.allochthons wrote: »My concern comes from some ignorance on how a lot of MMOs work.
My impression is that "Seasons" often mean that you essentially start over, and work for a goal for X months, but then lose all your progress (except the shinies) at the end.
So you end up basically re-leveling a toon every few months.
Can someone clarify? This is just what I hear (and very probably misunderstood) about Overwatch or other things, ESO is the only MMO I've ever played.
If it's more like a huge, longer Golden Pursuit, then, well, okay, but not great. I still want ESO to fill in large swaths of the map.
Although more activity in the base game zones is welcome. As is bug fixes.
This adds an new landmass who tend to be larger than ESO chapters even adding the DLC overland zone but WOW has simpler graphic and not voiced side quests. This raises the level cap and the new quest reward gear is better than your old raid rewards. So you start over in the new zone. This don't work for ESO, they tried it in the start, raising CP levels and so on.
It did not work so they went for one Tamriel who has worked well I say.
Its no way they can walk it back.
Not read it yet but just to put that to rest, now it could be something like battle passes who fits a bit with the golden pursuits.
Grinding just make you go in circles.
Asking ZoS for nerfs is as stupid as asking for close air support from the death star.0 -
tsaescishoeshiner✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭LatentBuzzard wrote: »Moving to seasons is a big red flag as if they're not selling an annual chapter upgrade, they're going to be trying to make that money up elsewhere. So how are they going to try and monitise seasons ? Via battlepasses ? If they start monitising via battlepasses then does that mean they're going free to play ? What's the alternative ? That we suddenly have to start paying for individual seasons several times a year ?
I'm curious, too. It means that instead of one big predictable "Gold Road" marketing push, there will probably be a "Season of the Bosmer" or "Season of the Mages Guild" type of push, which I can see appealing to some players. There's still something exciting about a new Chapter or Expansion to many MMO players, but I also like that they're focusing on improving systems to keep players around.
And they haven't said anything about battlepasses, just seasonal release schedule for new zones, stories, and systems. "Battlepass" implies a lot of other things that don't fit with what they've said, and I think is just jumping to conclusions. Seems like we'll hear more next year.PC-NA
in-game: @tsaescishoeshiner3 -
Sakiri✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭Only played WOW seriously as in other MMO but the standard way is to release new expansions every second year.
This adds an new landmass who tend to be larger than ESO chapters even adding the DLC overland zone but WOW has simpler graphic and not voiced side quests. This raises the level cap and the new quest reward gear is better than your old raid rewards. So you start over in the new zone. This don't work for ESO, they tried it in the start, raising CP levels and so on.
It did not work so they went for one Tamriel who has worked well I say.
Its no way they can walk it back.
Not read it yet but just to put that to rest, now it could be something like battle passes who fits a bit with the golden pursuits.
Right now WoW does seasons.
They launched the expansion with 8 dungeons. only four of them are in the random queue, along with four of old expansions dungeons. Next "season", the other four new ones and four different old ones will be in. The mounts, titles, gear awarded by the current season will no longer be available as you will not be able to run the current season's dungeons on the relevant difficulties.
That's the part I'm leery on. They release a dungeon, then take it away for a while, but somehow it's set ends up being something you MUST have. So in order to avoid that scenario, you farm the ever loving crap out of that dungeon til you hate it to fill out the stickerbook so you can pull it out later when it becomes the best set for whatever.6 -
Defatank✭✭✭✭the1andonlyskwex wrote: »"Seasons" feels like a code word for less real content, more FOMO, and a good excuse to switch to a different game.
@ZOS_JessicaFolsom has already stated that "Seasons" are not going to be removed.
ZOS is simply going to be adding more content for players to do as it is ready throughout the year as opposed to waiting each year to dump what the team has worked on for months and then players play that content for 3 mo and then leave. The new design I believe is to try and keep "new" content in the pipe through the year while still having all the other content to complete for new / returning players or even your daily players who decides to switch up some content they're playing.7 -
Integral1900✭✭✭✭✭
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Just following up on this. We have new content coming in 2025. We have our normal Q1 content for 2025 (we’ll touch on that next month), and April will have details for the rest of 2025. So it will not be a write off regarding content.
Yes it will. Remember, we are in the era of modern gaming, which generally seems to translate to as little as possible, as in frequently as possible, the suddenly made as possible. I fear the letter should’ve perhaps gone through a few more revisions before publishing it especially neglecting to point out that the seasonal stuff isn’t just gonna disappear at the end of the season. If I want to contact that just disappeared at the end of seasons I would scuttle off to Diablo four, fire up the necromancer and let the thing play itself. words like season need to be used with great care.4 -
Rogue_Coyote✭✭✭Personally, I would be okay with no new pve related content for a year, if it means attention is focused on years-old issues with the current state of the game.1 -
loosej✭✭✭✭✭If this message had come from a different game studio I would be cautiously optimistic. But since this is a Zenimax Online statement, I'll take a "wait and see" approach.
Don't get me wrong, all the things pointed out could be good changes if done right. But even if they all work out, I wouldn't call them a reason for celebration. Some things are, as pointed out, very long overdue. Fixing them would make a lot of unhappy customers not unhappy, and could even win some old customers back.
But don't expect too many pats on the back for doing things that should have been done years ago. I like that improved Cyrodiil performance and a return to higher pop caps are mentioned. But at the same time it's sad that I'm excited about the possibility that the product I've been paying for for years could maybe, finally work as intended...
I'm also very, very curious to see how many players will become unhappy customers again once we know how all this new stuff will be monetized.6 -
Aurielle✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Very curious to see what becomes of the PVP changes… What precisely is it about current skills that make it impossible to support higher population caps without taking a performance hit? Are we going to see the elimination of things like delayed burst skills? DoTs? HoTs? Also… if we’re disabling PVE skills, are we disabling PVE sets too? Will there be new PVP exclusive sets or loadouts that DON’T force the servers to do intense calculations (i.e. no more sets like Azureblight?) Will the changes discourage things like troll tank builds, bomber builds, and ball groups? Cautiously optimistic to see if they can pull it off, but have a LOT of questions…
Disappointed that there’s no mention of the current performance issues (outside of Cyrodiil), but not surprised.3
