PTS Update 46 - Feedback Thread for Subclassing

ArchMikem

Erickson9610 wrote: »

I really appreciate the reference to all of the Companions in the Subclassing quest!! I had a double take when I saw a name I recognized show up here.

...how does this person know ALL these companions? Most if not all of them are not famous whatsoever. Zerith isn't even from this Era.

sarahthes

Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »

madmufffin wrote: »

gorynych_88 wrote: »

madmufffin wrote: »

Subclassing isn't going to kill the endgame. It's going to raise the floor for a lot of people who haven't been able to take that step up and open up a whole new realm of possibilities for those at the top of the endgame. If your definition of the endgame is solely getting a checkmark on your Pithkas, then your definition is the issue and not subclassing.

"Subclassing" (it's not subclassing as greatly pointed up here, it's multiclassing and without limits it's just stupidity) will exactly kill the endgame in trials and PvP if they will go the way they already started. They should right now refuse of nerfing class abillitites, set that ones they changed back, and think about just limiting skills power on apply for non-native classes. It's the only way to keep at least some balance somehow. If they will prolongue to move this way they move now it will be the sad and awful fatality for the gameplay and not the light you want to see for some reason.

PS: Ideally if add this updates - it should be only 1 skill line allowed to change and not more, and some weakenings for abilities themsleves (like many people already offered in dedicated topics and here) but only when you use it on another class, not for the base ability. Caus it's the worst ever idea but x2 even - to break original unique class spells (that became usable again only last years after all the experiments with DoTs, weapon skill lines etc etc)... It means from the very start that you won't play pure classes as you played before even close and you could play ONLY with damn hybrids (out of running delves and quests ofc). Even when CP were reworked and any other changes of mechanics (even worst ones) for years weren't affect characters power that noticeable as it already seems will be this time. So I just wondered how changes like this could be even started by devs from straight breaking class powers and how some players can not understand these simple things.

Yet several scorepushing WR holding groups, tri prog groups, and hm prog groups are all excited to have new and refreshing gameplay to build strats around to change how they've approached certain content for years. But sure endgame is gonna die because damage went up

By several you mean one and a half that’s left

There's at least five on PC NA, though obviously of varying degrees of accomplishment. With about 40-45 different members between them.

PrinceShroob

ArchMikem wrote: »

..how does this person know ALL these companions? Most if not all of them are not famous whatsoever. Zerith isn't even from this Era.

Yeah, that was a bit weird. Bastian is a glorified babysitter for the son of an aristocrat, Isobel is barely a fully-fledged knight, and so on. Azandar is the only one who might be recognized in-world and he's probably more infamous for his conflicts with other academics.

Vaqual

The RP benefit that comes with swappable class lines is just outstanding. Some people say it makes no sense lore-wise, but I'd absolutely say the opposite is true. A character can have a past, multiple influences or have acquired an understanding of multiple types of magic or combat styles. Some combinations allow the expression of a personal story, whereas the base classes almost feel as if all characters were specialist soldiers trained in one of 7 particular ways. If the base classes were more generic that might make sense, but they are already so arbitrary and footed so loosely in the TES lore that they just always felt out of place. The subclassing is in my opinion an immense blessing for people who orient their characters in a RP inspired way.

Example 1: A player wants to play as a daedra hunter templar in need of power, who has been instrumentalized by Mora for a purpose that still aligns with the sanctity of his mission. This player might have liked to play as a pure arcanist or templar to express this, but a mixture of both comes much closer to the idea.

Example 2: A player might dislike certain combat loops or animations from one of his skill lines. That can lead to a complete loss of one ore more passives due to a slot/activation requirement. Slotting another, more suitable skill line can fill this gap and allow for a better performance of such a build.

Yes, without balancing some combination will allow for excessive power. Adjustments will be needed in the future. But there is no reason to act as if nerfs are somehow offensive to the player. Playing a clearly out of line setup is a conscious decision. If it gets toned down in the next patch and resources are lost on gear, that should not come as a surprise. There is also no guarantee or divine right for anything to be optimal or meta. Any build can become the best by tweaking single digits in coefficients and modifiers. The meta and build homogeneity are always at odds with true build diversity. Restrictions may give less creative players the illusion of build diversity and choice, because they feel like they are doing something different when they are playing the same meta builds on different classes. There is this complete mental disconnect between having fun in an RPG & beating the challenge and just pushing numbers & following the expectations of other players. Of course there will be situationally stronger and weaker builds with this larger selection and players are more responsible for their own "fun". But at least players can pick now, with subclassing, what is actually fun to them, instead of playing compromise classes and jealously clamoring for the goodies of other classes.
In my opinion this is worth upsetting the balance for a while and this doesn't mean that fair fights and good challenges can't be preserved or restored. Challenge is important, but any game can be challenging. I can play tetris if I am just looking for a challenge. An RPG needs good roleplay elements to thrive, and customization is the key to that - be it in terms of cosmetics or gameplay. So while I am strongly against "dumbing down", trivializing or "accessibilizing" the game, the RPG experience takes precedence. I am willing handle a bit of pain in exchange for the ultimate build freedom.
If I were a new player that knows nothing about the game and I was to decide between a game where my characters class can be configured to my liking, and a game with 7 presets, I'd probably never choose the ones with the presets.

sans-culottes

Vaqual wrote: »

The RP benefit that comes with swappable class lines is just outstanding. Some people say it makes no sense lore-wise, but I'd absolutely say the opposite is true. A character can have a past, multiple influences or have acquired an understanding of multiple types of magic or combat styles. Some combinations allow the expression of a personal story, whereas the base classes almost feel as if all characters were specialist soldiers trained in one of 7 particular ways. If the base classes were more generic that might make sense, but they are already so arbitrary and footed so loosely in the TES lore that they just always felt out of place. The subclassing is in my opinion an immense blessing for people who orient their characters in a RP inspired way.

Example 1: A player wants to play as a daedra hunter templar in need of power, who has been instrumentalized by Mora for a purpose that still aligns with the sanctity of his mission. This player might have liked to play as a pure arcanist or templar to express this, but a mixture of both comes much closer to the idea.

Example 2: A player might dislike certain combat loops or animations from one of his skill lines. That can lead to a complete loss of one ore more passives due to a slot/activation requirement. Slotting another, more suitable skill line can fill this gap and allow for a better performance of such a build.

Yes, without balancing some combination will allow for excessive power. Adjustments will be needed in the future. But there is no reason to act as if nerfs are somehow offensive to the player. Playing a clearly out of line setup is a conscious decision. If it gets toned down in the next patch and resources are lost on gear, that should not come as a surprise. There is also no guarantee or divine right for anything to be optimal or meta. Any build can become the best by tweaking single digits in coefficients and modifiers. The meta and build homogeneity are always at odds with true build diversity. Restrictions may give less creative players the illusion of build diversity and choice, because they feel like they are doing something different when they are playing the same meta builds on different classes. There is this complete mental disconnect between having fun in an RPG & beating the challenge and just pushing numbers & following the expectations of other players. Of course there will be situationally stronger and weaker builds with this larger selection and players are more responsible for their own "fun". But at least players can pick now, with subclassing, what is actually fun to them, instead of playing compromise classes and jealously clamoring for the goodies of other classes.
In my opinion this is worth upsetting the balance for a while and this doesn't mean that fair fights and good challenges can't be preserved or restored. Challenge is important, but any game can be challenging. I can play tetris if I am just looking for a challenge. An RPG needs good roleplay elements to thrive, and customization is the key to that - be it in terms of cosmetics or gameplay. So while I am strongly against "dumbing down", trivializing or "accessibilizing" the game, the RPG experience takes precedence. I am willing handle a bit of pain in exchange for the ultimate build freedom.
If I were a new player that knows nothing about the game and I was to decide between a game where my characters class can be configured to my liking, and a game with 7 presets, I'd probably never choose the ones with the presets.

What if I want to play a Necromancer and not an Elementalist-Thief with a skeleton? The irony is that this diminishes the ability to play single-classed characters with the same degree of power.

Zyaneth_Bal

sarahthes wrote: »

Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »

madmufffin wrote: »

gorynych_88 wrote: »

madmufffin wrote: »

Subclassing isn't going to kill the endgame. It's going to raise the floor for a lot of people who haven't been able to take that step up and open up a whole new realm of possibilities for those at the top of the endgame. If your definition of the endgame is solely getting a checkmark on your Pithkas, then your definition is the issue and not subclassing.

"Subclassing" (it's not subclassing as greatly pointed up here, it's multiclassing and without limits it's just stupidity) will exactly kill the endgame in trials and PvP if they will go the way they already started. They should right now refuse of nerfing class abillitites, set that ones they changed back, and think about just limiting skills power on apply for non-native classes. It's the only way to keep at least some balance somehow. If they will prolongue to move this way they move now it will be the sad and awful fatality for the gameplay and not the light you want to see for some reason.

PS: Ideally if add this updates - it should be only 1 skill line allowed to change and not more, and some weakenings for abilities themsleves (like many people already offered in dedicated topics and here) but only when you use it on another class, not for the base ability. Caus it's the worst ever idea but x2 even - to break original unique class spells (that became usable again only last years after all the experiments with DoTs, weapon skill lines etc etc)... It means from the very start that you won't play pure classes as you played before even close and you could play ONLY with damn hybrids (out of running delves and quests ofc). Even when CP were reworked and any other changes of mechanics (even worst ones) for years weren't affect characters power that noticeable as it already seems will be this time. So I just wondered how changes like this could be even started by devs from straight breaking class powers and how some players can not understand these simple things.

Yet several scorepushing WR holding groups, tri prog groups, and hm prog groups are all excited to have new and refreshing gameplay to build strats around to change how they've approached certain content for years. But sure endgame is gonna die because damage went up

By several you mean one and a half that’s left

There's at least five on PC NA, though obviously of varying degrees of accomplishment. With about 40-45 different members between them.

That’s exactly what I meant, 40 ppl might as well mean 0 in an mmorpg.

tomofhyrule

Another idea that people have been throwing around that could work out to make subclassed builds not so grossly OP but also not let pure builds be obsolete is to specifically adjust passives based on the number of lines players have of a Class.

Currently, every passive has two tiers. I’d say add a third, which would essentially be the unnerfed version we have on Live (particularly for DKs and Sorcs, whose passives got his pretty hard in 11.0.0). But as you trade away class lines, you are also unable to access the power from those passives at full strength and need to take the level 2 or even level 1 passives at maximum.

This would still keep a lot of the power in the skills themselves instead of the interplay between skills and passives that they didn’t originally plan together… like everyone’s current example of Rapid Rot hypercharging Fatecarver with zero investment in the Necro class beyond that single passive.

Another option would be to apply a “with a [insert Class here] skill slotted” or even “for X seconds after casting a [insert Class here] skill” on every Class passive. That would ensure that players would need to slot or even actively use the added Class skills instead of just buying a line only for passives. That could also be another was to shadowbuff unmulticlassed players, as they could get the passive activated by using any of their parent Class abilities, but a subclassed players needs specifically to use something from that line.

ForumBully

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Another idea that people have been throwing around that could work out to make subclassed builds not so grossly OP but also not let pure builds be obsolete is to specifically adjust passives based on the number of lines players have of a Class.

Currently, every passive has two tiers. I’d say add a third, which would essentially be the unnerfed version we have on Live (particularly for DKs and Sorcs, whose passives got his pretty hard in 11.0.0). But as you trade away class lines, you are also unable to access the power from those passives at full strength and need to take the level 2 or even level 1 passives at maximum.

This would still keep a lot of the power in the skills themselves instead of the interplay between skills and passives that they didn’t originally plan together… like everyone’s current example of Rapid Rot hypercharging Fatecarver with zero investment in the Necro class beyond that single passive.

Another option would be to apply a “with a [insert Class here] skill slotted” or even “for X seconds after casting a [insert Class here] skill” on every Class passive. That would ensure that players would need to slot or even actively use the added Class skills instead of just buying a line only for passives. That could also be another was to shadowbuff unmulticlassed players, as they could get the passive activated by using any of their parent Class abilities, but a subclassed players needs specifically to use something from that line.

I don't want this. ZoS, do it or don't do it. Just don't do a watered down version of it.

HalfDragoness

I have not been able to play because I don't currently have room for the game and the PTS on my computer at the same time, however this is my feedback based on what I've been reading here.

Please give a pure class a strength or bonus that they loose if they subclass. Subclassing should be a meaningful decision where choose the strength that comes from access to different skills that were never intended to be paired together or you choose the strength that comes from mastery of one class.
In D&D, for example, any character can multiclass as many times as they want but at the cose of never reaching max level in their original class. The levels of all your classes combined can never be over 20 so your choice is to either focus on your rogue class and become a 20th level rogue, or multiclass and be a 15th level rogue + 5th level sorcerer. You gain access to extra skills and spells but there's a cost. I don't think it's enough to make the cost just the skills points you have to spend to gain and morph your subclass skills in eso.

phantasmalD

sans-culottes wrote: »

ForumBully wrote: »

master_vanargand wrote: »

Let's break the class identities in real world.
For example, a soldier + a doctor + a assasin.
For example, a teacher + a caregiver + a thief.
For example, a white + a black + an asian.
For example, a mammal + a plant + an amphibian.
I know these sound exaggerated, but that's this update.
Oh, strange and mess. this update is stupid.

Ok you know it's possible to learn many things in the real world right? And you know race and species aren't learned right?

The examples given—however strained—do inadvertently prove that one can possess multiple identities at once. That said, I’m reminded of the old aphorism: “a jack of all trades is a master of none.” The irony here is that those who specialize, who deliberately commit to one path or class identity, now risk being structurally disadvantaged. Rather than deepening the fantasy, subclassing threatens to flatten it. A “phantasy,” perhaps—something once coherent that now flickers with contradiction.

What sounds more flexible, more like a jack-of-all-trades:
A ) a tank that can (by a quick gear change) flex into an off-tank, dd, support or healer
OR
B ) a DD whose one big choice is doing damage with a green or yellow beams.

People keep claiming that subclassed classes are more flexible, as if one could suddenly slot more than 10 skills as a subclass.
It is actually the pureclasses who give up power for the flexibility of pivoting their role as the needs arise.

People keep bringing up D&D classes, but the thing is, in D&D class = role. A rogue will never be a heavy armored frontliner wielding a claymore. But a nightblade can be.

Ever since ZoS started to rebalance classes so they can be competent at each role, classes became just reskins.
The real classes of the game are healer, tank and DD.

Vaqual

sans-culottes wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

The RP benefit that comes with swappable class lines is just outstanding. Some people say it makes no sense lore-wise, but I'd absolutely say the opposite is true. A character can have a past, multiple influences or have acquired an understanding of multiple types of magic or combat styles. Some combinations allow the expression of a personal story, whereas the base classes almost feel as if all characters were specialist soldiers trained in one of 7 particular ways. If the base classes were more generic that might make sense, but they are already so arbitrary and footed so loosely in the TES lore that they just always felt out of place. The subclassing is in my opinion an immense blessing for people who orient their characters in a RP inspired way.

Example 1: A player wants to play as a daedra hunter templar in need of power, who has been instrumentalized by Mora for a purpose that still aligns with the sanctity of his mission. This player might have liked to play as a pure arcanist or templar to express this, but a mixture of both comes much closer to the idea.

Example 2: A player might dislike certain combat loops or animations from one of his skill lines. That can lead to a complete loss of one ore more passives due to a slot/activation requirement. Slotting another, more suitable skill line can fill this gap and allow for a better performance of such a build.

Yes, without balancing some combination will allow for excessive power. Adjustments will be needed in the future. But there is no reason to act as if nerfs are somehow offensive to the player. Playing a clearly out of line setup is a conscious decision. If it gets toned down in the next patch and resources are lost on gear, that should not come as a surprise. There is also no guarantee or divine right for anything to be optimal or meta. Any build can become the best by tweaking single digits in coefficients and modifiers. The meta and build homogeneity are always at odds with true build diversity. Restrictions may give less creative players the illusion of build diversity and choice, because they feel like they are doing something different when they are playing the same meta builds on different classes. There is this complete mental disconnect between having fun in an RPG & beating the challenge and just pushing numbers & following the expectations of other players. Of course there will be situationally stronger and weaker builds with this larger selection and players are more responsible for their own "fun". But at least players can pick now, with subclassing, what is actually fun to them, instead of playing compromise classes and jealously clamoring for the goodies of other classes.
In my opinion this is worth upsetting the balance for a while and this doesn't mean that fair fights and good challenges can't be preserved or restored. Challenge is important, but any game can be challenging. I can play tetris if I am just looking for a challenge. An RPG needs good roleplay elements to thrive, and customization is the key to that - be it in terms of cosmetics or gameplay. So while I am strongly against "dumbing down", trivializing or "accessibilizing" the game, the RPG experience takes precedence. I am willing handle a bit of pain in exchange for the ultimate build freedom.
If I were a new player that knows nothing about the game and I was to decide between a game where my characters class can be configured to my liking, and a game with 7 presets, I'd probably never choose the ones with the presets.

What if I want to play a Necromancer and not an Elementalist-Thief with a skeleton? The irony is that this diminishes the ability to play single-classed characters with the same degree of power.

There might be (possibly temporary) disadvantages in pure classes compared to the status quo, but it is far from game breaking on any setup based on the latest patch notes.

opaj

Here's my feedback as of v11.0.0.
For context, my experience is as a player since beta who has all skill lines maxed out on all classes, but generally doesn't do anything harder than soloing a world boss or normal group DLC dungeon.

Did the sublcassling quest teach you everything you had to learn for using this system?
I went into this having already researched all of the information ZOS had released, so I basically ignored the tutorial quest at first. I did replay it this evening, and I'm not sure it really is adequate as an introduction to the system.

• The proposition of what subclassing is seems a little buried sometimes. I appreciate that the quest giver only speaks in an in-universe way, but I doubt I'd even understand what she was offering if I didn't already know about subclassing. Thankfully, there are lots of places outside of the quest that point you too her, so it's probably a non-issue.
• The dialogue is flavorful, but I'm not sure if it's very useful as a source of information.
• If you are playing with tutorials turned off, it seems you don't get any help pop-ups explaining the system. I generally don't need them, but I did get lost in the UI a few times, particularly in the menu to choose which of my current skill lines I was replacing. I think having pop-ups that you have to opt out of specifically would be more helpful here.
• I found the help text itself to be confusing. Writing clear help text will be difficult here, since we're talking about your native class skills, your equipped skills, subclassing skills, skills on other characters, and so on; polishing this text is not a task I envy.
• As an example of the above, this text is from the help file (and I believe is used in the tutorial itself): "To equip a skill lines you'll need to subclass a skill line from another class or master that skill line by achieving rank 50 on that skill line's primary class." I'm not 100% sure what "subclass a skill line from another class" means here--how is that different from equipping a skill line, in which case this reads as "To equip a skill line you'll need to equip a skill line." I also don't think that "master that skill line ... on that skill line's primary class" is very clear, and it's only because I know you need to reach Lv. 50 with a class skill as that class before you can subclass that I (think I) understand what this means. There is a lot of overlapping terminology at play here, and I think it would be beneficial to slow down and explain things in layman's terms, even if it means using more sentences.

As an aside, it was cute how the dialogue referenced the different companions, but I had to scratch my head as to why Bahtra knew who any of these people were. Most of the companions aren't notorious or famous, and I'd argue that some are downright obscure. I suppose this comes down to taste, but it made Bahtra's existence in the world a little less plausible for me.


Is there anything confusing about the UI or the methods to engage with Subclassing?
As I mentioned above, I think the help texts are a little unclear. My first time through, I got confused about when I was selecting a new skill line and when I was choosing the skill line to drop, but with a system this complex, it's fair that there's a learning curve.

How long did it take you to level up a subclassed skill line?
Didn't test, but maybe I'll check it out next build.

Do you plan to use this feature when it goes live?
100%. This feature was at the top of my "Things I Want that ZOS Will Never Do" list, right after spellcrafting/scribing, so you can imagine I'm on cloud nine right now.


Did you have fun experimenting with the system?
Absolutely. A lot of people have been posting about their hard work breaking the game with this system, but I really just want to live out my character fantasy (instead of class fantasy), and this lets me do that.

I'm not a big balance guy, but I do hope some more work is put into balancing the abilities. I'll talk about that more in the abilities thread, but skills like the revamped Merciless Resolve allowed me to buoy up some of my absurd novelty builds. And while I think that's just great, I do see how that's causing problems for balance when players are actually optimizing things.

Please just don't consider applying any blanket nerfs to Subclassing in general, like some folks here have suggested. Even if you find the right nerf that lowers the ceiling, it would be hard to do without lowering the floor, too, and I'd hate to see this system become a way for casual players to shoot themselves in the foot in spectacular fashion.

master_vanargand

Honestly, Arcanist's Fatecarver is the root of all evil in PvE DPS.
Even if Fatecarver is nerfed by 25%, 150k dps seems possible.
Still, Fatecarver will still be used because it is easy to play.

Dino-Jr

Is it possible to add a 'hide other players pets in towns' option? After sub-class is introduced towns are not going to be all that fun to hang out in with giant birds everywhere.

Xarc

I think everything has been said, now the keys are in the hands of the devs.
please update pts

incite

My feedback on subclassing (after 1 week PTS):

Please don't.

Feels bad to just throw out 10 years+ of class identity and everything linked to it gameplay wise, lore wise, etc. for a mix&match concept.

If you want to freshen combat experience, there are other ways to do this.

- add a 6th active skill on 1 or both bars
- have the option to replace your back bar ultimate for a 6th active skill
- add new skills to existing skill lines
- add new weapons (new weapon lines)
- true spell crafting
- ...

Zyaneth_Bal

incite wrote: »

My feedback on subclassing (after 1 week PTS):

Please don't.

Feels bad to just throw out 10 years+ of class identity and everything linked to it gameplay wise, lore wise, etc. for a mix&match concept.

If you want to freshen combat experience, there are other ways to do this.

- add a 6th active skill on 1 or both bars
- have the option to replace your back bar ultimate for a 6th active skill
- add new skills to existing skill lines
- add new weapons (new weapon lines)
- true spell crafting
- ...

Yes, this. Actual subclasses would be so cool to have.

But I’m afraid they went with multiclassing mainly for the reason that it doesn’t require much work compared to other options you presented. Creating new skills and animations is massive work and by introducing multiclassing they basically skip that and make a new feature out of nothing.

Tigertron

It’s easy to blame this on lazy or understaffed or overworked and over expecting on devs, and I agree the game must stay fresh to keep people’s attention.

I think to make it simpler from a dev side maybe tag some skills as not multiclassable. That could keep class identity and nerfs to a minimum. You then need to choose a base class to get the “full power” of that class and bring the other class skill that you have “dabbled” with in the past.

gc0018

The subclass smells like someone in the ZOS is forcing the Devs to achieve it at no matter what cost, generally, by someone has no idea about game development (maybe a finance, management, marketing guy) but eager to make achievement in the position. Many good games/technical companies died this way, I believe everyone can list a handful of them.


ZOS Devs team has 4 options to deal with subclass in current situation:

1-doing nothing and release at current setup,
result: only 4-8 out of 2,187 skill line combination is usable, numerous bugs-like combinations (forever invisible, undead tank etc), pure classes dead, not mention the PVE and PVP.

2-Nerf anything skill line that cause problem,
result: medium amount of work required. nerf storm come to everyone which like U35, may trigger the same massive quit. Also, the nerf storm will last for years, whenever a meta pop, storm comes.

3-Buff all the pure class and increase the difficulty of all PVE context accordingly,
result: massive amount of work required, hard for ZOS to make it on time.

4-Reduce the efficiency of the skilline only when it is used by subclassing,
result: medium amount of work required, need a lot of players to help on PTS. But it requires ZOS to rebuild the relationship with players.

I hope ESO can make it through...

master_vanargand

Weapon skills' damage skills will be almost useless in PvP due to subclassing.
Whirlwind has a new effect skin in the crown store, but a chance to use Whirlwind? Solo PvE? lol.

For example, what if Whirlwind added "While slotted on either bar, you gain Major Prophecy and Savagery"?
Then Whirlwind would be a great skill.
Weapon skills need more Major and Minor buffs.

Dino-Jr

Overall excited for sub-classing but I do have some feedback thats hopefully specific enough to be helpful.

Some general feedback organized by what I find myself mixing in the most:

• Nightblade: Getting access to mobility skills across all classes is a really big quality of life improvement. Nightblade's dash attack in particular is cooler than just about any other similar dash skill. I am very excited to be able to mix in Teleport Strike for PVE as its easily the most fun skill in the game for me. Having access to the Executes and Merciless resolve is great to. Really entertaining and I am hyped about having access to this across other characters.
  
• Warden: Deep Fissure, Growing Swarm, Falcons Swiftness, and Cutting Dive are all great and this is probably the next skill line I am most likely to swap in across various characters. All of its visually interesting like Assassination and none of it mixes in awkwardly. Good 20 second dots, some added vulnerability, and big burst damage. Very fun.
  
• Necromancer: Blastbones and Graveyard. I am going to experiment with these extensively. The graveyard timer limits where I will use it but the skill itself is great and quick to animate. Also like Deep Fissure being able to trigger Blastbones and immediately position for other attack skills is fun.
  
• Sorcer: Crystal Fragements, Haunting Curse, Bound Armaments, and Bolt Escape are the 4 skills from sorcerer I am most interested in having access to on other characters. I would use them more if the passives were fixed. The pets from Sorc are of no interest to me for Sorc or any other characters. I find pets to be visual clutter and highly uninteresting for gameplay personally. The visual assets for the pets look genuinely terrible/distracting. Pets dont fit my perception of Sorcer theme as being primarily a lighting/storm caster. Fragments, Haunting Curse, and Bound Armaments though are interactive and cool to me. Hoping the passives for Daedric Summoning get fixed before release. Below is easily my favorite build in the game, nothing plays quite like it (though some things get close). This is the only skill line change that feels like I am being forced to play a specific way and swap a specific skill line and that feels real bad.
  
  Before: What I want to keep playing
  
  
  
  After: Prefer not to feel 'forced' to use this skill line for sorc (*even though its one of my favorites in the game)
  
  
  
• Templar: Puncturing Sweeps, Focused Charge, and Radiant Destruction are the main draws for me for sub-classing. I very much wish Focused Charge did not have the taunt attached. Such a cool looking entertaining and interactive skill that I would use a variety of places if not for that. I am not a fan of the '6 target' cap on Puncturing Sweeps, it feels awful hitting a 7th enemy but doing no damage at all. Just seems buggy and awkward.
  
• Arcanist: Probably has the skills I am least interested in leveraging across builds because of crux mechanic visual clutter and how it forces you into particular skill combinations. If I use anything it will be from Soldier of Apocrypha for access to defensive skills. It would be nice to have a way to hide the 'crux' visual for Arcanist since sub-classing in their abilities I am not always looking to include a crux spending skill as well. Tome Bearer and Fulminating are cool together especially since you get access to the green weapons visual. Would be great to have an option toggle Crux Tracker to a Status Box bottom right instead of floating triangles, would make me much more inclined to experiment with various Arcanist skills across characters and to play Arcanist more in general. Also having passives dependent on spending crux is a little awkward when your not using spenders etc. Example of what I would want to do below:
  
  Before: Current Build -> Another of my favorites interested to experiment with sub-class changes with Arcanist without crux spend
  
  
  
  After: Prefer to be able to use some Arcanist abilities without spending Crux + Hidden Crux Visual
  
  
  

Main concerns so far are the following:

• The 6 target cap for Templar and Arcanists feels awful/looks bad/plays bad
• Sorc Summoning line passives are a big concern. They should not require having an active pet to get access. I would prefer an across the board nerf to the passives so I can still use them with any of the skills in the line.
• Pet Visual clutter in towns. This is going to be a significant problem.

randconfig

ArchMikem wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

I really appreciate the reference to all of the Companions in the Subclassing quest!! I had a double take when I saw a name I recognized show up here.

...how does this person know ALL these companions? Most if not all of them are not famous whatsoever. Zerith isn't even from this Era.

This person also mentions the many paths and has a similar skin and eye color as Ithelia... PLEASE BRING ITHELIA BACK ZOOOSSSS

Ditronus

Holycannoli wrote: »

After 11 years, after all our theorycrafting, grinding gear, golding gear, learning rotations, they're throwing it ALL out and reinventing the game with their idea of "subclasses"

Subclasses should be like, let's say Path of Exile. In POE you can further specialize your Templar with a choice of 3 "subclasses": Inquisitor, Hierophant or Guardian. I think one of them focuses on buffing elemental damage, another totems and a skill called Arcane Surge, and the last one defense and survival. You're not mixing and matching skills from other classes and throwing all notions of balance out the window, you're further specializing your Templar.

Most games with subclasses have their own name for it (POE calls itAscendancy Classes) and they function more or less the same way: Base class + specialization. It’s not Warrior + Mage or Death knight + Rogue (WoW) because that's asinine and impossible to balance.

They should have given us actual subclasses and specializations instead of this. How about sorcerer subclasses that focus either on pets, lightning damage or damage shields? Proper subclasses would have given us new passives to buff specific aspects of our base class and maybe even given all new skills we haven’t seen yet. We need new skills! This would have been the perfect opportunity but nope.

Forget all that gear you spent time on, none of that counts now. Have to start over again and everyone will be basically the same combination of skills and right now as it stands everyone will want arc + necro. If that combo is nerfed another combo will be clear winner and that's what we will see everywhere.

Plus pure classes are nerfed. If you don’t want to subclass you are penalized. How is that possibly acceptable?

Why, after 11 years, are they reinventing the game? I remember another game that reinvented itself: Star Wars Galaxies. Enough said.

Oh and I forgot scribing, you know that new system that lets us customize our classes already. What’s even the point of scribing after this?

Your idea is drastically better, yet it takes more resources and and time. Apparently, they don't have that kind of budget, which is sad. This whole subclassing idea feels like a community mod. Themes will be all over the place; I want a better necromancer that can summon zombies, not one that has an outdated-looking daedra from 2012 or is shooting cliffracers. Instead of new content, they shuffle stuff around.

Rungar

Ditronus wrote: »

Holycannoli wrote: »

After 11 years, after all our theorycrafting, grinding gear, golding gear, learning rotations, they're throwing it ALL out and reinventing the game with their idea of "subclasses"

Subclasses should be like, let's say Path of Exile. In POE you can further specialize your Templar with a choice of 3 "subclasses": Inquisitor, Hierophant or Guardian. I think one of them focuses on buffing elemental damage, another totems and a skill called Arcane Surge, and the last one defense and survival. You're not mixing and matching skills from other classes and throwing all notions of balance out the window, you're further specializing your Templar.

Most games with subclasses have their own name for it (POE calls itAscendancy Classes) and they function more or less the same way: Base class + specialization. It’s not Warrior + Mage or Death knight + Rogue (WoW) because that's asinine and impossible to balance.

They should have given us actual subclasses and specializations instead of this. How about sorcerer subclasses that focus either on pets, lightning damage or damage shields? Proper subclasses would have given us new passives to buff specific aspects of our base class and maybe even given all new skills we haven’t seen yet. We need new skills! This would have been the perfect opportunity but nope.

Forget all that gear you spent time on, none of that counts now. Have to start over again and everyone will be basically the same combination of skills and right now as it stands everyone will want arc + necro. If that combo is nerfed another combo will be clear winner and that's what we will see everywhere.

Plus pure classes are nerfed. If you don’t want to subclass you are penalized. How is that possibly acceptable?

Why, after 11 years, are they reinventing the game? I remember another game that reinvented itself: Star Wars Galaxies. Enough said.

Oh and I forgot scribing, you know that new system that lets us customize our classes already. What’s even the point of scribing after this?

Your idea is drastically better, yet it takes more resources and and time. Apparently, they don't have that kind of budget, which is sad. This whole subclassing idea feels like a community mod. Themes will be all over the place; I want a better necromancer that can summon zombies, not one that has an outdated-looking daedra from 2012 or is shooting cliffracers. Instead of new content, they shuffle stuff around.

maybe the best bang for the buck theyve ever done. People will be levelling alts and lines again, trying new things and having fun. base game is #14 in sales on steam. It must be having some effect and its not even out yet.

i dont really buy into the class identity thing or the unbalanced 0.1%. For most players it will just be fun. Not to say it dont need tweaks but thats what the test server is for. Im sure theyll figure it out.

silentxthreat

Im checking things out for a pure pvp view point. info we need to know is if the vengeance style of pvp is going live as well? With sets sub class and heal stacking as bad as it is atm balance will be very hard if we dont adjust heals stacks rushing agony and vicious death sets

Zallion

I will mourn this game for what it used to be if this goes live without meaningful limiting factors or diminishing returns for using subclassed skills, or conversely, buffs for not using subclass skills. If there is some way to keep pure classes relevant then I can get on board, but as I see it there is no way they won’t get left in the dust for the metas that are already developing and the worse has probably yet to come. To me this ruins a lot of what I enjoy about this game, and imo ruins the integrity of the game they’ve built over a decade thus far that has been based upon a class system. These skill lines were never meant to be blended. I could possibly get on board with maybe a single skill line, 3rd morphs or maybe a 4th class skill line. I fear the redesigns and swinging balance changes to come are going to result in something unrecognizable. I don’t want to be forced to run an amalgamation of skills from different classes then change my playstyle to remain relevant, nor do I have the time to grind things out anymore. This is not friendly to new players, and this is not healthy for endgame. This is largely targeting single character customization and build versatility, which on the surface is a good idea, but underneath it sacrifices too many other things in order to achieve. What lies in the wake of this going live may as well be ESO2. I hope the correct changes can be put in place to make both camps happy and to make this not a game breaking feature. I care for this game and it’s success, and I know they are going through with this. I hope that they are taking feedback seriously, because I know much of my sentiment here is shared by a lot of people. A few things I would be happy with: disabled in pvp, pvp campaigns with it disabled, or vengeance doesn’t feature it whatsoever. If any of those three things happen I would still play the game. If I’m forced to use this system or lose due to the powerspike that it enables, it may just not be my cup of tea anymore. And that’s okay, players age out of games. But if the population of folks who dislike this update is significant, I hope ZOS doesn’t completely ignore that fact and just steamroll ahead. You’ll have a worse exodus than U35. Balance it. Like you’ve never done before.

xFocused

I play on the PS NA server so I don't get to try out the PTS and see how subclassing works and overall how it's possibly going to look once it goes live.

With that being said, I've been checking this thread weekly, reading everyone's feedback, opinions, watching YT clips of PC players showing duels, parses, etc...And honestly, it's starting to feel like this might be a huge mistake on Zos to consider bringing this live. I'm not sure I'd say scrap it altogether but one of my questions is, who asked for this? I've been playing this game almost since beta and I don't think I've ever really heard or read amongst both PvE/PvP players that they wanted subclasses. Class identity has always been quite popular in this game and now it's just going to be gone.

Honestly, Zos could've implemented so many other options here to keep the game exciting and refreshing. Why not give each class new skills or passives? Why not introduce a whole new skill line altogether for each class to use? And what was the point of scribing now that subclassing will be a thing? They could've just expanded on scribing and added even more scripts and skills to use.

How about a updated Cyro map? Or a auction house for guilds to use? Cosmetic items that drop from world bosses, trial bosses and the like? There's just so many other things that players have been asking for over the years and this sure isn't one of them.

I'm going to at least give it a try because I do love this game and I've been playing way too long to just give up so easily but after talking with multiple guilds on the PS NA server, we're honestly a little worried this might be the nail in in the coffin for us.

Zyaneth_Bal

xFocused wrote: »

I play on the PS NA server so I don't get to try out the PTS and see how subclassing works and overall how it's possibly going to look once it goes live.

With that being said, I've been checking this thread weekly, reading everyone's feedback, opinions, watching YT clips of PC players showing duels, parses, etc...And honestly, it's starting to feel like this might be a huge mistake on Zos to consider bringing this live. I'm not sure I'd say scrap it altogether but one of my questions is, who asked for this? I've been playing this game almost since beta and I don't think I've ever really heard or read amongst both PvE/PvP players that they wanted subclasses. Class identity has always been quite popular in this game and now it's just going to be gone.

Honestly, Zos could've implemented so many other options here to keep the game exciting and refreshing. Why not give each class new skills or passives? Why not introduce a whole new skill line altogether for each class to use? And what was the point of scribing now that subclassing will be a thing? They could've just expanded on scribing and added even more scripts and skills to use.

How about a updated Cyro map? Or a auction house for guilds to use? Cosmetic items that drop from world bosses, trial bosses and the like? There's just so many other things that players have been asking for over the years and this sure isn't one of them.

I'm going to at least give it a try because I do love this game and I've been playing way too long to just give up so easily but after talking with multiple guilds on the PS NA server, we're honestly a little worried this might be the nail in in the coffin for us.

Getting actual subclasses would be cool but what we got is multiclassing and done wrong at that.

xFocused

Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »

xFocused wrote: »

I play on the PS NA server so I don't get to try out the PTS and see how subclassing works and overall how it's possibly going to look once it goes live.

With that being said, I've been checking this thread weekly, reading everyone's feedback, opinions, watching YT clips of PC players showing duels, parses, etc...And honestly, it's starting to feel like this might be a huge mistake on Zos to consider bringing this live. I'm not sure I'd say scrap it altogether but one of my questions is, who asked for this? I've been playing this game almost since beta and I don't think I've ever really heard or read amongst both PvE/PvP players that they wanted subclasses. Class identity has always been quite popular in this game and now it's just going to be gone.

Honestly, Zos could've implemented so many other options here to keep the game exciting and refreshing. Why not give each class new skills or passives? Why not introduce a whole new skill line altogether for each class to use? And what was the point of scribing now that subclassing will be a thing? They could've just expanded on scribing and added even more scripts and skills to use.

How about a updated Cyro map? Or a auction house for guilds to use? Cosmetic items that drop from world bosses, trial bosses and the like? There's just so many other things that players have been asking for over the years and this sure isn't one of them.

I'm going to at least give it a try because I do love this game and I've been playing way too long to just give up so easily but after talking with multiple guilds on the PS NA server, we're honestly a little worried this might be the nail in in the coffin for us.

Getting actual subclasses would be cool but what we got is multiclassing and done wrong at that.

You're right. I keep getting the two worded wrong, lol. Subclassing would be refreshing and fun to try. Multiclassing as what is being tested right now seems to be a move in the wrong direction

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe

Everyone complaining about how there's going to be a meta combo of sub classing... As if there isn't a meta right now of all arcanist full damage dealers. There will always be a meta; at least subclassing is fantastic fun (especially for my supports!) and opens up endgame content for a far bigger audience.