PTS Update 48 - Feedback Thread for Eastern Solstice

ZOS_Kevin

This is the official feedback thread for Eastern Solstice, mainly focusing on the zone, side quests, and other types of content found in the area. If you have specific feedback on the main story, please visit this thread so others can avoid spoilers. Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

• Entering Eastern Solstice
  • Were you able to get through the wall okay after the Writhing Wall event concluded?
  • Were you able to find the main quest givers to continue the main quest?

• Quests
  • Did you engage with the Main Story?
  • Did you find it easy to get the Main Story quests?
  • Did you engage with any quests outside of the main story? If so, which ones?
  • Did you find any quests to be problematic from either a directional or difficulty standpoint?
• World Bosses
  • Did you fight any world bosses? If so, which ones?
  • Were any of them too easy or too hard?
  • Were mechanics clearly communicated?
• Public Dungeons
  • Did you go into the new public dungeon?
  • Public dungeons are generally balanced for two or more players of average skill and gear. Did you feel sufficiently challenged?
  • Did you go in with or without a companion?
• Zone
  • What did you think of the Eastern Solstice environment?
  • Did you encounter any new enemies you haven't seen before? What did you think of them?
  • Now that the entire Solstice zone has been unlocked, what do you think of the overall process for Seasons of the Worm Cult unlocking access to part of a zone?
  • Do you have any other general feedback?

Freelancer_ESO

Were you able to get through the wall okay after the Writhing Wall event concluded?

I was on a template char so I was able to get thru the wall.

Were you able to find the main quest givers to continue the main quest?

I was able to complete the Eastern Main Quest on the Template char. The Template char got stuck on part of the Main Quest for the West and is unable to turn in Support the Fellowship. I also had spoilers for the West Main Quest in the dialogue of other quests.

Did you engage with the Main Story?

Yeah, I completed the Eastern Section and Bonus Quest

Did you find it easy to get the Main Story quests?

For the East it was

Did you engage with any quests outside of the main story? If so, which ones?

I think I did most of them.

Did you find any quests to be problematic from either a directional or difficulty standpoint?

I didn't have any serious issues. Seaside caves lacked a visual map.

Did you fight any world bosses? If so, which ones?

I fought Zyv with a sizeable group. He wasn't too bad with a sizeable group once you knew the mechanics. I took a bit of a performance hit when the waves occurred.

I didn't bother with the others after him because he looked like he'd be horrible to fight without a larger group and I assumed the others would be similar.

Did you go into the new public dungeon?

Yeah I cleared it with a companion.

Public dungeons are generally balanced for two or more players of average skill and gear. Did you feel sufficiently challenged?

It felt like the difficulty/time to kill varied a fair bit. At one point you go from a boss with like 300k hp (which respawned rather fast) to a boss with six million. The six million wasn't exactly hard but, it was a slog.

What did you think of the Eastern Solstice environment?

I liked that the Hadolid's are continuing to learn magic.

It really felt like the Worm Cult put tons of effort into decorating and that perhaps Tamriel would have fallen if they focused a bit more on other things. Sections of the Worm Cult areas did remind me of stuff from LOTRO so it felt perhaps less new to me than it might have otherwise.

Visually, it felt like significant sections of the Overland areas felt quite similar to other existing Overland areas.

The delves definitely delivered when it came to overall visual spectacle and I liked that you didn't have quite as much of a maze to get the skyshards. However, it did feel that they were a bit less "alive"/interesting than some of the game prior delves to me.

It can kind of feel like the zone is sitting in the past after you clear the story stuff since so much of the zone is about fighting a single faction.

Do you have any other general feedback?

I really liked the choices in dialogue response. I liked the quest where the npc ended up actually dusting a few other npcs. Even some of the really short quests felt interesting enough and made the world feel a bit more alive.


Now that the entire Solstice zone has been unlocked, what do you think of the overall process for Seasons of the Worm Cult unlocking access to part of a zone?

I'm not sure it's an approach that you'd want to take regularly as it can leave players a bit unclear as to what they are buying and the quality of the experience can potentially very dramatically depending on how the work together parts actually end up going on live.

Syldras

So, I finished East Solstice on PTS twice. First time on a template character in week 1. There I needed to do the West Solstice main questline to start the East Solstice one (which was done in half an hour), but except for that, that character had finished no quest content. Second time was now in week 3, on my copied EU main character who has done all quest content in ESO (except for the quests in PvP Cyrodiil, and a few dlc dungeon and trial quests). I wanted to be able to compare how much dialogue options may differ, and also, I wanted to be absolutely sure of the judgement I make.

Talking about time, the quests of the East Solstice questline took me about half an hour each, which means about 3 hours in total. When dialogues are fully voiced (for German, they weren't on PTS yet) and one listens to dialogues, it might take a little longer. Side quests took me maybe 4.5 hours in total, although one was bugged rather early, so I couldn't progress that one this time. I guess that would have been another half hour, so it's roughly 5 hours of side quest content - so 8 hours in total for East Solstice, including the main quest.

To answer questions...

Were you able to get through the wall okay after the Writhing Wall event concluded?

Yes.

Were you able to find the main quest givers to continue the main quest?

Directly after the end of the last Part 1 story quest? Not naturally. I needed to use the "continue zone" thing in the menu to be directed to the next location. Overview is lacking in the Solstice main camp with there being quest markers for different things everywhere.

Finding the quest npcs on the other side of the Wall wasn't hard, though.

Did you engage with the Main Story?

Finished it twice. Review here in the main story thread:
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/8375141/#Comment_8375141

Did you find it easy to get the Main Story quests?

Yes.

Did you engage with any quests outside of the main story? If so, which ones?

All I could find. It were 12; and from those 12, 3 didn't seem to be tied to a locations but strewn about the landscape. Those are easier to miss. I actually think I might have missed a few (Especially the Coldharborized parts of the East Solstice landscape seemed rather empty? So maybe there was something I didn't see? Which again makes me thing this game needs a quest list in the menu somewhere, so you could easily check whether you've found all of them). When exploring, I usually follow all roads (sometimes I even go collect all side quests first before actually doing any of them - did that on my 2nd PTS run this time, took me half an hour just to collect quests following the roads), and after that, I might look at buildings/structures I see on the map that are a bit off the roads, checking whether it might be something of interest.

Detailed side quest reviews following.

Did you find any quests to be problematic from either a directional or difficulty standpoint?

No.

Did you fight any world bosses? If so, which ones?

No. I played alone, and since soloing world bosses might take a whole while, I didn't try.

Did you go into the new public dungeon?

Yes.

Public dungeons are generally balanced for two or more players of average skill and gear. Did you feel sufficiently challenged?

Having played all of ESO's zones, I'd say it seemed to be average public dungeon difficulty when it comes to both mobs and bosses. I didn't fight all bosses, but the ones I fought weren't hard. But they never are. I've been playing this game for 9 years and use gold quality gear sets, though. Not sure if that's what the average player does.

Did you go in with or without a companion?

Without.

What did you think of the Eastern Solstice environment?

Beautifully designed, as always.

Did you encounter any new enemies you haven't seen before? What did you think of them?

Looked fine and plausible, I also appreciate that we got lore books on them.

Now that the entire Solstice zone has been unlocked, what do you think of the overall process for Seasons of the Worm Cult unlocking access to part of a zone?

Splitting the story in two parts felt artificial/constructed. But the main problem is that it reduced the sense of urgency and immersion - you basically rush through Part 1, then have that months long wait, then you rush through Part 2. The whole pace somehow doesn't feel right. Part 1 also led to lots of lore questions or even expectations/theorizing and not seeing any of that in Part 2 getting answered or taking place was underwhelming. But that's something for the main story thread.

I'd rather not see split stories like that again in the future. I'd say I'd rather prefer two seperate shorter stories if there's a plan to release story content both in summer and in winter (Q2 and Q4), but then again, the whole Solstice story unfortunately wasn't long either. The whole thing would have been sufficient as one separate dlc, for the typical story dlc price.

Do you have any other general feedback?

Side quest reviews: Giving a bit of commentary on all side quests I found, in the order I played them now during the second run. I'll usually give the quest name, unless I missed to note it or it was already translated to German, so I don't know the English name. In that case, I'll also add the name of the questgiver in brackets.

A Fullfilled Aim(?) (Ezhkel):
I really liked this one! My second favorite side quest in East Solstice. It was a good start for run 2, and a surprise when I came across it, as I missed this one during the first run. While I'm not sure what to think about the ongoing "humanization" of daedra we see in ESO, I think this character had an interesting background (especially if you have played other content before) and dialogues were well-written. I liked that our class was recognized, I liked the care that went into dialogues, even into lines that only come up if you talk to the character again inbetween quest steps. Some parts were genuinely funny, but not in a silly way. I liked the options we were given in dialogues, although for roleplay reasons I think it would be good to have one for characters who are rather sceptical or negative towards daedra. The "puzzle" at the beginning wasn't difficult, but it was fun nonetheless. The only thing I might criticize a bit is that our character has no dialogue option other than to be hesitant when it comes to "sacrificing" Ezhkel - since my character is very well aware that daedra don't actually die and the process of "killing" them is just needed, and nothing bad or "evil" at all, if they want to get a new body. So there's no reason to whine if a daedra wants to "die" - having our character do that doesn't consider what daedra are and how their "laws of nature" work. Quest took about 20 minutes in total.

Dismantling the Worm Cult(?) (Ojouna): A simple rescue quest (nothing too interesting for me, but I'm fine with a few rescue or fetch quests in each zone, for the sake of variety). I liked that you can make a choice at the end. Quest took less than 10 minutes.

Death Hounds Devotion: I just needed to kill one mob?! This was extremely short and didn't even take 2 minutes in total, including all dialogues. There are random encounters that have more content. It was a bit underwhelming, since I usually expect quests to consist of a bit more. Might have worked as the onset of a longer quest.

Lost Among the Ashes: I really dislike this one. It's a bit sad since location and setting could have made me love the whole thing, but I absolutely dislike how we have no agency about what happens. We get dialogue options to say we spare characters, but they get killed by our "companion" in that story nonetheless - why give us that choice then? I also dislike how the murder of people who have just surrendered is depicted like a funny "joke". And most of all, our character can't even say anything about that. No dialogue options at all, no way to comment on that behavior - rather strange how we're usually supposed to be "the good hero" - would a "good hero" behave like that and just stand back and watch? Same goes for the ending, of course; it's a long quest, 25 minutes or so, and then again, we get an "option" how to treat that one npc, and no matter what we say, it gets ignored and the npcs gets murdered. It could have easily been written as knocking that character out and bringing him to a healer. We know that a cure for vampirism does exist in ESO. And when it comes to the puzzle in that quest: It's fine, but too repetative. Doing exactly the same thing thrice isn't very interesting.

Blood on the Water: A nice and rather long pirate story (over 20 minutes), I liked the story itself, but running back and forth all the time was a little strange. Also how there's always another task more (or two more) that get added. It doesn't feel like a "natural" progress of the story, but more like "Oh, and by the way, also fetch this:" - and that's happening how often during that quest? 4 or 5 times? What I did like was that there was a variety of tasks. Giving the speech was fun. I liked that old quests were referenced. The writing itself was good. The "naval battle" was a bit disappointing since it was just another boss fight, but on a ship - no extra mechanics. I expected a bit more, especially considering what we got in the base game during the Aldmeri Dominion storyline 11 years ago. I also already mentioned it in the bug thread, but: The map of the cave system is still missing.

The Hermit in the Hills: Bringing food to an npc. Done in a minute. A few dialogue options, which I did like (My general stance is: The more choices the better!). It was a nice little quest, I guess, but it didn't really feel meaningful or exciting. To cook soup for a granny, I don't need to play an epic fantasy game.

The quest within Calindvale Gardens that I always forget to note the name of: A straightforward rescue quest. Not very interesting. Took about 20 minutes since the dungeon is big. It looks nice - all dungeons do - , but to really interest me, quests needs more on the story/lore side.

A Traitor's Tyranny: Another straightforward rescue quest. Took me about 12 to 15 minutes, which seems to be the average time for a side quest. Beautiful building, as usual. Lore seemed inconsistent; we've been told that no one has been in East Solstice for 30 or 40 years or so, and then there's this school on the East, with students who, before the Wall, seemed to cross to West Solstice casually all the time?! But no one from the West ever seemed to know about their existence either, despite them being a part of that Altmer College well-known in the West. It doesn't add up.

To Know the Void(?) (Sahmazim): A 5 minute fetch quest. Npc is clearly related to the Dark Brotherhood - why can't our character say anything about that and doesn't get dialogue choices to reflect their stance on this?

Roots in Stone: A nice, longer, well-written quest with a variety of tasks and different dialogue options. Could be one of my favorites from Solstice. Unfortunately, it was bugged both in my 1st and my 2nd PTS run. First time, the bug was near the end, at least, so I can say it took me about 30 minutes or so, and it was generally a nice experience and well-written.

A Cold Grave: Another 1 minute "just dialogue" quest - we saw the spirit of someone's dead husband and got the task to inform the spouse about it. Different dialogue options, including to flirt with the widow who just learnt about her husband's death. I didn't test it, not sure what the reaction would be.

Choice and Consequence: I loved this one! Easily my favorite from East Solstice, and maybe also for whole Solstice (it's in close competition with the Corelanya Manor quest). A long quest (maybe 40 minutes), a variety of tasks, lots of different choices to make, not only in dialogue (had lots of fun with that, though, and tried different things on 2 characters). Different endings, too, I guess? And different paths to get to that point. You can even behave horribly, which I really appreciate, for the sake of roleplaying what ever character we have in mind. I wish we could have chosen to fully go that path (Why not turn Cariel in instead of a disguised Worm Cultist, if we dislike her anyway?). But the direction was a good one. Now I'd love to see that in more quests, even within a main quest. If all quests were on that level, I'd never complain again (although, of course, simple fetch quests don't need different endings - but for more complex stories, I'd like to see something akin to this). A few smaller notes: The Staff of Magnus still hasn't been fixed yet. It still looks like Vanus Galerion's staff. And shouldn't new disguises go into the collection menu now? I'd really hope we might see the new ones from East Solstice getting added (also from the quests with Sahmazim and Ezhkel). The resurfacing of Naemon also leads to a question: What happens to the Old Life quest now, where we can see his spirit sometimes? He's not dead anymore, after all. Generally, the Old Life quest could need an update to reflect the events of newer chapters. I think the updates had stopped with Blackwood.

Generally, I enjoyed having different dialogue options or dialogues that acknowledged our class or skills. It could have been even more, for my taste, but it was a nice start. I'd especially like to see it for situations that call for a statement coming from our character, and that are more meaningful and morally interesting than whether to share soup with a granny or not.

What I found disappointing though was that there weren't many lorebooks. I think I only found 6 or 7 or so? Yes, there were lots of letters, mostly from the Worm Cult, but that was mostly just info on recent events telling us where to go next. That's not comparable to actual background lore, from my point of view. In Solstice, we're basically running through beautiful sceneries, but rarely actually learn something about a place. Feels like a wasted opportunity to me, sadly.

Margravigne

Entering Eastern Solstice
Were you able to get through the wall okay after the Writhing Wall event concluded?
Yes, although sections of the Wall remained visible in places.

Were you able to find the main quest givers to continue the main quest?
Yes, they're in convenient locations to make themselves known, although I usually continued the story immediately when that was a possibility, so I seldom needed to track a questgiver down except with getting started, and when backtracking for my template alt after they were stuck by incomplete quets in part 1.

Quests
Did you engage with the Main Story?
I completed it multiple times; NA-copied alt & template in weeks 1-2, and the same EU-copied alt in both week 3 and week 4 (since she was recopied/reset).

Did you find it easy to get the Main Story quests?
Yes.

Did you engage with any quests outside of the main story? If so, which ones?
Everything I could find. I wish I'd taken my NA main through them, but after she was blocked in the main story by the dialogue bug, I spent too much time catching a copied alt who hadn't completed Coldharbour up with other relevant content and running that one and a template through the main story, so I only had my EU main do any this week.
The quest with Cariel/Naemon was bugged, but I also wasn't as invested in them as characters, and was uncomfortable with the choices we had to make at certain stages, so it was the quest I personally enjoyed the least.
The random encounters were fun, and added some lightness to balance the much heavier content in the main story.
I'm looking forward to rerunning the Xul-Hist quest on an alt who's completed Murkmire.
And I'm really happy that I'd managed to complete the exploration achievement for the soulbound weapons and read the journal at the final location before I picked up the side quest from Suraj - that added significantly to the impact of what happened with two of the characters in that story, (yes, I cried, godsdamnit), and I adored the way so many past quests and actions, from the base game right through to a delve in western Solstice integrated with the plot and changed the interactions we could have. It was brilliant, my favourite side quest in this game to date, tied with Darien's at the end of the main story.
And that... that was so much more than I was expecting - the number of endings available, the fact we could fail based on whether we'd completed enough previous content to be able to impact what was happening at a certain point, and the bombshell dropped which left us on a rather terrifying cliffhanger? So much went into this, and the writing provided a balance allowing for differing headcanons to be able to play through and not feel that their viewpoint has been made redundant. I think I can see where the very different conclusions available could be pulled together in future content to smoothly continue the story, and I'm looking forward to it.

Did you find any quests to be problematic from either a directional or difficulty standpoint?
Other than being stalled by bugs, no, everything could be followed without difficulty.

World Bosses
Did you fight any world bosses? If so, which ones?
No, I'm saving those to meet on Live (got to keep something to surprise myself with)

Public Dungeons
Did you go into the new public dungeon?
I plan to do that tomorrow, and will update this afterwards, but I wanted to get the rest of this feedback posted before the weekend.

Zone
What did you think of the Eastern Solstice environment?
I liked the continuation of the western Solstice vibe, but with the pockets of Coldharbour's landscape blended throughout. It added an eerie feel, a sense of wrongness and contrast to the brighter, more cheerful colours.

Did you encounter any new enemies you haven't seen before? What did you think of them?
The Maldriths are an interesting addition, the soul-shriven behemoth was first encountered in Li-Xal Pass, but finding them in various locations around eastern Solstice was still a novelty.

Now that the entire Solstice zone has been unlocked, what do you think of the overall process for Seasons of the Worm Cult unlocking access to part of a zone?
I liked it. The concept made sense with the story, and being prevented from breaking through immediately provided a chance to take a breather and catch up on side content after the more urgent pace of the zone questline, once that was concluded.

Do you have any other general feedback?
I love that a more linear progression has been introduced, and quests have an extra depth of dialogue reflecting completed content. It makes those past quests feel like they have relevance moving forward, and rewards us for putting in the time and effort to complete them.
Returning NPCs with references to past shared experiences added a lot to the story, rather than feeling like they could have been interchangeable with any one of a dozen others because nothing we'd previously done together had any impact on the here and now, and I'd like to see a lot more of this.

Syldras

Margravigne wrote: »

And that... that was so much more than I was expecting - the number of endings available, the fact we could fail based on whether we'd completed enough previous content to be able to impact what was happening at a certain point, and the bombshell dropped which left us on a rather terrifying cliffhanger?

I'm curious; could you elaborate on that (in spoiler tags)? I do assume you mean the ending of quest 11, not the Darien epilogue?

I played through the main quest twice, the first time on a template character who had only completed a few East Solstice sidequests before (in week 1), and the second time on my main who has done almost all ESO quest content ever released (in week 3), and while I had a few more dialogue options inbetween on my main, the ending was the same in both cases.

Margravigne

Syldras wrote: »

Margravigne wrote: »

And that... that was so much more than I was expecting - the number of endings available, the fact we could fail based on whether we'd completed enough previous content to be able to impact what was happening at a certain point, and the bombshell dropped which left us on a rather terrifying cliffhanger?

I'm curious; could you elaborate on that (in spoiler tags)? I do assume you mean the ending of quest 11, not the Darien epilogue?

I played through the main quest twice, the first time on a template character who had only completed a few East Solstice sidequests before (in week 1), and the second time on my main who has done almost all ESO quest content ever released (in week 3), and while I had a few more dialogue options inbetween on my main, the ending was the same in both cases.

No, I meant Darien's quest after the main story, which has multiple endings.

I've run it enough times to follow all of them, on both a zero-connection template who was doomed to 'fail' and on a copied alt who's completed all relevant content) so regardless of how players feel about him as a character, they can pick something that works for them. There's a lot to unpack, lorewise, especially with the implications of who his passenger might be, so I'm looking forward to seeing how this storyline progresses in future content.

Syldras

Margravigne wrote: »

No, I meant Darien's quest after the main story, which has multiple endings.

I've run it enough times to follow all of them, on both a zero-connection template who was doomed to 'fail' and on a copied alt who's completed all relevant content) so regardless of how players feel about him as a character, they can pick something that works for them. There's a lot to unpack, lorewise, especially with the implications of who his passenger might be, so I'm looking forward to seeing how this storyline progresses in future content.

Ah, okay.

Well, even in that case, I got the same ending both times: Darien got sat on a boat with Skordo and sent away to a safe location. Didn't seem like a bad outcome to me at all. I played my template character with minimum finished quests as being rather unfriendly towards Darien, and my main who has done all quest content before as slightly friendly-leaning. It didn't feel like it made any difference in the end.

I must say I'm a little disappointed that this was announced to us as the story having "different endings". Certainly, in a way, it's correct. But people who don't care much for Darien couldn't care less about where he ends up.

Margravigne

Syldras wrote: »

I must say I'm a little disappointed that this was announced to us as the story having "different endings". Certainly, in a way, it's correct. But people who don't care much for Darien couldn't care less about where he ends up.

Here are all the other endings for you then, since it sounds like you 'failed' this on both characters:
[url][="https://youtu.be/weyo0eCHvAI"]https://youtu.be/weyo0eCHvAI[/url]

The docks ending will only happen if you don't have enough shared memories with Darien to help him overcome his 'passenger' when it's taking him over in the Temple, or if for whatever reason you don't use enough of the memories available to you.

Syldras

Interesting. I don't consider it a "failure" - actually sending him away seems like the perfect ending for both of my test characters. They don't care for Darien, don't consider him a friend, and most of all have no interest in flirting with him.

I still find it strange if this is what was meant as "being able to fail the main quest" when they said it during the announcement stream. Not everyone cares for "fan favorites", so not getting the flirty or deep friendship end can't be called a failure. You know, I expected something more meaningful, something with a bigger scope: like a difference in what happens with Mannimarco, or how the situation in Solstice will be at the end of the story. Actually the bit about different endings made me expect something spectacular, some big decision to make, a side to choose, a different outcome for the world (or the zone at least) - this is not it, for me.

I'm generally very sceptical about the idea to focus a story on a specific npc so much (and most of all not announcing it as such - I understand in this case, of course, that they wanted to make his return at the end of Part 1 some awesome surprise), since for people who don't care for this character much, it's just not interesting. My main sentiment of completing the story on PTS was: "So, that's it?! Nothing more?! No new lore on the Worm Cult, Mannimarco, not even a bit about who Wormblood was? What did he even return for?" It left me truly disappointed.

Margravigne

@Syldras if you can't see an inability to help someone regain control of their own mind from an entity attempting to control them a 'failure' in any way... well, at least you were content with the ending you received to that quest, but I think we're done here.

I don't share your sense of disappointment with the main story, it wrapped up the events on Solstice in a way that provided sufficient closure to the immediate issue while also leaving enough openings to pick things back up later, and not giving us every answer makes more sense when we don't have the means to obtain them. A little mystery is a good thing, it leaves room for people's headcanons. Maybe you'll be given the option to 'pick a side' if the conclusion to Horicles's poem is used in future content?

Meanwhile, I'd prefer to focus on providing constructive feedback rather than continuing to clog these threads by debating points that aren't helpful to the devs at this time, so moving forward please only query my PTS posts if it's relevant to assisting them, if all you want to do is debate something, that's better done elsewhere.

Syldras

Margravigne wrote: »

@Syldras if you can't see an inability to help someone regain control of their own mind from an entity attempting to control them a 'failure' in any way... well, at least you were content with the ending you received to that quest, but I think we're done here.

MMO or not, ESO is a roleplaying game. Part of roleplay for me means that I can decide how my character interacts with the fictional world and the people who live in it, including how their relationship looks like. I understand that there are always technical limitations, but giving the player as much agency as possible is the ideal that one should strive to, from my point of view. Now, of course there will usually be some main story about some world-ending threat we need to stop (the world coming to an end would be unfortunate, even for evil wizards and murder cultists, after all). But that's a different thing than pre-defining our character's stance towards one specific other npc for us.

My template character who had done no other content before and never talked to Darien before didn't even have a choice to rescue him, by the way. How is it a "failure" if there aren't even dialogue options because they just didn't know each other before? There's no choice. There's no way he could even have tried to save him, even if he wanted to, because the dialogue options just weren't there for him (He was basically in the situation that most players will be who decided to join ESO just now, with this year's content). From the roleplay perspective Darien was nothing more than some guy acting strangely, and he had to witness that, until fortunately someone came to stop him and put him on a ship to a location where he's save for now. He isn't even lost - he's just brought to another location. Who says no one else could save him there? My character was more or less an outsider to that situation, a mercenary who had just joined the Stirk Fellowship, assisted them on Solstice, but hardly more.

And consider the roleplaying perspective, it can get even more complicated: A character might willingly decide not to save Darien. A devout Meridia worshipper who believes in his mistress being unfailing and therefore would never do anything against her will. A wizard with his own plans or a morbid curiosity about what might happen next. A rogueish mercenary who doesn't care since all they wanted was some gold anyway. That was the beauty of the old TES games: You could choose who you play in this world, and be as moral or immoral as you had in mind for that character.

Margravigne wrote: »

I don't share your sense of disappointment with the main story, it wrapped up the events on Solstice in a way that provided sufficient closure to the immediate issue while also leaving enough openings to pick things back up later, and not giving us every answer makes more sense when we don't have the means to obtain them. A little mystery is a good thing, it leaves room for people's headcanons.

There were barely any lorebooks. Having your own headcanon is a fine thing (I do that all the time), but it does need some background info about the world the story takes place in, and that the game has to provide - otherwise I could just sit back in my armchair and make up a story myself, no need to play a video game.

I know the TES games since Arena - or more precisely, back then I just sat on my father's knee and watched him play, as I was just a small child at that time. Same for Daggerfall. Morrowind was the first TES game I played myself (I played Arena and Daggerfall myself later). And I've always loved the lore this fictional world provides. I want to see more of that. I want to see info on the places we traverse, on those towns, ruins, temples. I want to learn about the thoughts of the common people in this fictional world, I want to read their diaries and letters - which hopefully include more info than just some recent order which only serves as a hint for the player character to know where to run next. ESO was wonderful in that regard in the base game and earlier chapters - so many interesting books, everywhere! I felt disappointed that I hardly found any lorebooks this time.

Add to that all the interesting questions that Part 1 led too, which never got answered: We learnt nothing about Wormblood, despite him having been hyped up as a mysterious character back in his introduction news post. We got no Mannimarco background lore. We couldn't even talk with poor Vanus about his months of captivity. We didn't get any background info on how the Writhing Wall functioned, despite it being so alike to the Ghostfences of Morrowind. We didn't learn how the Worm Cult got to collaborate with Molag Bal and his daedra again - despite Molag Bal having damned Mannimarco to eternal torment back at the end of the basegame. And if they cooperate, why did it even need some complicated ritual to bring him back? Wouldn't Molag Bal have just released him, if they were at good terms (for unknown reasons) again? These are the reasons that led to that unsatisfying feeling at the end of the story. That "What, it's already over? But what's with all those interesting questions?" Some mystery is fine. If one gets the feeling that there's almost no new background lore, and no plot holes or questions got clarified, it's not fun, though.

Margravigne wrote: »

Meanwhile, I'd prefer to focus on providing constructive feedback rather than continuing to clog these threads by debating points that aren't helpful to the devs at this time, so moving forward please only query my PTS posts if it's relevant to assisting them, if all you want to do is debate something, that's better done elsewhere.

How is this unconstructive? I'm voicing my view on how this story was executed, I clearly state why I didn't like it and what I would have prefered instead. What I'd like to see ESO stories focussing on. The wish for choosing a different side. Or different endings that actually concern the whole zone. It could, for example, have ended with one ending where you are able to revert the Coldharborization of the island - and one where you indeed fail, when it comes to that. Or there could have been different endings about Mannimarco - either he dies once more, or he's able to flee. There are so many things that could be done. I think I am allowed to utter my thoughts on this; the writing is a part of the chapter, and this is a feedback thread after all. You, of course, are free to decide for yourself whether you'd like to participate in that or not. I'm not forcing anyone into a discussion. I'm just writing my review on the new content. Feel free to ignore it, if you don't want to discuss.