Developer Deep Dive—ESO's Class Identity Refresh

CAB_Life

OK, so after reading this over a few times, I have questions and concerns.I’m struggling to understand how making every single skill line a jack of all trades with desirable traits and passives will somehow magically result in A.) an easy on boarding for any new player—if anything, this will be twice as baffling as before and B.) balance when every single skill line is good and offers options for whatever role you want to play. Then we add additional benefits for locking yourself into your two or three primary class skill lines and it seems as if we have a new recipe for power creep. While I wasn’t always a fan of the rigidity of the tank/healer/DPS associated skill lines, it at least made sense and was consistent. It also seems as if we will end up with a more complicated, convoluted environment where the min-maxers will still find the best combinations of pure or partial classing and/or sub-classing and the ceiling will be even higher than before.

The rollout and timeline is also somewhat concerning and needs to be accelerated; like one class every quarter is simply not acceptable given the state that the game is in and that drip-feeding will only contribute to further unbalancing and player apathy.

Edit: and for the love of God, please give necromancers a permanent pet. These disposable skeletons that feel like nothing but DOTs are just embarrassing, especially when NPC necromancers are regularly standing around in the rift and other zones with their undead hordes just ambling about them.

Muizer

So, ZOS seem to have developed a knack of creating confusion, leaving players to speculate and then not correcting them when they reach the wrong conclusions.Perhaps we can try nipping it in the bud here, so at least we are on the same page here.

The fact that the changes are made sequentially, on a class by class basis, over a period of years means the overhaul of each class is intended to work in a 'self contained' manner. This is simply no way to address balance relative to other classes or their skill lines. We must conclude that any reference to the balance issues caused by subclassing were tagged on as an afterthought. Let's not delude ourselves into false expectations. The reference to subclassing and balance is just there to say "we heard you" or "we'll keep that in mind", but it's not what this Class Identity Refresh is about. That is not how it is listed on their to-do list. That is "update all classes to the quality standards of the Arkanist". Nothing more, nothing less.

Yudo

Good initiative but the timeline will be painful to stay in current state until you go through classes one by one, even then no real way of telling if it will be worth it that much. Can only hope for the best I guess and maybe check-in when a new update drops. At this point what will be ever delivered in finished state. The QA is there just to confirm long standing assumptions.
Can't say I'll be sticking around unfortunately. Maybe DK mains are happy lol.

CAB_Life

Nightarrow did a great job of echoing/ summarizing my concerns:

https://youtu.be/nO-OXzn1bhk?si=25r3k_EFquzPMb42

So they couldn’t balance the classes as they were in 10 years, but we are somehow expected to imagine that they will completely reinvent each class from the ground up, maintain some semblance of power parity along each skill line well also balancing that against subclassing? This requires a delusional level of suspension of disbelief and copium, as much as I want to support the shift in communications and the new development team, I just don’t think they’re gonna be able to do it and setting sky high aspirations like this will only lead to crushing, apocalyptic failure. And we haven’t even gotten into the deplorable state of things like Scribing or World skils which have never been addressed or balanced properly. Or the added complexity that this game already suffers from. The best games, layer progression, without burdening the player with bloated systems, add meta-item chases (ESO has none, really—once to get your lead that's it), rather than endless, horizontal expansion of already tired game systems.

Last'One

How can I say that I don’t believe a single word from ZoS without breaking any CoC rule?

1. I don’t believe in the current balance.
2. I don’t believe they will find balance.
3. And I don’t believe they will deliver significant improvements in the next three years.

The only thing I’m 100% sure of is this: I don’t expect major changes for at least the next three years.

If they keep subclassing without removing DPS sharing and logs, so players can actually play the game without the gatekeeping and toxicity around; DPS Numbers, one-bar, bad builds, then the game we have today is likely all we’ll get until the servers go offline for good.

allochthons

Visuals are being revamped. Which is great, many are old and dated. But please, ZoS, "Modern" skills do NOT need to be flashy and bright! Cool, yes. Blinding, no!

Please keep that in mind.

And give us, on consoles, at least*, the ability to turn off the flashy effects. It's a real problem, and it's been ignored for too long.

* I guess you can turn off other's ability visuals on PC?

Kallykat

Well, I appreciate ZOS speaking on the timeframe for the updates during the ESO Live. Obviously, they were still fairly vague about it and are going to take more time than many people would like them to take, but at least I have a little better idea what we're facing.

On the other hand, they didn't clarify their plan regarding how the mechanics and playstyles of each class will manifest in the skill lines. Maybe people with a higher level of knowledge of combat got more out of it, but for my part, I don't have a better understanding after watching the Live of what playing these classes will actually look like than I did after just reading the article. There still seems to be some confusion regarding whether or not they are sticking with the tank/dd/healer division or not.

Hopefully, they will clarify things presently as they claim to be committed to more communication and transparency moving forward. I'm primarily concerned with consistency across classes, whichever direction they take the skill lines, for the sake of simplicity. I'm also hoping they can also use this opportunity to implement tools to help new players and players who aren't combat minded to make sense of how the combat system works without having to do a bunch of research outside the game. I like the suggestions I've seen about class quests and labels on each skill, for example.

manukartofanu

Marto wrote: »

manukartofanu wrote: »

Сan you clarify—did I hear correctly that they explained we can’t just go and balance the classes and multiclassing, because it’s also a long process, and you can’t simply change the numbers, you also have to communicate with visual specialists?

If you want to change the duration, delay, or speed of any channeled, cast time or projectile skill, you have to work on the animation to match the new duration. Which is likely done by a different team.

But don't read their words so literally. What they mean is that changes to combat can sometimes result in changes having to be done in other areas. Animation, audio, code, server, etc. This is just a normal part of game development.

That’s all correct, but wasn’t the original question specifically: why don’t they simply balance what already exists?

You can balance the game without touching any of those parameters at all.
For example, you can adjust things like damage coefficients, stat scaling, resource costs, cooldown durations, stack limits, passive bonuses, and synergy values.

None of these require changes to animations, visuals, audio, or other asset-dependent elements.
This is pure balance tuning, not a skill redesign.

shadyjane62

Not seeing much these days that will keep me in the game.


Just saying...

Gabriel_H

CAB_Life wrote: »

OK, so after reading this over a few times, I have questions and concerns.I’m struggling to understand how making every single skill line a jack of all trades with desirable traits and passives will somehow magically result in A.) an easy on boarding for any new player—if anything.

It's already that for the 4 base classes.

nb_rich

I do not think anything can fix the issues with subclassing at this point. It originally should have only been 1 skill line to subclass not 2. Ive said this on multiple posts but it makes no sense my characters are specified by a class when they all have the same exact skill lines equipped (for example why is one of my characters a Templar and one a Arcanist when they both have Harold of the Tome, Dawns Wrath and animal companion skill lines). Keeping 2 lines at least would have kept a class identity and provide way more balance.

The problem with allowing 2 skill lines to be subclassed is everyone will just go for the skill lines with the most beneficial passives for there role. This is why Harold of the Tome, Assassination or Grave Lord is on every single PvE dps build. This also means you’re more limited to choosing a starting class depending on your role. With only having to keep one subclass from your original class the only way to balance classes is to separate skill lines by dps, healing and tanking, if not a bunch of skills will never be used which is already the case.

I also do not think it is smart to work on one class at a time. The community is just going to be more upset either because updated skill lines will be to powerful everyone has to use them until another class is updated, or the class will still underperform leaving us wondering when the next update for the class will come out which can be years if you go through each class one at a time.

nb_rich

I feel like ZOS needs to release these updated classes in groups. If you work on them one at a time, let us provide feedback then work on another and release a few updated classes at once, even it takes longer to drop the update for the classes. Just looking at the posts a lot of people think the DK will just be overpowered, and if its not overpowered everyone will be upset the class is still weak so its a lose-lose situation lol.

As a PvE player there is no serious problem with subclassing since we can still complete all content. The only issue as a PvE player is that it’s depressing to see people builds performing so much better then the builds I actually want to play. Its just an ego and pride thing to be honest lol.

I remember when subclassing came out I was excited and put together something cool. When I ran into a normal dungeon I couldn’t even get my rotation off cause everyone was just using the fatecarver beam including my healer and tank lol. Right after that I had no choice but to equip Harold of the Tome cause im not trying to just watch people carry me every trial or dungeon. If you go in a trial and any part of the trial requires one or two dps the Fatecarver users are first up cause they shred everything the quickest and easiest.

From a pvp player point of view I cant really comment on that but I feel like anyone can kill anyone in pvp doesn’t matter what build you use. When there are pvp events I play with pve gear and skills but I still kill other players just fine lol.

For a temporary fix bringing up the damage of other skills will help make the game more fun

CAB_Life

Gabriel_H wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

OK, so after reading this over a few times, I have questions and concerns.I’m struggling to understand how making every single skill line a jack of all trades with desirable traits and passives will somehow magically result in A.) an easy on boarding for any new player—if anything.

It's already that for the 4 base classes.

Except it's not though. DK clearly has a tanking and DPS tree, even if not explicitly labelled—their healing is all over the place though. Templar has the same, with restoring light (healing), aedric spear (now with an actual charge/taunt), and a mixed dps/ utility line. NB has shadow for tanking, assassination for dps and a clear healing line. Sorc you couldn’t say the same, although storm calling is just op and best for almost everything.

Sure the four base classes are not as refined as the later three classes, but they're more in line with a three-way split than a jack of all trades approach. They were already moving in this direction as a development team, so it would make more sense to refine this rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going for a complete overhaul from the ground up, which is destined to fail given their balancing track record.

Turtle_Bot

CAB_Life wrote: »

Except it's not though. DK clearly has a tanking and DPS tree, even if not explicitly labelled—their healing is all over the place though. Templar has the same, with restoring light (healing), aedric spear (now with an actual charge/taunt), and a mixed dps/ utility line. NB has shadow for tanking, assassination for dps and a clear healing line. Sorc you could say the same although storm calling is just op and best for almost everything.

Sure the four base classes are not as refined as the later three classes, but they're more in line with a three-way split than a jack of all trades approach. They were already moving in this direction as a development team, so it would make more sense to refine this rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going for a complete overhaul from the ground up, which is destined to fail given their balancing track record.

Just to clarify, are you saying sorcs lines are cleanly split into the 3 roles? because I really fail to see how that is even remotely possible considering just how many key aspects for each role that each sorc line is missing

If sorcs lines were actually following the 3 roles of tank/heal/DPS, key aspects for each role would be in their respective lines, aspects such as the following:
- armor buff, taunt and tanking niche (teleport) in the tank line
- spammable, DPS named buffs and class DoTs in the DPS line
- heals and group buffs in the healer/support line

However, as we can see below, those key aspects outlined above are clearly not in their respective lines.

Storm Calling (DPS line):

• Has DPS focused aspects such as:
  DPS passives, class execute, class AoE DoTs.
• Has Non-DPS focused aspects such as:
  Armor buff, class HoT and the class AoE CC.
• Missing DPS aspects:
  Class Spammable (most important DPS aspect), class ST DoTs, Class delayed burst/payoff skill.

Dark Magic (support/tank line?):

• Has Support aspects such as:
  Sustain, self healing, group healing, CC abilities
• Has Non-support aspects such as:
  Class spammable.
• Missing support/tank aspects:
  Taunt, mitigation/armor buffs/passives, group buffs/debuffs.

Daedric Summoning (support/healer line?)

• Has Tank/heal aspects such as:
  Group Buffs, class burst heals, mitigation buffs/effects
• Has Non-Tank/heal aspects:
  Class ST DoTs, class delayed burst, class DPS ultimate, class source of Major Prophecy/savagery
• Missing tank/healer aspects:
  Class HoT, class taunt.

CAB_Life

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

Except it's not though. DK clearly has a tanking and DPS tree, even if not explicitly labelled—their healing is all over the place though. Templar has the same, with restoring light (healing), aedric spear (now with an actual charge/taunt), and a mixed dps/ utility line. NB has shadow for tanking, assassination for dps and a clear healing line. Sorc you could say the same although storm calling is just op and best for almost everything.

Sure the four base classes are not as refined as the later three classes, but they're more in line with a three-way split than a jack of all trades approach. They were already moving in this direction as a development team, so it would make more sense to refine this rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going for a complete overhaul from the ground up, which is destined to fail given their balancing track record.

Just to clarify, are you saying sorcs lines are cleanly split into the 3 roles? because I really fail to see how that is even remotely possible considering just how many key aspects for each role that each sorc line is missing

If sorcs lines were actually following the 3 roles of tank/heal/DPS, key aspects for each role would be in their respective lines, aspects such as the following:
- armor buff, taunt and tanking niche (teleport) in the tank line
- spammable, DPS named buffs and class DoTs in the DPS line
- heals and group buffs in the healer/support line

However, as we can see below, those key aspects outlined above are clearly not in their respective lines.

Storm Calling (DPS line):

• Has DPS focused aspects such as:
  DPS passives, class execute, class AoE DoTs.
• Has Non-DPS focused aspects such as:
  Armor buff, class HoT and the class AoE CC.
• Missing DPS aspects:
  Class Spammable (most important DPS aspect), class ST DoTs, Class delayed burst/payoff skill.

Dark Magic (support/tank line?):

• Has Support aspects such as:
  Sustain, self healing, group healing, CC abilities
• Has Non-support aspects such as:
  Class spammable.
• Missing support/tank aspects:
  Taunt, mitigation/armor buffs/passives, group buffs/debuffs.

Daedric Summoning (support/healer line?)

• Has Tank/heal aspects such as:
  Group Buffs, class burst heals, mitigation buffs/effects
• Has Non-Tank/heal aspects:
  Class ST DoTs, class delayed burst, class DPS ultimate, class source of Major Prophecy/savagery
• Missing tank/healer aspects:
  Class HoT, class taunt.

“Could > couldn’t.” Sorry a couple letters really change context, since amended the post. Sorc is easily the messiest and most jack-of-all-trades, random stuff in every tree, which should worry people now that ZOS is pursuing this path ubiquitously.

heaven13

CAB_Life wrote: »

Gabriel_H wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

OK, so after reading this over a few times, I have questions and concerns.I’m struggling to understand how making every single skill line a jack of all trades with desirable traits and passives will somehow magically result in A.) an easy on boarding for any new player—if anything.

It's already that for the 4 base classes.

Except it's not though. DK clearly has a tanking and DPS tree, even if not explicitly labelled—their healing is all over the place though. Templar has the same, with restoring light (healing), aedric spear (now with an actual charge/taunt), and a mixed dps/ utility line. NB has shadow for tanking, assassination for dps and a clear healing line. Sorc you couldn’t say the same, although storm calling is just op and best for almost everything.

Sure the four base classes are not as refined as the later three classes, but they're more in line with a three-way split than a jack of all trades approach. They were already moving in this direction as a development team, so it would make more sense to refine this rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going for a complete overhaul from the ground up, which is destined to fail given their balancing track record.

While I completely agree and share your concerns that balance has never really been a thing and that mixing stuff up creates more potential issues and more combos that need balancing, I do still think it's more player-friendly, especially if they want us to engage in subclassing. If I'm going to subclass, I don't want to be forced into a specific skill line because it's the dps line (or the tank one or heal one). I want more freedom to choose which skill line appeals to me based on visuals and identity, not just numbers-go-brr. IF they can do it decently well, this will be better overall. I do concede that it's a BIG IF though.

tincanman

So, when can we expect eso to be out of beta?

karthrag_inak

The suggested approach is absolutely horrifying. Khajiit says that as someone who has over 14k hours in-game (According to in-game tools) and has spent approximately $10k dollars on ESO since beta.

Nobody was complaining about "class identity" before subclassing, which introduced skill options that forced players who wished to excel to use other class skill trees, since there was no incentive to stay pure to their class when picking the best combinations of skills from different classes would work better, with no penalty.

Khajiit thinks that a good way to counter this, and in the process alleviate a huge portion of the anti-subclassing sentiment due to the current imbalance, would be to have all subclassed skills and passives be docked by 5%-10% effectiveness. If the skill or passive has a number, dock that number by 5-10% if it is not from the character's primary class.

That would yield the realistic possibility of pure-class primacy in nearly all situations (at least insofar as it is possible now - some classes definitely do need some tweaking independent of subclassing) while not invalidating subclass choices completely, it could be implemented across the board in one pts cycle, and, most significantly, it would not be predicated on reinventing the existing class system from the ground up in the nearly-obscene, unfounded hope that somehow, miraculously, all things would magically land in perfect balance with each other.

CAB_Life

heaven13 wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

Gabriel_H wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

OK, so after reading this over a few times, I have questions and concerns.I’m struggling to understand how making every single skill line a jack of all trades with desirable traits and passives will somehow magically result in A.) an easy on boarding for any new player—if anything.

It's already that for the 4 base classes.

Except it's not though. DK clearly has a tanking and DPS tree, even if not explicitly labelled—their healing is all over the place though. Templar has the same, with restoring light (healing), aedric spear (now with an actual charge/taunt), and a mixed dps/ utility line. NB has shadow for tanking, assassination for dps and a clear healing line. Sorc you couldn’t say the same, although storm calling is just op and best for almost everything.

Sure the four base classes are not as refined as the later three classes, but they're more in line with a three-way split than a jack of all trades approach. They were already moving in this direction as a development team, so it would make more sense to refine this rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going for a complete overhaul from the ground up, which is destined to fail given their balancing track record.

While I completely agree and share your concerns that balance has never really been a thing and that mixing stuff up creates more potential issues and more combos that need balancing, I do still think it's more player-friendly, especially if they want us to engage in subclassing. If I'm going to subclass, I don't want to be forced into a specific skill line because it's the dps line (or the tank one or heal one). I want more freedom to choose which skill line appeals to me based on visuals and identity, not just numbers-go-brr. IF they can do it decently well, this will be better overall. I do concede that it's a BIG IF though.

All empirical evidence points to the fact that they cannot do it well and that's why we are where we are. They are entering a death spiral of make work projects that will never be finished and not in the typical MMO cycle of things where every expansion or so there's a soft reset. We're 10 years on and they still haven't figured out the basics of their game or core mechanics or core themes. I like that they're trying, but we all need to be reasonable and realistic about our expectations.

wolfie1.0.

Marto wrote: »

I also think that was a good Q&A stream

I'm particularly very glad that ZOS is taking that more proactive approach and reworking classes. There's been too many cheap bandaid fixes, specially with subclassing.

I was pretty positive about subclassing at first, but right now I really would prefer for it to be rolled back. If ZOS thinks they can fix it by working on the classes themselves... well, good luck. Regardless of whether it works to improve subclassing or not, the classes are long overdue a thorough look.

I'm fine with the class refreshes being prioritized by how dated they look and feel. Dragonknight skills really do look terrible. Not to mention they present a really bad first impression to any new players.

Except its not proactive, its reactive. IF they had done this rework prior to subclassing in preparation for it, then ya I would say its proactive. Not in this case.

wolfie1.0.

Marto wrote: »

Finedaible wrote: »

Having watched the stream, I think something isn't right over at the studio. Like, there must be something fundamentally wrong with it. Maybe they are criminally understaffed? This is abnormally slow to enact change and QoL. There's not a single rework in the history of ESO that I can recall ever being properly completed though. Dragging this massive rework over 2-3+ years doesn't look feasible frankly. Do they then design new hardmode content around what the class is, or what it is going to be? What if a change massively hinders or over buffs a class for several major updates? By the time they finally get to the later classes, the whole balance ecosystem will have drastically changed.

Wheeler also claimed on stream that hybridization was still being worked on when we fairly recently received developer comments in a Reddit AuA which would suggest it had been abandoned. What exactly is going on with that? Are there not deadlines with these kind of things? Are we just gonna keep hearing "trust us guys, it's coming!" for years and years indefinitely? Are we being lied to? ESO feels like it has become a Kickstarter project that never delivers despite its monstrous monetization practices.

If they can revitalize ESO to where it becomes enjoyable again, then that will be absolutely fantastic, but will there be anyone left to care by the time they finish it? IF they finish it?... Idk man, there's already over a decade of unfulfilled promises and mistrust between Zenimax and players. I've already given up on future Elder Scrolls titles, and this year has been the most unstable year for ESO yet in my eyes. Season pass model has left a sour taste.

I think a more fair way to put this is that the combat team at ZOS has been juggling way too many balls at once.

Maybe I'm just assuming things, but I wouldn't be surprised if things like Arcanist, Scribing, and Subclassing took up a lot of development time. And in order to hit the strict deadlines for those features, they gave a much lower priority to hybridization.

I think ZOS sticking so strictly to these self-imposed deadlines and restrictions is what's been hurting the game these past few years.

Why does a problem discovered and acknowledged in the PTS not get fixed before launch? Becase fixing it now would require delaying launch a week. So instead it gets scheduled for later. It bet it must suck for ZOS devs to see the forums complain about an issue that might already been fixed, but can't be released until weeks later.

Why was the plot of Legacy of the Bretons underwhelming? Because ZOS forced themselves to end each chapter with a "We win! But the true villain is still out there...", which makes the first half of the story feeling pointless and "forces" ZOS to rush the ending.

Why did the Writhing Wall have so many bugs that were fixed in the first 2-5 days? Why not just delay the event a week? Because delaying would mean delaying the Witches Festival, which would mean delaying the Daedric War celebration, which would mean delaying New Life, which would mean delaying Whitestreaks... etc etc.

The article and Q&A gave me a lot more hope than previous updates. I think ZOS really is starting to recognize that their rush to get things released on schedule is forcing them to release too much unfinished stuff.

That's also why I'm ok with it being done one class at a time. We already know what it looks like when ZOS tries to tackle every skill all at once. It's understandably messy. I'd rather have the class refresh for DK finished and released, than 3 half-finished classes or 7 bandaid fixes.

I agree with most of your sentiment except on a few points.

1st is that the wall event wouldn't have resulted in a delay in witches festival or the deadric war events. Zos hasn't really historically cared about rolling out new updates during in game events, and its led to complaints. And the timing of the wall event was in line with their regular patch cycle. Its actually probably more that theh had to be in line with already planned sales, marketing, and release schedules that couldnt be changed.

In all honesty zos could benefit from doing PTS builds for Q2 content in Q1s PTS cycle so that future features can be adjusted before they hit live. Especially if they cant place a fix before live under the normal cycle.

wolfie1.0.

karthrag_inak wrote: »

The suggested approach is absolutely horrifying. Khajiit says that as someone who has over 14k hours in-game (According to in-game tools) and has spent approximately $10k dollars on ESO since beta.

Nobody was complaining about "class identity" before subclassing, which introduced skill options that forced players who wished to excel to use other class skill trees, since there was no incentive to stay pure to their class when picking the best combinations of skills from different classes would work better, with no penalty.

Khajiit thinks that a good way to counter this, and in the process alleviate a huge portion of the anti-subclassing sentiment due to the current imbalance, would be to have all subclassed skills and passives be docked by 5%-10% effectiveness. If the skill or passive has a number, dock that number by 5-10% if it is not from the character's primary class.

That would yield the realistic possibility of pure-class primacy in nearly all situations (at least insofar as it is possible now - some classes definitely do need some tweaking independent of subclassing) while not invalidating subclass choices completely, it could be implemented across the board in one pts cycle, and, most significantly, it would not be predicated on reinventing the existing class system from the ground up in the nearly-obscene, unfounded hope that somehow, miraculously, all things would magically land in perfect balance with each other.

That would probably mess with system lag with all of the constant calculations in place.

Instead heres what I would suggest. Add a new skill line, lets call it "X Class Master" it becomes available once a characters base class reaches level 50 in all 3 primary classes. Inside said skill line you have 1 healer skill, 1 tank skill, and 1 dps skill. 5 passives. This skill line is only usable if you have the 3 primary skill lines equipped. Similar to how the weapons and armor skills work. These skills and passives are designed to give benefit to pure class users and bring them up to subclass standards. Gives more room to play so to speak. And with classes like nightblades and sorcs you really need that room.
Like for sorcs you could do something fun like have that class master reinstate the 3rd bar they used to have. Or move one of the pets there...or any number of things.

Renato90085

karthrag_inak wrote: »

The suggested approach is absolutely horrifying. Khajiit says that as someone who has over 14k hours in-game (According to in-game tools) and has spent approximately $10k dollars on ESO since beta.

Nobody was complaining about "class identity" before subclassing, which introduced skill options that forced players who wished to excel to use other class skill trees, since there was no incentive to stay pure to their class when picking the best combinations of skills from different classes would work better, with no penalty.

Khajiit thinks that a good way to counter this, and in the process alleviate a huge portion of the anti-subclassing sentiment due to the current imbalance, would be to have all subclassed skills and passives be docked by 5%-10% effectiveness. If the skill or passive has a number, dock that number by 5-10% if it is not from the character's primary class.

That would yield the realistic possibility of pure-class primacy in nearly all situations (at least insofar as it is possible now - some classes definitely do need some tweaking independent of subclassing) while not invalidating subclass choices completely, it could be implemented across the board in one pts cycle, and, most significantly, it would not be predicated on reinventing the existing class system from the ground up in the nearly-obscene, unfounded hope that somehow, miraculously, all things would magically land in perfect balance with each other.

but not all sbulcass have meta power,this killed other 95% sublcass build
and meta build need 20-30% nerf or passive/dmg buff cant stack,10% not enough

StihlReign

When you watch the video you realize there's no way they're going to get any of this done in a way that's remotely close to any semblance of balance. They're rebuilding the classes so they can rebuild the classes.

There are real issues in game. They just admitted it took the dev a month to work on light and heavy attacks.

The game's unbalanced broken state is here to stay for the long term...look at the events, the last few patches, the animations, Vengeance. They're so far off, picking flowers results in weird delays. They want to redo the most broken event ever, Again. No one working for us thinks there's anything wrong. Bananas, just absolutely bonkers...


We can't just tweak a number or change it...from a 5 to an 8. It's just, well, so hard to explain...but. I mean we have these interactions and things are involved. No, no, we need to rebuild the class. Yep, that's it, rebuild the classes. 3 years tops...maybe. For sure...

dwolfgheist

Since you state you are paying more attention to the community, I sincerely hope you take this into account:


If you want this to work, each skill line needs to have a specific purpose, currently some have it all ex: Wardens frost line has great offensive, defensive and healing tools, that can't happen, they should mainly only have either damage, healing, damage reduction, or CC/utility. Meaning each skill line is more or less a "role".

Damage lines should mainly work within themselves, or in case of a class getting 2 dedicated damage lines, they should work mainly well with each other, meaning they have a specific combo by using the abilities in those 1 or 2 lines together and should work badly with other class damage lines due to damage type dependancy for example (nightblade would be a good case for it, with the second one being more about life drain than direct damage, so that it's clear who has the most damage potential, but with a clear cost).
To increase damage further the best options should be to go for none class skills. With multiclassing, weapon and schola skills the player can also cover any issues of their class having no dedicated healing line, provided the schola skills are looked upon again (ex: nightblades new theme doesn't picture them as good healers).

Cut down on AOE skills(both healing and damage), mainly DOT/HOT AOEs and AOES with the player as the center with instant cast. Both in healing and in damage they make for the main issues in pvp (unkillable ball groups, zergs) it also makes combat none engaging in PVE, they should be scarce or just ultimates. Also they are the biggest issue for users who struggle with performance. multiclassing makes this worse, because why not stack burst aoes? (so please don't base anyone's identity on them)

Please incorporate the rule for weapons to no longer be missing in any new skill designs.

Damage types could gain relevance again, with mobs regaining their elemental resistances and some maybe even immunity, so that there is never a line combination that outperforms in all instances. Type resistance bonus could also be included on the armour passives when 5 (maybe less) of the same type are used to further develop this idea, so that players can also build their resistance against a particular overperforming line combination. If everyone still gets obliterated after having geared their resistances for those skills, then it's clearly time for a nerf with no complains. This is just an idea, but you catch the drift.

Consider removing/shortening the CC immunity after break free or make it a CP passive (could even be auto slotted for new players), maybe make stun abilities always with cast time and/or high cost, so people don't perma stun everything. The CC immunity only makes sense on players and bosses, a crab shouldn't have it, CC is nerfed in PVE to the point of it only being used for pulls.

You currently have too many variables, this is a nightmare for the developers, I am sure that if you explain this properly to the community they'll accept some changes better. How is a dual bow user supposed to go against a shield and frost staff user?
I think your issues with balance, even before multiclassing, come from this, if you want to keep 2 different weapon types as an option at all costs, I suggest a delay in the swap animation to offset the versatility and also to accomodate for the new animation so that both weapons can be visually present at all times) .

The negative discourse about class identity and multi classing could have been avoided if you had let it cook in pts for longer. You heard it before, but I just have to say that when you first announced it, I thought it would be in pts at the very least for a year, only to see the expected release date to not be feasible under any metric.

Work on necro with love please, the theme is so cliche that I don't feel I need to say how, but please don't make me summon tombstones or see a green laser come from a pile of bones anymore. One idea would be for necros needing to decide with their abilities if they want to heal/increase def or stack up on skeleton minions that run on time/have a certain health pool(there should be a healthy stack limit on the skellies obviously)

Hybridization was never concluded, it's a nuisance for old players and not understandable/extremely confusing for new players.
I would take this opportunity to finish it, since the changes you need to do will be major anyway, I would take this as the starting point for all the rest. Speaking of it, all class abilities should always cost magicka to a degree at least, none feel like stamina even physical, bleed and poison ones, neither is there a need for it anymore with hybridization. Stamina will always be relevant for dodging/blocking/melee and bow skills which can also be expanded upon. if you make most skills scale only from weapon/spell damage (this should be the same in the current situation) instead of including max stam/magicka the choice between how much stamina/magicka a player wants would be based mainly on the cost of the skills they use (with some healthy exceptions, but it needs to be stated in the UI) and how much they want to be able to use dodge/block/break free which would be by far more intuitive for new players and also diverse, possibly creating a sustainable character identity that fills a role, based on the weapons and skills picked, with class being just one of the building blocks, which I think is what ultimately most desire.

I would suggest, if you insist in going step by step (I don't think you should for this), to go for skill line instead of class, so that people can see changes and "content" across all classes and provide the needed feedback in pts for this endeavour, but for that you need to treat each skill line as a "role" ex: you first patch the necro line 1: damage dealer through corpse summons and dots, then later you patch the second line of supporter who sacrifices and creates corpses/summons to either buff or enhance dots damage type along with some other class lines; finally you patch the last necro line but only after the damage lines of all other classes are finished in case you need to adjust their's.

To correct the current situation you could add skills and work on the schola's class passive's before anything else to make them give buffs depending on how many class lines you have maybe, however the schola class passive should be the same for all after the class revamp, including subclasses or the buff only symbolic in percentage, because in theory it will no longer be needed.

I consider the class identity issue to be in reality just a balance issue, players are getting erased out there, even experienced ones due to damage combos that were criticized since pts. Most only used a few skills from usually 2 class lines before multiclass, however they were within the theme they intially wanted. Now they are forced to do picks outside of their desired theme to stay competitive, which is their true pain point.

What's key here is to make each line relevant by itself but tied to the other lines of the class through a mechanic like necros corpse use, or the other class lines having the skills and passives that fit it best so players can go for triple class with no direct nerfs but it would be mechanically less likely to be desired over dual and pure classes. Meaning if there are 2 healing lines, ex: necro vs templar what should differentiate them is the way to reach the goal tops but the overall healing and utility should amount to about the same in the end. The passives need to also be taken into account, because players will always want to stack crit and other stats for healing and damage, so I would avoid this kind of passives otherwise people will feel forced to stack them to stay competive, which is also what ultimately makes them dislike multiclassing, it's that and the insane burst combos and healing in both pve and pvp that can't be replicated by any pure class in an even close degree.

o_Primate_o

Mathius_Mordred wrote: »

Well if you hadn't introduced subclassing in the first place, something I don't believe anyone asked for in great numbers) you wouldn't have to do all this now.

A simple solution would be to boost DPS/Healing/Tanking of all Pure classes (ie classes that use only their original skill lines) by 10-15%. Simply add a new passive that can only be active if all original skill lines are present:

Pure Passive

Adds 15% to all damage
Adds 15% to all healing
Adds 15% to all resists and boosts health by 10%

Job done.

that or buff native skill lines by 5% for each additional native skill line slotted (+5,10%) and nerf subclassed skill lines by 5% for each non-native skill line (-5, 10%).

softyoung

I remember that the motivations behind stam/mag hybridization and the recent subclass update were build diversity and creativity. However, mid-to-high-level players will always search for the optimal build. Once constraints are removed, each player's individual optimization tends to converge into a single global optimum. Moreover, since there is only one type of trial dummy with identical stats and conditions, DPS players can very easily determine which build is closest to optimal.

Still, I believe that having frequent changes is better than having no changes at all, even if some of them may result in outcomes that are worse in hindsight. Updates are inherently stochastic — sometimes they lead to bad results, sometimes to good ones — but with constant feedback, the system can move in the desired direction. The goals set this time look promising, and if the developers continue to respond actively to community feedback, I think the game will become even better than it is now.

cyberjanet

One of the ways to get a unique class identity would be buffs like you get from the secret bosses in the dungeons. My vote for the DK would be the buff you get when blocking gives you a flame attack.

kriegwar13

Vaqual wrote: »

Replacing the global meta with one meta per class will just reset the game the pre-subclassing level of diversity. And even then the differences per class were marginal. There will be no progress if they offer a few big, high commitment bonuses to each class. Many smaller synergies will open up more ways of keeping certain abilities and gear options viable, tweakable and relevant.
Your idea isn't going completely against that, but the scaling of the bonuses would be pivotal to the resulting build diversity. Because I play my NB neither in medium, nor as a stealth- or dual wield-character. Why would I accept your power fantasy over mine? Your idea doesn't go far enough in my eyes and it is missing a real compromise.

With all due respect, The global meta of laser beams being the arcanist are the most damage dealing class? that's your power fantasy? If you want to accept your own fantasy then so be it. Not everyone has main character syndrome. That's how you view the game to be more egotistically "strong" and no-one-can-beat me kind of playstyle. Again, not everyone aims to be that competitively strong but to create their own character identity/fantasy all while being viable, and doing start to end game content.

We'll they said it on stream. If they are up for the change, they want to make things right. So whatever. That is just for aiming for long term benefits of the re-structure instead of doing mini-compromises that are band-aid patches to fix the balance of the game.

They also mention that the "core DNA" of Elder Scrolls games are playing what you want. Like you own it. To really enjoy the game, like of the single player titles. And doing identity of your character in any way you want. But then again, there is the MMO element within ESO, and that's where they need to do the balancing which has been a decade old issue.

Maybe you're not really an elder scrolls fan. Anyways who am I to judge. We all have our own opinion.

Vaqual

kriegwar13 wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

Replacing the global meta with one meta per class will just reset the game the pre-subclassing level of diversity. And even then the differences per class were marginal. There will be no progress if they offer a few big, high commitment bonuses to each class. Many smaller synergies will open up more ways of keeping certain abilities and gear options viable, tweakable and relevant.
Your idea isn't going completely against that, but the scaling of the bonuses would be pivotal to the resulting build diversity. Because I play my NB neither in medium, nor as a stealth- or dual wield-character. Why would I accept your power fantasy over mine? Your idea doesn't go far enough in my eyes and it is missing a real compromise.

With all due respect, The global meta of laser beams being the arcanist are the most damage dealing class? that's your power fantasy? If you want to accept your own fantasy then so be it. Not everyone has main character syndrome. That's how you view the game to be more egotistically "strong" and no-one-can-beat me kind of playstyle. Again, not everyone aims to be that competitively strong but to create their own character identity/fantasy all while being viable, and doing start to end game content.

We'll they said it on stream. If they are up for the change, they want to make things right. So whatever. That is just for aiming for long term benefits of the re-structure instead of doing mini-compromises that are band-aid patches to fix the balance of the game.

They also mention that the "core DNA" of Elder Scrolls games are playing what you want. Like you own it. To really enjoy the game, like of the single player titles. And doing identity of your character in any way you want. But then again, there is the MMO element within ESO, and that's where they need to do the balancing which has been a decade old issue.

Maybe you're not really an elder scrolls fan. Anyways who am I to judge. We all have our own opinion.

You are just putting words into my mouth, and it isn't even clear whether you understood my comment or not. I am not saying the status quo is good, I said your fix is bad.