PTS Update 49 - Feedback Thread for DLC and Warden in Base Game

ZOS_Kevin · January 12

This is the official feedback thread for DLC content being added to Base Game in Update 49. The following DLC and class content will be available when in Base Game:

Class: Warden
Imperial City
Orsinium
Thieves Guild
Dark Brotherhood

Specific feedback that the team is looking for includes the following:

Are you able to access Imperial City as Base Game content?
Are you able to access Orsinium as Base Game content?
Are you able to access Thieves Guild as Base Game content?
Are you able to access Dark Brotherhood as Base Game content?
Are you able to access Class: Warden as Base Game content?
Is there any other feedback regarding the DLC and Warden Class moving to Base Game you would like to highlight?

virtus753 · 9:12AM

I think I can access it all alright, but I have concerns about whether that access is effectively communicated in game.

When I logged on to the PTS with alt accounts that don't have dungeon packs, zone DLC, or ESO+, I didn't see any sort of notice that I had new content available. As a longtime player who reads the forums, I know where to go to look for this new content. As a new or returning player, or as someone who doesn't seek out information outside of game, I don't think I'd notice getting access to additional content. I also don't think I'd be able to differentiate very well what I could access and what I couldn't from certain menus, particularly set collections. (I like the map, though.)

In the set collections menu, this is largely due to the use of the term "DLC":

I'm coming from the perspective of someone who has most often seen "DLC" contrasted with "base game" as mutually exclusive terms. I had that impression long before I started playing ESO, and it seemed to be confirmed by ZOS's usage, up until today's patch notes. I'd known that DLC can be free (e.g. Vvardenfell and Imperial City on live), or it can be paid (all other DLC currently). It can be forced as an extra entitlement (Vvardenfell) or it can be optional (Imperial City). Regardless, it is IME post-launch content not covered by the same entitlement as the base game. In ESO specifically it seems always to have been used that way. Features and zones included in post-launch base game updates haven't traditionally been called "DLC" in ESO (see Craglorn). By contrast, even long after Morrowind/Vvardenfell (the zone DLC) was made free and forcibly applied to all accounts, it has always been referred to by official sources as "DLC". In the relevant announcement, the term "DLC" was used throughout the article, including phrases such as "free access to the...DLC" - that would have been the time to introduce it as "base game," but that term was nowhere to be found. Even now Vvardenfell still appears under "DLC zones" in the set collections menu, where players go to see where to source sets. Today was the first day I can recall ever seeing Morrowind/Vvardenfell referred to as "already base game" (on live) by an official source.

Now we have a situation where the majority of zones listed in "DLC zones" are not yet included in the base game, despite sharing that same category with four "DLC" that now are included. The extant classification - keeping both "base game DLC" and "not base game DLC" together on the basis of their historical access, rather than separating them or at least notating them based on current access - seems like it is likely to get in the way of facilitating that access.

Practically speaking, players don't need to know in game at a glance whether the sets they're looking at come from post-launch content that originated as DLC. (The history can be found online.) They need to know whether those sets come from content they can currently access. Even though overland sets can be traded, knowing when they can get the set themselves is important for getting players into that content they now have access to. When "DLC" has long been used in ESO terminology, and more widely, to mean "not accessible without an additional entitlement," why would a player who has not bought or otherwise claimed anything other than the base game even think they might have access to something labeled "DLC"?

I'm given to understand that eventually all DLC zones will be included in the base game. (If I had to guess, I'd think at least two full years from now, but it will be more than three if we continue to get 5 per year.) Until then, it will likely be very hard for players (especially new or returning) to understand what requires them to acquire an additional entitlement versus what does not. Please find a way to visually notate in menus such as set collections what "DLC" has become "base game", especially if you are somehow applying both those terms to the same content at the same time, as that doesn't seem to be a common convention.

Similarly, ICP and WGT monster coffers are still listed under Urgarlag's store, where I do not think many players will be inclined to look if they know they have not bought anything other than the base game. I can only think those dungeon quests will still be given by Urgarlag. On the upside, it should mean they keep their higher tier pledge rewards. On the (potential) downside, I assume these dungeons will now show up in everyone's random pool. Regardless of upsides or downsides, though, how will the game make it clear to players that they now can get two (more) of Urgarlag's pledges and purchase two (more) coffers from her? Are the devs relying on word of mouth from other players - or perhaps on players stumbling upon a pair of new checkboxes in the dungeon finder or a blue arrow on the couple of (extra) days it will appear each month (the DLC rotation is 34 days, if I'm counting right)? Even if this new access is mentioned in a text announcement in the launcher or some such, it also needs to be signaled clearly in game as well. I'm not finding that right now, and I hope that can be improved for the player base.

On that note, will all dungeon DLC eventually be included in the base game too? Or are IC's dungeons only being included because they are part of the same entitlement as a zone DLC?