Why did Zenimax even bother making an mmo?

Bloodfang

This thread is pointless. Game is well designed for questing either solo or by grouping with little issues really and even those are getting fixed.

OP saying that this game is purely focusing on solo play is totally false, and your argument that zenimax shouldn't be making an MMO is aswell. So far they're doing everything better than Blizzard did in 10 years anyway.

I spent 200hours lvling from 1-50 doing 400+ quests, 50+ dungeons, grinding a bit random mobs, running public dungeons more times, and i never even touched pvp..So I have no clue how much experience you are getting in PvP or Dungeons alone. But if it is designed to take you minimum 200 hours PvPing or doing Dungeons to reach lvl 50, then I would call that a great job at balancing leveling system.

Gohlar

Despair9 wrote: »

This thread is pointless. Game is well designed for questing either solo or by grouping with little issues really and even those are getting fixed.

Thread got necro'd, try checking the dates.

The game is very solo focused though, you can team up to do the solo content, but it's still solo content. The content designed for groups gives virtually no exp. This simple point is somehow going completely over some people's heads.

Despair9 wrote: »

I spent 200hours lvling from 1-50 doing 400+ quests, 50+ dungeons, grinding a bit random mobs, running public dungeons more times, and i never even touched pvp..So I have no clue how much experience you are getting in PvP or Dungeons alone. But if it is designed to take you minimum 200 hours PvPing or doing Dungeons to reach lvl 50, then I would call that a great job at balancing leveling system.

You don't seem to understand how exp is awarded in general, which is understandable with the default ui. It would take a lifetime to level up in dungeons the way things are now. It's getting changed, so they are aware of the problem.

These problems are widely talked about by anyone being even somewhat objective. I mean you guys can pretend they aren't there, but that's just stupid. ESO is a pretty poor multiplayer game both in terms of it's structure and it's functionality and Zenimax knows it. Teaming up for solo quests presents no challenge at all and is tedious.

Again, they have commented about these issues since the thread was created and are addressing them. Obviously, people like myself who were talking about these problems were on to something.

Rad

steerpike1979 wrote: »

I have to say that I tend to agree with the OP. Just finished a run on a tough public dungeon and it was a nightmare trying co-ordinate the quests in it with the 2 other players I was with. I must have run back and forth in the dungeon 3 or 4 times so that everyone could finish. I would like to see group questing made more user-friendly.

The quest tracker in ESO is prety much the norm, the problem is that the norm SUCK. My first experience with a quest tracker like this was in WoW, and I didn't last longer than the initial month.

When the leader picks a quest all navpoints, counters etc should automatically be shared with every groupmember, even if they do not even have the quest themselves. As soon as one of the teammembers complete any objective it should update the quest for everybody. Once done, those who had the quest in their tracker should get the reward, those who already done it don't get any reward. Simple as that.

drogon1

I'm gonna resurrect this thread because I am annoyed at how the OP was erroneously attacked for basically being ... exactly right.

ESO is currently primarily a single player questing experience, not an MMO. There is essentially no instance grouping to advance your character in the game, though the instances exist and are fun and well done. Thus, it is senseless to play a dedicated healer or tank in the game.

In sum, to remove xp from the most challenging PVE in the game - playing the instances - is an epic fail in MMO game design.

This game will bleed subs when the issue is better understood. The OP's concern is legitimate and important.

rlconeb14_ESO

Gohlar wrote: »

The game wants you to solo quest and only solo quest. Leveling is all solo questing. Your reward for hitting 50? More solo questing.

If they just wanted everyone to solo, wouldn't it have been smarter to just make a single player game? I mean they wasted a lot money building an mmo if they don't want people playing together.

Everyone to solo? So by your post you have solo'd all content and since you have please post the link to all your solo'd dungeons and vet dungeons. If I see this I might actually take your post seriously if not well your main point is complaining about solo quests which every mmo ever released contains and in large numbers. Oh there is nothing stopping you from grouping, nothing stopping you from not doing the quests and just grinding, but if you don't want a game with quests try a fps, all rpg genre games are going to have questing in some form or another.

Hiddenbunny

... Its funny people are attacking the "this game is solo game" opinion by saying you can do group stuff...

yeah, if ZOS didn't even provide that, they can't call it a mmo and charge you for it. But what is the benefit of any group play? Yes, you can group and you get enjoyment out of it. But if I am playing, I would like to progress my character...

Lets say I play one hour tonight in mid 20-30s. If I just do solo quests, I can probably get a level, some sky shards, some good quest greens, and I am advancing my character a little.

If I spent the hour in a group dungeon, what do I get? First of all, if I don't have 3 other friends, I will spend first 15 minutes in zone chat, since the LFG tool don't really work, then spent the rest of time do 1 dungeon or maybe 2 depend on the other people in my group. What do I get in return... "group enjoyment" I guess. I might get a drop, I might not, I certainly won't get nearly as much exp as questing, especially if its a repeat dungeon without a quest.

In this case, I argue that the vast majority of the people will just solo level, because the reward is not worth the time, even if you do have a good group.

So, since the game is designed that way, it is hard not to think the game is geared toward solo. Yes, there are group things to do, but ZOS is not rewarding people who are doing group dungeons, if anything, the current system is persuading people away from group dungeons.

You can group to do quests too, and I think that's fun, but you can do the same thing solo, its not specifically designed for a group. The specific group content, the group dungeons right now, simply don't give people any carrot for doing them, and that's the complaint we have.

Fersaken

I think what people are trying to say is

AS AN MMO THIS GAME FAILS which is true.

AS A SINGLE PLAYER GAME it excels. which is also true.

Zenimax had no business making an mmo. We are more or less still playing alpha, and from the looks of it will remain playing alpha for the next couple of months if not longer.

This just in Elder Scrolls Online: A realm reborn launching 01/01/2016

I mean who ever created the naming / username system should be shot.
The 5 guild thing is utterly useless. More or less keep one guild chat on and turn 4 off.
The auction house system is garbage.
The bugs are stupid. VR10 and can only do one dungeon because of bugs.

I could keep going but honestly whats the point they aren't going to fix anything. The game is prettied up garbage. Why do I still play? To pass time.

RagePlug

Offtopic here. There was also a guy on mmorpg forum, complaining about how he's not able to finish main quest at lvl 43 because it's too hard and he dies too much, so for that ESO sucks!

Aeradon

I've seen plenty of group content with much participants.

Lupinemw

Gohlar wrote: »

The game wants you to solo quest and only solo quest. Leveling is all solo questing. Your reward for hitting 50? More solo questing.

If they just wanted everyone to solo, wouldn't it have been smarter to just make a single player game? I mean they wasted a lot money building an mmo if they don't want people playing together.

Well good luck to the solo questers with Craglorn. I can't wait for the first one to moan that he can't solo the 12 man Trials

rhubbert_ESO

Poor guy has no friends, blames Zenimax

frwinters_ESO

Gohlar wrote: »

The game wants you to solo quest and only solo quest. Leveling is all solo questing. Your reward for hitting 50? More solo questing.

If they just wanted everyone to solo, wouldn't it have been smarter to just make a single player game? I mean they wasted a lot money building an mmo if they don't want people playing together.

Another one of these posts. Im not even reading any other replies. I already commented on another thread that was similar.

The main story is approximatly 10 quests. 10! OMG i got to do 10 quwests by myself? There are a handful of other quests, vbery small, that are solo. How many quests are in each zone. On average, going by the achievements there are at least 50-60 per zone. Each faction gets 5 zones, so thats over 300 quests. So what thats 1 out of every 30 quests you have to do it solo? OMG thats to much shut the game down! *sarcasm*

Get over it.

Kevaliji

Gohlar wrote: »

Hodorius wrote: »

I lvled from 1-vr3 with a friend... 99% of my playtime was in a group... still want my donkey!

Any tips on how to progress as a group? Dial back the nonsense a little, it gets us nowhere. Say something meaningful please.

One way you could use groups is say you're group is 4-5 VR 1's. Sweep the Vet 1 and 2 zones world bosses, public dungeons, and dolmens. Thats what i did on multiple occasions (to help lower level guildies) and it was a ton of fun. and as for someone saying PvP gives no experience, i got 45k vet points taking bleakers last night. Im VR6 53% till VR7, 30% of that is from pvp. At vet ranks PvP is almost the same xp as questing... Tip for pvp, repair, destroy enemy siege, kill everything. All those things give you vet xp, and it adds up pretty fast.

ZiRM

The answer is simply for the $$$, the Elder scrolls lore alone had people buy the game.

drogon1

Aeradon wrote: »

I've seen plenty of group content with much participants.

Hilarious.

drogon1

frwinters_ESO wrote: »

Gohlar wrote: »

The game wants you to solo quest and only solo quest. Leveling is all solo questing. Your reward for hitting 50? More solo questing.

If they just wanted everyone to solo, wouldn't it have been smarter to just make a single player game? I mean they wasted a lot money building an mmo if they don't want people playing together.

Another one of these posts. Im not even reading any other replies. I already commented on another thread that was similar.

The main story is approximatly 10 quests. 10! OMG i got to do 10 quwests by myself? There are a handful of other quests, vbery small, that are solo. How many quests are in each zone. On average, going by the achievements there are at least 50-60 per zone. Each faction gets 5 zones, so thats over 300 quests. So what thats 1 out of every 30 quests you have to do it solo? OMG thats to much shut the game down! *sarcasm*

Get over it.

I prefer leveling in dungeons (with at level players) because the group content is more challenging. In a pug, for example, usually 1 or 2 players play poorly, challenging the others in the group to pick up the slack and succeed.

Questing, on the other hand, I find to be faceroll. This guy thinks the problem is that people are lazy and not grouping to do the questing. But how much more faceroll and nonchallenging can questing single player content be with a group? Grouping to do regular quests is pointless in this game and pretty unfun.

Remove "solo" from Gohlar's comments, and replace with "single-player." Does this help the more obtuse out there?

The game forces you to do single player content - quests - to advance your character. Doing this content "grouped" is actually worse than doing it solo. Being forced to do it 95% of the time needed to advance your character is inexcusable in an MMO.

Let's hope the pvp kill xp is buffed sufficiently to make this a viable second way to advance your character.

Nazon_Katts

Ask Michael Dominguez, he may have an answer.