Rapid gear decay

Brakkar

I didn't have much time to play today, so I decided to look for some resources.
I avoided combat, sneaking past mobs and ignoring nodes which were guarded by monsters.
I came back to the town to refine found materials and sell some which I wouldn't use and found that I had a 558g repair bill for doing almost zero combat at all.
Seriously?

Knottypine

The unfortunate part is in the current state, even without dying it's not feasible to continue wearing the same armor sometimes not even for a full level without either repairing or crafting new items.

Luckily there are some armor drops that I can use to replace broken stuff... but even if I find something green or blue, it's not even that exciting anymore knowing it'll be broken in a few hours.

starkerealm

Cherryblossom wrote: »

txfeinbergsub17_ESO wrote: »

SaibotLiu wrote: »

This is when MMO's start to suck, if players get listened to when it comes to obstacles being too hard. Im the opposite, if I see a trend develop and they start making the game easier, I know I'll be a couple of steps closer to quitting this game. The repair bill serves a valuable purpose as a gold sink. If you diminish this significantly, suddenly everyone is available to save large quantities of gold, and your economy goes to crap. Im already able to save plenty of cash to do whatever I want, now when not so savvy players are able to save, it only amplifies what the more industrious players are able to do, then you have a problem because now those players whinging about repair costs before cant afford the elevated prices due to inflation. So really, bad players are just bad, if you balance the game around them, your game will be bad. Dont do that.

No offense to anyone intended, Ive just seen this happen dozen of times in an MMO, this post is nothing if not right on cue. For once lets just try to play smarter instead of begging for things to be easier. Its better for everyone.

Completely agree. The same thing happened because a bunch of whiners came on here and said the beginning was too un-Elder Scroll like so they made a change to have people go straight to the mainland. The idiots on these forums are not game designers, and do NOT represent the majority (who typically don't come to the forum to post).

Ok so you can both understand, this thread has come about because recently, not from the begining, peoples gear has started to degrade very quickly.
Within an hour my brand new level 46 gear was at Zero, I did not die once. I'm a night blade who stabs things in the back so I rarely get hit. So after an hour of play I now have a 1800gold bill. So it's Sunday, if I play for 5 hours thats a 9000gold bill. (I haven't stupidly went to Cyrodil and have struggled to load since)
You actually think that is working as intended? If you do can you pay my bill please cos I can't afford that, the average mob drops 1 gold!

There's two things that make this issue tricky. One: a lot of people aren't actually noticing this yet. Because of how it works, if you weren't already tracking your repair costs closely, you might not notice.

There are even addons out there that will auto repair your gear whenever you dock with a merchant, meaning there are players getting screwed right now that don't even know it yet.

This is especially true if you're leveling. When I first noticed this deterioration, I thought it was because I must have forgotten to repair, and that costs had risen sharply after going to Eastmarch, but further investigation showed that wasn't the issue at all.

Two: players are having a hard time realizing when this happened. I've seen people giving me flack for my estimations because it's not the experience they had when they were leveling. They don't realize, as you pointed out, that the deterioration rates changed with the 4/20 patch. I literally had someone tell me I didn't understand vending stuff because they'd had no trouble getting 255k on their VR3... yeah, they didn't do that in the last week.

All of this is compounded by the fact that we still don't know if this is a bug or intended behavior, because ZOS refuses to weigh in. If they'd at least say it's intended behavior, then I could just delete the game and get on with my life. If it's a bug, then I know I can keep paying my sub fee until they actually fix it.

Jirki88

One would think that ZeniMax would actually comment on issues like this. Well, at least in the fictional world inside my head where people do the logical and reasonable thing. Clearly, whoever handles Community Management around here, see it as a hobby. That's why they gladly chip in a jolly little comment on Khajiit avatars, while they stay away from actual issues like an arachnophobe stays away from a shrine of Mephala.

Drakonklenok

Jirki88 wrote: »

One would think that ZeniMax would actually comment on issues like this. Well, at least in the fictional world inside my head where people do the logical and reasonable thing. Clearly, whoever handles Community Management around here, see it as a hobby. That's why they gladly chip in a jolly little comment on Khajiit avatars, while they stay away from actual issues like an arachnophobe stays away from a shrine of Mephala.

I agree that there should be some official word on this...However, it is quite possible they (forum mods) don't know and thus cannot comment, could simply be they need to get an answer from someone more qualified. Forum avatars, that is in their domain, answering game design questions, is not.

Jirki88

Drakonklenok wrote: »

Jirki88 wrote: »

One would think that ZeniMax would actually comment on issues like this. Well, at least in the fictional world inside my head where people do the logical and reasonable thing. Clearly, whoever handles Community Management around here, see it as a hobby. That's why they gladly chip in a jolly little comment on Khajiit avatars, while they stay away from actual issues like an arachnophobe stays away from a shrine of Mephala.

I agree that there should be some official word on this...However, it is quite possible they (forum mods) don't know and thus cannot comment, could simply be they need to get an answer from someone more qualified. Forum avatars, that is in their domain, answering game design questions, is not.

Yes well... This thread was made six days ago. If they can't find out in six days I'd say the communication issues within the company is about as good as the official communication channels between USA and Soviet during the Cold War...

shadyjane62

If this is intended I will unsub and learn my lesson. I won't play till I see an official response. Have about 6 days to find out. I think that things have been so bad for me in this game, I'm hoping to ahve yet another reason to leave. I have to spend my game money on a year sub as that is most cost efficient. It will be here or at Rift. Don't want to waste my money on this game if this is all we will come to expect.

Asava

For me being VR3 I usually end up with a 1500g or so repair bill from questing bs vr quests. Now most items are worth around 36g when sold to a merchant and mobs drop between 2 and 5g a piece. My gold barely moves up. On a good day I'll make 15k gold but spend 10k on repairs easily. I haven't even bothered crafting yet due to inventory space issues.

starkerealm

Drakonklenok wrote: »

Jirki88 wrote: »

One would think that ZeniMax would actually comment on issues like this. Well, at least in the fictional world inside my head where people do the logical and reasonable thing. Clearly, whoever handles Community Management around here, see it as a hobby. That's why they gladly chip in a jolly little comment on Khajiit avatars, while they stay away from actual issues like an arachnophobe stays away from a shrine of Mephala.

I agree that there should be some official word on this...However, it is quite possible they (forum mods) don't know and thus cannot comment, could simply be they need to get an answer from someone more qualified. Forum avatars, that is in their domain, answering game design questions, is not.

That implies that these forums are just a box they stuff people to scream in. Which is possible, but, a very unflattering approach. If true, it also means there's virtually no incentive to post here.

starkerealm

Jirki88 wrote: »

Drakonklenok wrote: »

Jirki88 wrote: »

One would think that ZeniMax would actually comment on issues like this. Well, at least in the fictional world inside my head where people do the logical and reasonable thing. Clearly, whoever handles Community Management around here, see it as a hobby. That's why they gladly chip in a jolly little comment on Khajiit avatars, while they stay away from actual issues like an arachnophobe stays away from a shrine of Mephala.

I agree that there should be some official word on this...However, it is quite possible they (forum mods) don't know and thus cannot comment, could simply be they need to get an answer from someone more qualified. Forum avatars, that is in their domain, answering game design questions, is not.

Yes well... This thread was made six days ago. If they can't find out in six days I'd say the communication issues within the company is about as good as the official communication channels between USA and Soviet during the Cold War...

To say nothing of the fact that the devs have weighed in on other, more recent, less viewed, less populated threads with "we're looking into it." Which... makes me really worried that this is in fact part of their anti-goldfarming measures.

babylon

starkerealm wrote: »

To say nothing of the fact that the devs have weighed in on other, more recent, less viewed, less populated threads with "we're looking into it." Which... makes me really worried that this is in fact part of their anti-goldfarming measures.

It would have the opposite effect (making people poor will drive people TO the goldfarmers) so not sure how this could be justified for that reason.

starkerealm

babylon wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

To say nothing of the fact that the devs have weighed in on other, more recent, less viewed, less populated threads with "we're looking into it." Which... makes me really worried that this is in fact part of their anti-goldfarming measures.

It would have the opposite effect (making people poor will drive people TO the goldfarmers) so not sure how this could be justified for that reason.

My fear there is that the original thought process was, "let's curb gold farming by making it less profitable. Since gear already decays, let's ramp it up, so the farmers need to spend gold to repair." Except, of course, the farmers are in rags using powers. Like I said elsewhere, "severely misguided."

Also, one of the changes in the patch was "new backend systems to prevent goldsellers." For obvious reasons they're not going to discuss what those are, but the risk that this is one of those is there... and then the silence of the devs breeding paranoia.

babylon

starkerealm wrote: »

babylon wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

To say nothing of the fact that the devs have weighed in on other, more recent, less viewed, less populated threads with "we're looking into it." Which... makes me really worried that this is in fact part of their anti-goldfarming measures.

It would have the opposite effect (making people poor will drive people TO the goldfarmers) so not sure how this could be justified for that reason.

My fear there is that the original thought process was, "let's curb gold farming by making it less profitable. Since gear already decays, let's ramp it up, so the farmers need to spend gold to repair." Except, of course, the farmers are in rags using powers. Like I said elsewhere, "severely misguided."

Also, one of the changes in the patch was "new backend systems to prevent goldsellers." For obvious reasons they're not going to discuss what those are, but the risk that this is one of those is there... and then the silence of the devs breeding paranoia.

This isn't a f2p MMO, it's AAA. Anything they do that also punishes legit players will only cause legit players to drop subs. It would be foolish to suck the fun out of the game because of bots, who frankly don't give a crap about wearing rags or time needed to do things...they are automated.

I hope ZOS does not make that mistake.

starkerealm

babylon wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

babylon wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

To say nothing of the fact that the devs have weighed in on other, more recent, less viewed, less populated threads with "we're looking into it." Which... makes me really worried that this is in fact part of their anti-goldfarming measures.

It would have the opposite effect (making people poor will drive people TO the goldfarmers) so not sure how this could be justified for that reason.

My fear there is that the original thought process was, "let's curb gold farming by making it less profitable. Since gear already decays, let's ramp it up, so the farmers need to spend gold to repair." Except, of course, the farmers are in rags using powers. Like I said elsewhere, "severely misguided."

Also, one of the changes in the patch was "new backend systems to prevent goldsellers." For obvious reasons they're not going to discuss what those are, but the risk that this is one of those is there... and then the silence of the devs breeding paranoia.

This isn't a f2p MMO, it's AAA. Anything they do that also punishes legit players will only cause legit players to drop subs. It would be foolish to suck the fun out of the game because of bots, who frankly don't give a crap about wearing rags or time needed to do things...they are automated.

I hope ZOS does not make that mistake.

Me too. But, between my characters being unplayable for a week, and the heavy handed loot timer... and the part where the state of the game post admitted they didn't expect bots and spammers... I don't know. And, I am worried that this isn't accidental.

HandofBane

I mentioned this in another thread, but weighing in quickly:

This is likely an unintended bug hitting some people, and needs addressing from Zenimax's side. My own repairs, as a v1 (nearly v2 now), have been fairly cheap - cheaper than what I was paying in Coldharbour, though that may be from dying slightly less (no Harvesters, fewer zombies). From what I am seeing some of you quote as what you are paying, it is obscenely higher than what I have been - for a quick reference point, doing the entirely of the quest series in Daggerfall proper, with the multiple werewolf/Bloodthorn fights, my total repair bill after saving the king was about 45g. And this is as a dw/resto nightblade in medium armor who gets hit far too often.

Being over halfway through Glenumbra now, I have not had a single repair bill (even with dying) over 325g, and I tend to repair every time I head into town to sell, or see a wandering merchant along the roads. I am not trying to brag or anything, just provide some input that the repair bills you guys are seeing are far out of whack from what appears to be the "normal intended" repair price. Hopefully they are looking into what is causing this, as it has to be a bug.

starkerealm

Yeah, that meshes with my recollections of repair bills back before the 20th. A quick bounce in and out with minimal combat would run me around 12g, and put me at roughly 99% condition, in Stonefalls. Prolonged questing would put me into the 30g range, 40g with deaths. On my Dominion NB, I'm now seeing 100g from doing a single quest while avoiding combat and steathing around every enemy I can. This also took me down into the 80% condition range for my gear, with a few pieces in much worse condition.

ttwinklerub17_ESO

Im not finding an issue yet

lev 18 I think the highest repair I had was after a boss(and dying a few times) for 473gp

most of the time I spend the whole night fighting killing and picking up stuff 4-6 hrs
and what? have a repair bill if lucky hits 100gp or slightly over (most of the time I go back in and have no repairs - even after battling monsters for rawhide -filling my backpack)

I however kill things immediately as a nightblade/assasin
minimize the damage you take as much as you can
(Im sure using armor that reduces decay helps)

Im sure I'll probably see the problem as I go on but seeing that I earn 4k-10k in a session it's not a problem yet
right now Im more interested in getting my next upgrades backpack/bank
(My sinkholes 20k each)

murklor007neb18_ESO

Has anyone investigated what the actual decay rate is? Just post examples.

Fight one mob with 100% repaired armor, state what type mob/mob group and what kind of weapon/fighting style (ie ranged, melee, magic, etc) and what kind of armour you wear of course. State what value the armor is on afterwards. Keep in mind that just because an armor piece say "204" instead of "194/204" it is *not* at 100%. Its the value you need to look at. Right after that, jump off a cliff and die then state what armor is. So you get pre fight stats, after a fight stats and after death stats.

(no, the last part isnt only to laugh at you, its to check death decay).

This should at least show us some numbers. Personally I cant say I've noticed that much of a difference since the last patch - repair costs have always been insane. I thought it was higher just because I turned veteran but... Its still similar to pre-50.

starkerealm

murklor007neb18_ESO wrote: »

Has anyone investigated what the actual decay rate is? Just post examples.

Fight one mob with 100% repaired armor, state what type mob/mob group and what kind of weapon/fighting style (ie ranged, melee, magic, etc) and what kind of armour you wear of course. State what value the armor is on afterwards. Keep in mind that just because an armor piece say "204" instead of "194/204" it is *not* at 100%. Its the value you need to look at. Right after that, jump off a cliff and die then state what armor is. So you get pre fight stats, after a fight stats and after death stats.

(no, the last part isnt only to laugh at you, its to check death decay).

This should at least show us some numbers. Personally I cant say I've noticed that much of a difference since the last patch - repair costs have always been insane.

One thing that helps enormously here is DuraMeter. That's where my numbers are coming from, by the way. It drops an overall condition average on the screen.

My Nightblade that I've been dragging out, I was losing 1% condition per two mobs on average, lost 2% on the mission boss mob (though I did take a lot of damage there), took 2% from Del's Claim, that involved, literally, three bow attacks and one attack with strife on the boss, no damage received. 4% condition loss from death. I've confirmed that Strife and Veiled Strike can both reduce durability. It looks like by 0.2%, but that IS a guess.

Also, what have your repair costs been, historically? It used to be rare for me to break 100g unless I deliberately ignored repairs for an extended period of time or died repeatedly.

Guldendraak

I've noticed this myself...

During a typical playing session (on my heavy plate wearing templar), I'm out questing for a couple of hours (with a couple of public dungeon runs included) and with 1 death, at VR level, I can find myself with a repair bill of 2.5k gold - all my gear is at 0 durability.

Sometimes, I'm finding it easier to just make new green gear. I've also talked to others in-game and they are doing the same thing as even without a death, the repair costs seem out of proportion for what you are doing.

Can we please get a Moderator response to explain how our gear degrades? Also, It'd be interesting to see whether Heavy costs more than light to repair or whether melee are being penalised for taking the hits whilst casters stand back and avoid damage.

traigusb14_ESO2

This is definitely not universal. As I have been posting, I'm not affected by this.

Went out with a friend tonight (who has said his repair costs are bad) and did everything together for 1.5 hours, same quests, same mobs etc. I was tanking so I actually got hit more (Temp vs. his Sorc). We mostly did Eastmarch quests, though we did one run through the Halls of the Dead in town for a quick bag full of loot. No deaths for either of us

My repair costs 713.
His repair costs 3262 (and his pants were broken).

Both wearing crafted greens/whites/blues. Both level 35.

starkerealm

traigusb14_ESO2 wrote: »

This is definitely not universal. As I have been posting, I'm not affected by this.

Went out with a friend tonight (who has said his repair costs are bad) and did everything together for 1.5 hours, same quests, same mobs etc. I was tanking so I actually got hit more (Temp vs. his Sorc). We mostly did Eastmarch quests, though we did one run through the Halls of the Dead in town for a quick bag full of loot. No deaths for either of us

My repair costs 713.
His repair costs 3262 (and his pants were broken).

Both wearing crafted greens/whites/blues. Both level 35.

Any chance you have a rough estimate of your gear condition at the end? I've got the suspicion that the issue is deterioration rates being inconsistent.

babylon

Regardless of any of this, they need to make it so the total cost of repairs even if all armour is at zero durability cannot exceed the value of that armour (gold value if sold to an npc). How can 7 bits of armour at 30 gold a piece give us a 1000 gold repair bill? It should be at most 210 gold (cost of armour).

They need to reign in the costs of repairs, and I don't see how it can be possible that repair costs can ever be more than armour costs.

traigusb14_ESO2

Haven't fixed it yet, game is open in other screen. Don't have the addon, so doing math by hand.

I'm at 78% total (including my secondary weapon and shield) after 1.5 hours. ( He has already repaired but says most of his gear was in 20% range except broken pants at 0).

Worst piece of gear damaged is my blue shield at 70%. Best is my green belt at 86%

The only real difference in our gear (I made his with my sorc EDIT: all gear was newly made 34, both chars are 35) is I have 3 pieces of gear with + crit prevention, my shirt and both shields. I don't think it s crits though, because my sorc doesn't have any gear with that trait and he doesn't get boned either.

Otherwise it is all +AC, + devines + enchatments and + explore.

Yeah it is inconsistent, it also seems to be by account, rather than by character, class, gear tier or level. It was also definitely that patch.

I'm just trying to help narrow it down fort he devs.

BrierTOG

I am sad because before this patch the crafting had any use, now it hardly does as you can't always find enough to craft a new item before the old one broke down. Besides what us is there for crafters to continue as you probably won't sell anything because it breaks down too fast. Which is not your fault but still.

ashenb14_ESO

I have personally seen this issue, talking to people in my guild some have insain repair bills on gear others, who die more often get very low bills.

this needs fixed.....as it really screws alot of us over.

Im also wondering why i cant repair my own heavy armor as a rank 48 smith who crafts its own gear......in UO(ultima online) i always repaired my own gear and gear for others on my character who was a GM (grand master) blacksmith....yet, i cant do that in this game....where smithing is far more important.....

I would happily supply my own repair mats and even pay a small amount of gold per part(up to the vendor value of the item infact)

if this is part of the anti-bot system, somebody hasnt looked at what bots are using many are in broken low level gear in swarms that kill spawns before they even take a hit....

if you want to get rid of the bots, easiest fix for now, as they work on an automated system, would be to hire some people or even players to monitor and kick bots, possibly setup a seperate phase for the server where bots are moved to, where they get drops with no value at all, could even go so far as to give the bots drops they cant remove from their packs(we did this in a game i use to be staff on for another mmo and it worked great)

real players who got caught up could contact support, and have a dialog and get it removed, (get moved back to the normal server and get the items removed, bots became a loosing proposition since they could only farm low level areas for a short time and then ended up in the bot area getting worthless drops)

lots of ways to deal with bots....

shows the didnt think to clearly about the market they where entering that they didnt even think about gold farmers/spammers/bots....when even the likes of blizzard cant eliminate them after decades trying...

my suggestion though, they need to tune the costs down alot, so real players can repair our gear rather then just replace it....(some of us even ranged users get boned....)

and they need to deal with bots by getting real people to go from hot spot to hot spot booting/banning(at least temp banning) the bots, or moving the bots to an area like the old UO jail where they can just stand around without the ability to leave or do anything else......

honestly that would be my suggestion, i mean its manpower intensive to a point but, would be far more effective then pissing off real players so much that we refuse to sub....

if this is how they plan to handle the botting issue, i will unsub and wait for the game to go b2p or f2p...since by then i bet they fix the issues.....

Taid

is this a major troll topic? Im Vet1 at the moment, and i cant even remember a point where ive had to pay more than 2k gold EVER to reapair my stuff, i usually wear all grenn/blue from level 1 - 50 , quested and killed mobs the whole day being a melee tank/dps. WHen my inv is full i do my usual town-round and the repaircosts are below 1k Oo

The only situations where i have to pay between 1,5 - 1,8 k feeled, is when we wipe in a dungeonencounter or multiple and i have to rezz over 10 times or so.

So either you guys are in Full-Troll Mode or something is broken with your client information. I would bet for Trolls...

daemonios

As far as gold sinks go, this is EVEN MORE ludicrous than the 25% tax on guild store sales. I mean, this is a 100%+ tax on your questing income! Surely this can't be working as intended?

I craft all my own gear and use multiple sets. I used to repair every time I went into town, but recently stopped doing so because of the cost. Maybe now I'll actually make some money to get some more bank and bag slots.

Unless someone is role-playing as a mob punching bag, repair costs should never be more than can reasonably be earned by playing. Otherwise, I predict people will be stripping off their gear and doing like those annoying bots, going to low-level areas in search of trash loot to sell.

Dunhilda

Anarchos404 wrote: »

I've found Zenimax's secret plan!
They added sick decay rates to ruin the gear the cheaters/dupers have accumulated these last weeks and then we normal players get to suffer!

That is stupid, the dupers duped Materials like Rosin and Tempers. NOT gear.

thegamekittenub17_ESO

-peeks in- I just found for me, it repairs all items in your bag. Anything broken on your body and in your bag is repaired. I started just using whatever armor I had available to try and save on repair. Silly me didn't sell some broken armor in bag and the cost was sky high. So anything you are carrying in your bag and as well as armor you are wearing...it is repairing all of it.

But still getting slapped with a hefty repair bill is still happening if I don't just regear everytime I hit town.