Night_Watch wrote: »

The trap (think category) of making certain play styles undesirable by certain types of player and thus creating a 'them and us' sort of mentality were the 'them' are the undesirables and the us are the uber lords of the playground (I do not mean this in a derogatory way). More often than not, this trap also leads to players that a have genuine superiority complex - they may not be as superior to others as they imply but they truly think they are. Inevitably this leads to a certain degree of real or perceived eletism.
Edit: crossed some 'i's dotted some 't's!

What a load of nonsense. Do you have any facts to back up your claims that most good players have a superiority complex? Did you see that sort of behaviour/language from the raid leader in the screenshot provided?

All players that have completed the trials with respectable times have gone through the same reality checks as the one the raid leader is trying to impart on the OP.

Namely that for high DPS you need to have light armour and staff, you need to build high spell crit & spell dmg, you need to animation cancel to increase your DPS, you need to stack DoTs where possible for faster ultie generation.

That's the order of things, until ZOS changes it. You either accept it as reality and adjust, or you blame everyone else calling them elitists with superiority complexes and all that bull.

You would think the guys who made it the VR levels with less than optimal builds would be the "better" players. Just saying.

Crisscross wrote: »

Night_Watch wrote: »

I think that such groups should state their needs before accepting a new 'recruit'.

Speaking completely for myself, I would find this undesireable. In a PuG environment, I think it'd be great if groups would at least give "sub-optimal" players a chance or two to see if they could still clear the content with them. Repair costs may be high, but in a perfect world puggers should know what they're getting into before deciding to start, and the "sub-optimal" players know that it's on them to step up.

At the very least, the sub optimal players should be informed that they may be kicked during the run if they start to drag the rest of the group down. That way casual players without guilds can still manage to have some fun doing content that would otherwise be locked out for them, and it's also healthy for the meta just in case one person does come along with an "omg where did that come from" build that blows all the community's preconceptions out of the water.

I agree with you, but this isn't how MMOs sadly work

If you don't follow the mass or better said, the leaders - then you are simply put out of the business unless you become a leader yourself but believe me, you will sooner or later become the same "...." that you hated as a pug.

If you can have an easy run why make it hard? A lot of people will rely on very high dps due their own lack of skill in regards of mitigating damage, conserving magicka etc.

Talking about non enrage mobs here, but we sometimes battled mobs for 20 minutes at WOW - it was fine, but games have changed and a lot of people would not be able to stay focused for 20 minutes, so many boss fights are made for 1 or 2 minutes with an enrage timer these days

Laura wrote: »

Some people like melee, some people like casters

I happen to be the type of person who loves casters, I know I wouldn't be happy if I had to play melee.

The problem is that if you aren't a caster in this game you simply can not pull the kind of dps NEEDED to get through the trials.

I have lost a lot of good players who were die hard melee people because of this issue. That is what needs to change.

Of course all builds aren't going to be viable ever. If you put heavy armor on and try to run in as a caster with a bow you are going to have a bad time but melee and bow builds should be viable.

You think?

That's been exactly my point this whole time.

People it is not "better" or "elitist" or "us vs them" it is simple math and reasoning skills.

Spec A provides a cap of 500 dps
Spec B provides a cap of 800 dps
Encounter needs a minimum of 700 dps

There is your math now for the reasoning part

If spec A is below 700 and spec B is above 700 I will reason that spec B will work and spec A won't.

No elitism, no us vs. them its just basic math.

The people who understand this and work with it instead of banging their heads against the wall and screaming about it are not the ones at fault.

Tandor wrote: »

I'd blame the group leader if he had specific build preferences in mind but didn't specify them when advertising the vacancy.

I'd also criticise any group leader who adopted an elitist position in relation to a PUG.

Pretty much this. As a leader it's your responsibility to check everything out (including players builds/loadouts if necessary) before getting started.

That being said the group leader in this case seemed pretty decent. He explained the reasoning, didn't bash the player for anything and suggested ways he might go about it.

Leesha wrote: »

kitsinni wrote: »

Leesha wrote: »

grimsfield wrote: »

I would have kicked you too... Some things just don't work well in this game atm, unfortunately. You really should respec... and it would be wise to listen to people who offer advice.

It is people like you who ruin communities in mmos and make people antisocial. I play a light armor/staff sorc but I'm going to say it anyway. I really hope they destroy the light armor/staff build just so others can play how they want and have fun without being told they have to respec to be included in end game content.

How does attempting an encounter over and over and over that is literally impossible to do with your setup build a community?

How does telling people to play the way you think they should build a community? I'm not saying they should have kept the op in the group if he were truly the weak link. What I'm saying is, the closed minded mentality of light armor/staff or gtfo is wrong.

Until ZOS gives melee weapons slightly higher damage and mostly more sustain, that's how things stand. I for one hope that they make the necessary changes in the future for the sake of variety.

Until they do though, the fact remains that I'm not telling them to play the way I want, but the only way it's actually possible. That's very different from what you say.

steveb16_ESO46 wrote: »

Vuron wrote: »

[But, they devs never said "you can play any playstyles you want!". This quote has been going around and used in every argument that people have.

From the horses mouth

One of the core philosophies of The Elder Scrolls Online is to allow you to play the way you want. You’ve probably heard us say it or experienced it for yourself: equip any weapon, wear any armor, choose from a myriad of skills, pick your role, make choices in quests, ignore certain quests and just explore, etc. The idea is that these choices tie you more to your character, and respect that you might want to play differently from one day to the next. Many times, I’ve heard people discuss how they like to solo, others like to “raid,” and another group likes to PvP, so we know gamers never fit into neat categories.

However, many people who have become attached to their character want to see how their character would perform in a variety of situations or game modes. This is part of the reason we don’t have PvP gear and PvE gear, and also the reason we embrace being able to pick and max out more than a handful of skills. We’ve tried to avoid the danger of compartmentalizing and labeling certain players by acknowledging that circumstances change for people day-to-day. On Monday you might feel like playing alone, and Tuesday you might feel like working with friends on a dungeon. Whatever your motivation, you should be able to go do the thing you want without a lot of barriers.

This is the philosophy behind the core systems of ESO—play the way you want to play—and it extends to our veteran content.

no matter how many times certain posters pretend they don't know this the developers were absolutely explicit that the very basis of the game was 'play as you want'. Thee flexible build system was a very big selling point.

There was no 'but you will fail if you don't play the build i'm thinking about in my head' caveats.

They also never state that you'll be as effective as everyone else or that all builds and playstyles will be created equal. You are quite capable of playing how you want, as I did completing all the content with a DW/medium armor NB before any of the NB buffs. However, I'm not nearly as effective in certain situations with that build and don't expect to be. Conversely, the light armor/staff builds aren't nearly as effective as my build in other situations.

Building everything to the least common denominator reduces the game to a button mashing, kill fest. If you can wear the worst armor possible, slap 5 random skills on your bar, and breeze through the content, what does that mean for the people that spend time, effort, and testing to get better at the game?

Bramir wrote: »

kitsinni wrote: »

People it is not "better" or "elitist" or "us vs them" it is simple math and reasoning skills.

Spec A provides a cap of 500 dps
Spec B provides a cap of 800 dps
Encounter needs a minimum of 700 dps

There is your math now for the reasoning part

If spec A is below 700 and spec B is above 700 I will reason that spec B will work and spec A won't.

No elitism, no us vs. them its just basic math.

The people who understand this and work with it instead of banging their heads against the wall and screaming about it are not the ones at fault.

The goal is fun, not numbers or how fast you can level by farming some unchallenging mobs. Your 'reasoning' missed the very first reason...

Yes the goal is fun, but your fun and my fun are different.

My fun is not carrying you and your inefficient build through 20 wipes in Aetherian Archives and then having to grind for an hour to cover the cost of the repairs.

You missed your own reason

Tremulous wrote: »

I'm not sure what I am meant to QQ about here. Was he kicked because he was a Tank using a 2h or a dps using plate?

In any case I put pepper on my sweetroll and it tasted horrible.

dps using heavy +2h.

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

kitsinni wrote: »

People it is not "better" or "elitist" or "us vs them" it is simple math and reasoning skills.

Spec A provides a cap of 500 dps
Spec B provides a cap of 800 dps
Encounter needs a minimum of 700 dps

There is your math now for the reasoning part

If spec A is below 700 and spec B is above 700 I will reason that spec B will work and spec A won't.

No elitism, no us vs. them its just basic math.

The people who understand this and work with it instead of banging their heads against the wall and screaming about it are not the ones at fault.

The goal is fun, not numbers or how fast you can level by farming some unchallenging mobs. Your 'reasoning' missed the very first reason...

Yes the goal is fun, but your fun and my fun are different.

My fun is not carrying you and your inefficient build through 20 wipes in Aetherian Archives and then having to grind for an hour to cover the cost of the repairs.

You missed your own reason

Trust me, you would not be carrying me...

My build changes day to day, situation to situation and I leveled up all but bow and two-hander. And the best part is, I figured it out on my own rather than depending on someone to tell me how to do it best, like most 'elites'. I also have the reaction time and situational awareness that comes from lots and lots of pvp. But do you know what I would do if presented with an inexperienced player with a sub-optimal build in my squad? I step up to the challenge and carry them, because its challenging and fun. The easy way out is to kick them...you like things easy I am guessing...

At any rate, I do agree not everyone's fun is the same. But excluding people from groups because their build does not jive with something you read on the forums as being the optimal build, is true douchebaggery and is why I mock 'elitists' every chance I get.

Vuron wrote: »

This scenario is only going to become more common since the VR nerf. You're going to have people getting through VR content without really learning how to play an optimal build or how to adjust their builds for group content.

Don't blame other people because they don't want to carry you. Unfortunately, wearing heavy armor and wielding a 2h in trials would most likely mean they'd have to carry you. You might be the exception, but many won't be.

This comes down to the mechanics of the trials and not really the group leaders. These trials require very specific tactics and certain classes/builds just don't fit. This is a development issue.

That's a good and polite way of saying it. Ultimately not many people are going to want to carry strangers who aren't pulling their weight at all through, and in many cases realistically can't comfortably due to the way the mechanics, DPS checks, etc. are set up.

Instead of coming to the forums to complain that certain builds aren't good for certain activities, the OP really should have been looking at how he could make a build good for the activity he wanted to perform. Doing otherwise is like complaining that a healing build can't do as good a level of damage as a dps build. It's inherent to the very nature of RPG systems like this. It has absolutely nothing to do with "play how you want" or not.

Aeratus wrote: »

The PUG leader wasn't being a jerk. In fact, he took his time to explain it to you, rather than simply kicking you out of the group.

As an extreme illustration, if you prefer to play unarmored with fists and join a trial group, you're going to get kicked for having a sub-par build.

Obviously, 2h + heavy isn't as bad as unarmored with fists, but the idea is still the same.

Spot-on.

Bramir wrote: »

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Bramir wrote: »

kitsinni wrote: »

People it is not "better" or "elitist" or "us vs them" it is simple math and reasoning skills.

Spec A provides a cap of 500 dps
Spec B provides a cap of 800 dps
Encounter needs a minimum of 700 dps

There is your math now for the reasoning part

If spec A is below 700 and spec B is above 700 I will reason that spec B will work and spec A won't.

No elitism, no us vs. them its just basic math.

The people who understand this and work with it instead of banging their heads against the wall and screaming about it are not the ones at fault.

The goal is fun, not numbers or how fast you can level by farming some unchallenging mobs. Your 'reasoning' missed the very first reason...

Yes the goal is fun, but your fun and my fun are different.

My fun is not carrying you and your inefficient build through 20 wipes in Aetherian Archives and then having to grind for an hour to cover the cost of the repairs.

You missed your own reason

At any rate, I do agree not everyone's fun is the same. But excluding people from groups because their build does not jive with something you read on the forums as being the optimal build, is true douchebaggery and is why I mock 'elitists' every chance I get.

The number of people who would kick you because of what builds they read worked on the forums is very minimal in the wild. They can and will kick you though because they simply cannot do the Trial with your weight on them. In the end, whether you agree with them or not it is *their* group. You are welcome to form your own and play with people who enjoy a playstyle more similar to your own and actually I would encourage people to do so because they tend to have more fun when playing with people they relate with. Social activity is good!

However, yelling on the forums to "mock elitists" is self-contradictory... you are stating you hate "elitists" you disagree with (aka people who play well and want to do well) being "rude" but then are "rude" to people you disagree with yourself.

magnusnet wrote: »

People that go to trials tend to want to complete them.

In my case, if I join a random group where there are people who are below 2200 HP or some that are not VR12, not enough healers, too many tanks: I will leave the group instantly. I don't want to waste my time.

I btw have a special set & potions just for trials (Inferno & Resto staf), whereas in PVP in use resto and 1h & S.

If you're looking for a non competitive time in trials, join a grp that will farm the first boss. You won't get much further with your set anyways.

Oh and don't blame Zenimax, Trials are meant to be hard and the sets you can get in weekly rewards are very well worth it.

But rejoice, ZOS bent to crybabies and nerfed VR zones. They will probably, sadly, eventually nerf Trials so more crybabies can complete them.

No, DO blame Zenimax. "Hard" is fine. Requiring a small number of optimal builds to complete "hard" in a "play your way" game is a whole other thing entirely and is not. We aren't talking about every minute possible variations of builds, here. We are talking light armor and staff to the virtual exclusion of everything else. And that's just ridiculous and the ONLY people are fault are Zenimax. They released the unbalanced game. They left it unbalanced for a quarter of a year. They added the "hard" content that makes it worse.

What's really sad is with all this talk about "current gen" and "AAA" games and "modern MMOs" and "play your way" blah blah blah given the current state of balance in this game, not to mention the state of the game in general, you will find more variety and choices for every possible play style in a 15 year old game like EQ with narrowly defined roles for each class than you will here in a game that's supposed to be wide open. Simply because there is no balance and the topic of this thread is the shining example of that. You will also find more balance, more challenge, more and better rewards and a game designed with a basic understanding of what drives MMO dynamics than this one, too, but that's another conversation.

Sadly, I agree with the last point. They probably will just nerf the content so the imbalances just don't matter because that's easier than fixing their game.

Blame zenimax for that, too.

@Fleymark, excellent post.