Leveling through Vet Ranks (and the case with removing them)

Goldie · April 2015

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

The biggest cinch in this rope is the 'planned' removal of the Veteran Ranks. You have to realize that removing them will require massive amounts of code to be changed in order to allow weapons, armor, food, potions, mobs, drops, experience gains, delves, dungeons, quests, entire zones, etcetera etcetera to keep up with the change.

I would much rather them leave things as they are and adjust the experience in craglorn a bit to make it worthwhile to head out there after Cadwells Gold. Who knows what issues will arise with them being changed! If it aint broke don't fix it, just tweak it a bit.

Iago · April 2015

Goldie wrote: »

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

I'm glad somebody gets it.

Aimelin · April 2015

Goldie wrote: »

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

The biggest cinch in this rope is the 'planned' removal of the Veteran Ranks. You have to realize that removing them will require massive amounts of code to be changed in order to allow weapons, armor, food, potions, mobs, drops, experience gains, delves, dungeons, quests, entire zones, etcetera etcetera to keep up with the change.

I would much rather them leave things as they are and adjust the experience in craglorn a bit to make it worthwhile to head out there after Cadwells Gold. Who knows what issues will arise with them being changed! If it aint broke don't fix it, just tweak it a bit.

Nope, remove them.

pronkg · April 2015

It's kinda funny that no one seems to realize they'd possibly have to put in an alternative to them when they remove them. Gearwise

I don't think they are gonna scale all gear down to lvl 50 that would be strange, so if, and only if they are still planning to remove them, expect gear to scale on Champion points,

Scaling gear on Champion points will mean the current Top gear will require 35 champion points which is equivalent to 14.000.000 xp.

So however you will lose the ranks, you'll still have to XP/Grind to advance.
Changing basically nothing to the problem people experience except numbers.

What they can do is scale zones post main story to your lvl like they will do with upcoming DLC,s. That would be good since then you'll have the option to go craglorn/trials right after you finish the main story or finish the silver and good, but it won't be mandatory.
I'd vote yes to this.

All in all grinding/questing will always be a part of mmo's

Goldie · April 2015

Aimelin wrote: »

Goldie wrote: »

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

The biggest cinch in this rope is the 'planned' removal of the Veteran Ranks. You have to realize that removing them will require massive amounts of code to be changed in order to allow weapons, armor, food, potions, mobs, drops, experience gains, delves, dungeons, quests, entire zones, etcetera etcetera to keep up with the change.

I would much rather them leave things as they are and adjust the experience in craglorn a bit to make it worthwhile to head out there after Cadwells Gold. Who knows what issues will arise with them being changed! If it aint broke don't fix it, just tweak it a bit.

Nope, remove them.

Do you even realize what kind of under taking this will be and how many bugs will appear as a result?! Just because you want to hit max level with little to no effort does not mean everyone feels this way. I dread the day they actually attempt this, I feel nothing but horrible bugs and broken gear sets etc will result from it!

rmarsh936 · April 2015

Goldie wrote: »

Aimelin wrote: »

Goldie wrote: »

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

The biggest cinch in this rope is the 'planned' removal of the Veteran Ranks. You have to realize that removing them will require massive amounts of code to be changed in order to allow weapons, armor, food, potions, mobs, drops, experience gains, delves, dungeons, quests, entire zones, etcetera etcetera to keep up with the change.

I would much rather them leave things as they are and adjust the experience in craglorn a bit to make it worthwhile to head out there after Cadwells Gold. Who knows what issues will arise with them being changed! If it aint broke don't fix it, just tweak it a bit.

Nope, remove them.

Do you even realize what kind of under taking this will be and how many bugs will appear as a result?! Just because you want to hit max level with little to no effort does not mean everyone feels this way. I dread the day they actually attempt this, I feel nothing but horrible bugs and broken gear sets etc will result from it!

Agreed, and on top of that, the champion system is not that good of a replacement for vet ranks, its nice, but it has too much of a diminishing returns value, and on top of that, with vet ranks at least you get attribute and skill points.

Horrum · April 2015

Everyone is entitled to their opinon. Some like them, other don't. Live and let live.

Personally, after having played 1000 hours and currently doing Gold for the second time, I feel they have no other option but to remove them, but I won't get into why I believe so. There have been enough threads about this lol.

Raash · April 2015

Goldie wrote: »

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

.

Care to explain on why we cant have that?

LordSkyKnight · April 2015

I find it hilariously funny that people are complaining about core mechanics of the genre such as leveling but I guess that is what is to be expected these days with the new crowd sweeping into MMOs. They want everything handed to them, cash shop shortcuts, and everything in a online multiplayer game changed into solo content.

badbeansnub18_ESO · April 2015

I get an opinion too!

Remove them.

ItsGlaive · April 2015

To many, they are broken. 1-50 feels like an intended levelling curve, and it's not nothing. Silver and Gold (and by proxy, VRs 1-14) feel tacked on and cheap. Not only that, but it's quite a big ask, telling players they basically have to do the other two factions, factions they didn't choose or join, in order to join their friends in end game activities.

Many people don't like to grind, and so do the quests to level a toon, however three factions worth of quests is a lot for anyone, and that in and of itself starts to feel like a chore or a grind.

I've done Silver and Gold once, and I never want to do them again, but where does that leave me with my alts? They've said they'd remove them, and I think that's the best thing to do, they should never have been in the game in the first place.

Etem · April 2015

Remove them.

The amount of friends that have asked me before getting back into the game "Do they still have that stupid level to the cap 3 times thing?" then subsequently lose motivation to play the game.
They seriously gotta go. If your argument is that removing them is going to be hard then perhaps they should not have introduced it in the first place. I have no idea why they went ahead with it in the beginning.

Artemiisia · April 2015

Keep erm, im leveling an alt and I love it

Seraphyel · April 2015

Goldie wrote: »

If you take the time to actually complete the story quests, and make it to the Cadwells Gold areas, it doesn't take that long to level through Veteran Ranks. If you compared the time it takes you to 'grind' I'd say its neck and neck, if you try to level Vet Ranks in Cyrodiil however... well... you want me to buy you a snickers bar?

I know the leveling is tedious, but we cant have the entire games population make V14 in 2 weeks, and its absurd to keep asking for a quick fix to leveling in such a way.

The biggest cinch in this rope is the 'planned' removal of the Veteran Ranks. You have to realize that removing them will require massive amounts of code to be changed in order to allow weapons, armor, food, potions, mobs, drops, experience gains, delves, dungeons, quests, entire zones, etcetera etcetera to keep up with the change.

I would much rather them leave things as they are and adjust the experience in craglorn a bit to make it worthwhile to head out there after Cadwells Gold. Who knows what issues will arise with them being changed! If it aint broke don't fix it, just tweak it a bit.

No, it's not absurd.

VR should have been removed months ago. They are still here and will be here when the console players reach the game and that's a disastrous thing for ESOs future.

We need CONTENT. Craglorn is old and boring. There needs to be at least another 1 or 2 Veteran Zones.

And they need to remove the level limitation for those zones, it should be up to the player where to go.

We need a CHOICE where to go and what to do.

Veteran Ranks are the worst part about the game and they will drive away console players as well as they drove away PC players.

ElliottXO · April 2015

Remove the VR, make silver and gold zones optional and scale them all down to level 50.

AlienSlof · April 2015

I've only recently reached my first VR character and he's doing Cadwell's Silver right now.

If VR stuff is removed, then what is there for him to do? Adding group-only content is no good, as I'm a retiree, playing when most of my buddies are at work/uni, etc, and thus I often have only the choice of going solo. Also, I like to take my time, exploring every nook and cranny, which in a large group is not always possible - they want to rush round and get the XP. Which is fair enough.

Also, I don't just want to run the same old dungeons day in, day out, or do trials, and I have no interest in PvP. I enjoy the questing and exploring.

All I ask, is that suitable content is released to cover these eventualities, otherwise I might as well just level characters to 50, then start a new one.

rmarsh936 · April 2015

I love the prospect of reaching a new level, even if that level is called something else.

Semfim · April 2015

rmarsh936 wrote: »

I love the prospect of reaching a new level, even if that level is called something else.

Think that is the purpose of the Champion System. No one likes to receive zilch after putting in an effort. The beauty in the Champion System for me lies in that with its diminishing returns you get better than a player that invested less of his time than you, BUT if lvls cap at 50, the difference between characters is not that overwhelming. This allows incoming players to get on 'end game' activities while still giving an edge to folks who have more hours than them.

For the poster before saying that lvls is a MMO staple mechanic, I've seen further and further distancing from that filosophy. Mind you, lvls are great to get to a "know what Im doing" platform, but I've enjoyed seeing that the 'genre' is moving to a option based character building (eg: 5-6 skills on your skill bar).

The way I see it, if ESO had launched as the promised 1.7: B2P, max lvl 50, Champion System as a progression and a balance of classes (even though there are unbalances, we are a long way from April 2014), this game would have had kept the hordes of players that tried it.

Why? Because it would allow for Cadwel's to be optional, which was the reason most of the people left(on my list, others may differ). From a Rp point of view Cadwel's 'blows chunks', as a lvling strategy it is too long and boring and reward wise you only get content filler junk. From my perspective it was introduced because of the fear any game nowadays has of not having massive content at launch, as players who play for more hours when a game is released than hours I am awake during a normal day get all huffed in their knickers and come ranting on the forums (SWTOR anyone?).

Anyway, if Cadwel's is optional, players would use it as a way to get skill points, exploration, achievements, and the like. Doing it would make your character stronger, but if anyone felt comfortable with the ammount of skill points they get on the first (regular) areas they could go for all the other ways you can get CP from. And who would be bothered by that other than folks who think grinding Hircine's for two days counts as a reason for being mathmatically superior your peer?

Genomic · April 2015

Gee, imagine being against 'tedium' in a computer game. I have family, work, responsibilities and there is plenty of necessary hard work and tedium in those. I play games for enjoyment. If you cater a game to masochists and those without anything else going on in their lives, then that, sadly, will be your playerbase. ZOS need to widen the appeal of ESO beyond that to be successful.

I have to laugh at people lamenting the 'new' MMO crowd who want something that is fun, rather than an OCD grind. Because if ZOS ignores them, as the emerging dominant playerbase, ESO is doomed. There are so many other game developers who actually get this and forgo grind for engaging and stimulating gameplay. The old school tedious, hours long grind to increase a point in your stats is dead. May it rest in peace.

JD2013 · April 2015

How many threads do we need on this topic?

Hexi · April 2015

Without vet ranks the exact same people would be whining and crying that there was nothing to do and that there was not enough content.

Whiners gonna whine no matter what.

Iago · April 2015

JD2013 wrote: »

How many threads do we need on this topic?

I think we are still few threads shy of the two thousand mark

Haqikah · April 2015

I begin to think the veteran ranks are here to stay.

The main reason is the silence of Zenimax concerning the timing and possible changes due to the removal of the veteran ranks. Another reason is that I think it would be very bad publicity for the console release to push such a huge change just after releasing it.

VR might not be as bad as some people think when Zenimax finally releases DLC (or free new content) which gives alternate ways to level-up.

While I personally think the VR system is a big mistake, it does not bother me at all. But then I am a very casual solo PVE player most of the time. For the competitive crowd - both PvE and PvP - I can imagine the mandatory VR leveling to be very annoying.

Minack · April 2015

The argument against removing them seems to be varying degrees of "ZOS is so incompetent they'll screw it up somehow!"

Yes, removing them requires a plan.

Yes, removing them requires work and rebalancing.

Yes, there will probably be bugs.

Yes, ZOS is probably in over their heads.

But if they're not revamped, the same issues from last year will pop up again as soon as the B2P players reach Vr3. Same for console players.

Hexi wrote: »

Without vet ranks the exact same people would be whining and crying that there was nothing to do and that there was not enough content.

Whiners gonna whine no matter what.

If your idea of fun and engaging content is to do the 1-50 grind two more times after Coldharbour, then you and I have vastly different ideas on what constitutes content. Timesink doesn't equal content.

NewBlacksmurf · April 2015

pronkg wrote: »

It's kinda funny that no one seems to realize they'd possibly have to put in an alternative to them when they remove them. Gearwise

I don't think they are gonna scale all gear down to lvl 50 that would be strange, so if, and only if they are still planning to remove them, expect gear to scale on Champion points,

Scaling gear on Champion points will mean the current Top gear will require 35 champion points which is equivalent to 14.000.000 xp.

So however you will lose the ranks, you'll still have to XP/Grind to advance.
Changing basically nothing to the problem people experience except numbers.

What they can do is scale zones post main story to your lvl like they will do with upcoming DLC,s. That would be good since then you'll have the option to go craglorn/trials right after you finish the main story or finish the silver and good, but it won't be mandatory.
I'd vote yes to this.

All in all grinding/questing will always be a part of mmo's

What?....
Scaling VR into champion levels would or should mean that every 5 -10 champion levels equal 1 VR based on exp gains.

Gear and items can follow that..simple change in the UI

Loosing the ranks, NO just convert them as no one should loose progression

Why would they scale existing zones? Other than the tedious silver n gold quests everything is fine as is if you convert first into champion levels.

Grinding is only a part of the game for those who desire to grind...it shouldn't be forced into people

NewBlacksmurf · April 2015

JD2013 wrote: »

How many threads do we need on this topic?

Not enough it seems as ZOS hasn't commented in months based in when some of the threads started

Faulgor · April 2015

For almost a year now, they have been restructuring the game according to our feedback, which includes our disdain for veteran ranks. They spent months the Champion System as an alternative, and planed a phased release to rework existing systems into this new progression system.
And now you people are saying "nah, just keep them"? A whole year of development that could have been spent on other things for naught?

IMO, you had your chance to say how much you love veteran ranks a year ago. The community and ZOS decided they suck.

LordSkyKnight · April 2015

Genomic wrote: »

Blah blah blah

So what do you find fun and engaging in an MMO? What is your purpose for playing it?

Whether it is levels or skills you need to use to make stronger; the basis of the game never changes. You are going to be completing content to make your character stronger. So you want to rush to the end game / elder game to participate in content? To what end? All of it is hoops you have to jump through to increase the power of your character.

Hexi wrote: »

Without vet ranks the exact same people would be whining and crying that there was nothing to do and that there was not enough content.

Whiners gonna whine no matter what.

Exactly. ZOS can't win. People are whining to have Vet ranks removed, people are whining to have the questing in the other faction's zones optional, people are whining to have more solo content installed. I load up the forums and I see nothing but constant whining in the general discussion forum. Now I see whining posts that they haven't put something in the game for the 1st year anniversary. Good grief.

Cathrin · April 2015

Going to VR 14 is quite a bit of pain! But scaling the armors to the CP level, is even worse.
I am sorry, but with one CP per day, that you can realistically get when you have no more quests, that is just an endless grind to get to an armor, that needs a CP level of 200 or so.

The silver and gold quests are fun the first time, but that's it.
I did gold twice and have completed silver for the third time now. And now it is just a pain to level another class to VR14.

Also, the silver and gold quests prevent me from creating a character for another faction, because I just already know the story.

Cody · April 2015

Took me three months, and I played all day every day:/

3 months is not a short time.

NewBlacksmurf · April 2015

Cathrin wrote: »

Going to VR 14 is quite a bit of pain! But scaling the armors to the CP level, is even worse.
I am sorry, but with one CP per day, that you can realistically get when you have no more quests, that is just an endless grind to get to an armor, that needs a CP level of 200 or so.

The silver and gold quests are fun the first time, but that's it.
I did gold twice and have completed silver for the third time now. And now it is just a pain to level another class to VR14.

Also, the silver and gold quests prevent me from creating a character for another faction, because I just already know the story.

Yep yep

I don't follow how people look at converting VR to cp's as bad....it's better than just wiping them away with no credit