xMovingTarget wrote: »

The tf post actually made me think about trying FFXIV.

No troll

If you're mostly into PvE, including progressive group and raid content, and can tolerate the art style, you should go and pick it up. Right now. The overall quality of the product is heads and shoulders above what ZOS have delivered so far.

Only thing lacking is the PvP, there are just some generic mini games.

If you spent 30 mins in the ER TS you would not use the word fanboy.

Awesome article. Unfortunately it'll fall on deaf ears/blind eyes at ZOS.

dietlime wrote: »

Most people don't want 500 more generic fetch quests.

They're working on systems stability on an in-house engine that still has considerable networking issues; and they're working on a console port which is no small task.

Behind the scenes ESO does a lot of things other MMO's don't do. P2P networking and particle based game mechanics.

All those other games? All they did was tack on more content that was made by artists with their in-house world building tools.

That's great, but players still want new things to do every so often. A new vet dungeon isn't a generic fetch quest, and plenty of ESO players would love to see something like that. Each player that gets bored/fed up while playing the same content over and over while dealing with seemingly immortal bugs is a loss of revenue from unsubbing, from loss of cash shop purchases, and from negative word of mouth to other potential players.

Maybe some players expect perfection right now, according to their own narrow notion of what perfection in ESO would look like. But I suspect many just want to have a reason to keep playing, either because some serious problem has finally been fixed, some new area has been released, etc. For those who've been VR for several months and who have gone through the existing content multiple times, the wait for a new dungeons or zone since the last drop is getting old. Some players who started at release are just now getting to VR14, and some just to VR1. But even they will eventually hit the "What else is there to do?" wall. Many players have already been camped at that wall for a while now.

How quickly a player reaches that wall depends on how much time you have to play and what parts of the game you enjoy the most. I enjoy everything in the game and even though I have a VR14 DK and a VR14 Templar I still need to finish getting my Sorc to VR14. I also have a Nightblade sitting at VR1. And another Sorc waiting patiently at what, level 5 or 7? I actually don't think of doing the Alliance zones *yet again* to be a total chore because I love the settings, stories, art, etc. And my crafters are taking forever to get good at anything, so that's still something to work on. I further break all of that up with PvP, Craglorn delves, group dungeons, etc. So I can extend my detours and slow my approach to that wall. Yet many have already gotten tired of waiting next to it and have moved on. Others are seriously considering joining them, especially since they see no reason to stay subbed and can wait things out playing other games.

I'm sure the devs at ZOS more than anyone wish more projects were going faster and smoother. I appreciate that there may be an effort to tackle more substantial coding issues and related innovations that can allow for even better playable content. I have no objection to such work nor do I deny its length and difficulty. I would love to see how such efforts will enable exciting new dimensions to how the game is designed and played. I just want the game to be around long enough to see all of that happen.

Shunravi wrote: »

It's compacted into one zone, sure, but it's not group only.

So I just ignore every single dungeon, delve and other door in that zone telling me it's a Group thing?

Yes, it may be possible to solo some of the content in that zone, but the few delves I have stuck my nose into it quickly becomes apparent that groups were what that was designed for. I don't mind group content being added to the game, I just also want Solo content added too with the next zone(s)

Sadly I think the article is very accurate. I know many of us feel like we have been put on hold while they focus on the console release and the general feeling is that it's very unfair for us to bankroll and support the company financially while they focus all their efforts on something completely unrelated. Would we feel the same if the consoles opened up new players for us to play with? Maybe. But we already know they will be playing on completely different servers. We also know that they didn't spend a year paying $15 a month to create a game on a completely different platform from what we are using. I recall that currently there is mention that new content is supposed to decrease. Decrease to what exactly? We really haven't gotten anything new as far as I'm concerned. All we have gotten is a more polished game and content that was originally intended to be in the game at release. If anything they are behind schedule.

So much this. "In light of its overall importance, I fully understand the decision to shift a larger focus towards the console release but the fact that the studio has failed to produce a single new zone, dungeon, raid, or story-advancing quest line in what is rapidly approaching half a year does draw their development priorities into question."

I left in early Q4 and returned March 17. After spending CP and running around stealing, you have this now what moment. There is no new content.

"It seemed like this original vision for content expansion was being followed aggressively when content including the Imperial City (and it’s dungeons), Murkmire, and Orsinium was all showcased with functional (albeit unpolished) levels of completeness at the beginning of October, 2014 during ESO’s first Guild Summit."

What happened? We understand how important consoles are for the company, but where are these zones that were functional in Oct 2014? I'm the type of player that loves the story, listens to the quests, and really thinks about the tough decisions. But the story ended 5 months ago. Can we at least get a timeline of when you'll release, other than soon™?

If you remember ...

“Expect to see soon”: new facial animation system, improved grouping, fixes to player separation issues

“Expect to see in a while”: Imperial City, Champion System -> August to March "IN A WHILE" = 6 months for CHAMP SYS.

“Expect to see later”: Justice System, Spellcrafting = NEVER

http://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/2014/08/20/the-road-ahead----august-20

Sotha_Sil wrote: »

If you remember ...

“Expect to see soon”: new facial animation system, improved grouping, fixes to player separation issues

“Expect to see in a while”: Imperial City, Champion System -> August to March "IN A WHILE" = 6 months for CHAMP SYS.

“Expect to see later”: Justice System, Spellcrafting = NEVER

http://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/2014/08/20/the-road-ahead----august-20

I learned something new today - "in a while" means roughly a year or longer. When my boss asks when will I finish my current task, I can say "in a while" and instantly give myself another year to get it done. Thank you, ZOS!

asteldian wrote: »

While FFXIV has delivered content, I still couldn't go back to it. Was kinda fun getting to the max level but it suffers the lack of build variation I have enjoyed both here and in some past games. Ultimately FFXIV is too generic for my tastes.

More content is definitely overdue, but in honesty, if they could just give me a mostly bug free, lag free game at some point over the next couple months (by MMO standards I mean, I ain't expecting miracles!) Then that would actually be a big deal to me.

Regarding Craglorn, the only stupid design decision was having quest that actually forced you to have a group just to progress. Artificial requirements like that are BS. If you want to force people to group then do so by making the content group worthy. If a player can handle the content alone or with a friend then don't force them to find more people just to open a f***ing door

Agreed.

Great article by @Atropos .

I started a thread about this back in January: Does This Mean No New Content For 6 Months....Yes It Does

Here is what ZoS needs to do to open up the content that they do have but that is currently inaccessible to many players.

1. Fix the LFG tool. Make it better, more robust, and actually functional.

2. Introduce Cross-Faction PVE through the new and Improved LFG Tool

3. Fix PVP Issues.

4. Expose end-game content that is currently behind the Veteran Rank progression nightmare by reducing the amount of XP to achieve each veteran rank to 150,000.

Admittedly this does nothing for those people that have achieved everything ESO has to offer who do not wish to roll and alt.

Lionxoft wrote: »

Atropos does some great work both for TF and the add-on community. I'm not sure where he deserves the title of Fanboy. Hell, if you think he's a Fanboy you should ask him about ESO's loot system.

I would not label the author a fanboy. They missed obvious material that they could have referenced, if they had wanted to, and no fanboy would have missed that. It may seem balanced and right on target, particularly to people who think that content needs to be the focus, but the omissions make the writer sound like they have an agenda and bias that they want to air. Intentional or not.

So, no, not a fanboy.

LonePirate wrote: »

There is no doubt that the console release has prevented the release of new content for the PC players. ZOS has essentially said this almost verbatim. This article, while appreciated, needed to land some actual punches instead of the sparring taps it delivered. Specifically, the article should have mentioned the questionable project management and scheduling as well as the staffing/workload issues which seem like the obvious bottlenecks to me.

Roughly six weeks from now, ZOS has to send a functional version of the game on XBO and PS4 discs to the production centers where thousands/millions of physical copies of the game can be manufactured and shipped to retailers worldwide in time for the June 9 launch. There has been no wide scale public testing of the console code so far. Could you imagine if we had reached early February 2014 and there had been no public Beta testing of the PC game? That's where we are with the console release.

It's no wonder we have had no new content for PC players when it seems like ZOS is being constricted by the slowly closing console window.

They will depend on post-gold patches to update the masters.

In defense, to an extent, of the beta being late, the vast majority of the content is the same and will likely work on console exactly as it does on PC/Mac. The beta will have some of the same issues that we experience on here. The classes are not going to be magically balanced and bugs on Live will be unlikely to be fixed on console. All of this significantly reduces the scope of a beta. They will want to make sure that the megaservers are operational and scaled properly and that console specific features, like the UI, voice chat, etc are working as intended.

However, I do agree that they seem to be stuck in a perpetual state of not having enough people to accomplish things in a timely manner. Once console is out, they will likely establish a regular frequency to drop content, maybe once a quarter. It will never be fast enough to satisfy the players.

jkemmery wrote: »

jamesharv2005ub17_ESO wrote: »

They have basically written off the PC version in favor of consoles. So unless console people can buy it then it isnt coming out. They also just said nothing they showed in 2014 is even close to ready for release. Probably because months ago all PC development outside of the crown store was put on hold and everyone moved to the console version. So for the PC you might (maybe) see a new zone by christmas but most likely we are looking at spring 2016 before we see any new zones.

So ya this game on the PC is over pretty much. Sad too they failed on the PC. One of the biggest IPs in PC history and they turn it into a flop. Maybe bethesda will allow another company to use the IP for PC once they finally shut down the pc servers for good.

Couldn't disagree with the general sentiment of this post more. ZOS has a limited number of resources that they can devote to development. In the past several months, they have been focusing on the console release, for a very good reason: new players and new revenue. Once the console release has settled down and a whole new swath of players has joined in, I expect we will see the map of Tamriel begin to fill out, and an increased focus on developing new content/ story lines. In the mean time they have thrown out a few bones in terms of Crown Store items that serve both to keep players' interests piqued as well as generate some revenue for the game while being relatively cheap to develop. I'm optimistic that once the console launch is complete, new revenue will be added to the environment and the world will begin to grow and become more interesting as development resources can be freed up and more even possibly added due to the larger player base. Skyrim sold 2 million copies for the X-Box and another 900,000 on Playstation. Granted a good deal of those players are probably here but it's a safe bet that ESO will sell hundreds of thousands of new copies on the consoles due to the demand for a new Elder Scrolls game. I think we'll all be able to log in to Tamriel for quite some time to come. I mean, it's much better than WOW, in the opinion of many and that has been with us for years. I think ESO has a lot more in store. I have faith.

I know Skyrim and you sir (ESO) are no Skyrim.

LonePirate wrote: »

http://tamrielfoundry.com/2015/04/eso-content-crawl/

The TF crew, also known by their guild Entropy Rising, were some of the earliest players granted 24/7 access to the PTS almost two years ago. They compare the ESO content release schedule to some other games and draw some easy to reach conclusions.

Thanks for sharing; that was a very interesting read which - unfortunately - confirms my own gut feeling.

Orchish wrote: »

I'm a PvP player, I've gotten used to no new content.

Yep, ZOS is fortunate that the thrill of competition and sense of loyalty to the franchise has been enough to keep the pvp community active through what has been a content drought since day one. A little meaningful pvp content would be a much appreciated courtesy to pvpers, even if the battle is continuing without it.