considering this is an MMO and there are actual players to group up with, an NPC follower is unnecessary.

Solo'ers who don't want to group up with others? Well, you are probably playing the wrong genre if you are looking for lots solo player content.

Group up with like minded people to accomplish stuff, don't rely on a mindless zombie when there are players to do the legwork for you.

Not needed, theres enough players for that.

OMG No .. the game would become even more solo than it is now

The game lags enough as it is when there's a lot of players in one area, they don't need hirelings to make it lag more.

If you don't want interactions with others in an online game .. best bet is don't get an online game

I had to vote yes on this for one reason; This is an MMORPG. most people forget the 'RPG' part and just say MMO but it is still a Role Playing Game. Some people want to explore.

Comments like, "I'm playing an MMO and I want to run through a dungeon as quick as possible and pwn the boss. If you cant keep up then maybe you don't need to play an MMO" drive me crazy.

For comments like those I suggest instead you play a game like Halo or CoD to fulfill your "charge in, hack and slash, skip all content" play-style.

My wife and I play the game regularly, and occasionally my son will jump in a group with us. We are completionists and want to hit every single bookcase, barrel, crate and the mic occasionally echoes with "BACKPACK! BACKPACK!" Staying in groups is extremely difficult because, 5 minutes in, the rest of the group is gone and we have just given up trying to catch them.

I have been playing the ES series since Arena and, when Morrowind came for xbox, my wife got into the series and we had wished for years, through Oblivion and Skyrim, that they would add some kind of multiplayer to the series so we could play together.

Having an extra NPC with you to fill the group outside of PVP areas I think should be fine.

Yes.

• Everyone has different reasons for playing
• Each situation is unique
• Someone else's companion choice doesn't affect me

To have NPC´s assisting you, is not a question of ESO being an MMO, but if it would fit the type of game we play.

Looking back in time, MMO´s used to have a very strong reputation system, - where we players could, depending on our standing with them, hire what we needed. It could be a merchant who stood in our shop, a dragon knight who went to battle with us, or a collector who assisted us in acquiring specific type of resources.

SWTOR has a very similar system in place and it works flawlessly. WOW started with it as well and in my opinion its the best thing Blizzard did in over 8 years or so. While both systems are different, they could be implemented in one way or another also here at ESO.

The question however is, would ZOS be ready to actually implement a full reputation system, as this would be required for such a system. To just go into a town hall and hire someone seems pretty boring to me. What hireling systems require is a story for those NPC´s, so that a player can get attached to them.

We can pick them up while we play, find them in a dungeon or get them gifted to us for saving someone (slavery is bad).

These NPCs could then run our player shops, send us the money we earned by other players shopping in our store, they could take care of our house and garden, they could assist us in battle like at Craglorn or simply just be there providing us with new quests and stories.


As for the dungeon part, to have an NPC assist us in group dungeons can be tricky, SWTOR only succeeded partly in this. While you an do some dungeons with your NPCs, you tend to only have access to a single one and they might not act that smart, which is why so many followers in games tend to have an "essential setting" so that they can not die.

To sum this up,

yes a follower, mercenary system would be nice to have at ESO, especially if we consider that it might solve a few problems that ESO currently has. (Guild only trading, lots of group content outside of dungeons where people have issues getting like minded people, very time consuming crafting system...). Its also far from not suited for MMO´s, Ultima, SWTOR or WOW have them to just name the most popular games here.
That said, first we would need some type of rep system so that we can actually unlock NPC´s by playing the game, similar to Skyrim or SWTOR.

I am against just buying an NPC in a bar and once he or she is dead, I pick it up again. It needs to be meaningful content, big enough to fill a DLC, similar to housing. Don't just put it in for the sake of putting it in, it needs to serve a purpose.

I vote no only because, at least in Skyrim anyway, the AI for the hirelings was terrible. If you played an archer they got directly into your line of fire, if you played a thief type, they constantly gave you away. The only thing that would make me madder in a public dungeon than my hireling getting into my archers line of fire would be someone else's hireling getting getting in the way!

Unsure whether to say yes or no on this subject.

It would be kind of fun to be able to buy a mercenary for a certain fee, choose its class & level it just as we do with our own characters. Mercenaries could be purchased from the fighters guild. Although they'd need to be slightly smarter than what we had in Skyrim.

I think that ESO already works harder to discourage grouping than any MMO I've tried/played.

The last thing they need is another solo game aspect. The game has mercenaries to help you...they are called "other players"

Because its an online only game....not because its an MMO, there are many opportunities to partner or group up with other players.


EDIT: And I believe a similar idea was asked prior to the VR zones being reduced in difficulty. We didn't see merc's but we saw a change in difficulty.

Keep in mind that it wouldn't take significant resources to program NPC's to follow you because it's already in the game when you have temporary quest followers. Suggestion is just to make them a bit more permanent.

in the "good ole days" of ESO.

there were mage / fighter contracts you could buy.
I think i still have two...

Kill Well
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