Group dungeons for non veterans

Jolipinator · February 2016

I am a new player, at level 37 now. I have played one group dungeon so far as it was the only one that had any other players outside it. It was the first one in Auridon. I played with a group of strangers, we died a bunch of times but overall I had a lot of fun, and it gave me something to look forward to in each region.

When I felt I was a high enough level to attempt the next group dungeon in Grahtwood I went to check it out, but couldn't find any other players. For 3 days, every hour or so I would go back to check and eventually I found 2 people, both pretty close to my level. I was also in the group finder and soon enough it added a fourth player, so we headed in. What I didn't know was that the fourth player was a veteran, and after dying a few times I noticed on the screen it said the dungeon was scaled to Veteran Rank 16... If I remember correctly, I was level 25, one player was 24, the other 19, and the one added through the group finder was 44.

So first of all I have no idea how Veteran ranks work, because I am not at that stage yet, all I know is that it kicks in after level 50. So what happens after 50? Does your level reset, and you work your way up again? Otherwise I don't understand. One of the players was a veteran, but I don't know which, since the game hasn't explained anything about the veteran system to me yet, and the help section is useless.

The other problem is, why are veterans and non veterans even meeting in group finder? I read that after reaching veteran you get a new quest in each group dungeon, so why would the group finder send 3 people into a dungeon that shouldn't even be available to them yet?

The most annoying part is that I have continued playing the game without doing these dungeons, so now my level is too high. If I go back and play them with strangers the dungeon will scale to my level, and they will get annoyed at me for the same reason I am annoyed at the group finder. Cheers.

paul_j · February 2016

When you reach lvl 45 there is an undaunted quest giver that resets daily for people to level up the undaunted skill line. When you use group finder it automatically scales the dungeon to vet16. What platform are you on? Finding a group hasn't been too much of a problem for me on NA ps4

flguy147ub17_ESO · February 2016

Yeah not finding groups is driving me crazy. I have sat in group finder every night i have played since i was level 12 or so and i am 44 now. I have found 1 group in it. I may unsub and quit because i literally cannot play the content of the game i am paying for. Whats the point of playing the game if you cant play the content.

Jolipinator · February 2016

paul_j wrote: »

When you reach lvl 45 there is an undaunted quest giver that resets daily for people to level up the undaunted skill line. When you use group finder it automatically scales the dungeon to vet16. What platform are you on? Finding a group hasn't been too much of a problem for me on NA ps4

Why does it scale the dungeons to Veteran 16 if they haven't even reached 50 yet? I can't understand this system at all, and I can't find explanations anywhere.

I mean really, can someone explain what exactly happens after becoming a veteran? I don't understand why I am seeing players who are level 5, with the veteran symbol next to their name, and they are killing enemies in one hit. Are they a Veteran rank 5? That couldn't be how it works because I see players of all levels doing this, surely it would only go up to 16. Hopefully the champion system will be explained better.

Magdalina · February 2016

Welcome to the community, hope you enjoy your stay

I agree some explanations wouldn't go amiss but Zenimax thinks encouraging players to find stuff on their own is good or something, I'm not sure.
So let's start...
After you reach level 50 several things happen.
1)Basically there's no level 50 but veteran 1 instead(you can tell a player is "veteran" and not just level 1 because there's a shield next to their level when you look at them). From there you level on from vet 1 to vet 16 much akin to normal levels except it takes significantly more experience to do so. I'm not too familiar with recent changes(they did reduce experience) but it used to be basically 1 vet level~10 normal levels' time. After finishing main storyline you'll get access to other alliances' zones where you'll be able to earn that experience(or you could earn it by PvPing or running dungeons or something)
What you might want to take into account is they're removing vet ranks soon so there'll be only level 50 plus Champion Points(see below).

2)Once you reach vet one an alternative leveling system which is soon supposed to fully replace vet levels kicks in, called Champion Points System(on PC by default viewing your Champion Point is tied to "=" key). Basically as you earn experience on a veteran level char, no matter which veteran level, you earn Champion Points(there's a catch up mechanic in place so you earn them much faster if you have a few of them than when you have a lot of them) which you can put into constellations in the Champion System tab. The constellations have various perks which make you more powerful. It's not an overly complicated system, you'll see what I'm talking about once you get to level 50(well veteran rank 1).

3)You'll unlock the vet-only content of the game, namely Craglorn group zone(which is unfortunately mostly dead an d vry unrewarding these days), Trials(12 man dungeons) and veteran dungeons.
Regarding veteran dungeons - if you go in the group tab you'll see there's an option called "Dungeon Mode" on top letting you choose(or, well, currently not letting you choose as you're not veteran yet) between a normal and a kind of spiky shield - that means non veteran and veteran dungeon. Once you reach vet you'll be able to use it. For the dungeons which have no vet version it will do nothing. For those that do have vet version(the first 2 zones' dungeons for each alliance(Spindleclutch, Fungal Grotto, Banished Cells, Wayrest Sewers, Elden Hollow and Darkshade Caverns), Crypt of Hearts, City of Ash and IC dungeons(White-Gold Tower and Imperial City Prison)) it will set the dungeon to "veteran" mode, where you have a separate quest(for most dungeons it's kind of a continuation of the nonvet one's story, in WGT and ICP they got lazy and there're no separate quests for vet dungeons), new(though somewhat related) bosses and mechanics. These dungeons are typically longer than non vet versions(again with exception of WGT and ICP which basically have all the same bosses and mechanics except vet is much harder), too.

Now onto groupfinder...first of all, it did not put you in the vet version of the dungeon, you can't go there if you're not veteran yourself. However veteran players can go to non veteran dungeons by choosing "non veteran" dungeon option in group tab.

When the game launched all dungeons used to be set level, first tier dungeons(Spindle, Fungal, Banished) were all...level 15 I think? The problem it created was if you missed Spindle at level 15 and came back at level 21 you got no experience nor loot from any of the mobs in there(if you're >5 levels higher than a mob you don't get it), so they introduced dungeon scaling. Currently for any group made out of groupfinder the dungeon scales to the leader of the group.

Groupfinder is where it gets interesting though. Since it is known to have an issue with taking a long time to find a group they decided to enlarge the pool of available players and now it's not looking for players of your level but players of ANY level for the dungeon you chose(obviously it won't pair non veterans for a vet dungeon because they won't be able to enter it, but then I don't think you can search for a vet dungeon group at non vet level either). So level 10s and vet 16 can end up in same group. If you use groupfinder the dungeon will scale to vet 16 BUT you and whole group will be scaled to vet 16(or is it 15? I forget) as well. Check your stats, you should have a LOT more than your normal health, magicka, stamina, weapon/spelldamage etc in that dungeon. It is done so no matter the level everyone still gets xp and loot and argueably(?) can make dungeons more difficult for low level players(I'm not sure if it's true or not because you DO get scaled).

Note that the leveling will happen even if 4 level 10s group using groupfinder, simply how it works.

Phew.../wall_of_text_over

Hope this helps clear things up a bit

Nax · February 2016

Magdalina wrote:

Currently for any group made out of groupfinder the dungeon scales to the leader of the group.

This is not correct (though you did go on to provide the correct information in your following paragraph).
Just to be as clear as possible, if you use the grouping tool, the dungeon and everyone in your group will be scaled to VR16, with your group receiving stat boosts to help compensate.

Some nice changes are also being made to the grouping tool. You should read about it in the patch notes!

Magdalina · February 2016

Nax wrote: »

Magdalina wrote:

Currently for any group made out of groupfinder the dungeon scales to the leader of the group.

This is not correct (though you did go on to provide the correct information in your following paragraph).
Just to be as clear as possible, if you use the grouping tool, the dungeon and everyone in your group will be scaled to VR16, with your group receiving stat boosts to help compensate.

Some nice changes are also being made to the grouping tool. You should read about it in the patch notes!

That's what I said though o.O "outside of groupfinder"