Gameplay Updates and Q&A with Eric Wrobel

pecheckler · February 2016

nimander99 wrote: »

They are nerfing Breath of Life to reduce server load in pvp. That's why they won't back down from this change.

?????????

Wily_Wizard · February 2016

Any chance of getting some Tank/HA love for PVE?
Tanks aren't really necessary in ESO as it's built today, and the small defensive improvements aren't worth the torture and boredom to level one up. Maybe I just played too many older games with the holy trinity, but in ESO PVE I just feel underwhelmed (and bored) as a tank.

nemisan · February 2016

Are you serious: BoL nerf due to zos watching noobs whine on twitch....unsubbed

potirondb16_ESO · February 2016

Hi, just completed ESO lives, it was great to have you around on this one, I got a lot of answer and also a lot of thing to look foward for Dark Brotherhood. It also made me realise that since the plan for a reingeniring of Stamina vs. Magika would mostly comes in the next quarter, I should start my bucketlist now !

so here's some

1. Can we think of a way to give stamina class the ability to purge ? I would personnally recommend the other morph of resolving vigor for that, and would also make it a selfheal (same amount of Healing as vigor) but with purge.

2. Can we think of a way to gives more passives that come with having the ability slotted when you take a stamina morph ? I would love to see a stamina morph of fear that is worst then the magika fear but that also reduce the time you can be stun and/or cc, for Nightblade. Maybe a Conal fear ability... ?

3. Can we have better option for large group (this one is more about UI) ? It would be nice if we could actually get small group forming a huge group so we can get more crown to follow or even having a structure group with healer and tank within a raid ?

4. I also Wonder what you guys tough of the independant stamina bar to deal with roll-dodge, sneak and sprint ? Would you think it could help achieve some balance in between stamina user who depend on that ressource to Attack and magika who rely on it to survive ?

5. Is there a bug with immovability potion ? most of the time we do feel like we can't move or that we keep being root or something ? is it the gap closer issue ?

6. About dommage shield, could it be made so that it absorb a % of the damage dealt to a target ?

I was fighting a spam sorc earlier and I think I've deliever him 5 time his hp bar in term of damage.... so now that sorc can heal, it would probably be working well if you could still hit them through there shield even if it's only like 10% and 90% of the hit goes into the shield, that would greatly reduce the effectivness of this ability as a spamkey but would not lower the surviability of the sorc on the long run.

potirondb16_ESO · February 2016

pecheckler wrote: »

nimander99 wrote: »

They are nerfing Breath of Life to reduce server load in pvp. That's why they won't back down from this change.

?????????

Actually they are nerfing Breath of Life because it is spam key

nagarjunna · February 2016

Since you seem to be ignoring everything... I'll post here too!

Please read this:

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/247350/an-open-letter-to-zos-from-a-very-concerned-templar#latest

Also some sort of response to 35 or so pages of feedback might be appropriate. If you can't find the link it is here:

forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/245184/official-feedback-thread-for-templars#latest

It would be a generous gesture to at very least acknowledge the mountain of feedback. If you would go further and publish your vision for what the templar is as well as some sort of roadmap that would be awesome.

EnOeZ · February 2016

Wily_Wizard wrote: »

Any chance of getting some Tank/HA love for PVE?
Tanks aren't really necessary in ESO as it's built today, and the small defensive improvements aren't worth the torture and boredom to level one up. Maybe I just played too many older games with the holy trinity, but in ESO PVE I just feel underwhelmed (and bored) as a tank.

Tanking is boring as hell in this game.
Heavy Armor design is bull.... and so is Tank design, not innovative, flat, without excitement.
And in PVP it is worse.

... of course you can run in brainless Zergs and enjoy the game if it's your thing.

Wait, what Tank ? There are only people wearing something called "Heavy Armor" with taunt capabilities.

Molag_Crow · February 2016

timidobserver wrote: »

I just spotted another Templar nerf that most people aren't going to notice until the changes outlined above hit the pts.

@timidobserver Which is?

mistermutiny89 · February 2016

Aka we heard you but don't care. We're going to do what we want. Deal with it.

Frenkthevile · February 2016

mistermutiny89 wrote: »

Aka we heard you but don't care. We're going to do what we want. Deal with it.

Yeah that's the new EA attitude..

bertenburnyb16_ESO · February 2016

@EricWrobel

please abandon the House-idea and think about templar-class-archtypes and how to achieve them
to quote myself

bertenburnyb16_ESO wrote: »

problem is,
Zos's vision for templar is the stand your ground kinda playstyle, stay where you are and fight there,
in this game, especially in the dynamic group play in Cyro, that just dont work, its bollucks
also, long ago, they advertised 'PLAY AS YOU WANT" and now they wanne force all players of a certain class, to play that specific way...
thing is, I see templars as alot more than Zos does, for example battle monks type char, or holy knight type char, or even backline caster healers, or dedicated tank type char, wich would give alot more options toward "play as you want"
issue with this is, they need to calibrate the abbilitys according to those char concepts, and were a long way from home (pun intended) for that

on a side note, I think templar would really benifit from a shout-like skillline, wich would buff/protect/speedup/... allies and debuff/weaken/slow/scare.. enemys,
with passives like for example,
- heal yourself for a small amount with each buff applied to an ally
- increase your damage by a small amount with each debuff applied to an enemy
this would make them very good for battle monk/holy knight/tank type on-the-move-playstyle (throw the straw house in the garbage pls)

nemisan · February 2016

Stolen from PC Gamer..but, please ZoS take heed; listen.....What ultimately killed Star Wars Galaxies wasn't the servers finally closing due to Sony Online Entertainment's license for Star Wars ending, it was the controversial New Game Enhancements that stripped the game of its unique professions while also simplifying a host of other systems. John Smedley, president of SOE, would later outright apologize for the changes, regretting that the team "didn't listen to the fans when we should have." But it was already too late, players were fleeing the game in droves, and SOE tried fruitlessly for years to scrub the stains from their reputation.

SorataArisugawa · February 2016

nemisan wrote: »

Stolen from PC Gamer..but, please ZoS take heed; listen.....What ultimately killed Star Wars Galaxies wasn't the servers finally closing due to Sony Online Entertainment's license for Star Wars ending, it was the controversial New Game Enhancements that stripped the game of its unique professions while also simplifying a host of other systems. John Smedley, president of SOE, would later outright apologize for the changes, regretting that the team "didn't listen to the fans when we should have." But it was already too late, players were fleeing the game in droves, and SOE tried fruitlessly for years to scrub the stains from their reputation.

You mean, you need the OP Breath of Life to be special?... yeah right... nice one.

Templer are still the best healers. They could now even use the Restro Staff abilities with 25% more gain. But you are focused at on boring ability, which does everything. Sad...

jarrandub17_ESO · February 2016

Stam sorcs need some luvin. So, I ask:

Q. Do you ever intend on changing up some sorc abilities to give us a stamina damage skill in the sorc lines?

Bashev · February 2016

jarrandub17_ESO wrote: »

Stam sorcs need some luvin. So, I ask:

Q. Do you ever intend on changing up some sorc abilities to give us a stamina damage skill in the sorc lines?

I can answer instead of ZoS. "We understand your concerns and we will investigate Sorc stamina builds. Any possible changes if you conclude that some changes should be done will be implemented in patch 10 and if some of them are bugged we will fix them in patch 11"

bowmanz607 · February 2016

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Lettigall · February 2016

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

bowmanz607 · February 2016

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

Ya class and champ tree balance. Next up is reworking skills.

CP5 · February 2016

bowmanz607 wrote: »

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

Ya class and champ tree balance. Next up is reworking skills.

Hard to call this patch the 'class' balance pass when they flat out ignore a good half of the potential build types in the game and push them to update 10, if we're lucky.

SorataArisugawa · February 2016

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

3month more. 2nd quarter...

phillyproduct · February 2016

I like the update for what it is but in all honesty stam should've been fixed first magic is in a good place could've been better but a good place stam sorc stam temp atm simply broke period

Or they could make a stam crystal shard and give stamplar a better shield and effective solo heals in pvp

Elsonso · February 2016

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Actually, this update has a lot of balance stuff, like stuff related to existing abilities and skills and adjusting them. This is in Update 9 and the incremental patches between Update 9 and Update 10.

It sounds like Update 10 will address changing things along the lines of Stamina and Magicka. This is probably not balance work as much as it is aligning with a game play philosophy in how the two attributes are used. I sort of got the impression from ESO Live that Magicka and Stamina are not intended to be precisely balanced against each other.. I am sure it will also contain some ability balance issues to address anything that they feel needs to be updated after Update 9.

P.S. - I do hope that the entire SORCERER skill line remains Magicka only. If they want people to be doing "stamsorcs" they need to do something like make it so that hybrid and 50/50 builds are more viable so that the Sorcerer can use a stamina weapon.

Digiman · February 2016

potirondb16_ESO wrote: »

6. About dommage shield, could it be made so that it absorb a % of the damage dealt to a target ?

I was fighting a spam sorc earlier and I think I've deliever him 5 time his hp bar in term of damage.... so now that sorc can heal, it would probably be working well if you could still hit them through there shield even if it's only like 10% and 90% of the hit goes into the shield, that would greatly reduce the effectivness of this ability as a spamkey but would not lower the surviability of the sorc on the long run.

The problem with this is that without the shield the sorcerer goes down in less then 2 hits. I agree to dots and crits to increase pressure. But unless you solution is to make it so Lightening form increases physical resistance to damage by 30% for 6 seconds nothing that changes shields will help sorcerers survive any better.

Also your idea on focusing on health bars is also arguable since most classes just heal up through their health when they feel they are in danger. Health bars are literally meaningless, look at duels. It's unless someone runs out of resources or makes a mistake that gets them killed.

I actually think if ESO added a UI to see the targets magicka and stamina we would get a much clearer picture of what happens in combat.

Till then everyone almost dead just pops their health up to 100%, the only difference between them sorcerers is they have armor and dodging to soak and avoid the damage.

Sorcerers literally are the SS enterprise of ESO.

Lettigall · February 2016

bowmanz607 wrote: »

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

Ya class and champ tree balance. Next up is reworking skills.

Umm no, classes aren't balanced this update. Some classes got boost to their magicka builds, that's all.

eventide03b14a_ESO · February 2016

lathbury wrote: »

James-Wayne wrote: »

Helluin wrote: »

PvP wise, this changement to Magelight infact alters completely the description of this class and it's an unicum in game.

Shadow Cloak spammed, mainly by magicka builds, was surely an issue that required an action but this changement doesn't limit it, it nullifies a skill.
Probably some players "abused" of it but we can say something similar about every other core class skill.
Many other NB players like me uses and used this skill for skirmishing, as a defensive and repositioning skill.

It doesn't nullifie it, Magelight needs to be slotted to start with, second it needs to be cast and has a timer plus it also just got a reduced radius and higher cost. You can still shadow cloak everywhere you just need to be more aware of who is running Magelight now because just like how NBs can pop up anywhere at a moments notice now so can magelight be suddenly activated at a moments notice.

I love this change for PvP, it evens the battlefield for all players, Stamina or Magicka. Your a NB with shadow cloak so you need to start being more sneakier and smarter that is all.

ha lol have you even been on the pts it goes sorc streaks on you or dk chains activates magelight gets buff wails on you you try and gain distance to cloak get pulled and magelight again it negates the skill for 5 seconds which also means you cant access any of the passives in that line.

Where was the outcry of injustice when they added the restrictions to streak? How about the restrictions to reflective scales? Are you railing against the changes to the Templar heals?

It's not just you, but many people. They pitch a fit when it's their class on the chopping block, but it's perfectly fair when it's happening to someone else. Enough already.

nemisan · February 2016

SorataArisugawa wrote: »

nemisan wrote: »

Stolen from PC Gamer..but, please ZoS take heed; listen.....What ultimately killed Star Wars Galaxies wasn't the servers finally closing due to Sony Online Entertainment's license for Star Wars ending, it was the controversial New Game Enhancements that stripped the game of its unique professions while also simplifying a host of other systems. John Smedley, president of SOE, would later outright apologize for the changes, regretting that the team "didn't listen to the fans when we should have." But it was already too late, players were fleeing the game in droves, and SOE tried fruitlessly for years to scrub the stains from their reputation.

You mean, you need the OP Breath of Life to be special?... yeah right... nice one.

Templer are still the best healers. They could now even use the Restro Staff abilities with 25% more gain. But you are focused at on boring ability, which does everything. Sad...

in general, old bean....are you sure about temps being the best heals, lots of things happening with sorc's and their pet...not to mention DK's .....as for sad, /shrug

bowmanz607 · February 2016

lordrichter wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Actually, this update has a lot of balance stuff, like stuff related to existing abilities and skills and adjusting them. This is in Update 9 and the incremental patches between Update 9 and Update 10.

It sounds like Update 10 will address changing things along the lines of Stamina and Magicka. This is probably not balance work as much as it is aligning with a game play philosophy in how the two attributes are used. I sort of got the impression from ESO Live that Magicka and Stamina are not intended to be precisely balanced against each other.. I am sure it will also contain some ability balance issues to address anything that they feel needs to be updated after Update 9.

P.S. - I do hope that the entire SORCERER skill line remains Magicka only. If they want people to be doing "stamsorcs" they need to do something like make it so that hybrid and 50/50 builds are more viable so that the Sorcerer can use a stamina weapon.

Agreed. But many of the changes to abilities and what not were an attempt to balance classes not the actual skills themselves. The next update is when they will be going in and looking at each and every ability in the game for ability reworks, not for overall class balance. The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but this update focuses more on classes overall and abilities are secondary whereas next update it will be revearsed.

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

Lettigall wrote: »

bowmanz607 wrote: »

They said dark brotherhood is the update they are going to mess with and take a look at all abilities.

Before Orsinium they said that Thieves guild update will be the one with rebalance. Now they want us wait for ~5 months more...

Ya class and champ tree balance. Next up is reworking skills.

Umm no, classes aren't balanced this update. Some classes got boost to their magicka builds, that's all.

Class are more balanced then they were. Of course they didn't get it all. Did yoh really expect that? Imo,classes are in a better place then they were before this update. Dk got some much needed love. Sure it was more for mag dk, but they were 8n a bad spot whereas Stam dk didn't need any 9verhaulong work done. Nb got brought back down to earth with cloak nerd aligning it more with the other classes. Sorcs got tweaked and brought to earth a little more with the champ tree. Despite all of the issues people have with twmplars, I thought many changes were good. Not all bit many. That said, Templar was balanced with the philosophy that zos had in mind. Although it might not be the philosophy that they should have for templars, they still balanced them with that philosoohy. Last, many of the issues people have with Stam sorc and Stam Templar are ability based and not class based. Thsee are changes for next patch. That said, Idc what people say, Stam templars hit like a truck and have plenty of mobility.

GrigorijMalahevich · February 2016

Everything people say is just speculation with a very high emphasis on the _my ego_ subject. As you look at the game from your own perspective it is very subjective.

Ideally with PvP we are talking about 1x1 scenarios as 2x2; 3x3 will be just too much of a RNG.

So, let's us look on the core of 1x1. We have stamina and magicka builds (in general, but for now lets just take a look on match ups in classes) with 4 classes and a lot of races (let's not take in to consideration races as it has very minor impact and people can optimise race selection to suit their preferred class and playstyle).
That leaves us with 6 match ups for classes and (Sorc vs NB; Sorc vs DK; Sorc vs Temp and etc) excluding mirror match ups (Sorc vs Sorc) as they do not have an impact on the balance.
When the arena will go live and players start PvPing on the arena 1x1 - it will show a totally new perspective on the overall picture of match ups.
From there you can observe match up statistics for 99% players and 1% of elite. Obviously you need to make PvP arena something like a "ladder" when you get points for winning and lose points for losing and as you advance you get matched with similar players to your level.
If you can see that DK has a win rate of 60% against NB, then obviously there is imbalance in this match up and it requires some changes to take effect. On the other hand if the win rate of DK vs NB is around 51% than obviously nothing requires any amendments.

I do understand that it comes to stamina/magicka builds and it would have to be in consideration for a proper statistical report on current balance, but it would require a lot of time for the arena to work for ZOS to be able to get something that can be worked on.

Otherwise the overall game balance is influenced by a few people that have access to the forum, which from a statistics point of view is incorrect.

P.S. it is just my IMHO.

Khaos_Bane · February 2016

I don't understand the logic behind the Funnel health nerf at all. Wrobel explained that two nightblades in a 4 man group topped the healing chart and DPS chart. Well yeah they were two nightblades healing and doing DPS. Wouldn't that be true of and two classes doing healing and DPS.

He said a group with two nightblades won't need a healer. Well would that be true of any class spec'd well enough to heal and DPS? Aren't the nightblades the healers in this case? Are you saying that all groups should have one tank, one healer and two DPS and that any other group composition shouldn't be valid ?

bowmanz607 · February 2016

Khaos_Bane wrote: »

I don't understand the logic behind the Funnel health nerf at all. Wrobel explained that two nightblades in a 4 man group topped the healing chart and DPS chart. Well yeah they were two nightblades healing and doing DPS. Wouldn't that be true of and two classes doing healing and DPS.

He said a group with two nightblades won't need a healer. Well would that be true of any class spec'd well enough to heal and DPS? Aren't the nightblades the healers in this case? Are you saying that all groups should have one tank, one healer and two DPS and that any other group composition shouldn't be valid ?

I see your point. But to clarify he was saying 3 nb could run around with a tank. That said, I think if you can pull itnoff, then you should be allowed to do it.

Gameplay Updates and Q&amp;A with Eric Wrobel

Gameplay Updates and Q&A with Eric Wrobel