Turelus wrote: »

Everyone also has to remember this game wasn't build around perfect balance and equality.

Wrobel said it himself on a stream, when he as asked to originally make abilities he was just told to go and make a bunch of awesome abilities so he did.

Also the game was never made to be a Stamina or Magicka build game, we the players pushed it in that direction by min/maxing and then demanding for change when Magicka came out on top.

Now they're doing their best to fix and balance a game which from the initial design was not intended to be played the way we play, we were just meant to slot the fun abilities, place our stats all over the place and run around in unorganised blobs mashing skills at one another.

Now sure we can fault them for not having the forsight to see that a design strategy like that in a game which offers PvP is just terrible, but for all the crap we give them they're trying! Hell two years ago we didn't even have stamina class skill morphs, now everyone is up in arms that the ones we have aren't good enough.

As others have said here and in other threads, ZOS are doomed whatever they do because we are overly demanding and expect a perfect solution implemented within a few hours of the issues being discovered.

I think some of the problem has to do more with the direction of the game. They seem to be really torn on making a single-player game with a cash shop and an actual MMO.

Making awesome abilities that do awesome things is a great idea - in a single-player game. Unfortunately for ZOS they market their game as an MMO and they marketed it with PvP from the get go, so balance is a necessity.

There is valid feedback on stamina classes - such as having to balance their abilities around a pool that is used for spring, Dodge, sneak, and block.

There's plenty of feedback for months on all aspects of the game, from the cash shop item quality, to balance, to content, etc. None of it has been met with much acknowledgement -

I'm not saying who ZOS should listen to but generally you don't listen to single-player gamers when making/improving/evolving an MMO. This is counter productive to an MMO and they need to remember what they marketed.

Turelus wrote: »

Everyone also has to remember this game wasn't build around perfect balance and equality.

Wrobel said it himself on a stream, when he as asked to originally make abilities he was just told to go and make a bunch of awesome abilities so he did.

Also the game was never made to be a Stamina or Magicka build game, we the players pushed it in that direction by min/maxing and then demanding for change when Magicka came out on top.

Now they're doing their best to fix and balance a game which from the initial design was not intended to be played the way we play, we were just meant to slot the fun abilities, place our stats all over the place and run around in unorganised blobs mashing skills at one another.

Now sure we can fault them for not having the forsight to see that a design strategy like that in a game which offers PvP is just terrible, but for all the crap we give them they're trying! Hell two years ago we didn't even have stamina class skill morphs, now everyone is up in arms that the ones we have aren't good enough.

As others have said here and in other threads, ZOS are doomed whatever they do because we are overly demanding and expect a perfect solution implemented within a few hours of the issues being discovered.

@Turelus really hit the nail on the head. This game was designed for casuals. Just look at the god damn pve. It's mind numbingly easy with even a half thought out build.

I can fault them though. They've absolutely had enough time and feedback to be in a much better position now then they are. The first step is class representatives and dedicated class feedback subforums.

I, for one, would rather have the devs working on the game than coming to the forums. Yes, it is nice when they respond to a post, but it is better for them to be working on the game.

I have been here since beta. This game is not the same as it was in beta. It has evolved and likely will continue to evolve. Overall, it has just improved over time. It still has a way to go and ZOS acknowledged that. That is the most we can expect of ZOS. Yes, it would be nice if everything was perfect but whose version of perfect? Everyone has their own view of what they think the game should be, but no two views are exactly the same. What I would consider to be the perfect game is not what someone else would consider to be perfect. I respect that each of us have our own view. I don't have the entire picture of the game as I am limited to my own personal experience with the game. No one has all of the information, not even ZOS. However, ZOS is in the position of being able to collect and extrapolate the data from the game. They have the numbers. So, with those numbers, they make decisions about the future of the game.

Yes, it might mean that things change. I seriously doubt that the changes in the game have anything to do with ZOS 'hating' one class or another. I have read that argument and it is not logical. ZOS is trying to make the game better for the majority of the playerbase, not to appease the vocal minority. It is a work in progress. ZOS has acknowledged there are things that they are watching to see if they can improve. It takes time to collect the data.

I realize that we live in the instant gratification age and everyone wants things better for them now. Although it may seem like the fixes take forever to be implemented, it is not as slow of a process as it may seem. Yes, the lag in Cyrodil is bad but it is still much faster than how a game played when the internet was 300 baud. Can you imagine what ESO would have been like if we were still on 300 baud? ((For those who don't know, baud is bits per second. So cut the speed by 1000 times for megabytes per second.)

Yes, people will have to update their builds next week with the patch. Things that may have worked in the past won't necessarily work next week. The human species is known for its ability to adapt. We all will have to adapt. Changes are not always popular. A vocal minority of parents in the 70s were swearing that RPGs were the 'Devil's playground' and advocated that they should be destroyed. Where would we be if the genre was nerfed by the minority? Fortunately, the majority prevailed and we can play ESO today.

TLDR : ZOS is doing what is best with the information they have for the majority of the players. Change happens. Adapt.

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

I certainly wouldn't want to be a member of the team who is responsible for balance. It's just too difficult when I try to realistically think about the task of balancing everything as a whole.

However, because it's necessary to strive for balance, perhaps the combat team could implement a system that removes the 4 classes that we currently have (Templar, Dragonknight, Nightblade, Sorcerer) and instead allows us to choose 3 of the 12 skill lines for building our character.

Then, the issue is not about balancing classes, but instead, about balancing skill lines. This would drastically reduce the amount of work for the combat team and also give players more options. Then we wouldn't have whole groups of people complaining that their entire class feels useless to them (as we currently have with Templars).

YES. I was basically screaming this during beta. If there must be classes, at least make them more fluid and nuanced rather than rigid. You would basically pick up 3 skill lines and drop and replace them as needed similar to visiting the campus/WW curing NPC. Then balancing these skill lines becomes a cakewalk - if too many people choose a particular line then it is probably over-performing, and vice versa.

And why not? Classes have ZERO meaning in this game anyway. They are quite shallow, not balanced with regard to rock-paper-scissors, and as far as I can tell they are not even a little bit grounded in lore.

My wannabe storm-calling-Aedric-shadow-mage supports this idea. :P

Turelus wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

Do you have any idea of the amount of constructive feedback that the community has given them? Take your fedora off.

That doesn't mean they have to act on it though. End of the day this is their game and if they want the Templar class to fight in their house that's how it's going to be. Just because the vocal forums (and mostly PvP) community don't like that stance doesn't mean they can't do it.

I have been a Nightblade since day one, I've been through the lows, enjoying the current highs and fully expect lows again some day. The fact is though I enjoy the game and the dynamic PvP fights. My biggest gripe now isn't skill balance but the core mechanics which are in an ugly flux of pre-vet/veteran/CP/no-vet.

I am hoping that ESO 3.0 (which makes the most sense to be the VR removal release) will bring some balance and stability to the system and we can work onwards from there.

Also plenty of things get listened to when feedback is given, but knee-jerk reaction rage about "my class isn't win any more" are quite often what a majority of the posts break down into.

No one expects them to make changes overnight, or give in to every knee-jerk reaction, but the Templar class in particular has had broken and useless skills for a VERY long time. The feedback and suggestions from some people (Cough @Joy_Division cough) on solutions for improving the class are pretty impressive, but nothing ever gets done. Instead they try to balance around how they THINK their game plays instead of how it ACTUALLY plays.

Yet we see so many Templars in both PvE and PvP playing every single day with these issues. I won't disagree that if a skill is broken is should be ignored for extensive periods of time, however the class/game can't be so broken than it's unplayable if people are still online playing both the game and class every single day.

Every class is going to have its quarter on the top then it's time down the bottom. As I have said I agree they can do better, but having people tell the developers they suck at their jobs, and to quit doesn't do anything to help the situation at all. Again I can say that whilst there are hundreds of posts with good feedback most are drowned out by the crap posts and morons. They have also come a long way since release and are showing a willingness to communicate with us. I didn't see any class specific balance threads for Craglorns release, now we seem to have one for TG and I would imagine most updates going forward.

The issue seems to simply be we don't see or understand their vision for each class play style, then when they do tell us (Templar house) the community (again the vocal forums PvP community) reject it and deem ZOS too incompetent to manage THEIR (the communities) class.

The only thing we can do is band together and make sure the information we are giving them is good enough to show what/where/why/how and hope they take it on board, if they don't and choose a direction we don't agree with then we either roll with it and keep playing the game we love or walk away and go to something we enjoy more.

Just because they have an idea for a class, doesn't mean it's a good idea. Again, and I can't stress this enough: They make choices that suggest they don't even play their own game. They make decisions based on how they WANT or THINK the game plays, not how it ACTUALLY plays.

Also, the PvP community is normally the most vocal and critical because they are the most competitive, and in my opinion, have the best understanding of how classes work. The best PvPs are normally among the best PvEers as well. You really need to know the ins and outs of every class. Balance changes affect them the most. 99% of the PvE content in the game is mind-numbingly easy and be done with crap builds and crap gear just fine.

Turelus wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Sallington wrote: »

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

Do you have any idea of the amount of constructive feedback that the community has given them? Take your fedora off.

That doesn't mean they have to act on it though. End of the day this is their game and if they want the Templar class to fight in their house that's how it's going to be. Just because the vocal forums (and mostly PvP) community don't like that stance doesn't mean they can't do it.

I have been a Nightblade since day one, I've been through the lows, enjoying the current highs and fully expect lows again some day. The fact is though I enjoy the game and the dynamic PvP fights. My biggest gripe now isn't skill balance but the core mechanics which are in an ugly flux of pre-vet/veteran/CP/no-vet.

I am hoping that ESO 3.0 (which makes the most sense to be the VR removal release) will bring some balance and stability to the system and we can work onwards from there.

Also plenty of things get listened to when feedback is given, but knee-jerk reaction rage about "my class isn't win any more" are quite often what a majority of the posts break down into.

No one expects them to make changes overnight, or give in to every knee-jerk reaction, but the Templar class in particular has had broken and useless skills for a VERY long time. The feedback and suggestions from some people (Cough @Joy_Division cough) on solutions for improving the class are pretty impressive, but nothing ever gets done. Instead they try to balance around how they THINK their game plays instead of how it ACTUALLY plays.

Yet we see so many Templars in both PvE and PvP playing every single day with these issues. I won't disagree that if a skill is broken is should be ignored for extensive periods of time, however the class/game can't be so broken than it's unplayable if people are still online playing both the game and class every single day.

Every class is going to have its quarter on the top then it's time down the bottom. As I have said I agree they can do better, but having people tell the developers they suck at their jobs, and to quit doesn't do anything to help the situation at all. Again I can say that whilst there are hundreds of posts with good feedback most are drowned out by the crap posts and morons. They have also come a long way since release and are showing a willingness to communicate with us. I didn't see any class specific balance threads for Craglorns release, now we seem to have one for TG and I would imagine most updates going forward.

The issue seems to simply be we don't see or understand their vision for each class play style, then when they do tell us (Templar house) the community (again the vocal forums PvP community) reject it and deem ZOS too incompetent to manage THEIR (the communities) class.

The only thing we can do is band together and make sure the information we are giving them is good enough to show what/where/why/how and hope they take it on board, if they don't and choose a direction we don't agree with then we either roll with it and keep playing the game we love or walk away and go to something we enjoy more.

Just because they have an idea for a class, doesn't mean it's a good idea. Again, and I can't stress this enough: They make choices that suggest they don't even play their own game. They make decisions based on how they WANT or THINK the game plays, not how it ACTUALLY plays.

This is their game though. As dumb as it sounds we the players can't dictate to them when they have to do, we can give reasoning, thought and examples, however end of the day we are not the developers.

I don't think I have ever played an MMO where the developers look at the forums and go "You know what, you're 100% correct and we will use your idea". Even EVE Online which has some of the best Dev/Player communication out there this doesn't happen. The players tell CCP how terrible the idea is, CCP do it any way and the game continues on like it always has.

The difference between ZOS and CCP however is that CCP will post why they're doing it, how they're doing it etc.
The developers will take the game/classes/skills in the direction they want, the only thing we can do as players is give feedback, and that feedback is more likely to be listened to if it's constructive, informational and helpful.

Also we still don't know anything about ZOS' development methods. Wrobel has a team but how many are on that team? Does each team have its own code writers or is all the code done by one separate team and they have to be scheduled into doing changes etc.

I fully understand peoples frustrations here, there are still things ZOS say where I slap my head and wonder WTF they are doing, but I also accept this isn't my game and if I really don't like it I can find others suited to what I do like. It's coming upon two years though now and I am still paying my sub and still playing this more than any other game. So for all the issues it's not doing that badly in my eyes.

Any way maybe I should leave this debate for a few other replies, we're going back and forth quite bit here.

LOL! Thanks for responding and giving me stuff to read while I'm drinking my morning coffee and avoiding work.

Humatiel wrote: »

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

A more collegial attitude is indeed needed, but the developers explaining their way forward allows us to (through that explanation) provide feedback to help pursue that end. To remain utterly silent on almost all discussion points leads to the very chaos you see now and will not change until the "broad strokes" of their path forward is clarified.

The flip side of that however is every time they do speak up they get smacked down for making the choice opposite to what x player wants.

More threads like this (link to EVE Online Dev Post) would be welcome though. They're doing a good job with the specific forums for each class but better breakdowns of changes and then follow ups might help the growing pains.

Also ZOS should just forums ban people who don't know how to respect the Devs, start with a weeks ban, give them a life one if they don't learn. Nice and simple, you treat them nice but debate hard you stay, you insult and act like a ***, you get banned.

Turelus wrote: »

Humatiel wrote: »

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

A more collegial attitude is indeed needed, but the developers explaining their way forward allows us to (through that explanation) provide feedback to help pursue that end. To remain utterly silent on almost all discussion points leads to the very chaos you see now and will not change until the "broad strokes" of their path forward is clarified.

The flip side of that however is every time they do speak up they get smacked down for making the choice opposite to what x player wants.

More threads like this (link to EVE Online Dev Post) would be welcome though. They're doing a good job with the specific forums for each class but better breakdowns of changes and then follow ups might help the growing pains.

Also ZOS should just forums ban people who don't know how to respect the Devs, start with a weeks ban, give them a life one if they don't learn. Nice and simple, you treat them nice but debate hard you stay, you insult and act like a ***, you get banned.

To be clear, If I ask a person one thousand questions (supervisor or peer) and he answers one of them then I won't respect him regardless of the answer.

on topic: It's entirely possible that they've provided the feedback you seem to think they have and I just missed it, where might I find "official" (not a we think maybe sometime before I retire) feedback on their 6 month / 1 year / 2 year plans for class and content based balances / changes / improvements and there plans for future expansions and the patches that are expected to hit pc and console? As well as clarification regarding their preferred (meaning they will provide feedback to our feedback) method of organizing complaints/suggestions?

Humatiel wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Humatiel wrote: »

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

A more collegial attitude is indeed needed, but the developers explaining their way forward allows us to (through that explanation) provide feedback to help pursue that end. To remain utterly silent on almost all discussion points leads to the very chaos you see now and will not change until the "broad strokes" of their path forward is clarified.

The flip side of that however is every time they do speak up they get smacked down for making the choice opposite to what x player wants.

More threads like this (link to EVE Online Dev Post) would be welcome though. They're doing a good job with the specific forums for each class but better breakdowns of changes and then follow ups might help the growing pains.

Also ZOS should just forums ban people who don't know how to respect the Devs, start with a weeks ban, give them a life one if they don't learn. Nice and simple, you treat them nice but debate hard you stay, you insult and act like a ***, you get banned.

To be clear, If I ask a person one thousand questions (supervisor or peer) and he answers one of them then I won't respect him regardless of the answer.

on topic: It's entirely possible that they've provided the feedback you seem to think they have and I just missed it, where might I find "official" (not a we think maybe sometime before I retire) feedback on their 6 month / 1 year / 2 year plans for class and content based balances / changes / improvements and there plans for future expansions and the patches that are expected to hit pc and console? As well as clarification regarding their preferred (meaning they will provide feedback to our feedback) method of organizing complaints/suggestions?

To be clear, If I ask a person one thousand questions (supervisor or peer) and he answers one of them then I won't respect him regardless of the answer.

Not to be intended as disrespectful @Humatiel,

but there is an old Dutch saying
I quote
"one fool can ask more questions than 10 wise man can answer"

These guys cannot answer all questions asked,
They can, and they do, give us an outlook on their plans and thoughts
ESO live has that purpose

@Turelus

People would rage, nobody in there right mind would disagree with you there, but it would be a great step in a direction that the more knowledgeable player base would know(assume?) would be a step that wouldn't then be stepped back from a year later.

I believe that alone would serve it's purpose and make it worthwhile, I for one would appreciate a concrete path forward that I can base my playstyle around (or choose a different game should I see it's not for me).

Zheg wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Please note I do agree with those saying ZOS can do better, I believe so as well and have asked on the forums and in messages many times for better communication from them. However we also seem to forget the that before what we have now it was even worse.

The road ahead posts that were given in the past were (sorry to say) not exactly what's being asked for here. Go back and read them and it's all generic "we will bring x system, no ETA" "we're working on lag" "we're continuing our fight on bots!" etc.

What we're asking for is more of a development insight post, or a DevBlog.
An article written by the lead developer of that field (this case Wrobel) saying: This is our plans for X, we plan to achieve it with Y, the issues we face are X.

However the moment he takes the time out to write that and it gets published the entire thread will be "WHY YOU IGNORE TEMPLARS!!!" "JUST QUIT!" "LOL DOESN'T PLAY HIS OWN GAME" and nothing actually thanking him for giving us that insight and very few posts saying "Hey Wrobel, you spoke about X here maybe a possible solution you didn't think of is Y"

Considering that response he would get (and honestly can you say that wouldn't be the response given?) then why would he/they waste their time on that blog. Sure it makes it look like communication is going better, but no one will care for what's said only that none of their personal issues were addressed.

Also we had over an hour of Q&A on ESO Live with Wrobel, he answered a lot of questions for us, just once again some people didn't like the answers given, so they decided ZOS are not listening.

Two of the first questions asked to him were mine, and it's not that I didn't like the answers given, the problem was that the answers he gave were nonsensical and frankly, startlingly indicative of a lack of knowledge of game mechanics - particularly for the combat lead. As an example, one of my questions was whether he was comfortable with templars being more heavily impacted by the rapid maneuvers nerf since they are more likely than any other class to heal/buff another player and thereby lose their own rapids buff. His answer, templars can use Honor of the Dead to heal themselves - indicating he is either unaware of how smart healing works and how that's just as likely to heal the random pug next to you as it yourself, or that he is unaware Honor of the Dead is not a self-based heal like dragon's blood. The answer did not fit the reality of the in-game mechanics. Responses like that were hardly limited to one question, which only furthered the inclination to make more memes about how ridiculous the combat team development and viewpoints have become.

I can't debate this post... you win this round sir. +1 insightful.

Alabyn wrote: »

I hope part of the way forward is taking a more collegial attitude on the forums. Allegations that developers do not read the Forums, "hate" certain types of players, or classes conveyed by spiteful and provocative, insulting language just muddy the waters. The way forward begins not with Wrobel or anyone else explaining themselves, but with constructive feedback and behaving as gentleman and women. I hope your thread heads in that direction!

Once that culture has changed on these forums, we can begin the important work of improving the game.

what a bunch of horse poo, who r u? Some dude that works for ZOS? I mean why in the crap should any of us give pages of reports about this or that about a game, that we have payed for.

I dont work for ZOS, and dont get paid to help this game b better, in fact i dont even get discounts for helping, and nor does any 1 else.

Simple thing to do is say something sux, and then its their job to make it better, or better yet the people who made this game should just play a few good mmos, and then they would know how to make a game that dosnt suck.

Im sorry to u dude, but all i can say is, is that no 1 works for me for free, and then buys my product that they helped me make for free.

SuraklinPrime wrote: »

Personally I have been disheartened by the changes to stamina over the last few major patches as they seem to miss that for a stamina build we have to get skills, blocks, sprints, sneaks, break frees and dodges all out of one resource pool which now has penalties for dodging more than once and for daring to block in combat - whereas as magicka builds can happily do all these things out of a secondary pool and recharge their main pool at all times with no penalty.

While there was soft-caps I agree this was a determinant. Without softcaps, I'd rather have everything I need in a single resource. As a magicka build I have to devote resources for stamina and stamina regeneration. I can assure you magicka builds cannot happily do all the things you list. On the contrary, I am terrified of blocking because two blocks I do not have enough stamina to break free and I'm not getting any more for 4 seconds. Those penalties are much more punitive for players with smaller pools and lower regen rates. Stamina builds don't die running out of magicka, they just lose utility.

It's game of burst and burst avoidance, which means people generally do not have to spam skills for 40 straight seconds. So I would rather trade a few extra casts of damage for the ability to devote everything into my damage attribute and not be terrified to actually block things or avoid damage.

"Also if you're not going to bring constructive posts to this thread please don't post, so far it's been a pretty good back and forth debate with a lot of good feedback that I hope ZOS are reading. (WTB @ZOS_RichLambert /lurk) "

Good for u, work for free, I have done it also, but basically have given up on eso cause all they have been doing is slowly stringing us along with small content releases, that should have already been in the game, and appeal to our crown store wants.

But thats cool, maybe in a few years they may actually add swimming to the game....