Been playing a little over a week and have a few questions

Scarar1972 · June 2017

I am one of those filthy casual players that likes to min/max as best as possible to get the most out of my playtime. I am currently lvl 36 and play a Magicka Templar.

Questions:
1. I have over 40k gold. Is there anything worth me spending money on? I have a horse. Not sure what else there is.
2. Guild Traders- so in this game I am guessing there is no centralized market but instead random guild traders scattered across the land that you have to locate and pray they have something worth buying?
3. I have noticed that at least for the last 15 levels, mobs seem to have generally the same HP. I don't know if this is because I am using an add-on that is broken, but I see a lot of mobs that have 29-31k HP. This has been consistent for a while.
4. Since gear drops seem to scale with your level (i.e. if you are lvl 36 the mobs drop lvl 36 gear) is there a reason to fight "harder" mobs other than the fact that they seem to drop better quality loot more frequently? In this game does the difficulty of the mob translate to higher quality loot (blue/purple) loot? If so, how do I know what zone I should be fighting in so that I am fighting mobs that are truly my level? I realize that delve bosses, dungeon bosses, etc. drop higher quality loot.
5. Should I be vendoring everything I get that I don't use? I see you can deconstruct items and I don't know if I should be doing that. If I should, where will I get my gold in the future?

Thanks for the answers.

Elsonso · June 2017

Scarar1972 wrote: »

I am one of those filthy casual players that likes to min/max as best as possible to get the most out of my playtime. I am currently lvl 36 and play a Magicka Templar.

Questions:
1. I have over 40k gold. Is there anything worth me spending money on? I have a horse. Not sure what else there is.
2. Guild Traders- so in this game I am guessing there is no centralized market but instead random guild traders scattered across the land that you have to locate and pray they have something worth buying?
3. I have noticed that at least for the last 15 levels, mobs seem to have generally the same HP. I don't know if this is because I am using an add-on that is broken, but I see a lot of mobs that have 29-31k HP. This has been consistent for a while.
4. Since gear drops seem to scale with your level (i.e. if you are lvl 36 the mobs drop lvl 36 gear) is there a reason to fight "harder" mobs other than the fact that they seem to drop better quality loot more frequently? In this game does the difficulty of the mob translate to higher quality loot (blue/purple) loot? If so, how do I know what zone I should be fighting in so that I am fighting mobs that are truly my level? I realize that delve bosses, dungeon bosses, etc. drop higher quality loot.
5. Should I be vendoring everything I get that I don't use? I see you can deconstruct items and I don't know if I should be doing that. If I should, where will I get my gold in the future?

Thanks for the answers.

Simply...

1. You can spend money on gear, resources to make gear, or learn crafting, various potions, recipes, motifs, and other stuff. I tended to spend money buying gear so that I could learn traits, as well as materials that I did not have enough of when doing crafting.
2. There is no central market, and the developers have indicated that they prefer it this way.
3. With One Tamriel and scaling, monsters do not have different levels. They are all the same. You scale to them.
4. As with the answer to #3, normal monsters are all the same. Boss monsters will drop zone specific gear of a certain type, all scaled to your level. All zone boss monsters are the same "level" and drop the same type of gear (different sets), in the same ratio, when compared to the same type of boss monsters in other zones. There is no difference in level or quality of gear between delve bosses in one zone and delve bosses in another, for example.
5. Vendor, train, or deconstruct the common stuff that you do not need. Vendor for gold. Deconstruct for crafting skill level. Train if it is a trait you do not know. Special set gear, like purple and gold, might get money if you can find someone to buy it, even if not Level 50 CP 160.

vamp_emily · June 2017

A few Emily tips:

1. Don't spend your gold just yet, wait and use it on upgrading your end game armor.
2. If you plan on creating Alts, create them now and feed those mounts everyday. That way the mounts will be super fast when you start playing them.
3. Start crafting ( deconstructing things ) if you haven't done so yet. There are some crafting passives that will save you gold when upgrading armor.

and finally the tip of the day
When upgrading dropped gear to purple or gold. You do not need to upgrade/craft a purple or gold gyph.

kalarro · June 2017

Yes, the market thing is totally crap. Sounds like an innovative idea in paper, but no, sorry developers, it's just crap.

You got a nice amount of money for your level. (coming from another casual player). Items at max level are dirty cheap in the market. Not BiS items ofc. But you can get a full set of blue max lvl items for 20k easily.
The problem is, you can't get max lvl items until you are champion level 160.

You shouldnt really care about gear until cp160 IMO. Unless it's for training gear which makes you level faster.

I would disasemble instead of selling, unless the item has the trait of selling for more money. Disasembling gives more crafting skillpoints than crafting.

I even disasemble with alts that dont use crafting, just bc I prefer to have crafting mats if I ever want to do something. The money of selling items is terrible anyway, like 40g per item.

Doing the dailyn crafting writs is a good way to make reliable money (for us casuals). You need like 15 min for all 6 writs and gold + some items + crafting xp

About the enemies, they scale to you. They are all more or less equal powerful, except bosses or minibosses. But that doesn't mean they dont fight with different styles, some proving harder than others. They just have the same stats more or less

Scarar1972 · June 2017

First- thanks for the answers. The mobs that scale to you sure is something I was not expecting. Out of curiosity, what happens if people 10 levels above or below you are engaged on a mob already?

A few follow ups.

Why do people disassemble on alts?
Is there an easy way to disassemble or do you always have to locate a work bench of that item type?
Where do you get daily crafting writs? I have not even started crafting yet other than to do the first quests that show you how.
If guild traders are the market, how in the hell do you know where to go to find ones that actually have stuff you are looking for? Is there a consensus on a certain town being the major hub? I went Daggerfall, so Wayrest?
One answer mentioned "training". Where do you do that?
How do you "upgrade" gear? If you meant just adding an enchant, I understand.

LadyHeloise · June 2017

It might help you to have a look at the information here en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Craftingabout crafting which will answer most of your questions about writs, upgrading gear etc.

In terms of trading yes, each alliance has a bigger trading hub in the capital cities where there are more traders, but traders can be found in many settlements, at wayshrines and various places. If you are on PC there are add ons which help you search each trader, but yes, you have to go to each trader to do this. Although there is TTC which you may find useful https://eu.tamrieltradecentre.com/pc/Trade/Search.

BlackSparrow · June 2017

Scarar1972 wrote: »

First- thanks for the answers. The mobs that scale to you sure is something I was not expecting. Out of curiosity, what happens if people 10 levels above or below you are engaged on a mob already?

Technically, mobs aren't scaled to you... you are scaled to them. Everyone is scaled up to level 50 (max level) until they hit level 50, at which point the scaling stops (unless it's Level 50, 160 CP... others can correct me on that!).

So if you and someone 10 levels up fight the same monster, that monster is equally difficult to both of you, because you're both scaled to its level.

Scarar1972 wrote: »

Why do people disassemble on alts?

Disassembling, as was said, gives you materials that you can use for crafting. It also gives you crafting experience, and leveling crafting skills means you tend to get better stuff while disassembling, so it's useful to level (other than the obvious reason of higher level crafting meaning you can make better stuff). However, if you disassemble something on the same character that made the thing, you get a pittance of experience, and you can't level your crafting skill past level 50 in the skill line... so a lot of people with maxed out crafters hand their disassembles to alts to train them up.

Scarar1972 wrote: »

Is there an easy way to disassemble or do you always have to locate a work bench of that item type?

You need a workbench. You learn quickly which cities have the most conveniently located crafting stations in relation to the wayshrines (*cough* Mournhold *cough*).

Scarar1972 wrote: »

Where do you get daily crafting writs? I have not even started crafting yet other than to do the first quests that show you how.

By the "first quests" I assume you mean the crafting certification quests? That's how you start them. Once you've completed the certification quest, you'll see blue arrows around cities, pointing to the writ boards. You take crafting writs from there, and they're leveled according to your crafting skill level.

Scarar1972 wrote: »

If guild traders are the market, how in the hell do you know where to go to find ones that actually have stuff you are looking for? Is there a consensus on a certain town being the major hub? I went Daggerfall, so Wayrest?

You basically have to port around and hope, yeah. Not the most user-friendly system. There are add-ons that ease the experience. The good hubs are the ones where the guild traders are near the wayshrine, like the three capitol cities (in your case, Wayrest), but wandering to the traders that are in the middle of nowhere can get you some great deals.

My strategy is to keep an ongoing list of stuff I'm always running low on. Then, any time I pass a guild trader during regular questing, I stop and check their prices.

Scarar1972 wrote: »

One answer mentioned "training". Where do you do that?

The answer that mentioned "training" was talking about gear that had the "Training" trait, which gives you more EXP when you wear it. To get this gear, you have to find it in the world, then research the ones you're not using to learn the trait on each armor piece, so you can craft the trait in the future.

Scarar1972 wrote: »

How do you "upgrade" gear? If you meant just adding an enchant, I understand.

You can add enchants, yes, but "upgrade" in particular generally refers to the ability to increase an armor or weapon's quality, which increases its base stats relative to its level. Quality is indicated by what color the name of the item is: White < Green < Blue < Purple < Gold. Most items you find in the game will be white or green.

Upgrading is its own tab on the workbench, and requires particular items to do--the more of those items you use, the higher your chance of upgrading an item (and if you fail that chance, the item is destroyed). Generally, you go through gear so quickly while leveling that you don't really need to worry about upgrading until level cap. It's a bit of a waste of resources before that.