TESO – the past, present and what will happen in the future?

Publius_Scipio · October 2017

Isn't this show what Sypher did back in 2014-2015?

Anethum · October 2017

ZOS_MikaS wrote: »

We have recently removed a few comments that violated our community rules, particularly bashing. Please be sure to keep all feedback constructive and respectful.

Constructive...ok.

1. Eso latency even on very powerfull PC is hell bad. U see Keep sieging means now delay on skill 1 second+, its like u play always with Wrecking blows instead of skills. And 5(FIVE) month zos didn't improved it. I don't understand why, morrowind animations changes vere anounced as panacea vs this, but...what's going on with client-server work guys? U have no enouch money for good server's power? In some placas of trials eso also laggy as hell. (I always have now 1/2 - 1/4 of normal fps on twins in MOL, second last arena in DSA, last boss in MSA, second last boss in HOF, last boss in Hel Ra, on overperformed PC for eso in general). So, for a very long time i'm not interested in trials, and wonder of where top raids like Hodor on eu server for trials gets so much patience for this unstable ***.

2. PvP class balance...Maybe some players who says that pvp thould be hard divided from pve for this are right. It feels more than 3 years that u can't do right calculations for both parts of eso at the time. Every patch makes some class stronger than others (except mage sorcerers, they are op many years, and hell i don't wan't see them in pvp with asylum staves with instantly stun rune prison) Divide at least...balance separately maybe, it will be easier no?

3. AoE CAP supports zergplay. It's not easy to kill big group by smaller group even without this. U should be better organized, skilled, but... AOE capsmakes bigger groups the more stronger the more difference in size of group is... and max group size is 24 members, and u can meet 2 or more such groups. U will be extremly lagged, delays on skills are extremly big, u can get long loading screen. And in addition to this, your group do less damage on them because of AOE caps...Maybe its a time few year in a raw to do something with that? Less max size of groups (which server can normally support in performance...). Maybe some punishments in healing etc... Less max population in campagn (but its too low already for interesting global battles, which are not possible in such lags...). Solo and small scale pvp is extremly dissapointing partly because of aoe caps...

4. Farming system...everything said before - boring endless process (for example I stopped run maelstrom at all 4 month ago, i have no hope to get weapon i need there anymore - i've spent there so much time without enjoy). Thx for transmutations systems, with crystals... which should be also Farmed in pledges and trials...wtf?

5. Miat's cc tracker makes useless most of the combos and nighblades gank (ruined fight system, such datas should not be taken by addons in pvp). In PvE, such notifications (Raid Notifier like) should be supported by core game because of 1.

6. Damage\drain resourses poisons in PvP. They ruin fights and this going on much more than Year in a raw. First they vere 60% with that many resourses system, in Morriwng 30% with this poor sustain...they're even more OP in this system. Too Strong. If u think, some classes have overperformed sustain, work on them to balance, don't add such lazy trash to the game instead. And, any changes for that poisons in this patch again...perfect, everyone run with them, lets only do heavy attacks, its so interesting.

Tired to write this list but it can easy consist of 10 points.

Balamoor · October 2017

diplomatt wrote: »

Constructive...ok.

1. Eso latency even on very powerfull PC is hell bad. U see Keep sieging means now delay on skill 1 second+, its like u play always with Wrecking blows instead of skills. And 5(FIVE) month zos didn't improved it. I don't understand why, morrowind animations changes vere anounced as panacea vs this, but...what's going on with client-server work guys? U have no enouch money for good server's power? In some placas of trials eso also laggy as hell. (I always have now 1/2 - 1/4 of normal fps on twins in MOL, second last arena in DSA, last boss in MSA, second last boss in HOF, last boss in Hel Ra, on overperformed PC for eso in general). So, for a very long time i'm not interested in trials, and wonder of where top raids like Hodor on eu server for trials gets so much patience for this unstable ***.

This is probably something you won't be receptive to but the game runs fine for me and for my very large guild and most of us aren't running super powerful machines.........so YMMV, you may want to look at how your connecting etc

diplomatt wrote: »

3. PvP class balance...Maybe some players who says that pvp thould be hard divided from pve for this are right. It feels more than 3 years that u can't do right calculations for both parts of eso at the time. Every patch makes some class stronger than others (except mage sorcerers, they are op many years, and hell i don't wan't see them in pvp with asylum staves with instantly stun rune prison) Divide at least...balance separately maybe, it will be easier no?

Again something you may not want to hear but.....No PVP player ever has been happy with balancing of any MMO ever, and if you show me one that has I will show you ten that have their own vision.

Kneighbors · October 2017

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

Paganini wrote: »

Yeah, thats right. The amount of people playing is higher than at the beginning of ESO ( comparison of 2014/2015 and now) - which is pretty normal, because it was getting more and more known. But i started my thread with "in the last weeks and months" - and if you compare the last 1/2 - 3/4 year, you'll see that ESO has lost a lot of players. And that are only the login-datas registered by steam. This doesn't implement the people playing without their TESO-account connected to steam. As far as i know from friends playing on consoles, they also got seriously performance issues.

Steam only registers a small portion of PC players only. That's not representative at all of the overall ESO population, about which we have no quantitative data at all - only ZOS has them. As a result, we can only guess from impression and feelings in the game, because that's all we have.
I understand that you want to whine and complain about ESO and that's okay if that's how you feel, but don't try to back it up with any sort of population trending. Or streamer ranting.

He showed you steam statistics which prove his point. You say there's many players who play directly through client and you can't know the statistics but still you go ahead and bash him like it's obvious that if the stats are unknown so they are in your favor. Most probably though the stats are very similar or even worse. Besides that in game itself you must be really blind to not notice decline of popluarity.

And yes, for every vet player who passed all vet trials you need over 20 new players just to keep end game community healthy population, I hope you understand why.

So no need to spit across your monitor using unknow valuea when there are clear known ones which don't support your point at all.

anitajoneb17_ESO · October 2017

Kneighbors wrote: »

He showed you steam statistics which prove his point. You say there's many players who play directly through client and you can't know the statistics but still you go ahead and bash him like it's obvious that if the stats are unknown so they are in your favor. Most probably though the stats are very similar or even worse. Besides that in game itself you must be really blind to not notice decline of popluarity.

Steam statistics prove nothing - I already explained why.
Data is not available, unavailable data proves noone's point. I never pretended it was in favor of my point.
As to the game's popularity, the game's simply full of players, seems ever growing. That's what I see in the game. But since it goes against your point/ OP's point, you'll pretend I'm blind, lying, whatever.

I've been around for 3.5+ years and believe me, if every forumer claiming that the game's population was dying and drying had been correct about it, the game would have shut down by June 2014 already.

Rasimir · October 2017

I play a lot of PvP, and I indeed observed a lot of people leaving because of performance issues. The organized raids of former times don't exist anymore, guids have stopped playing, and people just play what they want even in groups. All get lags, quit when it is too bad, and a lot are looking for other games to play.

I myself lost my faith in the ability of Zenimax to identify and fix the issues.

In the "Welcome to 2017" article https://elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/25913 Matt Firor wrote:

As for Cyrodiil: we know that performance (both server and client) is often not up to par, to put it mildly. These problems particularly plague Champion-ranked Campaigns and, coupled with some of the balance issues and bugs that are still present, result in an often-frustrating experience for some players. We will be addressing this in 2017 – from Champion System performance to class/armor balance to client/server performance in large battles. This is a priority for us, but as these issues are extremely complex, we will be re-thinking how some of the systems in the game interact with each other; changes of this magnitude cannot happen quickly. We are not taking this lightly – change needs to happen. We will have lots more information on Cyrodiil balance and fixes shortly, but right now, we are focusing on investigating and testing different options.

Now 2017 is almost over, we got three major updates, and nothing has changed for the cyrodiil players. We still have the same performance issues. Zenimax changed things, but all they did had little or no effect at all.

We will have to live with the current state of the performce especially in cyrodiil, or leave ESO for good. Many took that exit already, and as soon as a new MMO comes up with comparable pvp features like ESO, a lot more will go, including myself.

geophonic_ESO · October 2017

Most people who are bashing on the OP right don´t even recognise the core of the mentioned problem: it´s Peformance!
This performance of the game in a trial environment, or in PvP, is often times very bad, independent of who is playing (i.e. rig, ISP). That guy with the best PC specs and the best internet connection one day has the performance issues, when the other guy on an old rig can do fine in the same situation. And these things change on a daily basis without any further indication.

However, today it has come to a situation where the core of the problem is not discussed rather than giving out ones own personal quasi-quantitative approach of "runs for me, must run for other too". Or the false impression the game is healthy, when all you really see is people standing around in town sporting their new mount/costumne/pet.
So you ran that one vet dungeon yesterday and it worked fine? Cool grats mate. But that doesn´t mean anything. Go ahead and at least try to evaluate the problem that is performance in trials and pvp and check back here later. If you are just waiting for that next costume to come out, move along, there is nothing to see here.

Get off your blinkers and at least try to evaluate what this is all about before cherrypicking your thoughts on the game.

FloppyTouch · October 2017

Lag has been an issue for a long time this is not why people leave. Crown crates are fluff items this is not why people leave.

People leave MMORPGs for 2 reasons
1.burnt out
2.new MMORPGs or game

It's very simple. Lag sucks we know it you know it we all get it but it's not why people leave.

anitajoneb17_ESO · October 2017

geophonic_ESO wrote: »

However, today it has come to a situation where the core of the problem is not discussed rather than giving out ones own personal quasi-quantitative approach of "runs for me, must run for other too".

The approach "I have performance issues, thus everybody has performance issues, ESO sucks and ZOS sucks and everyone is leaving because of this" isn't any better.
The only valid approach is "do I enjoy this game ?". If yes, stay. If not, leave.
Coming on forums and making everyone believe that the game is [snip] and everyone's leaving doesn't do anyone any good.

Is ZOS aware of performance issues ? Yes. Does ZOS do anything in their power to make things better ? So they say. Shall we believe them and trust them ? Up to you, up to me. Trust them ? Stay. DOn't trust them ? Leave.

Simple as that.

[Edited to remove profanity]

Doctordarkspawn · October 2017

Paganini wrote: »

Hello guys,

in the last weeks and months probably most of you guys have noticed that more and more people have left TESO.
Let me give you a quick overview about my „TESO-Backgrounds“:
I have been playing this game for 2,5 years. Within this time I’ve done almost everything in this game. PVE (progress raiding, semi-progress, casual), PVP (solo, progress and casual). I’ve been leading weekly raids for almost 1 year and i am currently leading a group through vHoF.

The biggest problem of TESO is: performance. Some months ago I’ve upgraded my old system (now i7 7700k, system + client on the same SSD, good internet connection, AMD RX 580) and the funny thing is: I’ve almost noticed no improvements.
Our biggest problem in vHoF for example aren’t the boss-mechanics – it’s the performance. Almost everytime at the Factotum (2nd boss) our tank gets high-ping-spikes during the split mechanic and it doesn’t matter who’s tanking. Or for example as soon as you reach the big room at the 4th boss EVERYONE in the raid has hardcore fps-drops down to 10 FPS and lower. We are raiding with completely different systems (CPU’s, Ram’s, graphic devices, router), different internet providers, different addons, PC’s optimized for gaming (no background software running)…. I also tried raiding without any addons, not only deactived – I also uninstalled all addons and their saved variables. The performance is still really bad, as soon as you’re doing group-content with more than 4 people – so PVE-Raids and PVP… The support is not really helpful: „Addons…. Ports.. new drivers…“ Do you guys know that „check your hardware“ „check your addons“ „ did you enable your ports“ are running gags nowadays?? And it doesn’t seems like there will be working performance-improvements in the future. During my time as raidlead I’ve lost so many good players because of those fps-drops and high-ping-spikes, I‘ve stopped counting them.

There are so many issues existing for such a long time:
Just the most common in
PVP:
- lags everywhere
- long loading screens in cyrodiil
- loading screens while using any charging abilities (just check out Feng Rushs gameplay videos and you’ll see how every player, getting those loading screens, reacts)
- no crosshairs while using siege-weapons

PVE:
- fps-drops in always the same areas
- micro lags, so light attacks won’t be registered
- vHRC left boss ( with the dogs/hounds) doesn’t respawn
- vSO portals at Manticore doesn’t show up/aren’t visible

Every PVE raid, you have to include almost half an hour just to get every client running and I am doing at least 1 break every 1,5h so people can restart their computer or clients, because the eso performance got so bad that it’s impossible to play. In PVP raids there is at least 1 person everytime who gets 4-5 long loading screens in a row until he/she just leaves the group „sorry guys, this is senseless and just a waste of time“.

People more and more get the feeling that you have „finished“ with improving the game and just create new „RP-content“ to make more money.

I mean, okay – I think it was like 5 months ago Matt Firor said TESO is not an MMORPG anymore. But to be honest: everyone I know playing ESO was laughing about this phrase. Did he ever play the game? Did he ever try to get a vMA weapon he required? Not only the whole endgame content is mmo-like (grinding hours and hours to get the right item, minimum-DPS to clear content, etc.). It’s like you’re buying a car and 2 years later you name it „bicycle“ – but it’s still a car.

Even most oft the popular streamers are slowly done with TESO.

„I am finding the game more and more stale, more and more pory run, and I just don’t really qualify giving the company my support, my money and my time“ (Blobs - Livestream 28.09.)

[snip]
Or the podcast of Ruben (@DaggerfallTradeMasters) , @Alcast , Kodi and @Hexys

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVQjLWGtBHg

I really recommend to take a look at those videos.

Yes, these are only some players, but their meaning is 100% representative for a lot of other players. To be honest: after you invited all those content creators to check out Morrowind, I was so happy. Because it seemed like you’re REALLY interested in improving the game together with the community. But now, 5 months later.. yeah.. I don’t know what to say. This game has such a high potential and it really hurts to see whats happening every patch.
Please, please, please take your time and LISTEN TO CONTENTCREATORS and consult their improvement suggestions!!

You can create the most beautiful game ever – if it runs like crap, nobody will be able to enjoy it.

I mean only those guys just running around, doing quests and playing ESO as a RP game, will never complain about those things. And I am pretty sure they also raise a big profit. Everybody knows:

no money -> no game.

But the way you’re currently acting will make sure that you’ll lose a lot of MMORPG players anytime soon.
You should think about your priorities. Instead of releasing one DLC after another, take your time to make a BIG PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT PATCH for ESO.

Thanks for reading. Please try to spread this thread, so Zenimax gets a better imagination what's important for many players!

[Edited for bashing content]

They dont care.

They will not change they're modus operandi for the sake of profit or customer satisfaction. They have shown this time and again. Refusal to use PTS feedback, even on widely hated changes. At most they will compromise, but anything they want to go through, will go through. Longstanding bugs and issues, sweeping solutions for minute problems.

ZOS does not want your feedback. Time and again they have shown through buisnes practice and PR practice they do not care what you have to say. The only way you have a voice, is to remove your dollar from the game.

themaddaedra · October 2017

Completely agree on that statement "no matter if you improve your pc, if you improve your connection or if you remove addons etc." as i have a very good example for it.

I have been running this PC for like 3 months:

i7 7700k
Evga GTX 1080 Ti FTW3
Gskill Tridents 16 GB 3200 Mhz
Samsung 950 Pro 512 GB nVM SSD
Liquid Cooling

and i was never able to get more than 40 FPS in trials. It's fixed on 100 fps when i'm running in zone doing crafting dailies etc. But never was above 40 in trials.

Lately i accidently broke my graphics card and started to use i7 7700k integrated graphics. My fps is now around 15-20 in trials. Not even to mention that all those lag spikes, long loading screens remain the same.

So it really doesn't matter how good your pc/internet is, endgame content is not even optimized at all. Not saying it's badly optimized, feels pretty much it's not optimized at all.

I hope we will see this improvement someday as the game itself is imo amazing. Have no idea what Zenimax is upto these days.

Rohamad_Ali · October 2017

All these posts do is trigger die hard fans , moderators and get ignored by ZoS . Always best to walk out quietly and don't look back . Don't try to help the developers and don't try to make anyone wake up . Just walk away . Like all games the servers will shut down eventually and their will a small crowd of people blinking in confusion as to why . You could put a magaphone to their ear and they still would not hear what you are saying . They just loved the game and didn't want to here anyone talk bad about something they love . They won't believe it when it happens so they won't believe anything you say now . And when it is all said and done they won't blame the game at all or the people that directed it . They will blame you for not being a good enough fan ... lol

Samphaa · October 2017

Me and my friends left the game over a year ago because of a lot of the problems you've just listed. I came back on the forums today to see what state the game is in because my friends are thinking of going back to it.
Glad I found this thread, you echoed everything I felt a year ago. It's not the game, it's zos's ignorance and incompetence.

reiverx · October 2017

I don't think the game will die anytime soon.

At the same time I don't think the game will grow. At least, not substantially. There was a time when I thought that ESO had the potential to be a huge hit but that ship has sailed. ESO now has a reputation as being laggy and buggy with obligatory updates containing nerf after nerf.

Shouldn't users look forward to updates?

Morrowind was ok. Just ok. Nothing special. The Champion Tree changes pretty much killed the enthusiasm.

Elsonso · October 2017

Matunnos wrote: »

I would like to add that I still feel frustrated about the so called "update" Morrowind. It was in fact a very expensive DLC.

It would be interesting to find out what ZOS and Bethesda think of Morrowind, privately. I suspect that they are not exactly thrilled. Behind closed doors, with cell phones turned off, NDAs firmly in place, and Firor locking the door.

I suspect that Morrowind really did nothing to build the active player base. It is possible that, due to the cost of the Chapter, the perception of the combat changes in Morrowind, and the general lack of attention to bugs and performance, as well as external factors not mentioned, the active game population peaked at the end of May and has been slowly declining since then.

starkerealm · October 2017

duagloth wrote: »

Does fengrush still play?

"What is a Fengrush?" *Throws Wineglass.*

Elsonso · October 2017

reiverx wrote: »

I don't think the game will die anytime soon.

At the same time I don't think the game will grow. At least, not substantially. There was a time when I thought that ESO had the potential to be a huge hit but that ship has sailed. ESO now has a reputation as being laggy and buggy with obligatory updates containing nerf after nerf.

Shouldn't users look forward to updates?

It is an interesting balance between fixing class and skill issues and preventing power creep.

On the one hand, if ZOS just sets the skills in stone, players will constantly complain that ZOS does nothing to address skills that are out of line. Whatever entity inside ZOS that does balance seems to have a problem anticipating how players are going to use skills and abilities, make choices, and generally play the game. As long as they cannot do this, they cannot balance the game.

So, ZOS is in a position where they are always responding to how players are playing the game. If ZOS brings up poor performing skills and does not bring down high performing skills, eventually they are going to have to trot out a few additional zeros for Health in the game to compensate. ZOS is correctly refraining from power creep in this game, but the downside is that they fall prey to the negative problem of people yelling "nerf" in some sort of knee-jerk panic. This panic tends to be contagious, justified or not. Many don't understand the "nerf", but carry the banner anyway, as it is popular.

Probably the best thing that will happen to this game is the next game. After that, many of these changes will no longer happen, as ZOS will not be interested in trying to balance the game. They will be focused on the new game. Only then will ESO achieve the stability it needs to really move forward. Sadly, too late.

Giraffon · October 2017

I wouldn't really care if the game sort of mutated into a mostly PVE solo playable game where the MMO part really just adds a social element to it. But if it's going to mutate into Skyrim Online, I got some demands!

- I want to swim and fish (with weapons) underwater
- I want to grow my own food and alchemy ingredients
- I want some freakin' storage in my house - lots of it
- I want my banker to have access to guild banking
- Nerf master writs! What a PITA! The drop rate on those things needs to go up like 500%. It shouldn't even be a thing.
- I want group finder to work for trial groups
- I want a walk toggle - I'm sick of jogging
- I want to put as many things in my house as I can fit in them. No limits!
- I want to be able to host a private server where the entire world is only open to me and anyone I invite to be on the server with me
- I want jewelry crafting
- I want to craft armor for my mount
- I want to customize the appearance of my assistants
- I want to turn in my writs anywhere. Craglorn is nice and all but can't we get an assistant to run the crap over there?

Wow! I just kinda' went crazy there. I had no idea that was all pent up in side of me!

Nithiel · October 2017

I bet the OP and those who take this topic seriously would like to hear a sincere statement from ZOS (aside from "We have recently removed a few comments that violated our community rules"

).
Do you want all those MMO-Players, Raiders, PvPers to leave ESO? Are you satisfied with keeping "only" those who invest in crown store items and crown crates and enjoy the open world single player content? What is your demand concerning the future of the game? Are you planning on doing anything against those performance problems?
This is not meant to be offending, there just seem to be some people who'd like to know.

Fuxo · October 2017

Open world PvP has severe performance issues that will never be fixed. Removing or even increasing AoE caps would have a negative impact on performance, ruining it even more. That's why ZOS has invested so much into BGs. The problem is that it's locked behind Morrowind paywall, group finder has/had many issues, matching system is non-existent and there is no lobby. Instead of adding more game modes, devs should address these things first. You need a solid foundation to build on. Not an unfinished one with a facade.

Pops_ND_Irish · October 2017

Balamoor wrote: »

KramUzibra wrote: »

Maybe I'm reading them wrong but the steam charts shows slow growth since 2014

Your'e not reading it wrong, the thing is no matter how much doom saying you see on the forums, the game is very profitable and has a large player base, I don't see that changing any time soon.

Sadly however complaining on forums is much more fun to some folks than any MMo could ever be, so expect more of it.

I agree.
The whiners say players are leaving, when in reality the whiners "SAY" they are leaving but never budge.
All talk and love to complain

Kode · October 2017

Past: Beta
Present: Frustrated
Future: Camelot Unchained

I believed this game would hang in there and weather the future releases but the direction of this game has been bad. They have been unable to fix the fundamental performance issues, the game still lags and isn't responsive. They haven't made any changes to how the game plays, PvP is a huge cluster of ability spam and PvE is generally mindless.
Could they fix it? Yes. If they do it could be a fantastic game.
Will they fix it? I doubt it. They are poorly managed and just don't seem to care. Camelot is going to drain their PvP playerbase... if it ever gets released. They are an innovative company that is trying to deliver a creative and fun product, meanwhile ESO sleeps and counts money bags. Maybe that is their strategy, but there is a shelf life.

Zbigb4life · October 2017

mocap wrote: »

past - sorcs
present - sorcs
future - sorcs

I call a nerf!!!