Is overland content, post starting zones too easy, for you?

Pele · November 2017

Just right.

lardvader wrote: »

To me it's far to easy but for someone who just started with 0 CP and no knowledge I think it's about right.

There are plenty of other things to do for a challange anyway.

This.

I can sleepwalk through overland content, but I'm not arrogant enough to think it should be made more difficult to suit me.

Although, a hard mode version of overland would be neat - not a removal of the current overland, but a separate version that you can choose to enter. A place where you in all your fancy CP 160 gear and maxed out Champion Points gets challenged because as it is, the only place that really shines is in confined instanced endgame group areas.

Flameheart · November 2017

Just right.

I would be up for a minor difficulty increase for overworld, delves, public dungeon and main quest line mobs/bosses, but you need to scale it for a CP1 player (no upscaling anymore from there on) and for the CP 660 player who wants to do stuff with more than just one char (things with obstacles get tiresome after a while when you have to do them over and over).

..but as you placed a biased poll "far to easy" I voted "just right".

alceleniel · November 2017

Just right.

It's easy, but that's just right. I want to have fun and don't fear to die with every mob. In the beginning of the game I often avoided mobs of 3 or more enemies. Now it's not a problem anymore (also because of One Tamriel). If I want a challenge and harder content there are enough possibilities.

Linaleah · November 2017

Just right.

redspecter23 wrote: »

PlagueSD wrote: »

redspecter23 wrote: »

I tried playing Secret World Legends for a bit and when the mobs starting taking as long as a boss fight each time I encountered them, I lost interest fast. Overland content should be a faceroll. Those mobs are just speedbumps on your way from A to B and anything more than that just feels like a slog.

Not sure what the issue is. I'm currently level 24 and am having no issues killing things in Secret World Legends. I'm Chaos/pistols and I run with a buddy same level that's sword/elemental. We melt through everything.

With a friend, I found it more balanced. Second part in Egypt I started to find that soloing trash mobs was no longer worth it. Only got worse in the next zone. I found myself skipping, sneaking and running past every trash mob I could find. This was in the lv 35 - 50 range. In the lower levels I was destroying things solo. This is the problem I could see happening if the overland in ESO gets bumped up. Instead of making it a challenge, it just becomes an obstacle that most players run past and leash. They'd have to be careful not to run into this issue.

this.

I'm currently splitting my time between SWL and ESO and while thanks to being dogged completionist, I was still out-leveling everything in Egypt, even with that, it was turning into a slog. I'm about to head into Transylvania and I guess we'll see if my desire to finish the story (which in my biased opinion is brilliant) will win over annoyance at spending so much time slogging my way through trash.

and its not like I die all that much. i die occasionally if I run through too carelessly and pull like 15 mobs at once and don't run far enough for them to disengage, or usually when I don't get the delicate timing of some gimmicky ability right (looking at you, Dr Klein and your annoying AoE, where use of a muggufin has to be timed just right, or its one shot). but its not like its genuinely super difficult. fights are simple. there's usually one, maybe 2 things to watch out for and the rest is just slogging through health bars. I guess its the difference between people who enjoy grinding and someone like me. I like it that in ESO I don't really have to grind if I don't want to. I like it that I can get past the trash quickly.

Chilly-McFreeze · November 2017

Far too easy.

kringled_1 wrote: »

To answer the main question of the OP in more detail (I voted Just right), while most overland content (excluding world bosses and significant chunks in craglorn) is easy on my CP character even though she doesn't do a lot of damage (pretty much a tank build with a bit more damage when I'm solo), it's not nearly as easy when I'm on my low level characters where I don't really know what I'm doing yet and I die moderately often.

Yes, there are a lot of people who encounter some challenges with this content. Try pug tanking random normals; although I hit groups with decent damage, I also hit groups where my craptacular tank 3-4k dps is 25-30% of group total according to combat metrics, and a decent number of these players are somewhere in the CP. People certainly won't learn all they need on a starter island (and Firemoth is much shorter than the base game starter islands anyways).

I have no issues with difficulty adjustments but I don't see it happening outside of instanced content.

As far as grouping goes: I play ESO because I want the option to group with people some of the time. Grouping for story quests, IMO, unless you have a dedicated group with rigid discipline and very similar schedules and tastes, is awful if you're trying to actually grasp the story. People in the group rush from objective marker to objective marker, things proceed past your pace (and I do read quickly), someone runs some quests when you're not online and then shares the follow up or whatever they were doing, it becomes a jumbled mess. I prefer to do longer story quests on my own. And I need the option to be able to do something in game on my own; if I had to group to do anything other than harvest nodes and crafting writs, I wouldn't have stuck with the game. As it is, I can find stuff to do that allows me to progress my character and develop my skills/etc even when not grouped.

A couple of examples, also: I've seen people asking for help with a WB for 15-20 minutes in zone chat. If the zone is not one with well-farmed sets, and the WB is way out of the way, perhaps not marked on a lot of players maps - you can spend a long time with noone there (and I've done that also). I've also spent 10-15 minutes fighting a group boss (a repeatable daily) in Craglorn by myself, I had to carefully pull his minions first, then started in on him. Got him to 30% health, then the minions respawned, one uppercut me off the platform, and they pursued me, then ran back and reset. In that whole time...noone else came. I've also seen people asking for help with the Craglorn quests for a long time. Grouping works ok for shorter, repeatable self-contained stuff like dungeons, gold coast dailies, but it works poorly for longer questing.

So a question for the higher difficulty people: what about dungeons and trials is less satisfying to you? I can understand the issues with the size and game performance in trials and scheduling questions, and I'd have no issue with group content for other sizes (2, 6, 8 say). I can kind of see how not using CP is a pain (especially if you then want to go do something else that needs them) but it should be easy to don crap gear.

And yes I understand that its not quite as satisfying when a quest builds up to a serious boss, and then its either a piece of cake intrinsically, or 4 other people waltz in at the same time and it dies in seconds. But I accept that as the price to be paid for there to be a significant amount of content that I and most everyone can do solo.

Great sentiment. Could actually agree with most of it, e.g. the group rush thingy. But I'd hope you are wrong about the difficutly slider, hope they implement it.

So why dungeons and trials don't satisfy those who like higher difficulty? Because it's short, because you have to rely on groups, because it's always the same. There are so many zones, countless quests with great stories. It's totally different from rushing a dung or trial to experience the whole game (again). Some people don't want to run the same instances over and over, they want the whole game to be fun for them.

I suggested it before, so I keep it short here: leave difficulty as it is and call it "normal", implement a seperate "veteran" mode for all overland content as well that progresses indepently from "normal" mode. But also add some achievments for vet OL content (like world bosses, etc.), but share those achievements for that difficulty won't matter (explorer, fishing, thieving, etc.). Maybe also improve the loot (no white stuff, some extra gold, etc.)

This won't push out newer players, it will satisfy more veteran ones and it adds some kind of replay value and artificially prolongs game time between each DLC. As someone who don't finds grinding dungeon Y for X times fun, I'd gladly sub for a few more month when I've got a reason to log on back on my main again.

Only issues I see with it are the dividing of zone population (but shouldn't matter since zones get several instances when there are too many players anyway) and the technically/ monetary effort to pull this off.

Turelus · November 2017

It is too easy.

However I am also CP690 in full legendary quality BiS DPS gear, I understand that the overworld content is aimed more at casual and new players for the purpose of telling a story. Some tweaks would be fine but it shouldn't be balanced around players like myself.

nnargun · November 2017

Far too easy.

Khenarthi wrote: »

Easy if I put on fancy max level armour and weapons, with fancy max level food, knowledge of the game and my class, and a generous amount of CP.

This means it's just right. If you find questing too easy, you can just skip eating food, quest naked or in broken gear, limit yourself to one skill bar, etc. I do this on most of my characters.

Nah, it's only challenging for complete noobs who don't know what they are doing yet. As soon as you know how to play and maybe pop a bread for 5k extra life every now and then it's absolute cake. Even without CP, fancy gear, fancy food etc. Only thing that did challenge me occasionally when I started my new account was group delve bosses. Of course with gaining CP it only gets even easier, though.

And what you suggest about taking off your armor etc is not really an option for many. That gear is what I grind for and I wanna wear it. I don't wanna adjust my play to the worse and run around with a crippled skill bar so monsters don't die from just looking at them. I want to use all my skills and my fancy gear and still be challenged. I think this is a pretty obvious desire in an open world game. Because as it is right now the open world of this game is pretty much useless for me unless I wanna go waste my time fishing at some pond.
Solving this would be the actual art of game design and I'm sure ZOS would love to offer open world/overland content best suited for every skill level. It's just not that easy to achieve.

Merlin13KAGL · November 2017

Far too easy.

Battle leveling (everything), while great in theory, makes things far too simple.

It also jacks newish players up, a lot, because they're often scaled stronger than they actually will be once they roll over to vet (stat-wise, anyway).

Most overland wasn't hard the first go'round. Not like NPC's employ a superior dynamic AI. Then with things like Dungeon Finder, you're boosted even more...

The few bosses/mobs out there that used to require some care are not nearly as menacing as they once were. There is no 'higher leveled zone' anymore, so you have the benefit of being able to go anywhere, but with little concern about the difficulty.

Then things change. You roll over to vet, maybe get a few CP's, and you finally check that little box at the top that says "Vet" beside it, enter content you've breezed through, only now you're getting your ass handed to you, with no idea why.

ZoS has two settings basically:

Faceroll
Nigh impossible

There is so much room for areas in between. It's a shame, and mediocre design, at best.

MaleAmazon · November 2017

Far too easy.

The somewhat So a question for the higher difficulty people: what about dungeons and trials is less satisfying to you?

Getting decent people to play with. Both in terms of ability and communication. It is possible, but ESO does remind me why my multiplayer is otherwise restricted to 1v1 RTS. Entering a PUG, putting on hard mode against the expressed wishes of another PUG member (me) and going 'we kick you if you cant tank it'... let´s just say I don´t find that pleasurable company and I find myself less and less inclined to even put up with it.

It takes a lot of time and effort to find enough people to do the harder content with. PUG is frustrating beyond belief, and I don´t have the time to engage in too much guild socializing just to find someone who understands how the chat window works. I still do it, but I probably won´t keep it up. I´m not antisocial and don´t bother with any 'it´s an MMO idiot' responses. I just personally don´t get enough out of it for the effort to setup a vet content group; I can still interact with people in other ways in the game.

Basically there is only one place in the entire game designed specifically for higher difficulty soloing; Veteran Maelstrom. Thats one single, kinda small, place in the *entire* game. Everything else of higher difficulty is either you artificially inflating the difficulty by playing group content solo or playing gimped.

I guess the one way I can think of to solve it would be to put in a kind of 'veteran mode' you could choose when you are in overland zones, like the veteran dungeon mode and functioning like battle spirit. This way when you put it on, say you get -40% damage and -40% health (just an example). But you get double loot or something.

This way you could still sprint through everything if you want (dont put veteran overland mode on), but there would be a way to make it more challenging without having it affect any other player - it´s your stats that are adjusted.

idk · November 2017

Just right.

It is not intended to be challenging to most. Have never seen overland in any game be a challenge to a mildly skilled player.

nnargun · November 2017

Far too easy.

idk wrote: »

It is not intended to be challenging to most. Have never seen overland in any game be a challenge to a mildly skilled player.

As I said above, I don't think it's intentional. They just don't know how to fix this. It would be awesome if everybody could play at their appropriate difficulty level in the open world of an MMO and I'm sure ZOS agrees with this.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

MasterSpatula wrote: »

The overland game is tuned to new players. Insisting the overland be tuned so it's a challenge to skilled and geared players is rank selfishness.

On a similar token, my single biggest complaint about this game is how everything takes way longer than it has any business taking. My, oh, sixth or seventh biggest complaint is that you can't go two steps without another fight. Imagine how absurdly long doing CWC dailies would take if every Factotum and Gloam Wolf was an epic fight.

Trash is supposed to be trash.

So, quit trying to ruin things for newbies, and quit trying to make absurdly time-consuming activities take even longer than they already do. Just stop it. Seriously. Go do the content that's actually aimed at you and stop trying to turn the content that's not aimed at you into content for you. Be better than that.

Well that was completely uncalled for when I literally just posted

Jade1986 wrote: »

I appreciate people expressing their opinions, its nice to have everyone give their 2 cents without each other crucifying one another.

So far I can see its about an even split, with a small margin voting for too easy, but thats a small margin. Keep it up guys and gals.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

Vapirko wrote: »

If the game is too easy for you drop into solo pvp, it’s the true endgame, the only place where the enemies have all the same advantages that you do.

But dat loading screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeen.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

Epona222 wrote: »

I find it easy (with 950+ CP to my name), but I run across enough inexperienced players who ask for help with quest bosses that I think it's about right - given that everyone has to pay for the game, they should at least be able to batter through the quest content and hopefully learn how to become more effective while doing so. Although a lot of people wish for a return to "Beta Doshia" (which nearly put me off entirely), it's unrealistic to expect that level of difficulty in a game that hopes to be commercially viable for a long time, at least as far as basic quest content is concerned. IMO.

I guess increased difficulty in final bosses , and overland being kept the same could be a comprimise? So that big baddie actually feels lik ea big baddie, and his minions can still feel like minions?

Adernath · November 2017

Far too easy.

lardvader wrote: »

To me it's far to easy but for someone who just started with 0 CP and no knowledge I think it's about right.

There are plenty of other things to do for a challange anyway.

Why did you voted for 'just right' if you say by yourself that it's far too easy for you? The purpose of the poll is to have *your* opinion, not of someone else you believe would have.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

Battle leveling (everything), while great in theory, makes things far too simple.

It also jacks newish players up, a lot, because they're often scaled stronger than they actually will be once they roll over to vet (stat-wise, anyway).

Most overland wasn't hard the first go'round. Not like NPC's employ a superior dynamic AI. Then with things like Dungeon Finder, you're boosted even more...

The few bosses/mobs out there that used to require some care are not nearly as menacing as they once were. There is no 'higher leveled zone' anymore, so you have the benefit of being able to go anywhere, but with little concern about the difficulty.

Then things change. You roll over to vet, maybe get a few CP's, and you finally check that little box at the top that says "Vet" beside it, enter content you've breezed through, only now you're getting your ass handed to you, with no idea why.

ZoS has two settings basically:
Faceroll

Nigh impossible

There is so much room for areas in between. It's a shame, and mediocre design, at best.

That is exactly my issue, why cant there be a middle ground? Or at least have bosses feel like bosses again.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

Adernath wrote: »

lardvader wrote: »

To me it's far to easy but for someone who just started with 0 CP and no knowledge I think it's about right.

There are plenty of other things to do for a challange anyway.

Why did you voted for 'just right' if you say by yourself that it's far too easy for you? The purpose of the poll is to have *your* opinion, not of someone else you believe would have.

I was wondering that too. That is why the title is the way I worded it. So people can speak for themselves, not for others.

Liley · November 2017

Too easy for people who know how to play their class.

For beginners it's about just right.

I think it should be slightly more difficult, so people actually need to learn how to play properly.

Adernath · November 2017

Far too easy.

alceleniel wrote: »

It's easy, but that's just right. I want to have fun and don't fear to die with every mob. In the beginning of the game I often avoided mobs of 3 or more enemies. Now it's not a problem anymore (also because of One Tamriel). If I want a challenge and harder content there are enough possibilities.

And another one who should have voted for 'too easy' according to his own words, but instead voted in place of a beginner which does only exist in his imagination.

Motherball · November 2017

Just right.

Difficulty slider + scaling by size of group. If Diablo 3 could do it, so can ZOS.

nnargun · November 2017

Far too easy.

Motherball wrote: »

Difficulty slider + scaling by size of group. If Diablo 3 could do it, so can ZOS.

Open world vs instanced only. Not a good example.

Jade1986 · November 2017

Far too easy.

Motherball wrote: »

Difficulty slider + scaling by size of group. If Diablo 3 could do it, so can ZOS.

I think a difficulty slider , ala oblivion, with unique cheevos attached to them, would work.

Kiralyn2000 · November 2017

Just right.

Adernath wrote: »

alceleniel wrote: »

It's easy, but that's just right. I want to have fun and don't fear to die with every mob. In the beginning of the game I often avoided mobs of 3 or more enemies. Now it's not a problem anymore (also because of One Tamriel). If I want a challenge and harder content there are enough possibilities.

And another one who should have voted for 'too easy' according to his own words, but instead voted in place of a beginner which does only exist in his imagination.

They think it's easy for them, and that this is "just right" for the game as a whole. For them to vote "too easy" would give the wrong impression of the poll results, since the poll is clearly set up to show "too easy" as a complaint or flaw. This would mis-represent their opinion. Hence, they vote "just right" because it's the closest of the options to what they think.

nnargun · November 2017

Far too easy.

Kiralyn2000 wrote: »

Adernath wrote: »

alceleniel wrote: »

It's easy, but that's just right. I want to have fun and don't fear to die with every mob. In the beginning of the game I often avoided mobs of 3 or more enemies. Now it's not a problem anymore (also because of One Tamriel). If I want a challenge and harder content there are enough possibilities.

And another one who should have voted for 'too easy' according to his own words, but instead voted in place of a beginner which does only exist in his imagination.

They think it's easy for them, and that this is "just right" for the game as a whole. For them to vote "too easy" would give the wrong impression of the poll results, since the poll is clearly set up to show "too easy" as a complaint or flaw. This would mis-represent their opinion. Hence, they vote "just right" because it's the closest of the options to what they think.

Yeah that's right. The poll is actually pointless because it's very obvious that their is a huge gap between an experienced player at level cap and a noob who just started the game. And since overland difficulty doesn't adjust to your skill it has to be "outleveled" at some point. Any high CP player will think overland is too easy if they are running vet dungeons etc regularly. It's absolutely obvious and doesn't really need to be pointed out. The question is rather how to fix this and make the open world more attractive for players in end game while keeping it at a reasonable difficulty for newbies.

Phatmattfu · November 2017

Overland is a hello kitty tea party.

Aside from the world bosses all the enemies might as well not be there.

They fall with a stiff glance in their direction.

A_G_G_R_O · November 2017

Far too easy.

Nestor wrote: »

Roll a new character, use non set gear, and no CP's. Then tell me how hard or easy the content is. That is the bar to be met for a new player.

Experienced players can seek out harder content behind doors (Dungeons and Trials)

Huh done it’s still easy, oh hey I took out all my cp and beat VMA with 2 deaths too. Can we buff the PvE yet?

EvilCroc · November 2017

Just right.

Overland PvE is for nice, atmospheric questing and leveling, not for challenge.

nnargun · November 2017

Far too easy.

EvilCroc wrote: »

Overland PvE is for nice, atmospheric questing and leveling, not for challenge.

I don't think questing is any fun if it doesn't present any challenge. They might as well just give me a book containing all the quest stories.

Chilly-McFreeze · November 2017

Far too easy.

EvilCroc wrote: »

Overland PvE is for nice, atmospheric questing and leveling, not for challenge.

Athmosphere dies down rather quickly if the quest boss dies from a sneeze.

Motherball · November 2017

Just right.

nnargun wrote: »

EvilCroc wrote: »

Overland PvE is for nice, atmospheric questing and leveling, not for challenge.

I don't think questing is any fun if it doesn't present any challenge. They might as well just give me a book containing all the quest stories.

Thats how I run vet trials, on Youtube.