I'd like to discuss CP and the grind that CP entails.

Azyle1 · May 2018

ShadowMonarch wrote: »

I can't get any of my friends to play the game BECAUSE of the CP grind, along with having to collect skyshards, lorebooks, train their mount over 180 days or spend $$$$ to have it not even account wide. Then having to PVE for a lot of the good gear for cyrodil and not being able to buy it with AP instead.

They are avid pvpers and want nothing to do with any part of the game outside cyrodil but the game has too much grinding in it for them to stick around. They find it hilarious that they are supposed to grind a character to 50, only to have to regrind to 160 to be back on the bottom of the barrel. Then when they had all been playing their first characters for a few days and made their 2nd characters to try a new class out, and found out their skyshards, lorebooks, and mount training reset they just uninstalled it and went back to wow.

Yeah, I can see how it is a little overwhelming and frankly annoying for new players. Again, I love the game and whatnot, but I'm just wondering if it could be tweaked somewhere.

Also riding stats needs saved across characters, that one doesn't make sense.

DanteYoda · May 2018

They want us here for a long time not a good time.. Customers buy stuff when they are bored grinding..

Grind is here to make Zos money, thats a fact.

Azyle1 · May 2018

DanteYoda wrote: »

They want us here for a long time not a good time.. Customers buy stuff when they are bored grinding..

Grind is here to make Zos money, thats a fact.

Right. Which is why they sell the riding books and stuff, too.

Juju_beans · May 2018

PlagueSD wrote: »

CP160 is all you need for the gear. Anything over that is just "frosting on the cake"

Also, if you have multiple characters, you can park them in a city for the "enlightened" buff and take them out to farm XP. You're not forced to do it all on one character as the CP points are shared between all characters.

Once I hit cp160 I forgot about CP and just played the game. I'm now cp480 and still just "playing the game".
What I like about this is that you are not gear chasing unless you want to farm a new set.
CP160 is the gear level and the rest is now passives.

So much nicer than the other MMO I used to play (wow) which was all about chasing gear constantly.

mav1234 · May 2018

CP gains should be tripled. ZoS and certain players can say "nothing in the game requires more than 400 CP," and this may be technically true. However, it ignores two important facts:
1) In PvP, there is an enormous benefit for having more CP than that, and access to CP drastically changes how you can build characters.
2) In PvE, much of the community is reluctant to attempt more difficult content with someone at that CP. It is not impossible, and yes, there are groups that do it, but as a new player, I have found it difficult to 'break in.'

By simply vastly increase CP gain, the maximum level progress is maintained, and it is not until the highest CP (where the relative difference between CP levels is the smallest) where it becomes a bit of a grind.

leeux · May 2018

I do think CP gains from quest should be increased a little... maybe even have some quests give "quest experience" granting a full CP on completion.

It's fairly easy to get CP if you gring like mad and have the XP buffs on you, but newer players often cannot afford either the "carry fee" or the XP buffs costs to be able to do that from the start. So optimal XP gains are only for people that has friends, that already has a main account with all the stuff they need, or that they have lots of gold somehow (via trading probably, but not all people like trading.)

Tandor · May 2018

ShadowMonarch wrote: »

I can't get any of my friends to play the game BECAUSE of the CP grind, along with having to collect skyshards, lorebooks, train their mount over 180 days or spend $$$$ to have it not even account wide. Then having to PVE for a lot of the good gear for cyrodil and not being able to buy it with AP instead.

They are avid pvpers and want nothing to do with any part of the game outside cyrodil but the game has too much grinding in it for them to stick around. They find it hilarious that they are supposed to grind a character to 50, only to have to regrind to 160 to be back on the bottom of the barrel. Then when they had all been playing their first characters for a few days and made their 2nd characters to try a new class out, and found out their skyshards, lorebooks, and mount training reset they just uninstalled it and went back to wow.

With no disrespect to them, this is not a game for avid PvPers from WoW who want nothing to do with the rest of the game outside Cyrodiil, never has been and never will be. If you said avid PvEers whose hearts were in Elder Scrolls lore were deterred from playing this game then it would be a lot more significant.

Panomania · May 2018

I'm really not trying to be a jerk here....but the thought that this game is in any way "grindy" is a huge illustration of whats wrong with the industry today. Developers have trained players to be 100% expecting instant gratification....kind of like WoW, where you basically get max level and gear for correctly typing your name.

This game isnt grindy, at all. WoW, FF, etc....not at all grindy. If anything they could all USE some grind; players would hit ennui far slower.

Guarlet · May 2018

mav1234 wrote: »

CP gains should be tripled. ZoS and certain players can say "nothing in the game requires more than 400 CP," and this may be technically true. However, it ignores two important facts:
1) In PvP, there is an enormous benefit for having more CP than that, and access to CP drastically changes how you can build characters.
2) In PvE, much of the community is reluctant to attempt more difficult content with someone at that CP. It is not impossible, and yes, there are groups that do it, but as a new player, I have found it difficult to 'break in.'

By simply vastly increase CP gain, the maximum level progress is maintained, and it is not until the highest CP (where the relative difference between CP levels is the smallest) where it becomes a bit of a grind.

1) There is a no-CP campaign in PVP.

2) I would recommend this as more general advice for the game anyways, but look for a guild to join. PUGs are always going to have their share of unpredictable people, but a good guild is worth its weight in gold for doing endgame content. But... I've always never seen someone kicked from a random group for having 400 CP. Less? Sure. But never 400+, unless they're playing poorly. That's just personal experience though.

teiselaise · May 2018

Azyle1 wrote: »

Guarlet wrote: »

Azyle1 wrote: »

It just seems like a strange idea in this game as no other MMO has such a grueling "End level" to achieve.

Oh my god lmao. You clearly have not played many MMOs.

I've played FFXIV through Stormblood and Wow through Mists.

WoW has the easiest level grind ever. It isn't even a grind really.

FFXIV just has stupid gated story quests, but other than that, when you hit 50, you're done. You do not have to grind 720 more levels.

Also, if you are going to talk about other MMOs, don't bother, because ESO, WoW and FFXIV are the only ones worth mentioning as others are garbage. (Maybe GW2 is an exception)

Try bdo, great game, grind is theoretically endless but I believe the soft lvl cap is around 63 atm, haven't played for ages though so might be a little off. The gear grind is possibly worse, the levels of rng are impossible.

firedrgn · May 2018

I am a casual player and have no problem getting cp.

AlnilamE · May 2018

ShadowMonarch wrote: »

I can't get any of my friends to play the game BECAUSE of the CP grind, along with having to collect skyshards, lorebooks, train their mount over 180 days or spend $$$$ to have it not even account wide. Then having to PVE for a lot of the good gear for cyrodil and not being able to buy it with AP instead.

They are avid pvpers and want nothing to do with any part of the game outside cyrodil but the game has too much grinding in it for them to stick around. They find it hilarious that they are supposed to grind a character to 50, only to have to regrind to 160 to be back on the bottom of the barrel. Then when they had all been playing their first characters for a few days and made their 2nd characters to try a new class out, and found out their skyshards, lorebooks, and mount training reset they just uninstalled it and went back to wow.

Well, once jewelry crafting comes out, you can craft them lowbie gear and they can spend their time in the sub-50 campaign and then go to the non-CP campaign.

Of course, they could just enjoy the sub-50 so much that they'll spend their time there with all the other folks who just make a new character every time their current one gets to 50.

DoctorESO · May 2018

Azyle1 wrote: »

I often hear that there is no better time than now to play ESO. I agree in some ways, but one thing I wonder is what new players think of CP. To me, CP leveling is way too slow and while I'm well aware that you do not need to be max CP to raid, you are still missing out on a lot of DPS/survivability even at ~400CP.

I have about 707 CP on my stamblade on Xbox. I've been playing for about 13 months, although not straight, as breaks were taken, but have spent over 500 hours on that character. I'm not even max CP yet. Now, part of this is due to them increasing it, but my point is, as a player that is in between casual and hardcore, that seems absurd that through that many hours (questing, and dungeons mostly) I am not max CP. Is this intentional? I want to start playing on PC but the CP grind has me second guessing if I want to. It just seems like a strange idea in this game as no other MMO has such a grueling "End level" to achieve. I'm well aware WoW and FFXIV do not have a CP system or whatever, but truly I feel in ESO you aren't max level until you are max CP.

TL;DR - CP grind seems way too long and should be shortened especially considering it is just going to keep increasing.

GW2 has a good system.

Asardes · May 2018

In fact ZoS did a lot to encourage people to play the game by making CP gain easier, even when they raised the cap every patch:
- they decreased the XP needed to gain them, at the start it was a flat 400K XP, and even then people managed to get 1000+ before they decided the gap had opened too much and they decided to cap them at 501, which was in place for more than a year.
- they added 400K worth of illumination per day, and below about 300 CP that's probably enough to gain one a day just doing a random dungeon; you start with 12 days worth of it, 4.8M, so you gain the first 100 CP straight away when you hit 50.
- they eliminated the Veteran Rank grind, which was pretty hard too since it was per character, with every veteran rank requiring 850K XP to gain, almost 13M XP in total; when they did that they gave the first 10 CP for free if you didn't have them already and they converted each VR to 10 CP
- they have scaled the whole game world to CP160, meaning you always get maximum XP when killing mobs and turning in quests, unlike it used to be: if you were 5 levels or more above the zone you got 0 XP from everything, and the game was so easy it wasn't even remotely fun
- they have double XP events 3 times a year, spanning some 10-11 weeks, that's basically 1/5 of the time when you get your XP gain doubled, so it's really easy to catch up if you're not at the cap
- they front loaded the CP in such a way you get most of the benefits with much less than before; also stats gain are capped at 20% when you spend 300 CP; for example spending 37/100 CP in a star gives you 60% of the potential bonus, and spending 56/100 gives you 80%.
- there's a pretty balanced mix of CP and no-CP PvP, especially next patch when battlegrounds become part of the base game, and thus accessible to anyone; even if I'm way past the CP cap I still find no-CP PvP better for a number of reasons
- there are plenty of CP capped players that are still very bad players due to the fact they haven't learned to play in the slightest, I mean people who spam 1 skill and light attacks bad; that's pretty indicative how easy is to gain CP

FloppyTouch · May 2018

It seems like a high number but it's not, nor is it hard to get too. With the catch up mechanism in place you get cp very fast.

I tested this myself to see what all the crying was about on the forums. I made a new character on the EU server from scratch and after 3 days was at lvl50 had a guild member craft me gear training and all the gold I saved from npc stuff I used to buy the cheap exp potions. I did the random normal every day writs and after that spent an hour grinding. Got to cp 450 in about a month. Was stupid fast and that was casual play I'm sure if I did not get bored I could have got to cap in another month or 2.

Bbsample197 · May 2018

long? this game is by far the easiest to reach the capped, i bought this game exactly a year ago and i just hit the capped in early january, i havent grind any cps at all the only thing im doing in the game is doing random dungeons, daily writs and daily pledges on all 3 of my character. this game has soo many double exp events in a year that youll reach the cp capped without even doing anything. so just playing casually and doing all three pledges will reached you to the capped in no time honestly i didnt even know ive reached the capped

EDIT: the only thing that is too long to get in this game are horse training and researching traits, you can mac each of the other skill lines in 2-3 days without putting an effort to it

Aurielle · May 2018

Based on my PSN Profiles trophy record, it looks like I started over on my second PS4 account in early April, 2017. I hit max CP early on during this year’s anniversary event, so it took about a year of mostly casual play to hit level cap. I only specifically ground out CPs when I was in the high 600s. If I’d made a concerted effort (e.g. doing random dailies every day on every character), I would have hit cap a LOT sooner. Either way, a year to hit max level in an MMO is not bad at all. There are multiple catch up mechanisms available in-game; if you use them consistently, you will find that it’s not much of a grind at all.

AlnilamE · May 2018

DoctorESO wrote: »

Azyle1 wrote: »

I often hear that there is no better time than now to play ESO. I agree in some ways, but one thing I wonder is what new players think of CP. To me, CP leveling is way too slow and while I'm well aware that you do not need to be max CP to raid, you are still missing out on a lot of DPS/survivability even at ~400CP.

I have about 707 CP on my stamblade on Xbox. I've been playing for about 13 months, although not straight, as breaks were taken, but have spent over 500 hours on that character. I'm not even max CP yet. Now, part of this is due to them increasing it, but my point is, as a player that is in between casual and hardcore, that seems absurd that through that many hours (questing, and dungeons mostly) I am not max CP. Is this intentional? I want to start playing on PC but the CP grind has me second guessing if I want to. It just seems like a strange idea in this game as no other MMO has such a grueling "End level" to achieve. I'm well aware WoW and FFXIV do not have a CP system or whatever, but truly I feel in ESO you aren't max level until you are max CP.

TL;DR - CP grind seems way too long and should be shortened especially considering it is just going to keep increasing.

GW2 has a good system.

Would you care to elaborate? I find GW2 relatively similar to ESO's system, if you think of Masteries as CP and Hero Points as Skill Points. Except that the grind to level crafting (and the crafting itself) are pretty brutal.

Asardes · May 2018

There is a guy who came over from console and joined my guild who created several characters and grinded to max CP in about 6 weeks. So it's quite possible to do it if you really try hard. I wouldn't recommend it, especially for new players. CP are overrated, and as I've said, there are plenty of people who are at the cap and have no clue how to actually play. Grinding itself teaches you absolutely nothing about playing the game since most grind spots have easy mobs and in the hardest ones you can team up with other players to beat them, or get plain carried, like Skyreach Hold. If people really wanted to grind CP, train, and get good gear at the same time, the best bet is vMA. That instance gives a load of XP, in fact so much that you can get your armor busted 3/4 through, without even dying (armor damage is proportional with XP from kills). I use the normal instance for leveling 10-50 and it's quite fast.

craigr02 · May 2018

Jameliel wrote: »

It's boring and takes too long compared to other MMOs. As with every game, you still have diehard fans who ridicule anyone who disagrees.

This is true, or they dont have responsibilities, so they can sit on their pc or console and play all day. They dont have to worry about work or the fam.

Tandor · May 2018

craigr02 wrote: »

Jameliel wrote: »

It's boring and takes too long compared to other MMOs. As with every game, you still have diehard fans who ridicule anyone who disagrees.

This is true, or they dont have responsibilities, so they can sit on their pc or console and play all day. They dont have to worry about work or the fam.

Or they don't see it as a race or competition, they're content just to play the game and let the CPs take care of themselves, in the full knowledge that the last few hundred don't make that much of a difference anyway.

Sparr0w · May 2018

Qwazz wrote: »

Wasn't there someone who streamed level 1 to CP690 in the span of 48 hours? It was on PS4 if I remember correctly.

Yeh, but that was with the max xp gains you could get (150%, gold training armour etc...) & constant grinding... not a fan.

160cp is gear cap, 300cp is the cap for stats and resources, everything else is small % gains. Can do pretty much anything in game with half competent cp300 players.

Riptide · May 2018

I actually quite like the CP system and the pace. Maintains a long term goal without being prohbitive.

Florial · May 2018

I started playing on a second account and started a character from scratch during the last event. Playing casually and this means no questing or serious grinding and just doing the daily writs and a random normal dungeon, my new character is now at CP 101. A few days ago I was thinking that ZOS is pretty darned fair to new players and the CP catch up. Playing while enlightened and perhaps popping an experience scroll is more than enough to get a few CP under one's belt.

Of course getting to max level CP will take some time but that is what makes MMOs fun for me at least---working towards something. My other account is close to 900 CP and that is through questing, dungeons and never, ever grinding. I just play.

As one aside---I've really had fun playing on a new account and getting that newbie experience again. It was a learning experience wading into some fights, forgetting that I didn't have all that CP behind my characters and getting wacked. On the other hand, I never found anything unfair or unbalanced. Personally I think the game is well balanced and forgiving to newer players.

josiahva · May 2018

Oh boy, here we go again with this topic. STOP GRINDING! Just play the game normally, the grind only exists if you want to grind. By the time your average new player has completed the main story in all 3 alliances and whatever side quests interest them, they will be right around 200-300CP. Add in the DLC and chapters and its closer to 400CP...at that point the diminishing returns make the difference marginal...this new player hasnt even started endgame content at this point....they still have a ton of vet dungeons to do, normal trials, etc before getting to vet trials and other "end game" content. So where exactly is the grind? the last few hundred CP? you will get that just doing pledges and other dailies at a rate of about 3 per day...so 100 days or a little over 3 months and you should be maxxed out if you do a daily random dungeon, the pledges, plus whatever other dailies of your choice(writs, PvP quests, fighters guild, undaunted quests, etc etc) New players would be lucky to have crafting maxxed out by the time they reach max CP. or a horse maxxed out

DoctorESO · May 2018

AlnilamE wrote: »

DoctorESO wrote: »

Azyle1 wrote: »

I often hear that there is no better time than now to play ESO. I agree in some ways, but one thing I wonder is what new players think of CP. To me, CP leveling is way too slow and while I'm well aware that you do not need to be max CP to raid, you are still missing out on a lot of DPS/survivability even at ~400CP.

I have about 707 CP on my stamblade on Xbox. I've been playing for about 13 months, although not straight, as breaks were taken, but have spent over 500 hours on that character. I'm not even max CP yet. Now, part of this is due to them increasing it, but my point is, as a player that is in between casual and hardcore, that seems absurd that through that many hours (questing, and dungeons mostly) I am not max CP. Is this intentional? I want to start playing on PC but the CP grind has me second guessing if I want to. It just seems like a strange idea in this game as no other MMO has such a grueling "End level" to achieve. I'm well aware WoW and FFXIV do not have a CP system or whatever, but truly I feel in ESO you aren't max level until you are max CP.

TL;DR - CP grind seems way too long and should be shortened especially considering it is just going to keep increasing.

GW2 has a good system.

Would you care to elaborate? I find GW2 relatively similar to ESO's system, if you think of Masteries as CP and Hero Points as Skill Points. Except that the grind to level crafting (and the crafting itself) are pretty brutal.

Getting to max level (80) is very easy and can be accomplished through crafting, which in turn can be accomplished with just some time and some real life money to convert to in-game currency to buy materials.

Then you have masteries, which can take time to get, but they do not make you stronger in the sense that ESO CPs do.

Anotherone773 · May 2018

Jameliel wrote: »

It's boring and takes too long compared to other MMOs. As with every game, you still have diehard fans who ridicule anyone who disagrees.

MMOs arent meant to have an end. I dont know why everyone tries to hurry up and get to the end of the game so they can sit around and complain how there is nothing to do when they skip 90% of the game. Leveling is not that bad in this game nor is it that important. A single CP isnt even worth the energy to hit = and assign it.

Its the journey that matters not the destination.

DoctorESO · May 2018

Anotherone773 wrote: »

Its the journey that matters not the destination.

It takes some people a lifetime to realize that.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO · May 2018

. I have about 707 CP on my stamblade on Xbox. I've been playing for about 13 months, although not straight, as breaks were taken, but have spent over 500 hours on that character. I'm not even max CP yet. Now, part of this is due to them increasing it, but my point is, as a player that is in between casual and hardcore, that seems absurd that through that many hours (questing, and dungeons mostly) I am not max CP. Is this intentional?

500 hours is around 20 days. In 13 months there is around 400 days. So you only put around 5% of your time towards that 700 cp. That is not a lot. That is only around an hour a day. By mmo standards, that is not a lot. That is pretty casual play time, like an episode of a TV series a day. Now I have ~150 days in-game on the PC. Been playing since February 2015. That is around 13% of my time since I started playing. So like I'm average ~3 hours every day since the day I started playing. That is between casual and hard core. There are people that have double or triple my time. That is hardcore.

Yzalirk · May 2018

At least CP applies to all your characters.