Community think tank - Classless system for ESO

Nisekev · January 2019

I'm not expecting ZOS to listen to such suggestion and overhaul the whole system based on my thread, but I wanna get community into discussing and adding to the idea of actually removing classes from ESO and letting players pick 3 of a bunch of "Base" skill lines and combine them for their own unique class and playstyle. Will take some rebalancing, but I think it's nothing impossible. Maybe make some skill lines mutually exclusive, maybe separate them into 3 categories like "tank", "damage", "support/sustain", maybe something else - you're welcome to add to the topic and improve it.
Who knows, maybe we'll inspire them into something big this way, like schools of magic and spellcrafting.

Turelus · January 2019

It's been discussed a number of times in the past.

One of the biggest issues is you won't really end up with much diversity as there will be new meta choices of skill trees and you may just end up with every role playing the same "class"

Nisekev · January 2019

ZOS have a team of paid professionals who should be able to balance skill lines in a way that makes any combination a viable meta. I think it wouldn'be so meta now if they didn't restrain skills into classes to begin with.

Stx · January 2019

When eso first launched I was actually very disappointed that they had classes at all. I love the way the skill lines function and how you can combine them to make a unique build.

Instead of class skill lines I had hoped they would just have a bunch of traditional elder scrolls skill lines like all the traditional schools of magic, weapon types, armor types, and utility skills.

Being forced into one of four (now five) classes seems silly when some builds only use a few class skills anyway.

I play a stamina templar and I only use 3 class skills normally on my bars. I could make the same exact character if you removed classes but added restoration magic skill lines or mysticism or whatever.

Gnortranermara · January 2019

I've played 100% Classless (no skills, no passives). Just a base "civilian" character. Mag and stam.

It's very fun for a while, and you gain an *extremely* deep understanding of class balance. But eventually it starts to feel like you're dry humping a bag of sand. Class adds flavor.

That being said, it would be MUCH cooler if they entirely replaced class with the schools of magic (+ Martial Arts for stam) and your class would just give you one special starter spell in each school.

Uviryth · January 2019

I HATE classless games. Its the gaming-equivalent of a participationtrophy.
"Your such a special little boy, you can do eeeeeverything"

RavenSworn · January 2019

I've played a class less combat system mmo before. It's called the Secret World. Heard of it?

I know right? That's why I'm here in eso.

Thorstienn · January 2019

I think they just did classes wrong. They did the more common method of classes found in other games, instead of making classes a buff to a play style.
Imagine they kept the old TES classes; Archer, healer, knight, battlemage, etc. Each could have maybe a few "class" specific skills, but mostly supplied passives.
When you start the game, you want to heal, be a healer, but use whatever other tools then game supplies, as maybe a passive makes heavy attacks with all weapons heal or something.
That's how I always imagined ESO. Not open ended classes like a templar; a holy knight? What does that do? What's their specific "role"? Oh anything apparently!

Malkorga · January 2019

Ultima Online was a classless game and I enjoyed it for the time I played

Stx · January 2019

Uviryth wrote: »

I HATE classless games. Its the gaming-equivalent of a participationtrophy.
"Your such a special little boy, you can do eeeeeverything"

This doesn't make sense... just because a character starts with no class doesn't mean they can do everything...

validifyedneb18_ESO · January 2019

Stx wrote: »

Uviryth wrote: »

I HATE classless games. Its the gaming-equivalent of a participationtrophy.
"Your such a special little boy, you can do eeeeeverything"

This doesn't make sense... just because a character starts with no class doesn't mean they can do everything...

Agree. I think a good and easy way something like this could be implemented would be say, by allowing players to select or "learn" 3 or 4 skill lines from any of the existing classes. So you cant use 10 skills from 10 different class lines, you're still slightly constrained. This helps limit the amount of min-maxing build creators can do, increasing build diversity, and also makes a classless system less daunting for new players who would start with a premade selection and can pick up and swap them later on by progressing their character.

validifyedneb18_ESO · January 2019

Turelus wrote: »

It's been discussed a number of times in the past.

One of the biggest issues is you won't really end up with much diversity as there will be new meta choices of skill trees and you may just end up with every role playing the same "class"

Already with builds you see multiple variations of similar builds, people build top tier builds but there are too many variables to do perfect calculations.

I think increasing the potential of each build to an entire games worth of abilities would increase this effect. But could be improved by aritificial limitations. Like forcing people to choose 3 of the existing class skill lines to use. So you might really want a particular ability from Assasination, but you also have to take into consideration the passives you would be getting (And implicitly giving up, as you're using up one of 3/4 skill line slots which could be used for another skillline with nicer passives)

Chelo · January 2019

Nisekev wrote: »

ZOS have a team of paid professionals who should be able to balance skill lines in a way that makes any combination a viable meta. I think it wouldn'be so meta now if they didn't restrain skills into classes to begin with.

Even if a build is only 5% more powerful than all the other builds. That build will become meta for just 5%... There's never going be an exact balance...

Uviryth · January 2019

I HATE classless games. Its the gaming-equivalent of a participationtrophy.
"Your such a special little boy, you can do eeeeeverything"

validifyedneb18_ESO wrote: »

Stx wrote: »

Uviryth wrote: »

I HATE classless games. Its the gaming-equivalent of a participationtrophy.
"Your such a special little boy, you can do eeeeeverything"

This doesn't make sense... just because a character starts with no class doesn't mean they can do everything...

Agree. I think a good and easy way something like this could be implemented would be say, by allowing players to select or "learn" 3 or 4 skill lines from any of the existing classes. So you cant use 10 skills from 10 different class lines, you're still slightly constrained. This helps limit the amount of min-maxing build creators can do, increasing build diversity, and also makes a classless system less daunting for new players who would start with a premade selection and can pick up and swap them later on by progressing their character.

That would only work if you could never ever ever in a million years ever undo the choices you made. And then you would have a million complainers.

ghastley · January 2019

The only difference between a class and a skill line is that you get three of them tied together. Think of it as just a skill line bundle, and it's no longer anything special. The more the game adds extra skill lines with DLC, like the Thieves Guild and Psijic ones, the more that pre-combining of skills becomes diluted. There are already meta builds that don't use anything from one line of the class, because these addition skill lines provided abilities that have displaced them. If ZOS keep doing this, your class will fade out over time.

Nisekev · January 2019

A bit of reminder for readers - What I'm suggesting isn't a free changing of class skill lines on the fly, but more of "create your own class" with 18 or so "base" skill lines, 3 of which you choose for your character and don't change them later.