"Now Is the Time for an Account Wide Achievement System" or "Why Don't Play Alts"

Karius_Imalthar · January 2019

I've been playing Elder Scrolls Online for five years now (since beta) and I have characters that were created since launch. I used to be against an account wide achievement system but now that the game is nearly five years old it is unrealistic to expect someone to create an alt now and have it ever eclipse or overtake their other characters in achievements. Basically it makes me never want to make an alt because, looking at the Achievements page, they look pathetic in comparison. I think the time has come to either introduce an account wide Achievement system. Players should be able to view their character-only achievements to see their progress on things like quests, etc. Without an account wide system though it feels like all newer characters are throwaway (especially with how easy it is to level now) and I quickly lose interest in playing. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Aliyavana · January 2019

I used to be against this but some trials are magika biased and ill never get those achievements on my stamina character

Sylvermynx · January 2019

*snort* I have 19 girls and am quite happy to do whatever needs doing on each one of them, whether it's getting skyshards, doing crafting, etc.

I don't have any use for achievements personally though. So I just don't care about that one. That's.... kind of like.... gold stars in kindergarten....

Vapirko · January 2019

And so starts the argument between the people who spend their time doing quests and collecting lore books (or play for 14 hours a day), and those who just want to press through to endgame content with each new character. For me, I don't much care about achievements but Im all for it. All the grinds are getting really old. Having to do sky shards, mages/fighters guild, undaunted, psijic, maybe vamp, on each toon aside from various weapon lines and of course class skills, alchemy, riding lessons and so on. I'd be on board for making at least sky shards and riding lessons account wide as well.

LaveniaRose · January 2019

I was originally against this as well. Until I realized how many achievements are do 30 daily quests somewhere. After seriously considering making a second main, I don't think it's possible. I don't need VMA, dungeons, or trials really to be account wide. But alliance rank, daily quests, crafting styles? Can those happen?

Odnoc · January 2019

Just play the game and have fun? Not sure why people worry about achievements on other characters when they probably don't have them all on one anyhow.

Sylvermynx · January 2019

Odnoc wrote: »

Just play the game and have fun? Not sure why people worry about achievements on other characters when they probably don't have them all on one anyhow.

Yep. Perfect.

JayAstrophel · January 2019

I really appreciate achievements, perhaps just because I like looking at all my shiny filled in badges - and when I started my second character recently I looked at their zero percent achievement rating and sighed. I would love, at least, a way to see every achievement you've ever earned on any character.

Alaztor91 · January 2019

Agree. Obviously some achievements wouldn't work in an account-wide system, like for example the ones related to quests or stuff like mages guild/fighters/psijic/thieves/dark brotherhood, also some imo should stay character bound like for example vma, vet dungeons, vet trials, pvp.

But is there any reason why other ''common'' achievements like for example kill X number of Y enemies or destroy X number of dark anchors, harvest X ammount of materials, etc are not account-wide? Those are just grindy tasks that require no effort, just time. We already unlock collectibles like costumes/mementos/dyes,etc for the entire account when we first complete the achievement associated with it, also some achievements like the housing ones and the CP ones are already account-wide.

Basically what I'm saying is that most achievements that require you to repeat X task Y number of times when that task can be done just as easily with a brand new lvl 3 toon or a fully equipped maxed toon should imo be account-wide, as long as those achievements are not tied to a skill line or a skill point unlock reward.

Also horses, you should be able to ignore the horse feed cooldown for your other characters if you have it maxed on 1 character, not free of charge, just ignore the cooldown.

jainiadral · January 2019

I've gotten so spoiled by GW2, and a lesser extent by SWTOR, which has a lot of legacy achievements and unlocks. I'm not really an achiever, but I really hate having stuff I've unlocked on another toon unavailable to my current alt. Skyshards would be really nice to have unlocked, same with wayshrines, crafting research and horse training.

MyKillv2.0 · January 2019

Sounds like that it should be a thing but since it would take a lot of work, I wouldn’t hold my breath anytime soon. I mean it took almost five years to get the simple ability to change up the order of your characters on the load screen.

SaintSubwayy · January 2019

Alaztor91 wrote: »

Agree. Obviously some achievements wouldn't work in an account-wide system, like for example the ones related to quests or stuff like mages guild/fighters/psijic/thieves/dark brotherhood, also some imo should stay character bound like for example vma, vet dungeons, vet trials, pvp.

But is there any reason why other ''common'' achievements like for example kill X number of Y enemies or destroy X number of dark anchors, harvest X ammount of materials, etc are not account-wide? Those are just grindy tasks that require no effort, just time. We already unlock collectibles like costumes/mementos/dyes,etc for the entire account when we first complete the achievement associated with it, also some achievements like the housing ones and the CP ones are already account-wide.

Basically what I'm saying is that most achievements that require you to repeat X task Y number of times when that task can be done just as easily with a brand new lvl 3 toon or a fully equipped maxed toon should imo be account-wide, as long as those achievements are not tied to a skill line or a skill point unlock reward.

Also horses, you should be able to ignore the horse feed cooldown for your other characters if you have it maxed on 1 character, not free of charge, just ignore the cooldown.

Those points are probably the main reasons we should get the acheivementsystem accountwide.

Trials are mostly designed to be meele unfreindly, aka meeles loose way more dmg when they play mechanics, than ranged do, therefore rendering meeles nearly useles sin certain trials, vAS, vCR+3 come to mind.

vMA well if you can do it on 1 char consistently, well then you probably get the weapon you're looking for, so the achievement is mostly secondary there (except for achievement hunters)

Dungeons, well you dont really need healer or tanks for certain dungeons, making those accountwide would help players maining tnaks and healers to a certain degree.

and for PVP (also known as the longest grind in history) IMO there should be 1 Ranking system, and that should be account ranking, not character rankings. Yes I know the PVP Rank shows your skill (w8sted time) on certain build / classes, but many aspects are left out, like overall pvp understanding.
in PVP espectionally I would add the aachievements accountwide....but this would result in a big MIMIMI PVP thread so jeah, let the MIMIMI beginn

Elsonso · January 2019

Karius_Imalthar wrote: »

I've been playing Elder Scrolls Online for five years now (since beta) and I have characters that were created since launch. I used to be against an account wide achievement system but now that the game is nearly five years old it is unrealistic to expect someone to create an alt now and have it ever eclipse or overtake their other characters in achievements. Basically it makes me never want to make an alt because, looking at the Achievements page, they look pathetic in comparison. I think the time has come to either introduce an account wide Achievement system. Players should be able to view their character-only achievements to see their progress on things like quests, etc. Without an account wide system though it feels like all newer characters are throwaway (especially with how easy it is to level now) and I quickly lose interest in playing. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

I've been playing this game for 5 years, and feel that the Achivements are the reason to create new characters.

MythicEmperor · January 2019

As ZOS refuses to implement class changes, I feel that this would be a workable alternative. As someone who pre-ordered the game and put thousands and thousands of hours on *just* my main, whom I already rerolled from a dk to a magblade to a magsorc, who was really supposed to be a necromancer the whole time (roleplay-wise), rerolling him again would feel like years of my life wasted.

MyNameIsElias · January 2019

I would love account wide achievements

Draxys · January 2019

I’m in favor of this. I’ll never get certain achievements on my main due to being melee. That’s really my biggest gripe. Those achievements are meant to be completed, and parts of the game design make it insanely difficult to do on certain types of characters. That’s not good design.

And it’s not about shiny stars or feeling good about yourself. It’s about being committed to your one main character and “completing” the game. Yes I know you don’t literally complete an MMO.

LordWenzel · January 2019

Achievements have to be account wide. They show player progressions, not character progressions (with few exceptions like skyshards, but for those can be always be implemented a system that show you all the skyshards in the map, if collected all in that area with a toon).

ListerJMC · January 2019

I would love an account wide achievement tab as well as the character achievement view we have now. I'm fine with titles etc. being on the character that did the achievement, but I'd really like to be able to see my combined account score.

I enjoy working on increasing my achievement score as a goal in games, and because I have to do it all on 1 character in ESO it does make me far less inclined to play my alts - even if I want to play them more than my main.

Edziu · January 2019

yes this is it

I was playing only my main almost 4 years nonstop since game release
everytime I lvled alt to 50lvl I was leaving him as magazine because I also have lost all of my interest on him when I wa seeing 0 achievements on my alt which I have done on my main

and ye for me acheivements are as player achievs, not character - I can do probably every acheivement wih every class but for what Im supposd to reapet it on every of my alt? (11 yet)
this is jsut nonsense to reapet every acheivement on every new char just to have it on look you have done it while there i literally no reward for completing same achievement on different char

now I play few months on my alt which is really nude in compare to my main
I play on alt only because I got sick of playing literally 1 class since game release adn you all know what? as this isnt my main with 28k+ achievs points I dont care about any new achievs on my alt

on my main I woudl be still achievements hunter to get as much as possibel but as dont play my main now I feeel really pised with these achievs which now I have realyyy deeeep in my ass while not playing my main and not having them account wide

these achiev mean for me now literally nothing as I have got that many on my main which stopped playing and dont have them on any other my alt

for me acheivements are not cahracter progress but player progress

is here someone who have gathered atleast 20k+ acheivements on his all 15 character? I dont think so anyone would have even time to do this if not playign 24/7 this game nonstop and for now we have almsot 35k achiev points to get..so good luck doing it on even atleast few characters if cant on every

Tandor · January 2019

While some people play multiple characters just to try or implement different builds in endgame , other people play multiple characters as equal individuals with whom they want to play the complete game.

The former want everything account-wide, the latter want everything character-specific. ZOS recognise these different approaches and have done a good job of balancing the game between them so that some things like champion points, collections and dye unlocks are account-wide and other things like skyshards, lorebooks and most achievements are character-specific.

The balance should stay as it is in my view, but by all means with the addition of an account-wide achievement window accessed from the character selection screen showing which characters have done what achievements, and with some additional achievement scores and rewards for certain achievements once they have been completed across the account but without the benefits of those achievements being received by those characters that haven't completed them.

Danikat · January 2019

The Kyoma's Global Achievements addon solved the problem for me - I have the option to see each characters achievements without having to log into them or to see them all combined.

When combined it shows the highest progress on a single character, not all characters combined, so it's still accurate for tracking progress towards completion, but it means I can easily check what I've already got completed and if I want to complete it I can see who has the most progress already without having to go between all my characters.

yodased · January 2019

The only way this could work is if you removed them from pre 50 pvp.

I really don't care either way, i only go for achievements on my main and if having them account wide makes you happier, cool.

I would also suggest that this be a toggle since some people probably like getting achieves on all characters.

BUT no way can you have fighters guild, skyshards and mages guild count on pre 50 characters. That would give yoymu a massive advantage over other people. If you want to grind out dawnbreaker and meteor and get the skyshards pre 50 thats on you, but rolling a character, getting them to 10 and going into pvp with 100 skill points, dawnbreaker, meteor and passives is a big helllllll no

Shorayel · January 2019

I think at least for the achievements which are only time-consuming like for example the "1 million gold" for legerdemain there sould be a possibility to unlock it to a new character.

Especially regarding the increasing amount of classes (isn't said there won't come more in future after necromancer)

I saw many people in other threats arguing that achievments like non-death-speed-run-hm-trials should only be on the character which achieved it and I can understand it a little bit.
But for only time-consuming achievments it's just annoying to do it again and again.

Odnoc · January 2019

LordWenzel wrote: »

Achievements have to be account wide. They show player progressions, not character progressions (with few exceptions like skyshards, but for those can be always be implemented a system that show you all the skyshards in the map, if collected all in that area with a toon).

Not sure where this came from, how they are now it is pretty evident they are character progressions. It is an RPG. Would I like to have grand master crafter on all my alts, yeah, a lot of time and several million gold went into that, no way I want to do that again. But the fact is, it is character progression.

Really, you definitely should not have the emperor achievement on a level 1 alt that you never pvp'ed with. That kills your whole argument right there.

Edziu · January 2019

yodased wrote: »

The only way this could work is if you removed them from pre 50 pvp.

I really don't care either way, i only go for achievements on my main and if having them account wide makes you happier, cool.

I would also suggest that this be a toggle since some people probably like getting achieves on all characters.

BUT no way can you have fighters guild, skyshards and mages guild count on pre 50 characters. That would give yoymu a massive advantage over other people. If you want to grind out dawnbreaker and meteor and get the skyshards pre 50 thats on you, but rolling a character, getting them to 10 and going into pvp with 100 skill points, dawnbreaker, meteor and passives is a big helllllll no

yes and this is very good option which I was proposing in another old thread about accout wide skushards - unlockable only after lvled character to 50lvl, same could be even with cp

Sergykid · January 2019

whoever says "beta" or "i've been playing since" triggers me, don't take it personally OP, it's a general thing

who cares about achievements, you have them on ur main. I care about weapon skill trees, guild skill trees, skyshards, practical stuff like this. My character won't be different in any way with achievements or not, but having undaunted 10 will help it from starters.

LordWenzel · January 2019

Odnoc wrote: »

Not sure where this came from, how they are now it is pretty evident they are character progressions. It is an RPG. Would I like to have grand master crafter on all my alts, yeah, a lot of time and several million gold went into that, no way I want to do that again. But the fact is, it is character progression.

Really, you definitely should not have the emperor achievement on a level 1 alt that you never pvp'ed with. That kills your whole argument right there.

Follow that logic i shouldn't have the vMA achievements completion with classes i never used to complete it. But still... I have those...

yodased wrote: »

BUT no way can you have fighters guild, skyshards and mages guild count on pre 50 characters. That would give yoymu a massive advantage over other people. If you want to grind out dawnbreaker and meteor and get the skyshards pre 50 thats on you, but rolling a character, getting them to 10 and going into pvp with 100 skill points, dawnbreaker, meteor and passives is a big helllllll no

Achievements account wide doesn't mean remove character progressions. People still have to level up skills, skill lines, gain skill points and levels. It's like all the other games, you don't get maxed out characters if you restart the game after unlocked all the achievements.

EphemeraCrawford · January 2019

I was indifferent to achievements until I found out they were tied to things like furnishings. Now I'd prefer that some achievements be shared account wide, much as dyes are unlocked for your entire account regardless of which character earned it. For example exploration and zone quests can be shared as these can be completed by any build and class. Perhaps overland skyshards could be included as they can be obtained with no effort but delve and dungeon ones have to be fought for and should be individual.

I agree that combat achievements such as trials should remain locked, as those are specific to what that character has accomplished and are a symbol of pride.

Jitterbug · January 2019

Sylvermynx wrote: »

*snort* I have 19 girls and am quite happy to do whatever needs doing on each one of them, whether it's getting skyshards, doing crafting, etc.

I don't have any use for achievements personally though. So I just don't care about that one. That's.... kind of like.... gold stars in kindergarten....

Wait... We get stars!?

heaven13 · January 2019

I think it would be great to add some kind of account achievement page where you can see all your achievements across all characters. New achievements could be added as well (complete x with each class, complete y with character in each Alliance or...something) that are specifically for accountwide achievement.

But I do not believe that all achievements should just become accountwide.

I get that it can be annoying. I recently got Emperor Slayer...on a level 30 alt that was only in Cyrodiil to get caltrops during the event. I don't have this achievement on my main or on my achievement hunter (different because my main is lawful good and will never complete some of the justice/TG/DB achievements but I digress). They're not the ones that killed the emperor and I want them to earn their achievements. It's enough that I now have access to the dye.

A global achievement tab would be a good compromise. It would allow players to track their achievements across their account while still letting each character earn their own.

driosketch · January 2019

Odnoc wrote: »

Just play the game and have fun? Not sure why people worry about achievements on other characters when they probably don't have them all on one anyhow.

But what if your fun is earning achievements on multiple characters? This is basically how I approach events. Breaking up doing the same thing over and over by doing it with a character who plays a little different. Every progression and discovery, from lorebooks, I mark them on an add-on map as a game in and of itself, to the first time a character makes it through particularly hard content.

I like that titles are character based, for the most part. I'm fine with cosmetics like dyes or costumes being account wide.

About the only one I'd suggest be account wide is the throphy drops, e.g. chattering skull from skeleton enemies. Because those things are not based on skill or time put in, but are instead pure RNG. Even fishing has mechanics that helps you catch the fish you need slightly faster.