ESO - fundamental flaws

Mr_Gallows · November 2019

ESO has a great world, a brilliant idea with Cyrodill. But execution is bad. Not getting into technical issues, that's another discussion - but game desing.

So many core things are wrong with ESO.

Combat is an obscure mess, with manual "auto attacking" being weaved in between skills and different ways of animation cancels. Yes it takes some practice and skill, but it's still a very glitchy design. Introduce lag and it's just a mess.

A basic thing like healing and damage being tied to the same stat... that's just bad. They should have had scrapped the character stats and instead put stats on items. Attack power, critical chance, critical damage, healing power etc. Currently the whole stat system and derived stats are a damn unbalanced mess and it never will be balanced the way it's designed.

Way too much healing in general. Having several healing effects running almost non stop during combat. How did they ever expect to balance this? They never will. Your health going up and down like it is... another broken core part of the system.

The concept of the weapons and weapon skills seem odd. You use a two handed sword, but not a single two handed skill. They should have split skills between attacks and utility. Instead of class attacks each class should have had their own approach to the different weapons and be given different skills with them. Then class skills should be mainly utility.

The buff system is like the healing system out of control. They did do something when they balanced around the minor and major effects, although some things in the game does not follow this logic like certain armor sets or skills giving a percentage bonus. It's another thing which is just a mess.

In general the game would need a core overhaul of the very core systems and combat, because patching the pieces together they they attempt, shifting the meta. It sometimes feels like a joke.

You did One Tamriel.

Now look at the core. The brilliant world, great story and amazing idea that is ESO, do not deserve such a poor core system.

OG_Kaveman · November 2019

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

Mr_Gallows · November 2019

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

I know they don't call it that, but it's what it feels like. Two systems put together in an odd way. It's like the old school mmos where you attacked with skills while your character would autoattack in between.

OG_Kaveman · November 2019

Mr_Gallows wrote: »

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

I know they don't call it that, but it's what it feels like. Two systems put together in an odd way. It's like the old school mmos where you attacked with skills while your character would autoattack in between.

But it is not. Light and heavy are not "auto attacks". Stating like they are is missleading and makes you look bad.

Mr_Gallows · November 2019

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

Mr_Gallows wrote: »

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

I know they don't call it that, but it's what it feels like. Two systems put together in an odd way. It's like the old school mmos where you attacked with skills while your character would autoattack in between.

But it is not. Light and heavy are not "auto attacks". Stating like they are is missleading and makes you look bad.

I thought the whole paradox of the expression - manual "auto attacks" made it obvious.

Anyway. It's a detail and one that does not add quality to the game either way.

relentless_turnip · November 2019

I have to disagree with your OP.

The combat in this game is amazing... when it works.

I agree it is laggy and buggy, but these are my main complaints.
I enjoy the combat in this MMO far more than I have in any other.

I feel there is opportunity to build to almost any style you like and make it some what viable.
No other MMO give you this freedom and the weapon skill lines make this very possible.

Its not perfect, but i personally think it is a great idea. That is sometimes executed well and has a lot of room for improvement.

Mr_Gallows · November 2019

I don't disagree with you on the character building options, which is a core concept of the game and a great idea.

The idea of the combat is also great, except I find the mix of regular attacks and skills very odd and clunky the way it's executed with weaving and animation cancelling. The whole healing/buff/damage balance is also out of control.

I do not want combat to be very different in terms of how it plays in theory. I would just like to see it much more balanced, more controlled and way less quirky.

I don't think it's possible without a change to the core. Somewhat like they did with One Tamriel.

Araneae6537 · November 2019

I disagree, OP.

Regarding damage and healer power — why shouldn’t they be based on the same stat if both use magic, for instance? In any case, I very much like it and plan to experiment with some hybrid builds. Plus, doesn’t every other MMO have a separate “healing power” stat? I know SWTOR did and GW2 does. I like that ESO is different in this and other things as well.

Regarding class abilities, noooo, you would take away much of the different flavor possible by playing different classes! I like being able to choose among weapon and other abilities available to all classes and class-specific attacks and abilities!

Regarding One Tamriel, I do agree that it should be easier, especially for new players, to find and start the main quest lines without Stuga and every other NPC trying to pull you elsewhere! More than that, the main storyline quests should NOT be available out of order. However, being able to travel anywhere and do local quests and stories in One Tamriel is fantastic.

Iskiab · November 2019

Agree and disagree on some points:
- light attack weaving (yes it is terrible)
- high healing amount (this is to help solo players heal themselves, the game is high burst and high healing)
- no healing stat (yes there is, healing done modifier)

Overall it’s a good setup save light attack weaving. Most people defend it, but really if you look at your average player they struggle with breaking 30k and light attack weaving. It’s something that separates a high end players from an average player which in itself isn’t bad, but doubling dps? That’s not good.

I’d also add buffs are too short term. I’m used to it but recently leveled a new character, lowby pvp is more fun in general and I think lack of shorter term buffs and less burst/healing is the reason.

Goregrinder · November 2019

Mr_Gallows wrote: »

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

I know they don't call it that, but it's what it feels like. Two systems put together in an odd way. It's like the old school mmos where you attacked with skills while your character would autoattack in between.

But it's not "auto"...this isn't WoW. It is MANUAL attacking. I know it is a hard thing for people who are used to having the computer do half the work for them, but you manually click your mouse for each individual attack. It sounds like this just isn't the game for you bud.

Iskiab · November 2019

Goregrinder wrote: »

Mr_Gallows wrote: »

OG_Kaveman wrote: »

with manual "auto attacking"

never called this in the game. it is light and heavy attacks.

I know they don't call it that, but it's what it feels like. Two systems put together in an odd way. It's like the old school mmos where you attacked with skills while your character would autoattack in between.

But it's not "auto"...this isn't WoW. It is MANUAL attacking. I know it is a hard thing for people who are used to having the computer do half the work for them, but you manually click your mouse for each individual attack. It sounds like this just isn't the game for you bud.

Therein lies the problem. The vast majority of people suck at light attack weaving and this ‘isn’t the game for them’.

If those who have issues all quit the game would close within a couple months.

Don’t live in the US close to the servers? Quit
Poor internet connection? Quit
Old PC? Quit.

Who’s left?

Mr_Gallows · November 2019

Iskiab wrote: »

Agree and disagree on some points:
- light attack weaving (yes it is terrible)
- high healing amount (this is to help solo players heal themselves, the game is high burst and high healing)
- no healing stat (yes there is, healing done modifier)

Overall it’s a good setup save light attack weaving. Most people defend it, but really if you look at your average player they struggle with breaking 30k and light attack weaving. It’s something that separates a high end players from an average player which in itself isn’t bad, but doubling dps? That’s not good.

I’d also add buffs are too short term. I’m used to it but recently leveled a new character, lowby pvp is more fun in general and I think lack of shorter term buffs and less burst/healing is the reason.

Well using the content as an argument for the constant self healing is exactly the logic leading to the game never getting fixed. That it is needed is a problem in itself. Especially for a game that has at least a hybrid action combat system. Even gw2 which uses tab targeting has a more effective active defence and way less healing.

Often I have 1-3 heals going, 2-5 buffs. Everything getting refreshed constantly. It's really a tedious system. But on top of the poor gameplay it also leads to some obvious balance issues, where thing easily excalate out of control and they clearly had no vision for a balance system when they created the game.

I know there is a healing modifier, but the concept of having damage and healing tied to the same stat is poor design.

Another thing is the character options for builds. I have seen mmos with much fewer options than ESO having a greater number of effective build options than ESO. The main difference is often skill names and the colours of effects 😏