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Blizzard devs comment on class balance & animation cancelling

  • starkerealm
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    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.
    So just lower DPS checks as if there wouldn't be that amount of damage in -game. This basically means lowering HP of bosses and some mobs. No need to replace whole DLC content. Everytime when devs consider nerfing anything combat related (CP, sustain etc) they need take that into account anyway.

    You say that like completely rebalancing every encounter in the game is something that can be trivially done in a weekend. It's not. You are literally talking about years of work that would need to be done.

    It's like saying, "well, it's easy, just build an entire city." There's so much more work that goes into this that you don't even begin to comprehend.
  • ZeroXFF
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    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.
    So just lower DPS checks as if there wouldn't be that amount of damage in -game. This basically means lowering HP of bosses and some mobs. No need to replace whole DLC content. Everytime when devs consider nerfing anything combat related (CP, sustain etc) they need take that into account anyway.

    You say that like completely rebalancing every encounter in the game is something that can be trivially done in a weekend. It's not. You are literally talking about years of work that would need to be done.

    It's like saying, "well, it's easy, just build an entire city." There's so much more work that goes into this that you don't even begin to comprehend.

    The rebalancing that took place in 1T was way bigger, and they only needed a single patch cycle to do it, on top of a bunch of other changes. It's in complexity equivalent to making excel multiply the contents of every cell in a column by a constant.
  • starkerealm
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    Juhasow wrote: »
    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.

    Actually You can do ~30k+ DPS in group just by holding left mouse button so most if not all the things You've mentioned can be completed on vet without competent weaving. It will just take longer then with decent weaving.

    You can pull ~30k on a dummy, using a very specific HA build. If you're using that as your metric, then a lot of vet content would be gated to only the very best players, on very specific builds. Such as, "if you're not running a sorc, just delete it."

    Also, not for nothing, you'd be gating the gear you needed to run the build behind content that required you to already have the gear. So, "you need the gear to be able to obtain it." That would be obnoxious. Fine for anyone who already had the gear they needed, but crippling for anyone who didn't farm the content before the balance change hit.

    It would also render some of the skins completely unobtainable. Either you got it before this change hit, or you're completely out of luck.
  • starkerealm
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    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.
    So just lower DPS checks as if there wouldn't be that amount of damage in -game. This basically means lowering HP of bosses and some mobs. No need to replace whole DLC content. Everytime when devs consider nerfing anything combat related (CP, sustain etc) they need take that into account anyway.

    You say that like completely rebalancing every encounter in the game is something that can be trivially done in a weekend. It's not. You are literally talking about years of work that would need to be done.

    It's like saying, "well, it's easy, just build an entire city." There's so much more work that goes into this that you don't even begin to comprehend.

    The rebalancing that took place in 1T was way bigger, and they only needed a single patch cycle to do it, on top of a bunch of other changes. It's in complexity equivalent to making excel multiply the contents of every cell in a column by a constant.

    The first work towards One Tamriel came after Tamriel Unlimited released. Some of the earliest prototype work that went into One Tamriel was used in the IC and Wrothgar. Taking that stuff from one zone to all of the base game (and Craglorn) took years of work. Even then, there was some stuff that was seriously broken when One Tamriel dropped.

    So, no, One Tamriel was not the product of a single quarter.
  • Sanctum74
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    Cryptical wrote: »
    You can weave your skill / LA / skill / LA without doing any AC

    But no point in LA weaving if it weren't for AC, why you weave LA when you can just spam the spammable instead?
    In games like LoL people do light attacks/auto attacks in between skills because there's a long cool down for skills. But here global cool down is 1s there's no point in doing light attacks then.

    Because you will never kill anyone with just a spammable, you need a rotation. Light attacks also proc enchants, skills, and item sets. You are also able to get a skill and a light in the same global cool down which is called weaving, not animation canceling. It helps to understand combat before making statements like this.
  • Paramedicus
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    That's not how you design games. If both HA and LA return resources, it will be just a question of which one is mathematically more efficient at it, then no point to do the other.
    So if devs make some abilites to have 10s cast time, then everyone gonna use only them if saids skills gonna be (mathematically) more effective?

    You sure about that?

    No actual game developer will even think about making a 10s cast time ability in a game where you can spam skills and have a global cool down of 1s.
    That i am sure about.

    The second thing i am sure about is that if you give resource return to both LA and HA, players will just use the more mathematically efficient one.
    So you are saying that cast times are important in fast paced combat, so devs won't add skill which takes too long to use. But when we talk about HA/LA, thier 'cast times' suddently dont matter?
    PC EU
    /script JumpToHouse("@Paramedicus")
    
    ↑↑↑ Feel free to visit my house if you need to use Transmute Station or vet Trial Dummy with buffs and Aetherial Well (look for the Harrowing Reaper on the northern rock wall) ↑↑↑
  • ZeroXFF
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    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.
    So just lower DPS checks as if there wouldn't be that amount of damage in -game. This basically means lowering HP of bosses and some mobs. No need to replace whole DLC content. Everytime when devs consider nerfing anything combat related (CP, sustain etc) they need take that into account anyway.

    You say that like completely rebalancing every encounter in the game is something that can be trivially done in a weekend. It's not. You are literally talking about years of work that would need to be done.

    It's like saying, "well, it's easy, just build an entire city." There's so much more work that goes into this that you don't even begin to comprehend.

    The rebalancing that took place in 1T was way bigger, and they only needed a single patch cycle to do it, on top of a bunch of other changes. It's in complexity equivalent to making excel multiply the contents of every cell in a column by a constant.

    The first work towards One Tamriel came after Tamriel Unlimited released. Some of the earliest prototype work that went into One Tamriel was used in the IC and Wrothgar. Taking that stuff from one zone to all of the base game (and Craglorn) took years of work. Even then, there was some stuff that was seriously broken when One Tamriel dropped.

    So, no, One Tamriel was not the product of a single quarter.

    1. In 1T they did much more than adjust max. HP.
    2. 1T shows that such a big overhaul is acceptable for the health of the game.
    3. Do you think they are working on the new chapters for just 3 months? What's the problem with making this adjustment along the way then?

    The HP adjustment by itself could literally be done in a few hours, and then they have months to find any unexpected consequences of that change.
  • NupidStoob
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    BlueRaven wrote: »
    NupidStoob wrote: »
    Stop beating the dead horse, animation cancelling is here to stay. This game is balanced around animation cancelling at this point. If you can't handle that it exists then leave and find a game that does things the way you imagine it should be done.

    Your probably right. But the fact that animation canceling was allowed to stay in the game is just a symptom at how weak and short sided the combat teams philosophy is in eso. It’s a poor aspect to a substandard combat system.

    And it really shows how strong the other game systems are in eso to still attract people despite a such bad combat system.

    Well that is just your opinion so there is that. If you feel like the devteam is incompetent and short sighted you have even less reasons to stick around.

    Let's imagine ZoS listens to all this "remove animation cancelling" whining:

    They adjust the cooldowns for light attack and skill so that they play their full animations. You would still have to weave, just with a different timing. A bit more forgiving sure, but combat would be slow. Please watch some of the launch gameplay videos of this game and see how incredibly boring the combat looks for reference: https://youtu.be/YlEipFtHw7o?t=210 With timestamp, but many more examples in this video.

    Now apart from combat being slower it would also become a lot more clunky as we are forced to watch entire animations before we can give the next input. This will mean that any situation where you are required to quickly block, dodge or interrupt will be delayed. The forums would be littered with whining about people dying because an animation had to play out and they couldn't react in time. A single misclick would be way more punishing than it is at the moment.

    Tanking would need a complete revamp, because with this all you could really do is taunt and hold block for the majority of the rest of the time unless you learn timings really well. Right now people can already tank like that if they want to, but this would just force everyone into this playstyle. Considering how few tanks we have in the game cause it's incredibly boring this would just make it worse.
  • starkerealm
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    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    Just everything Finn's team worked on, starting with Shadows of the Hist. Which is to say, basically everything since 2015.

    So, yeah, no, not, all content. But still talking about completely reworking four years worth of content.
    No offence but i think this statement is bit overly dramatic. Can you be more specific?

    The following content cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently:

    Vet Cradle of Spiders
    Vet Ruins of Mazzatun
    Vet Halls of Fabrication
    Vet Bloodroot Forge
    Vet Falkreath Hold
    (..)
    End of long list.
    OK, but why it cannot be completed without DPS who are weaving semi-competently?

    Because you cannot clear the hard wipe DPS checks without weaving.
    So just lower DPS checks as if there wouldn't be that amount of damage in -game. This basically means lowering HP of bosses and some mobs. No need to replace whole DLC content. Everytime when devs consider nerfing anything combat related (CP, sustain etc) they need take that into account anyway.

    You say that like completely rebalancing every encounter in the game is something that can be trivially done in a weekend. It's not. You are literally talking about years of work that would need to be done.

    It's like saying, "well, it's easy, just build an entire city." There's so much more work that goes into this that you don't even begin to comprehend.

    The rebalancing that took place in 1T was way bigger, and they only needed a single patch cycle to do it, on top of a bunch of other changes. It's in complexity equivalent to making excel multiply the contents of every cell in a column by a constant.

    The first work towards One Tamriel came after Tamriel Unlimited released. Some of the earliest prototype work that went into One Tamriel was used in the IC and Wrothgar. Taking that stuff from one zone to all of the base game (and Craglorn) took years of work. Even then, there was some stuff that was seriously broken when One Tamriel dropped.

    So, no, One Tamriel was not the product of a single quarter.

    1. In 1T they did much more than adjust max. HP.

    @Paramedicus's suggestion does as well. It already requires manual retuning of every active ability in the game. Adjusting health and mechanics for nearly every endgame encounter (and realistically, almost the entire game), complete reworks of 1/3 of the classes. It's not just tweaking max health values.
    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    2. 1T shows that such a big overhaul is acceptable for the health of the game.

    Technically correct, however removing Animation canceling would remove much of what makes ESO's combat unique from other games.

    In context, One Tamriel was mind blowing, because an entire MMO being scaled around the player was something you, basically, never saw. It made ESO more unique and accessible. This would make ESO more generic, and (ironically) less accessable.
    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    3. Do you think they are working on the new chapters for just 3 months? What's the problem with making this adjustment along the way then?

    The problem with doing something like this piecemeal is that you'd have incredible power swings while the changes were being implemented.

    You can already see the kind of damage changes like that can do by looking at the combat balance changes implemented last year. Saying, "no, it's going to be another two years of rollercoaster balance changes, before they've even finished the current changes would be fatal.
    ZeroXFF wrote: »
    The HP adjustment by itself could literally be done in a few hours, and then they have months to find any unexpected consequences of that change.

    No, simply changing the HP values for specific enemies would take months of work. On top of that, QA would need to audit everything. If you think they can play through the entire game in a matter of hours, you've clearly never played ESO.
  • Tommy_The_Gun
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    Blizzard ? You mean the company that announced mobile p2w Diablo and recently released flopped with Warcraft 3 reforged ? :joy:
    Sorry, but blizzard no longer means what it used to mean in the 90-ties.
  • BloodMagicLord
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    Are people moaning about animation cancelling just salty because they can't do it well? Like what is the actual issue with it, you're simply squeezing the most out of the game possible, while still obeying global cooldowns. If it broke the cooldowns, then it would be an issue, but it does not do that.
    PC EU | Tank | Immortal Redeemer | Gryphon Heart
    STOP CLASS HOMOGENISATION
  • Taemiru
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    Are people moaning about animation cancelling just salty because they can't do it well? Like what is the actual issue with it, you're simply squeezing the most out of the game possible, while still obeying global cooldowns. If it broke the cooldowns, then it would be an issue, but it does not do that.

    According to most of people crying about AC it's this:

    Being told that I can only reach a fraction of my potential if I play how I want is incredibly demotivating.

    I don't want to bar swap. I don't want to animation cancel, I don't want to weave. I just want to play with a greatsword, not pull a bow out of my ass to shoot a hail of arrows with to then pull my greatsword back out of my ass and fight with that.

    I desperately want to ignore what is meta, but to play how I want is like playing half a character because that's how ZOS designed the game
    . (c)

    And with that they also want to be able to pull godslayer ez.
  • Madhatten512
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    When I read this I couldn't help but think of ESO and I wonder if the devs here have the same thoughts on it..
    FEhDMCG.png?1
    How many of the awful class changes we've seen over the years have been a result of not addressing it here?

    Edit: This post really isn't about comparing ESO with Diablo 3 or even WoW but recognizing that game balance, gear stats, and all of our classes inadvertently takes a hit with animation cancelling present.

    You cant even compare tab target combat to ESO action based high pace combat.. Everyone needs to stop whining about animation canceling its been in the game since launch either learn how to do it, or go play something else. Weaving and good canceling is something that adds a skill ceiling to the game they have dumbed down combat enough for people who 1 cant anticipate the actions of their opponent or 2 they know whats coming but don't have the skill set to do anything about it.. I promise you even if they take animation canceling away you'll die to something else. First it was ultimate canceling they take it, then d swing was kill u gotta take it too. Now off balance cc yup its kill bad players by the thousands its gotta go.. There will always be something good players use to kill potatoes.. Stop trying to reinvent the combat of this game 6 years in!!!!!
  • bluebird
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    ESO's combat is a joke and devs probably feel like animation cancelling is the only thing that's good about it. :disappointed: Still, that doesn't change the fact that the bug-to-'feature' AC looks spastic and is so amateurish that it just casts a light of incompetence on the combat team and the lack of conscious planning of the game systems as a whole.

    They should either redesign combat around AC, remove AC, or remove animations.

    1) If they want players to press 2 buttons per second and get off both skill and LA damage, just remove the *** animations. What's the purpose of adding animation to skills if no player is actually supposed to see them because that's not how the game is supposed to be played at all by design?

    2) If they want to cancel animations, incorporate that into the skills. Some abilities in other games are off the GCD for example so they can be fired off quickly between other abilities, and the animation of the 'intended-for-weaving' skills in ESO (such as LA and other instants) should reflect that. It looks ridiculously spastic to cast a spell with my hand, then have my staff appear for a split moment as I light attack, then have it disappear again as I cast a spell with an empty hand again, etc. It's clearly a glitch - no matter how much devs embraced it - and it looks glitchy, and has no place in a serious combat system.

    3) If they do want to keep animations as they are on the skills, then add a GCD to prevent animation cancelling. And if they think this would make the game too slow, then too bad, choose one of the earlier 2 options, because adding lengthy animations to skills while also expecting to cancel them, and resulting in a spastic seizure of a 'combat' system is not working.

    Animation cancelling is 100% a crutch, but not in the way most people think (i.e. not a crutch for the playerbase). AC is a crutch of the dev team to make their combat seem like it has something even remotely interesting about it. Meanwhile other games such as GW2 give us dynamic ability combos (e.g. Fire Trap before Whirling Axes results in Fiery Whirling Axes), even old ones like SWTOR or GW1 had excellent skill interactions (Fusion Missile + Rail Shot), and WOW in its tab-targeting GCD glory still has amazing procs, combos and burst cooldowns.

    Also, regarding the 'you can't change animation cancelling, it would make endgame fights impossible' complaints, ZOS regularly nerf and buff damage skills for far more nonsensical reasons (e.g. the uncalled-for buff to DoTs then the catastrophic nerf to all DoTs to 'fix it' last year). So ZOS can just do widespread damage buffs and nerfs to compensate for any change to AC.
  • Stebarnz
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    ZOS have specifically stated that A/C is good for the game, they love it and that they are glad it gives the potatoes something to try and learn so they can complete FG1 normal.
  • hakan
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    Why do people think it is a bug?

    Almost every game has it. It is required.
  • starkerealm
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    hakan wrote: »
    Why do people think it is a bug?

    Almost every game has it. It is required.

    Because they don't understand what it is. Same reason you have people who think animation canceling lets you bypass the ability GCD. They refuse to cancel, and as a result, have no idea what it is or how it works. Because they don't like it, and don't want it, they assume that if they call it something pejorative, then others will think it's a bad thing as well.
  • BlueRaven
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    NupidStoob wrote: »
    BlueRaven wrote: »
    NupidStoob wrote: »
    Stop beating the dead horse, animation cancelling is here to stay. This game is balanced around animation cancelling at this point. If you can't handle that it exists then leave and find a game that does things the way you imagine it should be done.

    Your probably right. But the fact that animation canceling was allowed to stay in the game is just a symptom at how weak and short sided the combat teams philosophy is in eso. It’s a poor aspect to a substandard combat system.

    And it really shows how strong the other game systems are in eso to still attract people despite a such bad combat system.

    Well that is just your opinion so there is that. If you feel like the devteam is incompetent and short sighted you have even less reasons to stick around.

    Let's imagine ZoS listens to all this "remove animation cancelling" whining:

    They adjust the cooldowns for light attack and skill so that they play their full animations. You would still have to weave, just with a different timing. A bit more forgiving sure, but combat would be slow. Please watch some of the launch gameplay videos of this game and see how incredibly boring the combat looks for reference: https://youtu.be/YlEipFtHw7o?t=210 With timestamp, but many more examples in this video.

    Now apart from combat being slower it would also become a lot more clunky as we are forced to watch entire animations before we can give the next input. This will mean that any situation where you are required to quickly block, dodge or interrupt will be delayed. The forums would be littered with whining about people dying because an animation had to play out and they couldn't react in time. A single misclick would be way more punishing than it is at the moment.

    Tanking would need a complete revamp, because with this all you could really do is taunt and hold block for the majority of the rest of the time unless you learn timings really well. Right now people can already tank like that if they want to, but this would just force everyone into this playstyle. Considering how few tanks we have in the game cause it's incredibly boring this would just make it worse.

    I forgot about the video! I remember seeing that just before beta.

    Wow! I love that video. If only the game played like that! And look how clean and natural combat looks. Aw man. What we have today sucks. Now I am even more depressed by the state of combat now. Combat looks and feels so, so bad now.
  • JumpmanLane
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    I don’t get why people HATE animation canceling. They cancel animations by accident if they go through the normal actions of the game, like bar swap or block...unless they die real fast...A LOT.

    As for weaving in light attacks between skills, one could choose NOT to I suppose. Though, if folks around you in PvE start muttering about the low dps WHOSE fault in that. In PvP if someone is tbagging you because YOU couldn’t muster up enough damage to drop the fool, WHOSE fault is THAT lol.
    Edited by JumpmanLane on January 31, 2020 2:08AM
  • Sylvermynx
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    I don't hate AC. I'm just not really able to utilize it well, due to very high (satellite....) ping, and aging reflexes.

    I really do shake my head at anyone here paying any attention to blizz devs though.... just unreal. Holy crap, I quit playing that game in 2013, never been back. And no, they are not the behemoth they were back then either.
  • hmsdragonfly
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    Sanctum74 wrote: »
    Cryptical wrote: »
    You can weave your skill / LA / skill / LA without doing any AC

    But no point in LA weaving if it weren't for AC, why you weave LA when you can just spam the spammable instead?
    In games like LoL people do light attacks/auto attacks in between skills because there's a long cool down for skills. But here global cool down is 1s there's no point in doing light attacks then.

    Because you will never kill anyone with just a spammable, you need a rotation. Light attacks also proc enchants, skills, and item sets. You are also able to get a skill and a light in the same global cool down which is called weaving, not animation canceling. It helps to understand combat before making statements like this.

    @Sanctum74


    The point is LA would not be part of your rotation if it weren't for AC. The skill called "weaving" (which is basically LA on M1) will be useless, no point in using them because what it can do, your spammable does much better. And if you buff it too much so that it becomes stronger than spammable, all spammables will be useless in that case. You will either choose LA, or spammable, since both do the same thing.
    Item sets for LA will be obsolete and no one will use them
    It helps to use your brain to think before making statements like this.
    Edited by hmsdragonfly on January 31, 2020 3:58AM
    Aldmeri Dominion Loyalist. For the Queen!
  • hmsdragonfly
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    That's not how you design games. If both HA and LA return resources, it will be just a question of which one is mathematically more efficient at it, then no point to do the other.
    So if devs make some abilites to have 10s cast time, then everyone gonna use only them if saids skills gonna be (mathematically) more effective?

    You sure about that?

    No actual game developer will even think about making a 10s cast time ability in a game where you can spam skills and have a global cool down of 1s.
    That i am sure about.

    The second thing i am sure about is that if you give resource return to both LA and HA, players will just use the more mathematically efficient one.
    So you are saying that cast times are important in fast paced combat, so devs won't add skill which takes too long to use. But when we talk about HA/LA, thier 'cast times' suddently dont matter?

    What's even your point? If they make HA take a reasonable amount of case time, it will be just down for which one is more efficient, and everyone will use it. That's how gaming works.
    If they make it 10s of cast time, or some other ridiculous amount of time, the game will be extremely boring, imagine holding a button for 10 seconds and doing nothing else, who even play a game like that? So they will never do something like that.
    Is that too hard for you to understand?
    Edited by hmsdragonfly on January 31, 2020 4:00AM
    Aldmeri Dominion Loyalist. For the Queen!
  • Somber97866
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    Look I've been playing this game since almost the launch I'm going to go ahead and tell you now that the main thing that separates this game is the combat. H how fast-paced it is it's how grueling it is it's how hard it is to master. I never played a game like it and I don't want to play any game that isn't like it.
    I've tried playing Black desert, final fantasy XIV, Terra and all the others and none of them have compared to this one. There is no other game like it.
    On saying this I'm going to say this and state this that if they change the combat system which to me is the meat and potatoes of this game they are going to totally ruin this game. I do not want this!
    I love the way the kind that works I love the way the skills work I love the way you have to work together. I haven't always been a fan of some of the changes and I haven't necessarily liked the total one shot mechanics. But if they change this combat to something totally different and more like them other games then they're going to totally ruin this game.
    This will be the one of the saddest days I've ever seen in one of the stupidest news I've ever seen a company take and destroying their own game.
    When I play the other games it was boring slow and ridiculous. There wasn't even one of them to come close to the feel of this game! I think it's a bad move on their part and I honestly hope it doesn't turn out as bad as I feel it's going to!
  • Paramedicus
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    What's even your point? If they make HA take a reasonable amount of case time, it will be just down for which one is more efficient, and everyone will use it. That's how gaming works.
    If they make it 10s of cast time, or some other ridiculous amount of time, the game will be extremely boring, imagine holding a button for 10 seconds and doing nothing else, who even play a game like that? So they will never do something like that.
    Is that too hard for you to understand?
    I understand that I'm too bad at making analogies. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    No, simply changing the HP values for specific enemies would take months of work.
    Yes, letting QA run several dlc bosses few times while tweaking their HP by 15-25% would take months of work, because killing one take at least week (???).
    On top of that, QA would need to audit everything. If you think they can play through the entire game in a matter of hours, you've clearly never played ESO.
    Everything! Like, color of grass in Summerset! M8 I understand that you trying to be convincing and you are passionate about this issue, but let's get this talk more real?? Did you forgot how many meta combat changes were done in this game?
    Look I've been playing this game since almost the launch I'm going to go ahead and tell you now that the main thing that separates this game is the combat. H how fast-paced it is it's how grueling it is it's how hard it is to master. I never played a game like it and I don't want to play any game that isn't like it.
    I've tried playing Black desert, final fantasy XIV, Terra and all the others and none of them have compared to this one. There is no other game like it.
    On saying this I'm going to say this and state this that if they change the combat system which to me is the meat and potatoes of this game they are going to totally ruin this game. I do not want this!
    I love the way the kind that works I love the way the skills work I love the way you have to work together. I haven't always been a fan of some of the changes and I haven't necessarily liked the total one shot mechanics. But if they change this combat to something totally different and more like them other games then they're going to totally ruin this game.
    This will be the one of the saddest days I've ever seen in one of the stupidest news I've ever seen a company take and destroying their own game.
    When I play the other games it was boring slow and ridiculous. There wasn't even one of them to come close to the feel of this game! I think it's a bad move on their part and I honestly hope it doesn't turn out as bad as I feel it's going to!
    @hmsdragonfly take example from this guy, his arguments are reasonable: AC/weaving is what makes this game distinctive and learning it gives you something to do at end game, room for progession.
    Edited by Paramedicus on January 31, 2020 8:04AM
    PC EU
    /script JumpToHouse("@Paramedicus")
    
    ↑↑↑ Feel free to visit my house if you need to use Transmute Station or vet Trial Dummy with buffs and Aetherial Well (look for the Harrowing Reaper on the northern rock wall) ↑↑↑
  • Darkstorne
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    phermitgb wrote: »
    I've always been of the opinion that the very concept of animation cancelling is inherently breaking code. My logic goes something like this...
    programmers created the animations for a REASON
    under normal play, I hit a button or command, the results of that command goes hand in hand with the animation I watch on screen
    the ability to bypass the visual animation part of the is bypassing one of the two fundamental features of code associated with using that action

    now, some games, the animations for certain skills or abilities are excessively long, or lock you into an action while still exposing you to the environment. Alien vs Predator by Sega (2010) was a really egregious example of this, allowing players to do these wildly gruesome execution animations, in a fast first person shooter. The animation were pretty cool, but you could very easily be shot to death while locked into the kill animation, unable to cancel out if you started to take fire.

    Middle Earth : Shadow of War is a moderately good example of the other side - there were quite a few exotic animations for certain attacks, but most would be cancelled out by certain actions (like dodge) so that your defensive skills could override your offensive skills to allow you to get out of an offensive animation that might get you killed. And it is, in fact, under very narrow circumstances, possible to still get off your offensive skill and then effectively cancel the animation (the context-sensitive BLOCK skill does this pretty frequently)

    This is, as far as I can tell, the reason that animation cancelling might have a valid reason to exist - some animations are excessively complicated, locking you into an animation that might get you killed. Especially in an MMO with at least some boss mechanics that are instant kills, maybe animation cancelling is a necessity. BUT...using it as a technique to enhance your outgoing DPS is inherently bypassing what was "supposed" to be a limitation.

    And while the advocates of animation cancelling continue to point out that they should be allowed to exploit every advantage they can find and train themselves to use, the blizzard point above is perfectly reasonable. Game balance is, at least at some level, designed around animations as part of the limits of how far and fast players can damage targets, for the general population. Not every member of the general population can use, or wants to use, or even knows to use, animation cancelling, a bypassing of the intended purpose of the code, as a way to compete with the content. So, now devs are forced to either adjust coding for the potentials of animation cancelling for only a portion of the population, or listen to the overly tuned segment of the population *** about wanting harder content to cope with their animation cancelling adjustments to outgoing damage.

    in short (too late!) - animation cancelling as a feature of any code essentially acts as an "out" for players, allowing them to get out of a animation that might get them killed. However, when it's exploited as a way of increasing outgoing damage in games that are mostly centered around killing, it becomes a technique that warps game balance in general, actually ultimately harming both those that don't use it AND those that use it, driving a wider gap between 2 mindsets of players and forcing devs to either create a multitude of solutions for different segments of the population, or creating a frankenstein's monster of code trying to appease all.
    @phermitgb This is an amazing post. Thanks for taking the time to write it :smile:

    It gets a lot deeper than this too. Animation cancelling, when done well (not like ESO), ties the point an animation/attack deals damage to the point where an animation connects with an opponent. Detailed animation impact points like that mean the player skill comes from weaving/cancelling attacks at the right time, not just learning to mindlessly spam left click before each skill and then mindlessly cancel into a block straight away. You have to pay attention to the visual cues. That also opens up reactive gameplay opportunities, like timed blocks and parries, which then in turn open up baiting gameplay, like feinting an attack but cancelling it before it connects, to trick your opponent into attempting a parry (see For Honor). That’s a combat system that rewards true player skill. That is not what ESO has. Anyone who really understands the benefits of an animation cancelling system, knows that ESO’s implementation of it is atrocious.

    It distresses me that so many advocates of ESO’s version of animation cancelling are so quick to defend their position by belittling the opposite opinion, all out of fear for change, rather than understanding that animation cancelling doesn’t need to be removed to fix ESO’s combat, it just needs to be improved.
    Edited by Darkstorne on January 31, 2020 8:09AM
  • AgaTheGreat
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    AC is here to stay so this discussion is pointless. It only shows how many casuals there are who never touched anything difficult in eso. Never score pushed, optimised, refined. Never handled pvp well, cannon fodder. You should first look at yourself, it's not the game that's poor, it's you. 🤷‍♀
    PS4 EU Aga_The_Grey - retired | PC EU AgaTheGreat
  • Tigerseye
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    A/C was the 1st bug in ESO and one of many thats never been fixed main reason ESO has so many issues is due to this bug but since so many cry they'll stop playing or that it skill not exploiting ESO wont ever fix this bug nor the game itself due to it
    And i can A/C my skills just fine just saying the truth about A/C like it or not

    Where's your proof that ani-cancel causes any other issue? The devs have flat out said server pop and backend calculations are the performance culprits. Neither of which have anything to do with animation cancelling.

    Get 5 players that can A/C together on an dummy run a full kill of it with no A/C being used then do another with A/C being used and watch the lag begin thats all the proof you should need to understand that A/C hurts the game

    That has to do with all of the calculations happening with multiple people. Further in housing instances, you compound the issues with what the server has to calculate for the items in that instance. This is why there is a low limit to items in housing, because it causes stress on the server, which is also straight from the devs.

    You think they will at this point say oh hey we've found that A/C is the reason behind lag now that they added it as an skill after stating it was an bug that they themselves couldn't fix that really make them look like they know nothing of their own game so ya their going to place blame on everything other then the true issue reason game will never truly be fixed

    Going to need a citation for that.

    It's a well known, long established fact.

    I would say Google is your friend, but whether they are, or not, I'm sure you can use some kind of search.

    Kalante wrote: »
    Stebarnz wrote: »
    Do people actually want A/C to not exist? For the love of god why?? The combat would be slow and atrocious. Why would anyone want that?

    its a bug...i rather want to have it replaced by something intended, thought after and better...

    Champagne was discovered by accident and it turned out to be a glorious accident that made the world better so they kept it, just like A/C

    Penicillin was also discovered by accident. I guess that should't had happened and millions of people would be devoid of such useful medication that kills bacteria. According to the anti AC potatoes.

    Many people are allergic to penicillin, too. :smiley:

    A/C is more like an unexpected virus, than penicillin, anyway.

    Embracing viruses is normally a mistake.
    Edited by Tigerseye on January 31, 2020 11:36AM
  • Tigerseye
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    AC is here to stay so this discussion is pointless. It only shows how many casuals there are who never touched anything difficult in eso. Never score pushed, optimised, refined. Never handled pvp well, cannon fodder. You should first look at yourself, it's not the game that's poor, it's you. 🤷‍♀

    Learning bad habits is a bad idea, if you ever want to play other games, even vaguely seriously.

    Bad habits are hard to break.

    I try to weave here, now (even though I don't really do anything very serious in the game), but that is only because I am only playing this game, atm and I enjoy things like housing sufficiently to have committed to the game, for now, despite its many flaws.

    However, if I wanted to swap between games, frequently, I would not do it (for the aforementioned reason) and that would mean, if I didn't enjoy other things in the game, like housing, I would almost certainly have left by now.

    If you do a search about this subject it seems to be a major factor regarding why people leave the game.
  • Tigerseye
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    Sylvermynx wrote: »
    I don't hate AC. I'm just not really able to utilize it well, due to very high (satellite....) ping, and aging reflexes.

    I really do shake my head at anyone here paying any attention to blizz devs though.... just unreal. Holy crap, I quit playing that game in 2013, never been back. And no, they are not the behemoth they were back then either.

    I left around the same time as you.

    There are a lot of things wrong with WoW and the bad attitudes of the devs, there - or, there were when I left, anyway - but, to give it its dues, the combat there was always far better than the combat here is.

    Felt far more professional and less haphazard.

    Of course, it might be different now, no idea.
    Edited by Tigerseye on January 31, 2020 11:56AM
  • Tigerseye
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    Cryptical wrote: »
    You can weave your skill / LA / skill / LA without doing any AC

    But no point in LA weaving if it weren't for AC, why you weave LA when you can just spam the spammable instead?
    In games like LoL people do light attacks/auto attacks in between skills because there's a long cool down for skills. But here global cool down is 1s there's no point in doing light attacks then.

    Most games just have auto-attack anyway.
This discussion has been closed.