MrGhosty wrote: »

Something I'm curious about, not sure if there is lore out there to answer but have we ever been told how long a year is on Tamriel? The reason I ask is with the two celestial bodies in the sky, we're obviously not on "earth" but an earth like planet. There are planets with earth-like conditions that time passes very differently compared to what we experience. If you consider that time passes faster in-game maybe a traditional year of 365 days doesn't make any sense, if that were the case the passage of a year on tamriel could be equal to 5 years on earth.

Again I've not dug through the lore enough to find anything to support this, but that's how I've always thought about it.

Yeah, there's a calendar which maps up to our own.
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Calendar

Siohwenoeht wrote: »

This is done for new players and new players only.

Let's say you started with Summerset, which is really where this whole things breaks down. As a new player, zos wants you to see the new, shiny zone first. You complete that entire questline without ever being prompted to go to your alliance starter zone. So you can be the "saviour of Summerset" long before you are sacrificed to Molag and start the main quest.

It leaves veteran players without a satisfactory explanation, especially with Elsweyr and now the Skyrim chapter because you may have sacrificed either Sai or Lyris. But for a new player it all makes sense.

So, my biggest problem with the main questlines are not that I can do them in any order- it's that ZOS makes it as clear as mud in what order I should do them to get the best enjoyment out of them lore-wise. For instance, my most recent character:

1. I start the Hooded Figure
2. Complete Soul Shriven
3. Finish up God of Schemes at level 21
4. Do the majority of Caldwell's Silver
5. Literally finished The Den of Lorkhaj last night, at CP265, and the Queen's dialogue - which mentions a message - does not give me the option to accept any message. Of course, that makes sense, because the associated quest had already been done 30 levels ago.


At level 21- when I somehow got sucked into the quest to start The Weight of the Three Crowns. I don't even flipping know how that could have possibly happened, because there is nothing intuitive about ESO's presentation of their questlines. Now all of the leaders of the Aldmeri Dominion are standing around in Dune. Forever, I guess? I don't know where to go from there except whatever is in Caldwell's Gold.

I know that it ultimately doesn't matter to the majority of players, but I don't exactly play this game for it's mechanics. I play it for the lore and story. I am disappointed in the way quests are presented to me in-game, because I might have made different decisions or done additional actions - if it were more clear in the order I was to play. I'm not suggesting content be restricted for everyone, just that I don't have to Google something that should already be clear or find out after the fact, when I can't do anything about it.

xbobx15 wrote: »

Man you guys take this way too seriously

Blasphemer!!

As an RPer, I just say it's 587 (probably going on 588 now) because there's no way all these things could be happening in the span of one or two years. Most other RPers I know also count every irl year towards a year passed in the game, since it's easier that way to keep track of the passing of time in relation to what our characters and others are doing.

The stupid thing now is even though a year was supposed to have passed between Orsinium and the base game MQ, people can start Elsweyr, finish that, and then start the game's MQ and suddenly be back a year in the past and, as was mentioned already, find out some things about Abnur that make it make NO SENSE to be doing the game's MQ after Elsweyr. ZOS really, really, REALLY needs to make EVERY new expansion start you on the game's MQ, not put you directly into the newest content regardless of how much it will contradict with previous things to play them out of order. They also need to have some sort of thing that suggests at least a rough order of what order to play the expansions so things make the most sense. People would be free to ignore it and play as they want, but new players have no way of knowing what a 'proper' order of content is, especially when they have the newest expansion's tutorial thrown at them even before the game's actual MQ.

The conclusion that I came to, is that the whole thing is designed to teach us that time is not a linear river.
It is in fact a raging ocean of possibility and probability.

I fully expect to meet myself one of these days running in the opposite direction.

Well, in my headcanon, it's been 6 years since the game officially released, making Greymoor and the new threat to Tamriel taking place in 2E587.

It should be possible to create a mod that lists content in chronological order and even marks the next quest or dungeon for you, if someone felt that passionately about it to do it.

This is fascinating to me. I had read elsewhere on these boards that they had tried improving older content, and learned some sort of lesson that taught them not to do that. Monetary? Fan? I am not sure.

What that points out to me is that advancing the timeline for the full game would have unforseen challenges. Still, I can't help but wonder how one might do it.

It must be done in a way where:
1. New players do not feel locked out of old storylines.
2. Old content is brought up to date, throughout the game. This includes NPC dialogues, quests, and so forth.
3. It must occur in a meaningful, epic storyline that transverses the world to explain the change. Yes, this storyline could occur in one area, but it would not be as satisfying, since everything changes, and one would like to see that change impact in your most favorite of places, yes?

How would you do something like this?

From a project management standpoint?
1. Multiple, dedicated teams of writers, each coordinated by a knowledgable lore leader. This lore leader would also...
2. Need to coordinate with teams of software engineers, to develop updates along with the writing, and...
3. Coordinate with other lore leaders, at regular meetings, while...
4. Following the leadership of a more highly positioned leader, to ensure the overall vision was kept in place, because while this is going on...
5. It would require a separate set of teams to work on the world advancement storyline (which probably involves dragons and a catastrophe).
6. The World Advancement storyline would be the New Content, so all other New Content would need to stop--likely for an extended period of time, when compared to other New Content.

...it sounds like a large undertaking. Now, this is the issue, yeah?

What about new players who would be upset at being locked out of old content? Or players in the middle of old content?

Would ESO need double the number of servers, and end up running two versions of the game simultaneously? More instancing? Everywhere? More servers?

I don't know. ^^; I suspect as fun as the storytelling might be (and I'd love to run a story like that), it would be a technological nightmare.

Far more likely though, I suspect "official advancement" would happen via an ESO2, with the launch of new, updated sections, pieces at a time.

Dang, though. Wouldn't it be a wonder to see--or get to plan?

@ZOS_LeamonTuttle

Maki2859 wrote: »

Here is my personal point of view.

From the base game to Orsinium. We are in 2E 582. Everything to do with Planemeld and its end.

From Orsinium, we begin the year 583.
I consider that we evolve over time. Every IRL year is a new IG year.
And it makes sense for several things ...

The reunion with certain characters ... The aging and exhaustion of an Abnur Tharn who speaks of an Empire in better health and banished necromancers.

This is what I did and what is applied in RP.


There is consistency and an evolution over time. If everything goes in the same year or we do things in the wrong order, then there is no longer any consistency.

Hmm kinda make sense

The idea of ​​everything happening in a single year is not stupid just because it is a lot of things gathered in one time, but also because of the distance between things.

The truth is that the Daedric War is directly connected with Planemeld, the Dragon Season is also associated with Planemeld. Hell, even the current vampire season is associated with Planemeld. Not just because of the characters. (Lyris, imprisoned for a while in Coldharbour, Abnur literally says he has been imprisoned for years), as well as our character only resists Harrowstorms because he has no soul to be mowed.

They really want us to believe that Vestige traveled an entire continent on the main quest when solving alliance problems and ending the Daedridc Invasion, then went to Orsinium to solve the Orsinium ***, then went to the Gold Coast to solve the Gold ***. Coast, then he went to Morrowind, then he went to Clockwork, then he went to Summerset, and then he went to Murkmire, and then he traveled to Elsweyr, and after fighting dragons in Elsweyr he traveled to Skyrim, all in JUST ONE YEAR?

"Ah, but many of these stories are stand-alone, it doesn't have to be Vestige participating"

Do you really believe that? With the Prophet showing up at the end of the Orsinium main quest to talk about the Daedric War? With Naryu's Gold Coast prophecy about Veya?

With Morrowind's connection, Clockwork and Summerset? With Summerset literally stating that you are (or will be in the future) the Vestige through Darien? With Elsweyr starting with Abnur Tharn who was previously trapped in Coldharbour and (SPOILER) dying at the end of the Dragon Season? With the character only surviving the Harrowstorms because the protagonist does not have the soul attached to the body in a conventional way (because he is still a Vestige, despite having recovered the soul).

Honestly. Whenever I think about the timeline, I feel sad, as it seems that Zenimax is simply stepping on those who care about lore and questing.