How to make builds more fun

Aertew · December 2020

Just make heavy attacks regain your largest pool. So if you have a sword but put more points in magicka than stamina, you regain magicka. For staffs it can be the same thing. It would allow normal builds to work exactly the same but allow people to use weapons they like.

VaranisArano · December 2020

It hampers Tanks and hybrid builds who may split their weapons to regain stamina or magicka as needed.

You'd need to make it a toggle so players could decide whether to use it or not.

vestahls · December 2020

The way heavy attacks work doesn't even make sense now, and it's very counterintuitive.

Heavy attacks should just do more damage, like in any normal game. This returning of resources thing is something nobody guesses until they seek it out or read about it.

Honestly, there's only thing that makes builds fun: proc sets

GrumpyDuckling · December 2020

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide
- free up restrictions on class skill lines so we have more options to choose from when building a character
- give us the option to toggle some of the timer-based skills (like Lotus Flower) to reduce upkeep -- sometimes the game feels too much like maintenance where our character is constantly re-casting and re-buffing skills to try to maintain power and defense

MashmalloMan · December 2020

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide
- free up restrictions on class skill lines so we have more options to choose from when building a character
- give us the option to toggle some of the timer-based skills (like Lotus Flower) to reduce upkeep -- sometimes the game feels too much like maintenance where our character is constantly re-casting and re-buffing skills to try to maintain power and defense

Oooo I really like your last point.

Infinite Crit Surge, Bound Armaments, Dark Deal, Hurricane and Quick Cloak, but minus -40% healing/damage/sustain on each of those skills.

Sad to look at that right now and think about the fact that I manage to keep up 5 skills with different timers.. 40s, 33s, 20s, 15s, and 14s. Then I need to remember to only cast Streak/Dodge every 4s or bye bye sustain. Then managing pots on 45s cd.

Kinda amazing how much buff management players deal with, but we're so use to it by now we don't really question it. That must be a big barrier for entry on new player experiences. Not to mention the Console experience for managing skills is ABYSMAL. Their buff tracker is so convulted and bloated, I have no idea how anyone actually enjoys that experience.

If there was a statistic for average dps, hps, buff and debuff uptime between the platforms, I'm willing to bet consoles are behind by at least 10-15%. They also have weapon swap on the directional arrow key to the left by default.. I remember on PS4 I had to use the accessability features to change that to Right JoyStick, I imagine people just continue playing the default way trying to adapt to the clunky system by either taking their left thumb off the Left Joystick for moving to press it OR they warp there hand in the claw way with their index finger which is extremely awkward to say the least..

Great idea and highlights a major issues with this games "action" based combat. 12 skill slots, 2 of which you only use every 30-70s (ultimate), then 5 out of the remaining 10 slots are either buff management or somewhat empty slots used for passive stats from Fighters Guild/Mages Guild.

ZOS should start with this concern.

ExistingRug61 · December 2020

MashmalloMan wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide
- free up restrictions on class skill lines so we have more options to choose from when building a character
- give us the option to toggle some of the timer-based skills (like Lotus Flower) to reduce upkeep -- sometimes the game feels too much like maintenance where our character is constantly re-casting and re-buffing skills to try to maintain power and defense

Oooo I really like your last point.

Infinite Crit Surge, Bound Armaments, Dark Deal, Hurricane and Quick Cloak, but minus -40% healing/damage/sustain on each of those skills.

Sad to look at that right now and think about the fact that I manage to keep up 5 skills with different timers.. 40s, 33s, 20s, 15s, and 14s. Then I need to remember to only cast Streak/Dodge every 4s or bye bye sustain. Then managing pots on 45s cd.

Kinda amazing how much buff management players deal with, but we're so use to it by now we don't really question it. That must be a big barrier for entry on new player experiences. Not to mention the Console experience for managing skills is ABYSMAL. Their buff tracker is so convulted and bloated, I have no idea how anyone actually enjoys that experience.

If there was a statistic for average dps, hps, buff and debuff uptime between the platforms, I'm willing to bet consoles are behind by at least 10-15%. They also have weapon swap on the directional arrow key to the left by default.. I remember on PS4 I had to use the accessability features to change that to Right JoyStick, I imagine people just continue playing the default way trying to adapt to the clunky system by either taking their left thumb off the Left Joystick for moving to press it OR they warp there hand in the claw way with their index finger which is extremely awkward to say the least..

Great idea and highlights a major issues with this games "action" based combat. 12 skill slots, 2 of which you only use every 30-70s (ultimate), then 5 out of the remaining 10 slots are either buff management or somewhat empty slots used for passive stats from Fighters Guild/Mages Guild.

ZOS should start with this concern.

Seconded, love the last point.

I can attest that buff management on console is...frustrating. It means there are classes like warden and stamsorc that I like thematically but hate mechanically due to buff management. Instead I gravitate to something like the easier management of a nightblade with its auto armour buffs and fewer active buffs.

And while I'm sure there is a "get good" counterargument to that, to that I would say - its just not what I enjoy.

And for ages I sort of accepted that there would always be an issue with "toggle" buffs needing to be on double barred, like the older version of bound armaments or the toggle morph of siphoning strikes. But then ZOS updated vampire and made frenzy, which is a single bar toggle so clearly they can be done without the double bar issue.

So yeah, would love this. Could be balanced in heaps of ways depending on the skill, either resource upkeep like frenzy (maybe flat though not increasing), or make it lose some benefit if its always on (ie: siphoning strikes lose the "burst" resource restore as it never expires), or whatever. Not sure if it could be done without fully replacing the original skills, but I am sure there is a solution somewhere.

Aertew · December 2020

MashmalloMan wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide
- free up restrictions on class skill lines so we have more options to choose from when building a character
- give us the option to toggle some of the timer-based skills (like Lotus Flower) to reduce upkeep -- sometimes the game feels too much like maintenance where our character is constantly re-casting and re-buffing skills to try to maintain power and defense

Oooo I really like your last point.

Infinite Crit Surge, Bound Armaments, Dark Deal, Hurricane and Quick Cloak, but minus -40% healing/damage/sustain on each of those skills.

Sad to look at that right now and think about the fact that I manage to keep up 5 skills with different timers.. 40s, 33s, 20s, 15s, and 14s. Then I need to remember to only cast Streak/Dodge every 4s or bye bye sustain. Then managing pots on 45s cd.

Kinda amazing how much buff management players deal with, but we're so use to it by now we don't really question it. That must be a big barrier for entry on new player experiences. Not to mention the Console experience for managing skills is ABYSMAL. Their buff tracker is so convulted and bloated, I have no idea how anyone actually enjoys that experience.

If there was a statistic for average dps, hps, buff and debuff uptime between the platforms, I'm willing to bet consoles are behind by at least 10-15%. They also have weapon swap on the directional arrow key to the left by default.. I remember on PS4 I had to use the accessability features to change that to Right JoyStick, I imagine people just continue playing the default way trying to adapt to the clunky system by either taking their left thumb off the Left Joystick for moving to press it OR they warp there hand in the claw way with their index finger which is extremely awkward to say the least..

Great idea and highlights a major issues with this games "action" based combat. 12 skill slots, 2 of which you only use every 30-70s (ultimate), then 5 out of the remaining 10 slots are either buff management or somewhat empty slots used for passive stats from Fighters Guild/Mages Guild.

ZOS should start with this concern.

There is a addon that tracks your buffs and abilities, forgot what the name is though.

Taleof2Cities · December 2020

Aertew wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide
- free up restrictions on class skill lines so we have more options to choose from when building a character
- give us the option to toggle some of the timer-based skills (like Lotus Flower) to reduce upkeep -- sometimes the game feels too much like maintenance where our character is constantly re-casting and re-buffing skills to try to maintain power and defense

Oooo I really like your last point.

Infinite Crit Surge, Bound Armaments, Dark Deal, Hurricane and Quick Cloak, but minus -40% healing/damage/sustain on each of those skills.

Sad to look at that right now and think about the fact that I manage to keep up 5 skills with different timers.. 40s, 33s, 20s, 15s, and 14s. Then I need to remember to only cast Streak/Dodge every 4s or bye bye sustain. Then managing pots on 45s cd.

Kinda amazing how much buff management players deal with, but we're so use to it by now we don't really question it. That must be a big barrier for entry on new player experiences. Not to mention the Console experience for managing skills is ABYSMAL. Their buff tracker is so convulted and bloated, I have no idea how anyone actually enjoys that experience.

If there was a statistic for average dps, hps, buff and debuff uptime between the platforms, I'm willing to bet consoles are behind by at least 10-15%. They also have weapon swap on the directional arrow key to the left by default.. I remember on PS4 I had to use the accessability features to change that to Right JoyStick, I imagine people just continue playing the default way trying to adapt to the clunky system by either taking their left thumb off the Left Joystick for moving to press it OR they warp there hand in the claw way with their index finger which is extremely awkward to say the least..

Great idea and highlights a major issues with this games "action" based combat. 12 skill slots, 2 of which you only use every 30-70s (ultimate), then 5 out of the remaining 10 slots are either buff management or somewhat empty slots used for passive stats from Fighters Guild/Mages Guild.

ZOS should start with this concern.

There is a addon that tracks your buffs and abilities, forgot what the name is though.

AUI (Advanced UI) has an integrated buff tracker, @Aertew.

If you're a player that likes the default UI (or doesn't like the AUI layout), then the S'rendarr add-on will independently track buffs and debuffs.

Zodiarkslayer · December 2020

<Disclaimer>
This post uses sarcasm as a stylistic tool to enhance the argument against the original posters and subsequent propositions.
<Disclaimer End>

Really great idea!
Take any challenge to develop as a player out of the game. Yes! Who needs 12 buttons, if you can play with only ONE. Yeah! Lets streamline everything that is unique about the game. All we really want is to sink money and time into a fantasy!

Make Tamriel great again! Yeah!

ExistingRug61 · December 2020

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

<Disclaimer>
This post uses sarcasm as a stylistic tool to enhance the argument against the original posters and subsequent propositions.
<Disclaimer End>

Really great idea!
Take any challenge to develop as a player out of the game. Yes! Who needs 12 buttons, if you can play with only ONE. Yeah! Lets streamline everything that is unique about the game. All we really want is to sink money and time into a fantasy!

Make Tamriel great again! Yeah!

The intent of the comment here was not to simplify to a only using a smaller number of skills, but rather that instead we spend more time having to decide between and use a variety of active skills that actually interact with our opponent or as a counter in reaction to the something they do, instead of having to periodically cycle through 3 or 4 buff skills based simply on a countdown on the screen. The latter doesn't really strike me as unique or enhancing fun, but rather repetitive busywork. Instead the player development would be more focused on learning "which skill is optimal for the exact situation I'm in" instead of "its been X seconds, better recast Y".

TBois · December 2020

ExistingRug61 wrote: »

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

<Disclaimer>
This post uses sarcasm as a stylistic tool to enhance the argument against the original posters and subsequent propositions.
<Disclaimer End>

Really great idea!
Take any challenge to develop as a player out of the game. Yes! Who needs 12 buttons, if you can play with only ONE. Yeah! Lets streamline everything that is unique about the game. All we really want is to sink money and time into a fantasy!

Make Tamriel great again! Yeah!

The intent of the comment here was not to simplify to a only using a smaller number of skills, but rather that instead we spend more time having to decide between and use a variety of active skills that actually interact with our opponent or as a counter in reaction to the something they do, instead of having to periodically cycle through 3 or 4 buff skills based simply on a countdown on the screen. The latter doesn't really strike me as unique or enhancing fun, but rather repetitive busywork. Instead the player development would be more focused on learning "which skill is optimal for the exact situation I'm in" instead of "its been X seconds, better recast Y".

I think the main issue with what you are talking about is that it doesnt seem like zos wants you to have one build that has skills that are optimal for different exact situations you may encounter.

The main restrictions in the combat system are resource management and bar space. The choices and sacrifices you make while developing or using a particular build are very important. Having active skills for a bunch of different situations would greatly reduce the bar space restriction. Without adding another restriction like cooldowns this would be a very boring system in my mind. Also if I'm in an exact situation, without buffs being around and without cooldowns, would I just be spamming the same active skill more so than I already am with the current system? Or would I need to rotate through the actives to keep other active abilities up, and then are these actives just another form of buffs?

ExistingRug61 · December 2020

TBois wrote: »

ExistingRug61 wrote: »

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

<Disclaimer>
This post uses sarcasm as a stylistic tool to enhance the argument against the original posters and subsequent propositions.
<Disclaimer End>

Really great idea!
Take any challenge to develop as a player out of the game. Yes! Who needs 12 buttons, if you can play with only ONE. Yeah! Lets streamline everything that is unique about the game. All we really want is to sink money and time into a fantasy!

Make Tamriel great again! Yeah!

The intent of the comment here was not to simplify to a only using a smaller number of skills, but rather that instead we spend more time having to decide between and use a variety of active skills that actually interact with our opponent or as a counter in reaction to the something they do, instead of having to periodically cycle through 3 or 4 buff skills based simply on a countdown on the screen. The latter doesn't really strike me as unique or enhancing fun, but rather repetitive busywork. Instead the player development would be more focused on learning "which skill is optimal for the exact situation I'm in" instead of "its been X seconds, better recast Y".

I think the main issue with what you are talking about is that it doesnt seem like zos wants you to have one build that has skills that are optimal for different exact situations you may encounter.

The main restrictions in the combat system are resource management and bar space. The choices and sacrifices you make while developing or using a particular build are very important. Having active skills for a bunch of different situations would greatly reduce the bar space restriction. Without adding another restriction like cooldowns this would be a very boring system in my mind. Also if I'm in an exact situation, without buffs being around and without cooldowns, would I just be spamming the same active skill more so than I already am with the current system? Or would I need to rotate through the actives to keep other active abilities up, and then are these actives just another form of buffs?

Yeah I guess I see your point. I probably wasn't quite clear enough either, I didn't really mean one build that has all the skills for different situations, but rather that you would still be having to make sacrifices to select skills due to the bar space limit. You would still have bar space pressure fitting in all of these skills for all of these options, especially if a couple of bar slots were taken up with passives or toggles. But I guess this relies on there being enough different "situations" that you couldn't possibly have all the answers in one build. And that even then the "situation" has to be constantly varying to cause you to want to continually use different skills. But that possibly doesn't quite match the game as it is so wouldn't really work, like you say. I'm probably sort of talking about a different game here.

I guess I'm somewhat coming from the pvp perspective where things are more constantly varying second to second, so its less likely that you are in the same situation and more likely always choosing between things like spammable, delayed burst, stun, gap close, execute, heal, shield, escape, dodge etc etc.

But I get that in a PvE environment with rotations it potentially would just reduce to "use best spammable" for dps, as the situation is either less variable or known before the fight so you can adjust to just have the one optimal skill for that encounter. I agree this is not ideal, as gameplay devolves. That said, and I get that this is a purely conceptual distinction in my mind, I don't actually mind cycling through dots/hots in contrast to cycling through buffs. Like, I get that mechanically they are both the same, ie: cast this skill every X seconds to increase dps or stay alive, but I guess it just feels more "active" to me with the dot cycling than the buff cycling. And even buffs, I don't mind some, but too many just gets annoying to me for some reason. Not particularly consistent or logical here by me I know, but I guess I'm just coming from what I find "fun" as per the title of the thread. Which obviously will differ for others. I guess I kind of want to have my cake an eat it too, with everyone else still also getting theirs. Maybe just more options for playstyles.

ExistingRug61 · December 2020

Also, apologies for somewhat derailing the thread away from the content of the OP.

Back on that topic, yes I wouldn't mind options that allow more flexibility of weapons choice with build type (mag or stam). Resource return from heavy attacks is part of this. Damage type of weapons is another. Options to somehow swap these, sound cool. As long as it is somehow selectable/optional/controllable so that players can decide if they want it, as @VaranisArano points out.

deepseamk20b14_ESO · December 2020

For OP, is it really an issue as is? They have buffed resource gain by a comical amount already.

For everyone else, making things easier isn't fun nor is it satisfying. Buff management is part of every MMO, even action combat MMOs like Tera and this one. Everything has a timer, at least in ESO you can recast something with a timer as opposed to a normal cool down with other games where you need to wait until the skill has reset.

In PvE its already easy enough on PC, though I can understand console being a pain, they need action duration reminder or something to be part of the game.

As far as PvP, if you aren't keeping your buffs up and your opponent is, and they win, thats your fault. Not theirs, not the games, your fault.

Where I will agree though, is having to double bar stuff because its a summon or toggle. Its also annoying going from 1 bar where a certain skill increases max health for example, but if you lack that skill on the other bar, you lose that passive. Someone brought up frenzy, and I think that's a good example of a toggle that doesn't need to be double barred. By not having to double bar it isnt about making things easier, its about streamlining and allowing a bit more build diversity by freeing up a skill slot.

StarOfElyon · December 2020

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide

This all day.

I play hybrids to make the game more fun but I know that I'm gimping myself (which makes it less fun). But if power didn't scale from max stats, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged.

Syrpynt · December 2020

How I'd overhaul ESO if I had the opportunity to guide it to TES roots:

• Spell power and Weapon power be the only scalar that dictates the strength of abilities and light/heavy attacks. (Don't make magicka and stamina scale attacks).
• Light do less damage, heavy attacks do more damage, but no-longer would heavy attacks regenerate resources. Resources should regen while needing to light or heavy attack without using abilities between every one. Maybe the best combo is 3 light attacks, then a direct damage ability based on the boss' HP..? Make players have to learn how to change their rotation based on the length of a fight.
• Stamina and magicka pools are purely a "max pool" that allows for more abilities. Focus more on Spell damage, then you can do better burst damage for small or short fights. Focus on Magicka pool, then you'll do more steady damage for a longer fights, such as trials and dlc's.
• Max Weapon Power and Spell Power are just one "Power." Example: If you want to use sword and dagger with 90% Magicka-based abilities: Go ahead. You'll have to be in melee range with light armor though. That's pretty balanced I'd say. You also won't get stamina regen or weapon critical bonus that medium armor does.
• You want to cast spells in medium armor for damage (power) bonus and more defense? Sure but you won't have the magicka regen or magicka critical bonus.
• You want to wear heavy armor? Your sneak suffers (easier to spot in both PvE and PvP). You get -10% damage done and -10% healing done penalties. You however get resource regeneration and received bonuses.
• If you select a role for a dungeon/trial/pvp, that role gives a buff and a nerf respective to that role so you can't fake tank and just be a 3rd dps smashing the bosses before the mechanics even trigger.
- Tank role: Your healing done is reduced 10% and your dps is reduced by 20%. Your buffs done to yourself and others are boosted 30%.
- Healer role: Your buffing is reduced 10% and dps is reduced by 20%. Your heals are boosted 30%.
- Damage role: Your buffing is reduced by 10% and healing done is reduced 20%, your damage done is boosted 20%.

This role buff/nerf combo helps really define what roles do in ESO for group content. But it also wouldn't make tanks and healers useless when they run solo content because thise role buffs/nerfs would only apply while in dungeons/trials/PvP (group-content). See Battle Spirit for the similar nerf in Battleground PvP. This role buff/nerf could be implemented the same. A multiplier done at the end of all the damage/heal/block stats.

Even basic sets would be competitive and interesting then.

Lastly, go away from classes, break up abilities into their skill lines, and allow the player to pick 3 total. 1 must have offensive spells/abilities, 1 must have defensive+buff spells/abilities, and 1 must have healing spells/abilities. Or every individual skill-line gets 2:2:1 and an ultimate. (2 heal, 2 offensive, 1 buff+defensives--or some order like that). This would open to different combinations, and could be rebalanced after some period on the test server, and possibly a patch down the line. ONE TAMRIEL was a massive overhaul and shows that all I stated above is possible.

Right now you must be Magicka+staff to be a "viable" magicka dps, or Stamina+weapon to be a "viable" stamina dps. If a set is too strong with a proc, just decrease the damage output instead of increasing cooldowns and overloading the servers with calculations.

/rant.

zvavi · December 2020

StarOfElyon wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide

This all day.

I play hybrids to make the game more fun but I know that I'm gimping myself (which makes it less fun). But if power didn't scale from max stats, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged.

Imagine PvP, now that stacking resources won't affect dmg, you will have high health people that hit just like low health ones... This is a horrible idea.

Joy_Division · December 2020

zvavi wrote: »

StarOfElyon wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide

This all day.

I play hybrids to make the game more fun but I know that I'm gimping myself (which makes it less fun). But if power didn't scale from max stats, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged.

Imagine PvP, now that stacking resources won't affect dmg, you will have high health people that hit just like low health ones... This is a horrible idea.

What do you mean imagine? That's exactly what proc sets allow players to do.

Vevvev · December 2020

Joy_Division wrote: »

zvavi wrote: »

StarOfElyon wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

How to make builds more fun:

- get rid of the attribute scaling that encourages a stamina/magicka divide

This all day.

I play hybrids to make the game more fun but I know that I'm gimping myself (which makes it less fun). But if power didn't scale from max stats, I wouldn't be so disadvantaged.

Imagine PvP, now that stacking resources won't affect dmg, you will have high health people that hit just like low health ones... This is a horrible idea.

What do you mean imagine? That's exactly what proc sets allow players to do.

He's getting at that if you didn't need to stack magicka/stamina then you could take all those resources and dump them into health. However this is assuming the stats no longer scale. If for instance they made it scale off spell/weapon damage then we'll have the same system we do now, but more stacking damage instead of resources.

BXR_Lonestar · December 2020

vestahls wrote: »

The way heavy attacks work doesn't even make sense now, and it's very counterintuitive.

Heavy attacks should just do more damage, like in any normal game. This returning of resources thing is something nobody guesses until they seek it out or read about it.

Honestly, there's only thing that makes builds fun: proc sets

I agree, I think its weird that you would gain resources when, in the other ESO games, a heavy attack would drain your stamina more (and there is no heavy attack for magika).

IMO, rather than heavy attacking being a sustain mechanic, IMO, they should buff sustain so that heavy attacking isn't necessary to sustain rotations. For sustain, you should rely on racial passives, character build, armor stats, and any bonuses from skills, and glyphs.

They could then change how heavy/light attacks function. Light attacks should be for fast (but less) damage, and heavy attacks should reward you for stalling your offensive initiative with massive burst damage (big risk, big reward). Perhaps there can be mechanics where bosses become "prone" to heavy attacks and take more damage from a heavy attack in that window of time. For example, a boss that charges you could be prone to heavy attacks if you side step the charge and hit him at his back flank.

I think they flirted with the idea of changing heavy attacks to be more damage oriented, but I think there was some pushback in the community and they backed off of the proposed changes.

StarOfElyon · December 2020

BXR_Lonestar wrote: »

vestahls wrote: »

The way heavy attacks work doesn't even make sense now, and it's very counterintuitive.

Heavy attacks should just do more damage, like in any normal game. This returning of resources thing is something nobody guesses until they seek it out or read about it.

Honestly, there's only thing that makes builds fun: proc sets

I agree, I think its weird that you would gain resources when, in the other ESO games, a heavy attack would drain your stamina more (and there is no heavy attack for magika).

IMO, rather than heavy attacking being a sustain mechanic, IMO, they should buff sustain so that heavy attacking isn't necessary to sustain rotations. For sustain, you should rely on racial passives, character build, armor stats, and any bonuses from skills, and glyphs.

This has been my opinion for a long time. Sustain should come from enchantments, food, potions, and racial passives. That will mean less damage stacking. That will also make content more challenging.