P2W confirmed

StamPlar_1976 · March 2021

Sorry boss. This is nowhere in any way, shape or form P2W. ZOS can be called out for some things. But this isn't it.

AlextheMuspel · March 2021

Flamebait wrote: »

scorpius2k1 wrote: »

I'll be the black sheep here and say that regardless of what technicality is describing a feature "P2W", "P2A", "B2P", it still might as well be in the same category since not every player will have the ability to access what another does with every little feature and piece of content being locked behind a microtransactional paywall. Before pay mechanics were a commonplace thing in games aka "games as a service", all players could achieve and do the same things without having to continually pay their way to advance further (regardless of what it is). ESO is no doubt better than other games in these areas but ZOS is certainly pushing all the limits in this area it can from their playerbase. Being an MMO, ESO needs a lot of funding no doubt so mtx's are a necessity. I personally feel there could be a much better way and more options to go about things like that than constantly being in the players face whether it's a quest which locks out due to DLC, intentional inventory limitations, pay-only cosmetics, or other content. I really hope the amount of money that players invest into this game will provide the value in return they are looking for, which unfortunately has not yet been my personal experience.
.

I would argue that there is really nothing that is locked from any players reach. You can earn in game gold and buy anything that is on the crown store, from the DLC you mention to all the cosmetic items. The inventory is a reward for the subscription, which while convenient is certainly not required to play the game. If a player had purchased all the chapters and DLC they could complete any content in the game with a smaller inventory with no reduced ability compared to anyone else, although perhaps with a bit less convenience.

As for commenting that even cosmetics should not be a pay item, the only way they could even begin to justify that would be to make the game fully forced subscription with no tradable crown items, would you find that preferred? As for finding worth in the money spent, I certainly do, it costs me so little to play this game a year that honestly I don't even notice for the amount of time I spend enjoying it. I also have no problem paying for any service I use so perhaps I am simply a minority nowadays.

Can you buy Greymoor/Summerset/Elswyre with gold?

Flamebait · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

Can you buy Greymoor/Summerset/Elswyre with gold?

Yes you can buy the expansions with gold, simply by trading with someone else who gifts them from the crown store. At a current exchange rate they would cost about 1-1.3 million or somewhere in that general area, on PC-NA.

AlextheMuspel · March 2021

M_Volsung wrote: »

tl;dr : "Everything I don't like is p2w."

I never understand why TL;DR is actually a thing. If I remember correctly, reading long texts used to be a MUST in any sort of discussion, bc short sentences alone are incapable of expressing a sophisticated idea.

As I don't wish myself to get banned on this forum for profanity, I will not respond to this reply.

AlextheMuspel · March 2021

Belegnole wrote: »

Umm, right....well. Geez I got nothing.

Well though convoluted and rather a pain, the OP is more pay to advance than pay to win. Personally I will jump on the pay to win train faster than some others, but even in my book this is really stretching for it.

For example say we suddenly have the hammer of doom (which one hits everything) available in the store for say $20, or even $100. Now the game also has it via some quest line that includes multiple dungeons, yada, yada, yada. Just say that while obtainable outside the store, it would take "FOREVER!" . Now that I would consider PTW even though it may not fit the normal paradigm.

Do you know you can get the godslayer achievement for 21m gold?

Oh and the fire-ice skin, it's 6m gold.

$625 is the quickest way for the ice-fire mount.

NotaDaedraWorshipper · March 2021

This again? People seem to like throwing around words they don't understand.

ESO doesn't have any P2W. At most it has P4C. As in, pay for convenience.

amm7sb14_ESO · March 2021

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I will say what I say every time there is a P2W thread on this forum, which is quite often.

Sidebar: Thanks for the math. I have about 400 master writs saved up, looks like I am going to keep up with my crafting writs until the next double AP event (at that point, I just might retire from them). I wasnt sure how much XP they granted, and if it mattered which type you did.

P2W is not a binary term, but rather, it is a spectrum. You certainly cannot buy a unique item in the crownstore that makes you uber strong that you cant get in any other way. For some people, anything short of that is not P2W.

I find that to be a very narrow definition of a very broad concept. Truthfully, I think most people defend that at as the only definition out of pride/ego, because they refuse to admit to themselves that they play or contribute to a game that is on the P2W spectrum.

To me, you have to define two terms. Pay and Win. Pay is obvious. It costs hard cash. Win is far more subjective, especially in an MMO. That said, there are lots of ways to win. Perhaps a duel, a world first HM clear, a #1 leaderboard spot, etc. The real question is will paying give you a competitive advantage in those situations, and the answer is a resounding yes.

-Using cash to buy CP gives a massive advantage now that the cap has been raised, especially in PVP or leaderboard runs. All else equal, skill, build, etc, the person or group with the most CP is going to win a head to head fight.
-If going for a world first on patch day, it may well be in your interest to buy a new skill line if say a new class was released and redefines the meta.

Now I think ZOS does a very good job of keeping Obvious pay 2 win items (maybe a staff that grants 2k spell damage) out of the crown store, and that is a good thing. But this game has been on the spectrum ever since they allowed crown gifting because it is a direct avenue to convert cash to gold, and gold can give you a competitive advantage. Is ESO high on the p2w spectrum, not in my opinion. That said, it is certainly on it somewhere.

Waits for heads to predictably explode.

I mean, if disagreeing with you is "heads predictably exploding", then sure, I guess?

amm7sb14_ESO · March 2021

virtus753 wrote: »

nublife01 wrote: »

Katahdin wrote: »

Or you know, you could just not worry about your CP level and just play the game and let the CP come on its own.

Ill never understand the obsession with being at max level to the point where you just cant enjoy anything else in the game

You have to be at least 1400 cp to not get completely rolled by anyone 1400+ cp in cp pvp. It's a hard cutoff. If you're not that level of cp, cp pvp is not fun. Also in Imperial City you need the CP advantage to kill the bosses. So if you were at the previous 810 cap as most pvp players are as you dont gain that much cp in pvp, and want to do IC pvp whatsoever you need to go grind at an absolute minimum 600 levels of cp. This change was absolutely disgusting. I'm quitting the game because of it.

I apologize for having fun in PvP last night at CP 1380. My bad.

Bro. You're 20CP's away from "fun". You don't have enough points to unlock that one yet. It's still gated.

trackdemon5512 · March 2021

Flamebait wrote: »

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

Can you buy Greymoor/Summerset/Elswyre with gold?

Yes you can buy the expansions with gold, simply by trading with someone else who gifts them from the crown store. At a current exchange rate they would cost about 1-1.3 million or somewhere in that general area, on PC-NA.

Geez. 350k max PS4

Flamebait · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

Do you know you can get the godslayer achievement for 21m gold?

Oh and the fire-ice skin, it's 6m gold.

$625 is the quickest way for the ice-fire mount.

This is true you can indeed purchase a carry for godslayer or the fire-ice skin. Now for this to be relevant to the idea of play to win you have to show how having a purely cosmetic skin or a purely vanity title in anyway means that you cannot play the game without paying? Also the amounts you are listing are a currency that is earned in game solely and that on it's own would negate there being any pay to win.

amm7sb14_ESO · March 2021

Flamebait wrote: »

virtus753 wrote: »

Flamebait wrote: »

By the way the dictionary definition is this:
TOP DEFINITION
pay-to-win
Games that let you buy better gear or allow you to make better items then everyone else at a faster rate and then makes the game largely unbalanced even for people who have skill in the game without paying.

1) Urban Dictionary posts do not constitute "the dictionary definition." There is not just one dictionary in the world, and UD is not that one. UD is also not always considered a reputable or authoritative source, as anyone can post anything on there at any time. It's like copy-pasting from Wikipedia without fact-checking (or citing your source). At least Wikipedia has editors.

2) UD contains many other definitions that you're conveniently ignoring, some of which directly conflict with the one you chose to post. Here are some others:

"Pay to Win is a situation in gaming (usually MMOs or Massively Multiplayer Online games) where companies allow you to buy items or advantages with real money that cannot be obtained normally by playing the game.

An exception to the rule is that if an item/advantage can be obtained in-game but the acquisition time is unreasonably long, that can also be considered Pay to Win."

"Paying real life currency to beat players who are inherently better than you in any game."

"Any game policy where specific content needed to win is locked behind pay walls. Forcing people to pay, in order to access said content. While none can gain access to the content though other in game methods (combat, trading, etc)"

All of those are different from each other and from what you posted. So if we're going to accept UD as an authority, we have to acknowledge the range of definitions, not just cherrypick one.

Actually it says right at the top that it is the top definition, also all the definitions have already been shown to be false by ESO, so you have made my point. Lets go over the list then and prove it.

Buying items or advantages that cannot be gained by normal play, no such item exists in this game. I can get gold and buy literally anything from the crown store without ever spending money. Also everything on the crown store is cosmetic with the exceptions of XP scrolls and potions that are both easily replaced with crafted versions that are the same. No unreasonable amounts of time required of get any of them, at least not anyone I knows opinion of unreasonable time.

Paying real life currency to beat a player who is better. There is literally a 0-1% chance that I could beat someone who competes for and achieves world firsts and time clears and such, even if I had a good number of CP above them since there is no item in this game that can be purchased that would provide me with so much more power than they have simply from skill, in fact the majority of damage in this game is actually based on skill, knowing rotations and timing and weaving is more than gear and CP by a significant amount.

Specific content needed to win being locked behind pay walls. There is absolutely nothing since again you can trade for anything that you do not have, even chapters and DLC so nothing is locked behind a real money paywall without a method in game to achieve it.

Also this definition is literally the same on virtually every site that has a definition so I really don't feel like arguing about referencing thousands of sites simply to make you happy. If you find a reputable dictionary that has a significantly different definition then feel free to list it, but I am fine with the ones provided here.

In addition, the fact that people consider legitimate expansions as "P2W" is entirely asinine

bmnoble · March 2021

Its hardly pay to win at absolute most its pay for convenience, I could afford the master writs necessary to level the way the OP is talking about, never once sold crowns to make my gold, just daily writs and guild store sales over a long period of time.

As it is I am in no rush just hoarding the easy master writs I get from doing my daily writs, meaning other than the mats to do them it is costing me nothing to build up the master writs needed to do the exact same thing OP is talking about, sure I have only accumulated a few hundred from this method so far since start of February and a few cheap ones bought in my trade guilds since I can't be stuffed going all over the place to hunt them down, nowhere near the 1800 or so OP is talking about yet but I am getting their spending the absolute bare minimum of in game gold.

Doubt I am the only one, if people were not able to make decent amounts of gold in game, there would be no one to trade crown gifts for gold in the first place.

If you have been playing the game long enough to reach a high CP level you should have a decent amount of gold saved to work with, excluding housing addicts that is.

Alchemy and Enchanting master writs are the easiest to max out the drop rate for, you just need to learn all the Alchemy traits for all the plants on all characters and learn all the runes on all your characters.

One of the best guides if you want to learn the alchemy traits and level alchemy cheaply:

http://sunshine-daydream.org/craft-alchemy.html

barney2525 · March 2021

Isn't this assuming that the character has spent the time and effort, and spent the skill points, to level the crafting skills up to 50, in order to just Qualify to do Master Writs?

Is this common on Every character?

Jeffrey530 · March 2021

barney2525 wrote: »

Isn't this assuming that the character has spent the time and effort, and spent the skill points, to level the crafting skills up to 50, in order to just Qualify to do Master Writs?

Is this common on Every character?

Is still pay to win according to op, because you can pay someone gold from crown conversion to gather materials for you to deconstruct and tp to different locations for skyshards

silvereyes · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

This part gets a bit tricky, because you'd wanna pick the cheapest writs to do as all the writs grant the same xp. The best deal you can probably find on market is Enchanting writs, for Alchemy writs/Provisioning writs are extremely hard to acquire and overpriced.

PSA: if your crafter knows a ton of motifs, you play on PC with addons, and you do writs a lot, I recommend not trashing the 6-8 voucher writs for blacksmithing, clothing and woodworking that have a craft cost under 4k. They will be generally cheaper than buying enchanting writs for > 4k, and you can use WritWorthy to do them quickly.

Kiralyn2000 · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

M_Volsung wrote: »

tl;dr : "Everything I don't like is p2w."

I never understand why TL;DR is actually a thing. If I remember correctly, reading long texts used to be a MUST in any sort of discussion, bc short sentences alone are incapable of expressing a sophisticated idea.

"tl;dr" is generally one of two things -

1) a comment "your post is excessively wordy", or

2) a shorter & more modern way to say "Reader's Digest Summary: ____________"

RageKing · March 2021

VoidCommander wrote: »

Or if you do daily random normal dungeons on 10 characters every day at 100k xp (no xp buff), you could reach 1800 in 331 days. Using the provisioning perks, and the new green cp for adding 30 minutes to food and drink, you can make a 30 minute 100% ambrosia (20k gold) last 80 minutes instead. At an average 15 minutes per dungeon (and not using those toons for anything else, each ambrosia is good for 5 dungeons). 331 dungeons would then require 66 ambrosias, or 1.320,000 gold, and would reduce the time to 165 days. Yes the grind would be brutal, and it would require a player to have 10 "fake tank ready" toons. So long as you cared enough about the game to get a good damage build (and thus care about cp), you will be fine. Just give it time.

This is what I do. I have 5 tanks and 3 healers and a few dps i que as fake tank. Just pop a exp scroll and login once a day on them to do daily dungeon. its great exp.

remosito · March 2021

renne wrote: »

remosito wrote: »

you positive it's 50k with no boost?

I thought they give 160k to 240k (depending which writs) with 2x event, eso+ and 150% scroll boosts and enlightenment.

240k/4 = 60k without enlightenment.
60k/3.6 = 16.6k without boosts

11k for the lesser writs.

now maybe your number is with enlightenment. but that doesnt wirk for fast leveling as you could only do like 2 a day before you used up your enlightenment. so 1800 writs wiuld take you like 900 days. more than 2 years.

somebody else mentioned ambrisio and 30mins. get them prov skills and cp skill and its like 80 minutes.

for buying writs. cheapest by far are ww/cl/bs writs imo. bought 1600 in the last few weeks. all around or below(incl. mats) what I should be able to make back by selling voucher stuff.

so it's gonna be a zero gold to maybe 1M gold gained/lost game. depending on how voucher prices develop. ambrosia hype might drive them up.

Yeah, they absolutely do not give 50K XP with no boosts.

glad to hear it. op might have forgotten he had enlightenment. the biggest boost of alll.

nublife01 · March 2021

Akinos wrote: »

nublife01 wrote: »

Viewsfrom6ix wrote: »

nublife01 wrote: »

You have to be at least 1400 cp to not get completely rolled by anyone 1400+ cp in cp pvp. It's a hard cutoff. If you're not that level of cp, cp pvp is not fun. Also in Imperial City you need the CP advantage to kill the bosses. So if you were at the previous 810 cap as most pvp players are as you dont gain that much cp in pvp, and want to do IC pvp whatsoever you need to go grind at an absolute minimum 600 levels of cp. This change was absolutely disgusting. I'm quitting the game because of it.

I'm CP 700 and doing fine in PvP. Yes, the power gap is bigger now and it creates a higher goal I can want to reach now. To each their own, I guess.

This doesn't include zerging. Go duel a 1400cp player in CP IC and come back to me.

I've seen 700 cp players beat people wth double their cp and and more in duels. Having more cp doesn't automagically guarantee a win or make you a better player.

against a 1400cp+ player you are at an extreme disadvantage. in the form of healing damage or tankyness. playing against a player of equal skill at high skill gameplay you will most certainly lose if you are not 1400cp and they are. just because some terrible 1400 player faced a 700cp player and lost means little to nothing. your one instance of empirical data is nonsense.

Khenarthi · March 2021

As someone who used Master Writs in the past to level alts (during double XP events), I'm positive that the OP is greatly overestimating the amount of base XP granted by Master Writs. See this thread for some info on using Master Writs:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/365804/fastest-leveling-25-50-in-a-little-over-2-hours/p1

Edit: also, the spreadsheet used to calculate the amount of XP needed to level is now outdated since U29. So none of the math on the original post is accurate or even useful.

And I do not think it's P2W but that discussion has been had ad nauseum.

wakeyjimb16_ESO · March 2021

If someone is prepared to pay that much real life currency, go through the effort of trading crowns in that manner, for the length of time suggested, just for the sake of levelling their CP when it's efficacy diminishes after a very achievable point anyway then I think that says much more about the idiocy of that hypothetical player than any system in place in this game.

Kudos on the calculations but the premise of this argument is a nonsense.

menathradiel · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

heaven13 wrote: »

But since you can't buy CP, or writs, with crowns, this entire conversation is irrelevant.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/430760/discord-tamriel-crown-exchange-crown-store-items-for-gold-over-10-mil-crowns-traded

You can, and very easily, in fact. Crowns buy gold, gold buy writs, simple.

Because someone can do that, it does not follow that they will.

I get plenty of Master Writs from running characters through the crafting dailies, I also get plenty of gold. I'm certainly not about to waste crowns by selling them in order to get things I can obtain in-game with very little effort. Furthermore, even if I did choose to use the method you have outlined, it is not pay to win, as that is something which can only be achieved by spending money. If you choose to go down this route you are paying for convenience only.

Grinding is also a choice. Me, I prefer to just have fun in the game and let the XP accumulate naturally.

Juhasow · March 2021

@AlextheMuspel cool story there is however one little issue with it. Master writs base XP is not 50k. It's slightly over 12k for smaller crafts (alchemy , enchanting , provisioning) and slightly over 18k for bigger crafts (assuming 10% buff from ESO+ without it , It's 11k and 16,5k). When someone claims writs give 50k without any buffs he/she propably didn't count enlightment during the test which is x4 multiplier for 1st 400k xp every day.

I would suggest You to either edit math in main post or ask devs to remove it because It's highly misleading.

Kiralyn2000 · March 2021

nublife01 wrote: »

[Snip]

[Snip]

[Snip]

And this is even stranger. Just because the OP said "hey, the only way to get CP is to Buy Lots Of Writs. And the only way to Buy Lots Of Writs is to Sell Crowns. Therefore, P2W!", doesn't actually make the CP revamp a "p2w" thing.

This idea that every thing ZOS does is to force people to the Crown store is getting a bit out of hand.
Especially when it's aimed at "grind" and "time sinks" - two things that have been a common part of MMOs since before there were cash shops in them.

People seem so obsessed with this idea "we must max out CP as quickly as possible", that the idea that ZOS intended earning all those CP as a long term project (rather than something finished in a month) seems to be missed entirely.

And of course they intended it as a long-term thing - everything in MMOs is intended to take a long time. Because they want you to keep logging in. If you finish up everything quickly, you've nothing to do, and no reason to keep logging in. So MMO devs fill their games with things that take a long time - earning XP, earning gold to buy Some Big Expensive Thing, finding all the Rare Drop Treasures (motifs, styles, that one specific weapon), train up your mount, etc.

And then people turn around and scream that it's impossible to do it in a week, or that the only way to do it in a week is to Spend Cash. And therefore, it's all been done to Force You To Spend Cash. /facepalm

What I want to know is, why do so many people feel this desire to spend money, to skip playing the game they supposedly want to play?

[Edited for removed content]

D_U_S_T_I_N · March 2021

This game has always been very borderline on pay 2 win. The single biggest sign of this is requiring ESO+ to store your crafting material. You can try to argue it, but you really can't. I actually have been upset with the devs for a long time over this and other pay 2 win type mechanics in this game and I close beta tested this game in 2013. This game was suppose to be my wow killer.

I occasionally still come here to play here and there, and I love that the game has vastly improved over the years, but there are still issues. Don't forget, microsoft owns this now.

Artorias24 · March 2021

AlextheMuspel wrote: »

Belegnole wrote: »

Umm, right....well. Geez I got nothing.

Well though convoluted and rather a pain, the OP is more pay to advance than pay to win. Personally I will jump on the pay to win train faster than some others, but even in my book this is really stretching for it.

For example say we suddenly have the hammer of doom (which one hits everything) available in the store for say $20, or even $100. Now the game also has it via some quest line that includes multiple dungeons, yada, yada, yada. Just say that while obtainable outside the store, it would take "FOREVER!" . Now that I would consider PTW even though it may not fit the normal paradigm.

Do you know you can get the godslayer achievement for 21m gold?

Oh and the fire-ice skin, it's 6m gold.

$625 is the quickest way for the ice-fire mount.

21m gold? Last time i saw it for 250m. So If any carry guild on PC EU sells it for 21m send me and pm pls @Gnozo. Thanks.

But this discussion is useless anyway. P2W is when you can ONLY get something for spending real Money. Can i get CP1800 without selling crowns for gold and buying writs for it? Yes, i can while grinding mobs for example. No pay2win. End of discussion. Thanks

starkerealm · March 2021

FantasticFreddie wrote: »

What on earth?
Max CP or even 1600 CP is not necessary to "win" at the game.
Score pushing trial scores? Maybe, and there is a deeper gap in pvp too possibly now, but that is easily circumvented by playing no-cp.
There isn't a clearly defined "win" in the game.

Not even for pushing trial scores. The things that help with that cap out around 900 or so. People are missing the effect of forcing players to pick and choose what to slot, and how much that really does cap the overall power. Additionally, the maximum power you can get from the system is much lower than the old system offered us.

Kiralyn2000 · March 2021

D_U_S_T_I_N wrote: »

This game has always been very borderline on pay 2 win. The single biggest sign of this is requiring ESO+ to store your crafting material.

I do very well, storing my crafting material without ESO+. Yes, I've got some alts, and I got some of the storage chests via crafting writs. And whenever a "free ESO+ weekend" comes around, it all pops into the craft bag for free.

Also - how is storing crafting materials, "winning"?

I swear, the definition of "pay to win" has gotten as diluted & meaningless as "immersion".

NotaDaedraWorshipper · March 2021

Kiralyn2000 wrote: »

D_U_S_T_I_N wrote: »

This game has always been very borderline on pay 2 win. The single biggest sign of this is requiring ESO+ to store your crafting material.

I do very well, storing my crafting material without ESO+. Yes, I've got some alts, and I got some of the storage chests via crafting writs. And whenever a "free ESO+ weekend" comes around, it all pops into the craft bag for free.

Also - how is storing crafting materials, "winning"?

I swear, the definition of "pay to win" has gotten as diluted & meaningless as "immersion".

People like to throw around words they don't really know what they mean these days. Everything from political ones I'm not touching with a two meter pole, to simple things like "literal/literally".

starlizard70ub17_ESO · March 2021

Scardan wrote: »

It is not pay to win.

If you want to know how p2w looks like, I recommend you to play TDP4. No money=no progression. No pay=no win.

But leveling in ESO?
You don't need 3600 CP to win the game.

Actually, "winning" is pretty meaningless. If you like what you're doing in the game, then you're winning.

As for P2W, I agree with @Scarden, if you want to see real P2W, go play Black Desert Online. After a month or so, you'll hit that level 53-55 wall. Then you can grind for gear and xp forever, or shell out $$$ to move up. For the years BDO has been around, the highest level character anywhere is at level 64. That's what a P2W grind looks like.

Note: I played BDO for a few months awhile back. It's really fun until you hit the wall, then the fun dies. The reason it's a good example of what P2W is this. You don't have to buy things, but if you don't pay out $$$, you'll be so limited in inventory, bank, stable space, etc.. the game is almost unplayable without the upgrades. Think of it like suddenly having to pay $60 or the crafting bag and the stuff in it is gone. And your mount training costs per each mount (again) It's that type of P2W or grind to death game.