Do have players thoughts impact on the game?

starkerealm · July 2021

EnjiroKitsune wrote: »

So, it raises the question: Do have players thoughts impact on the game?

Feedback does affect the game. There's a few things I can point to and say, "that was because of me," and a few other changes I can point to and say, "I was there when that feedback happened."

That said, sometimes the answer is no. I can think of a few pieces of direct feedback where I was told by a senior developer some variation of, "that's not happening." It's not malicious, it's more that there are additional considerations.

Additionally, I know for a fact that the developers frequent the boards. They're not very visible, but they are reading these posts. With stuff like kids, it's not that the team never thought about including children, it's that there was some discussion on the subject and the end result was that they weren't worth including. (I don't know what the rationale was, though I seriously suspect this is a specific example where they're inflexible. If we didn't get kids in 2014, we're probably never seeing them added to the game, for whatever reason.)

Raltin · July 2021

BWAHA-HA!

Yes, but barely.

After all, players have been begging zos to write smarter dialogue since Elsweyr that didn't make our characters out to be absolute dummies, but that hasn't gone over well.

Orion_89 · July 2021

I agree with OP about children (what age they are is a matter of discussion, I myself prefer teens as they already can do almost everything so they may participate quest-stories). If someone (not me definitely) wish to kill them then it isn't my problem and not a problem at all (yeah, surprise, the world is not goodzeez).

But at the other side, I don't want them just to be added. There must be a mechanic, a reason beside the drama-wise, for example some kind of mentoring so they will be a continuation for your character. Some people asked to make companions to harvest resources, but they are your combat buddies. But children can be this way:

They may harvest
Steal goods
Be your armour-bearer (with extra inventory slots)
Be our personal courier (you send a letter and your kid appears next to the receiver, just an immersion feature)
Or can become an apprentice in crafts (and replace auto-writ addons).

Lugaldu · July 2021

But wouldn't it be strange if we haven't had kids in ESO in all these years, but then suddenly some show up? How should this be explained in the context of immersion?

Wolfchild07 · July 2021

They do listen, they've nerfed alot of things.

SammyKhajit · July 2021

Kids will be nice but need diversity.

This one hated Skyrim Nord kids with their same North American accents and bratty demeanour. It was like the developers themselves hated kids and wanted players to hate them too.

Sylvermynx · July 2021

SirAndy wrote: »

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Those fish are horrible, especially when they show up where they really should not be, such as swimming around an island.

Still much better than swimming against an invisible wall and a deep voice from the aether telling you that "You can't go there".

I'd really appreciate if I could remove the slaughterfish from Moon Sugar Meadow....

Alucardo · July 2021

Years ago I asked for a Crystal sword on stam sorc. They now have Crystal Weapon. I like to think that's all me baby.

whitecrow · July 2021

I thought the kids in Skyrim were fine, even Braith the bully. Cos that's how kids are.

SilverBride · July 2021

There was one particular kid in Skyrim who insulted me every time I ran into him. I tried to kill him but it wasn't possible. I should have gotten the mod that allowed it.

I don't want to have to deal with children in game anyway. It's bad enough dealing with the children in zone chat.

JKorr · July 2021

whitecrow wrote: »

I thought the kids in Skyrim were fine, even Braith the bully. Cos that's how kids are.

Kids have absolutely no intelligence and no concept of "stupid"?

Let's see....your character has fought a dragon and survived, been wiping out all the local bandits, draugrs, assorted undead, drug dealers, killed more dragons, gotten a pat on the head from magic voice hermit monks who won't see anyone else in person, wiped out all of the Thalmor patrols with extreme prejudice, fixed a god's problem with her temple while finding a legendary sword, among other endeavors. Who is also, by this point, probably wearing armor made from dragon bones, can shout lightning from the sky and call a dragon to fight for them. And Braith the bully still believes its okay to insult and flip them off.

If kids had been killable in unmodded Skyrim, there would be a couple fewer of them running around. I never bothered with a kill-the-annoying-brat mod, I just simply avoided every kid in the game; never spoke to or interacted with them. Much happier that ESO has no adolescents or younger.

asuitandtyb14_ESO · July 2021

WoW, LOTRO and GW2 all have children running about. I’m sure there are some more mmo’s out there that also have this feature, but I’ve only played those games. It’s not new, dangerous or controversial to have kids in those games. I’m pretty sure ESO could survive it. Smacks of a forgotten or cut feature that players are just blindly defending.

Destai · July 2021

@ZOS_Kevin As the new guy here, it'd speak volumes if you hopped in a discussion like this and actually gave us talking points. Of course, other players are doing some of that already, but nothing beats that official Z.

Speaking from personal experience, myself and many other players have complained ad nauseum about Stuga and other characters. Those NPCs eventually got adjusted, so yes, player feedback is heard and listened. I think what's missing is feedback loops here on the official forums that say, "Yeah, we heard that QoL request after X years and implemented it".

rpa · July 2021

It depends. Devs are always looking for popular nerf subjects because power creep is a real problem. So if you have a idea for a good nerf, make a thread about it.

Amottica · July 2021

VaranisArano wrote: »

Yes, players' thoughts do have an impact on the game. However, we don't dictate what the Devs will do and they may not implement it precisely how we'd like.

An Incomplete List of Implemented Player Requests:
One Tamriel

Splitting Imperial City from Cyrodiil

The return of Alliance locked campaigns (and the return of the non-locked campaigns)

No proc set PVP

Battlegrounds

Companions

Skyshards for Sale

Skill lines for Sale

Alliance Change Tokens

Necromancer class

Housing

Housing Storage Chests

Transmutation

Stickerbook

Changing Skills/morphs one at a time

Seals of Endeavor

More mounts/cosmetics acquired through gameplay

New Tutorial offering player choice of starting location

All of those were added to the game after players lobbied for them. Still, the Devs implemented them in their own way which may not appeal to all players.

Consider the final item on the list: the new tutorial. While I am thrilled that players have the choice of a variety of starting locations, I am disappointed that ZOS did not include the original start where the player is killed by Mannimarco and sent to Coldharbor as the Vestige.

It's my impression based on the above examples is that if you want to lobby ZOS for a change, you've got to keep lobbying them despite never hearing much back until it either happens or it doesn't.

The flip side is that if you hate a proposed change, you'd best speak out against it with reasonable arguments when it comes up. If you ignore it and say nothing, you may find yourself shocked and appalled when ZOS announces that they've heard from the people who want that feature. (There were a lot of people in that boat with the Alliance-locked campaigns.)

This is good to see. Thank you for sharing.

I will say that many ideas compete with each other and other ideas do not consider the game design as a whole. Zenimax, well, any developer, should consider if an idea is truly good for the game (and works with their vision) as well as the costs for implementing it. On top of that, they cannot chase every or even a large number of suggestions because that would lead to pure craziness.

Bat · July 2021

kargen27 wrote: »

NPCs can be killed by players. Children would be NPCs. Some player hitting a child with the Blade of Woe might be seen by some as a bit much. Making the children invincible like guards would work to fix this problem but what would be the point?

NPCs can be made impossible to target, there are numerous examples of NPCs that can not be killed with the BoW.

I should be able to steal candy from any eventual future child NPCs, though.