VaranisArano wrote: »

everseeing_njpreub18_ESO wrote: »

I can understand wanting to make the dialogs easy to follow for everyone, but i agree.

My primary request would be to feel more like "I" am the hero, not the hired sword just following someone around. This could all be done with some simple dialog tweaks if nothing more.

Rather than:
NPC- This guys bad and is going to blow up a puppy!
Me- DUHHH what should we do???
NPC- Lets go stop him!

How about:
NPC- This guys bad and is going to blow up a puppy!
Me- ~Heroic Stance~ Than lets go stop him!!!
NPC- YEAH! Lets go stop him!

A basic and silly example sure but i hope it gets the point across.

Yeah, it would be nice if ZOS considered offering dialogue options at some point. Some players really like feeling like they aren't some big name hero, while others want to be acknowledged as the Vestige. Me, I'd love the opportunity to respond to yet another villain monologue with "You do know this hasn't worked out well for any other villain, right?"

On the other hand, offering dialogue options like Fallout 4 or Swtor would be a big departure from ESO's previous content, so I'm not getting my hopes up.

Fallout 4 had dialogue options? Beyond yes, sarcastic yes, no but actually yes, and let me ask a question before yes.

SWTOR has great ones, though. There's also continuity and character recognition. NPC will know (or you can tell them) that yes you're that person who did those amazing feats and killed those people and things. To which they will've proper reaction, like awe or soiling themselves in fear.
In ESO I've lost count how many "big bads" and their minions I've fought and then been told with the next one how I can't fight them, kill them, and/or how dangerous they are, while I just stand there like a lemon and let them monologue.

Yes! It's been getting bad for a long time but Blackwood is especially atrocious - I am constantly being forced to ask the most obvious questions, often despite the fact that I'd already received the information!

Cases in point:

NPC: "You should ask Keshu Black Fin for help."

Quest update: speak to Eveli Sharp-Arrow

(to Eveli): "Do you have any idea who might help us?"

Eveli: "Oh yes! Keshu Black Fin!"

*I proceed to groan*

OR

*we arrive in a blasted land full of rocks and lava under a red sky, which we have visited before during the quest, and knowing that Mehrunes Dagon is the Big Bad and the Deadlands are his realm*

(to Eveli): "Any idea where we are?"

🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

These are just two of the most recent examples that come to mind, but it's actually severely putting me off the questline in general.

There is always a certain amount of expository dialogue in RPGs because of the need to make players (especially new players) aware of things even when a character living within the setting would almost certainly already know, but it's becoming really over the top and cringe inducing in ESO now.

Blackwood, and Eveli's dialogue in particular, have really dialled this up to 11. As if I needed any more reasons to hate Eveli.

Sorry, but had to necro this thread.
Was truly hoping that these posts might be heard by the writing team, but sadly no.
No spoilers, but did prologue quest in PTS.

NPC: Ok, we completed this. meet me at so & so and decide our next move.
"Ports to meeting location."
NPC: Good, you made it!
Me: Why are we here?

Come on, really!!
I am a TES Lore Nerd, I even stand around and listen to random NPC's conversations. Love the initial storylines.
But it is getting continually worse with the redundant and some cases just silly dialogs we are getting.
Yes, I know, "but returning players not knowing what's going on, etc".

Idea: How bout a actual journal associated with quest journal that answers those issues without our toon sounding like a complete moron.

Just my two drakes from a TES fan who loves the immersion and story telling. Please.
Huzzah!

Ghanima_Atreides wrote: »

wenchmore420b14_ESO wrote: »

Sorry, but had to necro this thread.
Was truly hoping that these posts might be heard by the writing team, but sadly no.
No spoilers, but did prologue quest in PTS.

NPC: Ok, we completed this. meet me at so & so and decide our next move.
"Ports to meeting location."
NPC: Good, you made it!
Me: Why are we here?

Come on, really!!
I am a TES Lore Nerd, I even stand around and listen to random NPC's conversations. Love the initial storylines.
But it is getting continually worse with the redundant and some cases just silly dialogs we are getting.
Yes, I know, "but returning players not knowing what's going on, etc".

Idea: How bout a actual journal associated with quest journal that answers those issues without our toon sounding like a complete moron.

Just my two drakes from a TES fan who loves the immersion and story telling. Please.
Huzzah!

Seriously?! This is the most disappointing news about the new chapter I've heard yet. It wil be so much fun feeling like an absolute idiot while trying to immerse myself in a story that's supposedly about political intrigue... NOT!

Just a note. I only did just the prologue quest, so haven't explored the main story yet, so we still have hope!! Maybe?
I was just kinda bummed to see this pop up so soon into new chapter.

BroughBreaux wrote: »

Yeah Blackwood was particularly atrocious like propertyOfUndefined said. Felt like the game was holding my hand through the whole questline and talking to me like I have a room temperature IQ. Keeping track of everything that was going on was just too much for me to handle on my own, so I need Eveli to do a recap after every singe thing happens. ESO is rated M for Mature, this ain't Sesame Street.

Not even Skyrim held my hand this much and Skyrim has a notorious reputation among long-time ES fans for treating the player like a child or an idiot.

I did it like a week ago and already can barely remember what happened. Something about some councilors of something getting killed by assassin's of something else. Mainly I remember a lot of running back and forth.

Marto wrote: »

Those conversations are meant to serve as a recap of the previous quests, in case you left the questline half finished and revisited it months later.

Or they are meant to introduce lore concepts that might be difficult to new players.

If you know every plot point in the story, or you have read every wiki page... those dialogue options are not for you. You can just skip them.

No, in Blackwood you were forced to click them or the quest would not advance. It was horrible. I had to use my imagination and pretend the characters were talking about something else during those parts or pretend it didn't happen at all.

NotaDaedraWorshipper wrote: »

In Western Skyrim an early quest have Lyris sending you to check on Kilkreath Temple, which she talks a little about. Like how it's a temple of Meridia etc. On the way there you meet Fennorian, who also talks a bit about the temple and you mention you were going to warn the priests. Then with the third character you meet (this is all within a short period of time), who is a priest of Meridia, you go something like "What is the Kilkreath Temple?" 🤦

I think that's because you could have gone to Kilkreath Temple without having spoken with Lyris and Fennorian about it first, so to cover that possibility they added a dialogue option where you can ask about Kilkreath Temple.

Danikat wrote: »

I wonder if it's part of trying to make chapter maps also function as starter maps? They think they need to explain everything because the player might be brand new to the game.

But even then some of the things they have your character asking about aren't TES lore or game mechanics or anything which might need explaining and in some cases the answer has already been made clear earlier in the conversation.

One option of course is to not click on those options, but normally I like to ask all the questions to see what additional story or lore details might come up so it's frustrating to feel like my only choices are to act like an idiot or potentially miss out on interesting info.

Yeah, but even non-rpg games have options for the player to ask an NPC to explain or not.
I know what ojel means, I know what xanmeers are, I played the murkmire expansion, but it's like my character completely forgot and still has to ask because it's the ONLY option we get.

I get that there's no role-playing in this role playing game in terms of story telling, but to completely eliminate player choices for non-impactful conversations is something I completely detested.
It's hard to get immersed in the story due to the excessive ludonarrative dissonance (Molag Bal, a daedric prince, is as hard to defeat as a generic delve boss, but the dreugh in the end of fungal grotto I in normal mode is way harder and more frightening), but not even allowing us to be a jerk and tell eveli she looks bad in the dress even if it has no significant impact...
Hell, There ARE recorded dialogues for players who are not part of the brotherhood...
And yet, players who did join the guild are forced to confess to Eveli that you're part of the guild.
Couldn't we simply get the dialogue choice to say it or not?

But the answer is no.
Because the dialogue choices don't get picked based on your finished quests, but rather on your skill lines. It's a rather dumb way to verify it.
I know this because my main character has NEVER done any thief's guild quests before, Quen is still in the outlaws refuge asking for help ever since. And yet, the ONE time I ever tried to open a trove, it turns out I COULD open it AND I got the skill line. This isn't a bad thing per-se, but consider that I was on my way to do the main quests from borderwatch in blackwood.

For those who haven't done that quest, you encounter lady twilight and seeks-the-shadows, apparently two characters from the original thief's guild questline.
And the only choice I had was "I'm part of the guild, I've never heard of you before"

I get that people want casual gameplay, but that's no excuse for insultingly lazy dialogues.
Story content is the huge majority of content in this game, and yet it's delivered so poorly and half-assed. Simply because all the effort goes into making character builds for dungeons and PvP (and they still break the game so not even THAT is well-made).

I don't expect oscar-winning dialogue, but giving us choice is even if it has no impact at all is something so basic, so simple, that could improve dialogue and story content a lot more, and yet we can't even have that.

"Hi, i am an assassin of the morag tong ..." - seriously, an assassin would greet me like this?????
"My family could fall into dishonor in case someone in this city is still alive" --> only dialog option you have: ""WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?" - ...... what the god damn hell, ZOS can you please address players who are not disabled as well? yes, they do exist ..... lost my [Snip] there on front of my PC and stopped questing nothern elsweyr 3 years ago and did not go on there so far seems like cyro rage whispers are better RP than questing in overland.

[Edited for profanity bypass]

One thing we should consider.

The Vestige is a Zombie, we died and got resurrected many times, I am sure some deaths were caused by head trauma. But we are still able to talk and mostly able to make our own decisions, so it's not really that bad.

What is bad, is that the Vestige is being abused by the npcs. Obviously they know we have some brain damage but still tell us to fight deadric princes who are powerful enough to destroy the world or send us into the most deadly caves while they stay in safety.

We are ESOs Forrest Gump, a nice but special person who somehow makes his/her way in this cruel world.

One of the reasons I think giving the player an optional voice would be helpful is that it would allow significantly more involved player dialogue that isn't quite so stupid, so you'd end up with more natural conversations. It would allow the writers to elevate the quality of the writing.

If the player only "speaks" in text, everything they say has to be reduced to a digestible form. Otherwise players would spend all their time reading. Which is not to say that the writing quality hasn't been dropping (Greymoor, particularly, was plain bad). But there is a limit to how good it can get if player dialogue is limited to a line in a text box.

"Hello main character, we will sail to a breton island to dabble in politics"
"How do I move forward?"

drsalvation wrote: »

Danikat wrote: »

I wonder if it's part of trying to make chapter maps also function as starter maps? They think they need to explain everything because the player might be brand new to the game.

But even then some of the things they have your character asking about aren't TES lore or game mechanics or anything which might need explaining and in some cases the answer has already been made clear earlier in the conversation.

One option of course is to not click on those options, but normally I like to ask all the questions to see what additional story or lore details might come up so it's frustrating to feel like my only choices are to act like an idiot or potentially miss out on interesting info.

Yeah, but even non-rpg games have options for the player to ask an NPC to explain or not.
I know what ojel means, I know what xanmeers are, I played the murkmire expansion, but it's like my character completely forgot and still has to ask because it's the ONLY option we get.

I get that there's no role-playing in this role playing game in terms of story telling, but to completely eliminate player choices for non-impactful conversations is something I completely detested.
It's hard to get immersed in the story due to the excessive ludonarrative dissonance (Molag Bal, a daedric prince, is as hard to defeat as a generic delve boss, but the dreugh in the end of fungal grotto I in normal mode is way harder and more frightening), but not even allowing us to be a jerk and tell eveli she looks bad in the dress even if it has no significant impact...
Hell, There ARE recorded dialogues for players who are not part of the brotherhood...
And yet, players who did join the guild are forced to confess to Eveli that you're part of the guild.
Couldn't we simply get the dialogue choice to say it or not?

But the answer is no.
Because the dialogue choices don't get picked based on your finished quests, but rather on your skill lines. It's a rather dumb way to verify it.
I know this because my main character has NEVER done any thief's guild quests before, Quen is still in the outlaws refuge asking for help ever since. And yet, the ONE time I ever tried to open a trove, it turns out I COULD open it AND I got the skill line. This isn't a bad thing per-se, but consider that I was on my way to do the main quests from borderwatch in blackwood.

For those who haven't done that quest, you encounter lady twilight and seeks-the-shadows, apparently two characters from the original thief's guild questline.
And the only choice I had was "I'm part of the guild, I've never heard of you before"

I get that people want casual gameplay, but that's no excuse for insultingly lazy dialogues.
Story content is the huge majority of content in this game, and yet it's delivered so poorly and half-assed. Simply because all the effort goes into making character builds for dungeons and PvP (and they still break the game so not even THAT is well-made).

I don't expect oscar-winning dialogue, but giving us choice is even if it has no impact at all is something so basic, so simple, that could improve dialogue and story content a lot more, and yet we can't even have that.

So much this. More dialog options please!
Also, I'm noticing that NPC's that we have had interactions in past don't know us.
I was so hyped at launch and beta that I really liked the stories and dialogs. It seems like then that the dialogs would adapt to your choices and reflect interactions with NPS's.
But now?? At one time, ESO had writers that worked for TSR writing D&D mods, which had some of the best writing in the whole genre, so what happened?
Please ZoS! Just take notice that WE notice, and sorry, it feels lacking.
My 2 drakes... Huzzah!