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800k people don't seem to mind difficult overworld
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drunkendx✭✭✭✭It's funny up to beginning to be ridiculous how all those "I wanna harder overland" people actively avoid actually hard content of ESO...13 -
AlexanderDeLarge✭✭✭✭✭
✭It's funny up to beginning to be ridiculous how all those "I wanna harder overland" people actively avoid actually hard content of ESO...
That instanced content accounts for maybe 1-2% of the entire game. Alright so you think we should stick to veteran trials and dungeons 24/7? I don't know about you but my guilds only run trials maybe 2-3 times a week at best. What are we doing while we sit in a LFG queue for a veteran dungeon? Constantly running arenas?
One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.Difficulty scaling is desperately needed. 11 years. 8 paid expansions. 29 dungeon and zone DLCs. 45 game changing updates including A Realm Reborn-tier overhaul of the game including a permanent CP160 gear cap and ridiculous power creep thereafter. Just because Cadwell Silver&Gold failed doesn't mean the game should be brain dead easy forever.
"ESO doesn't need a harder overland" on YouTube for a video of a naked level 3 character w/ no CP allocated AFKing in front of a bear for a minute and a half before dying if you don't believe me change is needed.8 -
Iccotak✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭SilverBride wrote: »The 800k people who don't seem to mind difficult overland are right where they need to be... in a game that provides that. They aren't spending time in a game that doesn't then requesting it be changed to their play style.
Rich Lambert recently answered the request for veteran quests and delves, and his stand on this is very clear.
"Can we get a vet mode for delves and quests? Uh, so we had that ... at launch. It was called Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold. Nobody did it and everybody hated it, so we took it out. We put the challenge into World Bosses, and into solo Arenas, and into Dungeons and Trials." - Rich Lambert
https://clips.twitch.tv/BovineLovelyGrassTakeNRG-IGkmH8s1XHeD9P2u
And I’d say that it doesn’t address Story bosses. The antagonist that the narrative hypes up over the course of an entire year.
Like if they took that level of effort they put into that endgame content- and put it into a difficultly option for Story Bosses 👌
The gameplay for the story is honestly just so bland that it undermines the story to a point of disappointment. Especially when they spend so long hyping it up.New players need easy content.
That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be options for other playersSilverBride wrote: »AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »New World has an incredibly challenging open world and it's refreshing to say the least after playing The Elder Scrolls Online for years where the hardest thing about most of these quest chains is walking to the objective.
The most logical course of action is very simple. Players who enjoy difficult and challenging overland should play games like New World. Those who enjoy a more relaxing overland story experience should play games like ESO. It is not logical to expect either type game to completely change their base game to adapt to individual players.
OR maybe people should be free to give feedback - and - the devs should consider that what players are asking for isn’t what they did before.
No one is asking for Cadwell’s silver & gold - in fact people have proposed a wide variety of different solutions to the problem.
It’s perfectly fine that you find it relaxing, no one wants to take that away from you.
What people for asked is an option to have gameplay that makes questing more engaging - and it’s a topic that comes up frequently enough in the community across various platforms, that it’s something that ZOS should think about.
——————————
No matter what side of the debate you’re on - telling people to leave isn’t conducive for a constructive conversation.
People can like a game and criticize it at the same time.
It’s fine if you’re not interested in the conversation, but let people have the conversation.7 -
drunkendx✭✭✭✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.
You know what I find fun in ESO?
Story, collecting sets, and various lore tidbits you can find around, just aimlessly roaming through various zones, etc...
If only thing you find "fun" in game is combat, then ESO CERTAINLY is not for you.13 -
AlexanderDeLarge✭✭✭✭✭
✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.
You know what I find fun in ESO?
Story, collecting sets, and various lore tidbits you can find around, just aimlessly roaming through various zones, etc...
If only thing you find "fun" in game is combat, then ESO CERTAINLY is not for you.
And what activities surround the "story, collecting sets and various lore tidbits you find around, just aimlessly roaming through various zones etc."? Being attacked by enemies a part of those quests. Being attacked while you're poking around a delve reading ancient inscriptions on the wall, being attacked by a bear while you're gathering firewood.
If you want to one shot that bear... Great, keep the standard mode toggle on. This request doesn't affect you whatsoever. Let's be very clear, I am advocating for choice and you want to take that choice away from me and all the other people who have the audacity to ask for this on the forums.Difficulty scaling is desperately needed. 11 years. 8 paid expansions. 29 dungeon and zone DLCs. 45 game changing updates including A Realm Reborn-tier overhaul of the game including a permanent CP160 gear cap and ridiculous power creep thereafter. Just because Cadwell Silver&Gold failed doesn't mean the game should be brain dead easy forever.
"ESO doesn't need a harder overland" on YouTube for a video of a naked level 3 character w/ no CP allocated AFKing in front of a bear for a minute and a half before dying if you don't believe me change is needed.8 -
SilverBride✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.
That is true for some players, but not all. I love overland just as it is. I love being the Hero and not being threatened by wolves and bears. I love being able to complete quest objectives quickly and easily, and without struggling. And I love that I can go after World Bosses and Harrowstorms for more of a challenge within overland, if I so choose.
But as Rich Lambert pointed out, no one was doing the veteran overland zones and everyone hated it. The fact that ESO flourished after One Tamriel shows that they made the right decision in the direction they took. Making overland more difficult again would not be good for the game.
But players aren't restricted to just one MMO. There is no reason a player can't play a more difficult game as well as ESO, and enjoy both types of game if they choose.PCNA12 -
Castagere✭✭✭✭✭WhyMustItBe wrote: »I'm curious about the title for this thread."800k people don't seem to mind difficult overworld"
Where does the figure 800k come from?
It is probably a reference to the number of people playing New World on Steam, which I intentionally ignored since it would be a terrible metric to compare the new game shiny fad-factor of a title out for 1 week to a game which has been running 8 years with a stable, healthy, and generally expanding player base.
OK, so the title is just wrong as I figured. Man, they just keep trying.3 -
AlexanderDeLarge✭✭✭✭✭
✭SilverBride wrote: »Rich Lambert recently answered the request for veteran quests and delves, and his stand on this is very clear.
"Can we get a vet mode for delves and quests? Uh, so we had that ... at launch. It was called Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold. Nobody did it and everybody hated it, so we took it out. We put the challenge into World Bosses, and into solo Arenas, and into Dungeons and Trials." - Rich Lambert
https://clips.twitch.tv/BovineLovelyGrassTakeNRG-IGkmH8s1XHeD9P2u
Rich Lambert knows as well as I do that the game launched in a completely broken state where instancing and grouping didn't work so that certainly didn't help matters, go figure having group mandatory content results in that content being ignored. Rich Lambert also knows as well as I do that the entire progression system and seven and a half years worth of content including gear sets has led to unprecedented levels of power creep that completely invalidates his anecdote.
Not to mention Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold were made at a time when the Veteran Rank system was off-putting to the point where hardly anyone was hitting VR16 (the equivalent of CP160) and I don't think anyone was really rushing out the door to do Aldmeri Dominion zone quests.Difficulty scaling is desperately needed. 11 years. 8 paid expansions. 29 dungeon and zone DLCs. 45 game changing updates including A Realm Reborn-tier overhaul of the game including a permanent CP160 gear cap and ridiculous power creep thereafter. Just because Cadwell Silver&Gold failed doesn't mean the game should be brain dead easy forever.
"ESO doesn't need a harder overland" on YouTube for a video of a naked level 3 character w/ no CP allocated AFKing in front of a bear for a minute and a half before dying if you don't believe me change is needed.9 -
Iccotak✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭It's funny up to beginning to be ridiculous how all those "I wanna harder overland" people actively avoid actually hard content of ESO...
Wow, that is categorically untrue. There are a lot of people who have made this complaint that regularly do endgame and others are also casual players.
No one is saying there is a lack of difficult content in the game.
What people have said is it the gameplay for exploration and questing is largely boring.
What people have said is that the main story bosses after all the hype & build up are often very disappointing.
I really enjoy the dungeons, and I enjoy the trials, but I’m still going to criticize the fact that I don’t have a Difficulty option when it comes to my gameplay experience of the story which is largely played solo.
—————————AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.
You know what I find fun in ESO?
Story, collecting sets, and various lore tidbits you can find around, just aimlessly roaming through various zones, etc...
If only thing you find "fun" in game is combat, then ESO CERTAINLY is not for you.
Story and Lore are cool. They are a definite main draw to the game. But this is an MMO with a heavy focus on action combat with varying builds. It is not a point and click adventure story.
engaging gameplay and engaging story should not be separate. They should go hand-in-hand.
Making combat gameplay almost irrelevant in the main story of all things is poor design.
Heck, even Bungie is addressing this complaint in Destiny. The next expansion will have a difficulty setting choice for the main story. And they did that because the game had a consistent problem of underwhelming story bosses in these hyped up expansions.
And it was a complaint that has been in destiny for just about as long as ESO has been around.SilverBride wrote: »
Making overland more difficult again would not be good for the game.AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »One shotting enemies in the overland, again, the overwhelming majority of the game, is the antithesis of fun.
But that’s not what people are asking for. Nobody is asking for an overall change that forces everyone to play harder Overland.
What people have asked for is the choice. An Option that they can choose for themselves.
Again people are not asking for things to go back to the way they were, and I am slightly confused as to why you keep framing it as if that is what they’re asking for - when that is very clearly not the case.AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »SilverBride wrote: »Rich Lambert recently answered the request for veteran quests and delves, and his stand on this is very clear.
"Can we get a vet mode for delves and quests? Uh, so we had that ... at launch. It was called Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold. Nobody did it and everybody hated it, so we took it out. We put the challenge into World Bosses, and into solo Arenas, and into Dungeons and Trials." - Rich Lambert
https://clips.twitch.tv/BovineLovelyGrassTakeNRG-IGkmH8s1XHeD9P2u
Rich Lambert knows as well as I do that the game launched in a completely broken state where instancing and grouping didn't work so that certainly didn't help matters, go figure having group mandatory content results in that content being ignored. Rich Lambert also knows as well as I do that the entire progression system and seven and a half years worth of content including gear sets has led to unprecedented levels of power creep that completely invalidates his anecdote.
Not to mention Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold were made at a time when the Veteran Rank system was off-putting to the point where hardly anyone was hitting VR16 (the equivalent of CP160) and I don't think anyone was really rushing out the door to do Aldmeri Dominion zone quests.
Agreed.
let’s be very clear on this. That period of time in ESO had a whole lot more problems than the veteran instance of zones.
And I think it is either naïve or disingenuous to try to frame it as if that was the sole core issue.
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Edited for spellingEdited by Iccotak on October 3, 2021 6:19PM9 -
trackdemon5512✭✭✭✭✭
✭PLEASE stop using the forums for “ESO should be more like NEW WORLD” posts. A game that hasn’t been out a week. A game that’s only out for PC. A game that has in no way established itself as what the larger share of the MMORPG community wants.
A game in which a first look acknowledged that the new car smell doesn’t last:
“With everyone exploring the world for the first time together, it's the most an MMO ever gets to feel like a proper adventure, and all this potential and anticipation creates a buzz of excitement that echoes through the starting zones, the hubs and the crowds waiting around for bosses to spawn. Even the dullest stuff becomes slightly more palatable because the bustle of a fresh MMO is weirdly energising.” - PC Gamer
A game where a review questions it’s longevity:
“Will the early wave of players stick around? It depends on whether New World can stand up to their machinations. If each server becomes dominated by a single faction, or the PvP can’t hold people’s attention, the game seems doomed to wither on the vine. The game itself isn’t really the main indicator of New World’s success — it’s the vibrant scenes built up around it in Discords and social media, where players are planning their best approach to claim the island against all takers.” - Polygon
Don’t use these forums as a hype train for a game that may or may not pan out and ask that this game, forged through nearly a decade of trial-and-error of what works and what doesn’t, should be. Because if that’s the case then ESO would have become like FORTNITE 2 years ago.
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AlexanderDeLarge✭✭✭✭✭
✭I don't blame anyone citing New World's massive success in response to the veteran overland naysayers calling us a vocal minority for the last five years. Clearly those who play it enjoy the difficulty of the open world. I know for a fact, as a tester who hit the level cap, that even when you're max level with the best gear in New World, it's not a game where you can turn your brain off.
It's a cliché but it's like Dark Souls, you're only safe in the outposts, if you start getting cocky and stop blocking/dodging attacks, even from enemies 50 levels below you, you'll be punished for it and likely die. Unlike TESO where an enemy attacking you while you're alt+tabbed is like an ant biting your foot. The difficulty is refreshing to say the least.Difficulty scaling is desperately needed. 11 years. 8 paid expansions. 29 dungeon and zone DLCs. 45 game changing updates including A Realm Reborn-tier overhaul of the game including a permanent CP160 gear cap and ridiculous power creep thereafter. Just because Cadwell Silver&Gold failed doesn't mean the game should be brain dead easy forever.
"ESO doesn't need a harder overland" on YouTube for a video of a naked level 3 character w/ no CP allocated AFKing in front of a bear for a minute and a half before dying if you don't believe me change is needed.6 -
_adhyffbjjjf12✭✭✭✭✭it is a cliche that was used by one reviewer. The pvp is a simplistic take on a single player gamer, not a modern MMOrpg. Just see the non paid reviews.
Block at right time, cc at right time, hit at right time. Check. PVE is crude and 20 years out of date and PVP content is shallow.
Could be a great game in a couple years, i will keep an eye on it for sure, but after beta, nah.1 -
SilverBride✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »Rich Lambert knows as well as I do that the game launched in a completely broken state where instancing and grouping didn't work so that certainly didn't help matters, go figure having group mandatory content results in that content being ignored. Rich Lambert also knows as well as I do that the entire progression system and seven and a half years worth of content including gear sets has led to unprecedented levels of power creep that completely invalidates his anecdote.
Not to mention Cadwell's Silver and Cadwell's Gold were made at a time when the Veteran Rank system was off-putting to the point where hardly anyone was hitting VR16 (the equivalent of CP160) and I don't think anyone was really rushing out the door to do Aldmeri Dominion zone quests.
I am sure that Rich Lambert is aware of the state of the game at launch and now. That fact that he mentions that no one was doing veteran overland and everyone hated it must still be relevant to him today since he mentioned that specifically in his statement just a month ago.
There has been an increased focus on casual play, particularly with the introduction of Companions. I assume that this is because they can see what features players are utilizing and are continuing in that direction.Edited by SilverBride on October 3, 2021 6:51PMPCNA8 -
Folkb✭✭✭✭✭Just give overland mobs more moves and not as slow performing them. Make them as fast at doing their moves as a player and give them player moves.
You can't give them more hp. They were like that before and fighting became a chore.2 -
trackdemon5512✭✭✭✭✭
✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »I don't blame anyone citing New World's massive success in response to the veteran overland naysayers calling us a vocal minority for the last five years. Clearly those who play it enjoy the difficulty of the open world. I know for a fact, as a tester who hit the level cap, that even when you're max level with the best gear in New World, it's not a game where you can turn your brain off.
It's a cliché but it's like Dark Souls, you're only safe in the outposts, if you start getting cocky and stop blocking/dodging attacks, even from enemies 50 levels below you, you'll be punished for it and likely die. Unlike TESO where an enemy attacking you while you're alt+tabbed is like an ant biting your foot. The difficulty is refreshing to say the least.
Opening day surge is not a metric of “massive success”. With any IP or genre with an established fan base the first few days are usually those who were waiting in the wings for the content to drop. As such there is usually a boom.
After that boom comes the real telling. With movies like comic book films or sci-fi content there are usually strong first weekend box-office results from those who pre-ordered tickets. After that you virtually always get a drop week over week that starts severe and continues gradually.
Six months into New World you can better tell how it’s received. The same way players hyped and bought Cyberpunk 2077, high sales week one, and then it was savaged and sales fell off a cliff. I don’t think anyone who said Cyberpunk was the future of open world games is saying that today. Think of the same for New World.10 -
As long as it's optional I guess I don't really care. The AI could stand to be improved for overworld enemies I guess. Honestly it's not something that really matters to me though, I enjoy overworld content being fairly easy and something I can do when I'm feeling tired and don't have much energy but want to be to feel like I'm doing something.
I'm not sure why we're comparing this game to New World though, they're very different games with very different types of gameplay being encouraged. It seems a little silly to compare an established PVE focused game like this one to a brand new PVP focused game like New World, which is close enough to release that excitement is still high and it's difficult to tell how the game is actually going to shake out once it's been around for a couple of months. If people are happy playing New World because it's more difficult, power to them, but I'm not sure what it has to do with us and I think we can make an argument for changes to this game without the comparison2 -
Hallothiel✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭If you post your thoughts on a public forum then be prepared for people to disagree with you & express their own thoughts too - without getting annoyed that people may not agree with you.
As I said, in my opinion, Overland is fine as it is. It is obviously fine for the majority of players otherwise things would have changed.
A ‘vet overland’ toggle to please the few who seem to want a nightmare experience even if just collecting mats?
Ok, how much dev time would that take?
And would you be prepared to pay for it?
I personally don’t want my sub to be spent on that (as there are aspects of this game that are in far greater need of attention than this) & would never use it. But if people who want this were willing to pay for it, then fine, knock yourselves out, having an epic battle with a mudcrab whilst fishing.
Oh, but the rewards are the same - said it before, shall say it again, if its all about the extra *challenge* then you shouldn’t care. Right?
And also agree with @SilverBride - just play both and enjoy the differences. But please stop trying to make ESO into being the same as other MMOs10 -
AlexanderDeLarge✭✭✭✭✭
✭
We had difficulty and then One Tamriel removed it and power creep resulting from the Champion Point system exacerbated the problem. Now we seem to have a bit of revisionist history going on where everyone's acting like the difficulty was removed because the content was unpopular even though anyone who played back then knows the instancing, progression system and grouping itself were massively broken on top of base game content being pretty bad and boring. Like I said earlier I don't think anyone is rushing out the door to play Aldmeri Dominion content but harder but the game has changed since then. The difficult content not being played was a casualty of more systemic problems.Hallothiel wrote: »And also agree with @SilverBride - just play both and enjoy the differences. But please stop trying to make ESO into being the same as other MMOs
It's funny you use this as an example, which is exactly what One Tamriel did via level scaling everything up to CP160. You seem to be totally okay with that but when a CP1200 player asks for a comparable experience it's somehow unreasonable?Hallothiel wrote: »having an epic battle with a mudcrab whilst fishing.
There are a lot of legitimate problems with this game that haven't been addressed. Using this mentality to justify not addressing them is ridiculous.Hallothiel wrote: »It is obviously fine for the majority of players otherwise things would have changed.ofalltheworlds wrote: »I'm not sure why we're comparing this game to New World though, they're very different games with very different types of gameplay being encouraged. It seems a little silly to compare an established PVE focused game like this one to a brand new PVP focused game like New World, which is close enough to release that excitement is still high and it's difficult to tell how the game is actually going to shake out once it's been around for a couple of months. If people are happy playing New World because it's more difficult, power to them, but I'm not sure what it has to do with us and I think we can make an argument for changes to this game without the comparison
You can't have it both ways. For the last five years, anyone asking for a veteran overland toggle was mocked and labeled a vocal minority. Now you have a brand new MMO, the first major Western release since The Elder Scrolls Online released in 2014, doing massive numbers despite featuring a challenging and dangerous open world and we're not supposed to bring it up as an example? If challenging open world content were as unpopular as it seems to be according to certain individuals, who I would argue are in fact the "vocal minority", New World wouldn't be remaining steady in numbers as high as it is and I'd be very curious to see The Elder Scrolls Online's concurrency numbers on PC coinciding with New World's release. Just to be clear I mean people actually playing the game, not just logging in for ten minutes to get Deadlands for free like I am.
I know honeymoon period and all that. New World isn't perfect, it has problems but the inherent danger that comes with being attacked by a bear while you're on his turf chopping trees down regardless of level and gear isn't one of them.Edited by AlexanderDeLarge on October 3, 2021 8:05PMDifficulty scaling is desperately needed. 11 years. 8 paid expansions. 29 dungeon and zone DLCs. 45 game changing updates including A Realm Reborn-tier overhaul of the game including a permanent CP160 gear cap and ridiculous power creep thereafter. Just because Cadwell Silver&Gold failed doesn't mean the game should be brain dead easy forever.
"ESO doesn't need a harder overland" on YouTube for a video of a naked level 3 character w/ no CP allocated AFKing in front of a bear for a minute and a half before dying if you don't believe me change is needed.11 -
Katlefiya✭✭✭✭✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »
So let me get this straight, it's okay for them to significantly overhaul and "streamline" the game to make it easier and more accessible but I can't ask for an optional mode to add the difficulty back in? [snip]SilverBride wrote: »It is not logical to expect either type game to completely change their base game to adapt to individual players.
[edited for flaming]
It was okay for them to come up with One Tamriel because it turned ESO into the successful MMO it is today. What is your business case that the investment into this optional difficult mode - of which you probably underestimate the necessary investments let alone the risks such vast changes may pose - is worth it for ZOS to pursue?8 -
I_killed_Vivec✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭BroughBreaux wrote: »All they need to do is add mechanics to NPCs, not increase their damage or health. The reason the overland is boring is because they just stand there and let you kill them, take 5 seconds visually telegraphing any kind of attack that would do any significant amount of damage, and they don't try to avoid your AOEs or strategize a good way to attack in groups.
even if every overland enemy had the same mechanics and the only variation was in boss fights, it would be better than the mind numbing overland content we have currently
Sounds like they are copying my tactics...
0 -
ZeroDPS✭✭✭✭Ishtarknows wrote: »Overland fighting teaches nothing about group content mechanics, so you'll have someone taking 10 minutes to light attack spam /heavy attack a world boss to death thinking they're great and that translates fine into group (harder) content. There needs to be something to allow players to prepare for more difficult content and questing isn't it.
what we need is: 4 man group and trials mechanics explanation menu!1 -
SilverBride✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭AlexanderDeLarge wrote: »Now you have a brand new MMO, the first major Western release since The Elder Scrolls Online released in 2014, doing massive numbers despite featuring a challenging and dangerous open world and we're not supposed to bring it up as an example? If challenging open world content were as unpopular as it seems to be according to certain individuals, who I would argue are in fact the "vocal minority", New World wouldn't be remaining steady in numbers as high as it is and I'd be very curious to see The Elder Scrolls Online's concurrency numbers on PC coinciding with New World's release. Just to be clear I mean people actually playing the game, not just logging in for ten minutes to get Deadlands for free like I am.
I know honeymoon period and all that. New World isn't perfect, it has problems but the inherent danger that comes with being attacked by a bear while you're on his turf chopping trees down regardless of level and gear isn't one of them.
New World has nothing to do with ESO. They are two very different types of games with very different focuses. The fact that some players gravitate to that type of game does not mean that there aren't just as many, if not more, who don't, and who prefer the more casual style of ESO.
Some people enjoy country music too, but that doesn't mean every radio station now must change its format to country to survive.PCNA13 -
AzuraFan✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭I think it would be difficult in ESO to offer an option/toggle for difficult overland content. It sounds easy, but how would it work in practice? Wouldn't it have to be on a completely different server? How can there be two players in the same instance, where one has normal difficulty mobs, and the other has vet difficulty mobs?
In the first Guild Wars, they had a hard mode, but every zone in that game, except for town hubs, was instanced. Each player was in their own private instance. So it was possible to do. When you entered an instance, you'd choose normal or hard mode.
But in ESO, only dungeons and trials are instanced. All the other zones are shared. So wouldn't it require a different "vet mode" server? If that happened, then people would complain about not enough players to group because the population would be split.
Anyway, just wanted to say that "just add an option" sounds easy but probably isn't.
(also that I have no interest in making overland more difficult. I play to relax and do the story. I don't do trials or vet mode anything because I have zero interest in that sort of thing. As for story bosses, they're easy to kill for experienced players decked out in good gear and with CP points. Not so easy for a level 5 player wearing low-level quest gear. And even when the bosses are super easy to kill, who cares? It doesn't detract from the story at all.)
EDITED TO ADD: I suppose there could be normal and vet instances, and when porting to a zone, players could specify which one they want. But it still sounds like a lot of work. I'd rather ZOS fix bugs and create new content.
Edited by AzuraFan on October 3, 2021 8:26PM5 -
WhyMustItBe✭✭✭✭✭
✭I think it would be difficult in ESO to offer an option/toggle for difficult overland content. It sounds easy, but how would it work in practice? Wouldn't it have to be on a completely different server? How can there be two players in the same instance, where one has normal difficulty mobs, and the other has vet difficulty mobs?
It would be super easy. The technology is already all in place.
The game is already built in such a way that you don't see everyone on the entire megaserver in the area you are. The game breaks the whole megaserver down into zones and sub-zones. Each of those has a cap on the total number of players allowed in that zone. When that number is reached, overflow is rolled into a new instance, or "shard."
That is why people you invite to a group can be invisible unless you port to them, which brings you into the same shard.
Now, think War Mode in World of Warcraft. The game basically creates shards that are War Mode On or War Mode Off. So, when placing you in a shard, it checks your War Mode flag and puts you in a shard with only other players that have War Mode on.
In ESO the same technology exists. All they would have to do is check a PVP flag, or a difficulty setting, and only put you into shards spawned for people with those flags set. Simple.
Edited by WhyMustItBe on October 3, 2021 8:30PM5 -
AzuraFan✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭WhyMustItBe wrote: »It would be super easy. The technology is already all in place.
As a (retired) (non-game) developer, I never make assumptions about what's easy and what isn't. I always dreaded the words, "Can you just add/do this? It should be easy." LOL. But yeah, I had edited my previous comment to say that maybe it would be possible by choosing which instance you want when you port, but your solution (flag set) would work too.
But easy vs. difficult will depend on the app architecture, etc. And I do think it could cause population problems, especially as the game ages and the population declines, as happens with all MMOs.
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WhyMustItBe✭✭✭✭✭
✭...I do think it could cause population problems, especially as the game ages and the population declines, as happens with all MMOs.
Greetings, fellow dev. o/
I thought about the population issue but to be honest with the way it already works I don't think it would be an issue. Since there is already a cap on the max players in a shard, what you would see would be a decrease in the number of individual zone shards on that difficulty/PVP setup first. There are enough people playing that, especially in "relevant" zones, enough would exist to populate at least ONE shard at each level of difficulty/PVP.
I mean the shard cap is something like 100 players. If ESO got to a point where they couldn't find 1000 total players for the current relevant zone to populate say 4 difficulty levels and a PVP flag for each, I think the game would probably have shut down, as even games like Tera still manage to pull in more people than that.
Edited by WhyMustItBe on October 3, 2021 8:40PM2 -
AzuraFan✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭WhyMustItBe wrote: »I thought about the population issue but to be honest with the way it already works I don't think it would be an issue. Since there is already a cap on the max players in a shard, what you would see would be a decrease in the number of individual zone shards on that difficulty/PVP setup first. There are enough people playing that, especially in "relevant" zones, enough would exist to populate at least ONE shard at each level of difficulty/PVP.
I mean the shard cap is something like 100 players. If ESO got to a point where they couldn't find 1000 total players for the current relevant zone to populate say 4 difficulty levels and a PVP flag for each, I think the game would probably have shut down, as even games like Tera still manage to pull in more people than that.
That's true, they could reduce the number of instances accordingly.
I'm not against adding an option/setting at all. I just shake my head at posters who think some developer at ZOS should be able to write a few lines of code and voila! Done! Because it's just adding an option or toggle. Maybe it wouldn't be too involved. Maybe it would be really difficult.
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trackdemon5512✭✭✭✭✭
✭WhyMustItBe wrote: »I think it would be difficult in ESO to offer an option/toggle for difficult overland content. It sounds easy, but how would it work in practice? Wouldn't it have to be on a completely different server? How can there be two players in the same instance, where one has normal difficulty mobs, and the other has vet difficulty mobs?
It would be super easy. The technology is already all in place.
The game is already built in such a way that you don't see everyone on the entire megaserver in the area you are. The game breaks the whole megaserver down into zones and sub-zones. Each of those has a cap on the total number of players allowed in that zone. When that number is reached, overflow is rolled into a new instance, or "shard."
That is why people you invite to a group can be invisible unless you port to them, which brings you into the same shard.
Now, think War Mode in World of Warcraft. The game basically creates shards that are War Mode On or War Mode Off. So, when placing you in a shard, it checks your War Mode flag and puts you in a shard with only other players that have War Mode on.
In ESO the same technology exists. All they would have to do is check a PVP flag, or a difficulty setting, and only put you into shards spawned for people with those flags set. Simple.
The developers of this game and others have already stated that creating such a slider ZOS not easy on an individual level as the game scales to you. In an MMORPG say you slid the slider to make the game easier for you rather than more difficult. Are you effectively gaming the system to cheese content? What about other players joining you? Do they reap the benefits of your higher DPS? Or conversely are they hampered in their search for assistance because you’ve hobbled yourself to make content more difficult?
Changing individual difficulty is a selfish decision that has ramifications in a universal overworld, esp one in which you cannot control instances or switch to isolated servers. This is why the game has regular difficulty, veteran difficulty, and hard mode. Each is individually chosen and specialized for more focused groups without compromising overall enjoyability.
And if you want an example of current mechanics made harder look at Harrowstorms and Elsweyr Dragons. Easy to moderate difficulty in groups. Bloody impossible solo/w. a companion and frustrating for players attempting to do daily content when respective zones are empty.1 -
WhyMustItBe✭✭✭✭✭
✭trackdemon5512 wrote: »The developers of this game [...] have already stated that creating such a slider ZOS not easy on an individual level as the game scales to you.
Source? As a programmer this would be incredibly easy. The level scaling is just a health/damage multiplier. All you would have to do to adjust this for different difficulty shards is add another multiplier to that. It is literally a single multiplication operation which requires no noticeable server resources nor programming effort. Like typing 1*0.3 vs. 1*0.3*1.2.trackdemon5512 wrote: »In an MMORPG say you slid the slider to make the game easier for you rather than more difficult. Are you effectively gaming the system to cheese content?
Not at all because 1) the quality/frequency of drops/rewards and XP gained can be scaled based on the level of difficulty you are willing to face (again with an extremely simple multiplier operation) and 2) the only thing an easier difficulty in PVE overworld really buys you is convenience.
Besides for the easiest mode it would basically be unchanged from how it is now. You could even have just two modes for overworld to keep it simple: Normal (how it is now) and Veteran (increased difficulty, XP, rewards). That would be in keeping with the way they have set up dungeons, and the way it used to be with the old Veteran zones before One Tamriel, only as a universal OPTION. There is nothing bad about giving people options, especially when it WOULD be very easy to implement programmatically.trackdemon5512 wrote: »What about other players joining you?
Much like War Mode in World of Warcraft, being invited to a group with someone on a different setting would inform you "the person inviting you is in X mode and you are in Y. Do you wish to join the group and be synced to their mode?" The person inviting in other words would determine the mode the group would be set to, and everyone in the group would be at the same level.trackdemon5512 wrote: »Changing individual difficulty is a selfish decision that has ramifications in a universal overworld, esp one in which you cannot control instances or switch to isolated servers.
It actually doesn't need to have ANY impact on the larger world if you understand how server sharding/instancing already works (which I explain in a previous post). Long story short, you CAN control instances and isolate servers: It is called sharding and it is already built into the game.
And keep in mind even people accustomed to Normal mode would benefit from the added DPS/skill of people who normally play on Veteran carrying some of their lower level/damage which would make getting invited to a veteran group, IF you accepted that invite, a lot less noticeable than you might imagine.
This is honestly a change that would really only benefit solo play by adding more options for people of different skill/gear/level/experience to enjoy, which is good for the longevity of the game while taking NOTHING from people who continue to play as it currently is.
Win win.
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