ESO PvP Update [Updated June 2022]

Flangdoodle · January 2022

This is such great news. Thanks Matt!

Casul · January 2022

Elo106 wrote: »

I hope im wrong, I WISH im wrong but this post just reads like corporate damage control.

Server are and have been the issue for a long time, yet the client was prioritized?
FPS issues could have been solved by lowering the graphics in big fights, servers we have no way to solve ourselves.
And 2 years after the year of performance you are "starting work on it right now"

Starting to work on it now. It wont be done for atleast another year.

So we have an excuse for yet another year with zero PvP content.

Some other small scale pvp content like arenas or something to keep players happy was no option?
Its the same excuse over and over again, no cyro content cause it could make lag worse, no other pvp content so we dont split the player base. Without content the player base keeps shrinking...

-> So you are basically "working on it" for another year. Dont expect any PvP content.

This right here. I am not holding out for the possibility for it to be fixed. I would rather stay away and wait till there is actual improvements rather then continually being reassured that things are going to improve without evidence.

Tornaad · January 2022

Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is exactly what I was hoping for in my post A Letter to ZoS. Thank you @ZOS_MattFiror And with something this big, I am not surprised that it took so long to both figure it out and create a plan of action to fix it.

HeroOfNone · January 2022

Happy to hear work on this and its not the same old "Well they should just throw more servers at it!" Idea I've heard other players for the past couple of years.

PVP had issues within the first 2 years that ESO got released, and it wasn't from the lack of hardware. At this point it requires an overhaul, and not a simple one that can be slapped atop of established code but something that impacts the HERO engine its based on.

I will also be happy to see new weekend events and ruleset changes to keep things interesting while we wait for improvements.

Odovacar · January 2022

Well, this was a nice note especially from the top dog himself. My company puts out these communications when things usually hit the fan too, lol.

Nevertheless, it's still nice to know a certain situation has made an impact to the point where our beloved PvP content will get a little more attention now.

If "the video" never surfaced would we be getting such a response for Matt? To be perfectly honest I'm still a little upset and I don't feel bad saying that either. I will always refrain from bashing or saying something stupid out of frustration because it solves absolutely nothing. I guess I'm just stuck at "Ok...I'll believe it when I see it" #soon

Dark_Lord_Kuro · January 2022

Trandaner wrote: »

Keeping PvP interesting, yet you remove DM only queue.

Good thing i hated it

Destai · January 2022

BuildMan wrote: »

Elo106 wrote: »

I hope im wrong, I WISH im wrong but this post just reads like corporate damage control.

Server are and have been the issue for a long time, yet the client was prioritized?
FPS issues could have been solved by lowering the graphics in big fights, servers we have no way to solve ourselves.
And 2 years after the year of performance you are "starting work on it right now"

Starting to work on it now. It wont be done for atleast another year.

So we have an excuse for yet another year with zero PvP content.

Some other small scale pvp content like arenas or something to keep players happy was no option?
Its the same excuse over and over again, no cyro content cause it could make lag worse, no other pvp content so we dont split the player base. Without content the player base keeps shrinking...

-> So you are basically "working on it" for another year. Dont expect any PvP content.

This right here. I am not holding out for the possibility for it to be fixed. I would rather stay away and wait till there is actual improvements rather then continually being reassured that things are going to improve without evidence.

I don't interpret it any other way. We had the year of performance, we've had resolutions from them to be better at communication, and this feels like a response to yet another fiasco initiated by ZOS employee actions. I'm glad more people are vocalizing this.

Nogawd · January 2022

I have worked in sales and retail a long time.

I know Kool-Aid when I see it.

TheGreatFloki · January 2022

That's soo good to ear! Finally good news for all PvP players!

In this state Cyrodiil is dying, lag is insane and nothing works... ESO is one of the best PvP experiences ever, only lacks perfomance.

Give us perfomance and many players will do a comeback and your numbers will improve! And please, keep us updated, don't let us in the dark.

Good luck ZOS! Let's save Cyrodiil experience

Aldoss · January 2022

This is exactly the kind of communication that I think should happen more than once a year. I hope you know just how refreshing it is to hear anything at all!

Do this more. Even if it seems like there's not much to say.

People might know when they look good, but it's always nice to have another human acknowledge it.

Keep affirming us that you haven't forgotten us. It's so easy to think dark thoughts when confronted with silence.

The_Lex · January 2022

Elo106 wrote: »

I hope im wrong, I WISH im wrong but this post just reads like corporate damage control.

Server are and have been the issue for a long time, yet the client was prioritized?
FPS issues could have been solved by lowering the graphics in big fights, servers we have no way to solve ourselves.
And 2 years after the year of performance you are "starting work on it right now"

Starting to work on it now. It wont be done for atleast another year.

So we have an excuse for yet another year with zero PvP content.

Some other small scale pvp content like arenas or something to keep players happy was no option?
Its the same excuse over and over again, no cyro content cause it could make lag worse, no other pvp content so we dont split the player base. Without content the player base keeps shrinking...

-> So you are basically "working on it" for another year. Dont expect any PvP content.

I feel exactly the same way.

neferpitou73 · January 2022

This is an excellent example of how ZOS should communicate and should have been communicating over the last couple of months.

I'm happy to see an actual detailed summary of how ZOS intends to improve the game. However, like many I'll be skeptical about all of these claims until I see them bear fruit in game. Which I very much hope they do.

Diggerkran · January 2022

Brilliant this looks really interesting and I hope it works out

Crash427 · January 2022

So in other words, we're working on it. Forgive my skepticism but given your track record I won't hold my breath. Another year of selling a product that doesn't work as advertised.

Xandreia_ · January 2022

@ZOS_MattFiror excuse us for being sceptical but for the past 3 years all we have heard is "we are working on it"

whilst i applaud your damage control post it doesn't really tell us anything. we've had a year of performance, promises of fixes, promises of an improved cyrodiil experience but we are yet to see anything, nothing has been done, nothing has been communicated and its the cause for distrust of the devs.

we just want a working environment that was Afterall the selling point of the game upon release.

there is no other combat system like eso and thats the only reason PvPers have stuck around.

Musax · January 2022

Pretty telling in what state the remaining PvP playerbase is when the message "after 3years of investigating we have now decided to start from scratch, don't expect any performance improvememts for another year" is widely seen as a huge positive thing...how dire must the mindset be?

I don't even think this is just a stalling tactic...but even assuming honesty, the best case scenario is still that performance will maybe fixes in 2023.

MurderMostFoul · January 2022

Elo106 wrote: »

I hope im wrong, I WISH im wrong but this post just reads like corporate damage control.

Server are and have been the issue for a long time, yet the client was prioritized?
FPS issues could have been solved by lowering the graphics in big fights, servers we have no way to solve ourselves.
And 2 years after the year of performance you are "starting work on it right now"

Starting to work on it now. It wont be done for atleast another year.

So we have an excuse for yet another year with zero PvP content.

Some other small scale pvp content like arenas or something to keep players happy was no option?
Its the same excuse over and over again, no cyro content cause it could make lag worse, no other pvp content so we dont split the player base. Without content the player base keeps shrinking...

-> So you are basically "working on it" for another year. Dont expect any PvP content.

Agreed.

Updates are nice, but there is nothing to be celebrated here. This reads as:

-We are making improvements to the whole game with server rearchitect (PvP improvements are a hopeful consequence)
-There will not be any new PvP content for a least another year (so let's get the disappointment out of the way now before we talk more about the next chapter on 1/27)

Sorry if I'm not cheering.

TechMaybeHic · January 2022

As far back as 2016, there has been a post about working on it. Top priority and all.

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/25563

Why should anyone believe anything different is going to happen this year?

FlamingBeard · January 2022

I'm having deja vu from every year previous to now.

"We're working on it" just isn't good enough at this point from a multi-million dollar studio and while a lot of the original team is no longer working on the game, this kind of initiative would have been nice to see 3 years ago.

It's too bad this couldn't have happened before the PvP community died out for the most part.

Tornaad · January 2022

TechMaybeHic wrote: »

As far back as 2016, there has been a post about working on it. Top priority and all.

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/25563

Why should anyone believe anything different is going to happen this year?

Because they are no longer trying to sell the company and thus do not have to worry about making it seem more profitable to get a higher sale price. Yes, they now have a publicly owned corporation that owns them now, which means that they have a legal obligation to make a profit for their investors, but news like server negligence on major games like ESO, could cause investors to lose confidence, so there is now pressure to make sure things like this actually get resolved.

Vaoh · January 2022

We’ve seen identical announcements about “performance improvements” over the years but PvP combat is clunkier/laggier than ever. We also notice contradictory messages regarding proc sets. First you say these are a huge part of what lags the servers.... then you make us go from zero proc sets to a meta of everyone wearing 1-3 new OP proc sets. How does this make any sense in helping performance?

Bottom line is that we need to see it to believe it. There will be tons of praise and increased PvP population if we begin seeing the results of your hard work this time.

blktauna · January 2022

Elsonso wrote: »

blktauna wrote: »

Honestly I would have expected this rewrite to have been ongoing, not just started now. This is obvious and ongoing technical debt. I know no one likes to deal with it because it isn't the new shiny but technical debt needs to be addressed or we get what's happening in cyrodil.

That being said, thank you for updating us. I appreciate the effort and I hope communication continues in this vein.

Rich first started talking about this months ago. As i see it... The official message does not herald the start of work, but the commitment to finish it.

One lives in hope but it seemed more of a 'yeah I guess we need to really do this' vs a 'we've been on this secretly for the last 3 years and this is the home stretch". Better late than never I guess

TrvpEriith · January 2022

ZOS_MattFiror wrote: »

It’s long past time to give everyone an update on where we are with PvP improvements. As many of you know, we did a series of tests over the last year to give us more data. These tests were successful and gave us the information we needed. We now have a plan going forward - but heads up: it is going to take some time.

In short – just like we did for the client a year or so back when we introduced multithreaded rendering to increase client frame rates – we are going to rearchitect our server. The version of ESO in 2022 is many magnitudes larger and more complex than the ESO that launched in 2014. So, in order to give everyone a good play experience in high-intensity situations like PvP and Trials, we need to essentially rewrite some of the foundational server code to account for it. This should dramatically increase server performance, but obviously we will need to test and evaluate as we go along.

We’ve been planning this for the last quarter and we’re starting work on it right now. But, as you can imagine, changing the fundamentals of a huge live game such as ESO is a delicate and multi-stepped process, so expect this to take up much of 2022. Much of the early work is going to happen behind the scenes and we are definitely not going to rush it. A re-architecture of this magnitude will require the entire game to be re-tested and evaluated, as this particular code is the foundation on which the game is built. It will take tons of QA and testing time as well, and I’m sure that when the time comes, we’ll do as large a test as we can on the PTS.

In the meantime, we’ll consider additional ways to keep Cyrodiil and Battlegrounds interesting and exciting (for example, potentially special rulesets or weekend events) and will continue to work on bug fixes affecting combat, but we won’t be adding any new features to PvP until the work mentioned above is complete. Doing so would not only prolong the fixes we want to implement but would also exacerbate the issue of poor performance.

We completely understand the frustration many of you are feeling, especially with lack of information about our PvP plans. This was a huge decision to make and we needed to make sure we had exhausted all other possibilities before announcing this. Thanks for bearing with us, and we will give you periodic updates about the re-architecture progress over the course of the year.

Thank you for this detailed of an explanation. In regards to Gina's earlier twitter question about communication I would say this sets an excellent example of moving in the right direction. I look forward to hearing the periodic updates throughout the year and the possibility of new pvp oriented weekend events!

Parasaurolophus · January 2022

TechMaybeHic wrote: »

As far back as 2016, there has been a post about working on it. Top priority and all.

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/25563

Why should anyone believe anything different is going to happen this year?

Xandreia_ wrote: »

@ZOS_MattFiror excuse us for being sceptical but for the past 3 years all we have heard is "we are working on it"

whilst i applaud your damage control post it doesn't really tell us anything. we've had a year of performance, promises of fixes, promises of an improved cyrodiil experience but we are yet to see anything, nothing has been done, nothing has been communicated and its the cause for distrust of the devs.

we just want a working environment that was Afterall the selling point of the game upon release.

there is no other combat system like eso and thats the only reason PvPers have stuck around.

It is obvious that the problem has gone far beyond PVP performance.

Vevvev · January 2022

Parasaurolophus wrote: »

TechMaybeHic wrote: »

As far back as 2016, there has been a post about working on it. Top priority and all.

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/25563

Why should anyone believe anything different is going to happen this year?

Xandreia_ wrote: »

@ZOS_MattFiror excuse us for being sceptical but for the past 3 years all we have heard is "we are working on it"

whilst i applaud your damage control post it doesn't really tell us anything. we've had a year of performance, promises of fixes, promises of an improved cyrodiil experience but we are yet to see anything, nothing has been done, nothing has been communicated and its the cause for distrust of the devs.

we just want a working environment that was Afterall the selling point of the game upon release.

there is no other combat system like eso and thats the only reason PvPers have stuck around.

It is obvious that the problem has gone far beyond PVP performance.

Indeed, it's been effecting zones with very active player populations and Trials as well. Any time the players get together and start using lots of abilities and proccing sets in mass server performance begins to drop.

Beardimus · January 2022

Great news.

Ksariyu · January 2022

I and apparently many others are glad to at least get some form of official update on. . . well frankly anything. And really, this is all most of us need - just a general update that gives any indication the dev team is working on something, especially when that something is an issue that's been shouted from the rooftops for literally years now. Months and months of silence and another small PR disaster shouldn't be the requirement for what really is still a small drop of actual information.

Anyway, glad to hear something at least. I genuinely hope there will be some improvements when it's all said and done, and hopefully that doesn't take another three years.

StevieKingslayer · January 2022

Thank you for finally giving us an official update on this. I've been saying for a long time that I think all those tests would culminate in re writing the original code. I honestly think that if you need to shut down pvp while you do part of that, then just do it. Please. I just want it working, I don't care if you shut it down for a month to test and implement. As long as it comes back stronger.

Also, weekend events? Thank you, yes!

esogamer2021 · January 2022

Just wanted to give you my own personal opinion

this is in no way a disrespectful post to the game or to anyone who works for eso but I think it’s always best to have real feedback from your players weather it’s negative feedback constructive feedback or positive Its feedback I think it’s important for people to have a honest opinion and this is mine and I hope you fully appreciate and how and where I’m coming from .

I’m happy you’ve finally given us a detailed update I understand what you’re saying here and the current state of the game more so for PVP players and in cryodill main campaigns is extremely bad , we expect some issues with this type of game but some days PvP is unplayable and it’s the worst I’ve seen it , even PvP content creators are leaving but I appreciate the fact that you’ve decided to try and do something to help combat this.

I get where your coming from with the keep battle grounds and PvP interesting but until the game is stable enough to cope with the amount of people playing and to be played at pace where you can use skills as they are intended to be used (( that’s not including the server dysnc issues ) and you don’t disconnect or randomly get blue screened or server kicked I can’t see this having much of an impact because you need that base stability to be sorted out first otherwise it’s just going to be another day of lag fests. I know your aware of how things are but unless you play and experience these issues daily yourself then you can’t fully understand where people are coming from .

Do I believe this will definitely be done ? Not really that’s not me jumping on the eso negative band wagon, I’m basing It on my own opinion on the last 5 years of playing eso and of the previous things that were going to happen but never did and it just seems like you have other expansion or chapter that is due to be released and as usual better changes are being promised.

Don’t get me wrong I really really enjoy playing eso I play daily Ive over 9,000 hours of eso play time but I’ve lost confidence because of what’s been promised previously and that’s just my own personal opinion but I really hope that the ideas you have and the new things your outlined do happen not just for your players but for eso as whole so I’ll watch what happens and I genuinely hope that things get better 😁

FrancisCrawford · January 2022

BloodyStigmata wrote: »

Aside from the badly needed PVP performance fixes that this will supposedly address, what else can we expect from this revision of the foundational code? Will this potentially open up other avenues for different types of content or customization that weren't possible before?

They don't know. Because when they fix the worst bottlenecks they now know of, hard-to-predict new ones will come to the fore.

https://www.dbms2.com/2009/08/21/bottleneck-whack-a-mole/