Account Wide Achievements: What's the impact?

Ishtarknows · March 2022

SerafinaWaterstar wrote: »

On console so the anticipation of this is debilitating, but can someone on pc please confirm if there definitely is a reduction in xp available now when playing alts, if things like delves & wbs have already been done on another character?

Obviously there's not a reduction in XP available since mobs respawn all the time and you can always grind for XP.

What there is though, is a massive reduction in easily got XP. There's no XP now for just wandering around discovering places or completing delves etc. Gone are the days where you could travel to a few guild mates to gain wayshrines and enough XP to hit level 10 for a random dungeon within a few minutes of spawning. What zos took away (replayability) they are replacing with grind. Cheers!

kringled_1 · March 2022

SerafinaWaterstar wrote: »

On console so the anticipation of this is debilitating, but can someone on pc please confirm if there definitely is a reduction in xp available now when playing alts, if things like delves & wbs have already been done on another character?

I can't test delve bosses because I don't have any that are incomplete other than Cyrodiil delves with multiple bosses. However, I do have a few world bosses incomplete, all in base game areas. Fought one and got the achievement this morning. Xp recorded in the loot log was 1.6k xp, which I think is similar to a repeat kill. These used to give closer to 10k on first kill, which I believe was awarded with the achievement. So both world boss and dlc dungeon slayer achievements have had xp awards removed from them, even for a first time kill, let alone repeating whether on an alt or not.

SerafinaWaterstar · March 2022

zaria wrote: »

SerafinaWaterstar wrote: »

On console so the anticipation of this is debilitating, but can someone on pc please confirm if there definitely is a reduction in xp available now when playing alts, if things like delves & wbs have already been done on another character?

Its an reduction in that you do not get xp for discovery on new characters or the sweet xp from doing an dolmen the first time.
However this is just an tiny fraction of the xp you get taking an new character to level 50. But its make it take longer to get to level 10.

It may be a ‘tiny fraction’ in your eyes but consider the number of delves & wbs etc, it all adds up to a considerable amount…..

ADarklore · March 2022

I'm not sure why people are saying you don't get XP from discovering places... because I was gaining XP last night every time I discovered a new location on the map or wayshrine, etc. As far as I can tell, there are no 'achievements' based on individual discovery locations... although there may not be an XP gain if there is an accumulated 'achievement' after discovering all locations (the pathfinder achievement I believe).

kringled_1 · March 2022

I'm not sure either. Discovery xp should still be there, and is linked to the map (which is still maintained as character specific). But there was definitely a lot of potential xp awards tied to achievements that is no longer available.

BlueRaven · March 2022

This whole thing by zos really felt like a solution in search of a problem.

This just messed up so many things, and server performance feels worse now then it was before.

_Zathras_ · March 2022

BlueRaven wrote: »

This whole thing by zos really felt like a solution in search of a problem.

This just messed up so many things, and server performance feels worse now then it was before.

If only they had prior warning; if people had only told them this wasn't going to work, and to reconsider.

Mythgard1967 · March 2022

I have been getting the same discovery XP as I did before AWA. This looks like a lot of disinformation.

And just to be contrary....all the posts say Alts are now useless with AWA....my experience is the opposite. Alts were useless to ME without AWA. I will say that the number of posts that say "everyone hates this" and "everyone agrees that alts are useless" and "everyone says this is bad" are starting to fray me a bit. I won't take a break from the game but I am thinking I might need to take a break from these forums if that kind of hyperbole is starting to get to me. All I keep thinking is....you don't speak for me.

So to speak for myself...Alts are now possible and fun for me where they weren't before.

New content? Damn that means I have to do it on my "main" that I don't even enjoy playing anymore so that I can get the achievements on a single character and then I can go back to playing the classes I enjoy more.

Since AWA; I have been having a blast playing on classes I enjoy more without worrying about any achievements. If cosmetics and dyes weren't tied to achievements or to "groups" of achievements; I wouldn't care as much...but they are.

If one of my characters gets a "title" that I do not feel is appropriate for that character due to another character having won it??? I don't have to use it. I am not worried if someone else is running around on a level 2 with a title not appropriate to that level. That is their game and if they want to set expectations in others who meet them in game...that they can't live up to....that is their choice. Their reputation will ultimately suffer.

I would take what we have now with AWA over what we had without it any day of the week. Even with the deeply flawed implementation. I am not saying that I think the implementation of AWA was good...far from it.....it could have been MUCH better....but...I am saying I prefer it broken to not having AWA at all.

Kirawolfe · March 2022

Hello!
Been with ESO since 2013 when I was in Beta. Took a long break a few months after release, then came back during Greymoor. Had been playing every day since then. Have dumped perhaps a little too much money into the game (think I'm one of those whales they like so much).

I haven't played since the update, save to give my trading guild a donation a little boost in pages before the flip.

I think the folks who wonder what all the fuss about AWA giving everyone the same title is, don't understand how I (and it seems many folks here) play this game. It actually has nothing to do with the titles you can choose to display.

I play for the new stories I can create on every one of my alts. Emphasis on NEW. And that's not possibly anymore with this update.

Sure, I can quest, but boy it's going to be confusing when my level 3 has people recognize he's a member of the thieves guild based on something else another toon has done. It's also really deflating when delves, dungeons, etc are registered as done as soon as he walks by. To not be able to give him the full story line of Greymoor - including that scene everyone's mentioned with Verandis at the very end - because one of these other characters of mine has already done it, is sad.

I love the idea of player achievements. I feel so sorry for the folks who had to get master angler %) I hate fishing. XD To be able to cumulatively compile those into something you as a player have done, is great. Love it. To be able to see how much the game you've experienced as a player is a great idea. But it shouldn't have come at the cost of the new stories you can weave with new characters you create. Player achievements should be separate from character progression.

The world should react to my level 3 doofus as a level 3 doofus. It has nothing to do with titles. A title is something I can choose. But I can't choose to not let what another character has done affect how the world reacts to this new character, and that's the damage this update has done.

I've unsubscribed. I'm taking a break. This impromptu event isn't going to bring me back, but I have a friend in a lot of pain right now that I like to roleplay with, with new alts, and may need to log in just to cheer him up. I'm not buying any more stuff. No more crowns.

The folks who chew through the game to get all of the achievements, to do every dungeon, to push every score they can, will tire of it and leave. That's completely fair, and a valid way to play this game. The folks who enjoy simply being in the world, who find new ways to experience the old stories over and over with characters they've crafted to take different narrative paths, are the ones who tend to stick around. Because the game is very replayable from that perspective.

ZOS has broken that.

Sorry for the novel. Not sure what's going to bring me back. Everyone's said it already - outside of the major bug fixes needed (dungeon finder, zone maps, skyshards, camera bugs, gimpy Bosmer, etc etc) - individual character progression and narrative has to be restored. It has to be separated from player achievements. No idea how the hell they'll do that when they trashed everything for a little more space in a database.

wolfie1.0. · March 2022

Jem_Kindheart wrote: »

I would have gladly paid a sub increase to $20 or $25 a month for them to NOT have this go live. They could have used the funds to upgrade their 1998 servers and impress investors at the same time!

Been playing since beta and I cannot see any QoL or performance improvement possible in this. I clearly don't work on the backend but an achievement/progress database file of my entire account cannot have possibly been more that a couple hundred kilobytes if properly written, maybe 2MB if very badly written.

If their server room, in 2022, cannot handle a few hundred thousand active db files open at 256kb or 2MB each, despite the massive money we've thrown at them over the years, such they they had to smash all character progress down to shave a few kilobytes, then I just don't imagine much future for the company or the game.

To put it another way. I paid 1000's of dollars per year to keep the game I enjoyed running. I will NOT be paying such sums until and unless ZOS restores my faith in them.

I will not be quitting, because I am at this point still redeeming my purchases. And I will still play. A playing customer is not the same as a paying one.

FluffyReachWitch · March 2022

kringled_1 wrote: »

So both world boss and dlc dungeon slayer achievements have had xp awards removed from them, even for a first time kill, let alone repeating whether on an alt or not.

Now that's interesting. It's already more of a grind to level side characters since they're now locked out of achievement experience by default. I suppose it puts main characters on equal footing with side characters in terms of the grind if that experience is gone entirely.

It would be helpful for ZoS to clarify whether this is the intended behavior for newly acquired achievements. The patch notes and articles leading up to the update covered the changes to Undaunted skill experience, but not this.

Whatever the case, this is a significant experience nerf, and the discovery experience we've always had sadly doesn't cover the losses. Buffs to discovery experience and perhaps questing experience could alleviate that.

Oliviander · March 2022

wolfie1.0. wrote: »

Jem_Kindheart wrote: »

I would have gladly paid a sub increase to $20 or $25 a month for them to NOT have this go live. They could have used the funds to upgrade their 1998 servers and impress investors at the same time!

Been playing since beta and I cannot see any QoL or performance improvement possible in this. I clearly don't work on the backend but an achievement/progress database file of my entire account cannot have possibly been more that a couple hundred kilobytes if properly written, maybe 2MB if very badly written.

If their server room, in 2022, cannot handle a few hundred thousand active db files open at 256kb or 2MB each, despite the massive money we've thrown at them over the years, such they they had to smash all character progress down to shave a few kilobytes, then I just don't imagine much future for the company or the game.

To put it another way. I paid 1000's of dollars per year to keep the game I enjoyed running. I will NOT be paying such sums until and unless ZOS restores my faith in them.

I will not be quitting, because I am at this point still redeeming my purchases. And I will still play. A playing customer is not the same as a paying one.

Same here still sitting on 70k + crowns 17k+ endeavors and 800+ gems and the purchase of high Isle.

I'll play - but no more bucks from me - even cancelled my sub

Jaraal · March 2022

Oliviander wrote: »

wolfie1.0. wrote: »

Jem_Kindheart wrote: »

I would have gladly paid a sub increase to $20 or $25 a month for them to NOT have this go live. They could have used the funds to upgrade their 1998 servers and impress investors at the same time!

Been playing since beta and I cannot see any QoL or performance improvement possible in this. I clearly don't work on the backend but an achievement/progress database file of my entire account cannot have possibly been more that a couple hundred kilobytes if properly written, maybe 2MB if very badly written.

If their server room, in 2022, cannot handle a few hundred thousand active db files open at 256kb or 2MB each, despite the massive money we've thrown at them over the years, such they they had to smash all character progress down to shave a few kilobytes, then I just don't imagine much future for the company or the game.

To put it another way. I paid 1000's of dollars per year to keep the game I enjoyed running. I will NOT be paying such sums until and unless ZOS restores my faith in them.

I will not be quitting, because I am at this point still redeeming my purchases. And I will still play. A playing customer is not the same as a paying one.

Same here still sitting on 70k + crowns 17k+ endeavors and 800+ gems and the purchase of high Isle.

I'll play - but no more bucks from me - even cancelled my sub

High Isle will be the first expansion I won't purchase. Looked at the new house and all I could think about is why would I give these people any more money, so that's not happening. I'll have to be satisfied with what I've already invested... because who knows what they will take away from us next? And TBH, I'm only playing a fraction of the time I was before, so my motivation is gone anyway.

peacenote · March 2022

ADarklore wrote: »

I'm not sure why people are saying you don't get XP from discovering places... because I was gaining XP last night every time I discovered a new location on the map or wayshrine, etc. As far as I can tell, there are no 'achievements' based on individual discovery locations... although there may not be an XP gain if there is an accumulated 'achievement' after discovering all locations (the pathfinder achievement I believe).

Yea I was curious about this too. It doesn't make sense to me. I'm not sure if it is an assumption that, because the map isn't always working that you don't get the xp if the icon doesn't change color or if there WERE achievements that added XP that no longer work and people are getting mixed up. I would like to be clearer on that.

There are at least some places where you get achievements for going there the first time. A lot of them, I think, have to do with if a new dungeon set comes out and you enter one, you get a pop up. I liked those to be character specific because I liked having a log of the different dates. But I have no idea if they gave XP or not. Never noticed.

I'd test it but I keep getting kicked off the server. :P

The_Boggart · March 2022

Starting cadwels silver on an alt
First task catch zones rare fish.

First disappointment from AWA
Fish caught, no flashing achievement banner.

First question
were any achievement points awarded all my past alts have?

A new rally cry
"Equal treatment for all alts".

kringled_1 · March 2022

Tested on EU - delve boss achievement xp is also no longer there.

LannStone · March 2022

My small report: I just finished leveling another alt through the Coldharbour main quest (which I've done 18 times before on my main account and a couple times already on this second account) and didn't notice any difference in dialogue, quests or XP gain

The_Boggart · March 2022

In cold harbour the daedra conversation to my alt was assuming the meeting in shadowfen I.e. addressing a n alt from EP but my alt was DC and never met it

Kesstryl · March 2022

.

The_Boggart wrote: »

In cold harbour the daedra conversation to my alt was assuming the meeting in shadowfen I.e. addressing a n alt from EP but my alt was DC and never met it

These things should be screenshot and posted as bugs, either on the bug report forum, or using in game slash bug feature, or both. I say this because the only way going forward that these inconsistencies will be fixed is if enough people complain about them. There are also people who've been asking for which quests are bugged, there's one on PTS and one in the general forum.

barney2525 · March 2022

Saieden wrote: »

Legitimate gameplay degradation includes map locations being auto completed, and delves and Dolmens don't give completion xp.

freespirit wrote: »

Skyshards are a mess!

All my characters now know the same number BUT those characters that haven't actually "found" them ofc don't have the corresponding number of skill points available AND the undiscovered icons are missing for those characters now!!

It's going to be a damn nightmare trying to work this one out for me. I have several low level characters that I level in Below 50 PVP, on those characters I would just go collect a few skyshards as I needed more skill points. Now I don't understand how I'm supposed to "know" which skyshards I have collected and which I haven't.

Please somebody tell me I'm being stupid and missing something?

Your best bet is to turn off addons, as they still track the old achievement. But generally, this is just the way it is now.

Agreed. And IMHO ... it's Krap. Achievements tell the Story of the Character. That's - the CHARACTER. It's Not the Story of the Account. The Account will Gain All the benefits of attaining the Achievements, without needing to wipe out the game play of the characters. I know there are people who don't like the concept that the Characters and the Account are not one and the same thing. But I've got One vampire character and yet for some mystical reason ALL my characters have achieved level 10 vampirism. It's just plain stupid. And the whole concept wipes out a lot of Flavor of the game. I just started a new character, started main quest, got to Kenarthi's roost and went to do the Fishing achievement. Caught the fish, No system response. Of course. A different character had already done it so this character is denied the opportunity. So I guess the bait market in AH is going to tank. There is absolutely no reason to play characters for their own development. Every character I have is a Master Crafter in every craft... even the ones I haven't created yet... right from level 1. Way to reduce the game from character's development to just a bunch of numbers on a stat sheet. Bravo.

Edit: Just read the Q/A on this. The bottom line is - They won't change this because its a way for them to store less data. The last thing they say is that they will Not change it unless there is a catastrophe of some sort. The actual views of the players don't seem to have been taken into account.

newtinmpls · March 2022

ArchangelIsraphel wrote: »

At this point I think I'm salting my popcorn with my own tears while watching a train wreck. God knows I've accumulated enough salt over the past month to supply an entire circus with popcorn for years xD

ArchangelIsraphel wrote: »

I can only imagine what those who never knew who cared about achievements and character identity are feeling right now as they log in to discover what's become of their account.

Looking over the feedback and the various self-congratulatory sounding comments by some of the devs/community reps, have come to a tentative speculation (I hesitate to say 'conclusion').

In the past, I've commented that the dearth of support for PvP and the generosity of support for housing/cosmetics is due to the ease of the latter being monetized.

It occurs to me that while there is a large player base of TES fans who WANT many, individual characters, and really like the RPG part of MMORPG, there may be another base of ESO fans who:

1-Will spend money on cosmetics and crown store items

AND

2-Don't care about individual characters as individual characters

I'll call them "Chess Players" as opposed to RPGers.

Both will spend money
Both may prefer more than one character, but in the former it's "character as people" and in the latter its "which chess piece do I want to move today"

The Chess Players
-Inherently wouldn't care about individual character accomplishments, and likely would prefer AWA only
-wouldn't want/need as many character slots - depending on the current Meta, maybe one for each class - and if we get class change tokens, that number would likely reduce to one
-[critical point] spend money.

They would be much lower maintenance customers, and a good source of income

I think that in terms of shaking out the hard core PRGers and encouraging (possibly courting) the Chess Players, this update may well be "working as intended"

If I am right, in the next year I expect to see a Class Change Token monetized.

Kesstryl · March 2022

newtinmpls wrote: »

ArchangelIsraphel wrote: »

At this point I think I'm salting my popcorn with my own tears while watching a train wreck. God knows I've accumulated enough salt over the past month to supply an entire circus with popcorn for years xD

<snippage>

ArchangelIsraphel wrote: »

I can only imagine what those who never knew who cared about achievements and character identity are feeling right now as they log in to discover what's become of their account.

Looking over the feedback and the various self-congratulatory sounding comments by some of the devs/community reps, have come to a tentative speculation (I hesitate to say 'conclusion').

In the past, I've commented that the dearth of support for PvP and the generosity of support for housing/cosmetics is due to the ease of the latter being monetized.

It occurs to me that while there is a large player base of TES fans who WANT many, individual characters, and really like the RPG part of MMORPG, there may be another base of ESO fans who:

1-Will spend money on cosmetics and crown store items

AND

2-Don't care about individual characters as individual characters

I'll call them "Chess Players" as opposed to RPGers.

Both will spend money
Both may prefer more than one character, but in the former it's "character as people" and in the latter its "which chess piece do I want to move today"

The Chess Players
-Inherently wouldn't care about individual character accomplishments, and likely would prefer AWA only
-wouldn't want/need as many character slots - depending on the current Meta, maybe one for each class - and if we get class change tokens, that number would likely reduce to one
-[critical point] spend money.

They would be much lower maintenance customers, and a good source of income

I think that in terms of shaking out the hard core PRGers and encouraging (possibly courting) the Chess Players, this update may well be "working as intended"

If I am right, in the next year I expect to see a Class Change Token monetized.

But RPGers do spend a lot of money. That's the group that's more likely to buy the expensive houses off the Crown store. RPGers are more likely to buy extra char slots to create characters a.k.a actual people living in Tamriel and experiencing the stories as individual people, so definitely a group that will buy chapters and DLC. Both groups might spend equal amounts on costumes and mounts, but prioritizing Chess Players over RPGers is shooting themselves in the foot.