Notes on the Quitting ESO epidemic.

markulrich1966 · August 2022

steamcharts befote U35:
-16.48%
now:
-13.77%

So the amount of players is increasing since the update.

I guess many had the usual burnout, this was increased by the MYM event that many people do not see as "Event", as they don't PVP. So they took a break.

Now they have a reason again to spend more time in the game, checking their builds and adapting them.

YandereGirlfriend · August 2022

peacenote wrote: »

The OP has made a very thoughtful post and unfortunately the fact that the title has "quitting ESO epidemic" has caused a lot of folks to go down the rabbit hole of what an epidemic of quitting would be.

Not to make assumptions but I think people are loosely defining that term in their heads as either "the most people who have ever quit in a period of time in reaction to a change" or maybe "the amount of people quitting would be visibly be obvious to ALL such that the game feels dead everywhere." And then using argument to those internal definitions to counter that a lot of people aren't quitting.

That's all kind of missing the point. Due to ESO's vast array of platforms, servers, and variety of content, it is actually unlikely that ESO would ever suddenly just die due to a mass exodus. I have done other posts on this, so I'll end that particular thought there.

The real point is that some of us are seeing friends, acquaintances, and content creators quit the game over changes made to it when they would likely would still be happy players if the changes hadn't been implemented. Moreover, these folks seem to be longtime players, in some cases having been around since Beta. It is commonly accepted that it is more expensive to recruit new customers (or employees) than it is to keep existing customers, so this is a red flag for the changes being released.

It doesn't really matter, imo, if it's 10 or 25 or 100 or 1000 players per patch. It doesn't matter if all of you notice or some or even a handful. Patches and changes should make people want to return to the game! They should be met with mostly excitement or neutrality, and of course there's always some skepticism. But people ARE leaving. I am certain that the people coming on the forums and saying their friends have quit (like me) are not lying.

Is it an epidemic? I don't know and I don't think it matters. It's still not a GOOD sign and ZOS should pay attention to well-thought out posts like the OP's to try and keep customers instead of losing more. In my opinion, while obviously people come and go all the time, any more than a couple of people quitting in outrage or sadness due to a patch is too many.

Well said and I very much agree.

Your point about the reception of patches was especially poignant and rang true in my subjective experience. Both myself and basically everyone that I know in the game (which skews heavily toward PvP) approach patch notes with a mixture of anxiety and apprehension these days - we have ever since all of the unwanted format changes and tests done to PvP in 2020-1. One of those patches basically deleted my home campaign (Ravenwatch), which went from thriving to utterly dead after being on the wrong side of one of these random changes.

As you say, in most games patches are like opening presents on Christmas morning whereas in this game recently it is like peeking through your fingers at the screen and wondering which classes are no longer playable, how many dozens of hours you're going to have to spend re-grinding all of your builds, and what core game mechanics are getting changed or outright removed. It should not be that way.

The one shining counterexample was the patch for the Sticker Book and curated dungeon drops. That really WAS like opening up an amazing present from the devs. I wish that we could have more patches like that. Probably everyone does.

UnabashedlyHonest · August 2022

...guess I won't quote that post after all. lolz That was so fast it was like a magic trick.

Seminolegirl1992 · August 2022

Jaraal wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

I've seen just as many players in game as always

Every zone in the game (except Cyrodiil and Imperial City) has different population shards, or instances. We don't know the exact number of players each shard is limited to, and it probably varies from zone to zone. But once an instance is filled with players, a new one is spun up, and is populated until full, and the process repeated.

The effect of this is that there may be (hypothetically) 400 people in Vvardenfell, spread across four instances, at 100 players per instance. Now, if there are 200 players in Vvardenfell, they would be in two instances. 100 players, 1 instance. How does this apply to your statement? Well, if there were 400 players in Vvardenfell every day last month at any given day, but that figure drops to only 100 players per day, then the number of players you actually see does not change.

So visual cues are not a good indicator of player population levels. Unless you get to the point where there are only 50 or 25 players per day in Vvardenfell, and then you might notice the emptiness on a consistent basis.

This right here^ There is indeed a mass exodus of players. Similar to the one around Morrowind's release, it seems. Though I don't have the numbers to back that up. That's just from quieter discords and two of my raids disbanding recently.

Seminolegirl1992 · August 2022

hiyde wrote: »

Here's some anecdotal info:

Historically, in the two big/busy trade guilds I help run:

A Chapter Launch week would see around 180 concurrent members logged in during primetime. (Well over 200 in older days)
A DLC Launch week would see 150+ peak.

So far this week, since the DLC launch, our busiest of the 2 guilds peaked at 92.
We checked with 15 other trade guilds in busy locations and only one of them passed 100 during primetime. (102)

One of our 2 trading guilds had *0* applications in 3 days. That has never happened before.

I'm not saying it's anything scientific, but these guilds have been around since 2014 and I'm fairly concerned over what I'm seeing this week. Curious to see what weekend numbers look like.

If the game sees a significant exodus, I hope ZOS learned the necessary lessons to alter course for the future. This is a terrific game with a stellar community and I don't see a lot of competition out there to peel away players if this game is in a good state.

I'm in one of hiyde's guilds. Can concur. I am one of those people that has missed about a week of logging in (haven't done that in years). I'm lucky they didn't kick me lol. This hurts trading guilds like ours who work tirelessly to help provide an economy for people to sell their stuff.

Olen_Mikko · August 2022

Okay.

You can send your stuff to me

DarcyMardin · August 2022

I have no clue whether there’s actually an epidemic of quitting (I kinda doubt it, because I’ve heard this over and over at various points over the past 8 years), but I can confirm that I, at least, am not signing in very often. This is highly unusual for me. My favorite templars all suck, suddenly, and my wardens, also favs, aren’t doing much better.

But mainly I am just SO sick of the constant drastic changes in the gameplay. And I refuse to adjust all my gear and stats all over again. I’m burned out on doing that *yet again.*

Maybe update 36 will revert some of the current mess…I hope so, but don’t have a lot of faith in that idea. It might be time to seek out another game, if there even is one that offers some of the same delights as ESO used to offer me.
.

Seminolegirl1992 · August 2022

UnabashedlyHonest wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

SizanLopkniht wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

SizanLopkniht wrote: »

SilverBride wrote: »

There is no quitting ESO epidemic.

There absolutely IS an epidemic of people leaving ESO. Ask any trading guild GM. Ask any trial raid leader. Ask any PvP regular and they will tell you there absolutely IS a mass exodus of players leaving ESO.

I've been a member is a successful trading guild for quite awhile now and we had one member say they were unhappy with the changes. Except for an occasional member leaving, which happens in all guilds, the only ones we lost since the update were those who were purged for not meeting the weekly sales requirements, and they were quickly replaced.

I've been all over Tamriel and I see just as many other players as I always have going about business as usual.

What trading guild are you referring to and where is the trader located?

You've repeatedly posted that you don't do solo or group trials, don't do battlegrounds, that you don't PvP and that you don't participate in vet HM dungeons or the PTS. That means there is a whole heck of a lot of the game you have not taken part in.

The major trade guilds that pay tens of millions of gold/week to keep their prime traders are, in fact, losing so many members lately that they are seriously struggling to pay the rent now days. Sure, if your trader is in some obscure location and populated with a small number of casual players they're doing fine. But the major trade guilds certainly ARE NOT doing fine now days. They are struggling.

Not taking part in something doesn't mean I don't know anything about it. ......

Actually, not taking part in any given content literally does mean you know less about that content and what it takes to complete it than the people who do participate in and complete that content.

Someone who's never gone scuba diving knows much less about scuba diving than someone who's been diving for years. That's how experience works. Someone with first hand experience knows way more about any given activity than someone with no first hand experience doing that activity.

Username checks out.. :P

Outofvoid · August 2022

Really how can u see it how healthy the game is looking right now, I mean a lot of gamers left and still leaving and nobody knows exactly how many are still playing out there. I think that u will see a drop of people which raided before and thats the point of doing raids after the *** update....

Muizer · August 2022

Kingsindarkness wrote: »

There is a group of about twenty five to thirty people on the forums who are really upset (even sad/depressed) about Update 35, and they are working really hard to convince the developers to effect change, they must really love the game (or at least their favorite activity which is High End Raiding) because they have become a cohesive group that suggest deliberation and coordination off site. They are determined despite suggestions of leaving the game to right the ship so to speak by any reasonable means.

There is a even smaller group of PVP players, the last patch effects them though not nearly as much...still they have much sympathy for the previous group but still feels as though they are invisible in game and on the forums, still they hold out hope that if the last patch is fixed they can go back trying to get attention about their issues

The rest is all over the place, this is a much larger group of people that range from people who just don't really like ESO and feel that if it Closes Bethesda will release TES VI faster, to folks who dislike Trade guilds to everything in between.

Leaving the exact size of the pools aside, I agree it's important to realize how the Devs must look at the feedback.

Most negative feedback comes from people who are into the hardest content of ESO. If you look at the stated goals of patch, their feedback will be taken to concern how the dps ceiling is impacted. And given that it was the intent to bring it down, the response could be taken as an indication U35 is a step in the right direction.

For the impact on the casual player the Devs will be looking at the game stats. The large numbers. Not the predictions of hardcore endgame players speculating about how the changes would impact players of an entirely different demographic, however well informed those predictions are.

That, at least, is my guess. It would be nice though if communication about the path ahead was a bit more explicit. For instance, whether the follow up step is going to be to adjust the difficulty of the content in a more granular way than an across the board nerf of boss health, or whether they intend to keep tinkering with the dps side of things.

Finally, I agree that the rapid succession of sweeping changes is unquestionably tiresome. This goes well beyond "keeping the game fresh".

jtm1018 · August 2022

let me see,
I lost stun on sneak attack,
I lost major buffs on oakensoul,
Dot got nerfed,
empower now goes to HA,
Hmmnn,
I definitely do not like this patch.

Somber97866 · August 2022

They need to hire you to the dev team! So you seem to get it but they don't!

Ragnarok0130 · August 2022

ADarklore wrote: »

Toxic_Hemlock wrote: »

Ragnarok0130 wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Ragnarok0130 wrote: »

Frankly with how U35 nerfed the very people ZoS claimed over and over that they were helping access harder content I not convinced the devs actually know why their decisions nerfed players in general in U35.

They admitted that they didn't know the complete changes U35 would have until after they went live with it.
How does that look?

Oh my, that's as bad as when I heard a congressman say "we have to pass the bill to find out what's in it." That's actually a case study in how not to properly balance a complex game and case in point on why I was saying changes of this scope needed a 3-6 month PTS cycle at a minimum to identify all of the secondary and tertiary follow on effects of these changes. This game hasn't been in beta for 8 years and it's not an early access title, this shouldn't be the method employed by professional developers.

Well I guess you can't warrant having a balance team on the payroll if they don't spend their days "balancing" the hell out of the game!

^THIS! It's called 'job justification'... and if you don't give them something to do, they might start looking elsewhere for a job, and right now there is a huge demand for devs out there. I've said this same thing before, wondering if they constantly have to make changes just to give their devs something to do... instead of accepting that the game is in a great state and doesn't need any massive changes, just minor tweaks here and there. BUT, apparently you cannot continue paying devs to just sit around doing nothing.

I agree, but this keeps bringing me back to the point at what a competent company would do. If a company has a stable product (we all can wish) requiring only minor adjustments then a good company would balance the size of that department to their workload; not intentionally harm their product and their customers' product experience (and by extension their shareholders returns on investment) to justify a larger staff.

What I see here is the company leadership failing to actually do project management actively managing and coordinating their product and staff allowing them to run off and do whatever they want without regard for how it affects other portions of the business and the customers' overall product experience. This scenario is a large point of concern from a business standpoint but given how the devs have admitted different departments' goals actively worked against one another in U35 solidifies this as the situation for me.

Edit for spelling

TheHsN · August 2022

Before 2 years, Players like me had over 3000 hours on ESO warned the Developers, and quit playing.
I still come from time to time and check the updates and see that they have a sickness that they think they are always over the community. They never listen. See you on U36.

Legendry · August 2022

Kingsindarkness wrote: »

Looking at this entire thread...it's sorta all over the place. There really is no one thing people are upset about, I don't think it will really get much attention because it will be viewed as basic background noise.

My real life job is in research, I literally find out what certain groups like and dislike for a living.

Please don't shoot the messenger I am a neutral party and have sympathy for all sides here,, but...

After spending a few hours looking back through the forums and watching Youtube and Twitch this is what I have learned....

There is a group of about twenty five to thirty people on the forums who are really upset (even sad/depressed) about Update 35, and they are working really hard to convince the developers to effect change, they must really love the game (or at least their favorite activity which is High End Raiding) because they have become a cohesive group that suggest deliberation and coordination off site. They are determined despite suggestions of leaving the game to right the ship so to speak by any reasonable means.

There is a even smaller group of PVP players, the last patch effects them though not nearly as much...still they have much sympathy for the previous group but still feels as though they are invisible in game and on the forums, still they hold out hope that if the last patch is fixed they can go back trying to get attention about their issues

The rest is all over the place, this is a much larger group of people that range from people who just don't really like ESO and feel that if it Closes Bethesda will release TES VI faster, to folks who dislike Trade guilds to everything in between.

The problem is that when all of this is put together on the forums it looks like noise...and technical types turn off when they are faced with a wall of noise. The question is how should the most cohesive group out of all of this communicate their issues without just being part of the noise wall?

One way would be if all Stream team members start talking about the same thing...of course that isn't going to happen because only a few of them are into just hard core raiding, and it seems that those who are have the least viewership....

Honestly I really don't have a answer to this...as I said I find out what type of people like and dislike a certain thing....I collate data and pass it along...I'm sorta a one trick pony that way...but I hope my research will help people understand what side of the pool they are in at least.

There will be folks that disagree with my findings and might even get angry because they believe their tribe is much larger or what not...the only thing I can say is I used the eight steps of research and followed the scientific method as closely as possible for just a few hours...I could stretch out research time...but I don't think the wall of noise conclusion will change.

Anyway I hope this helps even if in a small way.

Hello sir, and thanks for the input. Did you read the opening statement for this particular discussion? Do you agree on poor timing on implementation of the Dynamic Equilibrium technique?

Billium813 · August 2022

markulrich1966 wrote: »

steamcharts befote U35:
-16.48%
now:
-13.77%

So the amount of players is increasing since the update.

I guess many had the usual burnout, this was increased by the MYM event that many people do not see as "Event", as they don't PVP. So they took a break.

Now they have a reason again to spend more time in the game, checking their builds and adapting them.

Don't underestimate the amount of people that didn't even realize things changed or even know what U35 is. I have heard from multiple players things like "why is my damage lower now?" and "did they change something?". I think this isn't something you can just look at total player numbers THE WEEK the update drops and gather anything substantial. Yes, content creators and end game players are commenting that they are leaving and having a percentage of that 10% leave is devastating for content and end game groups. But in all honesty, it's a small population of the horde that play this game.

Your average player isn't going to know anything is changing going into this new patch, just that new content is being released and they want to go play. They will notice the changes eventually and may dig in to find out what changed or ask chat. Once they know, it depends on how much they care as to if it'll make them leave/stop playing. I think the real break is if players can't complete content they USED to be able to. IMO, that is the hill that your average player will care the most about.

Elsonso · August 2022

Seminolegirl1992 wrote: »

hiyde wrote: »

I'm not saying it's anything scientific, but these guilds have been around since 2014 and I'm fairly concerned over what I'm seeing this week. Curious to see what weekend numbers look like.

If the game sees a significant exodus, I hope ZOS learned the necessary lessons to alter course for the future. This is a terrific game with a stellar community and I don't see a lot of competition out there to peel away players if this game is in a good state.

I'm in one of hiyde's guilds. Can concur. I am one of those people that has missed about a week of logging in (haven't done that in years). I'm lucky they didn't kick me lol. This hurts trading guilds like ours who work tirelessly to help provide an economy for people to sell their stuff.

I used to be in both @hiyde guilds and am wondering how the weekend went...

Cyber10 · August 2022

I definitely left after all of the update 35 nonsense. All they had to do was listen to the community and maybe pump the brakes on so much at once. They could have taken a more calculated approach and made the changes over a couple of updates instead of rushing it all into one.

ThirdEye_PULSE · August 2022

danno8 wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

mpicklesster wrote: »

Amottica wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

Y'all do realize that between the two statements "Among the players I know, there's a quitting epidemic" and "Among the players I know, there's not a quitting epidemic" can both be true statements, right? You're starting to circle quite a bit.

Good point. While Seam Charts does show a ~14% decline in players for the past 30 days vs. July but is not showing a notable change since the update launched. More importantly, comparing the past 30 days to August 2019, the last year not bloated by COVID's impact, there is little change.

While we may see players in our circle leaving the game due to this update, it is questionable that we are experiencing a mass exodus. Ofc, this is based on the only broad data source available. While limited, it is a better indicator of the game's health than the small circle of people any of us run with.

Also according to Steam Charts, ESO logins have gone down by about 20% since 8/22 (i.e., the release of U35).

On 8/22, logins peaked at about 24,309:

Today, 8/26, logins peaked at about 18,991:

(the difference between the 2 peaks is technically 21.8%, but I just said 20% for the sake of brevity).

P.S. The up-and-down, sinusoidal nature of login activity is probably just due to daytime versus nighttime differences in login activity. For sinusoidal data like that, you just have to make sure you analyze only the peaks or only the valleys if you want to measure rate of change without having to bring trigonometry into the mix. Hence why I just compared the two peaks from 8/22 and today.

I also looked up last year's data from Steam Charts, and it was just a line:

So things were either entirely different back then or they don't store day-to-day data that far back (or a bit of both).

Anyway--I'd say a 20% drop in 4 days isn't...good? That's 1/5 of their player base (at least according to Steam).

You are looking at peak, not average, players for the day. The peak can more easily be skewed as it is a very short-term measurement.

Also, the more worthy comparison is comparing the same month across years as it eliminates seasonal fluctuations. That is how business people and analysts look at such information. Even then, I go back to 2019 to eliminate the peak that came with COVID since we expected a decline over time as things got back to a new normal. That puts ESO on an even keel which, while not bad, does not have the growth they were dealing with. Also, while less of a drop, ESO did see a drop in August 2019 numbers from the previous month of July, though not as big.

Exactly. I mean if I look at the steamchart right now at 7:00AM this Saturday, it has a higher log-in count than any other 7:00am Saturday in August. So game must be doing great right? Wrong. Trends are meant to be longer term measurements.

I thoroughly believe U35 is going to cause a loss of players, but it will not be noticeable for a few weeks at least.

Not to mention steam charts is a very innaccurate way to gague population of game.

I think the most telling is the people relating their experiences with guild mates leaving in droves, especially when the guilds are for specific things. Certain communities and guilds are barely effected.

Kingsindarkness wrote: »

Looking at this entire thread...it's sorta all over the place. There really is no one thing people are upset about, I don't think it will really get much attention because it will be viewed as basic background noise.

My real life job is in research, I literally find out what certain groups like and dislike for a living.

Please don't shoot the messenger I am a neutral party and have sympathy for all sides here,, but...

After spending a few hours looking back through the forums and watching Youtube and Twitch this is what I have learned....

There is a group of about twenty five to thirty people on the forums who are really upset (even sad/depressed) about Update 35, and they are working really hard to convince the developers to effect change, they must really love the game (or at least their favorite activity which is High End Raiding) because they have become a cohesive group that suggest deliberation and coordination off site. They are determined despite suggestions of leaving the game to right the ship so to speak by any reasonable means.

There is a even smaller group of PVP players, the last patch effects them though not nearly as much...still they have much sympathy for the previous group but still feels as though they are invisible in game and on the forums, still they hold out hope that if the last patch is fixed they can go back trying to get attention about their issues

The rest is all over the place, this is a much larger group of people that range from people who just don't really like ESO and feel that if it Closes Bethesda will release TES VI faster, to folks who dislike Trade guilds to everything in between.

The problem is that when all of this is put together on the forums it looks like noise...and technical types turn off when they are faced with a wall of noise. The question is how should the most cohesive group out of all of this communicate their issues without just being part of the noise wall?

One way would be if all Stream team members start talking about the same thing...of course that isn't going to happen because only a few of them are into just hard core raiding, and it seems that those who are have the least viewership....

Honestly I really don't have a answer to this...as I said I find out what type of people like and dislike a certain thing....I collate data and pass it along...I'm sorta a one trick pony that way...but I hope my research will help people understand what side of the pool they are in at least.

There will be folks that disagree with my findings and might even get angry because they believe their tribe is much larger or what not...the only thing I can say is I used the eight steps of research and followed the scientific method as closely as possible for just a few hours...I could stretch out research time...but I don't think the wall of noise conclusion will change.

Anyway I hope this helps even if in a small way.

Hmm. Ive seen a huge general theme among players that a lot of us feel burnt out from the pace of changes every 3 months. Not only the frequency of every 3 months, but the amount of changes that are often packed into that 3 month window. For as long as I can remember this has been a problem.

It has led to burnout for me multiple times. Worse, it keeps me away from the game for longer periods of time than any other game I play because after 6 months you have to spend a long time getting caught back up to where current meta is.

Of course, as a PVP player im more keenly aware of meta, but im not alone in this burnout. Whether its replacing sets that get nerfed too hard or playing a class thats no longer fun to play.

Would be interesting to see how other people feel about this issue in a poll. I see what your saying. This game offers so much to do for so many different activities. It often seems everyone has their own particular problems or gripes with the game and that hardly will ever lead to change we all want.

I feel that generally as a community most can agree on these two things:

1. Change is too rapid. Every 3 months for the drastic changes they push through is just too much for the average person to keep up with. Especially if you enjoy content which requires you to be aware of meta or you like being as good as you can and playing a game feeling like your powerful.
2. Communication from devs. I think we can all agree that we want more of it.

I might be wrong but ive seen people say these things before and ive said them before as well as felt it before. Its impacted the amount of time i play the game. My last break was 2 years.

kurbbie_s · August 2022

Outofvoid wrote: »

Really how can u see it how healthy the game is looking right now, I mean a lot of gamers left and still leaving and nobody knows exactly how many are still playing out there. I think that u will see a drop of people which raided before and thats the point of doing raids after the *** update....

just look at the pvp servers, all dead except grey host. Dont use the "but midyear mayhem" no. its been over a month.

EldritchSun · August 2022

Personally for me, the patch wasn't the whole reason for my quitting. I was a low to mid-tier player, mostly doing solo stuff, vet DLC dungeons and pug trials as a tank were my endgame. I was tired of constant bugs such as Isobel or Wrothgar achievements not working (this should be addressed asap, not when the next patch hits the live servers), High Isle bosses kill still not counting, broken things like Mara's Balm set make it to the release despite everyone points out it's broken. I'm tired of lacking the class identity because of the non-class skills outperform class ones - hybridization and the new dungeon sets (my necro looks at you, Turning Tide and Archdruid) only made it worse. The patch notes and testers' feedback were the last nail in the coffin where my desire to keep playing was. Nothing I mentioned above was changed, but now I was supposed to change my build and gear for no reward, just to mitigate all those nerfs. I had enough of this and decided to quit.

P.S Sorry for my English.

Pelanora · August 2022

So, in the end, all things considered, is FFIV just more fun than ESO

wolfie1.0. · August 2022

I don't think that as many players are quiting as instead they are changing how they play.

For me for example. I have thus far spent update 35 fishing, playing tales of tribute and doing crafting writs. Been taking the dlc pretty easy. Mostly because irl has been rough lately and I pushed hard to get some content done before the update released.

OtarTheMad · August 2022

Well, all I can say is that for me the build fatigue is real. I am not sure if a ton of people have indeed quit or are taking a break but I know a lot of people are talking about it, more than usual. I've been playing since beta and I have seen the population fluctuate a lot but it just seems like this time it's different.

For me, I just can't dedicate the time to redoing my characters every patch, not anymore. I am just so tired of grinding gear, redoing cp to balance my playstyle, and being at least somewhat competitive so I can finish content with friends, figuring out a good rotation again, and rebalancing what works in PvE and what works in PVP. It's just a lot to keep redoing, especially if you don't have a ton of time to dedicate to it. I thought that the combat overhauls would stop, at least somewhat, after High Isle since that seems to have finished the hybridization changes but then they just started a brand new overhaul and that's when I tapped out. I was already getting tired of it because I am still trying to get used to Q1 and Q2 changes.

I do love the game, it's really fun so I will keep an eye on it while I take a break but every time I go to log in I just find myself saying "what's the point". Lastly, I have to be honest... out of all things that could have got me to finally play something else and truly put ESO on the shelf... I didn't think it would be build fatigue. I thought it'd be bugs, PvP issues, lack of content, hacks, life, etc... but not what it was.

Anfieldkris · August 2022

A lot of long time players I have known for years are leaving the game, or going on ‘a break’ which may last anywhere from not long at all to forever. Others are logging in, collecting daily rewards, maybe reloading traders or doing writs and logging off. My guilds in general have a lower level of applicants than previously as well. We also no longer have obvious succession for the officers, which we have always had for the six years the guild has been running. Admittedly that’s just from my corner of the world and my experience.

The issue that seems to be getting most people down far more so than previously, from the many I have spoken to, isn’t the new meta sets which will require grinding and golding up and transmutes etc all over again. Kind of goes with the mmo territory when there is a new chapter to sell. This time it is the fact that almost all of their current builds have been made utter garbage overnight, which just feels like vandalism.

The whole play your way thing, hmmmmm, what I would like to do is play in a way that everything I have isn’t gutted suddenly, even if it means that there is newer, shinier stuff out there for me to hunt down.

LesserCircle · August 2022

ZOS, ZOS we don't want to change everything on our builds every 3 months, we don't want to learn everything again every 3 months. Learning how everything works in MMOs is a big quit moment for many new players, but it can be for veteran players too. Just stop, thanks.

StaticWave · August 2022

Yup, this is one of the biggest reasons I stopped playing. I’m a theorycrafter at core, and it really really sucked to spend 2 months theorycrafting multiple builds and testing them, finding one build you really enjoy, only to find out that build is trash the next patch when skills get changed or sets get nerfed.

SilverBride · August 2022

Anfieldkris wrote: »

A lot of long time players I have known for years are leaving the game, or going on ‘a break’ which may last anywhere from not long at all to forever. Others are logging in, collecting daily rewards, maybe reloading traders or doing writs and logging off. My guilds in general have a lower level of applicants than previously as well. We also no longer have obvious succession for the officers, which we have always had for the six years the guild has been running. Admittedly that’s just from my corner of the world and my experience.

These things happen even when there isn't a new update. Long time players often move on as the new wears off, or to try the next new shiny. Some stop logging on all together but others still log on for the daily or to do writs or endeavors. Players are continuously coming and going so a lot of this is just that.

I don't disagree that some have left because of the update but that isn't the reason everyone who left did.

Anfieldkris · August 2022

SilverBride wrote: »

Anfieldkris wrote: »

A lot of long time players I have known for years are leaving the game, or going on ‘a break’ which may last anywhere from not long at all to forever. Others are logging in, collecting daily rewards, maybe reloading traders or doing writs and logging off. My guilds in general have a lower level of applicants than previously as well. We also no longer have obvious succession for the officers, which we have always had for the six years the guild has been running. Admittedly that’s just from my corner of the world and my experience.

These things happen even when there isn't a new update. Long time players often move on as the new wears off, or to try the next new shiny. Some stop logging on all together but others still log on for the daily or to do writs or endeavors. Players are continuously coming and going so a lot of this is just that.

I don't disagree that some have left because of the update but that isn't the reason everyone who left did.

Erm, I’m pretty confident that I didn’t state that this was the reason that everyone was leaving. I am also pretty confident that I didn’t mention the update. I simply commented on the reasons given to me by people I have played with for years, founded and run a couple of guilds with, spend hundreds of hours with in dungeons and cyrodiil, and so on, who have stopped playing recently, and who have run out of energy and enthusiasm for having their builds trashed.

NettleCarrier · August 2022

Quoting OP "A veteran player most of the time will be trying to craft their own builds rather than watch youtube."

Actually, no, not really. As a veteran player here, this game changes too much for me to even bother with theorycrafting my own builds. I copy YouTubers because they've (or at least their partners) have done the work already and if I were to show up to a vet trial in anything other than a gear setup that I could cite a well known parser then I might as well not show up because I won't be let in the door.

It's a shame really, there's a lot of fun and surprisingly effective set combos out there.