I loved the Necrom expansion. Bravo

Ingel_Riday · June 2023

Pre-ramble bottom line: I was continually impressed throughout this expansion. It was great, and it left me excited for what else you have in the pipeline. Masterfully wrought.

To needlessly elaborate a bit more:

I enjoyed all the quests. The side quests were wonderfully off-kilter, the main questline was well-paced and clever, and some of the storyline bosses had legitimately interesting mechanics that made them pretty fun to fight. I had a genuinely great time.
The voice acting and dialogue were top tier. I especially enjoyed Wes Johnson as Hermaeus Mora. That man is a national treasure. He’s talented, kind to the fans, and pours his heart and soul into his roles. He has brought so much joy to the community over the years, and I’m grateful that he has stuck by this franchise for almost two decades. I smiled every time his tentacled god took the proverbial stage.
The new environments were wonderfully crafted, full of artistic flourishes, and exciting to wander. I could go on for a while, but I’ll settle for mentioning one specific touch that got a giant smile from me. The lore commented that Necrom was built between the ribs of a giant that Vivec slew, and the arm arch corroborated that… but I never expected to see the slain behemoth’s skull in Gorne. I paused to just stare in awe when I noticed.
You struck a great balance between The Lower Telvanni Peninsula and Apocrypha. It reminded me of the balancing between Western Skyrim and Blackreach, and when I looked up the 2020 expansion up for reference... yep.

Blackreach had: 2 delves, 2 world bosses, 1 public dungeon, 2 points of interest (eye locations), 8 wayshrines, 1 crafting station, 4 landmarks, and a few group events (Harrowstorms). Just enough to give it substance without stealing too much thunder from Western Skyrim.

Meanwhile, The Lower Telvanni Peninsula has: 2 delves, 2 world bosses, 1 public dungeon, 2 points of interest (eye locations), 7 wayshrines, 1 crafting station, 4 landmarks, and a few group events (Bastion Nymics). In addition though, it also received the expansion’s capital city, a raid, and a few more story-related locales. As a result, it has more heft and meat to it than its Blackreach counterpart... but not so much as to steal too much thunder away from Apocrypha. A very hard balance to achieve, but you did it.
The random events, lore tidbits, and general vibe of Necrom and Apocrypha were wonderful. Specifically, your team nailed the dark elves. 100% on point. It made me very glad that you have plenty left to work with for future expansions. They won’t happen for a very long time, I wager, but you still have the Redoran lands north of Stonefalls, the Dres lands south of Deshaan (which would be great for a lawful evil “sure, we’re slavers, but those guys worship demons” lesser of two evils expansion), the rest of the Telvanni peninsula, and the Telvanni isles. Heck, you could even do an expansion with the unused isle of Sheogorad and pair it with the Shivering Isles. Lots of remaining story opportunities for glorious Mother Morrowind.

Blah blah blah, I know. Just wanted to throw out some love. Oh, and one last note: I got trained on that old “roses and thorns” form of critique, and I find it hard not to fall into the habit of going: “sure, this was pretty good… but this and that and this.”

Couldn’t quite do it here, though. I mean, I tried… but I think my thorns list just turned out petty and nit-picky.

I found one spot in the map where the ground glitched and exposed the world beneath (yes, this list is petty).
A few new lorebooks had some odd typos. Probably just needed one more editing passthrough.
The dialogue in Azandar’s first quest was charming but wonky. I know that Sharp-as-Night’s quest chain had some serious edits during its time on the Public Test Server, which took it from 50 Scales of Gray to Roots: Hist Edition. However, I never noticed any resultant typos or errors. Azandar… was a different story. In particular, Azandar’s first quest had some odd grammar errors, with him intermittently referring to his colleague Martina as a they and a she, alternating every other sentence. At one point, he flip-flopped MID-SENTENCE and I cackled in pure English-major amusement. I have no idea what happened here. (Also, since I know the last sentence of paragraph 1 is confusing out of context, the "she," "they," and "them" all refer to Martina. Nothing screams "immersive, in-the-moment experience" more than parsing grammar. :-P)
I actually enjoyed both the Bastion Nymic and the new World Bosses, but I wonder how they’re going to fare after a few months when zone traffic is down. They don’t scale based on number of players, and the enemy health pools / mechanics don’t lend themselves well to just a few participants. A worry for later, I suppose.
From a game design perspective, I understand why companion loyalty quests take place outside the expansion areas. They get new players to visit other zones, see more of the game world, and get engaged with it. Great. However, from a veteran player perspective, I lament it. I lamented it in High Isle and Blackwood, as well. The six companion loyalty quests in each recent expansion could have been used to further flesh out the new zones and expand the list of quest-associated landmarks (which totaled 9 in Blackwood, 9 in High Isle, and 9 here). Instead, 14% or so of the 42 total quests in Necrom take place outside the expansion’s new areas.

Again, I get it… but I always find it a bit of a shame. I would have loved another landmark or two in The Lower Telvanni Peninsula that used Sharp’s loyalty quests to explore Telvanni magical mishaps, or another landmark or two in Apocrypha that used Azandar’s loyalty quests to explore Hermaeus Mora’s connections to fate and probability. Instead, I got sent to delves and public dungeons which I have already completed multiple times on multiple characters. Not terrible, but not always very thrilling. “Oh, The Forgotten Crypts… I’ve been here dozens of times on four different characters. Wonderful.” *shrug*

That’s all the rambling I had in my tank. Praise petals mixed with a paltry assortment of petty, harmless thorns. I loved this expansion and I’m grateful for the joy it brought me. Thank you again. It was polished, intriguing, and very much an Elder Scrolls experience. A great time.

tsaescishoeshiner · June 2023

I don't think the she/they issues with Martina is a grammar oversight, but a pronoun one.

Given that it happens blatantly in the same sentence, it seems to suggest that they're portraying Martina with she/they pronouns (as in, both). Which is fine. But in real life, I've NEVER heard the same person constantly use both of someone else's pronouns in the same sentence. In different thoughts or contexts, sure. But not right next to each other. I assumed they meant well, but either didn't know how she/they pronouns typically work or have a different experience than me. (Or "than I" if we want to play prescriptivism lol)

This is why they should use sensitivity readers for their quests, if they don't already. It's standard practice in the book publishing industry.

Edit: Also great post, agree on a lot of the highlights!

Necrotech_Master · June 2023

i also enjoyed the new content, and felt the quests and story were significantly improved over blackwood/high isle quality

the only annoyance i have with the nymic dailies is the ichor step, i think the actual instance difficulty is fine, though some of the rewards could be improved just a bit (the only reason most people have to do it right now would be the leads)

PrinceShroob · June 2023

I have a lot of friends who use multiple pronouns, so Martina going by she/they didn't bother me, except for Azandar switching pronouns mid-sentence, which was a bit clumsy. I don't go by multiple pronouns myself, so I can't say it's "wrong."

I wondered why the post-recruitment companion quests don't actually use the chapter zones. I suspect it has something to do with companions being an account unlock--if you recruited a companion with ESO Plus active, then your subscription ran out, you'd still be able to do the companion's later quests. That said, the exception to this "rule" is Isobel, whose questline routinely sends you back to High Isle.

AzuraFan · July 2023

I wouldn't say I loved the expansion (I gave it a 3.5/5 in another thread), but I really liked the main quest story, and many of the quest hubs were fun too. So kudos to the writers for that.

I'm hoping we'll pick up the story later (IOW, I'm hoping that Laramil's final dialogue wasn't written before they decided not to do a Q4 story DLC and now they plan to do another storyline next year.)

Ingel_Riday · July 2023

AzuraFan wrote: »

I wouldn't say I loved the expansion (I gave it a 3.5/5 in another thread), but I really liked the main quest story, and many of the quest hubs were fun too. So kudos to the writers for that.

I'm hoping we'll pick up the story later (IOW, I'm hoping that Laramil's final dialogue wasn't written before they decided not to do a Q4 story DLC and now they plan to do another storyline next year.)

This hadn't occurred to me at all. Gadzooks, haha. I hope we pick up the story later, too. The main quest story is too good to leave hanging.

On the topic of Martina, I'm not so sure it's a neo-pronoun thing. The first quest blurb had her as a she, the second blurb had her as a they, the third quest blurb took back to she, and so on until that final, amazingly awkward sentence that I included a screenshot of. I mean... maybe neo-pronouns have reached such a point of linguistic fluidity and I'm just not aware of it because I don't dabble in the subculture much, but the dialogue felt more like grammar oopsies to me. Awkward, "we re-wrote this a few times and needed one more editing passthrough" grammar oopsies.

Again though, the oopsies were an absolutely minor issue. I just... I didn't want to just pour out effusive praise without some kind of balance. Hence my list of quibbles at the end. :-P

Also, while on the topic of praise, thanks to whichever team cleared the changes to public dungeon drop rates. There is apparently a heightened chance each day to get a public dungeon's unique item to drop (ex: 2 scaly cloth scraps per day, 1 acorn, etc.), after which the drop rate goes back to normal until the next day. I love it. I had given up on that awesome scale-dress in Blackwood. 14 hours of looping back and forth through The Silent Halls... and I had 3 scaly cloth scraps. 3. I'm now up to 47. Only 2 more days (1 if I'm lucky) and I'll finally have it done. Finished the Stone Husk target dummy and I'm 2 glass shards away from the Abbey of Zenithar furnishing item, as well. Absolutely wonderful to have hope on these again. What a marvelous, subtle change that puts a light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.

(not adding a thorn to accompany that. I'm out of thorns at this point, haha. Just having fun).

Edit: fixed my own noun / pronoun agreements. Serves me right, guffaw.

katanagirl1 · July 2023

I did not realize the public dungeon drop rate applied to the old areas. I will have to go back and revisit a bunch of them. Never got any scaly cloth pieces.

Thanks for the tip.