I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Vhozek wrote: »

All I want is the ability to create a new character, get my butt kicked for like 30 levels while I quest, and do it all over again since I delete characters every 24 hours.

You used to be able to do something similar with one character after level 50 when VR was still a thing by doing Cadwell's Silver and Gold.

The reason why they stopped supporting VR and switched to one Tamriel... "people" didn't like how hard the VR zones were, consequently they were empty.

We've had harder overland, with real progression. It wasn't popular (though I loved it). ZoS have the figures, they know this, and that's why ZoS won't invest in it again.

(In before the lock!).

I'm quite sure zos will learn that the real problem was the forced split of the playerbase along alliances as well as there is a difference between forced difficulty and difficulty options.

It may take time, but finally they'll learn.

Yeah, guilty for being an optimist.

I do this regularly because I find overland/questing content to be laughably easy in my regular gear and with my regular abilities.

I make a custom build for what playstyle I'm going for (assassin, necromancer, plate knight, spellsword, etc), then intentionally give myself abilities that fit within that style, but aren't powerful. Likewise, gear is also chosen to be as weak as possible while still offering interesting/fun set bonuses. Same with Champion Points.

Long story short, it's still not particularly fun. Better than just burning through everything as I would normally, but still not even close to ideal.

Sacrificing fun abilities because they're too strong isn't a fun thing to do. Not using fun sets because they just make you a god with overland content is also not at all fun. Intentionally giving up ANY Champion Point bonuses because they will make me overpowered also isn't fun.

I'd like to engage with the full range of options available to me as a player in terms of sets, abilities, Champion Points, etc, and still have an engaging challenge with overland content. This is one of the reasons I'm such a big advocate for a difficulty option on overland stuff, even if it's just scaling the player so they're weaker (like One Tamriel already does).

A rather pointless thread when the pinned overland thread is just above. The same arguments and mostly the same posters. Why can threads not be merged when they are about the same topic?

Sarannah wrote: »

CP5 wrote: »

Sarannah wrote: »

People often forget it's their gaming experience that makes things easy, and often even their ESO experience. If people find something too easy, they should move on to tougher content.

What if I actually want to enjoy the story? Actually feel engaged in the world ending plot, and not have every main quest line of every chapter in every zone being designed around 'someone's first ESO quest'?

I get what you are saying, but for most players it is the opposite of that(which OneTamriel proved)... in that they don't want to wade through mobs for 10+ minutes just to get to the next part of the quest they are on. As that gets tiresome really fast, and takes away from the story. Not to mention, hard mobs take away any sense of progress as improving yourself should make you feel stronger and stronger. Godlike eventually, which we have now. There is quite some more difficult content available for those who want to do so.

Since a few expansions ago ZOS has already started making story bosses have phases, so they aren't one-hit-and-done anymore. They just haven't gone back to old content to apply these phases to all major story bosses. Which isn't strange, as old content is only touched if it is bugged.

Thing is, ZOS can't satisfy both sides on this issue. And as the game failed when it was hard, and got saved when it was made easier, I doubt ZOS will ever change the current course. Though they did make certain content, like world bosses, in Necrom tougher/harder(too hard in my opinion). Which to me shows they are hearing the "we want tougher content"-crowd, but can't fully give in, due to what happened at launch and with OneTamriel. Which is understandable.

They can, using the exact same tech they used before one tamriel, the same tech they use in dungeons and trials, and the same tech they still use in overland zones. And the gimmicky 'harder overland' with overland mobs who are overly aggressive followed by instanced dungeons does nothing to actually allow players like myself to enjoy the actual zone, instead being told "this instanced area to the side is your content to enjoy".

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Braffin wrote: »

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Vhozek wrote: »

All I want is the ability to create a new character, get my butt kicked for like 30 levels while I quest, and do it all over again since I delete characters every 24 hours.

You used to be able to do something similar with one character after level 50 when VR was still a thing by doing Cadwell's Silver and Gold.

The reason why they stopped supporting VR and switched to one Tamriel... "people" didn't like how hard the VR zones were, consequently they were empty.

We've had harder overland, with real progression. It wasn't popular (though I loved it). ZoS have the figures, they know this, and that's why ZoS won't invest in it again.

(In before the lock!).

I'm quite sure zos will learn that the real problem was the forced split of the playerbase along alliances as well as there is a difference between forced difficulty and difficulty options.

It may take time, but finally they'll learn.

Yeah, guilty for being an optimist.

Will learn?

We've had 1T for years now! They know.

There are two things that we don't know, but ZoS certainly do:

- The numbers. We don't know how many people want harder overland (compared to the overall player base), or want new 4 man trials (remember they ditch a DLC in favour of "QoL", so maybe they aren't too concerned). We don't know the churn of players at different levels of progression.

- The business plan. We have no idea how ZoS makes money. Whether it is long term elite players, or the filthy casuals who are more interested in quests and housing, or anything in between. We simply do not know.

Each "faction" of players here on the forum has their own ideas about how to make the game better (in their opinion), but we have to assume that ZoS know what they are doing - after all they are in the business of running games, and we are not.

Even if it doesn't fit our own views of how the game should be.

Adding a debuff potion can't be that hard and it would shut up some portion of the people who want harder overland. It would certainly shut me up for sure.

Vhozek wrote: »

The data they have is being presented wrong or they're perceiving it the wrong way.

And you know that how exactly?

We simply don't have the data to do anything other than speculate. No matter how you want harder overland content, only ZOS has the relevant data to base their decisions on. Whether we're happy with their decisions or not is another question.

I can only speak for myself of course, but one of the reasons I'll not be getting Necrom is the increased difficulty/number of mechanics for story and world bosses. It's not the only reason, but it plays a big part in my decision.

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Braffin wrote: »

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

Vhozek wrote: »

All I want is the ability to create a new character, get my butt kicked for like 30 levels while I quest, and do it all over again since I delete characters every 24 hours.

You used to be able to do something similar with one character after level 50 when VR was still a thing by doing Cadwell's Silver and Gold.

The reason why they stopped supporting VR and switched to one Tamriel... "people" didn't like how hard the VR zones were, consequently they were empty.

We've had harder overland, with real progression. It wasn't popular (though I loved it). ZoS have the figures, they know this, and that's why ZoS won't invest in it again.

(In before the lock!).

I'm quite sure zos will learn that the real problem was the forced split of the playerbase along alliances as well as there is a difference between forced difficulty and difficulty options.

It may take time, but finally they'll learn.

Yeah, guilty for being an optimist.

Will learn?

We've had 1T for years now! They know.

There are two things that we don't know, but ZoS certainly do:

- The numbers. We don't know how many people want harder overland (compared to the overall player base), or want new 4 man trials (remember they ditch a DLC in favour of "QoL", so maybe they aren't too concerned). We don't know the churn of players at different levels of progression.

- The business plan. We have no idea how ZoS makes money. Whether it is long term elite players, or the filthy casuals who are more interested in quests and housing, or anything in between. We simply do not know.

Each "faction" of players here on the forum has their own ideas about how to make the game better (in their opinion), but we have to assume that ZoS know what they are doing - after all they are in the business of running games, and we are not.

Even if it doesn't fit our own views of how the game should be.

Yes, exactly: will learn. This is based on the very same initial position, namely pre-one-tam, as you're using for your theory. Only zos knows which one is true.

Regarding the numbers you're right. We don't have them and can only draw conclusions out of the little bit of information we have. So, what do we have?

- Some statements from the devs regarding this topic, while this is the latest one:

Sort of looking back at how we did things with difficult overland content back before One Tamriel, we didn't see favorable results from separating players based on arbitrary categories and we really want to allow players to play with whoever they want and not introduce another barrier of interaction between different demographics of players.

With that being said, we do recognize a lot of people want increased overland difficulty and the new world events (Bastion Nymics) that are instanced for up to 4 players in Necrom is one of our answers to that.

https://eso-u.com/articles/eso_developer_ama__las_vegas_global_reveal_2023

- An increase in difficulty with necrom as well as a shift in development priorities away from story content.

None of that allows the conclusion, that only a small minority is demanding an increase in difficulty. That's not what they are saying. But yes, they aren't willing to optionally split the playerbase yet because of the bad experiences they made before 1T. So it's only logical to do what they did with necrom.

Now we have two options to interpret this behaviour:
- Zos isn't listening to it's playerbase at all, and they simply do what they want. But why are they increasing difficulty for everybody then? I didn't read any understandable explanation about that fact yet.
- Zos is listening to its's playerbase and tries to satisfy as much people as possible by making a compromise. Then look into the overland thread, with all the arguing against a "split of the playerbase" and doomsday scenarios based upon that, and you'll understand quickly what was happening with necrom in my opinion. The players voting against optional difficulty brought the forced increase upon themselves, as zos tried to take into account their concerns.

Changes are inevitable at this moment, as this process is already started. As another poster stated correctly, we can't expect them to deliver optimal results with their first try. Necrom was this first try, and it partially failed, which was expectable. But that won't lead to a full revert of the decisions already made, as the problem is still persistent. And zos already acknowledged that.

On a sidenote: Your statement about casual players is as wrong as it can be. If someone is playing a game more casually or more ... (what would be the correct, non-insulting term? Idk) doesn't say anything about preferred content. Not all questers are casual, and definitely not all members of the housing community. It's also wrong to equate "casual" with "unskilled". We see that regularily, when "casual gamers" join this discussion, they are also complaining about the lack of difficulty mostly. Most people opposing any changes are long-term-players, which would prefer a single player game anyways.

FantasticFreddie wrote: »

Braffin wrote: »

Well, this topic were discussed a lot in a sticky thread regarding overland difficulty. Look here, if you're interested:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/590162/overland-content-feedback-thread#latest

As short summary, there are two major problems with "just nerf yourself":
- It's nothing else than "git gud" coming from the opposite direction and is in direct opposition to character development (which is one of the most important mechanics in any rpg, even if you play it as pen&paper)
- Most of us tried nerfing themselves, the results weren't exactly desireable, look for yourself

Braffin wrote: »

As the original thread was closed during video processing I'll post my personal experience with "fighting the troll" in this thread.

For this attempt following rules apply:

- Toon is lvl 50, all points in stam, no CP slotted.
- No armor, jewelry, buff food, pots and further unnecessary paraphernalia are applied.
- Weapons: 2x dagger CP 160, white, no trait, no enchants
- It's strictly a one-bar-"build" to keep things simple.
- Used skills: LA, HA, bloodthirst
- Mechanics of the troll were respected, as I refuse to simulate a complete moron. Scuttler avoided AoE quite well too (he is a veteran in the end)

Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/GW_jTlNvqd8

Result: Definitely more tedious, but still braindead easy

The really interesting question is: Why do some players oppose an optional veteran difficulty for overland so fervent, while they demand the very same splitting of the playerbase in other connections (like for example PvP)?

Because zos doesn't have a great track record with making changes like that. Look at crux-- what people ASKED for was the ability to toggle the crux so they never saw it. What we GOT was a blanket nerf to crux.
People will ask for adjustments on whatever-- a set, a skill, and usually a small adjustment is all that is actually needed, maybe a 5% tweak or less, and zos either misses the mark completely, or changes it by like 40%.

Would I care if harder overland was optional? Not at all. But I have zero faith it would actually BE optional. And since I DO NOT want harder overland, I want them to just leave it as is.

But with that approach they should never do anything to the game to improve it, since failure is always going to be an option.