Sums up how I feel so far. The number of cycles before thoat is definitely my biggest complaint. If it were reduced by 1 or even if they just lowered the number of trash mob fights it'd be nice.

Arc 2 thoat is certainly harder than arc 1 and that's as far as I've gotten so far (I'm doing it solo with a companion).

I got the dragon on stage 3, it did not end well. Three instant shots and I'm out. The arena is just too small. I'd trade triple the HP if it came with triple the size of the arena.

Up till that point, it wasn't hard at all. Honestly, the dragon itself wasn't that hard, if I could just move without falling off.

Really if it's going to be all about RNG I'm not sure it will be worth my time. I get enough of that inToT.

I think this is pretty spot on. Be prepared to build for this. I kinda went in blind with a toon i was not super used to playing and a slapped together build for lolz. Didnt expect it to go very well. The first arc was very easy as far as trash. I do think they could do with one less cycle. It seemed needlessly time consuming. I didnt find verse bosses to be at all unmanageable, they were actually really easy. Just bring a breach, a shield, and pay attention to bosses that have knock back mechs. They dont hit hard at all and hp is low. Th'oat you definitely have to pay attention to the fight and mechs to not die. I had no issue clearing but i think the damage in that fight might be a little high to be arc 1 for the average player on solo run to be honest, a duo i could see being completely fine. Arc 2 was a bit more of a challenge. I got the marauder pretty quick and he does hit hard, spawns adds, and has massive aoes and knockbacks. That said he is a "special" boss with extra class loot so i think he should be left as a solid challenge and shouldn't get a nerf of any kind. Th'oat at the end of arc 2 definitely gets a lot more chaotic. Overall no real issues except i had to quit after arc 2 since i just ran out of time to play. Im not sure how people make it past arc 10. It really does take a long time.. i want to say it was like an hour and 15 to get through 2 arcs. You have to obviously take into consideration that it was a first run. Playing it through a second time id guess i could finish each arc in about 30-35 mins. So yeah my biggest issue was the time.

Ingenon wrote: »

The portals to the unknown were confusing to me. Out of four I got the chance to try, I completed only one. I will have to look for guides online for these minigames.

i have linked several threads with hints and suggestions how to beat certain minigames. the link
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7993052/#Comment_7993052

I got to fight Th'oat at the end of Arc 3 in solo. I thought I had good verses and could do it but... Consumed my last 2 threads on her and finished there.
My first thread got away at the start of Arc 3 from Fabled mobs which became unexpectedly harder - you really need to focus them from Arc 3.
Not died at the two marauders, both were the Red 4arms one.
Not died on the Maw of Lorkhaj boss, even if it bugged the One-Shot leaving me with no pillars to hide behind: I incredibly, barely survived.

I can see my limit at Arc 4. If I'd ever beat the last fight of Arc 3, Arc 4 would really put me to a test and I would probably never beat it. One of the reasons being that it took me 2+ hours to get to the end of Arc 3 and at that point my mind and my arms were telling me to stop (not the adrenaline, it was awesome!). Also, 2+ hours avoiding every secondary portal - would have taken way more time if I entered all those too.

Surprised by how good it feels.
Not a fan of the "same-ish" landscapes - I would have preferred to revisit old places...
Difficulty seems about right (?), and the amount of cycles I feel I would like it as it is if I was a teenager. In my conditions it's asking a bit too much to my body to go through all that each time, and I think I'll probably stop at Arc 1 as a norm, and only go further those rare times I will feel fine with pushing my limits.

My hope is that this becomes my easy method to get Transmutes, since I heard being in the leaderboard rewards 10. I can see myself do just Arc 1 on repeat with multiple characters to get them.

Oh! I didn't try a Companion out but I can see them die fast, if they'll act like my Warden's bear - AoE damage is high in this place! Not worth worrying about pets or companions probably; that's a bit sad.

As a pc player my impressions are indeed very similar to yours:

On Difficulty

I still think difficulty and it's scaling are fine overall. The biggest difference between a boss, which is beaten easily, and one, which swipes the floor with the player, is knowledge about the respective mechanics. It definitely helps to know the respective counterparts of the bosses to get a vague idea of how the fight works. There are all unique tho: When I encountered The Serpent in an early Arc for the first time, I interpreted it as indicator for the final phase of the trial and nuked immediately, only to learn about the orb mechanic when we met again in a later Arc (where nuking wasn't possible anymore). And even Kra'gh got a new move in EA (pulling the player in melee-range).
So paying attention to mechanics is essential in there. That's quite refreshing.

Maybe marauders need slight adjustments, although it may be sufficient to spawn them after the trashpacks, or entirely instead of them.

There are also permanent upgrades available for our verses and visions (as well as an additional live) at the trader, unlocked by doing the bonus content.

On Ease of Understanding

Hints during battles are working fine, I agree.

Otherwise some more information would be helpful: Especially the bonus round, where we are transformed into watchers, the newly aquired skills should be explained in a pop-up. I don't know how many players know, that we can actually read the skill-descriptions, if we open the skill-tab.

Regarding verses and visions: On pc we are able to hover our mouse over the V&Vs we picked to read the full description. I don't know if that works on console tho.

On Replaybility

To add onto your explanations: I think EA is designed to be easily expanded by adding new bosses, add-waves and boni. So I very well imagine it being fun long-term.

On Art

Yeah, the art is awesome. Nothing more to add.

Personal feedback: Xbox NA (Series X)

I “soloed” with a level 17 Isabel tank, and my build was a solo Imeprial StamArc build at 2222cp. Here’s the build I started with: https://youtu.be/lnHc7DhI1bs?si=XIuCppEytcKiIELu

My end came at A3/C4/S2 boss. Score was about 92,000ish. I made it through Arc 1 and 2 with no problems, they are both completely fine as is. Arc 3 was still mostly fine with 3 deaths to silly things.

Here are my 3 deaths. They were all in Arc 3 and past the half way point of Arc 3:

1. Marauder Gothmau one-shot me as he appeared in Arc 3 with an AOE that didn’t display (initial hit was about 24,000k with additional 12,000k damage. My heath is just under 30,000.) The aoe never showed. Very odd.

2. Caluurion. I knew his new mechanics, but on Xynode’s EA mechanics video he never had to deal with totems. My Arc 3 Caluurion fight had 6 totems that were slow to burn down and they revived super fast. I couldn’t really do any damage to him either and after a slow survival I just let him kill me. BUT then I find out there’s a bug with my Pale Order Ring? I unequipped it and reapplied, and then I burned Caluurion down faster than any boss I’d fought so far in all 3 arcs. Again, very odd.

3. Symphony of Blades. I knew the fight, it was slow and easy but the phase came with the Aurorans. They were spread out like an octagon ring with large gaps in between. I mistakenly treated it like the real DoM execute phase where you avoid them in the Colored Rooms, but you’re supposed to burn one like the normal wall. It was also 11:30 at night and I was exhausted after the whole run and just didn’t mind lol.

Overall: The experience was very fun, and the best part was guessing what boss would appear in the main boss phases. A fun lottery nod to ESO’s history (also an ingenious way to teach people about “diet” trial bosses without having them start trials). Tho’at was also really awesome. Like a cross between an Elden Ring boss but with a glossy yellow appearance like Super Mario Sunshine mud monsters.

The worst part was all the add pulls. They weren’t hard, just sometimes boring and very mindless. They need to at least remove the add pull between Stage 4 boss and Tho’at. If not, remove more! They steal from a better experience! Also I think anytime you face a marauder you should get to skip a stage. Marauders are not good substitutes for add pulls when the entire run takes like 2-4 hours.

The rewards were a little lackluster after all that time too. I still don’t know how to get the horse and pet? Are the little piece drops like public dungeons? I ran it for like 3 hours and have 0 of both if so. After I finally clear Arc 4 and get the gold trophy for my house I’ll probably never really run it again. Which is sad. Bosses are super fun! And the add pulls aren’t really too bad, there’s just soooooooooooo many.

Edit: Isabel did better than I thought! Totally useless vs any Tho’at in all Arcs, but she survived way more than she didn’t. Her taunting sucked, but my build could handle it.

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

I think this is pretty spot on. Be prepared to build for this. I kinda went in blind with a toon i was not super used to playing and a slapped together build for lolz. Didnt expect it to go very well. The first arc was very easy as far as trash. I do think they could do with one less cycle. It seemed needlessly time consuming. I didnt find verse bosses to be at all unmanageable, they were actually really easy. Just bring a breach, a shield, and pay attention to bosses that have knock back mechs. They dont hit hard at all and hp is low. Th'oat you definitely have to pay attention to the fight and mechs to not die. I had no issue clearing but i think the damage in that fight might be a little high to be arc 1 for the average player on solo run to be honest, a duo i could see being completely fine. Arc 2 was a bit more of a challenge. I got the marauder pretty quick and he does hit hard, spawns adds, and has massive aoes and knockbacks. That said he is a "special" boss with extra class loot so i think he should be left as a solid challenge and shouldn't get a nerf of any kind. Th'oat at the end of arc 2 definitely gets a lot more chaotic. Overall no real issues except i had to quit after arc 2 since i just ran out of time to play. Im not sure how people make it past arc 10. It really does take a long time.. i want to say it was like an hour and 15 to get through 2 arcs. You have to obviously take into consideration that it was a first run. Playing it through a second time id guess i could finish each arc in about 30-35 mins. So yeah my biggest issue was the time.

a note on the marauder is that the marauder itself does not spawn adds, he spawns with the normal adds that spawn during a add stage

usually if a marauder appears, its within 30 sec of starting the first wave of adds

a tip for fighting marauders is usually if you can to leave 1 ranged add alive, so it wont spawn the rest of the add waves while your fighting the marauder

i would also agree time is a big factor to getting further, my best run so far was arc 9 cycle 2 boss and it took somewhere between 5 and 5.5 hours to reach that point, so avg arc time was somewhere around 30-45 min (this was in a 2 person group and we did all of the bonus portals when they showed up)

another tip thats not really explained anywhere is that once you get to arc 4, starting in cycle 3 you will start to get random tho'at mechanics appearing in the add stages (these do not show up on the boss stages, only add stages)

only 1 tho'at mechanic will show up, and it randomly picks between: ice patches, eye beams, tho'at blobs, glass tentacles

my personal experience the tho'at blobs are the worst because they continuously respawn and theres always like 3 of them, and they can do their channeling nonsense while your trying to deal with the add waves and/or a marauder

Yes you are correct i meant to say adds spawn, i should have been more specific there. Im a bit dyslexic and adhd. I tend to mix up or misplace words lol. This is why i edit my posts so many times 😆

katanagirl1 wrote: »

Would you recommend doing the portals/side bosses/minigames, the first time through? I expect we got the bug with gear sets where you have to re-equip after so I was thinking of skipping them (if I can) until it gets fixed.

I personally 100% recommend not skipping them because while there may be the gear inconvenience, there are excellent bonuses hiding behind completing all stages of the mini-game.





These are just two of the six possible upgrades you buy once you complete all stages of the mini-games. Plus, at the start all the mini-games are simple except for the filer one which requires a bit of reading and understanding of skill changes.

Edit: Plus, completing the minigame gives you access to another verse choice, so you could be going into a boss fight with 2, or 3 verses active and make it a breeze.

MidniteOwl1913 wrote: »

I got the dragon on stage 3, it did not end well. Three instant shots and I'm out. The arena is just too small. I'd trade triple the HP if it came with triple the size of the arena.

Up till that point, it wasn't hard at all. Honestly, the dragon itself wasn't that hard, if I could just move without falling off.

Really if it's going to be all about RNG I'm not sure it will be worth my time. I get enough of that inToT.

That dragon is harder in EA than he is in his original encounter.

Sleep724 wrote: »

The fire marauder seemed too op, at least for my build. One of his light attacks was insta death. Wasted a couple lives on the dragon figuring it which way it was going with its one-hit breath ability.

The Maw boss I could not figure out. Hid behind the pillars and still killed me. Heard it could be bugged.

For the dragon, just walk around in a continuous circle along the outside perimeter of his aoe. He'll do it in a predictable way because he's going to keep turning his head to try and target you. Then he'll stop moving and that's when it's coming. The dragon also lifts its wing/tail when it wants to knock you back with those.

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Sleep724 wrote: »

The fire marauder seemed too op, at least for my build. One of his light attacks was insta death. Wasted a couple lives on the dragon figuring it which way it was going with its one-hit breath ability.

The Maw boss I could not figure out. Hid behind the pillars and still killed me. Heard it could be bugged.

For the dragon, just walk around in a continuous circle along the outside perimeter of his aoe. He'll do it in a predictable way because he's going to keep turning his head to try and target you. Then he'll stop moving and that's when it's coming. The dragon also lifts its wing/tail when it wants to knock you back with those.

for yolnakriin the 180 degree frontal burst is also dodgeable too, ive been unable to make it to the safe areas and just dodged and was able to survive

ArchMikem wrote: »

Why is it when I read all these testimonies, It just feels like Endless Archive is an even more frustrating Maelstrom Arena.

I like it much better than Maelstrom. There's little puzzles, varied enemies, and a rotating stock of prizes. And nothing has annoyed me like Maelstrom's poison round used to LOL.

So Rakkhat from MoL is a terrible fight.

He has a super quick cleave attack that launches you like a mile backwards, and I discovered that you can fall off the arena edge…needless to say I was not happy. Why would they give a boss this ability when the real MoL doesn’t have a ledge to fall off of? Better question: why are we allowed to fall off the boss arena edge at all if we only get 2 lives for the entire run?!

Also when you burn him into execution (like 30% health left) he basically one shots the arena floor with a 38,000 attack plus dots that burn you regardless.

ArchMikem wrote: »

This was my result first time in yesterday,



All the way to Arc 2 Tho'at. I lost my first thread encountering a Marauder halfway thru Arc 2, would have lost my second fighting Z'Maja, that Cloudrest Trial Boss, but I had just prior picked up the Vision that auto revives you if you die. That Vision saved that fight for me. But when I got to Tho'at the second time and discovered she has a second phase is when I hit my brick wall. It's those seeker ball things. That entire fight is overwhelming, there's so much ground AoE, floating spheres with energy beams, blobs of goop etc, and my Ember doesn't last long in there. I think I found my limit, this entire place is giving me flashbacks to Maelstrom Arena, but at least that place has a hard end goal that gives you a sense of accomplishment.

I don't even know how to read the stage icons, they weren't explained and all I picked up on was there's Arcs, Cycles, and Stages. Is that the order that's shown in my report? Arc 2, Cycle 5, Stage 3?

By the way, that one Offensive Verse that adds three swirls of Ice when you Light Attack? I want that all the time. I need that all the time.

swift gale

and i dont think ive seen z'maja in the archives yet, the only sload ive seen is z'baza which is the 4th secret boss in coral aerie

and yes, according to your report you ran out of threads on arc 2 tho'at