Turn each set into a usable set

gummy292 · November 2023

One of the most beautiful things within The Elder Scrolls Online is the vast variety of sets

Unfortunately, many sets with exciting mechanics are currently not competitive.
This is because they have been overnerfed or simply surpassed by newer sets.

To make ESO even better, I challenge you to help the developers.

We will do this by suggesting a modification for the unusable sets that would make the set usable again. Here are a few rules:

It can only be one modification per set.
It cannot be a modification that changes the mechanics of the set.
The set cannot become overpowered but can, at most, become in line with other META sets.
Example: Viper Sting
Armor Set Bonus
(2 items) Adds 657 Critical Chance
(3 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Stamina
(4 items) Adds 657 Critical Chance
(5 items) When you deal damage with a Martial melee attack, you deal an additional 3704 Poison Damage over 4 seconds. This effect can occur once every 4 seconds and scales off the higher of your Weapon or Spell Damage.

Modification: Increase the damage to 5100 poison damage.
Justification: With this modification, the damage aligns more closely with a set like Way of Fire, even though Way of Fire can also be used at ranged.

Example 2: Shield Breaker
Armor Set Bonus
(2 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Stamina
(3 items) Adds 129 Stamina Recovery
(4 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(5 items) Increases your damage done by 6%. This effect is doubled when attacking targets with a damage shield active.

Modification: Quadruple the damage against shields.
Justification: The uptime of this set is already very low. By doubling the bonus, it becomes a burst set in rare scenarios.

Lets make obsolete sets great again!

SandandStars · November 2023

A beautiful idea.

One flaw: What is the incentive for Zos?

phaneub17_ESO · November 2023

I liked Elegant when it was a straight up flat damage increase.

Panderbander · November 2023

Salvation:
(5 items) Reduces the cost of your Werewolf Transformation ability to 0. While transformed your timer does not decrease. While transformed you gain 150 weapon and spell damage and your active werewolf skill magicka and stamina costs are reduced by 15%.

Foxtrot39 · November 2023

Reworking sets to be usable is a wishfull request

There are too many sets that are similar and offer marginal differences

ZoS has no incentive to rework them in such way as they dont get anything in return for the work they will have to put into

On another hand the lack of a Q4 major DLC/content drop could give room to do that but there are more important fix to be done

CameraBeardThePirate · November 2023

They should absolutely do a pass on unused sets to bring them up to par, but I think it's pretty unrealistic to expect them to make every set usable. There's far too many sets in the game for that.

Quethrosar · November 2023

when i get bored because there's no sets to match the 1 or 2 meta sets, they will miss my eso plus.

bar_boss_A · November 2023

Just give DDs an easy (1-3 piece) source of minor slayer, preferably as an addition to slimecraw's 2 piece bonus. There are some really good sets out there slightly below raid gear power levels or with a slightly more complex proc condition. Except they all lack the 5% more damage bonus which is the lower bound of a 5-piece bonus and thus will never be viable.

There are three possible solutions to reintroduce the long lost horizontal progression:

Use EA to push out perfected old gear, eg. perfected hundings rage
Next raid drops a minor slayer group buff set
Easy available source of minor slayer (slimecraw/ undaunted ult?)

gummy292 · November 2023

SandandStars wrote: »

A beautiful idea.

One flaw: What is the incentive for Zos?

Maybe make them perfected sets in some new dlc area. Monetizing the idea isnt that hard

Galeriano · November 2023

bar_boss_A wrote: »

Just give DDs an easy (1-3 piece) source of minor slayer, preferably as an addition to slimecraw's 2 piece bonus. There are some really good sets out there slightly below raid gear power levels or with a slightly more complex proc condition. Except they all lack the 5% more damage bonus which is the lower bound of a 5-piece bonus and thus will never be viable.

There are three possible solutions to reintroduce the long lost horizontal progression:
Use EA to push out perfected old gear, eg. perfected hundings rage

Next raid drops a minor slayer group buff set

Easy available source of minor slayer (slimecraw/ undaunted ult?)

You already have 1 piece with minor slayer in the form of oakensoul. You can also use 3 pieces of trial gear to get minor slayer.

The thing is if You have "some really good sets out there slightly below raid gear power levels" than after adding some universaly easily obtainable minor slayer these sets will just replace current trial sets. There will be always some meta setup out there You cannot have all sets performing excatly the same in every scenario. Trial sets are supposed to have that slight adventage in PvE enviroment.

El_Borracho · November 2023

gummy292 wrote: »

Example: Viper Sting
Armor Set Bonus
(2 items) Adds 657 Critical Chance
(3 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Stamina
(4 items) Adds 657 Critical Chance
(5 items) When you deal damage with a Martial melee attack, you deal an additional 3704 Poison Damage over 4 seconds. This effect can occur once every 4 seconds and scales off the higher of your Weapon or Spell Damage.

Modification: Increase the damage to 5100 poison damage.
Justification: With this modification, the damage aligns more closely with a set like Way of Fire, even though Way of Fire can also be used at ranged.

Oh, so close. Except the devs used the current, useless version of Viper's Sting as a justification for their quasi-nerf of Pillar of Nirn. So while I fully support your position, it looks like flattening sets is the overall goal

Billium813 · November 2023

gummy292 wrote: »

One of the most beautiful things within The Elder Scrolls Online is the vast variety of sets

Unfortunately, many sets with exciting mechanics are currently not competitive.
This is because they have been overnerfed or simply surpassed by newer sets.

Bad sets are good for the game

I know this may sound like an oxymoron, but it's really not and I'll try to explain why

DISCLAIMER
This is not in anyway an excuse for sets that have been badly altered/nerfed from what their design was supposed to be. For example, Grisly Gourmet grants Empower, which used to make sense in the original design, since it procs off LAs. However, after ZOS modified Empower to buff HA only, Grisly Gourmet design is NOW "bad" and DOES need fixed. Not because it was a "bad" design from the start or because it isn't "currently competitive", but because it's become disjointed and ruined by incomplete changes.

Now that that's out of the way!

Power level is relative.

It can fluctuate depending on content type, player skill, Skills and Class combinations, Mag vs Stam, group role, and the general creativity of the player. Balancing all sets against each other, amongst all that, just to keep a flat power curve is not only incredibly boring, but it's virtually impossible! There are an infinite number of combinations of Builds vs player experience vs content. Balancing that all out is impossible.
Different sets appeal to different players.

There are a load of players that play ESO! There are a bunch of different ways to play too and, hopefully, ZOS will continue adding more every release! Just look at Endless Archive and the new play styles it can offer; potentially breathing life into sets that were once "not competitive". Or take PvP for example, even though they are all PvP, Cyrodiil vs IC vs BG can have different metas and playstyles which fluctuate based on Class and player experience. It's important that each player has the ability to shift the gameplay to their own liking and build how they like. The downside is that players need to realize that not all sets are meant for their specific use. Some sets may LOOK "bad" to some players, but other players may just be using them in their own unique combination!
Diversity of set power is key to discovery.

ESO is a game about discovery, adventure, and figuring things out! In ESO, you pick and choose which sets you use. That makes the ability to differentiate between sets very important. As you grow as a player, you get better at determining a set’s potential. This ongoing challenge is an important part of what keeps ESO fresh to new players! This is a primary reason why overland sets are mostly lower in power level compared to Trial or Dungeon sets.

The best way to examine this quality is to think back to your own ESO history. Can you remember key times where you finally “got” some interaction? When all of a sudden things just clicked and you realized why a set, or a build, was better or worse than you originally thought? That is part of the fun of playing ESO, and I assume ZOS purposefully slopes the sets to allow a constant sense of discovery for players.
Diversity of Power Rewards the More Skilled Player

A diversity of set power levels increases the skill of the game. A poor player may build badly, using a sub-optimal build or Skills. This makes sure that the more experience/skilled player will rise to the top of the metrics (be it pvp, leaderboards, or just metrics for clearing content). They understand how the game works better, they can put together a stronger combination of effects, and can achieve more with those builds! They are rewarded for their understanding of the game and application of knowledge/skill. It makes players enjoy the game even more when they feel they have a hand in achieving their metrics.

ZOS has the responsibility of making a game that makes players happy. But there are a lot of different players, each with their own unique desires. It's ZOS's job to cater to every one of them as best they can while keeping a fair and balanced MMO environment. Unfortunately, players often don't know what is really good for the game; they can't see past their own desires and passions. Be happy that there are sets you enjoy, ZOS put them there for players just like you!

BXR_Lonestar · November 2023

Some sets cannot be reworked to be good/usable with the current damage paradigm though. I'm mainly talking about max stats sets like Necropotence, Crafty Alfiqi, and Hulking Draugr. These sets are all about max magika or max stam, and with how damage scales right now, they're completely useless. Damage scaling is skewed almost completely towards weapon/spell damage and since neither of these sets offer any other stats, they simply can't be made useful/useable.

To fix that, they'd have to go back to how damage scaling was before - which I would prefer anyways tbh.

CameraBeardThePirate · November 2023

BXR_Lonestar wrote: »

Some sets cannot be reworked to be good/usable with the current damage paradigm though. I'm mainly talking about max stats sets like Necropotence, Crafty Alfiqi, and Hulking Draugr. These sets are all about max magika or max stam, and with how damage scales right now, they're completely useless. Damage scaling is skewed almost completely towards weapon/spell damage and since neither of these sets offer any other stats, they simply can't be made useful/useable.

To fix that, they'd have to go back to how damage scaling was before - which I would prefer anyways tbh.

Crafty Alfiq (and Hulking Draugr to a lesser extent) is a phenomenal set for Arcanist - Chakrams is one of the strongest defensive abilities in the game and scales off of your max stat.

However, outside of Arcanist and Sorcerer, I agree that there aren't many use cases for max stat sets anymore. Imo, they should reduce the amount that Weapon/Spell Damage contributes to scaling of skills and move some of that scaling to your max stats. This would discourage dumping all of your points into health which has become very common in PvP since the CP 2.0 changes.

BXR_Lonestar · November 2023

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

BXR_Lonestar wrote: »

Some sets cannot be reworked to be good/usable with the current damage paradigm though. I'm mainly talking about max stats sets like Necropotence, Crafty Alfiqi, and Hulking Draugr. These sets are all about max magika or max stam, and with how damage scales right now, they're completely useless. Damage scaling is skewed almost completely towards weapon/spell damage and since neither of these sets offer any other stats, they simply can't be made useful/useable.

To fix that, they'd have to go back to how damage scaling was before - which I would prefer anyways tbh.

Crafty Alfiq (and Hulking Draugr to a lesser extent) is a phenomenal set for Arcanist - Chakrams is one of the strongest defensive abilities in the game and scales off of your max stat.

However, outside of Arcanist and Sorcerer, I agree that there aren't many use cases for max stat sets anymore. Imo, they should reduce the amount that Weapon/Spell Damage contributes to scaling of skills and move some of that scaling to your max stats. This would discourage dumping all of your points into health which has become very common in PvP since the CP 2.0 changes.

Or even just have abilities whose damage/effect scales solely off of max stats and is not influenced by weapon/spell damage. This is how it used to be for petsorcs. I remember running around with my Highelf dual pet sorc sporting ~ 70k magika and melting everything. Was a great time until they screwed up damage scaling, and IMO, it has made the game less diverse.

mocap · November 2023

Viper Sting base damage is 1020, not 3700.

YandereGirlfriend · November 2023

SandandStars wrote: »

A beautiful idea.

One flaw: What is the incentive for Zos?

It could freshen-up old DLC content to motivate folk to buy it or maintain a sub. Obvs, that isn't the case for base game sets but modifying the tooltip values in particular is like an afternoon of work for an intern.

Novidian · November 2023

Shattered Fate: Make each set bonus in increments of 4. That’s more proportionate and allows it to be a strong 8pc that can be paired with monster/arena sets and a mythic. Maybe 4-5-3, even.

Even if you have to drop pen to 6500 and damage to like 629. Make the crit 12pc bonus give a flat 8-10% crit chance and damage. Right now, I don’t see a use for it past the 10pc. It needs something more worthwhile to use as a 12pc, since you’re giving up so much.

NMA: Drop the 5% cost increase. My only real gripe. I actually like the set a lot, otherwise. Hell, I think making skills cost 5% LESS wouldn’t be insane.

War Maiden: I just starting using this on my oaken-mag blade and love it. Glaring flaw is it doesn’t pump light attacks or skills that do flame/lightning/frost.

I realize it NEEDS a down side technically (though to make it on par with the many meta prof sets maybe not?), but it would be nice if it boosted light/heavy damage with destro staffs, too. Would it be crazy it it boosted light/heavy attacks by a flat 15% as a part of its 5pc?

A lot of other sets would simply be better if they had more uptime. Would a set like Briarheart see more use if it were able to be up near 100%, or didn’t operate as a proc at all? Possibly.

BloodyStigmata · November 2023

Maybe they could add the ability to "perfect" set pieces, which would let us upgrade the 5-piece bonus and also give it minor slayer/aeigis or some other new perfected exclusive bonuses. The item needed to do this could still be sourced in vet trials and arenas.

Still wouldn't solve the problem though I guess, but it's something.

Luckylancer · November 2023

Best fix will be adding differemt game mods that shine some sets (BG's boring game modes, no-cp no-proc pvp sets, solo arenas, solo dungeon option etc). Also differentiating classes from being reskins of each other will mame some sets niche for different classes (burningspellweave for dks, max magica for mag sorc pvp, necropotence for pet classes etc).

You cant balance all sets. But many sets can habe a few niche uses. This will make a lot more sets usefull.

Paramedicus · November 2023

They reworked all sets some time ago making some of older ones interesting. Soon after they reduced all buff effects sizes.. Odd tiems - was like two teams working independently.

Tyrant_Tim · November 2023

An easy remedy to Max Stat sets, would be to make healing scale primarily off of your highest stats instead of Weapon/Spell Damage.

You would see a resurgence of the sets overnight.

FoJul · November 2023

SandandStars wrote: »

A beautiful idea.

One flaw: What is the incentive for Zos?

Incentive to have the players on their side, and have a healthy feedback relationship.

notyuu · November 2023

All the sets are usable, sure they are not all POWERFUL or VIABLE...but they can all be used across varying degrees of player skill level or who knows what kind of meta.

lets take pillar of nirn for example, about 18 months ago in my raid guild I pointed out that it had an almost disgustingly high amount of power for what it requires...natrually I got brushed off due to the set not being the meta at the time...fast foward a year and lo & behold...PON is meta.....add in another 6 months PON got nerfed due to being meta.....

the moral of the story is, don't throw a set in the trahs just becasue it fails to meet your standards, instead try to think of use cases for them....and then you might notice that the number of unusable sets decreases considerbly

SandandStars · December 2023

FoJul wrote: »

SandandStars wrote: »

A beautiful idea.

One flaw: What is the incentive for Zos?

Incentive to have the players on their side, and have a healthy feedback relationship.

I would very much appreciate this. But I see no evidence that things are moving in this direction.