One thing to add going forward if they ever do something like this again is to spread players out have multiple spawn points or mechs that have to be dealt with while fighting the big bad. so everyone doesn't dog pile the boss and nuke it down in under a minute

Troops marching from the wall to the players with pedantic bosses, forming a large-scale war in real time between the player and the worm cult, and as the players attacked the wall it would weaken, everything would be scaled by the number of players with a cool difficulty, since there would be weaker and stronger players, but in the end everyone would help each other, and this war could happen by waves of monsters every 30 minute for example.

Since we've only seen the first phase so far, and after three days of dealing with the pain points, there's some changes I would do.


Replace "fetch quests" where players are forced to compete with one another for arbitrary drops, with "kill x numbers of". Why do they ask for 8 pelts, I kill 8 huge furry beasts, and get 0 pelts? Then kill a single oversized mouse and get 3 pelts? Make it so that 1 kill equals 1 quest advance credit. Straight up. No hoops to jump through. Also, why the map limit? Are Senches in the Dominion able to use some unseen groomer that uses conditioner on their fur or something? Why can't I kill some saber cats in the Rift and deliver their pelts instead?

Same for the vitrified souls deal. What even is a vitrified soul, and why does every single Worm Cultist and Daedra suddenly may or may not carry some in their pockets? Do Clanfear even have pockets? Have the quest NPC give us some sort of soul glass battery thing and charge it up by killing Daedra and cultists, charging the thing with each death. No nonsensical drops. We already have more Soul Gems than sense in this game. Making use of some crystal type object to capture the energy from the Worm Cult to use it against them wouldn't clash with the lore.

Change the crafting quests. Add more variety. So the soldiers only need helmets, shoulder pads, healing sticks, and bows? No boots? No cuirasses? No belts? Do they all use suspenders? And that's all they need? I was under the impression that some quests would ask for potions and food, but maybe that's for the other phases. Include furniture requests. Requests for bed rolls. Or wheelbarrows. Or barricades. Requests for simple resources or other items. We need 10 daedra husks. Or 10 ectoplasm. Or 10 wheat. Or 10 bits of wood. Etc. Allow us to skip (not pick up and ask for a different one) those we don't want or don't have resources for. Also, do away with the random 6 limit. Where did it come from? Is this to limit the rewards by compounding an atrocious drop rate with a limit on how many quests we can do? This leads me to conclude that no, this will not be a one of a kind event. If grinding every day until exhaustion still does not even assure you'll have a full set of Wormwrithe styles, or scales, or bone bits, there's going to be a lot of angry people. Unless of course the plan is to simply bring it back later, or include the style in the regular daily 365 available quests. Which again means there's nothing unique about this event, except for the 3 phase gimmick and the unlocking of a map for it. Golden pursuits are a distinct thing from the event itself. And we don't need to participate in anything for it to happen. That wall will come down and the "DLC" map will be released whether we have 200 million quests done or none at all. I think I speak for many when I say we run these quests for the Haj Mota bits and the golden pages and not some pointless progress bar. But I digress.

As for the Siege Camps, they're good. Quick to pick up, quick to get to. The Wayshrine locations are very decent. The enemies look like they hold for long enough when there's 100 people parsing on them, giving plenty time to get some hits in even if they don't visually spawn at all because there's just too much lag. 3 FPS whenever the boss is up is no fun. They don't seem to be ridiculously overpowered though, so maybe these will be very much soloable (maybe reduce the health) when the area invariably goes empty the day the event is over. However. Fix the despawning bug. Also, maybe. Reduce the number of players in each instance. Or maybe fix the game but that's asking for too much lol. Getting hit with FPS drops and random loading screens as I run, not even ride, towards the quest NPCs because the game can't handle this much stuff in one place isn't good.

Anyway that's my 37 cents, for all they're worth. We know they don't care, so take this as a small rant.

Edit: I just remembered there's an achievement at least for grabbing the Haj Mota parts. This definitely tells me there's going to be more chances at getting it in the future. You don't release an achievement that requires people to collect a finite amount of pieces to complete. Imagine someone only gets half, that achievement will sit there virtually forever without the chance of ever being completed, assuming the market runs dry shortly after. New players who join after the event will be permanently blocked from ever getting an achievement because the pet will never drop again. If it was truly meant to be something that only people who participated right now can get, then it would be part of the Golden Pursuits. So yeah. Focus on those instead. Or don't. I'm fairly sure the rewards may pop up in a couple years on a crate or something.

In hindsight some potential changes assuming you don't have much added resource wise:

Have the Soul Reaper Device spawn be guaranteed to trigger once every day when a player approaches a spawn location and raise the spawn rate a bit for the event.

You want to make it easy for someone that's just trying to do the event gradually to be able to do it and make it not be too horrible if someone is trying to farm it.

It might be beneficial to make the zones during the early part of events have lower populations or to have quests that send bunches of players to do something focus on world events where having more players doing it at once is less disruptive.

From a rewards perspective, it might have been better received to drop new sets rather than existing sets or to have the event reward tickets. It doesn't necessarily feel great to do the event for the day and come away with nothing.

I'm unsure if having a lower fragment count might have felt better. On the one hand, you'd be getting fragments less frequently but, I think it might also feel better to be done with 1 of 8 or 9 rather than 2 of 25

5 gates at the wall. A conal area that gets larger as the server counts players entering from wayshrines. Hordes of NPCs, hundreds if not more trying to kill everyone. A zone system that calls for help initiated by the players or the area, ie more healers gate 3, need tanks gate 5, Help!!

Crafting quests that boost or buff the strength or healing of the players in the cones. Walking World bosses that wipe the masses and create havoc.

NPC and player managed siege engines aimed at the wall. Progress meters. Crafting quests that repair, boost or buff the strength of the siege engines.

Zone wide trash talking Molag Bal.

I'm fine with it as it is, building up the tension slowly. I had uninstalled the game but saw the event was on. Playing over the game pass cloud is stuttery, often with greyed out graphics, and I need to be able to walk in a straight line so I'm currently installing the game again on my Xbox.

I think it'll be an easy way to level up my Nightblade so I can start sub-classing when it's over.

It's been pretty empty when I've been playing though so no problems with overcrowding.

Maybe a few new monsters would be good. Even the Alien and Predator films change the look of their monsters slightly with each film.

Having written events professionally... None of these threads will ever be heard, because either Devs want to make the content they believe in, the industry is terrified of being sued for "stealing your ideas" or because Legal/Marketing/Corporate have decided what the most efficient way to squeeze you for money is. There are brilliant, caring people in the industry, but they have very, very little influence and you the player even less.

Which is fortunate, because you the players, in general, are terrible too. Or at least, don't share the same motivations. Some of you will want to blitz the event and get it over and done with fast for a single reward. Some will want time to grind out every reward. Some of you will be openly manipulating the event to try and lock out, even directly harass others; they are playing for negative reasons. Even where they aren't, they are still often selfish. I was there, 20 odd years ago, for the WoW event that people reference here; the Gates of Ahn'qiraj, and enough time has passed for people to forget the fury when most players missed it, because the major guilds deliberately staggered the opening to be in hours after local midnight, when they'd have the best chance of being Server First to clear it.

No, there's another reason, quite apart from Whale squeezing FOMO, the industry has moved to fixed timetable, dev driven only content; you just can't please enough people by running a player driven countdown which will either be manipulated for reasons that will upset people (either yours or selfish players) or turn up when people with real lives can't plan for it.

But... Were I designing here? And the tools and permission were there to do what ever I wanted and thought was best for the game....? Here's a quick, 20 minute preliminary sketch of what I'd be thinking of;

Random drops replaced by Merits, which you save up to purchase from Vendors in the camp... It's a military campaign, let's reward loyalty. Prizes include rank title clothing, perhaps a hat or sword which can also be displayed as a wall trophy decoration in your home. But also, more importantly, every event unique drop can be purchased from reputatition merits. Want that one piece of furniture? Grind until you get that, then stop. Obsessively want them all? Do as much as you can!

Perhaps leave unbound clothing recipes inside random boxes inside the reward chest for the Camps (more on this later); we want something to be tradeable to help newbies raise gold. Balancing rarity to frustration is an endless task, but let's be frank, it's not an essential except for completionists so we don't need to make these too common, especially not if players can plan for their own rewards at their own place as above.

Even leaving in the "race to the Wall", make it quite clear that this is just for the preparation, for roleplay fun, but the "assault" will be at a fixed time.

Multiple paths to each stage; First stage, lead up to Wall coming down;

Leave the current Lens-blasting plot, but add player themed adventures to also help bring down the wall;

Solo quests to stealth into bases and leave timed explosives near the base of the wall. Each run gives a merit back at camp, and progresses campaign. Or become a fifth column in the Worm Cult in advance of helping betray them; Once trusted and embedded, this unlocks a solo mission in the second wave (more later). "Locate Invasion" mission; NPC somewhere asks you to find a hidden camp, which spawns in any of the instanced content so you have a solo fight. These give more reputation due to beings slower to do.

Leave the Camp Invasions running for world content, each one also gives merit, but less due to speed they get destroyed.

Stage 2: Wall Comes Down.

I didn't play on the test server; I hope they have fixed the animation of the wall coming down so the player can see it at their own pace. How I'd set it up from here; For those who have done a "leave explosives" sneaky mission, it triggers when they set off their own explosives. For those who have not, a mini-quest shows it... even if you've not purchased the expansion. Treat your players better, games industry. Let's say there's a mini quest where those without Solstice (sigh) are taken on a boat to just off the coast and get to see it go. Those who have done the "pretend to be Worm Cult" mission, they see it on a quest from the other side, and then get to backstab a lot of Cultists...

After which the wall is open, and armies can pour either side;

World Bosses spawn, but also, city invasions begin; I don't know if the game code allows for this, but Worm Cult mobs spawn inside cities. Fighting them off gains fractional reputation credit, and there now becomes a smaller Reputation with the local faction in each city; show your loyalty to Aldmeri, and get faction themed rewards.

Also, I don't know if the engine allows this, but home invasions. Make it personal, give people personal memories; Worm Cult comes to your homes and fights there... if that's not allowed, there's a server placed Portal/Evil watching eye appears in your home, as if they're trying to get in, unmoveable, ugly glowing decoration that is auto-placed and won't disappear until you click it and are teleported to the Coldharbour house map, and have to fight a currently lining up attack on your home... Don't clear it, wait out the whole event, the portal becomes trappable and then moveable/replaceable... free gift for anyone with a home! It's the 10th Anniversary remember, why not be generous? (just in case there's a player without even an Inn Room, "Replica Worm Portal" becomes available for reputation)... and at the end of the event, everyone also gets that Coldharbour house. Give it a reason to be a gift. Give it everyone.

At the very least, more Worm Cult should be spawned all across Solstice. Having just one World Boss on the island as the only difference between Stage 1 and 2 is pathetic...

Stage 3?

I've not spoiled it for myself yet; but I hear it's a unique dungeon, and that it's good. Let's say for now we leave that untouched. It runs for two weeks but, after that ends, there is a "clear up" dungeon that replaces it, and allows players to still get merits for a little while longer. People fall ill, they have emergencies... we put people first. Even if many of you MMO players are awful people! But even awful people shouldn't feel pressured to play right here and now or forever miss out.

Stage 4.

Yes, really. Try and get as many players into one area as possible for a celebration of not just victory, but the 10th Anniversary. There's the risk the server will fall over. Oddly, those of us there back in the day remember those moments of black holes and log in failures fondly too, decades later. And mail to EVERYONE a "Thanks For The 10th Anniversary Event" momento, so even if they weren't or couldn't get online, they get something to treasure. One that doesn't decay if not collected in a few days.

Games used to do this. A very, very few still do. It can do just fine with less FOMO spending. And the devs don't see any of the money you think they get from your Whale spending; when I was in the industry I was only ever paid for 20 hours a month, despite doing it full time.

Anyway... that's my first quick draft of how I'd have redesigned it.

StihlReign wrote: »

5 gates at the wall. A conal area that gets larger as the server counts players entering from wayshrines. Hordes of NPCs, hundreds if not more trying to kill everyone. A zone system that calls for help initiated by the players or the area, ie more healers gate 3, need tanks gate 5, Help!!

Crafting quests that boost or buff the strength or healing of the players in the cones. Walking World bosses that wipe the masses and create havoc.

NPC and player managed siege engines aimed at the wall. Progress meters. Crafting quests that repair, boost or buff the strength of the siege engines.

Zone wide trash talking Molag Bal.

I love the trash-taking Molag Bal idea!

I should have said how I actually like that they added the crafting daily quests this time. It’s a perfect stock-up activity for the start of this whole event. The fact that they put new furnishing plans in there is also good. The gather items like furs is a good idea but the implementation has been less than ideal. Yeah, you could just get those somewhere else than the areas with circles, but sometimes it is hard to remember where certain enemies can be found.