"Classic" / "Old School" Pvp Server running on pre 1.5 patch?

KingLogix · November 2025

With pvp server performance constantly challenged by complex sets & cp bonuses - what are everyone's thoughts on having a classic or old school campaign or server than runs on pre 1.5 or pre imperial city patch? Pvp was so much fun back in the day and that was largely due to how simple things were.

Necrotech_Master · November 2025

i think thats more or less what they are trying to do with vengeance campaign already

simplifying things, etc

theres pretty much no way they have the ability to run the game specifically in pvp on a completely different/older version of the game without just running the entire game on that version

so likely vengeance will be the closest you get to what your asking

Marto · December 2025

That's pretty much Vengeance, yeah.

Skills back then had less complexity and interactions. And so did item sets.

Heck, ZOS said that the new loadout system is supposed to present an equivalent level of power to wearing a simple set like Law of Julianos.

Lord_Hev · December 2025

Vengeance is not even remotely close to 1.5 patch. Vengeance is open beta when every one was below lvl 30 without enough skill points for their passives.

It's an interesting idea though. See, the common consensus was that due to the mega-server infrastructure, a 1.5 custom server is literally impossible. However, with vengeance zos has demonstrated they can in-fact in hypothetic; open up an exact 1.5 campaign(or 1.6 to account for a lot of under-the-hood large changes that were done to the game at a dna-level) is entirely possible in some form or another.

SolarRune · December 2025

Doesn't that go back to when most of the calculations were client side though? If so would likely need a different client to run, so wouldn't be the same as standing up vengeance.

MincMincMinc · December 2025

Marto wrote: »

That's pretty much Vengeance, yeah.

Skills back then had less complexity and interactions. And so did item sets.

Heck, ZOS said that the new loadout system is supposed to present an equivalent level of power to wearing a simple set like Law of Julianos.

I wouldnt say skills were less complex, they just had less bloat. Many skills had much more interactions and opened doors to different stat builds. Say you want to lean on crit surge for heals instead of vigor, well back before the harsh cooldown you could tick anytime you crit. Leading you to heavy dot tick stamsorc and crit stamsorc builds being viable.

You want to build for fighting out numbered? Run a sap tank where siphon attacks returned mag for each direct damage attack you did. So siphon would proc on every enemy you sap essence'd. Pairing with other direct ticks could keep pumping your resources.

Sets also mainly were focused on amplifying these skill interactions instead of replacing them. Now adays we see sets that literally are equivalent to skills for damage or effect. The old game was designed in a way where your "build" all pushed your capabilities towards an endgoal which inevitably was still requiring you to push buttons to achieve an output. Today's building is just more like a collector card game where you can afk and still have an output if wanted.