ESO Combat Isn't Hard to Grasp

guarstompemoji · December 16

...there's just no tutorial.

I downloaded WoW yesterday, and there's a couple of "train with me, recruit!" miniquests as you wade in on your first mission to rescue your shipwrecked survivors.

It teaches you about effect over time effects using story language, and shows you a spammable.

You begin the game w two skills, an over time and a spammable.

Your first 2 missions use these. So, they're used after the tutorial, w a minipractice inbetween.

So:

Introduction/practice -> quest -> practice again -> quest

ESO's tutorial teaches light attacks and blocking, but it never touches on these pillars of gameplay.

The result has been a decade of confusion and frustration, and an enforcement of "skill gap." Yes, a gap in gameplay will exist, but not showing these basics has had a devastating effect.

After seeing how simply WoW does it (a game w a muuch longer skill bar) it shows even more how this could easily be implemented.

Sluggy · December 16

I always thought this was a missed opportunity for guild dailies. the Undaunted delve, Fighter's Guild, Mages Guild, could all ask for some daily task that requires learning a basic element of combat for their daily. Simple stuff like, Weave twenty light attacks during a dungeon boss fight. Recover Stam/Mag twenty times during a boss fight using heavy attacks, taunt and hold a boss for one minute, etc...

Soarora · December 17

I have wondered how it is so many people end up as light attack spammers considering I don’t recall ever being that bad. But I did wear livewire + trappings of invigoration so…

We really need better in-game information. Including updating skill graphics to actually show the correct area of effect. Ice blockade’s effect is more narrow than the AoE, for instance.

guarstompemoji · December 17

If they could just...demonstrate "burst/spammable" and "over time..." And have the player practice, using 2 skills, just 2, and then do a story miniquest.

...

Players stand there and press LA all the time, and only LA. ...because that's all the tutorial covers when it comes to attack skills.

WoW does this so simply and easily. And, their skill bars are longer.

ESO players don't learn abt these until way later. It isn't difficult. It's just never taught. So, we get ppl spaming LAs, maybe pressing a skill or two, and getting frustrated.

It's been 10 years of this and it just creates strife and confusion.

El_Borracho · December 17

I thought subclassing and the Arcanist were supposed to solve LA weaving.

guarstompemoji · December 17

El_Borracho wrote: »

I thought subclassing and the Arcanist were supposed to solve LA weaving.

I hope this is a sort of side-reply to my post! The tutorial I'm suggesting would only show new players how to use their skills, so I'd like to keep focus on that.

"This is a burst."

"This is an 'over-time. Re-cast it when it's almost done."

"Here's a tiny quest. Now practice using just those two skills, because it's all we've given you on your bar just now."

Players do not know even this much. They're taught how to click the left mouse button, and block.

Weaving is more an advanced but awesome technique. Maybe it'd be an advanced combat tutorial at level 160cp or something.

Learning how skills work, as a new character, would be a solid foundation that doesn't exist right now and hasn't existed for a decade. Arcanist seems an attempt to eliminate not just light attacks, but also skills.

DPS in dungeons tend to left click, then occasionally cast a skill. Or two. It's jarring and mystifying to find out there's more to the game.

El_Borracho · December 18

@guarstompemoji Yep, exactly. Don't want to rehash the murky history of LA weaving, but it was and still is a great source of damage and upping your DPS. Arcanist was supposed to be the alternate route for those who don't like LA weaving. And, predictably, here we are with ESO transforming into a button masher because there are now builds that do not require an advanced tutorial, let alone any tutorial... right up to the point they wipe and complain they need more DPS

CameraBeardThePirate · December 18

If ESO had an actual, effective tutorial, I'd wager you'd see a Veteran Overland introduced real quick.

The fact of the matter is as soon as players learn effective rotations, 90% of the content in the game becomes a cakewalk.

El_Borracho · December 19

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

The fact of the matter is as soon as players learn effective rotations, 90% of the content in the game becomes a cakewalk.

This is very true today. But before the Arcanist and explosion of power creep, effective rotations made veteran content possible, but not a cakewalk. I still remember when VMOL was the pinnacle of having to learn mechs and pump out enough DPS to avoid a wipe. Not far behind was VHOF. If you could not meet the DPS check, it was over. Even vet Vateshran was tough to beat that DPS check if you did not have a solid rotation.

I ran a pug VMOL a few weeks ago. Granted, we knew the mechs, but the DPS was so high that it felt like a normal. We joked that if it was an organized raid and we treated it more seriously, we might have had a chance to skip runners. To me, that shows how far this game has fallen in order to placate those who refuse to learn a rotation. VMOL was never intended to be a cakewalk.

And don't even get me started to what a joke VMA has become.

mdjessup4906 · December 20

El_Borracho wrote: »

@guarstompemoji Yep, exactly. Don't want to rehash the murky history of LA weaving, but it was and still is a great source of damage and upping your DPS. Arcanist was supposed to be the alternate route for those who don't like LA weaving. And, predictably, here we are with ESO transforming into a button masher because there are now builds that do not require an advanced tutorial, let alone any tutorial... right up to the point they wipe and complain they need more DPS

Obligatory you actually Do need to la weave on arcanist to do good dps

But yes the #1 frustration of this game for new players who want to not suck (i remember what its like) is the utter lack of in game instruction on how to do meaningful damage for how the game actually works.

Well, that and not having a new/ casual friendly list of what quests to do first if you want to play the story in the original order, but thats not combat lol