Dear ESO pvp veterans…

Danse_Mayhem · December 29

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

DarkStrifeYT · December 29

I played eso since 2014, always into pvp and the story and pvp has unfortunately changed to this. Even I tried suggesting a ton of ideas and all got shot down, I gave up.

(Had to correct the year)

Xarc · December 29

cool story bro

But no one will give that up for you.

Danse_Mayhem · December 29

Xarc wrote: »

cool story bro

But no one will give that up for you.

Not me, the community and longevity of the game. Big picture mate.

Today it’s fun to use the most broken OP combos. Tomorrow we’re complaining that it’s all we face.
Next week we’re complaining that the action dried up.
Next month we’re complaining that vengeance replaced gray host because we wouldn’t give up our cross heals and ZOS did it for us.
Next year we are uninstalling

Big picture.

Erickson9610 · December 29

The appeal of ESO's PvP is that you are able to make these broken builds. You aren't able to get this kind of power in other MMOs.

If you want balanced, pick-up-and-play PvP, there's always Vengeance.

licenturion · December 29

People always go for the most OP stuff in multiplayer games, especially in a competitive space like Cyro/IC

I am currently playing the new season of Diablo 4 (which is PvE) and basically 99 percent of the players I see have the same paladin build that obliterates everything by just pressing 1 button every 20 seconds.

Players use the tools they are given. It's on the devs to fix them. But even then there will probably be a big mob of angry people mad their stuff gets nerfed.

Calastir · December 29

Erickson9610 wrote: »

The appeal of ESO's PvP is that you are able to make these broken builds. You aren't able to get this kind of power in other MMOs.

If you want balanced, pick-up-and-play PvP, there's always Vengeance.

Cooperharley · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

Most PvP veterans don't come to the forums and those that do likely won't do this dude! It's human nature man. People are going to go for whatever is most fun to them

Gankform · December 29

i said from the first day scribing and Subclassing is going to destroy the game...and its not only for pvp, now i can solo everything, i dont need to group anymore only sometime for trials and thats all. ppl alrdy can solo (hard) vet content without even wearing a weapon. the game is on a very bad path and I'm sorry about that

Four_Fingers · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

You never played in a real experienced "ball group", then.

aetherix8 · December 29

Players are never going to voluntarily let go of their OP builds. Period. I appreciate the intent, but my faith in such an outcome is exactly zero. It's up to the devs to fix the balance, and apparently they will get back to it after the holidays.

So next year we're getting:

1. Some classes reworked - from the latest leak/trainee blunder, it seems DK is almost done, and perhaps Warden will be refreshed fast too, so we might get another class or two reworked in 2026. This is an attempt to balance subclassing vs. pure class, as well as to reinforce class identity and allow for more viable playstyles.
2. Some more Vengeance tests mostly focused on damage/healing balance - results may or may not be applied to GH, but the devs have said before that they were tweaking GH a bit following previous tests results, so why not improve GH whenever possible.
3. New PvP mode - unless the ruleset is different from GH, this isn't really a solution. The same mess but on a smaller map doesn't sound promising at all. Vengeance also isn't an answer to those who wish to continue using sets in PvP.

My point is: don't despair. Use the energy you put into your OP to keep pressure on ZOS rather than asking players to save the game. Keep requesting meaningful changes to GH balance, continue outlining the biggest pain points. Devs already have a pretty busy schedule for 2026, so you probably won't see any big adjustments very soon, but it doesn't mean that they will never again put any effort into GH. Personally, I'm waiting for perma Vengeance, but if GH gets reworked then this is so much better as more choice is always welcome.

Vulkunne · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

...

tell me what you think.

Yeah, they're not going to do that. Although I agree with most of what was said, I should highlight your mention of the other game and its community and so forth. With respect, even though you are right, umm you really need to understand who you're dealing with here.

They just don't seem to care about those things, in more ways than one too ok. So, in time, you will see what I mean, if you don't already, which maybe you do. But you will find out.

I've had to make some changes myself to stay competitive, had to let go of some folks who were not worth my time, I hate to be that way but those closer to that situation know what happened and they understand my meaning. Sometimes we just, no matter how right we are we can't expect everyone else to change for us. We have to be the change and change is messy. They've inconvenienced us yes but there's also a price to be paid for doing so. Some understand this more than others.

I also don't think it's a good idea for Guilds or Syndicates of players to set build policy for the masses or to single out some of us because we are challenging or for whatever reason. It should never happen. He's using RoA so let's make fun of them... you know. I never advocated for anything like that. I think it's better to encourage a balanced game rather than putting more people with fake authority on a pedestal over everyone else. If that be the case, then we should all be using RoA consistently to defy them. Because they should never even try to define us. Yeah, there will be those who weill bend the knee, sure. Won't be me.

BXR_Lonestar · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

What do you think it is that we did BEFORE subclassing existed? Everyone had different classes and different builds. Charm was still prevalent, but less so because if you wanted to dragon leap, you had to be a DK. If you wanted to use Merciless Resolve, you had to be a Nightblade. If you wanted to use streak, you had to be a Sorc. It's subclassing that has shaken all of that up, and predictibly, everyone navigates to the most efficient subclass setups. You can't fault ANYONE for just playing the game that was given to them. And to be fair, a TON of players from both the PVP side of the aisle and the PVE side warned Zos that this would happen if they unleashed subclassing in the way that they did - and they did it anyways.

Keep in mind that what we have now WAS the change that "shook up" what we had before. I'm not saying its better - as I've largely spoken out AGAINST subclassing - but it is what it is. At this point, subclassing is not going away so you just need to adapt or concede that your going to be playing less than optimal. Don't hate the players, hate the game for this.

Rally Cry and Rush of Agony were very prevalent even before subclassing. They were just typically run on support. To be honest, we see less Rush of Agony and/or Dark Convergence than anything else right now. If these sets are still effecting you, it is very much a L2P thing...

Monomyth is good, but its niche. It doesn't work particularly well outside of a cookie cutter build optimized for crit damage, and to take full advantage of it, you should be a Khajit. However, I and many others don't want to change all our characters to Khajit, so there are other mythics that are just as good for non-crit oriented setups.

And Ball groups? They still exist, but my guilds group of coordinated brawlers/supports have been farming most ball groups with an 8-10 man. They're not invincible. But you need a group that is well coordinated to take them on, so if you DON'T have that, the emphasis is on YOU to steer away from that fight rather than be farmed.

As to charm spam? Yeah, its annoying. It never was so prevalent as it is now because people have discovered its a crowd control that doesn't obey the same crowd control rules. Something needs to change with it for sure, but until that happens, people are going to continue to abuse it.

But really, other than your complaint about charm, I get the sense that this post is just rage-baiting.

imPDA · December 29

If you want to draw more attention and actually make people play without it - you should host a tournament with rules: ban some sets, skills, combinations, etc. I know enough veteran PvP players who plays off meta or slightly off meta builds because of things you described, but you can't remove meta things entirely because it is too OP and can't be replaced without losing almost every duel.

You can also make a guild with rules like that, with weekly tournament to keep players active. I knew guild like that; they were newbies and practiced inside the guild to become more familiar with PvP because everyone in Alikr just oneshotted them.

I also watched tournament hosted by Mr-k0 yesterday and I would say, there were not much meta players there, no warden players at all I think, and rules were not restricted (only bash build were banned). A lot of tournaments in the past had more strict rules were, because there always was very strong "meta" build or annoying skill/set/etc. Until then, there is no sense not to use the most powerful build you can think of, except if you are tired of easy wins against less experienced people or you are tired of the same duels over and over.

mook-eb16_ESO · December 29

https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/69117

The livestream’s main topics will be:

Seasons–the new approach to ESO releases that replaces Content Pass
Some of the new content we’ll be introducing over the first few Seasons
QoL improvements, class and combat changes, PvP additions, and in-game events changes
And very importantly, how we are going to approach all this so that we can surprise and delight you with new additions while working to better incorporate your thoughts and feedback as we tackle reworks and improvements to our core features.

Xarc · December 29

You can't just politely ask people to give up skills and playstyles when they're going to have to face people who won't. It's not fair, so it's impossible.

CatoUnchained · December 29

It's not up to us to fix GH.

It's up to zos to limit heal stacking and tweak a few of the most abused sets.

ZOS created this situation, only ZOS can fix it.

Thumbless_Bot · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

Been playing 10 years. Never equipped roa, rally or the 'meta' 3 subclassing lines at one time. Admittedly I used wretched for a while and charm for about a day to try it out, but dont use those either. Also, dont even have the latest dlc, so no mono...

I do just fine in pvp.

The real question... Is winning with cheeze even winning?

hoangdz · December 29

I got bored of subclass because it was too imbalanced, so I went back to pure stamsorc and been having fun. However, I will not put down Monomyth or Rallying Cry because damage is simply too absurd to do so. Even with Rallying Cry, I am still taking 14k bow procs to the face unless I build 35k+ resists WITH Rallying Cry lol. Rallying Cry and Monomyth are unfortunately a necessity in this meta.

El_Borracho · December 29

Unless you are part of the hard-core veterans, which is maybe 10-25% of PVPers who are adept at crafting creative, powerful builds for their playstyle, the meta will always be there. There are simply too many nerfs, changes, rebalancing, tweaks, etc. for casual to veteran PVP players to constantly keep up with. Even just leaving for a couple of months can make your build obsolete.

10 years ago, like @DarkStrifeYT pointed out, there were multiple options for being a viable DD in Cyrodiil. Then players complained, so they "fixed" the problem, and have been fixing it ever since. I remember when Mark Target was an OP skill and the worst thing you had to worry about was Snipe desync. Now I wish those days came back.

The first crack to appear was Mythics and the simultaneous crushing of Monster Sets. While a few remain useful, the loss of Monster Sets was a big blow to build diversity. Scribing was a valiant attempt to bring some diversity back, then the Warden Class Mastery appeared. Subclassing has only accelerated the process to this overarching meta.

As a non-hard-core PVPer, I was able to keep a DK build that used the Last Ayleid King mythic effective well past its prime, and have played with some Huntsman's builds. I tried the warden charm/ROA/Monomyth builds, they are just not fun. Its funny, players complain about Vengeance for lack of diversity, then immediately hop back onto their meta. Its got to the point I wish they brought back the original Oakensoul, or at least the infamous original Elf Bane-Zaan combo.

valenwood_vegan · December 29

Zos has to balance their game. "The playerbase" isn't going to follow some rules dictated to them in a post on a forum that's visited by like 1% of players. Zos put the game in this state and it's not something that can be fixed by "the players" somehow banding together, that's just not realistic, unfortunately.

The players *have* done their part, by offering volumes of useful feedback about broken sets and builds and combinations and mechanics, for years. And for years zos has ignored most of it. That's how we got here.

Lord_Hev · December 29

I'm doing my part! I only play pure-class, do not use wretched vitality or rallying cry ever.

This is way too idealistic; people don't function like that. The community will never fix anything. They will only abuse what is provided to them, take advantage of, with no disregard of their actions. This is fundamental nature. That is why Zos has to be the ones to do something.

Radiate77 · December 29

El_Borracho wrote: »

Unless you are part of the hard-core veterans, which is maybe 10-25% of PVPers who are adept at crafting creative, powerful builds for their playstyle, the meta will always be there.

Yup. Gotta read those numbers and understand the give-and-(not-so-often)take system.

It is extremely satisfying to make a thematic “roleplay build” that excels against people using what they consider meta. Those same players go on hour long tangents about how broken and unbalanced a build with 27k health is… not understanding that you don’t need crazy health or armor you just need to know how to mitigate damage.

While Subclassing can help source necessary buffs and debuffs, the core gameplay still revolves around knowing when to dodge, when to block, how to weave, and how to read health percentages to time your burst.

I’ll also add, there are counters to the “meta”. Anyone who’s been playing forever knows how to counter melee metas, and it’s with stand your ground ranged builds, and funny enough they are now better than ever.

G1Countdown · December 29

I think ZOS should sponsor a theory building session / contest with I don’t know, 5 mil gold//crates/something similar for a viable build to compete with these skills that does not utilize any off the specific skills mentioned in OPs post.

Radiate77 · December 29

G1Countdown wrote: »

I think ZOS should sponsor a theory building session / contest with I don’t know, 5 mil gold//crates/something similar for a viable build to compete with these skills that does not utilize any off the specific skills mentioned in OPs post.

That would actually be a lot of fun.

BardokRedSnow · December 29

I knew this would be cringe from the title.

It is Zos' job to fix their game, not the customer.

Oblivion_Protocol · December 29

Hi, Veteran PvP player here. I’ve been playing this game since 2020, and got into PvP around mid 2021. I’ve seen a lot of metas come and go, played through hundreds of builds, and experienced change after change to the game. I’ve read your post, OP, and I can say one thing with confidence.

I’m not doing any of that. Neither is anyone else who’s serious about winning in PvP.

I, too, have complained about sets and abilities and metas and ball groups in the past. But at the end of the day, these things aren’t going anywhere. ZoS has clearly demonstrated that. And these sets, abilities, and strategies work. Who wants to be less effective in combat? Who wants to be less powerful? Not me or the majority of endgame PvP players I’ve encountered.

To be clear, I’m happy for anyone who has fun in PvP without using any of this stuff. If you can function in Cyro on your unique off-meta build, that’s great! But the meta players also have fun on our builds and in our groups. We’re not going to limit our fun because people disagree with our strategies or get frustrated that they can’t beat us because of some refusal to either use what works or learn how to beat it.

As for the long-term health of the game, the PvP community may be dwindling, but it’s not going to die. Not by a long shot. I’ve been hearing that Chicken Little take for years now, and it hasn’t come to pass. Even if Vengeance replaces GH, people will play it (I won’t be one of them, but others will). It takes a LOT more than some overperforming gear to kill an MMO mode with a dedicated fanbase.

Danse_Mayhem · December 29

Thankyou for the varied responses.

I will clear up that I am a day 1 pvp main, and have ran my fair share of meta; Nothing about this was rage bait at all. It’s coming from a place of someone who’s good enough at PvP to run something other than those things I mentioned, and still make it work.

I’m mostly just sick of being in a community where the people complaining the hardest, are usually the ones that are using those things the most.

My reference to the dark souls community was because I was a pretty big YouTuber there, and myself and other uploaders, quite successfully spread around some non-meta playstyles that kept that game alive for way longer than it would have otherwise done, if the attitude was the same as here.

Honestly, if you’re of the opinion “ima use my OP stuff and keep winning until ZOS fixes it” then that’s completely fine, you’re free to playa nd enjoy eso as you wish;
I just don’t wanna hear from you that PvP is in a bad place right now. Be the solution. The point of this was to encourage people to try something different. The truth is that every time you run a Charm / rush of agony ball group, spamming that same thing over and over to decimate anyone else not doing the same, you’re killing community morale, which is causing people to leave PvP and low faith. This is a community game after all and some responsibility falls to the player base not to all just run the most toxic thing and make anything else unthinkable. Blaming ZOS is completely valid, but also the lazy option.
I’m no moderator or authority here; The defensive responses about “muhhh OP build just adapt and let me be OP” aren’t needed. I’m there with you on these same builds, or was to begin with. This is an observation / suggestion.

After months of subclassing being a thing, I’d have thought more people would be bored of the same combos, and would be utilizing the many possibilities of combos to get creative. Since you don’t really ‘win’ anything in eso PvP (other than protecting an ego) I’d have thought that trying something new would be more important than winning every fight.

Appreciate some of these responses from the ones who understood the point of this post.

Artisian0001 · December 29

Danse_Mayhem wrote: »

I challenge you, put down the rallying cry, the monomyth, The charm, the rush of agony, the same 3 subclasses that 90% of cyrodil is using for like, and try something new.

Hear me out. We, as the community are the fix here.

I get it - When subclassing was released, we were all excited to be OP, our PVE DPS doubled overnight, we got instant insane PvP builds and felt stronger than emperors…

But it’s getting old now. I don’t think I’ve spoken to a single pvp regular who enjoys the current state of pvp, and ZOS clearly aren’t doing anything about it anytime soon;

The charm spam.
- It’s annoying and overpowered. No other class mastery performs this well. If Procs on healing soul (also overtuned) so can be used both offensively and defensively, to stun entire groups through block and dodge roll… without even slotting a stun. The AOE is also huge. If you use charm and deny how ridiculous this is, you’re in denial. Drop it for a week and I’ll see you back here. No one enjoys this trash.

Rush of agony
- I still have no idea why a set that has the best CC in the game, doesn’t grant CC immunity, and has an explosion attached to it afterwards because why not. It’s even got its own internal cooldown separate to regular CC, which I have to assume is harder to code than just making it obey the rules of normal CC?? It does nothing for pve, and all it does is ruin PvP with that ridiculous interaction. It’s a tool for ball groups to decimate solo / small groups, and large fights are almost always decided by this annoying set, often spammed every 8 seconds in tandem with charm. No one enjoys this.

The same subclasses
- Everyone is using assassination, with a combo of storm calling, animal companions, aedric spear or restoring light. Everyone. They are overtuned and it makes every player an infinite sustaining, speed machine TankHealsDeeps with no counter, no weakness, and everyone just bouncing off each others invincible builds, until you notice some poor soul trying something different in a group fight - and you go and 2 shot them, before getting back to being more survivable than a trials tank. It’s boring. No one likes this.

Monomyth / Rallying / Wretched
- I mean mostly Monomyth. It’s busted OP and it’s why we all use it. But the Same builds are everywhere. When sets like rallying over perform to such a level, build variety is dead.

Ball groups
- I mean where to start… I’ve played in a ball group and actively felt my brain cells melting away with how boring it was, spamming the same few skills around a pull spam every few seconds and causing the game to lag for everyone nearby. I’ve also played against them, and PvP is legit miserable for anyone not in a ball group right now.

My point?

It’s time for US, the player base to take some accountability here. Sure, we can rightfully blame ZOS for such god awful balance and ignoring things flagged on PTS, we can flame them for the current state and hope that they listen, and we can post feedback and tag them… But it’s been months, and all we have is a fleeting hope of this class balance in the near future… But the veterans amongst us know full well that won’t be the fix that pvp needs.

It’s on us, the players, to put down that trash that’s ruining the game, and try something different. Sure it’s nice to win all the time, and i know the ego players are gonna shudder at the thought of not being at their best…. But the alternative is killing the game.

I came from the dark souls community before playing eso from console release, and in that community, the playerbase got together and collectively decided that we weren’t going to all use the same broken OP stuff. We made news and made fun of people who did that. We tried new things and got creative, and as a result, the game lasted years after the developers stopped caring.

I don’t know how long eso has - Hopefully a while because we love this game right? But we currently have a community full of pvpers who know full well what the problems are, yet do nothing about it, in favour of remaining OP.

At the very least, don’t be one of the people complaining about how pvp sucks, before jumping on your rally / null arca / balorghs warden base with assassination and Storm calling.

Rant over, I am mad. I’m not chill. 12 years on eso and here we are, with the worst balance since release, and a playerbase that’s forcing each other into the very meta that is causing the need for vengeance campaign to take over (which most of us don’t want)

tell me what you think.

i challenge you to improve and adapt

Radiate77 · December 29

@Danse_Mayhem, maybe a better angle to tackle this would be to spread awareness on how to counter said builds.

Not many people are posting PvP builds anymore, and most veterans who understood the value of counterplay are no longer around to spread that knowledge. It’s on us… the people who have been around through all of these different metas to inform people that there are still options.

When that starts happening, just like in Dark Souls, the community will correct itself.

Instead of melee burst builds, people might pull up with a staff and wards, and then when people get sick of that... they counter it with a flood of DoTs and intermittent burst.

Melee burst builds can’t kill someone stacking wards correctly, but they can sure keep up with a flood of DoTs when built right.

That’s the beauty of it.

Danse_Mayhem · December 29

Radiate77 wrote: »

@Danse_Mayhem, maybe a better angle to tackle this would be to spread awareness on how to counter said builds.

Not many people are posting PvP builds anymore, and most veterans who understood the value of counterplay are no longer around to spread that knowledge. It’s on us… the people who have been around through all of these different metas to inform people that there are still options.

When that starts happening, just like in Dark Souls, the community will correct itself.

Instead of melee burst builds, people might pull up with a staff and wards, and then when people get sick of that... they counter it with a flood of DoTs and intermittent burst.

Melee burst builds can’t kill someone stacking wards correctly, but they can sure keep up with a flood of DoTs when built right.

That’s the beauty of it.

Love this answer, and completely agree with you on this!