THE NEW DK SPIKES

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

Lord_Hev wrote: »

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

Lord_Hev wrote: »

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

Lord_Hev wrote: »

I actually like the new spike armor, it's very subtle, sleek and not obnoxious like the old one. Wouldn't mind the suggestion of taking some inspiration from skyrim's dragon aspect shout.

You’re in a huge minority honestly, most people would be over the moon to be just given the choice in game what one one choose an added skill style or something to use the new or classic one just hoping we get heard and acknowledged

Woah there my friend. If you've seen my other posts in other threads, I have been vehemently against updating visuals forcefully aka "replacers." Zos should use the skill style architecture in place to great extent and allow all legacy visuals and animations to be preserved as an option for players.

Apologies, I’ve not seen your posts but it sounds like you’re onboard just something a lot of us feel strongly about and it it sounds like you do aswell, and I’m praying that this will be implemented in this case it’s a great time and opportunity to ability to keep that ability identity through choice — whether that’s a classic option, toggle, or alternative — rather than having it taken away entirely.

The fact zos has yet to do anything with old templar jabs with the skill style system is ridiculous. It's clearly possible on a technically level... they blatantly changed nb merciless resolve/relentless focus with a new animation on that recent malacath style.

I completely understand that changes and constraints exist, and not everything can be adjusted instantly. That said, ESO already has examples where alternate animations or visual updates have been introduced successfully — including newer skill styles and recent animation variants for skills like Merciless Resolve / Relentless Focus.

Because of that precedent, this feels like a good opportunity to lean into that system and help players feel heard on a very sensitive, long-standing visual would go a long way toward maintaining trust and confidence in the feedback process.

Awbuz · January 13

I don't like the new spike.
They should be bigger/more visible.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

Awbuz wrote: »

I don't like the new spike.
They should be bigger/more visible.

I get what you mean a lot of players feel the new spikes are too subtle or look like a turtle shell or back pack . The good thing about having optional Skill Styles is that it would let everyone choose: those who prefer the classic, bigger spikes could keep them, while others could use the new look

Faulgor · January 13

Fascinating that we could have feedback that the skills are visually "too much" and "too subtle" at the same time.

Personally I like the new spikes, and wish the other skills were similarly understated.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

Faulgor wrote: »

Fascinating that we could have feedback that the skills are visually "too much" and "too subtle" at the same time.

Personally I like the new spikes, and wish the other skills were similarly understated.

it’s the type and motion of them. Constant pulsing/heartbeat visuals add visual noise, which can be overstimulating for some players. Ideally that’s something that could be toned down or made optional without affecting those who enjoy it.

For Spikes specifically, the issue isn’t subtlety — it’s loss of identity. The new visuals read like a small shell on the back rather than the iconic spiked armour wrapping the DK’s body and limbs. That silhouette was instantly readable and thematic, and this version feels like a downgrade in both presence and class fantasy.

16BitForestCat · January 13

All I can see is a Spiny latched onto my DK's back. Are Mario and Luigi gonna show up and hit me with fireballs to knock it off? Wait, DK's are supposed to be all about the fire. Can I knock the Spiny off of myself so I don't have to look at it anymore? It really does look terrible to me.

guarstompemoji · January 13

Oh man. I really did enjoy the old ones. They could be updated, ofc...made a little sharper, some flame whisps, but they were fun and melded into the character.

Thank you for agreeing to revisit this rework. It means a lot that the team is listening!

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

guarstompemoji wrote: »

Oh man. I really did enjoy the old ones. They could be updated, ofc...made a little sharper, some flame whisps, but they were fun and melded into the character.

Thank you for agreeing to revisit this rework. It means a lot that the team is listening!

Agreed on all of that I’m really hoping for something positive to come from putting this much effort into getting noticed and a large majority of players agreeing

Destai · January 13

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

J18696 wrote: »

The animation for casting the new spikes i quite like but its the turtle shell appearance at the base of the spikes that totally ruin it for me

There’s a reply from a dev in here they’re going to look at potentially reverting it which is great news for us

For transparency, I don't know if we can revert it, but we are checking in with the team who is working on these visuals to get more info on the "why" for this change, confirm it looks like they expect, and what the options are.

Acknowledged that you're looking into the options, but this is why I think "revert" should be on the table for most, if not all changes that land on PTS. In this case, if the new one's not being well received (doesn't sound like it is), will the old animation be compatible with new numbers/mechanics of the skill?

Animations are such a touchy thing - just look at how often people bring up the Jabs and PermaGlow changes. I'd hate for this PTS to be marred by an unwanted change getting pushed through.

FWIW - I could live with the new spikes animation, but they feel very not-Dragon to me. Good example of what changes to get out earlier than PTS, hopefully that's something you guys can do with the Warden. I'll be much, much more vociferous about that class, as it's my main.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

Destai wrote: »

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

J18696 wrote: »

The animation for casting the new spikes i quite like but its the turtle shell appearance at the base of the spikes that totally ruin it for me

There’s a reply from a dev in here they’re going to look at potentially reverting it which is great news for us

For transparency, I don't know if we can revert it, but we are checking in with the team who is working on these visuals to get more info on the "why" for this change, confirm it looks like they expect, and what the options are.

Acknowledged that you're looking into the options, but this is why I think "revert" should be on the table for most, if not all changes that land on PTS. In this case, if the new one's not being well received (doesn't sound like it is), will the old animation be compatible with new numbers/mechanics of the skill?

Animations are such a touchy thing - just look at how often people bring up the Jabs and PermaGlow changes. I'd hate for this PTS to be marred by an unwanted change getting pushed through.

FWIW - I could live with the new spikes animation, but they feel very not-Dragon to me. Good example of what changes to get out earlier than PTS, hopefully that's something you guys can do with the Warden. I'll be much, much more vociferous about that class, as it's my main.[/quote]

Nice post! This is my main, and it’s an absolute staple of the class. The old skill that gave you a damage shield? Visually, it gave you a shield. The old one that sprayed spikes? It literally sprayed spikes. It was perfect as it was, and it also aligned perfectly with the new changes—perfectly, in my opinion.

The “why” and reasoning behind the changes don’t matter. If this doesn’t get visually changed back, toggled to the old skill style, or adjusted to look more like it originally did after all the feedback and effort people have put into bringing this to attention, I honestly don’t feel like I’ll want to log in much. Being my main class for 10 years, taking away what made it iconic feels… like a breakup. 😂

stimpy986b14_ESO · January 13

Why not just add a skill style for the old version?
Just don't you dare put it on the crown store.
I would also like skill styles for molten weapons. The visuals look great but I already have cool looking weapons and want too see them when fighting.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

stimpy986b14_ESO wrote: »

Why not just add a skill style for the old version?
Just don't you dare put it on the crown store.
I would also like skill styles for molten weapons. The visuals look great but I already have cool looking weapons and want too see them when fighting.

At the absolute minimum this is what a a huge majority are hoping for especially since it already exists and interacts fine with everything

BardokRedSnow · January 13

I didnt get a good look at them until recently and yea I gotta say you can put me down for "This looks terrible". Just make the spikes bigger, big spikes are badass, widdle spikes are laughable on a "dragon knight"

BardokRedSnow · January 13

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey all, just wanted to hop in here and say we see your feedback and have raised it with the team who is working on these visual updates. We'll update with the info they provide, tomorrow.

I really appreciate yall being transparent and on the ball with this, its pretty huge and goes a long way to restoring trust with players.

I wanna ask, if they can't reverse it which is understandable, could they just make the spikes bigger, or simply make a refurbished version of the old original spikes? I think all DK enthusiasts for the most part, old and future really only want the spikes to look cooler, and fresher, not totally different.

This to me is definitely a downgrade, no one will be intimidated seeing that. I know there's been some opinions that the spikes are too much but overall thats not from people who arent fully signed on to loving the class, its iconic for the class to have big mean dragon spikes the same as it is for necromancers to have their spiney back ornament.

edit: I downloaded the pts and looked for myself, and I do think the spikes will look better bigger like before but honestly its not so pertinent that a change has to be done imo, I like it the more I use the skills.

So I will defer to y'alls judgement, good job

love the changes.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey all, just wanted to hop in here and say we see your feedback and have raised it with the team who is working on these visual updates. We'll update with the info they provide, tomorrow.

I really appreciate yall being transparent and on the ball with this, its pretty huge and goes a long way to restoring trust with players.

I wanna ask, if they can't reverse it which is understandable, could they just make the spikes bigger, or simply make a refurbished version of the old original spikes? I think all DK enthusiasts for the most part, old and future really only want the spikes to look cooler, and fresher, not totally different.

This to me is definitely a downgrade, no one will be intimidated seeing that. I know there's been some opinions that the spikes are too much but overall thats not from people who arent fully signed on to loving the class, its iconic for the class to have big mean dragon spikes the same as it is for necromancers to have their spiney back ornament.

I think the biggest thing for me is the actual old skill both looked better and whilst they pretty much share the same effects the old skill also portrayed them better aswell
Hardened armour (shield one) gave a visable shield on it
And volatile spikes (damage one) also had a great spike spray animation
I’d say they hit the mark with a lot in this but, they really missed out on this one and clearly we all want the same thing

Shadesofkin · January 13

Given that blade cloak is still in the game, is there a way to simply adopt that asset to feel like it's swirling scales/spikes?

Radiate77 · January 13

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey all, just wanted to hop in here and say we see your feedback and have raised it with the team who is working on these visual updates. We'll update with the info they provide, tomorrow.

I really appreciate yall being transparent and on the ball with this, its pretty huge and goes a long way to restoring trust with players.

I wanna ask, if they can't reverse it which is understandable, could they just make the spikes bigger, or simply make a refurbished version of the old original spikes? I think all DK enthusiasts for the most part, old and future really only want the spikes to look cooler, and fresher, not totally different.

This to me is definitely a downgrade, no one will be intimidated seeing that. I know there's been some opinions that the spikes are too much but overall thats not from people who arent fully signed on to loving the class, its iconic for the class to have big mean dragon spikes the same as it is for necromancers to have their spiney back ornament.

My brother, I played a Dragonknight up until Necromancer released, and both the Spikes and Bone Armor look incredibly bad.

Maybe if we didn’t have such a huge array of cool cosmetics to design our character something like this would work, but ESO is known for having the best character customization post-creation out of every MMO on the market.

They should be leaning into this, not overriding all of our hard work with ugly rocks and spikes,

BardokRedSnow · January 13

Radiate77 wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey all, just wanted to hop in here and say we see your feedback and have raised it with the team who is working on these visual updates. We'll update with the info they provide, tomorrow.

I really appreciate yall being transparent and on the ball with this, its pretty huge and goes a long way to restoring trust with players.

I wanna ask, if they can't reverse it which is understandable, could they just make the spikes bigger, or simply make a refurbished version of the old original spikes? I think all DK enthusiasts for the most part, old and future really only want the spikes to look cooler, and fresher, not totally different.

This to me is definitely a downgrade, no one will be intimidated seeing that. I know there's been some opinions that the spikes are too much but overall thats not from people who arent fully signed on to loving the class, its iconic for the class to have big mean dragon spikes the same as it is for necromancers to have their spiney back ornament.

My brother, I played a Dragonknight up until Necromancer released, and both the Spikes and Bone Armor look incredibly bad.

Maybe if we didn’t have such a huge array of cool cosmetics to design our character something like this would work, but ESO is known for having the best character customization post-creation out of every MMO on the market.

They should be leaning into this, not overriding all of our hard work with ugly rocks and spikes,

Way I see it is in battle, no one's gonna be looking at how I matched the red cloth on my armor with the red hilt on my sword or care about my immense fashion sense.

What they will care about and notice is the big spiky Nord flying at their face when theyre at a quarter health lol. Out of combat is fashion time, in combat is fear me time.

In and out of battle, fire turtle aint it.

Radiate77 · January 13

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

In and out of battle, fire turtle aint it.

Well yeah, we are in agreement here. 😂

Radiate77 · January 13

If we have to have spikes, then they should be looking at how the Ebonheart style looks, and deriving inspiration from that. There is no other motif in the game, other than the Glass Helm, that screams Dragonknight than that.

I also want to add, this belongs to the Earthen Heart skill line, and what is the heart of a planet? Extremely compressed lava. Not rocks.

Why not play into Lava for this skill?

Twohothardware · January 13

There may be some visual bugs going on right now that they'll iron out over the next couple of PTS updates. But the old DK spikes were nothing special in terms of visuals and were about as basic as you can get so I'm glad they're totally re-doing all the skills to give a fresh face to DK.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

Radiate77 wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey all, just wanted to hop in here and say we see your feedback and have raised it with the team who is working on these visual updates. We'll update with the info they provide, tomorrow.

I really appreciate yall being transparent and on the ball with this, its pretty huge and goes a long way to restoring trust with players.

I wanna ask, if they can't reverse it which is understandable, could they just make the spikes bigger, or simply make a refurbished version of the old original spikes? I think all DK enthusiasts for the most part, old and future really only want the spikes to look cooler, and fresher, not totally different.

This to me is definitely a downgrade, no one will be intimidated seeing that. I know there's been some opinions that the spikes are too much but overall thats not from people who arent fully signed on to loving the class, its iconic for the class to have big mean dragon spikes the same as it is for necromancers to have their spiney back ornament.

My brother, I played a Dragonknight up until Necromancer released, and both the Spikes and Bone Armor look incredibly bad.

Maybe if we didn’t have such a huge array of cool cosmetics to design our character something like this would work, but ESO is known for having the best character customization post-creation out of every MMO on the market.

They should be leaning into this, not overriding all of our hard work with ugly rocks and spikes,

respect your opinion and genuinely appreciate you sharing your thoughts on the spikes — not everyone is going to like the same visuals, and that’s completely fair. That said, a huge portion of the Dragonknight player base did love the original spikes, and for many of us they’ve been a defining part of the class’s look, feel, and fantasy for years.

Rather than moving away from that entirely, it feels like there’s a real opportunity here to lean into what made the original spikes feel so good — their presence, size, and intimidation — while still refining or modernizing them if needed. Ideally, both styles could co-exist, giving players the choice to use the classic look or the new one, without taking anything away from either side.

BardokRedSnow · January 13

Gonna redownload the pts myself n take a look n see how I feel, definitely important enough to do so.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Gonna redownload the pts myself n take a look n see how I feel, definitely important enough to do so.

Check out the new elder heal (older coag) that looks like it’s bugged and the heart floats above your head a lot of people have said about this skill aswell it looks odd and people would rather the heart removed, it’s kind of like having a group icon forced above your head

Radiate77 · January 13

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Gonna redownload the pts myself n take a look n see how I feel, definitely important enough to do so.

Check out the new elder heal (older coag) that looks like it’s bugged and the heart floats above your head a lot of people have said about this skill aswell it looks odd and people would rather the heart removed, it’s kind of like having a group icon forced above your head

Yeah, this one, the bugged wings, and Spikes are the only animations currently throwing me off too.

BardokRedSnow · January 13

Eh honestly guys, I think I actually kinda like it. I think yea it does look a wee bit like a pinecone lmao but its a bit more fashionable. It looks much better in person than on these screens or short videos.

I could go either way on it tbh, the animations are so good that if they dont make the spikes bigger, I wont be upset. Maybe I'll make my own video in 4k to show what I mean.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Eh honestly guys, I think I actually kinda like it. I think yea it does look a wee bit like a pinecone lmao but its a bit more fashionable. It looks much better in person than on these screens or short videos.

I could go either way on it tbh, the animations are so good that if they dont make the spikes bigger, I wont be upset. Maybe I'll make my own video in 4k to show what I mean.

I know how it looks in game but it’s just not for me feel like a teenage mutant ninja turtle or like it’s a parasite on your back might aswell just chuck a rucksack on my back instead rename the class too koopaknight if it gets left

aetherix8 · January 13

These new spikes are better, but why is the entire thing so small? It does resemble an alien parasite atm, but only because it's too small, if it were covering just a slightly larger area so the detail can be clearly appreciated. Otherwise I like them more than the good old ones that are definitely too big.
Also, all these new animations are so flashy it makes me think that we won't be getting any options to keep the old versions because they look too distinct.

MXVIIDREAM · January 13

Radiate77 wrote: »

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Gonna redownload the pts myself n take a look n see how I feel, definitely important enough to do so.

Check out the new elder heal (older coag) that looks like it’s bugged and the heart floats above your head a lot of people have said about this skill aswell it looks odd and people would rather the heart removed, it’s kind of like having a group icon forced above your head

Yeah, this one, the bugged wings, and Spikes are the only animations currently throwing me off too.

Part of me wants to say it’s bugged there’s no reason for the heart to be flying about over your head haha I can’t imagine they’ve done it intentionally very poor choice if they have just put it back in the character or remove it entirely

BardokRedSnow · January 13

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Gonna redownload the pts myself n take a look n see how I feel, definitely important enough to do so.

Check out the new elder heal (older coag) that looks like it’s bugged and the heart floats above your head a lot of people have said about this skill aswell it looks odd and people would rather the heart removed, it’s kind of like having a group icon forced above your head

the heart above the head is odd yea i hope thats not intentional, would rather have it centered and your body go shadowy like before. Not too much a fan of that, and the wings is killing me also because the animation for leap, and wings buffet look great itself, but the side bacon lmao xD Very bugged and I wanna see what sprouting my wings feels like with the new stuff x3

All in all tho these just need tweaking, the spikes are not the end of the world.

Whats really badass tho is the new two hander animations, rally is sickkkk, I wont hate having to go back to using that at all.