Maintenance for the week of February 23:
• NA megaservers for maintenance – February 23, 4:00AM EST (9:00 UTC) - 12:00PM EST (17:00 UTC)
• EU megaservers for maintenance – February 23, 9:00 UTC (4:00AM EST) - 17:00 UTC (12:00PM EST)
• ESO Store and Account System for maintenance – February 23, 4:00AM EST (9:00 UTC) - 12:00PM EST (17:00 UTC)
We will be performing maintenance on the PTS on Monday at 4:00AM EST (9:00 UTC).

Animations and sounds of two-handed sword terrible?

TheDreVMiros
TheDreVMiros
Soul Shriven
Аnimation update itself is not bad. The game needs it. But so far, it doesn't look or sound very good. I'll start with the sounds.

The sounds don't change depending on the type of weapon. Sledgehammer, axe, sword = sword sound. It's like you're picking up a big sledgehammer, but the sounds are like you're wielding a sword or a katana.

Animations: Some animations don't feel as massive as the old animations, such as Berserker Strike or Reverse Slash. And there are no variations in animations for different types of weapons. No matter what you pick up, it will feel like you have a sword in your hand, both in terms of animations and sounds.

So far, it all looks rather unconvincing and poor quality. More like “oh well, let it be.”. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to postpone updating the animations for two-handed weapons and work on them in more detail first?
  • SirIronclad
    SirIronclad
    ✭✭✭
    Аnimation update itself is not bad. The game needs it. But so far, it doesn't look or sound very good. I'll start with the sounds.

    The sounds don't change depending on the type of weapon. Sledgehammer, axe, sword = sword sound. It's like you're picking up a big sledgehammer, but the sounds are like you're wielding a sword or a katana.

    Animations: Some animations don't feel as massive as the old animations, such as Berserker Strike or Reverse Slash. And there are no variations in animations for different types of weapons. No matter what you pick up, it will feel like you have a sword in your hand, both in terms of animations and sounds.

    I agree with these points
  • Radiate77
    Radiate77
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    This would be the time to give each weapon different animations, yeah.
    Dragon Priest [Restoring Light, Draconic Power, Grave Lord]
    Death Knight [Grave Lord, Winter’s Embrace, Siphoning]
    Pyromancer [Ardent Flame, Dawn’s Wrath, Earthen Heart]
    Summoner [Living Death, Grave Lord, Daedric Summoning]
    Ranger [Animal Companions, Green Balance, Shadow]
    Druid [Earthen Heart, Animal Companions, Stormcalling]
    Elementalist [Stormcalling, Winter’s Embrace, Ardent Flame]
    Dawnguard [Dawn’s Wrath, Restoring Light, Ardent Flame]
  • MincMincMinc
    MincMincMinc
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭
    They did just copy and paste the same "shwing" sound effect for all the 2h skills. This is gonna get exceedingly repetitive. At least onslaught should stay as a "bonk" sound effect.

    Animation wise my only complaints are how reverse slash doesnt do the spin around slam dunk, instead it just looks like a generic sword swing. Its going to be hard for enemies to distinguish which skill is being used. Onslaught's animation looks too goofy with your character's feet turning perpendicular like they are a lumberjack chopping wood in a goofy way. In both of these cases, the previous character animations were far superior

    For the "VFX" as the design team used for terminology. Uppercut's trail and effects are too overblown, it should be toned down by 50%, there is no reason generic spammed skills should be this flashy. Save the crazy VFX for important events like ultimates and CC mechanics. Same goes for reverse slash, I suggest just making the VFX only appear if you get a killing blow with the skill this way you can emphasize the moment making it feel special.

    Why do I feel like this is game design 101 that was somehow messed up?

    Combat wise:
    • Onslaught and berserkers is just not unique, it should have the ult return if you execute with the skill. Or if we dont want the "ult" return maybe make it give you another cast of the ult for free if you execute with it.
    • Dizzy falls behind other spammable choices for damage.(surprise attack gets guaranteed crit+sunder+offbalance.......B4B gets hemoragh+70%dmg+sustain.........jabs tooltips the same but also gets insane sunder+burninglight procs+aoe) I would remove the snare from dizzy and have it trigger the followup passive which is rarely ever used. This promotes dizzy users to run more 2h skills, where wrecking users get major berserk for out of 2h combos. Perhaps followup could even affect rally heal too? Not to mention the snare is pointless since you are never using dizzy when offbalance is on cooldown.
    • Crit rush just does too little damage for what its worth maybe the distance bonus could be increased to like 100-150%
    • Rally is a burst heal that cant be reliably used, why not give minor mending with the skill or something to compensate for the downtime. Maybe minor mending if you use rally when at low hp or something.
    • Forward momentum with subclassing major brutality is EVERYWHERE, some builds even 1vX have up to 4 sources of it. You could change this to give a different buff for damage like major courage or literally anything else. Also why should I run this 4s source of snare/root immunity when every other skill gives me major expedition+some other buff+slottable passives? This skill is just 10 years out of date for what it gives. Its no surprise we havent seen this since it was changed back in murkmire(2018)
    Edited by MincMincMinc on January 30, 2026 12:37AM
    I only use insightful
    BG MMR should NOT reset, zos sponsored smurfing is a terrible design choice.
    PvP needs more incentives, even simple purple/gold mats would suffice.
  • ESO_Nightingale
    ESO_Nightingale
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    ✭✭✭✭✭
    They did just copy and paste the same "shwing" sound effect for all the 2h skills. This is gonna get exceedingly repetitive. At least onslaught should stay as a "bonk" sound effect.

    Animation wise my only complaints are how reverse slash doesnt do the spin around slam dunk, instead it just looks like a generic sword swing. Its going to be hard for enemies to distinguish which skill is being used. Onslaught's animation looks too goofy with your character's feet turning perpendicular like they are a lumberjack chopping wood in a goofy way. In both of these cases, the previous character animations were far superior

    For the "VFX" as the design team used for terminology. Uppercut's trail and effects are too overblown, it should be toned down by 50%, there is no reason generic spammed skills should be this flashy. Save the crazy VFX for important events like ultimates and CC mechanics. Same goes for reverse slash, I suggest just making the VFX only appear if you get a killing blow with the skill this way you can emphasize the moment making it feel special.

    Why do I feel like this is game design 101 that was somehow messed up?

    Combat wise:
    • Onslaught and berserkers is just not unique, it should have the ult return if you execute with the skill. Or if we dont want the "ult" return maybe make it give you another cast of the ult for free if you execute with it.
    • Dizzy falls behind other spammable choices for damage.(surprise attack gets guaranteed crit+sunder+offbalance.......B4B gets hemoragh+70%dmg+sustain.........jabs tooltips the same but also gets insane sunder+burninglight procs+aoe) I would remove the snare from dizzy and have it trigger the followup passive which is rarely ever used. This promotes dizzy users to run more 2h skills, where wrecking users get major berserk for out of 2h combos. Perhaps followup could even affect rally heal too? Not to mention the snare is pointless since you are never using dizzy when offbalance is on cooldown.
    • Crit rush just does too little damage for what its worth maybe the distance bonus could be increased to like 100-150%
    • Rally is a burst heal that cant be reliably used, why not give minor mending with the skill or something to compensate for the downtime. Maybe minor mending if you use rally when at low hp or something.
    • Forward momentum with subclassing major brutality is EVERYWHERE, some builds even 1vX have up to 4 sources of it. You could change this to give a different buff for damage like major courage or literally anything else. Also why should I run this 4s source of snare/root immunity when every other skill gives me major expedition+some other buff+slottable passives? This skill is just 10 years out of date for what it gives. Its no surprise we havent seen this since it was changed back in murkmire(2018)

    Yeah actually forward momentum giving major expedition would make sense.
    PvE Frost Warden Main and teacher. Come Join the ESO Frost Discord to discuss everything frost!: https://discord.gg/5PT3rQX
Sign In or Register to comment.