baratron wrote: »

BenNordish wrote: »

I would like to be hopeful. But what makes me very skeptical is a very big flaw in the new strategy of ESO. Jessica and Jason talked at the ESO Tavern a very lot about player feedback and doing what the players want. How do they plan to achieve to get feedback from the players and do what the players want, while firing all the community managers whose job it is to keep up the communication with the players? That doesn't work!?

Microsoft doesn't understand the role of the Community Manager. They simply do not understand the need to communicate directly with the players who buy the game.

They don't understand that player feedback cannot be sent directly to the Devs. What Dev wants to read the ranting screeds we get on these forums sometimes about how a new feature is all [snip] broken, and someone wasted a [snip]-load of time trying to get the [snip] thing to work, and now they're super angry and praying to Molag Bal for a curse on all ZOS Devs? The Community Managers read the rants and turn them into useful, actionable statements like "Many players are reporting a bug with [action] at [location] during [quest name]."

Fortunately, we still have @ZOS_JessicaFolsom, @ZOS_Amy, and @ZOS_Kevin here working for the English speakers of the world. Hopefully there are still some international CMs left (the UK lost ours last year) for the other player language groups.

I believe this is where a shift in thinking is needed from ZOS and likely Microsoft. The developers should be present on their own forums, especially given the rather strong moderation we have here and AI tools available.

I've heard many times from the community that feedback isn't reaching the developers. Given how some issues have persisted for years, I think there's some merit there. Prior to the mighty @ZOS_Kevin joining, that problem seemed quite acute. And even now, he has limits because he's just one person and isn't technical. Because of that, feedback or developer questions aren't always answered, or even asked.

We saw that here, where it took Rich coming in to describe a problem, even though we were told "no updates" for months. And that's with months - months - of us giving them the tools to ask the right questions. To me, that said they're not even entertaining our suggestions for communicating better, they're sticking with whatever MO they have as a team. That's precisely where CMs become a bottleneck. I'm speaking purely on a process level, not pointing fingers.

I also think it's important to see when their designs upset people.

Take the whole Staff of Worms debacle. That genuinely irked people off. They need to see that so they don't do it again.

Or combat changes where people have provided parses or other detailed feedback - I absolutely expect someone like @ZOS_BrianWheeler to be in those discussions. If it's uncomfortable, sorry, but then maybe the changes and thinking need to be reconsidered.

I worry if it just filters through a CM, a developer can scoff it away, and continue doing whatever they're doing. I'm saying that as a developer myself. There's a difference between a PM telling me something's an issue, vs the client being candid with me. One's more impactful than the other.

Fundamentally, the game's entertainment, and they need to know when it's not feeling like it.

Now, that's not to say CMs don't provide value. They do. I think that value is better realized in patch notes, in facilitating discussions, AMAs, and overall studio updates. Let's say a developer chimes in on a issue initially, acknowledges it, and then the CMs provide a summary across multiple dev teams. The PTS summaries have been great because they show us how they understand the issues, not just how we've reported them.

Destai wrote: »

From an overall business perspective, I can see why the creator programs and stream team initiatives would be sunsetted.

I have to completely disagree with you there - assuming they are, and I don't know that they have been.

The Creator Programs and Stream Team initiatives are advertising for the game and enhancement for the game, and as far as I know, they don't actually pay any money. They provide in-game rewards. So all positive, and no real cost. (I know someone who's getting rewards from the Creator Program who's put in a tremendous effort over many years and contributed massively to player enjoyment, who is getting in-game rewards. Not real money.)

So all they cost is a little effort from an employee to maintain them. That's it. And the benefits are tremendous.

Destai wrote: »

I believe this is where a shift in thinking is needed from ZOS and likely Microsoft. The developers should be present on their own forums, especially given the rather strong moderation we have here and AI tools available.

I've heard many times from the community that feedback isn't reaching the developers. Given how some issues have persisted for years, I think there's some merit there. Prior to the mighty @ZOS_Kevin joining, that problem seemed quite acute. And even now, he has limits because he's just one person and isn't technical. Because of that, feedback or developer questions aren't always answered, or even asked.

We saw that here, where it took Rich coming in to describe a problem, even though we were told "no updates" for months. And that's with months - months - of us giving them the tools to ask the right questions. To me, that said they're not even entertaining our suggestions for communicating better, they're sticking with whatever MO they have as a team. That's precisely where CMs become a bottleneck. I'm speaking purely on a process level, not pointing fingers.

I also think it's important to see when their designs upset people.

Take the whole Staff of Worms debacle. That genuinely irked people off. They need to see that so they don't do it again.

Or combat changes where people have provided parses or other detailed feedback - I absolutely expect someone like @ZOS_BrianWheeler to be in those discussions. If it's uncomfortable, sorry, but then maybe the changes and thinking need to be reconsidered.

I worry if it just filters through a CM, a developer can scoff it away, and continue doing whatever they're doing. I'm saying that as a developer myself. There's a difference between a PM telling me something's an issue, vs the client being candid with me. One's more impactful than the other.

Fundamentally, the game's entertainment, and they need to know when it's not feeling like it.

Now, that's not to say CMs don't provide value. They do. I think that value is better realized in patch notes, in facilitating discussions, AMAs, and overall studio updates. Let's say a developer chimes in on a issue initially, acknowledges it, and then the CMs provide a summary across multiple dev teams. The PTS summaries have been great because they show us how they understand the issues, not just how we've reported them.

It is well recognized that shielding developers from distractions and interruptions is key to their productivity. It's the nature of the job and the people doing it. So no, you really should not want developers to get caught in the kind of unstructured, interactive relationship with the players. That would be incredibly inefficient.

BenNordish wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

BenNordish wrote: »

I would like to be hopeful. But what makes me very skeptical is a very big flaw in the new strategy of ESO. Jessica and Jason talked at the ESO Tavern a very lot about player feedback and doing what the players want. How do they plan to achieve to get feedback from the players and do what the players want, while firing all the community managers whose job it is to keep up the communication with the players? That doesn't work!?

I don't mean any offense to her by saying this, but Gina was hardly the only Community team member, though I know Kai (who I never saw since I'm not German) was also laid off and I think he was like the German equivalent of her? At any rate, losing a few people doesn't mean they've lost everyone. They can still look at feedback (there's the whole stickied thread that's still up there asking about peoples' pain points and stuff) and pass things on just fine.

It wasn't only Gina and Kai. For example the whole community team of the UK was let too and probably in other countries as well. And no Kai was more than just Gina for the German area. And with him we lost very much everyone here in our area, since the other two community managers from Bethesda who looked out for the communities of Fallout and Doom will be gone in around three months as well and the only Bethesda staff member for Germany that will be left will be just a PR spokes person whose job it is to talk to media outlets not with the community.

Kathi and Zino are being made redundant too?! That's awful. The UK CMs were actually laid off last year and the UK team was merged with Nordics.

The full list of US layoffs has been obtained now from a Freedom of Information request to the State of Maryland Department of Labor, and apparently some "bilingual" Community Managers who looked after the Chinese and Italian communities have also been laid off. I already know that there was no Japanese Community Manager in Japan (from the complaints of Japanese players at the Guild Summit last year).

Apparently Microsoft has no concept of why Community Managers are important. I suspect they don't even understand why the community is important.

Is this week one or two of silence? I feel like not having a statement soon is rather damning of the state of the game behind the curtain.

It's very sad news that the community managers from ESO's international communities have gotten laid off too. One day I hope that American businesses can do what's right and sustainable instead of chasing profits. Good luck to all those affected.

notsojuicy wrote: »

I don't understand halft of the discussions, like for example "uhhh, eso tavern is gone" this or that...

From an enterprise point of view high on the list of cutting costs is always marketing&events,
needless to say and highly debatable the value of such events from a financial and growth point of view for a product which is on the market for a decade....

Matter of fact is, that due to several information the Team right now has around the same size as back in the days where
Summerset/Greymore has been released....

Can we as a community stop repeating this like it's a "gotcha, everything is great!" thing?

The source for this statement is a player who went to the ESO Tavern and spoke with Jason Barnes. She then posted that on social media, and everyone is reading their own story into it. She has since come back to this forum to say that her words are being taken completely out of context:

baratron wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

ImmortalCX wrote: »

^-

Actually I just checked and apparently prior to the recent layoffs, there were over 300 people, so they are left with around 100, which (apparently) is that size of the studio during their massive Orsinium expansion. They should be able to pull this off. In fact, it begs the question, with an identical size as a decade ago, why wouldn't they be able to produce large yearly expansions?

If they become lean and efficient, the game could continue unscathed.

I keep seeing this: “Oh, they’re the same size as Orsinium and that was amazing! We have nothing to worry about!”

Really? All of the people behind the reasons we liked Orsinium were forced out. The ‘goal’ of these reductions was to remove team leads so every developer is doing their own thing in their own bubble (or, as we know the true goal is, to have Copilot do it for them).

Are we expecting consistency? And if everyone is writing their own code for their own project (or again, having AI vibe code it), are we expecting the spaghetti code problem won’t get way worse?

I don't know where people are getting "we have nothing to worry about" from.

The quote from Jason Barnes was simply that Zenimax Online Studio, after layoffs, is approximately the same size as it was when they made Wrothgar and Summerset.

My exact phrasing, as posted on these forums, on UESP's Discord and on UESP's social media, was "while the layoffs are extremely upsetting for everyone involved (of course including players), this is not necessarily the end of new content or the game going into maintenance mode." I even bolded the "not necessarily".

I could not and did not say that the current ZOS team could produce a DLC as complete as Wrothgar, because:
(a) Wrothgar was produced under the compulsory subscription model.
(b) There is so much more code in the game now, therefore so much more scope for bad interactions and bugs.
(c) We don't know the exact makeup of the team that remains.

All we do know that a "reasonable" number of people are left at the studio.

Since then, a whole load of gaming news sites have copied all or parts of the original post, adding their own spin. It's genuinely alarming how little fact checking has been done in spreading my words. None of the sites have contacted me to ask for permission to quote me, and none of them have asked for any credentials or even proof that I was at the ESO Tavern! At last count, four of the sites have also misgendered me - I am and have always been female, but apparently even in 2026 women aren't considered to be serious gamers.

Also, more news has emerged as I've been travelling home from the Tavern (we always drive rather than fly), and now someone's got hold of a full list of job titles of laid-off staff via a Freedom of Information request to the State of Maryland Department of Labor. It's extremely upsetting to see the job titles and think about the people they represent. I already knew that Rich Lambert had been made redundant, but I didn't know about Susan Kath until a few hours ago.

People think I'm not worried about the future of ESO? I'm extremely worried!

But. It's not dead yet.

tomofhyrule wrote: »

notsojuicy wrote: »

I don't understand halft of the discussions, like for example "uhhh, eso tavern is gone" this or that...

From an enterprise point of view high on the list of cutting costs is always marketing&events,
needless to say and highly debatable the value of such events from a financial and growth point of view for a product which is on the market for a decade....

Matter of fact is, that due to several information the Team right now has around the same size as back in the days where
Summerset/Greymore has been released....

Can we as a community stop repeating this like it's a "gotcha, everything is great!" thing?

The source for this statement is a player who went to the ESO Tavern and spoke with Jason Barnes. She then posted that on social media, and everyone is reading their own story into it. She has since come back to this forum to say that her words are being taken completely out of context:

baratron wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

ImmortalCX wrote: »

^-

Actually I just checked and apparently prior to the recent layoffs, there were over 300 people, so they are left with around 100, which (apparently) is that size of the studio during their massive Orsinium expansion. They should be able to pull this off. In fact, it begs the question, with an identical size as a decade ago, why wouldn't they be able to produce large yearly expansions?

If they become lean and efficient, the game could continue unscathed.

I keep seeing this: “Oh, they’re the same size as Orsinium and that was amazing! We have nothing to worry about!”

Really? All of the people behind the reasons we liked Orsinium were forced out. The ‘goal’ of these reductions was to remove team leads so every developer is doing their own thing in their own bubble (or, as we know the true goal is, to have Copilot do it for them).

Are we expecting consistency? And if everyone is writing their own code for their own project (or again, having AI vibe code it), are we expecting the spaghetti code problem won’t get way worse?

I don't know where people are getting "we have nothing to worry about" from.

The quote from Jason Barnes was simply that Zenimax Online Studio, after layoffs, is approximately the same size as it was when they made Wrothgar and Summerset.

My exact phrasing, as posted on these forums, on UESP's Discord and on UESP's social media, was "while the layoffs are extremely upsetting for everyone involved (of course including players), this is not necessarily the end of new content or the game going into maintenance mode." I even bolded the "not necessarily".

I could not and did not say that the current ZOS team could produce a DLC as complete as Wrothgar, because:
(a) Wrothgar was produced under the compulsory subscription model.
(b) There is so much more code in the game now, therefore so much more scope for bad interactions and bugs.
(c) We don't know the exact makeup of the team that remains.

All we do know that a "reasonable" number of people are left at the studio.

Since then, a whole load of gaming news sites have copied all or parts of the original post, adding their own spin. It's genuinely alarming how little fact checking has been done in spreading my words. None of the sites have contacted me to ask for permission to quote me, and none of them have asked for any credentials or even proof that I was at the ESO Tavern! At last count, four of the sites have also misgendered me - I am and have always been female, but apparently even in 2026 women aren't considered to be serious gamers.

Also, more news has emerged as I've been travelling home from the Tavern (we always drive rather than fly), and now someone's got hold of a full list of job titles of laid-off staff via a Freedom of Information request to the State of Maryland Department of Labor. It's extremely upsetting to see the job titles and think about the people they represent. I already knew that Rich Lambert had been made redundant, but I didn't know about Susan Kath until a few hours ago.

People think I'm not worried about the future of ESO? I'm extremely worried!

But. It's not dead yet.

This. I mean, I wrote it but it's a fair quote with nothing changed.

The only way that we could say "Everything is great" would be if we were as misguided as Question Hound in the webcomic Gunshow, by KC Green. You all know the image, it's been a very popular meme for over ten years:


ZOS is literally ON FIRE right now. Whole teams have been gutted and need to be put back together. Work needs to reassigned to those still employed. The senior management has been removed after only a few months in position, and they're only working until the end of this month for handoff reasons. The entire company is grieving the losses - those who still have jobs are upset at losing the coworkers which have become friends.

But ESO is Not Dead Yet.

THAT is what Jason's comment is supposed to mean. Not that everything's okay because it really isn't! But that it's not the end YET. ZOS can still recover.

Arunei wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

Is this week one or two of silence? I feel like not having a statement soon is rather damning of the state of the game behind the curtain.

Kevin already said it's going to take time, there hasn't been "silence". Why do so many people think they can get a fully revised roadmap done within a few days? They have a whole several months' worth of things they need to look at and the teams are probably still being restructured, which means work is still being evaluated. All of that is going to take time, nothing about it is damning.

Can we all please have patience and stop acting like something that should obviously take some time not coming out immediately is indicative of the worst?

I am one of the most optimistic people for the future of this game. However, taking weeks to months to release a roadmap speaks to something that has been systemic with this studio, which is their inability to produce content in a timely or competitive fashion. It should not take weeks to look at the workflow, prioritize 3 to 5 things, and then to assign them to what will obviously be a "tentative" order of release.

CaptainVenom wrote: »

I guess this is an update, too:

We're also bringing our teams closer together across Bethesda. ZeniMax Online Studios will partner closely with Bethesda Game Studios on The Elder Scrolls franchise, while continuing to deliver incredible new experiences for The Elder Scrolls Online. Season One: Return of the Thieves Guild recently launched, and the team has more planned for the future. By aligning more directly across the franchise, we can create even better experiences for players.

Bringing our teams closer together is helping us build a stronger foundation for everything we create next.

From here.

This is sadly most likely just PR coverage to give people false hope. The roadmap is the only way we're gonna see the truth of things.

Let's be honest, the roadmap was nice, but it's not an extremely high bar to match or even surpass it if any of these higherups are serious about helping and working with ZOS to improve the game. So if eventually poor Kevin comes in with a gutted roadmap? Then we know it's all lies, and sadly that's exactly what I expect it to be.

CAB_Life wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

Is this week one or two of silence? I feel like not having a statement soon is rather damning of the state of the game behind the curtain.

Kevin already said it's going to take time, there hasn't been "silence". Why do so many people think they can get a fully revised roadmap done within a few days? They have a whole several months' worth of things they need to look at and the teams are probably still being restructured, which means work is still being evaluated. All of that is going to take time, nothing about it is damning.

Can we all please have patience and stop acting like something that should obviously take some time not coming out immediately is indicative of the worst?

I am one of the most optimistic people for the future of this game. However, taking weeks to months to release a roadmap speaks to something that has been systemic with this studio, which is their inability to produce content in a timely or competitive fashion. It should not take weeks to look at the workflow, prioritize 3 to 5 things, and then to assign them to what will obviously be a "tentative" order of release.

How can you claim this without having any idea what all was in their workflow? They likely already had the rest of the year's stuff started to some degree and who knows whatever other stuff they're working on that we haven't heard of yet because it's still in early development. No one can say it shouldn't take a couple of weeks because no one knows how much work they have to reevaluate and spread between everyone that's still working on the game.

Meanwhile, the sadness continues.

And AI is trash...

James-Wayne wrote: »

We need update 51 on PTS to keep people off the forums for awhile 😆

Nah it'd just make it worse probs lol.

Seraphayel wrote: »

CAB_Life wrote: »

Is this week one or two of silence? I feel like not having a statement soon is rather damning of the state of the game behind the curtain.

Honestly, I‘m pretty disappointed by this also. I expected an updated roadmap last week, the latest.

The layoffs happened two weeks ago, I think anyone can expect them to figure out the near future (e.g. all that’s coming in 2026) within a full work week, let alone two.

Especially in regards to the upcoming PTS we need more clarification in regards to U51 and the rest of the year.

After the drastically improved communication change that started early this year, this silence is rather disappointing.

Because we knew they can do better and they really did, the first 6 months of this year have been amazing and one of ESO‘s best.

Couldn't agree more.

I was just thinking again here about @ZOS_JessicaFolsom last online on July 6. Is she laid off to? Or on holidays? On her LinkedIn there is activitiy 3 days ago.

Artisian0001 wrote: »

Multiple days and 10 pages later with extreme community pushback and not a single response from anyone working at Zenimax. A tale as old as time I guess.

Regular employees are not free to talk; those emloyees hired to do the talking probably are awaiting new directives from upper management. And, as we have already learned, there are many, many management levels that need coordination...