Itemization Problems of ESO

Stamden · June 2014

There are a couple of things that I are really starting to annoy me with the itemization system. I don't want to see people's time get wasted by gear being made obsolete. I'll list my concerns, with my suggested solution below:

1. Frequent cap raises (V13 probable next patch, and VR15 already seen in video) makes all previous gear obsolete. This is especially annoying when it is very hard to earn, such as Trial gear or dungeon rares (Worm Cult, Ebony, etc). I hope ZoS does not expect people to spend a month or more refarming decent gear.

Solution: Make Trial gear/Dungeon Rares scale with your level.

2. Trial gear is quite weak. I am not saying that they are bad, but for top-tier, endgame gear that takes months to complete, they should not be that under performing. I am not saying they have to be the end-all-be-all sets, but some of them are laughable compared to normal PvE/Crafted gear. I am going to explain how I think you should fix them. Alternatively, you could make them have 6 or 7 piece set bonuses.

Solution:
Wise Mage Set- Change 4 piece to 5%

Ophidian Set- Change 4 piece to 5%. Either change the 5 piece completely or buff the duration to 30s+. Keep in mind stamina builds are already under performing.

Defending Warrior- Increase pulse damage to ~300ish or lower CD time to 5 seconds.

Immortal Warrior Set- Haven't had a chance to try this one yet, however 1 hour seems really steep. Even if the effect is amazing I still would think it shouldn't go past 30 minutes. Also 4 piece needs to be changed

Opinion: I personally don't think Trial set armor should have the exact same armor value as crafted/regular PvE sets. I don't know if people would disagree with that but I would love to hear your opinions on this.

3. PvP sets itemization is terrible. You can spend 600+ AP per piece, or just get it in the rewards for the worthy box and upgrade it twice. Currently there is nothing to actually spend that AP on if you don't want to waste it on that armor.

Solution: Make any new PvP sets past VR10 only obtainable through buying them from NPCs for AP. Also add new sets, the current ones lack in comparison to PvE/Crafted gear.

4. Rare Dungeon gear (Worm Cult, Ebony, etc) currently has no traits on them.

Solution: Obviously, put traits on them

Also, I don't know if this is a problem or not, but please make Crypt of Hearts drop different rare sets then the VR5 and VR10 dungeons. It's bad enough those very hard to earn sets at VR5 became obsolete once people found out it's the same ones that drop at VR10. Of course if they scaled with your level that previous problem could be eliminated. However, please don't make the mistake of remaking the same sets with a different VR level again.

Thanks for reading this post, feel free to post your thoughts and opinions.

EDIT: Worm Cult and Ebony getting nerfed? LOL. The poor guys that wasted weeks trying to farm those sets. Oh my god the poor decisions ZoS makes. I am done with this game for now.

Anilahation · June 2014

No the game constantly levels this isn't WoW where you do the raids and are completely geared for 5 months then you just do the raids because their is nothing else to do

zazamalek · June 2014

In addition bound armor from bosses.

We have had 4-5 complete tanking sets drop in all the runs I have done. NONE of them dropped for me. We have had 2-3 complete healing sets drop, NEVER for the healer. I (the tank) ALWAYS gets the DPS set - I'm further along with my Worm Cult's Rainment set than our primary DPS is, and I'm the tank.

Give us 2 minutes to trade bound pickups. No more is needed.

People are losing the willpower to run dungeons in my guild. We laughed for a while at how ridiculous the RNG is, now 2 months later it feels like it is actively trolling us. Games added a grace period to (or completely moved away from) bound drops for a reason - it's frustrates groups of players.

Glissando · June 2014

zazamalek wrote: »

In addition bound armor from bosses.

We have had 4-5 complete tanking sets drop in all the runs I have done. NONE of them dropped for me. We have had 2-3 complete healing sets drop, NEVER for the healer. I (the tank) ALWAYS gets the DPS set - I'm further along with my Worm Cult's Rainment set than our primary DPS is, and I'm the tank.

Give us 2 minutes to trade bound pickups. No more is needed.

People are losing the willpower to run dungeons in my guild. We laughed for a while at how ridiculous the RNG is, now 2 months later it feels like it is actively trolling us. Games added a grace period to (or completely moved away from) bound drops for a reason - it's frustrates groups of players.

Yep,same happened to our group. Healer has dps/tank gear,i have tank/healer,tank has all the dps gear,medium + light. It's pretty clear that it is designed that way to make us farm the hell out of the vet dungeons.

Pretty bad.Also,the game is not rewarding at all when it comes to loot drops.Last bosses rarely drop good items,you never get a blue drop anymore,not that you would use it.Overall itemization in the game is horrible.

I reached VR12 with my NB a few days ago.Have all my gear epic/legendary...Did 350 dps on a single target boss with my Bow spec last night.I've simply lost the will to play.

Stamden · June 2014

JoseDelgadoCub17_ESO wrote: »

No the game constantly levels this isn't WoW where you do the raids and are completely geared for 5 months then you just do the raids because their is nothing else to do

Your not really thinking about the problem here. When they raise the level cap, there is going to be left over VR12 Trials that nobody is going to run anymore. That is wasted content, development time, and money. So eventually they are going to have to make Trials and Trial gear scale with your level.

Judging from your comment, I am going to assume you've never done Trials before. That's fine, but realize getting a complete trial set takes a very long time. People are not going to re-farm their hard earned gear after level cap raises, especially considering that the gear really isn't that great.

Lastly, why all the hate about WoW? There is a reason that game has lasted over a decade, and end-game itemization is definitely one of them. If gear I took months to get became obsolete really quickly, then I would feel pretty inclined to quit that game.

Stamden · June 2014

Glissando wrote: »

zazamalek wrote: »

In addition bound armor from bosses.

We have had 4-5 complete tanking sets drop in all the runs I have done. NONE of them dropped for me. We have had 2-3 complete healing sets drop, NEVER for the healer. I (the tank) ALWAYS gets the DPS set - I'm further along with my Worm Cult's Rainment set than our primary DPS is, and I'm the tank.

Give us 2 minutes to trade bound pickups. No more is needed.

People are losing the willpower to run dungeons in my guild. We laughed for a while at how ridiculous the RNG is, now 2 months later it feels like it is actively trolling us. Games added a grace period to (or completely moved away from) bound drops for a reason - it's frustrates groups of players.

Yep,same happened to our group. Healer has dps/tank gear,i have tank/healer,tank has all the dps gear,medium + light. It's pretty clear that it is designed that way to make us farm the hell out of the vet dungeons.

Pretty bad.Also,the game is not rewarding at all when it comes to loot drops.Last bosses rarely drop good items,you never get a blue drop anymore,not that you would use it.Overall itemization in the game is horrible.

I reached VR12 with my NB a few days ago.Have all my gear epic/legendary...Did 350 dps on a single target boss with my Bow spec last night.I've simply lost the will to play.

I am in full support for a grace period to trade with your group members.

I do see why the made everything BoP though, it's because of how screwed up the economy is. They want to prevent dupers or people who knew dupers from getting everything with little work.

hellkrasher · June 2014

I dont think trial gear NEEDs to be different, trials by them self aren't specially difficult, the reward for it is to be in the leader-boards, but its not the hardest thing ever to deserve stronger gear than VR dungeons.

I think trials should give the same quality gear as dungeons, but with different set options than dungeons or crafting, unic sets as they give now. They maybe need some update to what those sets give, but not really make them stronger than anything else, i think thats one of the beauty of ESO, i dont think ppl want WoW type of progression.

If you want reward for doing trials, you get a unique appearance and unique set bonuses and also you can compete to be the best group in the leaderboard, THAT SHOULD BE ENOUGH!

As i said, trials arent that hard, so, all those unique rewards are perfectly fine. But ofc, ppl always want to be the special snow flakes, deserving it or not :P

Glissando · June 2014

The items suck ass anyway,who would dupe them?lol

Taiminator · June 2014

Fully agree on all the points made so far. I've seen so many garbage drops in dungeons with either no trait or no attributes. It just feels so unfinished it's unreal. How can a game with such a huge budget have such a *** drop system. I also find it ludicrous that everything becomes bound upon wearing. Selling or passing on gear you've outleveled used to be an important aspect of my gaming experience.

Also very much against raising the level cap every other month. Farming mats to make your set legendary takes months unless you buy gold or play 18 hours a day which working folks cannot do. Making all that work obsolete vendor/deconstruct trash that you can't even pass to a friend who may be leveling up a little slower is infuriating and the will to keep on going diminishes.

Qumulous · June 2014

Gear grinds are the death of MMO's. Raising levels quickly will result in many people quitting when they reach a point when there are no people able or around to help. Just look at everquest for example in its 15th year and people return to the game to find that they can't progress without help. So what did eq do? They gave you a high level toon with tons of AA. They had a huge gap of veteran players to new subs and returning players.

Honestly its a PITA having to farm for legendary components. Getting legendary gear then finding out a couple weeks later your gear can be upgraded and starting the worst kind of grind in games that burn people out the most. I do not enjoy working my ass off to only have to repeat the same kind of crap week after week. You need time to enjoy getting to the top and wearing the top gear. Time to enjoy being powerful and owning people. Its about enjoying the game gear grinding takes the enjoyment out of games. I will not continue to play another game that does the exact same thing on a faster basis than free to play games. Another epic failure? we shall see

Phazzle · June 2014

I agree that gear should be usable for at least a couple of months. Consider the time and effort it takes to craft a legendary.

Lava_Croft · June 2014

How does reaching for example VR13 instantly make your VR12 gear worthless?

psufan5 · June 2014

I wouldn't mind the gear changes if they would do away with getting 1 crafting material back from deconstructing a crafted item. 8 waxes to move one piece to legendary, only to get 1 back if you are lucky when you break it down? Thats absurd.

TotterTates · June 2014

I'm just going to throw my frustration in here as well...

I ran WS 150+ times back when I was VR8-10 waiting for the release of Craglorn.

As a DK tank using a 5 Heavy /2 Light armor setup, I ended up with 6 full sets of worm cult and 9 full sets of savior. Guess how many Ebon pieces dropped for me... ding ding ding, if you guessed 1 piece, you are correct!! (bonus points if you said shoulders)

Lava_Croft wrote: »

How does reaching for example VR13 instantly make your VR12 gear worthless?

I wouldn't say instantly useless, but I wouldn't want to sit at VR 13 for a month with VR 12 gear.

elblobbob14_ESO · June 2014

Lava_Croft wrote: »

How does reaching for example VR13 instantly make your VR12 gear worthless?

Doesn't make it worthless, just doesn't make it the best. Legendary mats just don't fall off trees, and so I understand the frustration of finally getting that full set of legendary gear, and assuming it will be the best you can get for awhile, only to realize that there's going to be better gear available in a couple weeks.

I held onto all my legendary mats when I saw that Craglorn was coming out. I finally completed my full set of legendary gear last week. I would be disappointed to find out that in 2 weeks my gear isn't the best it could be. Not devastated, but certainly disappointed.

stungateb14_ESO · June 2014

deathpandax_ESO wrote: »

JoseDelgadoCub17_ESO wrote: »

No the game constantly levels this isn't WoW where you do the raids and are completely geared for 5 months then you just do the raids because their is nothing else to do

Your not really thinking about the problem here. When they raise the level cap, there is going to be left over VR12 Trials that nobody is going to run anymore. That is wasted content, development time, and money. So eventually they are going to have to make Trials and Trial gear scale with your level.

Judging from your comment, I am going to assume you've never done Trials before. That's fine, but realize getting a complete trial set takes a very long time. People are not going to re-farm their hard earned gear after level cap raises, especially considering that the gear really isn't that great.

Lastly, why all the hate about WoW? There is a reason that game has lasted over a decade, and end-game itemization is definitely one of them. If gear I took months to get became obsolete really quickly, then I would feel pretty inclined to quit that game.

I wonder why Blizzard admits to gear progression starting in WotLK was a mistake?

Stamden · June 2014

Reduced the debuff to armor and spell resist for the Wise Mage Item Set Bonus

The effect wasn't even that good in the first place, ZoS. People reported an increase of around 4-5% more DPS, which is perfectly on-par with the other sets. Are you trying to give no incentive at all to completing Trials?

Lava_Croft wrote: »

How does reaching for example VR13 instantly make your VR12 gear worthless?

It doesn't instantly make it useless, but conserving that we have already seen videos of VR15, the cap raises will just get more ridiculous. When it takes over a month to complete your desired set, only to have it be useless in the next month, the game gets to the point where it is and endless gear grind.

stungateb14_ESO · June 2014

Oh and WoW is the worst comparison of gear "obsoletism" you can make unless you just started playing in Cata or MOP. From launch to Burning Crusade there was no less than 3 gear obsoletion's if memory serves me it was MC<Blackwing<AQ40(some debate on linear gear progresion from bwl and aq40 so they designate aq40 as t2.5 and bwl as t2) and Naxx40 being t3 thats 3 tiers of gear in less than 2.5 years not bad but look at post TBC- patch 5.2.0 and the introduction of Tier 15 thats 12 tiers in 8 years since TBC.

This list does not include world dragon loot from Onyxia thru the Emerald dragons or dungeons like upper/lowerBRS,world drops or Dire Maul or class specific epic quests Bow/Staff/Sword or the legendary quest which is in of itself was a debacle in itemization.

Gear progression is a joke in WOW.

kedz54 · June 2014

TotterTates wrote: »

I'm just going to throw my frustration in here as well...

I ran WS 150+ times back when I was VR8-10 waiting for the release of Craglorn.

As a DK tank using a 5 Heavy /2 Light armor setup, I ended up with 6 full sets of worm cult and 9 full sets of savior. Guess how many Ebon pieces dropped for me... ding ding ding, if you guessed 1 piece, you are correct!! (bonus points if you said shoulders)

Lava_Croft wrote: »

How does reaching for example VR13 instantly make your VR12 gear worthless?

I wouldn't say instantly useless, but I wouldn't want to sit at VR 13 for a month with VR 12 gear.

Why? Need that extra 4 magicka? Lol

Rioht · June 2014

Absolutely agree! And thank you for making such a detailed post about it.

I have already brought up the level increase problems and how it forces players to ignore any gear that isn't the highest available VR level at the time.

I definately like the idea of the items scaling with your character. However I might suggest something different.

Players are constantly complaining about how crafting is falling to the wayside in usefulness. One solution, to both the level cap increase and crafter effectiveness would be to introduce material that could be used to upgrade an items level. This would provide crafter's with a profitable service to upgrade players items to their desired level. Additional it would allow players to actually use items they find along the way during their lvl0-VRmax and continue to use their favorite gear as the VR levels increase.

This would make the lvl0-vrmax grind much more interesting for players and actually make you consider, "is this an item I could utilize for my endgame?". Where's currently any item, even the highest quality items that are anything less than the current max VR are useless for anything other than deconstructing.

Stamden · June 2014

Rioht wrote: »

Absolutely agree! And thank you for making such a detailed post about it.

I have already brought up the level increase problems and how it forces players to ignore any gear that isn't the highest available VR level at the time.

I definately like the idea of the items scaling with your character. However I might suggest something different.

Players are constantly complaining about how crafting is falling to the wayside in usefulness. One solution, to both the level cap increase and crafter effectiveness would be to introduce material that could be used to upgrade an items level. This would provide crafter's with a profitable service to upgrade players items to their desired level. Additional it would allow players to actually use items they find along the way during their lvl0-VRmax and continue to use their favorite gear as the VR levels increase.

This would make the lvl0-vrmax grind much more interesting for players and actually make you consider, "is this an item I could utilize for my endgame?". Where's currently any item, even the highest quality items that are anything less than the current max VR are useless for anything other than deconstructing.

This idea would work great too

frwinters_ESO · June 2014

Frequent raise caps? They did this once. How is that frequent? Next update we already know is just vr12 as they said it

xaraan · June 2014

I would be surprised to see the level cap raised to VR13 in the next update. I expected the cap to get raised the next time they release a large add on again like Craglorn pt 2 eventually. But I could be wrong, if I am, having a 13th level character does not make 12th level gear obsolete.

Gear scaling to your level is a bit much, unless you mean the initial drop and not once you have it. Then, ok, as long as the dungeon leveled to you as well so people can't go farm high level gear off low level areas.

I do agree that stuff like worm cult, ebony, etc. should have traits. And the 4 piece set bonuses on the new gear is pretty sad.

nathan_bri · June 2014

It never ceases to amaze me that a developer will announce a roadmap, then stick to said roadmap and players who seemed to have ignored same are up in arms. Happened in WoW and it seems to be happening here.

This just in: anything you do now will be superseded by something you can do later, maybe even one or two months from now.

You have a choice: do all the things now and enjoy the process of doing so or do them all later and enjoy said process then. Or, even better, do both. The systems in place are there for entertainment purposes. Be entertained. Get your legendaries or not. Agonize over whether to "be the best" now or later or both. It's all part of the game. This is not real life. There is no "I've made it and now I can retire."

Stamden · June 2014

frwinters_ESO wrote: »

Frequent raise caps? They did this once. How is that frequent? Next update we already know is just vr12 as they said it

VR15 already has been shown in developer videos.

Cep · June 2014

I agree that trials gear 4 peice should at least be 5%

Stamden · June 2014

Well, I am done with this game until there is actually an incentive to do Trials.

Stamden · June 2014

JoseDelgadoCub17_ESO wrote: »

No the game constantly levels this isn't WoW where you do the raids and are completely geared for 5 months then you just do the raids because their is nothing else to do

Well in this game you don't do the raids at all, you buy warlock and willows and are done completely because that is the best gear in the game. According to your logicc, having no hard-to-obtain, worthy gear is better then having some.

Cybrdroyd · June 2014

I don't see the problem with the game being difficult, certain gear being rare and hard to get. If you want easy, go play hello kitty. Hard and challenging, and ever increasing difficulty and need to obtain better and rarer gear is what keeps people playing, does it not? I don't want them to stop, its why I pay 14.95 a month, so they continually add more and more content frequently rather than have an annual expansion for 40 hours of content.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO · June 2014

zazamalek wrote: »

Games added a grace period to (or completely moved away from) bound drops for a reason - it's frustrates groups of players.

To be pedantic, you're referring to loot which was 'rolled' on and the grace period was to recover from "sorry, I shouldn't have rolled on that".

No game I play allows you a 'grace period' to trade non-rolled drops that are BOP.

BOP is a thorny issue, I hate it but many hardcores love it as it helps boost the e-peen value of their phat lewt, in their eyes at least.

Stamden · June 2014

Cybrdroyd wrote: »

I don't see the problem with the game being difficult, certain gear being rare and hard to get. If you want easy, go play hello kitty. Hard and challenging, and ever increasing difficulty and need to obtain better and rarer gear is what keeps people playing, does it not? I don't want them to stop, its why I pay 14.95 a month, so they continually add more and more content frequently rather than have an annual expansion for 40 hours of content.

Nobody has a problem with it and that's not what this topic is about. What is being discussed here is the constantly increasing level cap. This means all previous gear becomes obsolete. Basically the game becomes an endless gear grind for those who like to max their items.

But that can't even be addressed right now because crafted/PvE gear is vastly superior to Trial/Dungeon gear anyway.