Official Feedback Thread For 2025 ESO Direct & Seasons of the Worm Cult

bruta · April 10

Wanted something different for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

RicAlmighty wrote: »

Content Pass is an epic failure in my opinion. So instead of a $40 annual chapter, there is now a $50 "Content Pass" that takes months to deliver all the content included within it, and you don't even know what content you are paying for before you get it. This is not a compelling offering.

pretty much, it does look like a worse model that what we had in previous years.
and imo subclasses are a big fail for general replayability, the point of logging on another class was mostly that - its unique abilities and identity

DeathStalker · April 10

Please have some mercy. Can we please get a simple yes or no to the question of overland difficulty being forced on everyone or optional? This is pure torture for some of us.

Poss · April 10

RIP class identity. No one asked for this. Once again the implication on PvP hasn’t been thought through

Aliyavana · April 10

Very excited for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

Officially, the timeline is moving forward from the main questline. However, officially, what year is it in-universe? 5E 592?

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

spartaxoxo wrote: »

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Tariq9898 wrote: »

What about the overland difficulty increase?? Is that optional?

This is still being worked on and will be something we rollout later on.

I understand you can't go into detail but tons of players have been agonizing about this for months on end. Can you just let us know if the current plan is that this something players opt in to or a complete overhaul of difficulty in the game that everyone will experience? We don't need details. We know those can't be provided. We know that plans could be changed. But months of anxiety about that question has made left many players anxious and nervous and has completely colored anticipation. If there is anything at all to share on just that one question, it would do wonders to shape anticipation and discussion in a positive direction.

To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment.

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

Hrolthar wrote: »

There's a bug on the Xbox store, the wrong price is showing for the 2025 Content Pack. It is showing £84.99 GBP instead of £44.99 GBP.

We have gotten this changed. It is just caching oddly on the Xbox end of things. This should be updated within the day.

lei.aili_ESO · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

For the multiclassing/subclassing thing coming up (which sounds awesome and I'm excited for, btw):

If I had previously made an arcanist character and leveled up all their class skills to 50, but I've already deleted that character, when the new update comes will I have access to those arcanist skills, or will I need to level those up again?

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

lei.aili_ESO wrote: »

For the multiclassing/subclassing thing coming up (which sounds awesome and I'm excited for, btw):

If I had previously made an arcanist character and leveled up all their class skills to 50, but I've already deleted that character, when the new update comes will I have access to those arcanist skills, or will I need to level those up again?

Good question. We'll pass this on and get an answer.

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

GothicMark wrote: »

Sorry, why the massive price hike? Maybe I'm missing something but it looks like we're expected to pay over double the cost of a chapter for this season pass, and I'm not seeing that we'll be getting over double the content. Unless ESO+ is included and I missed that, then I'm sorry, but ESO is going to be out of my price range.

Normally, you would be paying for the chapter and Q4 DLC depending on the year. The content pass includes all dungeon content this year, so you do not need to purchase them individually.

Tariq9898 · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

With the release of subclassing, will there be less class identity and uniqueness?

Varana · April 10

@ZOS_Kevin
Can we please get a clear "yes, with ESO+ you will pay twice for the dungeon packs, you're stupid to pay for this game" or "no, with ESO+ you will be able to buy the season without the dungeons for less".

merevie · April 10

Wanted something different for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

I am disappointed that players are still not getting a bag to hold materials in base game. It's cynical and disrespectful. Players have to make toons to carry gear and log in and out to get it. You are well aware of this and don't care a teeny bit.

While you live in America, not all of us do. We do not have the world's richest economy when making purchasing decisions.

Prior to this model, we could select which content to get.

This model requires $90 (in New Zealand currency) or to get nothing.

So you'll be getting nothing from me.

spartaxoxo · April 10

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Tariq9898 wrote: »

What about the overland difficulty increase?? Is that optional?

This is still being worked on and will be something we rollout later on.

I understand you can't go into detail but tons of players have been agonizing about this for months on end. Can you just let us know if the current plan is that this something players opt in to or a complete overhaul of difficulty in the game that everyone will experience? We don't need details. We know those can't be provided. We know that plans could be changed. But months of anxiety about that question has made left many players anxious and nervous and has completely colored anticipation. If there is anything at all to share on just that one question, it would do wonders to shape anticipation and discussion in a positive direction.

To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment.

Thank you for the response. I guess my follow up question is if this is something still so early into prototyping, is this is something still planned to drop this year? I know last year, it was stated that it would be coming this year which lead to many of expecting news during the live. The new content cadence was stated to help with speed of releases so I wonder if this is still possibly coming this year?

abaker013 · April 10

[/quote] To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment. [/quote]

Thank you for clarifying the position you're in and for listening to us. I really enjoy gaming, but my skills will always top out below many players. I'm average at best. If it becomes too difficult, it stops being fun for me. I am concerned about being shut out if a difficulty increase is not optional.

Charden2016 · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

Lot of concerns about this update

#1 - Class identity being completely erased. Subclassing sounds very cool and intriguing.... for casual or solo players who want to do more of a role play fantasy type playthrough. On the other end, as the classes stand now, we have a different meta for each class and with hybridization, a lot of those are VERY similar already. With the introduction of subclassing, this will virtually erase any class and even player identity. Raids will have a single meta for completion. PvP will have an offensive and full defensive meta. Everyone will essentially be playing the same exact build.

#2 Balancing in PVP - We already have a very bad tank/ball group meta, which makes small group/solo play VERY difficult in cyrodiil. This "tank" meta has yet to be addressed.... Having the healing ability of the warden with the burst damage of nightblade and cc ability of DK or arcanist..... is broken. And scribing makes this even worse. There needs to be balance before this goes live or cyrodiil will die.

#3 Eso plus Value - right now eso+ members are paying for access to dungeons, zones, and craft bag. For 14.99 US + Tax - that seems like a reasonable value. However when we start paying the increased cost to purchase the "content passes" we will no longer need ESO+ for dungeons and zones.... and will only pay for craft bag.. which, while useful, is unnecessary. Why would anyone pay for both once this goes live?

Right now I'm torn between being excited because it's a new update.... and wanting to cancel my eso+ and never touch the game again. We need more clarification on a lot of points.

Jolter · April 10

Wanted something different for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

GothicMark wrote: »

Sorry, why the massive price hike? Maybe I'm missing something but it looks like we're expected to pay over double the cost of a chapter for this season pass, and I'm not seeing that we'll be getting over double the content. Unless ESO+ is included and I missed that, then I'm sorry, but ESO is going to be out of my price range.

Normally, you would be paying for the chapter and Q4 DLC depending on the year. The content pass includes all dungeon content this year, so you do not need to purchase them individually.

Since the dungeons and Q4 dlc zone have always been included with ESO+, are you going to give a discount on the content pass to ESO+ subscribers or reduce the price of ESO+? Otherwise this is a definite price hike for your loyal ESO+ subscribers.

Charden2016 · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

RoseTheSnowElf wrote: »

Sorry if this has been brought up and I missed it, a lot of posts and kind of hard to keep up.

The announcement says the pass and content is all available in the Elder Scrolls store, but no mention of console store(s).

I'm on Playstation, and as far as I can tell, none of this has been added to the PS store. And the new dungeons haven't been added to the crown store.

Are they going to be available later, or is this part of the new model, content can only be purchased through your Elder Scrolls store?

The content pass is available on the Playstation store. I cannot speak for the dungeons being available for crowns.

Freelancer_ESO · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

Cost is going up compared to the Chapter if I remember right which might or might not be a good/bad deal depending on how much story content is coming (You are getting dungeons now with the pass when you didn't with the Chapter which is a benefit for those not on ESO+).

I generally don't love server-wide collaborative content but, maybe ZOS can make it work.

From a solo perspective, I think subclassing could be fun but, I'm not looking forward to running into other players using it as I think it will increase the extremes for both really weak/really odd builds and really strong builds. It is also a little amusing to go from having class locked cosmetic items to having the class abilities be usable by other classes. While I understand it was likely a significant challenge to implement on a system level it does feel a little cheap for the big new feature to just be ability re-use.

I think at times newer content can depend a bit too much on returning characters.

I think at times the formula of combining two races together avoids the issue of people that hate a specific race finding the content to be bad but, it also puts a damper on the positives for people that like a specific race.

GatheredMyst · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Tariq9898 wrote: »

What about the overland difficulty increase?? Is that optional?

This is still being worked on and will be something we rollout later on.

I understand you can't go into detail but tons of players have been agonizing about this for months on end. Can you just let us know if the current plan is that this something players opt in to or a complete overhaul of difficulty in the game that everyone will experience? We don't need details. We know those can't be provided. We know that plans could be changed. But months of anxiety about that question has made left many players anxious and nervous and has completely colored anticipation. If there is anything at all to share on just that one question, it would do wonders to shape anticipation and discussion in a positive direction.

To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment.

TLDR, it's coming. It's being worked on. We're getting it in some capacity. Maybe not as part of the next update, but it's happening.

Feedback's been conveyed.

Let me pose this question, then. I was among apparently several who was looking to the ESO Live with hope that it would give us some info. If we're back to waiting for that information to surface (and i'm not saying this as an attack, promise. Stupid text not conveying my tone), can you answer when we might be more realistically hope to tune in for more information? That way, we can more realistically align our expectations?

Thanks for talking to us about this. It's greatly appreciated.

disky · April 10

Wanted something different for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Tariq9898 wrote: »

What about the overland difficulty increase?? Is that optional?

This is still being worked on and will be something we rollout later on.

I understand you can't go into detail but tons of players have been agonizing about this for months on end. Can you just let us know if the current plan is that this something players opt in to or a complete overhaul of difficulty in the game that everyone will experience? We don't need details. We know those can't be provided. We know that plans could be changed. But months of anxiety about that question has made left many players anxious and nervous and has completely colored anticipation. If there is anything at all to share on just that one question, it would do wonders to shape anticipation and discussion in a positive direction.

To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment.

I don't want to come off as entitled, and I know it's just a game, and I understand that game development is about time/resource/priority management, but Matt discussed this in his December letter and now it seems like it's still in early prototyping with no prospects of a release anytime soon. Meanwhile, we're seeing a lot of progress on a major new system that was not discussed publicly prior to today. it's just really frustrating to have been given hope for a change that would make the game fun to play, only to have it shoved aside for something that sounds fun but isn't nearly as important to a lot of us. It feels like a bait-and-switch.

I'm here because I love this game and I want it to be better. I'm saying this because ESO matters to me. Please, I'm begging you guys to give overland difficulty options priority. I know it's complicated and controversial but it's something that will, for a lot of people, make the overland game actually fun to play for the first time.

Edit: And I just want to say that I understand systems can be developed simultaneously and different teams may be assigned to different features, but I can't get over the feeling that subclassing is something we didn't know about until now, and overland difficulty is something the community has been demanding for years. And also that it's understood how important the feature is to players given the vastness and length of the discussion on this very forum.

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Thank you for the response. I guess my follow up question is if this is something still so early into prototyping, is this is something still planned to drop this year? I know last year, it was stated that it would be coming this year which lead to many of expecting news during the live. The new content cadence was stated to help with speed of releases so I wonder if this is still possibly coming this year?

As of right now, the goal is to still have this out during the content pass timeline. But if that changes, we will update once we have a clear picture if anything changes.

RicAlmighty · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

GothicMark wrote: »

Sorry, why the massive price hike? Maybe I'm missing something but it looks like we're expected to pay over double the cost of a chapter for this season pass, and I'm not seeing that we'll be getting over double the content. Unless ESO+ is included and I missed that, then I'm sorry, but ESO is going to be out of my price range.

Normally, you would be paying for the chapter and Q4 DLC depending on the year. The content pass includes all dungeon content this year, so you do not need to purchase them individually.

Except being an ESO+ subscriber already gave you access to that Dungeon DLC. So that perk is now essentially being removed from ESO+, because there is no way to purchase just the "Chapter" like content without the Dungeons. Which also speaks to players that do NOT want to own the dungeons. There are quite a few players that make use of ESO+ in order to play the DLC dungeons, but then when their subscription expires, they fall back to the base game dungeons only, which can be preferable in terms of shorter queues and runs. Content Pass will now make this kind of thing difficult if not impossible by forcibly bundling dungeons together with the new "Chapter" like content.

This entire Content Pass just seems to me that it was not thought out fully in terms of how players actually make use of ESO+ and other content. It gives me the impression that it was haphazardly slapped together in order to have something to take over once the concept of "Annual Chapters" was killed. Hopefully, something can be changed for the 2026 version of this that actually takes all of this into account.

Tariq9898 · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Thank you for the response. I guess my follow up question is if this is something still so early into prototyping, is this is something still planned to drop this year? I know last year, it was stated that it would be coming this year which lead to many of expecting news during the live. The new content cadence was stated to help with speed of releases so I wonder if this is still possibly coming this year?

As of right now, the goal is to still have this out during the content pass timeline. But if that changes, we will update once we have a clear picture if anything changes.

Thank you for this response! Looking forward to hearing more.

It’s good to know they are working on it and taking the “optional” route seriously.

ZOS_Kevin · April 10

disky wrote: »

I don't want to come off as entitled, and I know it's just a game, and I understand that game development is about time/resource/priority management, but Matt discussed this in his December letter and now it seems like it's still in early prototyping with no prospects of a release anytime soon. Meanwhile, we're seeing a lot of progress on a major new system that was not discussed publicly prior to today. it's just really frustrating to have been given hope for a change that would make the game fun to play, only to have it shoved aside for something that sounds fun but isn't nearly as important to a lot of us. It feels like a bait-and-switch.

I'm here because I love this game and I want it to be better. I'm saying this because ESO matters to me. Please, I'm begging you guys to give overland difficulty options priority. I know it's complicated and controversial but it's something that will, for a lot of people, make the overland game actually fun to play for the first time.

Edit: And I just want to say that I understand systems can be developed simultaneously and different teams may be assigned to different features, but I can't get over the feeling that subclassing is something we didn't know about until now, and overland difficulty is something the community has been demanding for years. And also that it's understood how important the feature is to players given the vastness and length of the discussion on this very forum.

Totally get it. Understand where you are coming from. Just want to clarify here that we have a team dedicated to overland, so it is getting the focus and time needed. This is an important feature and we want to make sure this is done correctly. So there is a team dedicated to this. Some of the features that you are seeing today have been in the works for a bit. So that is why you are seeing them today. We hope to have more info in the future to share about overland.

Arunei · April 10

I'd like some clarification on something. When they were talking about certain Collectibles like the Sloth Pet, it sounded like they were saying that those Collectibles would *only* be available to earn *during* the Season. Is that going to be the case? I'm certain I remember us being told earlier in the year the same thing you're saying now, that all content remains available for good if you buy the Season Pass. But does that only apply to the content itself, as in the story and World Events, and not certain Collectibles?

Cause if that's the case it was really misleading to be told all content would remain permanently available with the purchase of a Season Pass.

AlexanderDeLarge · April 10

Very excited for the upcoming Seasons of the Worm Cult Content

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

To be honest with you, giving any information at this point would be doing you and everyone else a disservice. We are too early in the prototyping process to share anything that will be helpful. The most I can share is that we have taken the feedback about being able to opt into overland difficulty to the team and highlighted this is very important to the community. But this is a work in progress. Not much more I can share at this moment.

While I understand it may be too early, this post is literally the most transparent we've gotten from ZOS in years and it's not much. That overland feedback thread was pinned back in November 2021 and we're still waiting for a response other than Rich's Cadwell Silver/Gold retort, vague "it's being discussed" posts, the director's letter labeling it as a potential experiment and moderation cleaning up the thread because it's so contentious due to us being completely in the dark for years on end.

For everyone's sake I think a newsletter and/or stream focused on this subject exclusively is warranted. A lot more communication going forward too.

Edit: Refreshed and there was a lot more discussion and transparency. Still stand by what I said but I really do hope we can count on a lot more communication coming from your team about this. Thank you Kevin.

Aisleyne · April 10

I really don't understand the decision to hint that there are changes to ESO+ and then deep dive into the minutia of all the other systems before addressing it. They should have just told us what is happening instead of dragging it out. It's a really annoying pattern.

GatheredMyst · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

disky wrote: »

I don't want to come off as entitled, and I know it's just a game, and I understand that game development is about time/resource/priority management, but Matt discussed this in his December letter and now it seems like it's still in early prototyping with no prospects of a release anytime soon. Meanwhile, we're seeing a lot of progress on a major new system that was not discussed publicly prior to today. it's just really frustrating to have been given hope for a change that would make the game fun to play, only to have it shoved aside for something that sounds fun but isn't nearly as important to a lot of us. It feels like a bait-and-switch.

I'm here because I love this game and I want it to be better. I'm saying this because ESO matters to me. Please, I'm begging you guys to give overland difficulty options priority. I know it's complicated and controversial but it's something that will, for a lot of people, make the overland game actually fun to play for the first time.

Edit: And I just want to say that I understand systems can be developed simultaneously and different teams may be assigned to different features, but I can't get over the feeling that subclassing is something we didn't know about until now, and overland difficulty is something the community has been demanding for years. And also that it's understood how important the feature is to players given the vastness and length of the discussion on this very forum.

Totally get it. Understand where you are coming from. Just want to clarify here that we have a team dedicated to overland, so it is getting the focus and time needed. This is an important feature and we want to make sure this is done correctly. So there is a team dedicated to this. Some of the features that you are seeing today have been in the works for a bit. So that is why you are seeing them today. We hope to have more info in the future to share about overland.

This is what I needed to know, and considering the timeline listed in another post, might just be what I needed as well to get onboard with purchasing the Season thing.

Thank you very much.

TheDutchChef · April 10

@ZOS_Kevin
Question... I bought the pass, and as soon as i went into game i got 7 unlocked....
A friend of me bought pass to, and that person got 12 unlocks
Where are the rest of my unlocks?
I am missing so far i can find:
- Mount
- Emotes
- Pet

Only thing i found added was the recall action....
But that person has them added already?

Adremal · April 10

Need to hear more/try it out before I decide

Housing vault reveal and stiff dead silence about the furnishing limit. How many decades are we going to be waiting for an answers, regardless of it being positive or negative? And should we think in decades, EoS or the heat death of the universe?