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The Elder Scrolls Online |OT| of THE MOST HYPED GAME EVER

Somnia

Member
So I realize most Gaffers have stopped playing this already, but quite a few people (mainly casual mmo and pvpers) are still playing so I thought I'd post this transcript with Paul Sage on upcoming changes to ESO. Quakecon should show some real good stuff for the game.

Source: http://www.reddit.com/r/elderscrollsonline/comments/2ajf9h/news_as_requested_transcriptnotes_of_paul_sage_qa/

Dragonstar Arena

In Update 4, there is content called Dragonstar Arena. It is in the next part of Craglorn. It is a bit like trials but designed for a group of 4. * You have to fight off waves and there an announcer that announces how you are doing and taunts you if you are not doing well. It is * PvE content and pretty difficult (putting it mildly).
You get different scenery with different stage you are in.
There will be leaderboard just like the trials.
Dragonstar Arena is the last planned update to Craglorn.
Singleplayer arena like in Oblivion? Right we are working on on the social experience but fear not in Quakecon we will announce one to two new zones that give you solo stuff like the 1-50 experience.

Imperial City/3v3 map

Right now our PvP team is working on the Imperial city, it is a big dungeon where you have to own ownership of the Imperial city.
We have a 3v3 map for the shows (i.e. Quakecon) and we have gotten a lot of good responses. The trick is making sure that anything we introduced with battlegrounds etc does not interfere with Cyrodiil and reduce its population.
What about having arenas giving you different rewards from Cyrodiil? It is definitely something we have looked at it but the key is to make sure the different rewards play nice with each other. Arenas are definitely something you can expect not too far off.

Class balance/EU server move

Progress report on class updates/balancing? When any update goes in, we look at the collected data from the various feedback methods and that will influence how we go from there. Putting a plan for all of balancing together is a bit different.
If you live in Europe and play in NA servers, can transfer to the EU servers after the EU server migration in late July/early August? That won’t be necessary, you won’t notice anything different.
What spurred on the migration of EU servers to Frankfurt? It is one of the things we always wanted to do. Now we got everything together and able to do that. We want the EU players to have the best experience.

VR Rank Overhaul

Our hope for the VR system initially is that it would gate items so you would always have this item progression to chase up. Behind the scenes we also had seasons idea where you VR ranks would be wiped and you would start fresh at a new season. That whole system just didn’t have enough moment to moment rewards. There is nothing that is a predictable reward to chase after.
For some people there is a level of challenge they really enjoy but there is also a large number of people who don’t like the challenges. * * The ramp up in difficulty between 1-50 and the VR hits you really hard. We have a lot of difficult things in the game like the trials already. * We want players to still have fun when you reach the VR zones.
In the first phase of VR rank overhaul, we lowered the difficulty of the VR zones to make the difficulty more consistent. For those players who are after challenges we will have something for them later.
Lack of constant rewards make the VR system grindy.
In phase 2, which arrive with Update 4 most likely. We will remove the Veteran Points system and have normal experience gains direct the growth of the Veteran System. Also, we’ll increase the amount of XP granted in PvP but we will add some measures to prevent farming.
Different Cyrodiil campaign for those below 50 and those in the VR ranks in the future. When we take away VR points, we will not take away VR ranks so that won’t affect itemization and the gear you can wear.

Champion System (VR Overhaul Phase 3)

This will replace the Veteran system. This is a system where you are constantly adding points (Champion Points) into passives that will make your character stronger – i.e. critical hit or spell defense. You will add % that will increase these rating. It is a bit like the alternative advancement system (AA) in other games (i..e EQ1, EQ2)
It will be account wide so once you open up the Champion rank you will be able to take these points and apply to other characters. The points you put in one character won’t affect your other characters and there is a built in respec that will be fairly straightforward and easy to get.
Put in an hour and you will get one of those points for example. Experience past 50 are converted into champion points.
Any alts you make will be affected by the champion points already earned on your account. You just cannot earn champion points until you are level 50.
Enlightenment bonus – it is like rested experience so the longer you log off the more bonus you get.
In the Champion system, we will have more gear introduced by seasons where there is no level requirement. They will be harder to get. Season 8 gear will be more powerful than season 7 gear for example but the season 7 gear will be more readily available. There will be a solution for crafting as well.
Champion rating – Look at your gear as well as all your points in the champion system to see if you can take on a certain content or not. * The Champion rating will be introducing some divide in the community but it based more on gear rather than your points to make it easier to catch up.
New itemization coming out as well in update 4– New sets coming out, populate bosses with different set pieces.

Guild management in Update 3

Guild leaders can now create guild ranks, delete guild ranks, and give people more customized guild ranks. They can also assign unique icons for the ranks. Guilds can now have up to 10 ranks.
With the guild traders/kiosks we created a shopping a game where it is really fun to shop around and see who has what. There are 122 of these kiosks added to the game.
Any concerns for bigger/wealthy guilds that just corner the market? We will let it go free market at first and see from there.
Guild Heraldy is same for all guild members and cannot be modified individually.
Custom chat channels for guilds with multiple guilds/overflows? Yes that is something we want to do.
Any sort of guild quest? Paul sage’s personal preference is to have some sort of land ownership or shop ownership where guild can own a bar etc but there are no promises that is coming.
Guild chat fixed to silence members that are actually silenced? Yes

Class Balances

There were some changes that went in recently that we felt we should have offered a free respec. We will be lowering the cost of respecting in update 3. We will also offering a single free respec in update 3. We may raise the respect cost back up in future updates. We are looking at the damage output of Templars. There are some lines like Dawn’s Wrath that will be adjusted to increase their viability. Stamina based builds – we are looking at it pretty carefully. We made some recent changes to it. When we have the answer will put it out there in more detail. We have to be cautious about it as there are always sneaky builds people make that become flavor of the month. What more adjustments can Nightblades can expect? We will see how 1.3 performs and adjust from there.

Dyes & itemization

Any chance of an appearance tab? There are no plans for that at this point.
Able to dye weapons and shields? The development team is divided on this issue with some want weapon dyes and others not wanting weapon dyes. Costumes cannot be dyed currently so that is the first thing we will make adjustments before weapons/shields. Paul wants to dye shields but unsure on weapon dyes.
Option to toggle off armor dyes? We won’t have the ability to toggle it off anytime soon.
Torches? We would like to get them in but no ETA.

Combat

To imply impact, we have a small stutter in frame when your character’s weapon impacts a target. We analyzed this animation to make light attacks a bit faster and feel more responsive.
The character atlas now cache both weapons to make weapon swapping more responsive. Previously when you swapped weapons the character atlas had to rebuild that weapon. Now we predict what you are going to do by having the atlas cache both weapons to make for more immediate weapon swapping.
Zoom option on bows? We want to get the most bang for our bucks for features we introduce, not sure if this would benefit lots of players.
Adding a physical damage component to staves? Not anytime soon but there will be new animations for staves to make them feel more responsive.
Combat damage for light/heavy attacks increased anytime soon? Yes and no, it will depend on the weapon and the circumstances. Maybe not to the light/heavy attacks but to the weapon abilities. Wait and see.

Q&A

Jewelcrafting anytime soon? Don’t know Our current crafting designer wants it but it is a matter if we can fit it in. It is certainly on the plans but not sure on when.
Adventure zone that focus on exploration and questing? Our next zone that is built like a 1-50 zone will feel different and more centered on exploration.
After update 3, what is the next big step? Update 4, improving gameplay, champion system.
When is housing going to be a priority? It is already a priority but can’t talk much about things that is not at the near future.
Pets bound to account, summoned like a spell and not like an item? Yes we would like to put in an UI system for vanity pets.
Distraction based content. What features do you feel personally would fit in ESO. Finding little puzzles, treasure maps. Justice system.
Any new info on justice system? Tune into Quakecon
Any addons you would see to become toggle settings in the game? I am a huge fan of DPS meters. Different inventory management systems and also some people like the scrolling combat text.
Official companion app? That will be done in uh.. uh.. uh… No answer.
Hair salon to change my hair/features? If we don’t get one in soon our art director will kill me. It will be something you get for being social with people.
More info on Imperial City? Tune into Quakecon. There will be videos and pictures.
Inspect player feature? If we had infinite resources we would totally add it. Not on the horizon anytime soon.
Select players with cursor? Not that I am aware.
Consoles? No info on consoles.
Increase draw distance? Yes there is a possibility we will be doing that soon.
Will there be dueling system and option to automatically decline dueling? Dueling isn’t something we don’t want. It is just the rules for duels can be tricky in the environments. Once the Justice system goes in we will have the system setup since the Justice system will feature some PvP.
Additional weapons/weapon skills? Not any time in the near future.
Plans for multiple layers of armor rather than tight/form fitting? Some of the stuff you see right now is done to improve the framerate. There will be some armor improvements in the future but might not be what you are expecting.
Any QoL features for RP players coming soon? We will have more to release on this later.
Mounted combat or just charge ability? Wouldn’t say no to charge ability. Might be something you will hear about soon.
Additional questlines like thieves guild/dark brotherhood? We will definitely be adding those in and more gameplay options like stealing and murdering people, all those things that are really fun in life.
Fixes for Mac/OS X crashing in large group content? Our mac programmers are looking into it. Hopefully we will have news soon. The tricky part is that it doesn’t happen on every mac.
Nameplates/guild tags as optional UI elements? Nameplates have been in our UI backlog for a while. It is not we don’t like them. It is just that when we turn it on, it doesn’t look great. We will add them sometime in the future along with the option to not display them.
Limited guild/account API for making web apps? Not on the radar for development currently.
Any plan for large group content that isn’t timed? Yes we always look for places where players can demonstrate skills beyond timing.

Update 1.3 should be hitting within the next 2 weeks which adds a lot of QOL changes, dye's, weapon swap delay is basically gone now, PVP campaign changes (30 day campaign, 7 day vr only, 7 day non vr only, etc. 5 total).
 

Somnia

Member
Also quite a few changes to bring stamina builds back into play, already started and while still weaker than robe/staff users its getting closer and after 1.3 will be much closer.
 
Just subbed again. I think it's worth coming back to if the VR grind got annoying for you. Plenty of people are power leveling in Craglorn and the VR zones have been nerfed substantially. Balance is still not the best for certain classes and play styles, but the developers seem to be changing stuff at a brisk pace. I'm quite optimistic about this game now.
 

lazygecko

Member
No one posted the QuakeCon news yet? For shame, GAF.

Here is the full presentation video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LkeMacg-b0

Summary of Quakecon pannel, courtesy of Zyphix-Legit75. Going to paste it here. Original post can be found HERE.

IMPERIAL CITY

Imperial City is a pvp and pve zone (You enter via sewers. Three different entrances. Campable, so people can stop you from entering)
100 percent safe zone after entry (each alliance has a starting zone). You get the story here (The Imperials need your help).
You clear out mobs and players in a district to capture it Get unique rewards (Like Imperial Daedric style unlocked)
Repeatable quests yielding high gold and xp.
An arena that you can help out in (Don't quite get this)
A 'market' zone in Imperial City: Can capture this as a district, can respawn here (Alliance owned) Has special crafting tables that you can craft imperial daedric armor in (see pictures below).

GROUPING UPDATES

Players, while grouped, will share items that are picked up off the ground (if you're told to go collect 5 flowers, you're whole group shares the items picked up)
Players in groups will always be able to see each other. They'll be in the same 'channel'
Sharing quests are going to be improved
Other things like this (Significant improvements were mentioned)

CITY OF ASH VET DUNGEON

When you go back to the dungeon in veteran mode, you have to go through a portal to save the elder that previously went through in the normal dungeon mode.

DUNGEON CHANGES

Dungeons will now scale to the level of the group leader (Or your level if no group is established) (Includes monsters, items, XP and gold).
Difficulty in dungeons dynamically reduces if you're struggling on a boss (I think this is only for solo play)

UNDAUNTED SKILLINE

Expanded, new passives, et cetera
After completing dungeons multiple times, you can get undauntless keys which open chests and unlock cool items and armor sets (Look really cool, see screenshots below)

SERPENT TRIAL

New 12 man trial featuring the third celestial, the serpent
Loot gives you a medium armor trial set

DRAGONSTAR ARENA

Essentially is a four person group for trials (Like trials, with 4 people)
The better you do, the harder it gets, the harder it gets, the better loot you get
Timed event
Leaderboards like trials
Multiple levels (Like easy, normal, hard)
'The difficulty level has been cranked up to, like, 15' Lol. I hope so.

NEW FACIAL ANIMATIONS

Adds more emotion to the NPCS faces during dialog
Extremely dynamic
I generally don't really find this stuff interesting, but this is really cool

VETERAN SYSTEM

Veteran content refers to anything 'post-level 50'
Zenimax likes you're allowed to go to the other zones on the same character
Zenimax is working on the reward system for the veteran ranks
Zenimax thinks experience is too different between 1-50 and veteran content
What Zenimax has already done to fix these issues

  • Decreased the difficulty
What Zenimax is going to do

  • Get rid of veteran points. You gain ranks through regular experience.
  • Bonus experience gain the longer you stay offline between play times
    • Helps keep friends closer together
  • Ability to level up passives with points you earn (Champion points)
    • These champion points will be available to spend on all your characters
    • More points unlocks more passives
    • You spend the Champion points in a menu that looks like Skyrim's skill line system
  • New gear will be introduced, but in a slightly different way
    • The new gear you get will come with new content
    • The gear will be the same level, but it will be better, harder to get, and worth more
    • The longer the gear is available in the game, the easier it will be to get
    • A gear chase will exist, it just won't let players fall behind

JUSTICE SYSTEM

Instead of just being able to take things from NPCS, you have to sneak around and steal them without getting caught - If a guard finds you, you have to pay a bounty or flee - Paying the bounty makes you lose all your stolen items - If you flee, the guards fight you
YOU CAN KILL NPCS!!! ALMOST EXACTLY LIKE SKYRIM!!! - If guards catch you, they will ask you to pay a bounty, if you can't pay it you have to run away and/or fight the guard - If you die, you lose your stolen goods (Don't know about the penalty from dying to a guard after killing NPCS) - Players can act as guards and kill these players that steal and kill NPCS (OPEN WORLD PVP)

SPELLCRAFTING

The spell crafting system will be available after completing the Mages Guild questline
There are certain doorways that can only be found by using a new spell - In the middle of the room that the door leads to will be a tablet - The tablets can be worn down, broken, and scattered through the world - You have to find all these peices and put it together - A new minigame like lock picking - Easier spells will be found on unbroken tablets, while harder spells will be broken into many peices - These tablets only give you the base effect of the spell - For example, you could find an 'AOE' tablet - You then can pick three different effects and put them all together to make your own spell - There is different materials (The higher level material you use to make a spell, the more effective it will be) - It is an extreme challenge to find all these different spell bases - You can trade tablets you make. You can 'consume' these tablets. EXTREMELY COOL EFFECTS TO LEARN THESE DIFFERENT SPELLS - The spells you learn are permanent - YOU CAN CONJURE ALL DIFFERENT TYPES OF MONSTERS! (you just gotta make the spell first)

ART AND ANIMATION WORK (ARMOR PREVIEWS AND NEW ZONES)


  • Combat responsiveness
    • Audio feedback for actions (like drinking potions, and when you're out of magicka and stamina) will be more noticable
    • Abilities lockup is FIXED
  • Animation timing
    • The timing of impacts is improved
    • Velocity of swings are improved, combat feels tighter and more responsive
    • Poses are changed (Aesthetic improvements) (EX: staff weilders won't be slouched)
  • Particle effects
    • No more cutting out of particle effects in large scale PvP
    • Missing an effect could cause you to die, so these effects are prioritized
    • You can toggle these effects on and off
    • A slider will also be available to lower memory for particles
    • Effects are pre-cached (lol, what is this)
  • WEAPON SWAPPING IS INSTANT

ARMOR AND WEAPONS

New armor styles for two new zones
Dark brotherhood armor
Thieves guild armor
Dwarven armor
Glass armor
Lots more armor sets
Can now skin monsters and wear their skin as armor

MURKMIRE ADVENTURE ZONE

Not much information was given, and I found nothing big to note. It's a swamplike place featuring a different variant of Argonians.
Nonetheless, this is going to be a fantastic zone. Check the screenshots posted

WROTHGAR SOLO PVE ZONE

HORKERS ARE BACK
Female giant

QUESTION AND ANSWER BIG THINGS TO NOTE

Q: Werewolves are in dire need of change, what will you do?
A: There are changes in mind. Two phases. Phase 1: Bring all everything into balance (ultimate cost, etc). Phase 2: Add new passives and active abilities to expand out the skill line.
Q: Will we ever see more character custimization? (Barber shop, etc)
A: Customization will be coming, no specific details were mentioned.
Q: Is the offender caught stealing (In the Justice System) on a timer?
A: The more bad things you do, the higher your bounty. Eventually, your bounty is so high that you're going to be 'kill on sight'. If you're going to be a criminal, you're going to have to pay the price.
Q: Why do some quests get broken from one patch to the next?
A: There is a ton of moving parts, when we go and fix a quest in one area by adding in or ajusting particle effects somewhere, it doesn't mean it's going to work under all circumstances. Sometimes something like that will slip through.
Q: When are we going to see the facial animation system?
A: Unknown
Q: Do you plan on adding a dueling feature for players that don't like the huge epic war that Cyrodiil is?
A: A dueling system isn't as simple as you might think. There is a lot of things to consider. Once the Justice System is in place, we will have the resources needed to make this possible.
Q: What are the future ideas for adding reason to PVP
A: Imperial City is a start for this. Imperial City is a huge advancement towards this goal. The new PvP gear (Shown in screenshot below) will also be a step towards this. We are trying to expand on this without taking from the Cyrodiil experience
Q: Are there new motifs?
A: Yes.
Q: What are your plans for stamina builds VS magicka builds
A: There a number of plans. I will go through a few with them. One of the things we have already done is add a pasive to medium armor to reduce cost. There are also a number of attacks that need a DPS increase which have been increased. Ultimates will be based off stamina AND magicka (Whichever one is higher). A lot more.
Q: What do you have in plan for roleplayers in the future?
A: A few things have already been mentioned, like the Justice System, but we are also going to add systems like guild traders, et cetera. It's going to be an ongoing effort.
Q: The gold sink is way to high to play different specs. Do you have any plans at all to ajust the price of respecs?
A: Yes. For the first week of update 3, respec costs will be SUPER cheap. After that, it will be brought up to a reduced price (Around 25 percent of what it is now). The last thing being added is being able to respec just morphs, which will be extremely cheap.
Q: What are the developers doing to seperate PVP from PVE content. EX: PVP passives and actives giving an edge in PVE content.
A: Steps will be taken to mitigate the effect PVP has on PVE. Former Emperor bonus is a focus.
Q: Do you have plans to discourage emperor trading.
A: In 1.3, changes will be made. First, condensing the campaigns from 10 to 5. Second, increasing the amount of alliance points needed to become an emperor. Third, a three day lockout will be added for home and guest campaign.
Q: Is a spelltome from spell crafting one time use? And can you make stamina spells?
A: No, but you can make more tomes. You can't make stamina abilities, but you can create a restore stamina spell. We have another idea for stamina users.

Great news all around. The spellcrafting and how it's tied to the game world and economy is especially cool.
 

gossi

Member
US Server going offline now for 'Update 3'. Patch 1.3.3. EU gets tomorrow.

Dyes are in, big guilds can buy stalls in different regions (bidding process), weapon swapping is almost instant now as both weapon sets are cached in memory rather than loaded on demand, and the number of PVP campaigns reduces down to 5 (from 11).
 
US Server going offline now for 'Update 3'. Patch 1.3.3. EU gets tomorrow.

Dyes are in, big guilds can buy stalls in different regions (bidding process), weapon swapping is almost instant now as both weapon sets are cached in memory rather than loaded on demand, and the number of PVP campaigns reduces down to 5 (from 11).

So many changes in this patch. ZOE seems incredibly committed to this game. I'm impressed.
 

Ivory Samoan

Gold Member
US Server going offline now for 'Update 3'. Patch 1.3.3. EU gets tomorrow.

Dyes are in, big guilds can buy stalls in different regions (bidding process), weapon swapping is almost instant now as both weapon sets are cached in memory rather than loaded on demand, and the number of PVP campaigns reduces down to 5 (from 11).
Great changes, I really like the direction the devs are rolling with for ESO... plenty more of this, and we might see the incline happen again (subs that is).
 

lazygecko

Member
pinkckui0.jpg


Aw yeah.
 

hepburn3d

Member
Had a mess around with the Dye Pack system last night.

Noooooot bad.

Definitely adds some personal feel to the game.

I'm hooked on other games at the moment (and summer out doors). If they can keep these kind of updates rolling out I may re sub for a few months in summer and see how well balanced it feels. If it's fun they've got me back.
 

gossi

Member
I have over 260 hours played now. My latest take on the game is:

- Still very buggy. Guilds currently turned off as Update 3 broke them again. Grouping often results in having no group leader. Fast swapping weapons with a bow now breaks in PVP. Getting disconnected and rollbacks in PVP near large siege battles. This is basic stuff the game sold itself on and it still doesn't work properly 4 months after release. ???

- Engine performance is terrible in PVP.

- Enjoyed questing when I listen to the quests. Boring if you skip the voice acting and reading as they're essentially the same templates reused over and over and over and over.

- When PVP works, it can be beautiful.

- Enjoy hanging out with my guild. Social wise, it's great (aside from the bugs!). /zone chat is actually surprisingly good for an MMO, the paywall has kept a lot of idiots out.
 

hepburn3d

Member
soooooo this game is getting a lot better!

Dropped in at the weekend to try the missions and encountered no bugs and enjoyed the content. I really do think this game released too early. Think console players may get the benefit of this when it rolls out.
 

Anbokr

Bull on a Donut
Yeah, game definitely released a few months too early. If they launched right now: with little to no bugs, more balanced classes, a fairly large raid dungeon, better and more focused pvp campaigns, a dye system, better accommodations for group levelers, and elimination of bots... I think they would've had an amazing game and a lot more player retention.

My friends and I have resubbed to finish leveling our characters (we stopped at around level 30 because I had finals and other stuff at the time). Game is as fun as ever, still has a great combat system and the best leveling for any MMO I've played. Seems like they've also been releasing large content patches every month, seems pretty cool.

Still disappointed that werewolf sucks ass though, I remember hearing them say they will buff it after launch, and then it looks like they said it again in a recent interview but never delivered lol...
 

hepburn3d

Member
Yeah, game definitely released a few months too early. If they launched right now: with little to no bugs, more balanced classes, a fairly large raid dungeon, better and more focused pvp campaigns, a dye system, better accommodations for group levelers, and elimination of bots... I think they would've had an amazing game and a lot more player retention.

My friends and I have resubbed to finish leveling our characters (we stopped at around level 30 because I had finals and other stuff at the time). Game is as fun as ever, still has a great combat system and the best leveling for any MMO I've played. Seems like they've also been releasing large content patches every month, seems pretty cool.

Still disappointed that werewolf sucks ass though, I remember hearing them say they will buff it after launch, and then it looks like they said it again in a recent interview but never delivered lol...

If Zenimax can keep this kind of momentum up with patches and new content then in a few months this game will be solid. I think if you want to enter the MMO market you really need a rock solid game on release day. I stopped at level 40 due to frustration but I think I could go back and finish the story now.

There are little things I'd really like. Horses seem to have been gimped, would like to see them speed up again, I've had people run past me. I think to match the new dye system it would be nice to customize your horse to, to give it that complete unique player feel.

Other than that ... controller support :D happy using Pinnacle but I really want native controller support. I think this may actually come when the console version releases, would make sense really.
 

hepburn3d

Member
Main story complete. As far a stories go it was actually quite solid. If they manage to release a Bethesda co-op elder scrolls game in the future I will be happy. Although I won't hold my breath
 

hepburn3d

Member
How's this game faring, btw? Success? Semi-success? Bomba?

I have no idea about PvP player count but in PvE at VR3 there's always players around to help with dark anchors and boss's which I'm really surprised about because about 4 months ago I was usually by myself.

I just reactivated today. I quit at VR1 right before Craglorn patch. Is VR leveling still a huge grind? Any tips?

I almost want to respec...

VR grinding has been made easier now. Seems to happen a lot quicker, which has made a few angry, think they feel they earned it the hard way. Respec cost have hugely dropped. I've respec'd at veteran, makes a huge difference for all those points you may have put into things to try.

Only thing that made a huge difference for me was, respec, craft or ask someone to craft you an armour set with bonus's that help your class, then either put all you attr points in 'health' or 'stamina & magicka', then apply enchantments in the opposite to your whole Armour set. Takes a while to do but when you do suddenly you feel like you're fighting like a boss, is nice. My nightblade has 2 armour sets on, 1 gives a knockback ability when below 35% health which gives me time to slip away. Then I put all my attr points into magicka and stamina evenly, then applied a full set of health enchantments to my Armour. Makes the game fun.


Freakinchair and I are playing on and off, enjoying leveling up, don't see myself sticking around for the endgame though, once I hit 50.

I said the same except I'm enjoying the other zones at veteran now.


Things I'll say is that bugs don't ruin the game as much any more, abilities seem to have been well balanced, the player count is moderate, there are no bots (!!!), missions share credit when part of a group now (wow!) and over all it's actually fun again.
 

user237

Member
I'm still playing the game every day. I've logged in every single day since early access.

I did quit the NeoGaf guild a long time ago... way too many inactive players in there, and the guildmaster was inactive (this was on the NA server). Realistically this game was never going to be popular on this forum with the bad first impressions it got.

The game is a lot better now and the new content is generally worthwhile.

I have no idea if the game is financially stable, but inside the game there are plenty of players. However as a guildmaster of a big guild I see a lot of players going inactive, which makes me think many players are buying the game and subbing for a month or two just to play through the alliance quests before they quit.

The quest stories are very good and worth playing for Elder Scrolls fans, even if they don't care about playing with others.
 

lazygecko

Member
I'm still playing the game every day. I've logged in every single day since early access.

I did quit the NeoGaf guild a long time ago... way too many inactive players in there, and the guildmaster was inactive (this was on the NA server). Realistically this game was never going to be popular on this forum with the bad first impressions it got.

The game is a lot better now and the new content is generally worthwhile.

I have no idea if the game is financially stable, but inside the game there are plenty of players. However as a guildmaster of a big guild I see a lot of players going inactive, which makes me think many players are buying the game and subbing for a month or two just to play through the alliance quests before they quit.

The quest stories are very good and worth playing for Elder Scrolls fans, even if they don't care about playing with others.

I think this is a design flaw in modern MMOs in general. The way they try to create this illusion of a single player experience through the questing, trying to cover up a percieved weakness rather than catering to the strengths of the genre. It's no wonder then that players will treat it as a single player game, and then just quit when they're done with the quests.

Spending time and money on NPC voice acting and dialog choices isn't how you keep players in the long term.
 
Has there been any updates whatsoever on a console release date? It was delayed for 6 months and 6 months is creeping up with absolutely no word or update.

I really want to play this game, but I want to get it on PS4.
 

hepburn3d

Member
Has there been any updates whatsoever on a console release date? It was delayed for 6 months and 6 months is creeping up with absolutely no word or update.

I really want to play this game, but I want to get it on PS4.

On most of the forums people seem to think it will be released in Q1 15. I think you'll get a better experience if you can play it with no bugs from the start.

In the latest patch there were controller handlers which shows it could be getting closer.
 
Might start playing my main again, the time away has let me miss the game. I lost steam after hitting VR given the long grind I knew it would be. Is it much better now? The idea of another two entire alliances just send so daunting.

Any active guilds to recommend?
 

dubq

Member
Kinda wish the devs would give an update on the console version. Wondering if it's even worth bothering with anymore..
 

Buzzbrad

Member
Kinda wish the devs would give an update on the console version. Wondering if it's even worth bothering with anymore..

I assume Q1 2015 is when the release will be. Maybe it will coincide with a big update to the game. If you have a PC I would highly recommend it on there, if not you might as well wait it out.
 

hepburn3d

Member
Morning EU Gaf

I've taken over the EU guild as the previous guild master hadn't logged in, in 5 months :(

I'm quite enthusiastic with this game now, in fact I love it since 1.5. So expect a healthy crafting bank, I've spent 5k making us a simple NeoGaf tabard (feel free to review), and I've also researched nearly all bow, medium, light, and dagger traights. Happy to help a fellow Gaf with Ebonheart character dungeons and missions. Just PM me (hepburn3d). My wife can help with the Daggerfall characters (littlerose23).

I've put 100's of recipes in the bank and tonnes of crafting mats.

I'm going to keep making this bank a treasure trove of usefulness. If any new EU gaffers want to join just PM me. I'm thinking when the Justice system updates we could decide if we want to become an Enforcer or Thief guild :)

If you've not logged in ages I won't kick you out. This is a long term game so expect a long term guild.
 

BizzyBum

Member
I just resubbed a few days ago. I'm going to assume no one plays this here anymore? If so, how's the game currently? Has Zenimax released any subscriber numbers?

I'm still only level 40 currently in the Rift so I'm still nowhere near end game stuff.
 

Somnia

Member
I just resubbed a few days ago. I'm going to assume no one plays this here anymore? If so, how's the game currently? Has Zenimax released any subscriber numbers?

I'm still only level 40 currently in the Rift so I'm still nowhere near end game stuff.

Zenimax isn't a publicly traded company so they probably won't release numbers. Last we heard from inside number sites was 700k+ subs. With the addition to steam I'd assume it's probably still in the 500-700k range which isnt great and isn't horrible. The dev team has stuck together (unlike carbine) and they are putting in a ton of work.

I haven't played in awhile, but I know a lot of people who still play and say the game has gotten drastically better and sounds like it'll be even better after 1.6. I really think ZSO should do a free weekend to draw people in, would help a lot imo.
 

gossi

Member
The 700k subs number was pulled from a website I haven't heard of before, which was based on guesses.

ZOS started laying off staff about a month or so ago.
 

TheYanger

Member
0 chance they have seven hundred K subs. That's not 'not bad not great' that's a lot of subs for an mmo. The retention they'd need to have for even a quarter of that would be absurd
 

BizzyBum

Member
Yeah, I was gonna say 700k subs would be phenomenal. No way the game has that many.

It does seem like the devs are supporting it with a lot of updates adding features so that's always a good sign despite layoffs which is always expected with these types of games.

They really dropped the ball with the console release, though.
 

hepburn3d

Member
I just resubbed a few days ago. I'm going to assume no one plays this here anymore? If so, how's the game currently? Has Zenimax released any subscriber numbers?

I'm still only level 40 currently in the Rift so I'm still nowhere near end game stuff.

Well of the original 50 NeoGaf members only 10 have been on in the last month and 3 in the last week. The community is healthy enough to play though. I've not had to solo anything in the game just by calling out for help in the chat. Edit: I'm V7 a 1/3 of the way through Cadwells Gold to, still busy

I think this game bled users from 1.0 to 1.3 but I think as of 1.5 it's probably stabilized (due to game fixes or hard core fans?). The interesting thing now will be if it can pull users back. Can imagine that will be really hard no matter how great the content because many will have a sour taste left over now. Might be a slow and steady approach.

You might be able to tell if you've seen my earlier posts that I've gone from hating this game to loving it now. So much so that I've put a self imposed ban on buying new games until I get bored of this game because it's all I want to play.
 

BizzyBum

Member
I enjoy it, as well. The only reason I canceled my sub in the first place was due to finances and cutting back any extra spending but now that I have some extra income again I wanted to get back into it. I think having one huge megaserver helps with the population and having a lot of people on at all times instead of having 10 separate servers.

And 1.5 finally adds chat bubbles!
 

BizzyBum

Member
What's the community like for the game, at this point?

I'd love to play, but the monthly fee puts me off.

Numbers-wise it seems fine. I always see a lot of players running about and whenever I need help on a boss or dungeon I usually get a response pretty fast.

As for the community as a whole everyone I've dealt with has been really friendly and helpful so far.
 

Azzurri

Member
I'm quite impressed with the sheer updates this game has and is getting. Seems to be really picking up since launch.
 

BizzyBum

Member
I'm quite impressed with the sheer updates this game has and is getting. Seems to be really picking up since launch.

Yeah, it's pretty good. I mean yeah, they released too early and we're still technically playing a beta, but it improves each update. The console release should have a much more complete game that was ways ahead of the PC release and that's something they need if they want staying power on the Xbone and PS4.
 

hepburn3d

Member
Rumor is 1.5 drops today :) looking forward to it. Feels like it could be the last of fixes to the original and now we can start looking forward to the new content :D
 

Keinu

Member
Been wanting to play this game, but I need controller support. My wrists can't handle playing with mouse and keyboard. Are there any news about controller support for pc or is the console release my only chance?
 
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