Going to take my time with this MMO. Not racing to 50 and quit first month. There crafting seems fun.
The Elder Scrolls Online
- Thread starter Anomander Rake
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Vitality
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Seems like a smart decision, atleast for maximizing your purchase. The crafting is pretty standard, it's a simple gather and combine model, not too interactive.
The story on the other hand is pretty engaging, reminds me of TOR in this regard (which was done to my liking). There were times where even the hardcorest of us in our PvP group during ToR would shout over mumble, "shhhh cutscene". Lol, I'd imagine there's going to be a fair bit of that in this game.
I'm sure I'll fall prey to my main groups poopsock mentality though, as we'll want to be bleeding edge in pvp for as long as this game can hold our interest.
For the record - I actually did find a way to make TESO's mobs challenging (as you and others have mentioned in this thread, I too just basically skipped half a zone and went to areas where mobs and quests were ~3 levels higher than me), and that really is where the game turned the corner for me in a big way. Frankly, it's what sold me on the game. That and switching to 3rd person perspective, only doing one quest at a time, and also not picking up every single quest I saw (though the completionist in me wept with every ignored floaty thing over an NPC's head). But until I did that, I was actually pretty pissed that it was so absurdly easy. And that was solo. I shudder to think of the epically shit smeared /faceroll that would come of grouping through the overland content.
Anyway, to my mind it just points out two of a number of pretty big problems ahead of them. Bugs n' shit are certainly fixes, combat mechanics and have fun in combat is important (and I personally found it to be so, for now), stuff like that; but having your shit tuned right is arguably one of the most important things for the longevity of the game. I'm not so sure I should have to skip a whole bunch of stuff just to make the game challenging. I'll do it, and I'll probably have alotta fun with the game (really lookin' forward to release actually), but it doesn't really sit right. I won't even mention the vast ocean of two dimensional thinkers and complete nitwits that make up the bulk of the MMO crowd, who will not be able to think outside the box enough to hop off the rails a little.
If I'm average joe gamer, will I look back on my progress through the game as a boring as fuck battle with tedium, stuck in a treadmill of pointlessly stupid shit that I'll quickly grow to resent (probably not a reaction you want from the bulk of your content), because it's so ridiculously easy? Or will I have some fond memories of all the adrenaline filled fights where I barely escaped with my digital life, or the times I actually had to rethink my build to defeat an encounter (only to find some cool new ways to use my abilities I hadn't thought of), or grab somebody to help me out, or whatever?
There's gonna be a little attrition in a game that's toeing the "Difficult" line. I won't go into a rant about how the fukwits that would leave an MMO because it's too hard are not the people you want in your game anyway, but whatever. But I'd argue it's what is best for the long term health of the game.
Yer right. Sucks.
Speaking of which: Obviously it's too late for TESO, and it's not like it's an easy thing, but why can't there be a difficulty slider in MMO's? A little bit of relativistic mechanic that (the second I hit a given mob), simply gives the mob 50% more health and it hit's 20% harder or whatever? As my reward for trying to push my way out of the morass of mediocrity, maybe it gives me a +10% chance to get a blue/purple drop. Is that really so hard? I'm not a programmer, I'm talkin' outta my ass, probly bein' dumb, but it doesn't sound like a major project. I'd argue it would've saved a helluva alotta MMO's from the waste bin - for me.
Tuco
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The variable difficulty that comes with reward has a big presence on arpgs like Diablo3 and Path of Exile (Both those games have a system where you increase the mob's power level and get more chance to drop good loot. Path of Exile's is pretty involved and interesting). WoW kind of has this with heroic dungeons but it's very binary.
Vitality
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Would love to see something like the Path of exile Map Laboratory in TESO, lost my 88 Summoner Witch (Nemesis) to a 90% additional phys dmg, vulnerability curse trap boss in a 73 map, I killed it but it downed me with a crit bear trap.
Probably should've rerolled that map even though I had an insane amount of armor (Grace+Det+IR+aura nodes)
Lesson learned I guess.
Kreugen
Vyemm Raider
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Someone mentioned that in the tutorial level, you should have to block some super duper windup attack and move out of some red thing on the ground or DIE. So that right there, you learn that flashing yellow = block and red shit on ground = fucking move.
Instead, you learn that "well, you'll lose some HP but you'll kill it faster if you just keep attacking and you'll regen that health back two seconds later"
This is a great idea and would give some actual value to the Coldharbor tutorial thing. The concept of POE/Diablo style difficulties in an MMO is something I've wanted for a long time now. It may not have make sense for it to be exactly as it is in those games, but there certainly needs to be some mechanic to allow MMO vets to get through the quite slow early game without falling asleep. I typically just grind higher level mobs like Torgaard has mentioned, but frequently the game fights back against that with requisite story quests and extremely tight character level requirements for quests and other content access.
Kreugen
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The greatest thing ever in a MMO:The Secret World: Nightmare Dungeon Unlock The Gatekeeper : Unfair.co
The DPS one was the hardest. Tons of shit to dodge (or die), shit to interrupt (or die), and it was timed. Still can't explain how fucking terrible everyone was, though.
The DPS one was the hardest. Tons of shit to dodge (or die), shit to interrupt (or die), and it was timed. Still can't explain how fucking terrible everyone was, though.
Gatekeeper reminded me of the priest and hunter epic quests from classic wow. Good times.
Tuco
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That's a cool idea, thanks for linking it. I've long thought that solo-only tests should be integrated into MMOs. My ideal way would be to completely remove hard-set xp based levels and to have different levels of these types of tests players would pass to gain levels. It'd hopefully separate the baddies from good players and if your levels gave you bonuses would innately help good players.
People would pay other people to do the quests for them. I recall hunters logging into other people's accounts just to do the quests for them.
Tuco
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No doubt, but it'd create a market for skilled players. Plus on my server it was shameful to have to get someone to get your Rhok'delar or benny.
How soon we forget. When EQ was brand-spanking-new, I was too busy with work to be very involved. In fact, Velius was out before I could really devote to it the time it required to advance with any notable speed. By the time Luclin was out, I had maxed my level and caught up to others who played since the beginning. But a few interesting things happened along this journey that gave me a perspective on MMOs I seldom see anybody hint of.
During my period of being strapped for time, I watched others climb and achieve. They went from "noob" to "uber" and I still had to dick around with early content. That's when I got to straddle two populations. I knew the perspective of the more advanced crowd (called "uber" by themselves and only "high level" by everybody else) and that of the people who joined in late. Johnny Low Level, just trying to complete his one quest a day amid power players who hogged content both looked up to and admired, resented and despised all at once those who came first. Bobby High Level just needed to finish his farming and leveling for the week to show up to raids prepared and didn't have the time to notice Johnny.
But the interesting thing throughout is that the stratification of the playerbase pushed those who fell behind. They gained a hunger to be like those ahead, and that hunger drove them to stick with the game come hell or high water. This made it simple to gather together groups of hopelessly lost, semi-alienated loners and underachievers to train into a decent raiding force, once I had the time to advance. They were eager to break past their barriers, and as they learned the simple things they had for so long overlooked, there was a copious amount of facepalming.
Something similar will happen in ESO. Those who challenge themselves and reach for the more rewarding content will advance faster, achieve things sooner, and altogether look much better. Those who enjoy eking out a role in Tamriel fighting the easy overworld trash that lets them still feel like a Dovakhiin or Nerevarine will come to look up to their counterparts. Stratification is all but guaranteed, and it will spread players across content and provide insight from those who spearhead for those who come behind them.
I don't see what's wrong with that. This game has the lowest price I've ever seen to cement a place among that higher echelon of player. You don't need "l33t beta infoz". Not really. You don't need an old uberguild, though for some things (like PvP and later, adventure zones), it would help. You don't need to be an old school RPG wizard with secrets of method and thought handed down since the days of D&D. You just need to have the patience to explore a bit. To stand out from the crowd, just leave the crowd behind. That's all there is to it. (edit: Well, outside of PvP. In Cyrodiil, stick with the zerg until you get some experience there.)
From this perspective, I can't see how the easy-schmeezy starter areas are a problem. Those will help the new MMO players to join in, and let them catch up on concepts they know jack about. To quote EVE parlance, they're not stupid -- they're noobs. They'll catch up. A bigger, better question is, how does this content expand later, when that hand-holdy, extremely easy lowbie content isn't required anymore?
rhinohelix
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Blackwulf
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Yeah, I've never been big into crafting in these games, but I'm definitely gonna give it a go. I like those specialty crafting stations around the world.
Dr Neir
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More I see about the crafting the better I like it. So far looks to be better than expected. Still worried but love the ideas they have in place so far. Really like that crafting is top billing period! Nothing in the world will be better than a crafted item. Is there anything on the PC shops I have been hearing about?
I can see hours and hours of crafting/gathering all day, the special crafting stations I am sure will be on a website within a week. While I would like to map this myself, not seeing a point at since its stationary POI.
To be fair I'd only say it isn't fun when healing in Cyrodiil, due to the fact you can't actually aim healing abilities. There are PBAoE heals that emanate from your character, AoE heals for which you choose an area with your mouse, and "smart" heals that affect anywhere from 1 to 3 or so people. Those "smart" heals choose their own targets, basically whoever's within range and with the least amount of health. In a PvE scenario, at least at lower levels, this is fine as your group is only 4 people anyway. In Cyrodiil however you could be standing among a dozen faction members including whoever's in your group, and your "smart" heals will count every person in your faction within range as a potential target.
If a group member gets hit by a siege weapon that sets them on fire or poisons them your best option is to hit them with a powerful, single/limited-target heal because AoEs are, from what I've seen, either a HoT that may not heal faster than the DoT that's killing them or spells with a cast time that may not go off in time to save them. Unfortunately you can onlyhopethat single/limited-target heal actually hits your group member, especially if they weren't the only person hit by that siege weapon.