Hi guys! I'm the author of the post that was copied to the OP here . Someone messaged me to let me know this had been put up over in these parts. I do want to say "thank you" for giving credit to me for my post, up front. I tried to keep the initial write-up as a "sticking to the facts" post, and to load it with info that was lesser-known or unknown.
I am going through all of the thread and compiling answers into this post that can be shared (I will simply let you know if I can't on any given question that's still verboten; we have been given some guidelines). I may have to be a little vaguer about some things still but I'm allowed to share plenty! Final edit has been made for this post... so don't worry about missing anything as it will be in another, later post in the thread if there's more for me to comment on.
Originally posted by inemosz
Originally posted by ThumbtackJ
Originally posted by DMKano 1-50 in 65 hours. Sweet.
I sort of just skimmed through it, does that include heavy exploration, or just following the main story with the occasional side quest?
It's a bit vague, indeed. But he mentioned if you do level quickly, maybe that's it. He have also gone from 1-50 around 8-9 times so far during various phases, so he knew what he's doing in leveling.
Yeah, it is vague on purpose , as unfortunately I have to be still on a lot of the content, as far as specifics. The last thing I want is to go out of what Zenimax gave us permission to share, both from respect and practicality. The 65 hours leveling to 50 is with a completely "go as fast as you possibly can and optimize using movement speed abilities, sprinting, and being as efficient as possible" type playthrough. For most normal players who mix in a minor amount of crafting, some exploration and skyshard hunting, and a little pvp, you should easily be double that (to 130 hours) if not more, to 50/VR1. For explorer types who really roam the world doing all there is to do, you'll net another doubling time-wise there (so probably in the neighborhood of 250+ hours at absolute minimum). Adding in doing the Mage's Guild quests and getting Lorebooks to unlock them will also add another 10-15 hours even if you already know some or many of the locations to actually collect them and finish the questline.
The Fighters' Guild is easier to level as it involves a questline but levels by killing undead and daedra, which is less time-consuming than running through a lot of zones, even if dodging agro, to collect lorebooks. The quests for that will take a little time too, particularly if doing them as you're still leveling up. Like I said in the introduction, I unfortunately can't delve into specifics yet, but I'm allowed to give general impressions such as these on that content.
Originally posted by Nzscorpion80 Damn get some sunlight.
I do... I'm part of the long-term beta test, which has given me ample time to .
Originally posted by immodium
Originally posted by Scot No MMO has that good an end game it is worth racing to get to top level. 90% of the content is pre end game, why race through so you can play the last 10%?
What's end game in ESO though? Maxing to 50? He states that you've only seen 25% of the worlds content (excluding PvP) when you hit 50.
Is the Vet rank system end game?
Yes, the Veteran Ranks are endgame progression, basically another set of levels in terms of playing. However, the story content literally is the entire two other Alliances as though you were going from 1-50 again (there's a story reason for this) with some alterations so it makes sense, and the six Veteran dungeons which are some of the same environment inside the normal mode dungeons, but are all new bosses with a new story and some new areas, for each one. It's important to note that the speed of how you will level through Veteran Ranks will probably change (this is strictly me guessing) before the game is released, so as to pace it better in regards to the content vs. what your Veteran Rank is.
Once you finish with the Veteran Ranks and have done the dungeons, finished through the Veteran zones, etc. you still have Cyrodiil which is basically player-generated content around the keeps, chokepoints, killing stragglers if you're into smaller-scale stuff, roaming, intercepting enemy forces, defending and attacking. There also are 18 public dungeons inside of Cyrodiil that are a good way to gear up for basics and should see a good bit of traffic at the entrances and inside for smaller-scale action, and a lot of skyshards, some of which are only accessible when you have access to the Scroll Temple of one of the enemy factions.
Originally posted by atuerstar
A Big Thanks to GoldenTiger for writing the only review that stuck to the facts and made me even slightly interested in the game. They provided a lightly detailed yet comprehensive overview of the entire game! Not once did I feel like some hype blinded madperson was shoving their ideology in my face. The emotional tone was even and the news - the facts - were the basis of its entire delivery.
I say fire one of your featherweights and get this person to bring some good old fashioned journalistic values to the site.
I appreciate that. The reason I even wrote this all up is because I know when I am looking at an upcoming game, it's frustrating to hear "Everything rocks!!" or just a slam-down of the entire game, and it can often be difficult to find lesser-known beta info even if it's free from the NDA (such as this is). I have my critiques of things, but I'm mostly trying to stick to the facts so people can make their own judgement.
Originally posted by SpottyGekko
Originally posted by DMKano
1-50 in 65 hours. Sweet. That's my priority #1 - get to 50 for unclamped AvA attributes.
Many people will be chasing that butterfly...
Hopefully ZOS will fine-tune the PVP level-adjustment process to make it less abrupt than it is currently. Rumour has it that currently a L50 can slaughter a L49 (everyone gets L49 attributes in AvA if lower than L50) simply because the adjustment cap is removed at L50.
That will be a massive lure for eager PVP'ers, because if things remain as they are, the handful of players that reach L50 first and hit Cyrodiil are going to have a massive advantage...
Your first line's a good way of saying it. I don't think most people will get through that quickly, but I wanted to provide a number for if you're absolutely pedaling it. I'm unsure if I'm allowed to remark specifically on the AvA scaling system as that's technically in a zone you guys could go into, but not get to see how stats worked for that in Veteran Ranks, so I will hold off on that for now. As a general impression, though, most games have a good early-mover advantage when you get to the high levels quickly and there's a PVP element involved. Things are still being adjusted as far as pre-50 balance and options vs. post-50 balance and options as an ongoing (I know devs usually say that when they are just looking at it but not working on it, but I mean this as in they are actively looking at it) process.
Originally posted by arieste
Originally posted by immodium
Is the Vet rank system end game?
Sounds like it and sounds pretty awesome tbh.
It really is a brilliant way of taking advantage of all the content you've created for the other factions AND creating endgame at the same time. Without seeing it first hands, it seems to me to be a fantastic design decision that takes into account the typical "rush to cap" and embraces it without sacrificing the initial 1-50 experience in the process. If it works out, you get the best of both worlds.
I thought that exact same thing when I first had heard it mentioned a long time back in an interview video. A problem that often arises in MMO's is that you end up with each faction only seeing a fraction of the game content for PVE. Having built it from the ground-up to be re-usable including fitting into the story lets them really make use of all they have available.
Originally posted by Telondariel
Good read. Thanks, OP.
I've never been a rush-to-endgame sort of a person in any game I've played. I dally too much, preferring to explore and wander around, crafting, harvesting. In DAoC I'd spend an inordinate amount of time in Darkness Falls farming seals and participating in 1-on-1 PvP encounters that you could stumble into. I was never a powergamer, or content locust, rather that person who just savored the experience who has a serious case of altaholicism.
It's good to see that they spent a lot of time and thought into fleshing out the game. It should keep a lot of people quite busy, and satisfied.
First off, you've captured my heart with the Animist shroom gif as your avatar. If you're someone who dally's around some with farming and crafting, etc. you will be much, much longer than my initial number for the leveling speed. You really can play the game at any speed and have a lot to do still, be it seriously zooming through to the Veteran Ranks, doing it halfway and messing with crafting/exploring/etc. in the process, or really looking for all there is. I've found even as someone that fits into the first type there for the most part, that there was often something that caught my eye and diverted me from the main leveling paths, but was beneficial and broke things up some. As you might imagine there is a good cross-section of playstyles amongst the testers, so while I don't view myself as fitting into the other two categories, I have heard feedback about it, tempered with my thoughts.
Originally posted by arieste
Originally posted by greenreen
their comment about gear mostly being BOE
This would be pretty awesome if it's indeed true - so sick of everything being no-trade or BoP in recent games.
Also, I've always hoped for a game where you could get an amazing piece of gear in a dungeon/raid and then get a crafter to tweak/improve it. Again - best of both worlds.
I did indeed mean "Bind on Equip" when using the BOE acronym. While some BoP (Bind on Pickup) rewards exist, they are very sparingly used. Another thing of especial interest, that was probably missed by a lot of weekend event players, is that even once an item is bound, it can still be stored in your shared account bank, which means you can hand gear down to an alt, or get it over to a crafter character to upgrade, then bank it and pick it back up with your main(s). Personal opinion alert: I was very happy to see this was all possible and it seems to be a good compromise to me between items just accumulating and being re-sold repeatedly to other players, while also making them valuable even if you already have them (for sale or guild wealth or guild bank purposes), and also allowing you to change the drops in some ways if it's close to what you want but not exactly it.
An example of this in particular is the weapon enchantments which each have different effects tied to their damage going off (disease will apply an incoming heal debuff to your enemy, fire will sometimes apply a DoT that burns and can technically even re-apply itself if you get lucky, etc.). Another major example would be changing the main stat of an item from say, Magicka by putting an enchantment over (removing the old one) it for Stamina, or changing a resistance on a jewelry item.
Originally posted by Iselin
Originally posted by BadSpock
Really wish I could beta on XB1...
I just worry about population and the Alliance war on console due to no cross-platforming.
I know I'm weird, but I definitely preferred Skyrim on my 360 to my PC, and would only really consider ESO on XB1 but not if it is going to be a ghost town and the AvAvA is going to be weak.
The overall campaign size limit is 2,000...as long as there are 2,000 active XB1 players, you'll have no problems with ghost town campaigns... pretty low requirement.
Good info catch. Per interviews, the limit is 2,000 people concurrently in a single campaign (with many more assigned to it of course), from what I saw awhile back. I have no idea if that's still the current number but I haven't seen anything to make me think that has changed.
Originally posted by aslan132
Thank you OP for sharing the link/story. Ive been going back and forth on this game for sometime now. I had already planned to buy it anyways, because frankly after trying both ESO and Wildstar, I just enjoy ESO more. One of the things that had me most worried was the lack of content options. Wildstar provides alot of different features, like small and large group PVE (dungeons and raids), arenas, battlegrounds, warplots and player housing. While ESO only seemed to have small group PVE and Cyrodiil.
I knew Adventure zones existed, but there has been zero info available for what they actually were, other than the devs telling us they are NOT raids. That had me worried, because if they arent raids, then where is the large group PVE content? And what are they. Even though what he says in that OP story isnt confirmed, I think its near enough to what they actually will be. And honestly its even better than what I expected. Sure, they are not raids, they are large zones, open public zones, that contain one or more raids within them.
This is all good news. And Im glad to see that progression continues, and they make smart use of all of their available content, reusing it again and again. It also means it will be that much easier to continue adding future progression.
ESO caught my fancy more, as well. Both games really have a lot to them, with many of the same features but done in different ways that results in drastically different games. The main items that one has but not the other would be Wildstar having housing, while ESO has a territory-control objective-based and persistent PVP zone in the form of Cyrodiil. I may have over-shared a bit if all they had said publicly about adventure zones was that they aren't raids, so I'll refrain from saying any more on them for now. With how much info I was writing out, and not even based off of notes but just thinking through everything, that was a bit of a slip. I do feel they are making excellent use of their available content, and by extension development resources, with how they've designed things.
Originally posted by evilastro
Originally posted by spizz
If you like clusterfuck pvp with no tactics whatsover, you will like wildstar
I like the PvP in ESO, but Wildstar PvP plays like a game of chess compared to ESO.
The PvP in ESO is a little more action-y and quicker-paced, while the PVP in Wildstar is very tactically based with a little less need for rapid on-the-fly planning, in my opinion. I like both, but personally ESO plays better to me due to its nature of being an open zone with objectives as a metagame, versus the main PVP in Wildstar being instanced and pre-set.
Hi guys! I'm the author of the post that was copied to the OP here . Someone messaged me to let me know this had been put up over in these parts. I do want to say "thank you" for giving credit to me for my post, up front. I tried to keep the initial write-up as a "sticking to the facts" post, and to load it with info that was lesser-known or unknown.
Since Cyrodiil is open, can you comment on leveling in the PvP Zone? Is it an effective way of leveling?
Originally posted by Scot No MMO has that good an end game it is worth racing to get to top level. 90% of the content is pre end game, why race through so you can play the last 10%?
What's end game in ESO though? Maxing to 50? He states that you've only seen 25% of the worlds content (excluding PvP) when you hit 50.
Is the Vet rank system end game?
From what I gathered from his post, vet rank system is a mechanic of end game.
Elder game content is: PvP, crafting, Adventure zones, raids (?), Veteran (heroic) dungeons, questing in enemy territories as 50+/++.
Not sure if I added or missed anything.
A note for the crafting combined with their comment about gear mostly being BOE (which I'm taking to mean bind on equip) I do remember from the interface that you didn't have to equip gear to use enchants on it so even if you don't craft, my thought is that you pass it to a friend, ask them to enchant it then they pass it back or you just buy the enchantment itself that is a standalone inventory item. That adjustment of gear to suit you is probably going to mean that even if you don't craft you'll want to know what the options are to alter the gear. I don't know about upgrading gear through the other crafts like blacksmith where they work directly with gear if that would bind it but for sure I tested the enchants.
That comment about gold being important makes me think I won't buy anything I don't have to early on and instead craft any gear. I saw some people say they were buying gear from vendors in the lvl 6-10ish areas and that they were broke. I didn't buy any gear and only wore what I found but I had over 3k gold when I logged out finally and I spent a fair amount buying lots of lockpicks to have on me - they were like 13g each from a vendor. Easily I made 5k just in those lower lvls but of course I would die and need repairs too and I took a paid travel route about 5 times. The gear looked too expensive to me from vendors, I do think they want you to get interested in what crafting offers even if you don't want to do it yourself.
Small correction on your example... enchantments(runes) can just be sold or given, so the owner of the equipment can add the enchantment, he just can't create them. ESO specifically said they did this so people wouldn't have to worry that their gear was about to get ganked.
I like what Zenimax has done with the 50+ and ++ zones, although I do wonder about the replayablity for people who enjoy having a ton of alts. With one character you will see the other two zones, which takes away a fresh start for people who get tired, and want to roll a different faction for a fresh experience.
It's a nitpicky thing, and I don't think it'll dissuade a ton of folks, but it does make me wonder.
Nice write up. I am a slow leveler but one thing that jumped out at me is how deep this dam game is. I love to wander off and waste time for no good reason....this actually pays off....you find some awesome places that have unique uses. Also the AI is pretty dam epic for an MMO. No other MMO has so much interaction from NPCs that I have played...they react and talk to you just because your in their vicinity....like a true ES game.
Originally posted by Scot No MMO has that good an end game it is worth racing to get to top level. 90% of the content is pre end game, why race through so you can play the last 10%?
What's end game in ESO though? Maxing to 50? He states that you've only seen 25% of the worlds content (excluding PvP) when you hit 50.
Is the Vet rank system end game?
From what I gathered from his post, vet rank system is a mechanic of end game.
Elder game content is: PvP, crafting, Adventure zones, raids (?), Veteran (heroic) dungeons, questing in enemy territories as 50+/++.
Not sure if I added or missed anything.
A note for the crafting combined with their comment about gear mostly being BOE (which I'm taking to mean bind on equip) I do remember from the interface that you didn't have to equip gear to use enchants on it so even if you don't craft, my thought is that you pass it to a friend, ask them to enchant it then they pass it back or you just buy the enchantment itself that is a standalone inventory item. That adjustment of gear to suit you is probably going to mean that even if you don't craft you'll want to know what the options are to alter the gear. I don't know about upgrading gear through the other crafts like blacksmith where they work directly with gear if that would bind it but for sure I tested the enchants.
That comment about gold being important makes me think I won't buy anything I don't have to early on and instead craft any gear. I saw some people say they were buying gear from vendors in the lvl 6-10ish areas and that they were broke. I didn't buy any gear and only wore what I found but I had over 3k gold when I logged out finally and I spent a fair amount buying lots of lockpicks to have on me - they were like 13g each from a vendor. Easily I made 5k just in those lower lvls but of course I would die and need repairs too and I took a paid travel route about 5 times. The gear looked too expensive to me from vendors, I do think they want you to get interested in what crafting offers even if you don't want to do it yourself.
Small correction on your example... enchantments(runes) can just be sold or given, so the owner of the equipment can add the enchantment, he just can't create them. ESO specifically said they did this so people wouldn't have to worry that their gear was about to get ganked.
I had that option there. "or you just buy the enchantment itself that is a standalone inventory item. "
I needed clarification on the blacksmith type upgrades - did you try any of those? Do they bind the equipment being upgraded?
Sorry my brain died there, when I saw buy I thought vendor, for some reason to me buy always means vendor, trade means player, LOL.
No, upgrades do NOT bind unbound equipment. I was able to get up to crafted blue/steel and it was not bound.
I like what Zenimax has done with the 50+ and ++ zones, although I do wonder about the replayablity for people who enjoy having a ton of alts. With one character you will see the other two zones, which takes away a fresh start for people who get tired, and want to roll a different faction for a fresh experience.
It's a nitpicky thing, and I don't think it'll dissuade a ton of folks, but it does make me wonder.
I don't know whether any of them have long term impacts, but there are *lots* of choices in the quests, so in order to see all the variations (however slight they may be) you will have to play through each faction's content at least twice.
Peace is a lie, there is only passion. Through passion, I gain strength. Through strength, I gain power. Through power, I gain victory. Through victory, my chains are broken. The Force shall free me.
Comments
Yeah, it is vague on purpose
, as unfortunately I have to be still on a lot of the content, as far as specifics. The last thing I want is to go out of what Zenimax gave us permission to share, both from respect and practicality. The 65 hours leveling to 50 is with a completely "go as fast as you possibly can and optimize using movement speed abilities, sprinting, and being as efficient as possible" type playthrough. For most normal players who mix in a minor amount of crafting, some exploration and skyshard hunting, and a little pvp, you should easily be double that (to 130 hours) if not more, to 50/VR1. For explorer types who really roam the world doing all there is to do, you'll net another doubling time-wise there (so probably in the neighborhood of 250+ hours at absolute minimum). Adding in doing the Mage's Guild quests and getting Lorebooks to unlock them will also add another 10-15 hours even if you already know some or many of the locations to actually collect them and finish the questline.
The Fighters' Guild is easier to level as it involves a questline but levels by killing undead and daedra, which is less time-consuming than running through a lot of zones, even if dodging agro, to collect lorebooks. The quests for that will take a little time too, particularly if doing them as you're still leveling up. Like I said in the introduction, I unfortunately can't delve into specifics yet, but I'm allowed to give general impressions such as these on that content.
I do... I'm part of the long-term beta test, which has given me ample time to
.
Yes, the Veteran Ranks are endgame progression, basically another set of levels in terms of playing. However, the story content literally is the entire two other Alliances as though you were going from 1-50 again (there's a story reason for this) with some alterations so it makes sense, and the six Veteran dungeons which are some of the same environment inside the normal mode dungeons, but are all new bosses with a new story and some new areas, for each one. It's important to note that the speed of how you will level through Veteran Ranks will probably change (this is strictly me guessing) before the game is released, so as to pace it better in regards to the content vs. what your Veteran Rank is.
Once you finish with the Veteran Ranks and have done the dungeons, finished through the Veteran zones, etc. you still have Cyrodiil which is basically player-generated content around the keeps, chokepoints, killing stragglers if you're into smaller-scale stuff, roaming, intercepting enemy forces, defending and attacking. There also are 18 public dungeons inside of Cyrodiil that are a good way to gear up for basics and should see a good bit of traffic at the entrances and inside for smaller-scale action, and a lot of skyshards, some of which are only accessible when you have access to the Scroll Temple of one of the enemy factions.
I appreciate that. The reason I even wrote this all up is because I know when I am looking at an upcoming game, it's frustrating to hear "Everything rocks!!" or just a slam-down of the entire game, and it can often be difficult to find lesser-known beta info even if it's free from the NDA (such as this is). I have my critiques of things, but I'm mostly trying to stick to the facts so people can make their own judgement.
Your first line's a good way of saying it. I don't think most people will get through that quickly, but I wanted to provide a number for if you're absolutely pedaling it. I'm unsure if I'm allowed to remark specifically on the AvA scaling system as that's technically in a zone you guys could go into, but not get to see how stats worked for that in Veteran Ranks, so I will hold off on that for now. As a general impression, though, most games have a good early-mover advantage when you get to the high levels quickly and there's a PVP element involved. Things are still being adjusted as far as pre-50 balance and options vs. post-50 balance and options as an ongoing (I know devs usually say that when they are just looking at it but not working on it, but I mean this as in they are actively looking at it) process.
I thought that exact same thing when I first had heard it mentioned a long time back in an interview video. A problem that often arises in MMO's is that you end up with each faction only seeing a fraction of the game content for PVE. Having built it from the ground-up to be re-usable including fitting into the story lets them really make use of all they have available.
First off, you've captured my heart with the Animist shroom gif as your avatar. If you're someone who dally's around some with farming and crafting, etc. you will be much, much longer than my initial number for the leveling speed. You really can play the game at any speed and have a lot to do still, be it seriously zooming through to the Veteran Ranks, doing it halfway and messing with crafting/exploring/etc. in the process, or really looking for all there is. I've found even as someone that fits into the first type there for the most part, that there was often something that caught my eye and diverted me from the main leveling paths, but was beneficial and broke things up some. As you might imagine there is a good cross-section of playstyles amongst the testers, so while I don't view myself as fitting into the other two categories, I have heard feedback about it, tempered with my thoughts.
I did indeed mean "Bind on Equip" when using the BOE acronym. While some BoP (Bind on Pickup) rewards exist, they are very sparingly used. Another thing of especial interest, that was probably missed by a lot of weekend event players, is that even once an item is bound, it can still be stored in your shared account bank, which means you can hand gear down to an alt, or get it over to a crafter character to upgrade, then bank it and pick it back up with your main(s). Personal opinion alert: I was very happy to see this was all possible and it seems to be a good compromise to me between items just accumulating and being re-sold repeatedly to other players, while also making them valuable even if you already have them (for sale or guild wealth or guild bank purposes), and also allowing you to change the drops in some ways if it's close to what you want but not exactly it.
An example of this in particular is the weapon enchantments which each have different effects tied to their damage going off (disease will apply an incoming heal debuff to your enemy, fire will sometimes apply a DoT that burns and can technically even re-apply itself if you get lucky, etc.). Another major example would be changing the main stat of an item from say, Magicka by putting an enchantment over (removing the old one) it for Stamina, or changing a resistance on a jewelry item.
Good info catch. Per interviews, the limit is 2,000 people concurrently in a single campaign (with many more assigned to it of course), from what I saw awhile back. I have no idea if that's still the current number but I haven't seen anything to make me think that has changed.
ESO caught my fancy more, as well. Both games really have a lot to them, with many of the same features but done in different ways that results in drastically different games. The main items that one has but not the other would be Wildstar having housing, while ESO has a territory-control objective-based and persistent PVP zone in the form of Cyrodiil. I may have over-shared a bit if all they had said publicly about adventure zones was that they aren't raids, so I'll refrain from saying any more on them for now. With how much info I was writing out, and not even based off of notes but just thinking through everything, that was a bit of a slip. I do feel they are making excellent use of their available content, and by extension development resources, with how they've designed things.
The PvP in ESO is a little more action-y and quicker-paced, while the PVP in Wildstar is very tactically based with a little less need for rapid on-the-fly planning, in my opinion. I like both, but personally ESO plays better to me due to its nature of being an open zone with objectives as a metagame, versus the main PVP in Wildstar being instanced and pre-set.
I like the PvP in ESO, but Wildstar PvP plays like a game of chess compared to ESO.
Small correction on your example... enchantments(runes) can just be sold or given, so the owner of the equipment can add the enchantment, he just can't create them. ESO specifically said they did this so people wouldn't have to worry that their gear was about to get ganked.
I like what Zenimax has done with the 50+ and ++ zones, although I do wonder about the replayablity for people who enjoy having a ton of alts. With one character you will see the other two zones, which takes away a fresh start for people who get tired, and want to roll a different faction for a fresh experience.
It's a nitpicky thing, and I don't think it'll dissuade a ton of folks, but it does make me wonder.
/cry I don't think I can do it like I used too.
That's 65 hours of gameplay just to get to V1. Just sayin.
I know right.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9F8bs_THKiY
Sorry my brain died there, when I saw buy I thought vendor, for some reason to me buy always means vendor, trade means player, LOL.
No, upgrades do NOT bind unbound equipment. I was able to get up to crafted blue/steel and it was not bound.
I don't know whether any of them have long term impacts, but there are *lots* of choices in the quests, so in order to see all the variations (however slight they may be) you will have to play through each faction's content at least twice.
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.