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Checking out Update 12 - One Tamriel with a brand new character.
Iselin
Member LegendaryPosts: 18,719
I'm going to use this thread to share my experience and thoughts while playing in the Public Test Server (PTS) with brand new character without using any champion points. I want to do this because ever since this update was announced I've been curious (and a bit skeptical) about a brand new player being able to hold his/her own bolstered to CP160 everywhere.
I chose to play as Redgard Stamina Sorcerer since that's a build I've been playing a lot lately so it's easy for to compare the experience with my CP300 stamsorc. Once I get past the first Island I'll be heading to new Craglorn and I'll probably also take my higher level stamsorc there to see how different they feel.
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First thing I noticed was that this area is also CP160 bolstered. Your health, stamina and magicka attributes will all be in the 15k - 20k range right off the bat. And the mobs are also all CP160. The other thing you'll notice right away is that these mobs no longer display a level. This is a change everywhere and since all mobs are now CP160 it'd be meaningless and redundant to display their level.
The first few fights here are slightly tougher than before: the time to kill (TTK) is a bit longer and you can run out of resources easier. Not hard by any means but you do have to pay attention a bit more.
I also got a blue 2-HD hammer drop here with the sharpened trait... not bad at all. This is the first blue drop I've ever seen in the tutorial. I was thinking of training DW first but that hammer sealed the deal - 2HD as my first weapon it is.
Once you finish the tutorial you'll end up in the starter zone of your chosen alliance. I picked AD so it was Khenarthi's Roost for me. I was level 4 when I left - slightly higher than before since I'm used to leveling to 4 just after this when talking to the Prophet.
Once again the CP160 TTK is slightly longer all around but not excessively so. The difficulty boost is slight but noticeable.
The nicest surprise that you'll run into is dropped item sets. Yup, even lowly KR has its own item set now, the "Trainee" set. This is a set where 2 pcs give you +health, 3 +magicka, 4 +stamina and 5 + approximately 3 times as much of all 3. The drops also seem to favor the training trait (+xp from kills) although not all of them will have that trait.
When I say "drop" I don't actually mean that since I haven't gotten one from a random mob. Many of the quest rewards still give you the same item as before except now that item is also part of the Trainee set. The other source is from lockpicking chests: advanced and master chests seem to always have one piece of Trainee + other stuff and I also got one from an Intermediate. They come at you pretty fast so it's not hard to get a 5-piece set as long as you're willing to mix and match armor types.
One item that I got from a KR chest that I'll put in the odd column was the Stormhaven Treasure Map IV !? Hey we can go anywhere... but I think I'll just skip going there for now
Treasure maps for your general vicinity IMO, would still be more appropriate.
Another noticeable thing is that XP is slightly accelerated and not just due to the few armor pieces with the training trait I managed to grab. I know this area and level range well since I make a lot of alts to go and play in the 10-49 PVP campaign here. I normally leave KR @ level 7 but this time I just got to Mistral, haven't even started the quests there and I'm already almost level 8. I think I'll easily be level 9, maybe even 10 before leaving the island.
There's also a new addition to the default UI. When you hover over a weapon, piece of armor or jewelry you'll get a green or red update to the appropriate values on the left of the screen next to your equipped items with the increase or decrease to stats like stamina, %crit, weapon damage, etc... a nice addition.
That's all for now... I'll add more later.
I chose to play as Redgard Stamina Sorcerer since that's a build I've been playing a lot lately so it's easy for to compare the experience with my CP300 stamsorc. Once I get past the first Island I'll be heading to new Craglorn and I'll probably also take my higher level stamsorc there to see how different they feel.
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1. Coldharbour tutorial
First thing I noticed was that this area is also CP160 bolstered. Your health, stamina and magicka attributes will all be in the 15k - 20k range right off the bat. And the mobs are also all CP160. The other thing you'll notice right away is that these mobs no longer display a level. This is a change everywhere and since all mobs are now CP160 it'd be meaningless and redundant to display their level.
The first few fights here are slightly tougher than before: the time to kill (TTK) is a bit longer and you can run out of resources easier. Not hard by any means but you do have to pay attention a bit more.
I also got a blue 2-HD hammer drop here with the sharpened trait... not bad at all. This is the first blue drop I've ever seen in the tutorial. I was thinking of training DW first but that hammer sealed the deal - 2HD as my first weapon it is.
Once you finish the tutorial you'll end up in the starter zone of your chosen alliance. I picked AD so it was Khenarthi's Roost for me. I was level 4 when I left - slightly higher than before since I'm used to leveling to 4 just after this when talking to the Prophet.
2. Khenarthi's Roost.
Once again the CP160 TTK is slightly longer all around but not excessively so. The difficulty boost is slight but noticeable.
The nicest surprise that you'll run into is dropped item sets. Yup, even lowly KR has its own item set now, the "Trainee" set. This is a set where 2 pcs give you +health, 3 +magicka, 4 +stamina and 5 + approximately 3 times as much of all 3. The drops also seem to favor the training trait (+xp from kills) although not all of them will have that trait.
When I say "drop" I don't actually mean that since I haven't gotten one from a random mob. Many of the quest rewards still give you the same item as before except now that item is also part of the Trainee set. The other source is from lockpicking chests: advanced and master chests seem to always have one piece of Trainee + other stuff and I also got one from an Intermediate. They come at you pretty fast so it's not hard to get a 5-piece set as long as you're willing to mix and match armor types.
One item that I got from a KR chest that I'll put in the odd column was the Stormhaven Treasure Map IV !? Hey we can go anywhere... but I think I'll just skip going there for now
Treasure maps for your general vicinity IMO, would still be more appropriate.Another noticeable thing is that XP is slightly accelerated and not just due to the few armor pieces with the training trait I managed to grab. I know this area and level range well since I make a lot of alts to go and play in the 10-49 PVP campaign here. I normally leave KR @ level 7 but this time I just got to Mistral, haven't even started the quests there and I'm already almost level 8. I think I'll easily be level 9, maybe even 10 before leaving the island.
There's also a new addition to the default UI. When you hover over a weapon, piece of armor or jewelry you'll get a green or red update to the appropriate values on the left of the screen next to your equipped items with the increase or decrease to stats like stamina, %crit, weapon damage, etc... a nice addition.
That's all for now... I'll add more later.
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“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Post edited by Iselin on
Comments
3. Dude, where's my "go anywhere?"
So it was level 9 out of KR and out to Auridon after all. So off to Craglorn I'll go after a quick visit to the Mage's and Fighter's guild as well as the Undaunted to enable those skill lines. But wait... I don't have access to any Craglorn wayshrine nor to any Grahtwood one so I can go to Elden Root and talk to the Craglorn NPC... wtf?
So after looking around and asking in chat ("What you want to go there for? Come to the VG wayshrine and duel like everyone else"
So a quick post in the ESO forums and someone pointed out to me that there is a new type of NPC (and yes they're marked on the map, doh) called "navigators." The ones in Vulkel Guard are by the docks and have ship anchor icons. You can choose to go to other places within your alliance or to the other aliiances... nice! I like the way they implemented this with in-game NPCs... now that I know about it, that is.
The navigator helpfully sent me right to Elden Root in Grahtwood within hailing distance of the Craglorn travel NPC. So off to "new and improved" Craglorn finally.
(Note: something I forgot to mention that's another welcome addition. Since you're bolstered to CP160 everywhere there is only one type of soul gem that drops everywhere now - the max level revive anyone Grand variety... good bye multiple stacks of soul gems in my banks and micromanaging that.)
4. Craglorn as a level 9 - first impressions.
Haven't done much there yet other than start the first couple of quests. However one of those already took me into a delve complete with and end-of-delve miniboss and skyshard to get. Now anyone who has gone to Craglorn on live with a 50+ character and gone into a delve will know that the delves there are no laughing matter especially if you're solo. Forget all that. This is the new normalized for solo-play Craglorn.
Even with a level 9 character with 5 abilities, no CP and mix and match dropped gear (I'm not crafting myself anything for this playthrough) I had no problem whatsoever doing the whole delve including one of those giant burrowing armadillo-snake cross monsters as the delve boss. I never even had to toggle-on my Overload ultimate. I might as well have been doing an Auridon delve. Sure, the mini-boss fight was longish but in no way was it too much for a level 9. The bolstering seems to be working so far.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
I'll withhold final judgement until I try it, but from what I've read, I'm not feeling like I'll be a fan.
Enjoyed the read though, and looking forward to more of your posts detailing your experiences!
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
The world is going to the dogs, which is just how I planned it!
I also remember reading a comment made by Rich Lambert that the low level characters would be getting a bit extra bolstering in One Tamriel over what they currently get on the live server. That may very well be what I'm seeing with my lowbee on the PTS.
This makes sense to me since if I can be skeptical, as I was, about low level characters being able to handle the content while they fill-out their skills and gear-up, I'm sure the developers who do this for a living had those thoughts way ahead of me. An extra bit of scaling up for them would be one solution.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Public Dungeons are something I've gotten used to soloing when no one else is there. And I always go for the "group challenge" in them for the 1 skill point reward. I have soloed all those group challenges except the one in Wrothgar which is virtually impossible to do solo.
So I was curious to see if I could do it still with the new mechanics.
I use that magicka sorcerer for healing 4-man dungeons so my set-up is Destro/Resto. When I'm soloing I only keep 1 or 2 healing skills in the resto bar and use it for AOE with my root and liquid lightning while keeping my Destro bar single target.
So I gave the this group challenge that consists of 2 waves of mobs, skeletons first and then ghosts, before the boss appears, a shot. I managed to pull it off solo but just barely. It was very hectic and I had to use healing abilities and shield bubbles to a far greater extent than I've ever had to. I think I only managed to do it because my magicka regen is exceptional on this character. The fight took a good 5 minutes or so to complete.
So yes, the bosses in public dungeons are definitely tougher. I think I'll go hunting for a world boss in one of these old zones next and see what happens.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
5. Yes Virginia, there is variable bolstering
It took me a while to figure this one out although the evidence was right in front of me all along on the "Battle Leveling Boost" tool-tip. I did glance at it at one point but it's mostly full of place holder values such as "Increases Maximum Stamina by X" where it literally says "X."
But there are a couple of values that are filled-in: "Increases Maximum Health by __" and "Increases Damage Against Monsters by __ %" I first noticed that the increased damage against monsters was 70% at level 10 and then I saw it go down 61% at level 13. So I checked a couple of other of my characters that were transferred to the PTS and created another new one to see where it starts.
A brand new level 1 character gets a 97% boost in damage against monsters, a level 26 character has this value at 22% and the values is 0% on a level 34 character.
So there you have it. The method they chose to make sure that low level characters could handle going anywhere is level-dependent, variable bolsters. Pretty simple solution.
I also have to say that without peeking at the tooltip all you really know is that you can handle fights, be they on the overworld, delves, dolmens, etc. with approximately the same degree of difficulty as you level up.
This does take away somewhat from the traditional vertical progression feeling of being more powerful and being able to take on tougher challenges. But the unlocking better abilities progression is still very much there as you level. As to tougher challenges, public dungeons, dolmens, group dungeons, world bosses, etc. are there.
6. Those zone-specific Item sets... they're everywhere!
I already mentioned above the new "Trainee" set that drops in the starter island. Doing a bit of running around in Auridon showed me that there are 3 Auridon-specific sets that you get from chests, mob drops and quest rewards. This is a great thing especially for non-crafters or those new to the game and still crafting-challenged (it does take a while to be able to make some of those sets that are unavailable unless you have 4, 5, 6 or more traits researched.)
These drops come at you fast and furious, and some have very interesting 5-piece bonuses:
As with the KR Trainee set, a lot of quest rewards in Auridon have had their same old rewards changed to be part of those sets intelligently: if you get a staff as a reward, you can bet It'll be part of the Elegant set and so on.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Why would i want to go through the same boring grind. Imo they should of waited till they had a new area to introduce within each faction along with housing or something.
I think this is more for the console players who many haven't played another faction to level 50.
Using the Elegance set I mentioned above that a lot of Overload Sorcs like to use, currently the end game version of those are raid drops only and top-out at CP150. If you want that after One Tamriel goes live you can get a full CP160 set grinding in Auridon.
That's just one example.
Edit: Oh and BTW, a lot of the set pieces that only used to come as armor pieces now also have weapons and jewelry in the set... getting two full 5-piece sets will be pretty easy now.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
I feel like I just came down with autism.
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What they're doing is making sure brand new players are not totally gimped when forced to do all their leveling going against CP160 mobs.
Every time you level you get at least 1 skill point to spend and points to add to your stats. Both of those things make you a lot more than 3% extra capable of killing mobs, and 3% extra damage against mobs is what you lose from that newbie bolster per level until it becomes 0% at level 34.
Instead of doing it this way they could have done all kinds of other things, like an across the board nerf to all mobs everywhere to make sure the low level players could handle them... and that would have gone over like a lead balloon.
With this method all mobs everywhere actually got buffed, not nerfed... and the lowbees can still handle it.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
This is something that will get old fast for me. I PVP in Cyrodiil a lot so accepting random duel invites is not exactly what I want to do when I'm in PVE land... luckily there's an auto-decline toggle.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
I don't have any high cp characters, but I am hoping that the duelling system will help me understand pvp in eso more since the fighting mechanics have never really "clicked" for me, unlike in other games. If I can get more intimate control of my character and a grasp of counter play it will probably make the game much more enjoyable.
For anyone unfamiliar with ESO crafting you basically learn nothing from deconstructing items that are trivial or for items that are to complex. Maybe new players will have to use alts if (when) they need more "level appropriate items" to deconstruct.
And will there be an on the daily crafting quests. Will lower level characters be able to level Provisioning to 40-ish say enabling them to hand in a higher level daily?
They did add one specific dueling arena somewhere. I haven't been there but I read it's somewhere near the Wayrest Sewers entrance. So they are trying to encourage people to go do it there and not bother random strangers. But on the PTS, as I suspect will be the case when it goes live, wayshrines in busy towns seems to be the preferred spot.
As you say, used as a way for practicing and getting better at 1v1 fights, or for training and teaching in a PVP guild it can be a very good tool. But in my experience from playing other games that have it, the main use seems to be randomly challenging strangers in busy spots.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
With the huge number of new sets and their increased drop rates there will probably be a pretty brisk new market selling and trading those pieces for the sets that become the most sought after... as well as grinders going after dolmens, delve, public dungeon and world bosses and swooping down on chest locations in areas where those preferred sets drop.
I don't think all these new sets will have much of an impact on leveling crafting (except maybe more reluctance to decon something if it's a set piece) but grinding patterns will definitely change since you can now grind anywhere for full XP AND get a chance at dropped sets for those areas.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
There is also the point about materials nodes will yield stuff equivalent to your craft level (50%) or your level (50%). So potentially lots of iron and lots of rubedite ....... or will it be voidstone in the original areas? Basedon the comments about sets I suspect rubedite - especially as the Gold version will essentially be the new base.
If - as seems to be the case - drops are going to be level based and nodes are going to be 50/50 level or craft skill based it could make it interesting for new crafters gaining skill beyond iron. (Still be able to gain skill of course but will probably mean a lot of node harvesting).
Also, the main reason I used that character was to see what kind of chest drops I would get from the couple of CE maps I have lying around as well as treasure maps I got with lower level characters... you get CP160 gear from both if you open the chest with a CP160 character. So save those maps for now until this goes live
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED