Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Summerset Review - Elder Scrolls Online Columns
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Summerset Review - Elder Scrolls Online Columns
Last year’s Morrowind chapter put Elder Scrolls Online on a whole new level. I was already a fan, but that expansion cemented the MMO as my go-to game in what’s available today. I approached Summerset with trepidation, because the setting and story didn’t have the same draw as that mythical return to 2002’s Vvardenfell. I’m happy to report that Summerset is an even better experience than Morrowind.
Comments
The problem with level scaling is there's no real direction, when there's a set level for each zone, you kind of get a general idea of how to progress.
You can literally do it in any way you want. The bonus of doing Tamriel Unlimited (pre-expansion) first is that you can get more Skyshards. But if it were me, I'd do Morrowind, then Clockwork City, then Summerset. And then go do the base game and Orsinium too.
Try to be excellent to everyone you meet. You never know what someone else has seen or endured.
My Review Manifesto
Follow me on Twitter if you dare.
You can see my sci-fi/WW2 book recommendations.
I started off playing the original content, and you can if you want, but I later switched it up after I unlocked Morrowind with preorder of Summerset. The order I played my new character was Morrowind-Clockwork City-Summerset. You get a general idea of what's going on in and the story fills in the gaps if you go through all the dialog options. If you start a new character you will start in Summerset, but again you won't necessarily be lost of you talk to the NPC.
Those of us who have been playing since 2014 did it that way because we had no choice: the 3 alliances were separate and the zones were level gated so you had to do it that way. And when the DLC started to get added we played those in order too because, once again, we had no option.
The original story culminated in the Imperial City DLC which was the end of the Molag Bal plane meld story. Starting with the Orsinium DLC you started to become aware of a new daedric threat and each story DLC advanced that story - some just a bit and some a whole lot with the Clockwork City and Summerset being the two meatiest DLCs that are all about that new story.
But if you do want to go back to the beginning, each alliance's main story quest in each zone does finish with a breadcrumb quest that sends you to the proper next zone where the story continues. If you start it by doing the old Colharbour tutorial, the end of that will send you to the right spot to get your alliance's story line started. You just follow the breadcrumbs from there.
Having said that, each zone is self contained and if you do them out of order, there are plenty of conversation options along the way that are there specifically to bring you up to date in case you did it out of order or just forgot. You don't need to do them in order although it is more interesting if you meet some of the many recurring characters at the proper time in the right context - and Summerset has many of those returning NPCs in both the main and side quests.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
"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
Sure it's early and the prices will come down but they won't come down all that much since the real problem is that you need 10X the upgrade mats each step of the way: to make something green, blue, purple and gold.
Leveling the skill line and trait research are not much of an issue. I have JC already at 50 mostly through ruthlessly deconstructing every single piece of post-Summerset jewelry I got from drops (I do need at least a 2 month break from dolmen grinding though
I've also harvested a lot of seams and refined those. You could say that I've played a lot since the Summerset launch and that I've focused on jewelry crafting a lot more than the average player.
And what can I make after all that? I have enough upgrade tempers to make 2 rings green at 100% success rate, enough to take one of those 2 to blue, about a third of what I would need to make 1 ring purple and no gold platings whatsoever - I have 6 grains and need 4 more to have my first gold plating. Making 1 item gold requires 8 platings after leveling your passives, BTW.
So if you're a casual player with an idea that you won't sweat it, harvest your own mats and craft yourself a set of 3 gold jewelry whenever just be aware that this "whenever" is likely to be give or take, about 18 months... say January 2020 to be on the safe side.
Welcome to jewelry crafting!
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Making jc require literally 10X the grind for those all-important upgrade mats just brings this to an insane level. The only sane thing to do under the circumstances is pretend that they did not add jc to the game at all - the implementation is that idiotic.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Because it's guaranteed. You can grind out your ears in an Asian game and there's still a 40+% chance you will fail and your weapon will break and you will have to start all over.
ESO is not forgiving in that respect, but it sure as hell isn't as bad as the RNG systems.
Is a man not entitled to the herp of his derp?
Remember, I live in a world where juggalos and yugioh players are real things.
I'm not an IT Specialist, Game Developer, or Clairvoyant in real life, but like others on here, I play one on the internet.
Haha. What progression. There is no progression it is all level scaled then a meaningless grind for your points. There is no depth in the persistent world at all. It is an irrelevant backdrop. Go to the fearsome forest of wherever to face the perilous beast of the area... forget it. There fearsomeness is just a formula based on your level as are most mat drops. The world of ESO is pretty and boring and for the most part it matters not where you are.
My brother in law and I every week for our guild night choose a location and then just explore the area and we generally stumble upon new things we haven't seen before. I have been playing since Beta and I am only CP 375 (gives an idea how casual I am), but I do make time for for all of the content besides any of the trials at this point. One day I'll join a guild that is involved with more of the group content.
I don't know why you think crafting is tied to the cash shop. I've maxed out crafting in alchemy, provisioning, and blacksmithing and I'm near max level in clothier; I've never used the cash shop. I'm not playing ESO currently, so I have no opinion on JC.
That’s because the people who play this trash game have no idea what an MMO should be. ESO is by far the absolute worst MMO out there, and ZoS is a terrible company that puts out garbage content that’s overpriced and the idiots just eat it up because... “zomg, it’s ESO!” I regretted purchasing Morrowind not even an hour into it because it was so void of meaningful content for an “expansion.” And then ZoS one ups themselves and released another expansion (Summerset) with even less content and still charges a premium for it. A new map that really offers nothing besides a time sink doing quests in an MMO (because people play MMOs for the quests, duh!) a new skill line (whoopdedoo!) and a new crafting category that shouldn’t be a main feature of any expansion. As a matter of fact, none of the features of Summerset would be primary features in any other MMO, it’d just be additional small filler content. But nope, the main features of ESO expansions are so minuscule to be called main features of a full priced box expansion that it’s downright laughable. Why people give this terrible company money is beyond me, other than they’re ignorant suckers.
Is this a joke? Meaningful progression in their “expansions?” There’s barely any progression whatsoever. Grind out CP that barely has an impact on your character per level. What’s the CP cap at these days, over 700? What is this game supposed to be an ARPG like diablo 3? There’s absolutely nothing this game does better than any other game. In fact, it does everything worse than most MMOs out there. The combat is absolutely terrible, worse than tab target combat, and it’s supposed to be exciting as it’s “action” combat. This game is garbage and it belongs in a trash can. But unfortunately, dumb people who give ZoS money every time they release some over priced garbage content will ensure they continue to do the same thing for years to come.
The good:
Some beautiful areas/art, nice to see Raz again, jewlery crafting plus transmutation potentially opens up an incredibly diverse range of builds, the new skill line also adds more to play around with.
The bad:
Terrible implementation of jewelry crafting. First it requires far too many resources; its a hard slog to even just get enough materials for a trait, let alone improving a ring to something useful. I also dislike how the new traits are found. You have to do specific activities to get certain traits, which can be exceedingly boring.
Psijic quest line. Ridiculous grind and boring. Basically you just have to run around the map finding nodes for hours on end. There is no interesting gameplay mechanic, its just a mindless chore. And the way it is presented is so lame its almost funny: you finish finding the nodes in one area, then go back to hand in the quest, only to be sent to another area to do the same thing- rinse and repeat about 10 times!
Abyssal Geysers. Dolmens by the sea. At least Molag Bal had some character, the baddie that spawns these things sounds ridiculous. These are not bad per se, just more of the same. Like the review says, these were a missed opportunity to introduce a new and interesting game mechanic.
More powerful gear locked behind pve grind. This is a major negative for me because I only play ESO for the RvR.
Unfortunately (for me) ESO is locking more and more gear/skill lines behind activities that I don't enjoy, which is really making me look forward to CU and Crowfall, although I suspect I might end up like that Bless streamer when they eventually release
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
But I did just hit another pve wall: I just finished levelling my templar healer and hopped on my crafter to make a set of Kagrenac's Hope only to find I need to finish the entire Fighters guild quest line to access it. Wouldn't be that big of a problem except my crafter has no combat skills, haha.
That Oblivion damage that can't be mitigated and has a 10% proc chance on any damage to apply the dot is insane. But as OP'd as it is, it's nice that a crafted set for once is getting all the nerf hate.
It's also so nice to finally be able to do 5-5-2 on staff users.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Anyway, I just saw that ESO will have two more DLCs later this year. I just can't keep up. There are too many. I'm already five behind with the release of Summerset. Still working my way through Orsinium. How do you deal with the excess of DLCs for ESO? It's just way too much content to buy and consume. At least I am current with Guild Wars 2, Stellaris and Crusader Kings 2. Looking at jumping back into World of Warcraft as all the expansions are included and I would just have to buy BfA. Thoughts?
not enough content for a full price expansion.