UESP Report on ESO from PAX East

[Daveh]

Well that's slightly disappointing. (However the talk of fine tuning the system does give me some hope that we might see something better.)

As an invulnerable 'ghost' I assume you couldn't attack anyone or anything. Would be kinda game breaking, particularly in the middle of a battle

Yes, as a "ghost" you could just move around from what I remember (only died once and watched others die a bunch). While these options for death seem fine for me what sort of system would you prefer?

[Velvet LeChance]

I was hoping for something perhaps a tad harsher. Slightly larger XP drop (you lose all XP points that you've gained at that current level though you can't drop below the level you are on.) and the loss of your equipped weapons and armour (if someone loots your body before it vanishes.) Make people fear death.

Of course I'm a realist and hadn't been expecting much more than a slight drop in XP and off you go again. Still slightly disappointed though.

EDIT: On the ghost thing I can see waves of ghosts running around in the middle of a battle getting annoying, especially if they stay in ghost mode for 10-20 seconds. Though I wont complain until I actually play the game. And even then I probably won't complain as I don't ever expect to be leaving Valenwoods jungles. Ever.

[Daveh]

I was hoping for something perhaps a tad harsher. Slightly larger XP drop (you lose all XP points that you've gained at that current level though you can't drop below the level you are on.) and the loss of your equipped weapons and armour (if someone loots your body before it vanishes.) Make people fear death.

Of course I'm a realist and hadn't been expecting much more than a slight drop in XP and off you go again. Still slightly disappointed though.

EDIT: On the ghost thing I can see waves of ghosts running around in the middle of a battle getting annoying, especially if they stay in ghost mode for 10-20 seconds. Though I wont complain until I actually play the game. And even then I probably won't complain as I don't ever expect to be leaving Valenwoods jungles. Ever.

I would guess that the ghost form details and the amount of XP loss would be one of those things easily changed in beta. If ESO is like other MMOs the XP lost could also be level dependant, i.e. you lose more XP at higher levels.

I haven't played many MMOs recently other than Everquest but I'm guessing that the death penalty in the "typical" MMO is relatively less harsh that it was years ago. I know Everquest dramatically made the death penalty much less harsh in the past 5 years or so. We went from losing all equipment/gold on the corpse and respawning at our bind point requiring a naked corpse retrieval run which would often result in a few more deaths. If you didn't get a resurrection within 3 hours you would lose around 20% of a level per death with the possibility of de-levelling.

They then changed it over the course of a few years to not losing any equipment/gold and adding very cheap corpse summoners which makes death merely a minor inconvenience. I have mixed feelings about this: it does make it much easier and less of a headache to return to playing the game after death but on the other hand dying has no real point or fear to it as you mention. I would assume there is a good balance to find between the two extremes for ESO. IMHO they made death far too easy to recover from in Everquest but I'm sure you could find someone who thought the opposite too.

[Avron the S'wit]

I personally think death in any form is a major inconvenience more so than something to be feared, in almost any MMO I've played. When you're playing online with lots of PVP and even people who don't play by the rules (griefers), dying is inevitable. The key is to balance something that ends the flow of your playtime with something that won't discourage casual gamers away from wanting to participate: having something that's very harsh is likely to do that. It's hard to find those checks and balances, but I think the death penalty as presented right now is pretty fair.

[AngryNord]

How are the styles of weapons/armour? Similar to Skyrim, or completely re-done (again...)? It has already been said medium armour will be in, will we also be able to wear clothes underneath armour, like in Morrowind?




(MODs are free to move this post to another thread if deemed to be more fitting there, or even make it a separate thread)

[Jeancey]

AngryNord, each race has its own style of armor, so Iron Armor made by an Orc will look different from Iron Armor made by a khajiit. Other than that, there is Light, Medium and Heavy armor, and for weapons there are Two handed, One handed with shield, dual wield, Bow, Destruction Staff and restoration staff skill lines. Those aren't the specific weapon types though, so no word on that. Spears and Polearms are not in the game however.

[AddictedtoMorrowind]

Spears and Polearms are not in the game however.

I HATE YOU DEVELOPERS

[Jeancey]

hahaha, you never know, they could add them later. The whole "melee at a distance" thing is pretty iffy in most modern games.

[Daveh]

How are the styles of weapons/armour? Similar to Skyrim, or completely re-done (again...)? It has already been said medium armour will be in, will we also be able to wear clothes underneath armour, like in Morrowind?

Jeancey answered it better than I could...the character models do look pretty though. There is also a costume slot that you can equip disguises and assumably other apparel to change your overall appearance although I don't believe anyone has actually seen or play tested this feature yet.

[Jeancey]

Daveh, I believe one of the press event people mentioned that he had to fight very tough enemies at level 2, only to be told later that he was supposed to equip a disguise and "007 his way through". I'm not sure if any of the other press event people completed the same quest, but there might be something in one of them to shed some light on this.

[Merix]

Did you feel like the number of useable skills was enough?

[Jeancey]

While I am not Daveh, I want to mention that many issues I have heard of from other MMOs is that there are so many skills, everyone is always using the same skills, and the game doesn't feel all that interesting. By limiting skills to only 5 or 6 (out of, I believe it was calculated to be 50 or 60 possible skills), this makes each player much more unique in terms of what attacks they are using. Admittedly, there are likely to be skills that everyone must use because they are better than others, but I think the limit is a wonderful idea, as it allows each person to play exactly how they want, rather than how they must in order to compete.

[AngryNord]

AngryNord, each race has its own style of armor, so Iron Armor made by an Orc will look different from Iron Armor made by a khajiit. Other than that, there is Light, Medium and Heavy armor, and for weapons there are Two handed, One handed with shield, dual wield, Bow, Destruction Staff and restoration staff skill lines. Those aren't the specific weapon types though, so no word on that. Spears and Polearms are not in the game however.

Well not such a bad idea, might be nice if the races had some armour that was unique to each race, too... Shame about the no spears :-/
Did anyone check whether it'll be possible to wear clothes underneath armour/robes like in Morrowind, or if it is only one at a time like Oblivion and Skyrim?

[Jeancey]

Given how MMOs generally work (with limited slot-based equipment), I don't think that there will be clothes completely separate from armor. However, WoW does have the ability to wear a shirt under the armor, so it isn't unheard of. We will likely have to wait and see, but at the very least, you are going to be able to wear normal clothes. We just don't know yet if they take the place of your armor, or if they are separate.

[Daveh]

Did you feel like the number of useable skills was enough?

I didn't really play anywhere near enough to see this...it would take a while and you need to get to level 50 to see how balanced it was throughout. The system at first glance does look interesting especially when considering that as you use the 50 skills you level each of them up which opens up some sort of skill tree for you to customize the skill as desired. It will be interesting to see exactly what these skill trees are. I haven't even seen any complete listing of all skills/spells/abilities in ESO yet.

[scribbane]

Do you think the game seems to be user friendly enough for people to get into it, despite having very minimal MMO experience? I know that's a tough question to answer since you have MMO experience. I definitely want to get the game, so I'm just curious as to your thoughts on an MMO newb and ES vet learning to play the game.

Edit: Reworded because I thought my grammar was subpar.

[Jeancey]

Again, I didn't get to go to PAXEast, but all of the reports I have read say that it feels like an elder scrolls game. The overall impression was the same, for one of them at least, as the first time they played Skyrim.

[scribbane]

I think what I'm trying to get at, and maybe you've answered my question already, is something along these lines:

People are saying that TES:O is like Skyrim online, but there are still major differences in gameplay, mechanics, UI, etc between an RPG and an MMORPG. Does the "Skyrim feel" translate so well, that someone with less than 2 hours of MMO gameplay can readily adapt to the differences?

My question comes from my own inexperience with MMO's as well as Dave's post because of things like:

The available characters were one of 4 of the standard prototypes (warrior, mage, thief, cleric) and started at level 5.

the basic controls and game play should be familiar to anyone who has played a RPG/MMO in the past few years.

You have 5 hot buttons you can assign to a variety of spell and combat abilities.

I don't expect a full tutorial on MMO's since I could look that up myself, but these confused me just a little. The concept of standard prototypes I understand, but do you not get to pick your skills? Is picking a class in TES:O like picking a class in any other MMO, like picking a class in Morrowind, or like Skyrim where there are no classes? I didn't realize that RPG's and MMO's had similar control schemes. Are hot buttons the same as hotkeys, or is it like other MMO's I've seen, where all your attacks are bound to a number and not mouse driven like Skyrim.

I hope that my question is clear, since I know I seem to be all over the place with what I'm talking about.

[Jeancey]

I think that the available characters to play at PAX were premade, and started at level 2, because the starting zone isn't ready yet. I'm not 100% on that. However when the game is launched, you pick a class, all your class determines is your three class lines, and your starting weapons. You could be a thief (nightblade) who tanks, or a warrior (dragonknight) who heals. There is nothing stopping you from doing that. So it is somewhere in between. You get a class, but you are not restricted to that class, you don't even have to use your class skills at all if you don't want to.

[Daveh]

Do you think the game seems to be user friendly enough for people to get into it, despite having very minimal MMO experience? I know that's a tough question to answer since you have MMO experience. I definitely want to get the game, so I'm just curious as to your thoughts on an MMO newb and ES vet learning to play the game.

I watched several definite gaming newbies play the game and with just a few basic pointers from people they were doing fine. Combat is similar to Skyrim where you can flail your weapons around without much effort and have a good chance of winning combat against single weak enemies. Higher level mobs and mobs in groups will definitely take some more skill as was evidenced by watching people die repeatedly.

When I say "it feels like Skyrim" that is a very general statement. Obviously there is significant game play differences but the general feel of moving around, exploring and hitting things is very Skyrim-esque. Particularly with exploring there appears to be many interesting things to divert your attention as you explore, just like in Oblivion/Skyrim.