Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds



  • This is Dives-From-Danger.

    0_1497386650255_20170613124951_1.jpg

    Wave hello to the nice people, Dives-From-Danger.

    0_1497386668832_20170613124956_1.jpg

    Glow with the holy light of Azura*, Dives-From-Danger.

    0_1497386686618_20170613125016_1.jpg

    (I always wondered why Azura's visual trademark there features only one moon when Nirn has two but... whatever.)

    ... seriously though, let's talk about ESO's new Battlegrounds, which you may have seen being blabbered about during Bethesda's E3 show. Unlike most announcements at E3, Battlegrounds is already released (and has been for a couple weeks) and already firmly sucks.

    You may remember ESO as that somehow good MMO which is run by a horrible company that seems utterly committed to destroying it. Also suing John Carmack. So let's find out how they botched Battlegrounds!

    • The far and away biggest problem is that there's seemingly zero effort made to balance games, either by player level, equipment ranking, or even number of players to a team. The very first Battlegrounds match I played was 2v4v4 (ESO has three factions, so Battlegrounds matches have three teams), and as you can imagine it was an unavoidable curb stomping. But that brings up a question... why does the game have trouble getting three teams of 4 together? That should be easy. Well, because...
    • The UI is amazingly bad. So you enter the queue to play Battlegrounds through a full-screen dialog box similar to the dungeon finger dialog, or the dialog to enter the Cyrodill PvP area.

      0_1497387208453_20170613125031_1.jpg

      Unlike those other two examples, however, this dialog box doesn't change when you're asked to join. In Cyrodill, when you're ready to enter the PvP area, a button pops up on the dialog itself saying so. In Battlegrounds, you only get a small text notification in the middle of the screen. Doesn't sound so bad? Oh, I forgot to mention: the text notification only appears if there's no dialogs open. That means everybody trying out this new feature and expecting it to work like the other two extremely similar features in the game are going to miss numerous game invites and... gee I wonder if that's why the game has trouble getting all 4 teammates in a group?

    • Battlegrounds is available to people who have bought the new Morrowind expansion to the game. Morrowind also has a new class, which means a large proportion of those people will be playing the Morrowind content with a brand new character (like Dives-From-Danger up there). One of the new quests tells those low-level characters (level 15, I believe) that they should try out Battlegrounds. Combine that with point one, the utter lack of any kind of balancing, and you end up with a huge shitshow. The people who want to play Battlegrounds "seriously" are all level 50 with maxed out equipment and skills, and they keep getting matched with these level 15 people with jack shit. Instead of blaming ESO for introducing this situation in the first place, they end up screaming and insulting the poor Joe who just joined Battlegrounds because the game told him to, saying he's a retard and should die and never ever to queue up until he's max level, etc. It seems like they (both the experienced players, and ESO itself) want to ensure every player's first Battlegrounds experience is fucking terrible. (So far their plan is working.)

    • As a result of the above, plus the fact that Battlegrounds by default allows full text chat between teammates (which is something that sounds good on paper, but in practice pre-made chat macros are MUCH better for many reasons), the community is already incredibly toxic. Incredibly. I played something like 8 rounds and used my "ignore" button on something like 11 different players.

    Ugh.


    * Completely unrelated pop culture trivia: Azura in Elder Scrolls Online and Skyrim is voiced by Lynda Carter, yes, the original Wonder Woman.



  • @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    The very first Battlegrounds match I played was 2v4v4

    Did they at least give you 5 extra points per minute because that's better than just having balanced teams or an incentive to play with other people?

    Oh wait, wrong game.


  • :belt_onion:

    @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    * Completely unrelated pop culture trivia: Azura in Elder Scrolls Online and Skyrim is voiced by Lynda Carter, yes, the original Wonder Woman.

    Even more unrelated pop culture trivia: before Wonder Woman, she represented the U.S. in the Miss World pageant, 1972 (made it to the semi-finals, didn't win).


  • area_pol

    @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    The people who want to play Battlegrounds "seriously" are all level 50 with maxed out equipment and skills, and they keep getting matched with these level 15 people with jack shit.

    This kind of PvP mode in PvE game is broken by design.
    The skills / classes are designed and balanced for fighting the mobs/bosses and not players. In a PvP context, some things become useless and some become very strong.
    There was a PvP mode in Diablo 2 mutliplayer, but on higher levels it was always 1 hit kill.



  • @Adynathos said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    This kind of PvP mode in PvE game is broken by design.

    I disagree with that.

    I do agree that PvP and PvE modes should be kept more separate than they (usually) are in MMOs. (Like, your character appearance is the same, but PvP should have its own distinct skillbars and possibly a list of curated equipment to use.)

    @Adynathos said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    The skills / classes are designed and balanced for fighting the mobs/bosses and not players. In a PvP context, some things become useless and some become very strong.

    In ESO, there are actually several skills that aren't very useful in a PvE environment but are very useful in PvP (like Caltrops). So it goes both ways.

    The problem here is, here's ways ESO characters become powerful:

    • Level (not inherently, but through attribute unlocks which track with level)
    • Quality of equipment
    • Skills (amount of unlocked skills, amount of morphed skills -- level 15 characters will be lucky to have all 5 skill slots + ult even full by that point)
    • Champion Points (CP) (work kind of like perks in Skyrim)

    Battlegrounds attempts to make things slightly more fair by removing CPs from the consideration. (CP-unlocked stuff doesn't work in any PvP area in ESO.) It does nothing to account for the other three. There's no way a level 15 person can be competitive against a level 50 person. There's no way a level 50 person can be competitive, really, since the equipment levels max out at CP160, which is something like 50% better than level 50 equipment with no CPs.

    (In fact to geek out a bit, disqualifying CPs actually hurts my character there in PvP because while he's only level 35, he does have the 400+ CPs earned from my other characters. CPs are account-wide. So not only does he have level 35 skills and equipment, but he doesn't have the, for example, health regen bonus he'd get if CPs were allowed in PvP.)

    None of this would be that much of an issue if the game could form battles where everybody's +/- 5 levels of each other, but it can't. I'm pretty sure it doesn't even try.


  • Winner of the 2016 Presidential Election

    @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    The people who want to play Battlegrounds "seriously" are all level 50 with maxed out equipment and skills, and they keep getting matched with these level 15 people with jack shit. Instead of blaming ESO for introducing this situation in the first place, they end up screaming and insulting the poor Joe who just joined Battlegrounds because the game told him to, saying he's a retard and should die and never ever to queue up until he's max level, etc. It seems like they (both the experienced players, and ESO itself) want to ensure every player's first Battlegrounds experience is fucking terrible. (So far their plan is working.)

    Sounds like GTA Online; or any online game for that matter. This is exactly why many people (like me) usually stay away from the online multiplayer parts of a game: If you're not perfect, or bought the game too late, you'll get screamed at by teenagers with too much time on their hands.

    Fortunately, not all GTA Online players are assholes, despite the fact that the whole point of the open world in GTA is being an asshole to random players and NPCs. Some high-level players actually play missions with noobs and do not complain if the noob fucks up.


  • FoxDev

    @asdf said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Fortunately, not all GTA Online players are assholes

    Rockstar's karma system does actually a half decent job of keeping the worst of the assholes away from non asshole players. and it even does so in an almost invisible manner.

    though even so when i play on line it's always in private session with a couple of my friends. I'm still going to get blowed up but at least it was a friend that id it.


  • FoxDev

    @accalia said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Rockstar's karma system does actually a half decent job of keeping the worst of the assholes away from non asshole players. and it even does so in an almost invisible manner.

    If only the same could be said of their anti-hacking measures...


  • FoxDev

    @RaceProUK said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    @accalia said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Rockstar's karma system does actually a half decent job of keeping the worst of the assholes away from non asshole players. and it even does so in an almost invisible manner.

    If only the same could be said of their anti-hacking measures...

    their anti hacking measures attempt to use the same karma system, but...... that one has good days and bad days. it really depends on wether or not the hacker is reported and if the hacker is using a hack package Rockstar has seen and knows how to detect.

    that is also the reason why i play only in private session with friends.


  • Winner of the 2016 Presidential Election

    @accalia said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    though even so when i play on line it's always in private session with a couple of my friends. I'm still going to get blowed up but at least it was a friend that id it.

    Hm… I'm still looking for a team for the heists. *hint* *hint*

    Not tomorrow, though, I'm swamped with work ATM.



  • @accalia said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    @RaceProUK said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    @accalia said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Rockstar's karma system does actually a half decent job of keeping the worst of the assholes away from non asshole players. and it even does so in an almost invisible manner.

    If only the same could be said of their anti-hacking measures...

    their anti hacking measures attempt to use the same karma system, but...... that one has good days and bad days. it really depends on wether or not the hacker is reported and if the hacker is using a hack package Rockstar has seen and knows how to detect.

    that is also the reason why i play only in private session with friends.

    I recall some story about hackers being able to drop items on innocent players that would cause the innocent players to be permanently banned for hacking. It was either GTA V or Dark Souls 3. Maybe both.



  • @asdf said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Sounds like GTA Online; or any online game for that matter.

    Mechwarrior Online has a pretty healthy culture (somehow, despite having VOIP, text chat, and ignoring virtually all player abuse complaints!) I think the more niche a game is, the more likely it is to have a decent culture.

    (Also: GTO is a game where you role play a murder drug dealer criminal, right? Maybe those people are just role playing.)

    Generally-speaking, there's two types of online games:

    1. Those that don't give a shit about culture and friendliness and end up being toxic hellholes of shit
    2. Those that do, and have a chance to not be toxic hellholes of shit

    @asdf said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    despite the fact that the whole point of the open world in GTA is being an asshole to random players and NPCs

    Yeah... right? Why are you so surprised?


  • Winner of the 2016 Presidential Election

    @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Yeah... right? Why are you so surprised?

    I'm actually surprised that the cooperative parts of the online multiplayer are that enjoyable. I've seen worse online games in that regard…

    You just have to make sure you stay away from the open-world part of the game. That's where all those overpowered assholes follow you around. Fortunately, you can skip that part entirely and jump straight to the missions.



  • @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    Mechwarrior Online has a pretty healthy culture (somehow, despite having VOIP, text chat, and ignoring virtually all player abuse complaints!) I think the more niche a game is, the more likely it is to have a decent culture.

    How is MWO nowadays? I stopped playing around when the Clan Invasion was released. Honestly, I felt insulted by the $500 golden Timber Wolf skins. The devs also seem to think that because the game has relatively few 'Mechs, which doesn't bother me that much intrinsically because they are quite highly detailed, it should be extremely grindy because we have to stretch those breadcrumbs out a very long way indeed. I was also quite disappointed with how the dynamic campaign map released, with really long matchmaking times and such.

    But I want to like that game very badly because the core combat part is, somehow, still actually really good. Like, very nearly MechWarrior 2 good. I just got tired of not being able to customize any other 'Mechs than the ones I already had. I believe I got the $40 Founder's pack so I had a headstart. I kinda assumed that the game would peter out after the disappointment that was the long-awaited campaign map launch.



  • @CrazyEyes I won't promise you'll love it, but the new skilltree system changes everything and you owe MWO another try since they've implemented it.

    It's benefited some mechs (My 6 LLas Stalker actually shines now) and has put the damper on others (Kodiak-3s are now as slow and unwieldy as all other 100-tonners. Which I'm not shedding a tear about, since they were so dominating.)

    @CrazyEyes said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    But I want to like that game very badly because the core combat part is, somehow, still actually really good. Like, very nearly MechWarrior 2 good. I just got tired of not being able to customize any other 'Mechs than the ones I already had.

    I don't know which you had, but it's funny that I have a totally different attitude. My issue is they keep creating new mechs instead of spending that same development effort on things like, for example, fixing the game's UI, or making more maps to play on, or fixing that weird bug where the Catapult's missile door shadow isn't attached to the skeleton even though the actual door itself is, that bug always boggles my mind, how the hell.



  • @blakeyrat Wow, you're right. They have been churning out the 'Mechs faster than a Star League factory during the 2700s. Looks like they easily have over 100 now. I guess that solves one of my gripes with the game. I seem to remember when I was playing there were around 12-15.



  • @CrazyEyes Yeah well they can pre-sell mechs and get direct income from them, while nobody pays them jack to fix bugs.

    And I know a lot of people who pre-buy them every time, and frequently mock them about buying JPGs, like Star Citizen idiots.



  • @blakeyrat said in Elder Scrolls Online Battlegrounds:

    JPGs

    Japan-Playing Games?


Log in to reply