elder scrolls online alpha review

[Carrots_macduff]

brought to you by the one and only jesse cox AKA omfgcata


theres no video footage yet, but none the less some very interesting info.

apparently the pvp will be an all inclusive open world type deal, with seperate game modes/types all being played at the same time in the same world, at least thats how i understood it. very much interested to see how that turns out.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Yeah the instancing/sharding aspect is fascinating. Really interested in how that turns out.

Can't say I'm thrilled it's a traditional quester with raids though.

 

[WoW Killer]

Oh sweet. This would be why Jesse was absent in the last TGS podcast. I remember TB stopping himself before saying something like "oh wait, we're not allowed to tell you where he is".

I'll post more when I've watched the video.

 

[Fappy]

That made the game sound a lot more appealing than I thought it would be. Hope it's not as disappointing as GW2 XD

 

[King of Wei]

Well this is sounding surprisingly awesome! I'm loving the inclusion of siege weapons and using tactics like surrounding forts and starving out enemies, ambushing - and probably protecting - supply chains and the like.


I forget though, how much territory is this game going to cover? All of Tamriel of a few specific provinces?

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I forget though, how much territory is this game going to cover? All of Tamriel of a few specific provinces?

Given the regional groupings they've jammed together for those weird alliances, it sounds like all of Tamriel.

 

[IndomitableSam]

At first I was interested in this and looked daily for updates. Then it started to sound boring and run of the mill, so I stopped caring.

Now?

I WANT IT. NOW.

Please don't screw it up, Zenimax.

 

[Fappy]

At first I was interested in this and looked daily for updates. Then it started to sound boring and run of the mill, so I stopped caring.

Now?

I WANT IT. NOW.

Please don't screw it up, Zenimax.

For real. This is super easy to fuck up. It has me terrified.

 

[IndomitableSam]

At first I was interested in this and looked daily for updates. Then it started to sound boring and run of the mill, so I stopped caring.

Now?

I WANT IT. NOW.

Please don't screw it up, Zenimax.

For real. This is super easy to fuck up. It has me terrified.

I will be playing with casual players, 20/25+ if I can. That sounds so awesome.

I also dropped what I was doing (was working while listening) when he said "one massive server". Like, really dropped the papers.

 

[Fappy]

At first I was interested in this and looked daily for updates. Then it started to sound boring and run of the mill, so I stopped caring.

Now?

I WANT IT. NOW.

Please don't screw it up, Zenimax.

For real. This is super easy to fuck up. It has me terrified.

I will be playing with casual players, 20/25+ if I can. That sounds so awesome.

I also dropped what I was doing (was working while listening) when he said "one massive server". Like, really dropped the papers.

Yeah, I hope that little tidbit doesn't cause stability issues or anything. Sounds awesome in theory.

 

[SajuukKhar]

He said "second age"....... SECOND AGE...... ITS SECOND ERA..... ERA

BLARG GARB FARB DARB.

Besides that...... sounds good.

 

[WoW Killer]

Alright a couple of thoughts...

First on the need for simultaneous appeal to MMO fans and TES fans. I agree that is going to be extremely important (and the difficulty of this is probably the main reason the very idea of the game raised so many eyebrows). But I don't think the story emphasis is correct. I don't see TES games as being story driven. There's a lot of lore and back story in there, and each game has some sort of a central plot to go through, but that's not really the focus of the games. TES games are more about the discovery aspect of having this enormous world to explore, and it's in part the relative lack of a guiding story that gives you the freedom to do this. The biggest block on this is level restricted content, which doesn't appear to have been addressed.

Combat sounds quite promising. I like that they're keeping mouse-driven melee. Having hotkeys for spells isn't such a big deal, as even the single player TES games are crying out for this. What I'd be looking for specifically is for the mouse based attacks to be central to the combat regardless of level, rather than being something used primarily in the beginning with the hotkeys taking over at endgame (like in Age of Conan for instance). The biggest question for me is still the class/progression system; I'm still mostly in the dark about that. Jesse mentioned you get a choice on HP/Stamina/Mackica on level up much like Skyrim; is that a hint at non-respeccable progression? That could be a big deal.

 

[Fappy]

Alright a couple of thoughts...

First on the need for simultaneous appeal to MMO fans and TES fans. I agree that is going to be extremely important (and the difficulty of this is probably the main reason the very idea of the game raised so many eyebrows). But I don't think the story emphasis is correct. I don't see TES games as being story driven. There's a lot of lore and back story in there, and each game has some sort of a central plot to go through, but that's not really the focus of the games. TES games are more about the discovery aspect of having this enormous world to explore, and it's in part the relative lack of a guiding story that gives you the freedom to do this. The biggest block on this is level restricted content, which doesn't appear to have been addressed.

I believe they said early on that all provinces are open to pretty much all levels, but that specific areas of those provinces will have different level requirements.

Combat sounds quite promising. I like that they're keeping mouse-driven melee. Having hotkeys for spells isn't such a big deal, as even the single player TES games are crying out for this. What I'd be looking for specifically is for the mouse based attacks to be central to the combat regardless of level, rather than being something used primarily in the beginning with the hotkeys taking over at endgame (like in Age of Conan for instance). The biggest question for me is still the class/progression system; I'm still mostly in the dark about that. Jesse mentioned you get a choice on HP/Stamina/Mackica on level up much like Skyrim; is that a hint at non-respeccable progression? That could be a big deal.

He mentioned that you can respec in the middle of a dungeon, so I assume Health/Stamina/Magicka can be respecced in some way or another.

 

[SajuukKhar]

I wonder if the tree cities of Valenwood will walk?

Though, given as how they fell silent during the Oblivion Crisis, I wouldn't be surprised if the trees stop moving as some sort of defense mechanism/res ponce to the intrusion of Oblivion into the Mundus.

I need to know this, knowing that there is lore out there to be had that I do not possess infuriates me.

 

[Fappy]

I wonder if the tree cities of Valenwood will walk?

Though, given as how they fell silent during the Oblivion Crisis, I wouldn't be surprised if the trees stop moving as some sort of defense mechanism/res ponce to the intrusion of Oblivion into the Mundus.

I need to know this, knowing that there is lore out there to be had that I do not possess infuriates me.

What about the mud/worm/whatever taxis in Blackmarsh? That shit is weird as shit to visualize.

 

[ohnoitsabear]

Okay, based on this, everything sounds awesome (especially the combat and mob AI), except the quests. Based on what little he talked about the quests, they sound too much like new WoW quests, which I'm not a fan of.

Still, I've started actually caring about this again, and I will definitely keep my eye on it.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I wonder if the tree cities of Valenwood will walk?

Though, given as how they fell silent during the Oblivion Crisis, I wouldn't be surprised if the trees stop moving as some sort of defense mechanism/res ponce to the intrusion of Oblivion into the Mundus.

I need to know this, knowing that there is lore out there to be had that I do not possess infuriates me.

Dude, I think you know more about ES Lore at this point than the people who created it in the first place.

 

[SajuukKhar]

What about the mud/worm/whatever taxis in Blackmarsh? That shit is weird as shit to visualize.

I wouldn't be surprised if those also retreated.

I do expect to see silt striders in Morrowind though.

Dude, I think you know more about ES Lore at this point than the people who created it in the first place.

No

Kirkbride knows the most, but hes batshit insane.

And there's plenty of people on the official Bethesda forums, like Lady Nerevar, who know more then I do.

 

[Fappy]

Kirkbride knows the most, but hes batshit insane.

He probably spent too much time reading elder scrolls then!

ZING!

[sub]I'll go sit in the corner now.[/sub]

 

[SajuukKhar]

He probably spent too much time reading elder scrolls then!

ZING!

[sub]I'll go sit in the corner now.[/sub]

No, he doesn't read. He writes.

He hasn't worked for Bethesda officially since Morrowind, though he did some contractual work on Knights of the Nine, but he and Bethesda, are still pals, and they take much of what he writes and puts it into canon because they know he is good.

http://www.imperial-library.info/content/forum-archives-michael-kirkbride

Vehkship: in character fragment:

Belief-engines, properly called the ?Auxiliary Semi-Shockpoint Nilgularity?, provide energy for short dream-sleeve jumps in case a Vehkship?s main ego is damaged, allowing the C0DA Paravant to potentially get to the safety of a voidyard orbital.

By creating the equivalent of an Nu-class Mnemolic, shrinking it instantaneously via a creatia tesseract array, and then projecting the resulting moth-talk well to a nil-point just outside the ego?s hull, an ASSN can slingshot the Paravant into era-streams without the needed energies of nearby aetheric bodies or shockpoint application.

The ASSN is strictly Last Ditch technology, however. It?s often deemed as too dangerous for its own good, because it works on the rarified principles of Phynaster?s Inversion, a set of mathematics that doesn?t exist in our own dimension. Vehkships have vanished in nil-space trying to make an ASSN jump?indeed, the celestial irregularity known as the M4bV Legerity, in which the C0DA Oblivion Vanquisher appears and implodes in perpetuity, is the belief system?s most famous cautionary tale.