While questing behind enemy lines I came across a city with a river, where some rebels were fighting the Imperials. Anyway, while I was doing some quests there I saw someone from a rival faction run up to the quest giver. I followed him around to the NPCs he had to talk to, then to the imperial guards he had to fight. After the guards had broken his initial attack and started to hurt him a little bit, I emerged and let my blades tear him apart, only to disappear into the shadows seconds later.

Yes, this is a cheap way to get kills. But, not really that cheap. I knew the dangers of questing in Cyrodiil, that's why I saw him and he didn't see me. I really like the vulnerability that Cyrodiil introduces. The harshness, the brutality of war. Running around Cyrodiil reminds me of games like DayZ or Planetside2, the world doesn't revolve around you, or your faction, it's a living breathing world that cares not weather you live or die, weather you get a fair fight or get ambushed doing quests. The lumber mills keep cutting, the farms keep farming.

I don't think I would have purchased this game without Cyrodiil being like it is.

Bang bang, you shot him down

Did you catch him with your girlfriend?

Exactly what PvP servers are like in other popular MMORPGs.

I'm glad you liked it; hopefully PvEers who are normally too skeptical of open world PvP find the experience as thrilling as you did!

First decent world PvP experiences tend to stick with people for a long time. Still remember my first couple times out to the frontiers in DAoC, didn't take long to get hooked.

OP +1

I was always confused when people who enjoy PvE said they wouldn't bother with Cyrodiil. To me the other players just introduce another layer of difficulty. Having to avoid them while going about your quests makes things 10 times more interesting in my eyes. Of course, on paper it sounds bad to have PvE quests in a PVP area, but with the sneaking mechanic the way it is, it's not really an issue if you're smart about it.

yep thats what makes cyrodiil so cool.

I had the same encounter and almost killed the other person. But i died first. Shame on me for not reacting quicker.

Anyway, it reminded me a lot of WARHAMMER PvP which i enjoyed a LOT. And the PvP in Cyyrodil is great from what i have witnessed. Massive scale stronghold sieges and lots of people running around. Yes i like both PvE and PvP so i will have no issues enjoying this game.

Well, i hate being ganked and i hate people who do it, but at least in this game you have a chance to resist and an attack is always a risk for the attacker, too.

Not like in other MMOs where a 30lvl-higher-than-you one hits and corpse-camps you.

Same experience as OP here.

Except I've been jumped as I was trying to find out if a one eyed NPC just did blink or wink.

There's not much time to get lost in your thoughts there.

long live eve online... brothers in arms...

long live Goon Swarm

Yeaaaahhh... no.

PvE server for me thank you very much... had more than enough of my fair share of rogues ganking and corpse camping.

The key to PvEing (and ganking for that matter) in Cyrodiil is to sneak sneak sneak. Sneak everywhere if you feel unsafe. If you're standing still, sneak.

^ This

Up to level 10 I didn't sneak once. The NPCs are blind, I would just use my 2.5s invisibility if I needed to hide. But, my first experience in Cyrodiil was tagging along with and then being invited into a 4 man group. When I rode up to them on my horse they were sneaking, so I decided I should do the same. We ended up outside another factions keep picking off stragglers for over an hour before we all ended up dead.(Mostly due to a non-group member drawing too much attention.) I learned so much about the sneaking system, it's amazing how effective it is when used cautiously, especially when combined with the nightblades invisibility skill. In the city in my OP I literally had people walk right past me, if you time the invisibility just right, you'll never get spotted unless they're deliberately looking for you.

You make i sound like pvp is almost important..i would have most definitely purchased ESO without Cyrodil ever added..

Hah last evening I had a blast. I was doing some commando moves paired with 1 of the guild members.

1) I was stealthing with another player near the ADs army path towards one of our (DC) keeps. We've noticed that some guy is straggling, so we wanted to jump on him and kill him. It did not go as planned as I suddenly got a huge lag spike that resulted in 30-40s delay. Needless to say, my partner was killed as there was not enough dmg to burst the target quickly and some other guys joined that damned elf and helped him. Since I never broke my stealth due to the lag, they did not know that I am there... and behold, they set up a forward camp... Imagine their suprise that as soon as they've set it up, I put it on fire, destroying 7,2k alliance points of worth item, before they had any use of it. On top of that I managed to kill one guy and run away from the other... I admit that my escape was possible largely due to the lag spikes at that moment, but still it was fun.

others are Classified

Sneak is great when abused, watching the target cursor move to a close line then to a small circle seemed to do a lot more damage, unsure on the numbers but seemed to increase % of damage taken.

It's important for me because a world filled with threatening humans is a world of infinite possibility. A world of AI controlled enemies is only fun for a while.

It's like buying a race car and doing time trial laps on a race track. Eventually you would get bored of it, but if you have access to races against more than just the clock, you'll never get your fill.

We all find ganking lowbies or folks getting beat up by NPCs thrilling kills!

Saw the title, thought it would be a post followed by 'and I liked it, the taste of his cherry chapstick'. Sadly, it was not to be.

No need to be like that

Excellent post, couldn't agree more.

I had a similar experience where I was questing, and checking out some of the towns in Cyrodiil. I noticed some movement ahead of me, and caught a glimpse of the enemy banner above his head. I immediately went into sneak, and worked my way around him until I had a good view of what he was doing. I also made sure he was alone, then I stepped out of the shadows, and introduced him to bow and arrow.

He put up a good fight, but in the end I had the pleasure of siphoning his last bit of life into my own.

I didn't stick around long after that though. Who knows how many friends he has .