» Fri Jan 31, 2014 4:32 pm NEW INFORMATION COMPILATION THREAD
Dervy has been MIA, so I made a new thread with amendments. Parts that are still applicable I have copied and pasted, but all information should be current. I have also removed incorrect, cluttery, and redundant info. Original Dibs go to DERVY
ENGLISH IS NOT MY NATIVE, PLEASE TELL ME WHERE MISTAKES ARE MADE. PLEASE ALSO MESSAGE ME WITH ADDITIONS! I am also ACTIVELY SEARCHING FOR ALL SOURCES, PLEASE BE PATIENT. All this info is hard to collect and find!
Please inform me of incorrect/out of date materials.
NOTE: No additions will be accepted without a link!
AMENDMENT DATE 30.1.2014
Contents
1.0. 鈥?The Environments
2.0. 鈥?The Factions
3.0. 鈥?Guilds
4.0. 鈥?MegaServer
5.0. 鈥?General World PvP
6.0. 鈥?PvP In Cyrodill
7.0 鈥?Combat
7.1. 鈥?Anti-UI Combat Philosophy
7.2. 鈥?Monitoring the Environment and Animation
7.3. 鈥?Tab-Targeting, Soft lock & Projectile/Range attacks
7.4. 鈥?Blocking & Dodging
7.5. 鈥?Tactical & Strategic Combat
8.0. 鈥?The 鈥淔inesse鈥?System
9.0. 鈥?Character Progression
9.1. 鈥?General Levelling
9.2. 鈥?Morphing
9.3. 鈥?Class Freedom
9.4. 鈥?The Perks System
9.5 鈥?Gear, Item Affixes and other stats
10.0. 鈥?Abilities & Skills
10.1 鈥?Abilities & Skill Loadouts
10.2. 鈥?Hotswapping
11.0 鈥?Crafting (A Work in Progress)
12.0. 鈥?Stealth
13.0. 鈥?Story Progress
14.0. 鈥?Miscellaneous Information
16.0. 鈥?Collector's Edition & Preorder Benefits
17.0. 鈥?Miscellaneous links for newbies
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1.0. The Environments & Setting
Tamriel will be scaled like the previous games, but will be a bit larger than each. All of the major buildings and structures as they appear in previous games will also be there and [presumably] visitable. Windhelm will look the same, as will the Palace of Kings located within, and they will have the same feel.
This game takes place 1000 years before the events of Skyrim and features a 3 faction war between the Ebonheart Pact (Made of Argonians, Nords, and Dark Elves), the Aldmeri Dominion (Bosmer, Altmer, Khajiit) and the Daggerfall Covenant (Redguards, Breton, and Orcs).
- Not all of the world will be available at launch, though through expansions and patches more will be added in time. A Day/Night cycle is present.
- At level 10, the character's storyline takes off and at that level they are able to engage in PvP.
- Environments are huge, each zone is made for 20-40 hours of gameplay and all zones include at least 1 four player dungeon.
- Each faction's content has ~150 hours of content.
- There are 22 zones currently, which means without extras there is almost 440 hours of gameplay, and potentially twice that accounting for miscellaneous quests in the game.
- The game environments and rendering has been created so hundreds of players may be seen at a time, even on lower-end systems
Massively:
1.1 Exploration
- Some Sky shards can only be found from exploration (currently tracking source)
- There is interactivity with the world, and you may take items off shelves and things.
- There is fishing. link
- There are also books, mundus stones and chests hidden throughout the world.
2.0. Factions, Races, Restrictions, and Locks
There are three factions: The Ebonheart Pact, The Aldmeri Dominion, and the Daggerfall Covenant. With the current announcement, any race can currently be on any faction. More information on that is in section 16, "CE & Preorder Benefits."
Currently, after reaching maximum level and finishing your faction's content, you may then explore other faction's content with your own faction. This is called Newgame+ and Newgame++. Each faction you complete, the others become more difficult.
3.0 Guilds
Guilds are NOT faction locked, you may have characters from other factions in your guild. However, they cannot join the same Cyrodiil as your guild. An account can have a maximum of 5 guilds total.
There used to be social media interconnection, but because of new social media regulations, this has been abandoned.
(more info needed)
4.0 Megaserver
The Megaserver is a collection of smaller servers combined to create a larger server that all characters reside in. There are several small instances and in real time.The megaserver technology is created to reduce the hassle trying to find friends on launch day. There are also instances on the megaserver that players are able to switch to, and the instances reduce the numbers of players you see so that it is not overwhelming.
It is important to note that within the Megaserver and the phasing technology, your choices vs the choices of your friends will result in a lapse. For instance, if you choose to save a village, and your friend deserts them, the village may be on fire the next time your friend goes, yet while you are standing next to [your friend] you will simultaneously see villagers cheering you on, while [your friend] does not.
There used to be a survey to complete to put you on a phase with likeminded people, but as I am aware it has currently been removed.
5.0. General World PvE
"Distractionary Gameplay"
This is the developer's terms for an environment that promotes going off the beaten path. It could be that, on your way to deliver a message, you are contacted by a bleeding person that demands your assistance because a troop of roving bandits left her destitute and her husband in trouble, etc. There are quests and events littered throughout the world that discourage you from staying on a linear pathway. Some quest mobs will also be phased, so that you cannot miss them by barely a second. Kill shares also exist, so if you help kill a mob, you will get credit.
5.1 Daedric Anchors
Molag Bal is busy! Periodically while you are adventuring, Dark Achors will appear out of a portal and Tether Nirn to Oblivion, causing an invading army to cause wanton destruction. It will be up to you and a makeshift team of ragged adventurers to seal rift and banish the anchor.
5.2 PvE Dungeons
Public dungeons exist in ESO, for some you do not need to make a party. Public dungeons have a harder difficulty depending on the number of people inside. There are also public dungeons and quests in Cyrodiil.
5.3 Adventure Zones
ESO's term for "raid." (or something dramatically similar.)
Adventures zones are for a large groups of players at maximum level, and they may be either open world or instanced, new and/or old dungeons.
6.0. PvP In Cyrodiil
Matt Firor was one of the developers on Dark Age of Camelot; as such this game has been said to have a similar feel in PvP. There is a sort of currency called "Alliance Points" which can be used for a variety of things, such as changing campaigns.
- Campaigns are phased versions of Cyrodiil (the whole of Cyrodiil) in which different players are placed. For instance, in Campaign 1, the Aldmeri may be winning, while in Campaign 2, Daggerfall Covenant is winning. They are separated, phased versions of Cyrodiil. Each campaign can support up to 2000 players, and the only way to currently switch campaigns is to use alliance points. The campaigns never stop and are persisitant.
- Cyrodiil is said by the developers to both be slightly smaller, and slightly bigger than in Oblivion. My sources vary.
- In Cyrodiil there will be siege weapons and destructable environments, as well as ways to increase siege damage, protect them with more armor, etc. Thusly, it is possible to blow down a wall or gate and such. There is a fast travel system between keeps your faction owns, but not if they are currently under siege. Keeps may also be upgraded like siege weapons.
- Everyone is scaled to level 50 in Cyrodiil and will have the stats of a level 50, but a character under 50 will not gain new skills or abilities.
- The Emperor is a position that is change every 24 hours or until death (to my current understanding). The person with the most points gained in a 24 hour period will become the emperor and will gain a new skill line and passives that inspire allies. Once defeated, the emperor loses his position, but keeps a much weaker version of their skill line.
7.0. Combat
Synergy: Players will be able to chain combos with each other for maximum damage. For example, a mage may set off a firestorm, and another player can come in and create a whirlwind (or something) to increase the damage of the mage's attack exponentially. Some AI can also do this against your players though!
- Tanks and healer roles exist, but are not required. Dual wielding exists.
- Pulls/Knock Downs/ Staggers / Roots/ Knock Backs are there too. There are immunities, and large amounts of stamina can get you out of them.
- Finesse: This dictates the killcams which are only confirmed for PvP. Killing the victim in a certain way will trigger these.
- A first person view also exists in game for both PvE and PvP
7.1. UI, Target Locks & Aiming
The UI has been designed and minimalist and non-intrusive. Your enemy will also glow red to signal that is is an enemy, but it is able to be toggled off. Aiming is soft locked, it will only assist your aim, not permanently hold onto your target or cause your arrows to magically follow the target.
7.2 Block and dodging
Blocking can be used with any weapon, a shield takes less stamina and blocks more damage, while something like a staff takes considerable stamina and blocks a moderate amount. A shield may also be used to bash/knockdown/stagger an opponent. Stamina may be used to break out of a stun or crowd control.
A character may also dodge, dodging removes a lot of stamina but has the possibility of avoiding all damage.
7.3 AI and Strategic Combat
AI in ESO is reportedly somewhat intelligent. They will form combos against your party and use tactics that you may run into trouble with.
8.0 Finesse
This system rewards you for taking advantage of Synergies, tactical advantages and strategic combat like Staggers and Knockbacks. The more you take advantage of the combat system, the more 鈥淔inesse鈥?you get. This 鈥淔inesse鈥?gives you more experience points during that combat, and also rewards you with either more loot, or more unique items.
The Finesse system is also how you charge up your Ultimate. You have a bar which shows how much charge you have, and you can charge that up with Finesse. So people who are not really active in combat participation will not be able to use their Ultimates as frequents as other players who do use Finesse to their advantage. This also reduces spam of ultimate moves, and makes it so only the most skilled players or those who take advantage most will always have an advantage over other players.
9.0 Character Progression
They estimated that it will take 15 hours to reach level 10.
Characters level up by killing mobs around the world, granting us experience. In ESO however, Experience isn鈥檛 just limited to our XP bar. As we use weapons in Elder Scrolls Online, our weapon-types also gain experience. This is not related to our Character Level in any way. The more you use a specific weapon-type, you gain more and more experience and level up those weapon-types. Each level gives you a skill point which you can invest in your Weapons Skill Tree.
Each weapon-type has its own Skill Tree, so a 2h-Sword will have different passives on its tree than a Bow would. Also as we level up our Weapon-Types, we can gain new abilities which are specific to those weapons.
- The Skill tree starts branching out once our Weapon-Types have reached level 4. At each level, the ends of the skill tree branches out twice. Similarity to how many skill/perk systems work in many MMO鈥檚 and in TES games, the skill tree grants our abilities and skills new perks.
- Respecs are in game
- There are around 20 skill trees, including race, guild, achievements, lycanthropy, vampires, PvP, lore & others.
- There will be "Skyshards" which allow your character to keep progressing once you have reached level 50. Three skyshards allow you one skill point and are scattered throughout the world in various means.
9.1 Morphing
Morphing is the ability to customise skills and abilities, and to specialise skills in certain areas. For instance, for a Dragon Knight, his main ability could be morphed to add more threat to his attack, or more control (or maybe even more damage or utility!). In this case, it is the player's preference as to what to do with the skill. Abilities can be morphed ONCE.
9.2 Class Freedoms
All classes can perform all roles, but some may be better suited. For example, a nightblade may use a restoration staff to heal, but may not be as efficient as a Templar specced healing and also using a restoration staff. It is also possible to be a battle mage in heavy armor and slinging spells, a paladin, whatever kind of class you want.
9.3 Perks
Every Level you will get 1 attribute point to put into either Health, Magicka or Stamina. The more you invest in these attributes, the more passives you can unlock with these attributes.
Vampirism and Werewolves are also confirmed for the game, and have their own skill lines.
COULD NOT CONFIRM, BUT HONORABLE MENTION:
Armour and Power are twostats, along with Health Magicka and Stamina. They will not follow the typical MMO skill/stat system with Strength, Agility, Movement Speed, Intelligence etc.
You will be able to get all 5 of these confirmed stats as Affixes. The Pre-Alpha testers could not confirm if there were any other item affixes on gear.
The 3 Primary Skills and their affixes also give your character increases to its performance in combat. As follows:
Magicka Affects the Strength and Damage of your magical spells. Higher Magicka allows you to cast more spells and more Magicka costly spells
Your Stamina affects:
your Damage with Weapons and Weapon Abilities/Skills
2]路 how long/often you can block
2]路 how long you can sprint for
2]路 how long sneak for
Health only increases the amount of survivability you have
10.0 Abilities and Skills
- In ESO, classes only determine 3 of the skill lines you may ultimately use. There are 5 ability buttons along with a 6th slot for your ultimate. Left click by default uses your main hand weapon, the longer you hold it the more power it charges, and thusly also consumes more stamina. Right click is to block and/or use your secondary weapon.
- Your skills are mixed, of your 5 hotbars, some of them are weapon abilities, and some of them are skills from skill lines. As Dervy puts it:
- There are 3 major skills trees: Class, Weapon and Armor
- From the 3 main skill trees are 6 鈥?7 sub-skill trees that allow you to specialize in weapon types (one-handed, staves, dual wielding, etc.), spells and abilities.
- Lock Picking is a skill. You鈥檙e limited to 23 seconds to pick a lock, there are 5 tumblers, you have to listen for clicks to know when you can let go of a tumbler otherwise your picks will break.
- You can steal from NPC houses but not from other players.
- There is an accuracy component in the game, spells and arrows will need to be aimed. No Heat Seeking.
- Players get Ultimate Abilities start at level 14. Ultimate Abilities depend on your class.
- Anyone can be a healer if you decided to put points into your healing skill tree. The best healer will be the Templar but that does not mean other classes can not be good healers.
- Sorcerers can Teleport but range is limited.
- There鈥檚 an ability that allows you to grab an enemy with a chain and pull them towards you.
- You can do all types of crafting or focus on a specific professions (depends on available points).
- Classes have specific perks (i.e. Templars have improved healing abilities).
- Lock picking is a skill in the game.
11.0. Crafting - Additions & Review needed!
Crafting will be done at a later time. From what I understand there was a major Overhaul and not much info is available, other than crafting having its own skill line, meaning that one can specialize in crafting over combat.
THIS INFO MAY BE OUT OF DATE:
- There are Soul Gems that can recharge weapons, craft weapons and resurrect players. link
- The extent soul gems will play on crafting is unknown.
Excerpt from Gamefront:
OUT OF DATE INFO- Review Needed in spoiler!
Spoiler
The good news for crafters is the statement from the devs that you will be able to make some of the most powerful items in the game. This is rarely the case in MMOs, since developers want to control the flow of high-end items to prevent mudflation. Though the TESO devs didn鈥檛 talk about the mechanism that will prevent mass production of legendary items, rest assured they have something in mind.
- There are 5 crafts: Provisions, Enchanting, Weaponsmithing, Armorsmithing & Alchemy. You receive "crafting points" that you may spend on any of these as you see fit, but have a limited number of crafting points. You may become an expert in two crafts, or dabble a little in all of them.
- Items created through crafting produce gear equal to the best loot in the game.
- Crafting will also be able to improve, customize and augment high-level items found in the world.
- There are combinations that you can discover, and crafting is based on a "discovery system." There are tons of combinations, and you can add things together to find the best way of creating things.
- Materials will drop off enemies, and you must tinker with different materials to see what they create. There are up to four different effects of each material depending on how you use it and what it is paired with.
- There are special locations to craft. (anvils for smithing, etc.)
- Some materials can only be obtained through Cyrodiil.
- To craft, you add two main items together, and then may add other items for augmented effects. You can add higher quality items for greater effects.
12.0. Stealth
Stealthing Drains Stamina, those in stealth appear in a shroud. Stealthing is not absolute and sneaking improperly may lead you to being caught.
13.0. Story Progression & Roleplaying
- You cannot yet kill enemy NPCS, unless perhaps in Cyrodiil. A crime system is set after launch, and housing is not in the game.
- Majority of the Molag-Bal story-line will take place in ColdHarbour, which is Molag-Bals plane of oblivion. Unfortunately, this story-line is 100% solo and instanced, so you will not be able to request help in these story lines!
- Books around the world will open up new quests, as well as be part of the Mages Guild Story. These are called 鈥淎ncient Tomes鈥? Reading/Collecting Ancient Tomes increases your Mages Guild Rank.
- Also regarding books, each time you read a book, it is automatically added to your book collection. Books will not consume any inventory space and you can go back and read them any time you want.
- Dark Anchors are related to the Fighters Guild. The more Dark Anchors you destroy, along with their Daedra, the more rank you gain.
- Paul Sage has stated at some point, we will be able to 鈥渆xperience little parts of the lore鈥? such as the King Ransers War, which was 50 years prior to the Elder Scrolls Onlines setting. Paul Sage made it seem like we could go back into history.
14.0. Miscellaneous Information
- There is no auction house
- You can also Loot items from crates and even from NPC homes. Maybe this was a slight hint that Lockpicking will also make an appearance in ESO?
- You can use 鈥淩鈥?for your consumables, such as potions or food.
- "Shift" is to sprint.
- Achievement System and Lore Library (Hinting at the Book Collection I mentioned earlier)
- Red Glowing mobs are hostile. Yellow are neutral.
- "E" is your primary "action" button. It is also a "loot all" button.
- You can tab through your current active quest with 鈥淭鈥?
- Kill Cams will make a return in ESO.
- Mundus Stones, which are similar to Guardian Stones in Skyrim will make an appearance. Mundus Stones grant the players buffs.
- Unlike in Skyrim where you can fast-travel to every location you鈥檝e obtained, ESO will have Wayshrines you need to find. Wayshrines will be ESO鈥檚 method of fast travelling through the world. It has not been confirmed if there will be a form of gold-sink for these Wayshrines. [20]
- Morality, as well as Criminality will be added after launch. This ties in with the Thieves Guild story line also.
- Theives Guild and Dark Brotherhood are coming after launch.
15.0. Collector's and Preorder Benefits
PREORDER:
5 days of early access (from Sunday, March 30)
A 鈥淪cuttler鈥?vanity pet
Bonus treasure maps that you can find throughout Tamriel
The ability to play as any race on Any Faction
COLLECTOR'S [IMPERIAL EDITION]:
Access to the Imperial race as a playable selection for your character
Imperial white horse (a free standard level mount)
Mudcrab vanity pet
Rings of Mara (gives bonus experience shared between two accounts when you group together) (available without CE and in game)
16.0. LINKS FOR NEWBIES
http://eldersouls.com/elder-scrolls-online/skills
http://elderscrollsonline.com/en/
http://tamrielfoundry.com/
http://shadowedmare.com/
http://teso-rp.com/
http://elderscrollsonline.com/en/map/tamriel
SOURCES
Spoiler
[1] ?v=lg3cMvTeV_8
[2] ?v=27MjH8hi1zQ
[3] ?v=tN38nu4cVg0
[4] ?v=KxJTsq2XeKY
[5] ?v=f1dqCjnATWg
[6] ?v=0oXmBM1Uh6M
[7] ?v=mqPPxGpI-Yk
[8] http://mmohuts.com/v...eveal-interview
[7] ?cat=19
[10] /
[11] ?INTCMP=SRCH
[12] ?INTCMP=SRCH
[13] /
[14] /
[15]
[16]
[17] /
[18]
[19] /
[20]
[21] /
[22]
[23]
[24] ?v=hO3kO2uPoxY
[25]
[26] http://www.zam.com/s...907&storypage=2%C2%A0
[28] http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/03/20/zenimax-on-tesos-first-person-mode-mudcrab-armies/
[29] http://www.onrpg.com/MMO/Elder-Scrolls-Online/news/PAX-East-2013---Elder-Scrolls-Online-Closer-Look
[30] http://massively.joystiq.com/2013/03/22/pax-east-2013-hands-on-with-the-elder-scrolls-online-round-two/
[31] http://elderscrollsonline.com/en/media/videos/567
[32] http://elderscrollsotr.mymiddleearth.com/2013/03/26/gameplay-mechanics/
[33] http://elderscrollsotr.mymiddleearth.com/2013/03/23/wrap-up-of-saturdays-events-at-pax-east/
[34] http://www.theouthousers.com/index.php/news/121099-elder-scrolls-online-news-from-pax-east.html
[35] http://www.gamefront.com/the-elder-scrolls-online-preview-its-like-skyrim-online/5/
[36] http://elderscrollsonline.com/en/news/post/2013/05/03/ask-us-anything-variety-pack-4
[37] http://www.examiner.com/article/a-pax-east-playthrough-of-the-elder-scrolls-online
[38] http://www.gamefront.com/the-elder-scrolls-online-preview-its-like-skyrim-online/2/
[39] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGrflK6An6Y
[40] http://tamrielfoundry.com/2013/03/konkle-in-a-box/
[41] http://www.gameshampoo.com/magazine/articles/1534/pax-east-2013-the-elder-scrolls-online-hands-on.html
[43] http://shadowedmare.com/the-elder-scrolls-online-at-pax-overview-day-two/
[44] http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/821/feature/7226/Elder-Scrolls-Online-Crafting-in-Tamriel-Revealed.html
[45] http://www.zam.com/story.html?story=32077
