And random exploration is even more boring because 90% of my own job was making sure loot containers were 1. not clipping too bad and 2. flagged with the correct loot table, so I have literally seen every corner of the main map and most of Craglorn.
I was reading this article a while ago and I remember them talking about all the changes they had to make late in development.
Perhaps the most tedious job was adding more interactive physical objects into the game world. One of the quirks of Elder Scrolls games is that nothing is bolted down. Some Morrowind and Skyrim players have developed a kind of in-game kleptomania, collecting random objects until they have hundreds of pillows or entire 18-person place settings squirreled away in a chest somewhere. To meet that expectation, ESO needed loot, and lots of it.
Every barrel, every box and every shelf fit for the purpose had to have something on it that players could make off with. A gang of nine interns was conscripted to spend weeks adding thousands of interactive objects into the game. The project came to be known internally as "Clickeyville."
Was that you?
Yes, I was a citizen of the good town of Clickeyville. I wasn't one of the ones adding stuff, mind; I was the one checking stuff and then going "Hey buddy, you forgot to flag an entire dungeon worth of crates..." or, my very favorite, "Just FYI all the grapes in the Daggerfall Covenant are currently tagged to give black pepper when looted. Oh and that's on the live server."
Oh and a LOT of cases of "Guys if you put anything on top of a crate or barrel, it either needs to not be on the animating lid or the crate needs to be set to Null so it never opens or animates, otherwise we have lids that go through lanterns." SO MUCH of this, everywhere.
*Edit* There's even a lorebook in the .dat file that players weren't supposed to ever see, but since UESP datamined it I feel like I can share it here. Behold, the tale of Clickyville: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Online:The_Ghostly_Stag
As an explanation, Clickyville actually referred to a real "place" on the dev server, part of the big fat testing implementation... thingy. Basically this server exists as a very alpha phase to test all kinds of stuff, mostly things like buildings, objects, and so on, to make sure we didn't do something crazy that's going to accidentally melt the server. Part of this even included a little "town" built to test, well, the town-building tools, that got left up so later we could test lootable objects. We spent A LOT of time testing the dye system there too (which was handed off to the QA side of Clickyville once things had calmed down a bit on that end). Something about the way the devs built it meant that animals would sometimes randomly spawn in there, including a white stag, so way back before I was even hired, somebody on Team Clickyville wrote this as part of the Books test, annnnd then forgot to take it out before it went into a beta and thus UESP got hold of it. AND NOW U KNO.
It really is/was kind of a lonely but peaceful place to hang out.
Hey, Penny Arcade! If any of you lurkers are even mildly interested in trying this game out, it's gonna be 100% free to play this weekend. Check it out! It's pretty great!
I'm going to be trying to install this game again this weekend.
Wish me luck! Pray for non-infinite loading screens!
The first load screen after a fresh install or a major patch is always a loooooooooooooooooo...oooooong one for me. Just let it sit. Go get a hot cocoa. Pet the cat. Eat dinner. Come back and enjoy.
This game is a lot more fun than I remember it being.
I really think the dev team has improved this game A LOT from launch. Tbh I was sure when I was laid off that the game was dead in the water and was going the way of Wildstar, but I think the team really stepped up, figured out what players wanted, and gave it to them.
I'm going to be trying to install this game again this weekend.
Wish me luck! Pray for non-infinite loading screens!
The first load screen after a fresh install or a major patch is always a loooooooooooooooooo...oooooong one for me. Just let it sit. Go get a hot cocoa. Pet the cat. Eat dinner. Come back and enjoy.
I'm pretty sure they are compiling shaders and such during that initial load screen, but the visual feedback to the user is just nil.
This game is a lot more fun than I remember it being.
I really think the dev team has improved this game A LOT from launch. Tbh I was sure when I was laid off that the game was dead in the water and was going the way of Wildstar, but I think the team really stepped up, figured out what players wanted, and gave it to them.
The dungeons are what I wish Wildstar was. Plenty of interaction but not absurd amounts of RED GROUND dealing TONS OF DAMAGE.
+1
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
Wildstar had so much potential, then they made that guy who used to run a hardcore EQ guild the chief end game content designer. They are still trying to unfuck that mess.
Wildstar had bad PVP at launch. I also remember the time when I got to mid game job classes, where I was literally spending hours trying to explore, and the game turned from great to absolutely horrible.
Roe on
0
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
Hmm, so I can't send money to my own characters? Or is it blocked along faction lines?
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
So is duel wield just daggers, or can you duel wield other things? And is it still kind of bad? I remember people saying it was bad early on, and you should probably avoid it. Was thinking of doing something off the wall like a duel wield Sorcerer. Kind of a magic swashbuckler.
Yeah, in fact, there's a passive for dual-wield abilities depending on what weapons you're using, like axes giving ... bleed? ... and daggers giving crit, etc.
EDIT: As pointed out below, this passive is at the top of the DW tree; I was actually thinking of the two-handed passive, which is, like, the second one.
I've come back to the game, at least for a period of time, but I still have some gripes. Despite the very welcome flexibility, I find myself frustrated by the weapon switching and class design. There are gameplay reasons to be a magicka nightblade, but I don't want to be a NB with special dagger-wielding class animations, and then I go back to shooting beams of light at enemies with my Destro and Resto staff. It messes with my own personal "class fantasy" a bit. I want to be able to access other abilities without being required to switch weapons. But really, I think two of my biggest gripes are that the spell animations are a bit lame(both in terms of graphical oomph and design), and that the random mob encounter is too easy.
It does sound like I need to do some more dungeons though, I'm up to champion level 100, and I've only done about 3-5 instanced dungeons. I have not had great experiences grouping with randos. No one would use their mic, or would instead provide annoying leet commentary. Now their's keyboard chat, but I don't have a keyboard for my PS4, and it doesn't seem that it's rolled out very widely into the game.
Yeah, in fact, many dual-wield abilities have riders depending on what weapons you're using, like axes giving ... bleed? ... and daggers giving crit, etc.
That's the last passive in the dual-wield line, though.
Yeah, in fact, many dual-wield abilities have riders depending on what weapons you're using, like axes giving ... bleed? ... and daggers giving crit, etc.
That's the last passive in the dual-wield line, though.
Oops. Sorry - was actually thinking of more easily available Two-Handed passive I've used more often.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
So I got my dude up and going last night, duel wield sorcerer using 5 medium and 2 light armor pieces. Found a couple of interesting things, like the fact that pets are kind of weird. Are there any pet controls? I didn't see any. Do they act completely autonomously?
Also Lightning Form seems really good on a melee character.
So I got my dude up and going last night, duel wield sorcerer using 5 medium and 2 light armor pieces. Found a couple of interesting things, like the fact that pets are kind of weird. Are there any pet controls? I didn't see any. Do they act completely autonomously?
Also Lightning Form seems really good on a melee character.
Zero pet controls; daedra go where they please!
+1
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
Which is sometimes in to the ether. He seems to get lost a lot when I mount up, and I have to resummon him.
Which is sometimes in to the ether. He seems to get lost a lot when I mount up, and I have to resummon him.
in the beta, the pets had extremely large aggro ranges, and all the pet aggro dumped to you if it died or despawned. This caused some hilarious events where entire zones would aggro to you.
So I got my dude up and going last night, duel wield sorcerer using 5 medium and 2 light armor pieces. Found a couple of interesting things, like the fact that pets are kind of weird. Are there any pet controls? I didn't see any. Do they act completely autonomously?
Also Lightning Form seems really good on a melee character.
Yeah one of my PvP characters back on the old account that I lost was a melee lightning form sorc with a 2h weapon. CHEARG > LIGHTNING FORM. I think even NPCs use that spec!
This game is pretty fun so far! I'm around level 5. Still no idea what I'm doing with my skills, I hope there's a respec option or this stuff isn't permanent.
This game is pretty fun so far! I'm around level 5. Still no idea what I'm doing with my skills, I hope there's a respec option or this stuff isn't permanent.
You can pay gold to respec, it can get expensive but its not too bad.
CorriganX on Steam and just about everywhere else.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
So one of the things I'm not a fan of with the skill system, and maybe I'm just overthinking it, is that I feel I always need at least one skill from each of my class trees on my bar at all times, to keep levels going up in that tree. This limits my skill slots quite a bit. Right now I really don't use anything from Dark Magic, but if I don't keep Crystal Shard on my bar I feel like I'm missing out in levels in Dark Magic. I'd rather drop it for another Dual Wield skill, and keep my pet, Lightning Form and Mage's Fury on my bar.
Posts
If someone could log on real quick and add me to friends and invite me, I'd appreciate it.
Yes, I was a citizen of the good town of Clickeyville. I wasn't one of the ones adding stuff, mind; I was the one checking stuff and then going "Hey buddy, you forgot to flag an entire dungeon worth of crates..." or, my very favorite, "Just FYI all the grapes in the Daggerfall Covenant are currently tagged to give black pepper when looted. Oh and that's on the live server."
Oh and a LOT of cases of "Guys if you put anything on top of a crate or barrel, it either needs to not be on the animating lid or the crate needs to be set to Null so it never opens or animates, otherwise we have lids that go through lanterns." SO MUCH of this, everywhere.
*Edit* There's even a lorebook in the .dat file that players weren't supposed to ever see, but since UESP datamined it I feel like I can share it here. Behold, the tale of Clickyville: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Online:The_Ghostly_Stag
As an explanation, Clickyville actually referred to a real "place" on the dev server, part of the big fat testing implementation... thingy. Basically this server exists as a very alpha phase to test all kinds of stuff, mostly things like buildings, objects, and so on, to make sure we didn't do something crazy that's going to accidentally melt the server. Part of this even included a little "town" built to test, well, the town-building tools, that got left up so later we could test lootable objects. We spent A LOT of time testing the dye system there too (which was handed off to the QA side of Clickyville once things had calmed down a bit on that end). Something about the way the devs built it meant that animals would sometimes randomly spawn in there, including a white stag, so way back before I was even hired, somebody on Team Clickyville wrote this as part of the Books test, annnnd then forgot to take it out before it went into a beta and thus UESP got hold of it. AND NOW U KNO.
It really is/was kind of a lonely but peaceful place to hang out.
https://podcast.tidalwavegames.com/
im logging back in momentarily, if you want to @CorriganX or give me your @ name.
CorriganX on Steam and just about everywhere else.
Thanks for the invite.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtaEnj4nDwU
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Fuck you, Dolwinora. Your death brought none of the satisfaction it should have.
Wish me luck! Pray for non-infinite loading screens!
The first load screen after a fresh install or a major patch is always a loooooooooooooooooo...oooooong one for me. Just let it sit. Go get a hot cocoa. Pet the cat. Eat dinner. Come back and enjoy.
I really think the dev team has improved this game A LOT from launch. Tbh I was sure when I was laid off that the game was dead in the water and was going the way of Wildstar, but I think the team really stepped up, figured out what players wanted, and gave it to them.
https://podcast.tidalwavegames.com/
I'm pretty sure they are compiling shaders and such during that initial load screen, but the visual feedback to the user is just nil.
The dungeons are what I wish Wildstar was. Plenty of interaction but not absurd amounts of RED GROUND dealing TONS OF DAMAGE.
Just put it in your bank and your other characters can withdraw it.
Edit: your bank is shared account wide, in case that wasn't already known.
It's definitely not bad. I quite like it a lot.
Yeah, in fact, there's a passive for dual-wield abilities depending on what weapons you're using, like axes giving ... bleed? ... and daggers giving crit, etc.
EDIT: As pointed out below, this passive is at the top of the DW tree; I was actually thinking of the two-handed passive, which is, like, the second one.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
It does sound like I need to do some more dungeons though, I'm up to champion level 100, and I've only done about 3-5 instanced dungeons. I have not had great experiences grouping with randos. No one would use their mic, or would instead provide annoying leet commentary. Now their's keyboard chat, but I don't have a keyboard for my PS4, and it doesn't seem that it's rolled out very widely into the game.
That's the last passive in the dual-wield line, though.
Oops. Sorry - was actually thinking of more easily available Two-Handed passive I've used more often.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Also Lightning Form seems really good on a melee character.
Melee sorcerer? Why not! Pretty good at it, actually.
Zero pet controls; daedra go where they please!
in the beta, the pets had extremely large aggro ranges, and all the pet aggro dumped to you if it died or despawned. This caused some hilarious events where entire zones would aggro to you.
Yeah one of my PvP characters back on the old account that I lost was a melee lightning form sorc with a 2h weapon. CHEARG > LIGHTNING FORM. I think even NPCs use that spec!
https://podcast.tidalwavegames.com/
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
You can pay gold to respec, it can get expensive but its not too bad.
CorriganX on Steam and just about everywhere else.
There's some sort of DDOS attack going on with both ESO and GW2 right now. Somebody's got their knickers in a twist re: MMOs I guess.
https://podcast.tidalwavegames.com/
Again, maybe I'm just overthinking it.