In the MMORPG The Elder Scrolls Online, Update 33 and the Ascending Tide dungeon pack finally launches the new narrative arc “The Legacy of the Bretons”. MeinMMO author Jürgen Horn was allowed to venture into one of the new dungeons with the developers at Zenimax and had some rather unpleasant experiences there!
What kind of dungeon is it? For our preview here, we ventured into the new dungeon “Gram of the Shipwright”. This is an old, decaying shipyard located in Rivenspire.
Together with the instance “Coral Wastes”, this dungeon is part of the DLC Ascending Tide. It will be released alongside Update 33 on March 14, 2022, for PC and on March 29 for consoles.
As always, the first dungeon DLC should lead into the new expansion High Isle.
Who played? Dungeon DLCs are always a reason for joy for me because, as usual, I meet familiar developers from Zenimax. Among them this time were Jeremy Sera (Lead Content Designer) and Mike Finnigan (Lead Encounter Designer), with whom I had already rocked numerous dungeons in such events.
The biannual dungeon runs with the devs are so much fun already because the developers present their work with passion and pride.
With Cats on the Loot Raid
What is this dungeon about? In the dungeon “Gram of the Shipwright”, we travel to an old, rotting shipyard. Proud ships of the “All-Flags-Navy” were once built there, but that was a long time ago.
Now everything is rotten and decaying. But here, the clever Khajiit pirate Za’ji is looking for blueprints to improve his ship “Perfect Pounce”. Or as my fellow players put it, “He wants to make the ‘Perfect Pounce’ even more perfect.”
By the way, some of you might recognize Za’ji from the final Elsweyr DLC Dragonguard. It was also about his ship there.
The shipyard was reportedly inspired by real medieval dry docks that were sometimes even built into the sea, according to the developers.
How did the first boss go? After gaining access to the shipyard, we are greeted by undead and ghosts. If they don’t attack us, the ghosts seem to just carry on with the work they presumably did in life.
At the end of the first section, another ghost appears, but is rather unfriendly. It is the cruel foreman who hits hard and probably thinks we are lazy workers.
In any case, he insults us and accuses us of being work-shy. And we are costing him a fortune with our laziness!
However, the boss can be defeated with a bit of skill, even though our healer has to work hard. This is intentional, as according to the devs, this boss is the first “check” to see if the group is even worthy. “If the healer doesn’t pay attention here, it’s over,” says one of my fellow players.
What can you expect from the 2nd boss? After defeating the tyrannical slaver, the scenery changes. We briefly leave the shipyard and enter a grove that once supplied wood for the shipyard. Now everything is overgrown with plants again, and as a boss, we are faced with an angry spriggan. It summons wolves and bees, and the whole fight becomes really chaotic with the numerous adds.
It gets to the point where our tank desperately tries to taunt my dragon pet several times because he thinks it’s one of the bee adds. But luckily, he soon realizes his mistake, and we were eventually able to take down the plant monstrosity and its creatures.
This is how disgusting the final fight will be: In the end, we go back to the actual shipyard and the lighthouse visible from afar. There, living enemies appear for the first time, and our companion Za’ji (who mysteriously disappears during each fight) wonders what the nasty sea elves of the “Dread Sails” are doing here. Do they want the blueprints for better ships too?
We mow down a group of sea elves, and in the end, we reach the platform in front of the lighthouse. There, a sea elf ship is sailing away with some unknown loot.
But the captain stays behind and mocks us. This is of course not acceptable, and we prepare for battle.
While Za’ji immediately runs off and cheers for us from the wall, the captain conjures up disgusting undead from the depths of the sea. They then stagger across the playing field and vomit their souls out!
That alone is already disgusting and dangerous, because the vomit causes significant damage. But after the vomiting, the stuff remains in disgusting puddles on the ground, and anyone who steps in it takes additional damage.
As the boss continues to fight cheerfully, the playing field becomes increasingly dangerous and our evasion options dwindle.
Therefore, we have to constantly knock down the vomit-zombies and exploit a mechanic of the boss. Because he regularly summons deadly waves that knock everything in their path down. But if we lure the waves in such a way that they wash away the disgusting vomit puddles, we make the battlefield navigable and clean again.
And so it continues: Beat the boss, dodge the vomit puddles, take down zombies, use the wave to clean up. After some time, we can finally take down the boss. Za’ji gets his plans, and we get a small insight into the true plans of our enemies in the upcoming expansion “High Isle”.
Conclusion: ESO dungeons are always an experience
Every 6 months, it’s that time again, and I am invited to the big dungeon crawl at Zenimax. And as always, it was a lot of fun. The dungeon is well made and varied. Especially the twist at the end, when the sea elves appear, brings a nice twist to the story.
But for me, the highlight is the cool NPCs. Here it’s the little Khajiit captain Za’ji and his decidedly larger first mate Coska. She is indeed a massive Senche’rath and the verbal battles between the cowardly Za’ji and the fiery Coska are a real highlight.
I am certainly looking forward to the release of Ascending Tide and the big expansion in the summer. The first DLCs are already generating a lot of anticipation.
Jürgen Horn
Editor at MeinMMO
So much for my experience with the new dungeon “Gram of the Shipwright”. Besides this and another dungeon, there’s also Update 33, which brings among other things lower loading times, account-wide achievements, and an important change to the combat system. You can find out which one here: ESO: Update 33 Ascending Tide brings 3 major combat changes
