In the fantasy MMORPG The Elder Scrolls Online, extensive changes are planned for PvP. Most will be realized in the Thieves Guild, the upcoming DLC.
The topic in The Elder Scrolls Online over the last few weeks: How do we change Cyrodiil? How will PvP be in 2016? There’s a lot planned. In the last stream show, PvP chief Brian Wheeler answered questions.
Imperial City, castle swapping, and the zerg
The Imperial City in The Elder Scrolls Online is set in stone, but that doesn’t mean it will always stay that way. Changes are also being considered for this. However, they want to discuss it once they are sure of what they are doing. Ideas are being discussed like “individual districts could be controlled, which would give bonuses to the faction or they could respawn there.”
In Cyrodiil, they don’t want “castle swapping”, where attackers take a castle and immediately give it up so that defenders can reclaim the castle. They’ve seen this in other games and find it atrocious, so they want to avoid it. Thus, they are struggling to raise the rewards for conquering a castle, even though they desire these sieges.
They want to reward small groups and solo players more strongly. Currently, players receive a 10% bonus for each team member in their group, up to a maximum of 250%. In the future, this value will be capped at 50%. However, the value for “all players” will be doubled. For full groups, this will mean slightly fewer points, but significantly more for solo players and small groups. This aims to make it clear that “zerging” is not the only way to succeed. This is expected to come with the next DLC, the Thieves Guild.
Performance is set to improve long-term
Regarding PvP performance: The problem with performance is that individual abilities, procs, or certain effects are checked for all players within the “range” of each player. This overwhelms the server when a lot of these checks occur.
This is why performance in “veteran campaigns,” where everyone has some gimmicks, is significantly worse than in non-veteran campaigns, where the server has to do less calculation. It’s a marathon to solve these tasks. Zenimax is working on this , for example with the “These effects now only affect the group, not all players” changes.
Duels and battlegrounds are coming
Battlegrounds, or structured PvP, are a long-term goal for The Elder Scrolls Online. The previous elements shown for testing are said to have been held together by “band-aids and gum.” When they bring this, it will be done correctly and competitively. This will take time.
They are also working on duels. When this is implemented, players can duel anyone anywhere, except in certain protected zones. However, a duel does not protect players in Cyrodiil from being interrupted by others.
Siege weapons to change with the Thieves Guild
Siege weapons are set to change. In the TESO forum, Brian Wheeler has already presented some ideas, which were hotly debated. We quote from the German forum thread on this.
All changes listed below are currently still being tested on our internal servers and could change before reaching the public test server (PTS) and the live servers.
- The damage of all siege weapons has been increased by about 30%, and we are currently considering raising this further.
- Slows have been standardized for all siege weapons that cause this effect (ice ball trebuchets, lightning ballistae, oil catapults, etc.). They now slow by 50% and the effect lasts 6 seconds.
- All side effects caused by siege weapons (slowing, reduced healing, increased siege weapon damage) can no longer be removed.
- Oil catapults receive a new effect that causes “stamina damage” and drains about 5000 stamina from enemy targets.
- Lightning ballistae receive a new effect that causes “magicka damage” and drains about 5000 magicka from enemy targets.
- Ballistae can now turn faster and the “spread” variable has been removed, so you will now hit your target with 100% certainty.
- Sunder Shot now causes an effect that increases siege weapon damage by 20%. This value was originally 10%.
Equipment will become stronger – new vendors coming
Also still under discussion
- The forward camps will return.
- Some sets will be raised to VR 16
- Perhaps on two days a week, there will be special vendors in Cyrodiil. They will arrive at a specific time in a specific location. They sell the Undaunted sets, with the offerings changing weekly. The prices will be relatively high. Clearly, a way for PvP players to secure desirable PvE gear. Wheeler’s description sounds a bit like vendor Xur in Destiny.
- There is currently also a heated discussion about the notorious AE Cap for attributes, and we will certainly hear more about that.
- There will be a PvP campaign where champion points don’t count.
