Elder Scrolls Online

Experiment.

Wait, what?

I thought it said I could only make food and drinks that I'd found the recipes for.

Are you telling me it's been like the Alchemy system the entire time?

Yes. You can even eat ingredients.

edited 26th Apr '14 6:10:44 PM by Kiefen

THEN WHY THE FUCK DOESN'T THE COOKING INTERFACE ALLOW FOR THAT?!

Oh I thought we were talking about alchemy, sorry you need recepies for cooking...

As a thought experiment I decided to figure out how I'd have gone about dividing the races of Tamriel into different sides for a game.

The first big difference is that my dividing of the continent into three groups would take place after Skyrim instead of before it.

• FACTION A:
  • Formed of the Nords, Imperials, and Dunmer, and in control of the territories of Central and Northern Cyrodiil, Central and Eastern Skyrim, and Western Morrowind. My current thinking is that, canonically, the Stormcloak Rebellion failed, but concurrent events lead to Imperial acceptance of Altmeri control dwindling, thus immediately after the Stormcloak Rebellion a Second Rebellion, this one lead by the Dovahkiin himself, succeeded not in achieving independence for Skyrim from Cyrodiil, but in unifying the two states. The Dunmer, having gone through the near-total collapse of their civilization and their nearly-complete expulsion from their own homeland, just got dragged along for the ride.

  • Dedicated to the restoration of Human rule over Tamriel, Faction A is also dedicated to universal acceptance of a new Pantheon of Gods, one based heavily on the Nordic ones, with a sprinkling of Cyrodiilic influence to make things smoother, like Akatosh being Dragon God of Time instead of Alduin, who turned out to be Dragon God of Time's Slightly Lunatic Eldest Son of Eating the World Once It Gets Past It's Use-By Date. The Dunmer, being elves, are exempt, but the rest of Humanity has to switch over! This is causing problems for them, however. While the northern parts of Cyrodiil, having been influenced by the Nords for generations, switched over with little trouble, the Colovian Highlands and the Nibenese Bay regions are holding out in favor of the gods they've always worshiped, to the point where those regions are controlled by the other two factions.

• FACTION B:
  • Comprised of the Bretons, the Redguard, and the Orcs. Having been separate from the Empire for quite some time now, the regions of High Rock, Hammerfall, and New Orsinium are quite happy to do their own little thing and keep on worshiping their own gods, thank you all the same. Faction A's insistence that no, seriously you guys, you have to come back, means that the two sides do not get along in the slightest. There's also the fact that the Orcs now control a good chunk of Western Skyrim and wont give it back. Apart from that, Faction B controls the entirety of High Rock and Hammerfall, as well as the Western portion of Cyrodiil.

• FACTION C:
  • The races of Bosmer, Khajiit and Argonian have been united under the banner of the Altmeri. The Bosmer because they've been a vassal state of the High Elves for centuries, the Khajiit because they owe the Elves for bailing them out from some disaster, and the Argonians because the Elves promised to support them taking their revenge on the Dunmer for centuries of slavery. Their territory includes Valenwood, Elsweyr, Black Marsh, as well as Southern Cyrodiil and Southern Morrowind. The Summerset Isles, the home of the leaders of this little group, is far enough away from all the action that for gameplay purposes it doesn't count.

• The Odd Man Out:
  • Seeing as how there are ten races but only nine parts of Tamriel, someone always gets left out. Traditionally it's been the Orcs, who never get their own part of the map. Since ten does not divide evenly into three, the Imperials get left out in Elder Scrolls Online unless you own the Imperial Edition, in which case they can join any of the factions. In my version, it's the Altmeri themselves who get to be the special tenth race. In Faction C the Altmeri are the leaders, while in Factions A and B they're third-class citizens who fled Summerset because they don't agree with the Thalmor's beliefs and didn't want to be executed for not following party lines. Thus, each Faction's line up is:
    • A: Nord, Imperial, Dunmer, and Altmer. The Nords and Imperials are pretty much equals, the Dunmer are looked down upon a little but get a free pass because they acknowledge Lorkhan as being a good guy of a sort, while Altmer are viewed with suspicion and mistrust.
    • B: Bretons, Redguard, Orcs, and Altmer. Cultural differences aside, the Bretons and Redguard get along pretty well. Altmer refugees live more comfortably in High Rock and Hammerfall then they do in Skyrim and Cyrodiil, and the alliance with the Orcs is as tenuous as it is in Online but the Humans recognize the upsides to having a militaristic nation wedged between them and their opponents, plus it beats more centuries of being trapped in an endless cycle of mutual hate and war-crime committing.
    • C: Altmer, Bosmer, Khajiit, and Argonians. The Altmer rule all with an aloof yet iron fist. The Wood Elves, being Elves, are humored and treated more gently by their masters. The Khajiit are fairly aware of their status as a tool in the High Elf plan to dominate the races of Tamriel, but they've decided to just go with it 'cause it's not like the last people in charge were super nice to them, why should the new boss be any different? The Altmer don't actually give a damn about the Argonian desire for revenge against the Dunmer, they just the lizard people as a useful source of (lizard)manpower, as well as a way of exterminating their Daedra-worshiping kin on the other side of the continent.

Huh, that sounds kind of cool :) You won't have to travel all the way back to your guild headquarters to buy things.

Though I'm wondering if we'll be getting another cinematic trailer. And is the game out on consoles yet?

Console versions aren't out yet. Those are set for late 2014/early 2015.

Anyway, today is The Elder Scrolls Online's Steam debut, and to celebrate, they're running a launch sale of 50% off the standard game and 40% off the Imperial Edition. Any of those worth it?

It's on Steam now? MOTHERFU-

edited 17th Jul '14 7:48:14 PM by Gralien

And also for some reason despite the Imperial Edition upgrade and palomino horse DLC being available for the Mac, the game itself isn't for the Mac, at least according to its Steam info.

Weird.

edited 17th Jul '14 7:53:25 PM by theLibrarian

So.... Is it any good?

Given how quickly it went from "talked about" to "not talked about", I'm guessing it's fairly unremarkable. Or at least too pricey to retain public interest.

I haven't played it but some of my friends have.

Too expensive for my tastes and it's a bit mediocre.

It's pretty fun, in my experience. I find the economy system a bit weird (14,000 for the weakest horse?!) but other than that I'm enjoying it.

Booting it up for the first time in months, waiting for the granddaddy of all updates to finish.

Needless to say, I've been out of the loop. Do Templars still suck, or have the classes finally been balanced? I recall dying a lot, although that might have just been me choosing poorly on the skill table. I seem to recall a preference for One Handed and Shield, Medium Armor, and Dawn's Wrath.

So, I was replaying some Skyrim recently and felt that I very badly needed TESVI soon. Since that might be some time off I am considering playing ESO. I was wondering if anyone can tell me if its any good. I don't dislike mmorpgs but I am not really in too much of a mood for them right now. Can ESO's PVE compare to the single player games? Or will It constantly feel like a gutted TES game? Also, back before it came out I heard some say that Zenimax was screwing up the lore. I know Cyrodil is not jungled so it must be true to some extend but how bad is it?

edited 22nd Nov '14 4:02:59 AM by GrieverVIII

EB Games Australia is pulling all ESO related material, from game boxes to time cards.

edited 9th Jan '15 4:12:40 PM by tclittle

Why's that, I wonder?

Perhaps it's going FTP.

Let's not jump to that conclusion just yet, as tempting as it may be. Zeni Max Media has still got a lot of money left to burn on the altar of their online experiment.

Looks like it's right

http://blog.us.playstation.com/2015/01/21/the-elder-scrolls-online-tamriel-unlimited-launches-june-9th/

Whoever called that one about FTP (across all platforms), raise your hand.

edited 21st Jan '15 12:24:21 PM by Alucard

-Raises-

Did the Nord get taken prisoner, I wonder?

Not only Free to play, but Pay To Win