The first major update to Elder Scrolls Online had been announced for awhile, but an elaborate post by Elder Scrolls Online Game Director Matt Firor reveals some interesting information about the upcoming Craglorn update, as well as what’s in store for the next couple of months. If you haven’t been up to date with ESO news, Craglorn is centered around PvE content and large-scale adventure zones that promise not only to be difficult, but also competitive. Teams that go through the new adventures faster than others will get recognition and considerable rewards. Craglorn is obviously centered around improving the PvE aspect of ESO’s endgame, which in its current state, is sadly slightly lacking.
Craglorn is a part of Update 1, the first major content update to Elder Scrolls Online, and it’s already undergoing testing on the game’s PTS servers. Here’s the current (bound to change) patch log:
- Craglorn, the first Adventure Zone, specifically created for groups of Veteran Rank 1 and above characters
- Trials, which are 12-player “raid”-type instances for Veteran Rank characters, featuring completion time leaderboards
- Death recap: you can now see who killed you and what ability they were using. This is invaluable information in dungeons, PvP, and Craglorn
- Underdog bonuses in Cyrodiil—you’ll get more Alliance Points and XP while fighting for an alliance with a lower population in your campaign
- Animation tweaks and polish
- Combat ability balance changes and fixes
- Class ability tweaks and updates
- Content bug fixes, especially edge cases where quests could become de-synced
- And much, much more—check out the final patch notes when they are posted in the forums
Based on the patch-log, it’s clear that the update is more or less finished, and after some extensive testing, will make its way to public servers. This is likely to occur before the launch of Elder Scrolls Online on the PS4 and Xbox One. But things aren’t stopping here. Bethesda and Zenimax are well aware that a lot of things still need improving, and they are certainly paying attention to player feedback, complaints and critical reviews. Matt Frior also provided us with some hints of what we can expect once Update 1 is successfully launched:
- A system that allows grouped players to see each other even when they’re in different phases
- A justice system—steal from and kill NPCs and deal with the consequences if you are caught
- Migration of European Megaserver to our European datacenter.
- Field of View (FOV) adjustment
- Armor dyeing and tinting
- Two new Veteran Dungeons: Crypt of Hearts and City of Ash
- New region of Craglorn with a new Trial (the Serpent)
- Increased ability to pick up items in the world
- Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood storyline and quests.
- Spellcrafting
- Horse Racing
- Dragonstar Arena—similar to Trials, but built for a group of four
- Improvements to fishing
- Crafting system improvements
- Improved Looking for Group system
- Better NPC facial animations
- Guild functionality updates: guild store interface updates, customizable guild insignias, tabards, and guild ranks, and Guild Kiosks—guild stores open to everyone that are available to the highest-bidding guild.
- Auto-leveling dungeons that level to your group leader
- Awards when you repeat dungeons
- Imperial City PvP dungeon
Alright, that’s quite a lot. Don’t expect to see everything to drop in at once, but these changes and additions will likely provide subscribers with their money’s worth of things to do. More customization can’t hurt, and the possibility of tweaking the look of your armor through tints and dye is a welcome addition. Let’s just hope it won’t be an in-game cash-shop addition. Other things that are sticking out are Spellcrafting, which might hint at even more complex builds and the much desired Dark Brotherhood storyline, which many Elder Scrolls fans had been hoping to see in ESO.
Last, but not least, Matt Frior understands how frustrating constant downtimes have been for players who were eagerly trying to explore the end-game content of Elder Scrolls Online. Almost not a single day went by when the servers weren’t taken down for at least a couple hours, and these downtimes, while necessary, do tend to add up. Considering it’s a game you have to pay a monthly subscription for, it’s nice to see Zenimax is acknowledging this aspect. As a consequence, those who had an active subscription prior to the 1st of May will be getting an additional 5 days of free play-time on their accounts as compensation. It might not seem like much, but it’s a nice gesture, and players will likely react positively to the news.
Matt Frior’s post is an extensive one, so if you want to read up on the details yourself, feel free to take a look at it on the official Elder Scrolls Online website.