Pocket Guide to Visioning Your Character

Unfortunately I have come to witness many of our forum members having incorrect visions of how they are capable of customizing their characters, with lists of abilities from previous Elder Scrolls games, multiple weapons of choice and multiple magic schools.

That is not how you are capable of customizing your character, and I understand that some may want to dream, but in keep in mind that unrealistic expectations lead to unhealthy hype towards the game, and will in the end damage your overall experience as a whole from the first minute you set into the game.

Because of hope that people let go of these unrealistic expectations, so that they can enjoy the game without sense of disappointment from the beginning, I have decided to make a small guide how you should imagine your character.

The first step is choosing the class (Such as Templar or Dragonknight), now while we do not have a lot of information about these classes. One can imagine a Templar could specialize in two things; casting side and melee side.

The next step to take is supporting the vision of your characters role is to choose your armor type. Lets say we are rolling that Templar caster that focuses purely on magic instead of melee. Now, do we want to have heavy armor (health-based), medium armor (stamina based) or light armor (magicka based)? Let's go for light armor, whatever that grants surely supports our casting role.

Next step we want is to choose our weapon. Since we expect our Templar to be a nuking caster, we don't expect him to fare well in melee, do we? Let's pick staves, they certainly have some passives that assist us in our role.

So now we have the base: Class, class specialization, armor and weapon.

Then comes the abilities. With the recent information you can pick at least 4 class abilties, ultimate & weapon skill, possibly even more class and weapon skills.

Since we don't know even 10% of the games abilities, I'll just state the obvious:

(Ability) Sun Strike - High damage attack that grants a HoT
(Ability) Sun Fire - a ranged nuke that has a chance to snare
(Ability) Rushed Ceremony - AoE group Heal
(Ability) Some defensive ultimate ability
(Weapon skills) Some stuff that support our ranged nuker role.

Now, we have 2 nukes, 1 AoE heal, 1 defensive ultimate and two abilities from staves that support our ranged Templar nuker.

In conclusion, the format will be:

- Class of your choice
- Specialization: Ranged attacker / Ranged Nuker / Tanky Healer / Pure healer / Melee / Stealth and so on (Keep in mind that this role should be visioned as limited to 1 thing)
- Armor of your choice (Support on health / mana / stamina)
- Weapon of your choice to augment your specialization (Not necessary, but natural step would be to pick weaponry according to your role)
- Skill set that specializes you in your visioned specialization. Example of Templar Nuker above.

This is a realistic view of what your character will turn out to be.

Very realistic, but it more or less contradicts what the devs have said. Although this is a good aim, and would pretty obviously be able to be done, if everyone used the format you posted, then in a mere group of say, 50 people, you wouldn't even be that unique. I'm not sure if this is aimed to be purely realistic regarding class customization or what, but, I don't think one "special" (ranged this, stealth that, bla bla) role is the aim for TESO. This is making is seem like there is no point in even having not much-to none class restriction that the devs have oh so spoken about.

Of course, you don't want to stupidly contradict yourself by going daggers & sneak with heavy armor, but you also don't want to limit yourself with well.. this. You can be a archer with a destruction rune. Some builds will take longer to perfect than others, a pure healer will probably do much better than a half warrior half healer hybrid in a short race, but in a long race, the warrior/healer hybrid would eventually start getting more and more advantages over the person who chose pure healer.

As a last example, my character is going to be a 1H Sword & Rune user, while switching my rune with another sword (assuming there is weapon hotkeys), and using destruction and conjuration runes. I'm going to be using a mostly mage based class as well, with light or medium armor, frequently switching between my pure-melee and spellsword styles depending on the situation.

In short - yes, this is very realistic and reasonable, but I highly doubt it is going to be as limited as: "DK with 2 handed swords and heavy armor, with some restoration runes", but more like "DK with dual swords and medium armor, with some destruction runes mixed in.". Of course. So, I just believe that as long as it isn't in contradiction with your class pick, then you should be able to work it out. Like the devs said, classes are just starting points. The devs would be sadly mistaken if this is as far as class customization goes.

Edit: Ok, just confirming that is what you meant.

(February 25th 2013, 02:30 AM)Hero of Kvatch "Mad God Wrote: Very realistic, but it more or less contradicts what the devs have said. Although this is a good aim, and would pretty obviously be able to be done, if everyone used the format you posted, then in a mere group of say, 50 people, you wouldn't even be that unique. I'm not sure if this is aimed to be purely realistic regarding class customization or what, but, I don't think one "special" (ranged this, stealth that, bla bla) role is the aim for TESO. This is making is seem like there is no point in even having not much-to none class restriction that the devs have oh so spoken about.

Of course, you don't want to stupidly contradict yourself by going daggers & sneak with heavy armor, but you also don't want to limit yourself with well.. this. You can be a archer with a destruction rune. Some builds will take longer to perfect than others, a pure healer will probably do much better than a half warrior half healer hybrid in a short race, but in a long race, the warrior/healer hybrid would eventually start getting more and more advantages over the person who chose pure healer.

As a last example, my character is going to be a 1H Sword & Rune user, while switching my rune with another sword (assuming there is weapon hotkeys), and using destruction and conjuration runes. I'm going to be using a mostly mage based class as well, with light or medium armor, frequently switching between my pure-melee and spellsword styles depending on the situation.

In short - yes, this is very realistic and reasonable, but I highly doubt it is going to be as limited as: "DK with 2 handed swords and heavy armor, with some restoration runes", but more like "DK with dual swords and medium armor, with some destruction runes mixed in.". Of course. So, I just believe that as long as it isn't in contradiction with your class pick, then you should be able to work it out. Like the devs said, classes are just starting points. The devs would be sadly mistaken if this is as far as class customization goes.

Correct, naturally the characters will be more specialized into something, and I left out the leveling (hp/sta/mana nodes) from it. Its just how people should essentially first hand vision their character. That's not how they should build their characters, as we lack information regarding character builds as whole. But the point of the thread is to give people a realistic expectation of how their characters will be fleshed out, when put shortly.

"Caster nuker templar" would be a short description of someones build, however characters that could be classified into this category can vary by a ton.

Its funny but thats pretty much how i see my Templar being, people will almost certainly look @ your post and think its a hey do it like this, which i am sure it wasnt intended as its just to show people that dont know that ESO is a totally different mechanic than say skyrim and that the perks and weapons, armour, will do different shit than previous TES games so theres no point in having a perk wish list.

(February 25th 2013, 10:22 AM)murderdoll Wrote: Its funny but thats pretty much how i see my Templar being, people will almost certainly look @ your post and think its a hey do it like this, which i am sure it wasnt intended as its just to show people that dont know that ESO is a totally different mechanic than say skyrim and that the perks and weapons, armour, will do different shit than previous TES games so theres no point in having a perk wish list.

The thread's idea is to set false hopes straight, that's its priority. But yeah at its best it could give people some ideas.

I have a feeling that character development will be largely based on the perk system; chasing certain perks by leveling the appropriate skills and health/sta/mag.

Since we don't know what those perks are yet, it's rather difficult to discuss character development outside of the very general terms you laid out.

After reviewing the available perks, one might very well decide to go in a totally different direction.

I understand what your saying here @"Nehemia", and I like that you've made this post. Its a good description.

My question is though, do we REALLY know how limited these ability trees will be, in regards to each class? I got the impression by the descriptions Ive seen that, at higher levels the trees will open up to the point that most abilities will be available for most players to build. Understandably, early on your choice of "class" will limit your abilities, but it sounded to me that their intent was to make most choices open to most (or all) classes eventually.

Is this how you read it or do you think it will be more limited by "class" choice all the way through?

(March 8th 2013, 08:02 PM)Balkoth Wrote: I understand what your saying here @"Nehemia", and I like that you've made this post. Its a good description.

My question is though, do we REALLY know how limited these ability trees will be, in regards to each class? I got the impression by the descriptions Ive seen that, at higher levels the trees will open up to the point that most abilities will be available for most players to build. Understandably, early on your choice of "class" will limit your abilities, but it sounded to me that their intent was to make most choices open to most (or all) classes eventually.

Is this how you read it or do you think it will be more limited by "class" choice all the way through?

Your character's class will be restricted in a way that you will not be capable of using abilities from other classes ability trees or list. Then there are the universal "Perks" such as Werewolf & vampire we have little on. (My guess the following are ultimate transformation abilities, but its just a hunch). And perks we gain from somewhere else, such as weapons armor and possibly birth signs.

On our hotbar we will have 4 class related abilities and 2 weapon based abilities. As poster from above stated, the character customization will most likely be heavily based on you hauling the perks you think will fit your role. So the open class environment does not exist, but classes can use same abilities regarding weapons, it was recently come to light that for example staves have different "trees" to give out specializations, such as healing.

So ultimately my guess will be we will call our classes with the following format (Shadowbane had similar customization system and they used the same): [Armor Weapon Perk/Spec class]

Where Armor & Perks will be mentioned if out of the ordinary, spec equals specialization, a broad and vague descriptive word for your character. Such as "Nuker" = Specialized in dealing damage with magic from range. However it tells nothing from your choices in the end.

Examples:
Cloth Bow Nuker DK
Axe Tank Templar
HA Staff Werewolf sorcerer
Cloth 2h Procblade

Interesting. I hope it does go this way. I like the idea of some variety, but I think too much would make it real messy. Personally I want some uniqueness and permanence to my class choice, otherwise whats the point. Im betting Stam/HP/Mana end up playing a major part in builds too, considering what we know so far. (I understand why you left it out of this though)

In that case crafting or other such abilities will most likely fall under universal perks then, with armor having its own universal "skill trees", and probably using trainers to start crafting skills.

sounds good well, at least gives some of us an idea of how we want our characters thanks :)

I suppose I'll post my character.

- Class: Sorcerer
- Specialization: DPS Caster/Secondary Healer
- Armor: Light
- Weapon: Primary; Staff (Frost) Secondary; Staff (Healing)
- Skills: Unknown, focused on AoE and CC as well as high damage spells.

This game skill tree will be different than the originals games. I will have to think better.

Here is the gist of what my character would be according to your layout.

- Class: Dragon Knight
- Specialization: Melee dps / crowd controller
- Armor: Heavy
- Weapon: Two handed great axe (Possible with axe and shield at times depending on the situation. )
- Skill focus: Skills focused on dealing out fast and hard damage whilst keeping the enemy either snared, rooted, slowed, stunned ect.

Goal of this setup: A big focus on hunting down healer types in the back lines of pvp as well as lighter armored dps and ranged classes, using the cc to effectively cripple their group support or stop a dps from taking out another member of my team

On the pve side of things this setup would do best as a supporting offensive tank type, possibly working with another tank to distract enemy's and mobs, keeping the heat off of our less armored and weaker group members. But then again who knows how the AI is going to react in TESO such a plan could be thrown off by shear randomness of the Monsters actions.

This setups main weaknesses will be against very defensive types that can outlast it's damage through survivability and slowly kill you off.

In other words..Don't fight straight tanks.

Another weakness will be multiple ranged foes, this setup in game may or may not have enough CC or utility ability's to keep two ranged players held down at the same time which will result in you running after one or the other whilst they both run about and fill your guts full of arrows.

Remember how many other skill trees are out there though as well. Especially things like the fighter's guild line, I'm betting will have some active abilities too. At least I really hope that those 3 "class" slots aren't just class skill line but like "play style" slots. So if I had a spell I learned from the mages guild I could put it there. Least I hope. And I agree with @Hero of Kvatch "Mad God" in that only actual class and racial lines are unique to you and those whom you share class/race with. Everything else is available to all that want a certain line. Just so that's clear :) but yah I really like the idea behind what you mean, it would really suck for the game in general if tons of people thought that the amount of freedom in terms of skills like in skyrim were in this game. Probably one of the worst feelings ever is getting super hyped about a video game and then realizing one of the most exciting things in it isn't as good as you expected. Just soul crushing. So thanks for helping show that we will have a little restriction in terms of skills, to help keep each character unique!

(April 14th 2013, 09:32 PM)Gor Guzkhal DreadTusk Wrote: Here is the gist of what my character would be according to your layout.

- Class: Dragon Knight
- Specialization: Melee dps / crowd controller
- Armor: Heavy
- Weapon: Two handed great axe (Possible with axe and shield at times depending on the situation. )
- Skill focus: Skills focused on dealing out fast and hard damage whilst keeping the enemy either snared, rooted, slowed, stunned ect.

Goal of this setup: A big focus on hunting down healer types in the back lines of pvp as well as lighter armored dps and ranged classes, using the cc to effectively cripple their group support or stop a dps from taking out another member of my team

On the pve side of things this setup would do best as a supporting offensive tank type, possibly working with another tank to distract enemy's and mobs, keeping the heat off of our less armored and weaker group members. But then again who knows how the AI is going to react in TESO such a plan could be thrown off by shear randomness of the Monsters actions.

This setups main weaknesses will be against very defensive types that can outlast it's damage through survivability and slowly kill you off.

In other words..Don't fight straight tanks.

Another weakness will be multiple ranged foes, this setup in game may or may not have enough CC or utility ability's to keep two ranged players held down at the same time which will result in you running after one or the other whilst they both run about and fill your guts full of arrows.

Here's something for you to consider; Getting regen & heals to support you. For example Magma armor is a wonderful ultimate for the job you're planning to do (As enemies will certainly target call you down). Magma armor caps the incoming damage to 3% of max health and creates an passive aoe damage aura around you. This skill supported with Dragon blood, an ability that instantly heals for x% of your max health combined with 40% health regen afterwards. These kind of abilities hand out excellent survivability and allow you to allocate points from Health to stamina and mana. Keep in mind though that if your health is too high for Magma armor, DoT's aren't capped at that 3%, which means if the enemy target caller yells you to be DoT'ed, you're bleeding to death in matter of seconds. With low health, the DoT's will hit the cap, and 1 dot tick may not deal more than 3% of max health, to add to this; Your regen is significantly more effective percentage wise, allowing you to possibly outregen your opponents DoT's.

Just some theorycrafting.