Morrowind expansion discussion, Spoilerific discussion of the new Morrowind content Options

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

How do templars balance wielding heavy melee weapons with their magical abilities?

Quite simply, they don't. Since you don't get magicka back from melee weapon attacks, using melee weapons on any magicka build is purely aesthetic. For story content that's usually fine though.

So basically if you are wanting to play a mage/warrior hybrid, it would be best to just go ahead and focus on magicka with a staff ability bar and then perhaps do your special class magic abilities on the other bar tied to a melee weapon? Would that be right?

[Acadian]

Magic-based characters focus on staves and class abilities. For every class, most class abilities favor magic.

Stamina-based characters focus on stamina weapons and slip in just a few of their class abilities that either have a stamina morph or magic skills that deliver results that do not scale with magic.

The primary successful exception to this is tanks. They are generally a true hybrid character focusing on health to survive, stamina to block and magic for special abilities. The price they pay for extra health and splitting resources between stamina and magicka is that, though they can take a real beating to protect others, they have poor damage and must rely on others for damage.

You will see some interesting and successful variants. For example, some damage-focused magplars wield 2 swords but never hit with them. They rely only on casting magic abilities. The reasons they carry 2 swords are twofold. First, they get an extra enchantment slot. Second, the top passive for dual swords in +5% to ALL damage. The price they pay is in sustain - no staff heavy attacks to regen magicka unless they slot one on the back bar.

Similarly, you will sometimes see magsorcs with twin daggers. Same reasoning except, since magsorcs are reliant on crit %, they benefit from the twin dagger top passive of +5% to crit %.

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

So on weapons enchants you don't need to hit with them to gain the benefit of their enchant?

[Acadian]

If you mean enchants, then (like poisons) they won't do you much good if you are carrying the weapon only for one of the passive perks I mentioned. Traits on weapons, however, apply fine as long as the weapons are equipped.

[Grits]

The cutscene with Mannimarco is neat. I wish they had included it from the beginning. The stuff that Lyris and The Prophet tell you makes more sense once you’ve seen yourself be sacrificed. I didn’t plan on going the Coldharbour route again, but new Jerric was too curious not to talk to the Hooded Figure. *sigh*

Also The Prophet must have launched him extra hard out of Coldharbour this time, because he experienced a hard landing.

Some shots from the sacrifice cutscene:

You seem to be in the same situation as the bald guy who is walking in front of you

This does not look good

My turn (I failed to catch the previous sacrifice’s body being yanked from the altar)

Dude, put down the knife and let’s talk

Dead

But death is not the end



Khajiit, I use the Pelinal’s Aptitude crafted set for hybrid builds. It is not ideal, but it is the closest I have come to having a character feel like a battlemage.

[Acadian]

Grits, thanks for the screenies. Oooh, I'm so glad Buffy left Meanimarco writhing in perpetual torment last time we saw him!


I am unhappy about two things relating to Spike the clannfear that really hurt Buffy the Bowgirl (stamsorc). The clannfear no longer autoheals between skirmishes. His self heal is expensive to use for a stamsorc so repeatedly using it is problematic. When Buffy is stealthed at range and tells Spike to attack, he instantly draws aggro instead of the game waiting until he actually closed the distance and bit. That tends to compromise Buffy's position earlier than she wants. The heal thing is the bigger and more problematic concern.

Since neither of these 'changes' were mentioned in the patch notes, I'm hoping they are unintended bugs to be fixed. Playing a bow stam sorc that uses a pet is already as challenging as we can deal with. These extra zingers, if not fixed, may cause her game to become too tedious to bother with.

For the pet using magsorc, these bugs aren't a big problem since she sits on a mountain of magic, can shield her pets and strikes with the power of a thunderstorm.

This post has been edited by Acadian: May 23 2017, 06:36 PM

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

If you mean enchants, then (like poisons) they won't do you much good if you are carrying the weapon only for one of the passive perks I mentioned. Traits on weapons, however, apply fine as long as the weapons are equipped.

Does the dual weapons thing work for a waraxe and sword as well as two swords?

Khajiit, I use the Pelinal’s Aptitude crafted set for hybrid builds. It is not ideal, but it is the closest I have come to having a character feel like a battlemage.

Oh thanks for the tip! Khajiit will have Mira be on the lookout for this station.

[Acadian]

Here's the write up of Dual Wield's top passive:

Grants a bonus based on the type of weapon equipped: Each axe gives your melee attacks a 8% chance to bleed enemies for 2310 Physical Damage over 6 seconds. Each mace causes your attacks to ignore 10% of an enemy's Physical Resistance. Each sword increases your damage done by 2.5%. Each dagger increases your Weapon Critical rating.

Note the dual swords applies to ALL damage (even magic damage). I misspoke regarding dual daggers; as you can see they only boost weapon crit%. It is stamsorcs who normally DW daggers due to this. Their critical surge sorc ability lets them heal on crit hits so they want a very high crit rating.

If you use 2 of the same weapon you get 2x that weapon type bonus. If you use 2 diff weapon types you get 1x the bonus for each weapon. So it depends what you want to get from it.

Again though, for a magic character the choice is dual swords carried only to boost all damage.

[Grits]

Acadian, how did Buffy direct Spike to attack a target from stealth before this update? I have never been able to figure out a way other than attacking the target myself, which has limited the clannfear’s usefulness. Bad news for Elke about the clannfear healing. She has to dole out her magicka carefully so that she gets healed when she needs it. Thank you for the warning.

Today on a guild chat channel someone was asking everyone to describe their Warden so that they could get some ideas/get hyped. Jerric supplied, “Huge Nord pooping out health flowers.” So far that seems pretty accurate.

Oh, magplar Jerric used to carry his sword and board for occasional use of the weapon line's taunt ability. Now he can do that with a frost staff. But he misses carrying a shield.

This post has been edited by Grits: May 23 2017, 10:29 PM

[Acadian]

To command pets to attack, you hold down the 'command pets' button, while targeting and doing a 'light attack' on the target. No attack will go off, instead, your pet(s) will attack that target. I do this all the time on PC but I'm under the impression that you can't do it on game consoles.

Before MW, Spike would charge in but not alert the foe until he drew first blood. By then he had solid aggro and Buffy could safely attack from stealthed range. For a stamsorc with clannfear, Dark Exchange will help a lot since you can trade stam for mag and hp. Both the aggro change and loss of autohealing between skirmishes were introduced coincident with MW. Since there is not a peep about either change in the patch notes, I'm really hoping it is a bug. As I've said, a bowsorc is too much of a challenge to accept anything making it harder/less fun.

It is a completely different proposition with Buffy the magsorc. When she has the pets open combat, Spike charges, Drusilla fires lightning bolts and Buffy slides to one side. The foe will get hit by Dru's lightning bolt first and charge right through Spike after Dru- but not before Spike gets a bite on him. About the time foe reaches Dru, she is dancing to avoid him and he decides that Spike is a better target after all, so he turns to meet Spike. All this time he's running back and forth, Buffy has laid down a solid carpet of thunderstorm under his feet and is pummeling with high damage. She can also shield and heal both pets at will. So very different, but ultimately much more potent package than the stambowsorc.

It is great fun to hear about Jerric's wardish adventures as he poops out healing flowers! The warden does look interesting but I think I'm going to wait to let the bugs and dust settle.

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

Here's the write up of Dual Wield's top passive:

Grants a bonus based on the type of weapon equipped: Each axe gives your melee attacks a 8% chance to bleed enemies for 2310 Physical Damage over 6 seconds. Each mace causes your attacks to ignore 10% of an enemy's Physical Resistance. Each sword increases your damage done by 2.5%. Each dagger increases your Weapon Critical rating.

Note the dual swords applies to ALL damage (even magic damage). I misspoke regarding dual daggers; as you can see they only boost weapon crit%. It is stamsorcs who normally DW daggers due to this. Their critical surge sorc ability lets them heal on crit hits so they want a very high crit rating.

If you use 2 of the same weapon you get 2x that weapon type bonus. If you use 2 diff weapon types you get 1x the bonus for each weapon. So it depends what you want to get from it.

Again though, for a magic character the choice is dual swords carried only to boost all damage.

Ok got it. Looks like Brenna is just going to be a staff kind of gal, lol

[monkeyemoness]

I know no one wants to hear me whining, but did anyone else feel like Vvardenfell was...unfinished? Not just Vivec, mind, but it's almost like they didn't complete everything in time and just decided to close things off.

I know they did this with Craglorn on launch so maybe they're planning to expand in the future? They said something to this effect as far as the Sheogorad region goes. (Not on the list to things to do, but is considered, anyways).

This post has been edited by monkeyemoness: May 24 2017, 04:59 AM

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

I know no one wants to hear me whining, but did anyone else feel like Vvardenfell was...unfinished? Not just Vivec, mind, but it's almost like they didn't complete everything in time and just decided to close things off.

I know they did this with Craglorn on launch so maybe they're planning to expand in the future? They said something to this effect as far as the Sheogorad region goes. (Not on the list to things to do, but is considered, anyways).

As Ghastly said earlier in the thread:

I'm sure they'll find a way to profit from adding it later.

Lol

[mALX]

Incoming screenie dump, excuse the PTS watermarks:

A familiar sight

Some great armour designs

Buoyant Armiger

Telvanni guard

Militant Ordinator

New bugs

New...birds?

Silt strider

Vivec city

Vivec interior

Telvanni towers

Telvanni interior

Telvanni furniture

Ashlanders

Ashlands

Old new friend

Ooh, you got Divayth Fyr !!! I just met him yesterday for the first time, not sure how I missed him on the PTS, because I did that trial - I think because he looked so young that it never occurred to me that it was Divayth, so didn't notice his name, lol.

Oh so now the game starts in Morrowind? What about the Coldharbour stuff?

By starting in Morrowind, you don't "officially" become Soul Shriven until you set foot on the mainland and take the quest--kickstarting the beginning in Coldharbour without the tutorial bits. The game still functions as if you were though, lmao. I didn't get to see it myself, but apparently they put the intro cutscene back into the game that was removed with Tamriel Unlimited. The one where you get to watch the PC get sacrificed.

Anyways, I didn't get too far into the Morrowind storyline while in Beta, but I did explore a bit. My opinion of it was between "this is great!" and "this is too empty." It was advertised that exploration would be rewarding so I expect more than what you can find in vanilla (and you can find some neat things in out of the way locations), but then again I didn't explore too thoroughly.

Also, they decided to keep the rancid female Dunmer outfits, which is even worse because practically everything else fits Morrowind's aesthetic. It isn't as bad as the concept art, but jesus are the designs jarringly out of place. who greenlit this? Why weren't they limited to the mainland, where it would make more sense (especially if you take it as an imitation of Almalexia's...outfit....) A better alternative, IMO Like I said, the male outfits are basically what's displayed there. :T

Anyways, that rant aside, I figure I can share what I'm going for with my Warden once I decide to buy the expansion.

1, 2

The name was just a placeholder (that was taken, I ultimately went with Nord in Development) I'm mostly concerned about the hair and face. I guess I can ultimately go with that but idk. I got time to work on it I guess. Personality-wise, he's supposed to be a blend of Jo'zira and Eolan (there is a very good reason for this). As for Backstory...eh, gotta work on that too.

Great looking Warden!

I kind of agree with you on the main questline - almost too easy, but fun! I was hoping for it to be a bit harder; more involved from the sound of the build up Zen gave it. It ended too quickly, in my (humble) opinion.

Aw man. No Cephalopod helm for Telvanni guards?

Not yet? I'm sure they'll find a way to profit from adding it later.

Best addition so far has to be the new songs added to the lute emote. Haa-Rei has been rocking out in the Sadrith Mora town square.

Speaking of Sadrith Mora - the Telvanni house isn't yet purchasable but it's listed as a 'notable' home so it's likely going to be reeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaally expensive.

Yes, the outside of it looked Awesome, but I wasn't very impressed with the size or look of the interior. I think the only draw inside would be the transporter.

Datamining has been done and tbh, two of the hairs caught my eye.

This one's for maybe replicating one of my Skyrim characters in ESO now that there's a frost/healing class. (maybe...oh, hey!
I completely forgot that until recently he was my avatar here!)

This one probably for my warden, since in my mind he always had Eolan's hair and I didn't want to repeat it on another character.

Wait, THAT is your avatar here? I ... Uh ... your avatar looks like a baby alligator hatching from its egg, am I ... huh?

Second: Did you say those characters are from Skyrim? That game does not look like Skyrim to me, Wow !!! I think I need a quick trip to the eye doctor here!!!

[mALX]

The cutscene with Mannimarco is neat. I wish they had included it from the beginning. The stuff that Lyris and The Prophet tell you makes more sense once you’ve seen yourself be sacrificed. I didn’t plan on going the Coldharbour route again, but new Jerric was too curious not to talk to the Hooded Figure. *sigh*

Also The Prophet must have launched him extra hard out of Coldharbour this time, because he experienced a hard landing.

Some shots from the sacrifice cutscene:

You seem to be in the same situation as the bald guy who is walking in front of you

This does not look good

My turn (I failed to catch the previous sacrifice’s body being yanked from the altar)

Dude, put down the knife and let’s talk

Dead

But death is not the end



Khajiit, I use the Pelinal’s Aptitude crafted set for hybrid builds. It is not ideal, but it is the closest I have come to having a character feel like a battlemage.

This is so cool! I wish Zen would quit cutting the great stuff from the game and/or nerfing it!

I know no one wants to hear me whining, but did anyone else feel like Vvardenfell was...unfinished? Not just Vivec, mind, but it's almost like they didn't complete everything in time and just decided to close things off.

I know they did this with Craglorn on launch so maybe they're planning to expand in the future? They said something to this effect as far as the Sheogorad region goes. (Not on the list to things to do, but is considered, anyways).

I was hugely disappointed in the Clockwork City. I was so excited to be going there based on the previews Zen put out; but on going though it = it was a whole bunch of gorgeous nothing. Barely any enemies, absolutely no loot; way too easy to avoid the traps ... what was all the hype for? It was a lot less than I thought it would be.

Do I feel they pushed it out half finished = not quite that bad. But do I feel they will add to it over time = yes, and in my (humble) opinion = they had better, lol.

[monkeyemoness]

Datamining has been done and tbh, two of the hairs caught my eye.

This one's for maybe replicating one of my Skyrim characters in ESO now that there's a frost/healing class. (maybe...oh, hey!
I completely forgot that until recently he was my avatar here!)

This one probably for my warden, since in my mind he always had Eolan's hair and I didn't want to repeat it on another character.

Wait, THAT is your avatar here? I ... Uh ... your avatar looks like a baby alligator hatching from its egg, am I ... huh?

Second: Did you say those characters are from Skyrim? That game does not look like Skyrim to me, Wow !!! I think I need a quick trip to the eye doctor here!!!

Oh, my current avatar is from this comic. I recently changed it to that.

The avatar I had before was of my Skyrim character, which wasn't supposed to stay as long as it did.

I'm guessing these hairs are coming with the Dwemer Crown Crate rewards and once I get access to Wardens, I'm shooting for both hairs so I can use one of them to recreate one of my Skyrim characters. He Approve


Anyways, as far as the Clockwork City goes, they said that this isn't supposed to be THE Clockwork City, but just a small section of it. A preview, in some ways. We're still getting that Clockwork City DLC, Morrowind just sort of leads into it a little more.

It's not like the plot progress hasn't been drip fed to us for longer than it should have, though. :V

This post has been edited by monkeyemoness: May 26 2017, 12:04 AM

[mALX]

Datamining has been done and tbh, two of the hairs caught my eye.

This one's for maybe replicating one of my Skyrim characters in ESO now that there's a frost/healing class. (maybe...oh, hey!
I completely forgot that until recently he was my avatar here!)

This one probably for my warden, since in my mind he always had Eolan's hair and I didn't want to repeat it on another character.

Wait, THAT is your avatar here? I ... Uh ... your avatar looks like a baby alligator hatching from its egg, am I ... huh?

Second: Did you say those characters are from Skyrim? That game does not look like Skyrim to me, Wow !!! I think I need a quick trip to the eye doctor here!!!

Oh, my current avatar is from this comic. I recently changed it to that.

The avatar I had before was of my Skyrim character, which wasn't supposed to stay as long as it did.

I'm guessing these hairs are coming with the Dwemer Crown Crate rewards and once I get access to Wardens, I'm shooting for both hairs so I can use one of them to recreate one of my Skyrim characters. He Approve


Anyways, as far as the Clockwork City goes, they said that this isn't supposed to be THE Clockwork City, but just a small section of it. A preview, in some ways. We're still getting that Clockwork City DLC, Morrowind just sort of leads into it a little more.

It's not like the plot progress hasn't been drip fed to us for longer than it should have, though. :V

Oh, I DO remember that avatar !!!! That comic you posted = !!!!

[RaderOfTheLostArk]

I must be a real cheapskate. I haven't bought the expansion yet. I really want it, I'm sure it is going to worth the money, and I think the game has earned my support, but I have to be careful how much I spend right now. I could afford the game, but with grad school coming up I just have to be wary about any purchases I make. I've had to spend a bunch of money on stuff lately too.

I probably could afford to buy the expansion, but I'm going to hold off for now. I definitely plan to get it in the near future though. It's going to be awesome seeing those familiar sights and faces again. Well, except for Vivec. [censored] that guy. Pretty cool that Divayth Fyr is in the game though.

[monkeyemoness]

idk mang, I don't think any of us would blame you if you prioritize real life over a game.

[monkeyemoness]

Anyways, it seems that Morrowind is currently selling for 18% off on quite a few of the game retail websites on Zenimax's "official" list. Question is, do I go for it or wait to see if it drops any more? The thing officially goes live next week so idk. Apparently I got till release to decide if GamersGate's countdown clock is any indication.

EDIT; Welp, I got it. Still gonna wait a bit to start, tho

This post has been edited by monkeyemoness: Jun 2 2017, 12:07 AM