WOOOOOOOOOOT !!!!!!!!!!!!





There are enormous numbers of people registering at once, so it may take a while and may be slow, etc = but I suspect starting your registration before the free trial launched may have caused a bump. You might want to contact the support team at either Steam or ZOS and see if you can get that free trial activated properly despite jumping the gun.

Well hopefully they will post the December Crown Store Showcase tomorrow. It would be nice to know what’s coming out (haven’t forgotten about the pinnacle Orc house for Rider).

I logged off this morning and revisited to create a second account for the trial, which got the download link immediately. So I left the download running when I came in to work. Hopefully this evening, I can find out how to use the client with the other account. If, not my "ghastleytrial" character will be a disposable test one.

That may be a good thing anyway, as from what I've read, builds seem to be complicated, and need up-front decisions, rather than being left to evolve.

Yes, on the builds; you get a much more developed character if you plan one out. I made my NightBlade through a lot of trial and error; which you won't have time for in a trial period. "Alcast" or "Sypher" have good builds if you want to use a template example of some good working builds; you can Google their name and find a build in their lists that you think might suit your play style and desires for a character.

What you do with those is use a build like Alcast or Sypher as a basis build for your character; but then tweak it to meet your own preferences.

Example: I used Alcast's "Stamina Tank" as a basis for my Tank; but then tweaked it to more suit my own capabilities and playstyle = and after talking to experienced Tanks I switched the stamina levels he used to health instead; to get a much more sustainable Tank. Britta turned out perfect for my needs, (but without his build as a basis I was kind of lost at where to begin).

And Sypher makes fantastic overpowered builds, but you have to be in the game a while to find and obtain the armors you need to really achieve what he does with his builds.

If you are looking to play a Templar or Sorc, ASK ACADIAN! You can't do better than him for advice on either of them; he has studied those builds extensively for years and knows exactly what makes a completely Awesome build on both of them.










** And by the way, I forgot to mention this above: They took down the game this morning for maintenance; probably to fix the issue so many were having getting on that free trial period. So we are all not enjoying the delay with you.

December Crown Store Showcase

Rider, the Pinnacle home is on there!!

Also, a pretty, festive horse, and a wide brim hat with one side folded up!

When I left home this morning, I estimated the download had at least another hour to run, and I'll probably get home to a prompt for the actual installation. I'll then probably spend hours just playing with the Chargen process.

This. Khajiit remembers when he first started playing, he agonized over the kind of character to start off with on day one. He kept tweaking features and changing races and classes, it was madness! This one didn’t actually start playing the game until the next day!

That being said, it wasn’t much different than when a main TES or Fallout game launches. Khajiit always spends an inordinate amount of time in Chargen!

Oooh, thanks so much for posting this !!!








Yes, my first character took a LONG time to make; and she came out Awesome...but way too tall = she is taller than most other characters around her, lol. I made sure to be careful about not adding too much height (or in most cases to shorten slightly) my subsequent characters,







Ditto.

Running under plan B, with the "ghastleytrial" account and disposable character, Fleur gra-Borghak.

Took my first screenshot!

And yes, it runs well enough at 5760x1080 that I'm not tempted to change.

Ah, looks like you made it to High Rock. Care to share your thoughts so far?

I've only scratched the surface. There are still a lot of things I just don't know how to do, as the game can't give much tutorial without getting in everyone else's way. The Main Quest pushes you as much as it does in the Single-payer games, so I've been following that mostly, as I won't see all of it in a free weekend anyway, so I may as well explore it for any real character later. Then again, I could say the same for the world in general.

Suffered a bit from judging my battles as playing solo, and having other players drawing extra enemies to my vicinity, but equally benefitted from their clearing a path for me, so it evens out.

Game looks good, but the complexity is a bit off-putting. I'm currently trying to figure out repair. Does that only apply to armour? I had a weapon that suited play-style, and was additionally part of a set, but it wore out. If I can't do anything, I'll deconstruct and move on.

I suspect that I won't be able to craft in additional styles during the trial, so I'm ignoring appearance. And knowing where to find the right materials will only come with experience, too. She's using quest rewards mostly.

We're nearly at level 15, where the second bar cuts in. I want to explore that dynamic and see what it offers. And at the end, I'll probably switch to travel and exploration, to decide where to play if I buy the game.

WOO HOO! Looks like Fleur is in Daggerfall, too!

Was the weapon in question enchanted? If so, then the health of the weapon gets changed to “charge”, in which case you’ll simply need a soul gem to recharge it. Armor can be repaired with repair kits regardless of whether or not it’s enchanted (and it really should be).

For crafting gear, you will start off knowing your particular race’s style and you can acquire knowledge of other races’ styles by reading special books. Some motifs will have chapters you have to collect to learn every piece of gear in the style (ex: Malacath style legs, helmets, swords (which includes greatswords), etc.).

Yes, likely was enchanted, and the recharge mechanism is another thing the game hasn't pointed out to me. Soul gems are sparse, and it may be one of the game aspects I won't have time for in the trial. Such as researching traits, where those times add up too quickly.

I need to try a few new weapon types, too. She's just been using one- and two-handed melee so far, as that's where her skills are. So no ranged, which would help. I don't recall any bows dropping that she could have tried, come to think of it.

I need to take a break and go shopping, fix the car, pay the bills, etc. too!

The armor repairing = Click "I" to open up your inventory screen. On the right side of your screen is a window box showing your inventory list. On the left side of the screen there will be a window box showing a character replica with all the armor/jewelry/weapons/and costumes or disguises you have currently equipped.

You repair armor (and possibly unenchanted weapons, I am not sure about them) using "Repair Kits." Weapons are "Charged" Using Soul Gems.

Repairs/Charging of weapons/and Enchanting are done exactly the same whether the item is in your inventory or currently equipped: Find the item you want to Repair/Charge/or Enchant:

** Right click on the item you want to repair; find "Repair" on the drop down list that appears and click it. This will open up a dialogue window in the center of the screen in which you will click the repair kit you want to use (in case you have different strengths of repair kits) and click "OK" to accept the repair or "Cancel" if you change your mind and decide not to repair at this time.

Enchanted weapons can only be "Charged;" and it consumes the soul gem so you will need a soul gem in your inventory for each weapon you want to charge up.

** Right click on the weapon you want to charge up; find "Charge" on the drop down list and click it. This will open up a dialogue window in the center of the screen in which you will click the soul gems you want to use (because previously they had different sized soul gems; but don't anymore). Click "OK" to charge the weapon or "Cancel" if you change your mind and decide not to charge it at this time.


(you can also resurrect with soul gems where you are standing; or choose to resurrect at the nearest wayshrine if you don't want to spend the soul gems or don't have any).


Enchanting: If you come across glyphs in your travels and want to enchant a plain armor; repeat the steps above except right click on the piece of armor you want to enchant and choose "Enchant" from the drop down list. The dialogue window that opens will show whatever glyphs you have in your inventory (that can enchant that item) to choose from.

** Enchantments are not determined by your character; but by the armor/jewelry/or weapon you are enchanting. In other words, you can't put a level 20 enchantment on a level 19 item. Most of the glyphs (or any loot) you pick up in your travels will be at your character's level.

If you join the Chorrolites guild, you can right click on any of our names on the Guild Roster and choose "visit Primary Residence" to visit our homes at any time, whether we are in game or not. My house is the Guild Hall; so it will give you access to any crafting you want to do; target dummies; Mundus stones; etc.

Also; if you want to explore a new area and don't have a wayshrine there; look at your friends list or Guild Roster and find a member who is somewhere you have never been to: Right click on their name and choose "Travel to Player" = it will bring you to a wayshrine nearest where that player is. The Player you do this to will never know you "piggy-backed" off of them; and it makes finding and exploring that much more exciting.

Also: You can ignore the pushy main quest. Everyone more or less ignores it until they are ready. It is okay; but nothing like the fun quests you will find all over the Provinces that are radiant to the locations you visit.

Skyshards = you gain skill points every 3 skyshards you find and absorb; so if you see one = activate it.

PS: I have a package ready for you with some soul gems and repair kits = and most definitely lockpicks. I am not sending it till I am sure I have the right account; because some of the friend invites I sent to both you and your Fleur gra-Borghak character came back as "Account Not Found."

I looked at what you wrote on here, and this time sent it to "ghastleytrial" - but want to be sure you will receive it before sending anything tangible.

Don't send anything. Since this is a disposable test character, I'd actually prefer her to do everything unaided for now.

If I decide to purchase the game, Blossom will probably have different ideas from Fleur. And that won't be until the new year. I'll be going back to the UK to visit my mother for a few weeks, and she has no internet.

You can send me a friend request = that will clear it all up: mALX1

I am hoping this isn't a mechanic of being on a trial basis. If it is, then hopefully we can meet up in game and I can hand you the items via the "Trade" function.

(Press "F" whenever a person's name is showing as you are looking at them, and it will open up a wheel that gives you options of interactions you can have with them.

"Trade" allows you to give people gifts or receive gifts from them. When they or you click on "R" it will send whatever items you have placed into the "Trade" slots to the other person and put them into that person's inventory. Anything they have given you will show up in your inventory.

"Whisper" sends them a private message to their chat box in aqua blue so they know it is just for their eyes. If you see aqua blue writing in YOUR chat box, that is someone whispering to you.

"Invite to group" asks that person to join you in fighting either in a dungeon or to fight a world boss, etc.


Chat Box: Hit the forward slash / to get into your chat box; then type your commands


Commands:

/say followed by a space will set it for you to type to anyone in the zone
/yell followed by a space will set it for you to yell at anyone in the zone = your chat box print will look red.

You can set the color of the print in your chat box for different factions so it suits you better; but most Guild chat is green by default; whispers are blue; zone chat is white; yelling is red; and system notices are yellow.

** You can also click on a person's name in the chat box and it will automatically set it up for your to whisper to that person for quick communications with them.



Emotes: Typing the forward slash always puts you into your chat box. You won't be able to walk/fight/etc in there; so if you didn't mean to do it just hit the "ESC" key.



/sit
/sit2
/sit3
/sit4
/sitchair

(etc; I think there are 6 "sit" commands; but not sure)


/cry
/wave
/kiss
/salute
/sick
/sleep
/sleep2
/eat
/eat2
/eat3 (etc)

/drink (there are more drink choices too; but I can't remember if they are numbered or by words like /drinkwine for example

There are hundreds of emotes; you can find a list to print out; or here is a link:


http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Emotes

Oh, that is awesome that you will be visiting your home again! We may never get you back once you see it again, though; lol. I hope you have a wonderful trip!

Ok; hmmm = from what I read, the temporary accounts are held for you in case you join later (probably on your own PC) so that you don't have to toss out a character if you don't want to = can just pick up from where you left off if you decide later to get the game.

You can probably change the account name later if you want; that is definitely allowed; and you can also delete Fleur if you didn't want to keep the character; but I think the IP address is how they identify you so they will know if another account tries to use that IP address and may have some issue about that where your real account would be treated as a guest on GhastleyTrial's computer or something. (XBox Live used to do that; urk). But of course, you can talk to support when the time comes.


By the way, did you know you have a bank account to store items in the game? It comes with like 60 slots; and your character has 60 slots on them to hold items. The banks are in any main town for each Province: Daggerfall, Mournhold; Vivec City; Anvil; Riften; Windhelm; etc.

When you are permanently playing the game, there are ways to increase storage.

Khajiit, thanks for posting the link to the Showcase!

Nice to see that Pariah’s Pinnacle, which is likely to be breathtakingly expensive, is offered for a nice long time over the holidays instead of just a couple of days. That horse looks gorgeous, and I like that broad-brimmed hat.

At first I was happy to see old crown crates making a reappearance so I could check out the low-gem selections, but it seems that the items from these crates won’t be available for purchase with gems. Just the crates will be for sale for Crowns.


ghastley, welcome! Character creation is still my favorite mini-game. As for builds, you are able to re-spec attributes and skill points in game with gold, so don’t sweat your choices too much at first. Class and Alliance are the choices that you can’t change later other than creating a new character. Even race can be changed for real money, with some restrictions depending on what version of the game you buy. I think your plan to explore and try things out is a good one. If you find that your gear needs to be repaired, you can also have most merchants repair it for a fee in gold. I use the wandering merchants that you encounter on the roads for a lot of quick junk selling + repair stops. Your game looks amazing, of course!

Since the free weekend ends on the 6th, I'll probably break off from the Wyrd Tree quests and go wandering. It seems like a good idea to see if she can explore the other alliances' starter areas a bit, so I can choose wisely. The DLC areas don't look as if they're a good idea to visit if you don't have much play-time invested, so I'll ignore those.

I probably will get the game in the new year, when I get back from vacation. It plays quite well in surround video - I was surprised at that, but of course, most of the work is done at the client end, and the usually off-screen characters have to be "there" anyway, even if they're not rendered. I just wish you could mod it!

You can explore the other starting zones freely (despite technically being an enemy of the other alliances). The Daggerfall Covenant is Khajiit’s current favorite alliance questline but the other two had some good moments too. In anycase, don’t worry too much about “choosing wisely” here, because you will have the opportunity to experience all of the other alliance questlines with the same character.

The closest I've come to modding it is a type of "Personality Idles" thing that randomly plays the character emotes whenever they are idling. It makes them more interesting and can really be funny sometimes when they randomly do some apropos emote at a time when it just fits perfectly with the situation, lol.

But you can change their hair by buying wigs; or put different eyelashes or tattoos on, etc. Plus you can buy houses and decorate them yourself; even crafting the furniture yourself once you learn the patterns or diagrams (etc).

As for clothing = yeah, you are kind of stuck with what you can find; craft; or buy from the Crown Store. If you steal from dressers or wardrobes; sometimes you can find some very cute clothing to wear around towns (when not in combat because it won't have any armor rating) = but you have to find a fence and launder it first so it is no longer considered stolen.

Everyone has their own favorite Alliance. Haute likes Daggerfall Covenant (High Rock & Hammerfell). I like Ebonheart Pact best (Morrowind, Eastern Skyrim, and the Black Marsh). Acadian likes the Aldmeri the best; (Summerset Isles, Valenwood and Elsweyr).

Your Alliance is usually predetermined based on your race (unless you play as an Imperial; then you can choose your Alliance). To play as an Imperial you must purchase the Imperial upgrade. OR = you can also get the "Explorer's Pack;" which allows any race to start in any Alliance.


Aldmeri Dominion: (Altmer, Bosmer, Khajiit)


Daggerfall Covenant: (Breton, Orc, Redguard)


Ebonheart Pact: (Argonian, Dunmer, Nord)


Just as in all the other TES games, your race can give you certain bonuses that will help you in combat, etc.








Khajiit is right, Ghastley = since One Tamriel, the only time Alliance REALLY matters in actual play is doing the main questline with the pushy Prophet (have to do that in your own Alliance) or in PvP; where Alliance is everything.

New ESO Live airing on the 8th.

Khajiit watched the ESO Live show and they said this year during the New Life we will get a “Breda’s Mug momento” so we don’t have to go to the tent every time the xp bonus wears off.

Aw geez, did someone complain that they had to return to the tent to drink that stuff (like did they forget to pick it up when they had to return there every fifteen minutes anyway to get and complete those 12 quicky quests?)

Yeah apparently it was a big complaint. This will come in handy though. If your xp bonus runs out in the middle of a quest or whatever, you’ll now be able to replenish it conveniently!

It is kind of like them suddenly adding "With Ta" to the daily Writs; like we haven't been able to figure that out for the past three years and now suddenly we have to be told to use the Ta stone?

I need to learn how to whine so that Zen will start implementing water in the horse troughs; or straw/hay for their stalls; etc.

tbh it's a good thing they did this because one of the big issues with only having one Bread is that there were so many goddang people in one area that getting kicked to the login screen was inevitable during the first few days. (Not to mention people were actively trying to make it worse) Granted, it might not really solve this issue because there's still only one Bread handing out the quests, but it helps a lot.

Ooh, or how about “The drop rates for motifs are ridiculous! I need them to be more convenient.”. That’s a whine Khajiit could get behind!

I'll whine with you on that one!






Well, but you still have to go there for the quests. So why not grab the brew while there? What they could do to ease that would be to have a quest giver in different locations; like one at each of the Alliance zones.

This is true, and Khajiit’s characters hit up the mead barrel just about every time they turned in a New Life quest. That said, unless they are offering something a lot different in the prize boxes (if the Witches Festival prizes were any indication, we can probably look forward to getting lots of festive plant branches. ), Khajiit will be using the New Life as an opportunity to level up characters faster, and will therefore not be doing the New Life quests as much as last year. So because of that, it would be handy to have a way of restoring the xp bonus if I was in the middle of a quest, or dungeon, or whatever.

Yeah, they are always good times to level up characters with all that free XP boosts laying around for the taking. But I had a blast with a group of my friends doing those 12 quests together; especially the Bergama race one. (grouping makes that one go in record time, lol) - and any excuse to get a free present is a good one for me, lol.

What I am wondering/hoping is whether they will have some different memento stuff (since I got every thing they had to offer last time) or if they will have some different quest tricks other than blowing the fire or juggling knives; throwing mud; etc. I mean, I have all that stuff; so wondering if they will add something new this time; or new achievements or something.

Yeah, Khajiit still has several rune boxes, a bunch of Skinchanger chapters (Feng and Mira are masters of the style), a ton of the consumable “tricks”, and some of the recipes. It would be nice if we could win the new hats, but this one suspects “new items” means “festive branches” (or some other similar furnishing).

I could sure handle some festive branches to go with the million dead ones I got during the Witches Festival,

Lol, this is true, but Khajiit is getting really low on space!

Thinking about saving up some crowns just to buy a bigger house to store branches! Man Khajiit wishes we could store stuff at home. Maybe have a chest or something in every home that can hold like 20 slots. That wouldn’t be too much to ask would it? Maybe even make it to where we could spend gold or crowns to upgrade the slots like a second bank. It’s a win win, yes?

I shoved mine beneath the floors in the Skywatch apartment since I never use it anyway, lol. It has become a warehouse for Jester banners and dead branches; and all those unsellable crown store furnishings I moved out of Hundings; etc. (same with that Daggerfall free room = warehouse storage).

Hey, Maz could use those festive branches for Pinnacle!

New Life Festival Details.

Looks like the only things new are the mug collectible and some lights and lanterns for homes. We’ll be swimming in Skinchanger chapters and Runeboxes we can’t use

Since I didn't participate in this last year, Maz and I are looking forward to giving this a whirl. Now that she is almost done with her Gold, she should have no problem going to all the nine dailies. Whether or not she does it for the more than two weeks this is supposed to run, I'm not sure.

In any case, we're interested in the lights, and of course, the bonfire. Those would be awesome to add to Pinnacle!

Thanks for the helpful link, Khajiit!

Ooh, thanks for keeping us posted on the latest news, Khajiit! For some reason I don't get these notices till days after you get them! (Urk).

No prob mALX! It comes straight from the official site. Khajiit checks it like everyday, lol

So THAT is your secret!!! Is there a link for that?

I can't believe they mail out emails that don't come for days after they have posted it on their site; why not mail them out as soon as they post it? Grrrrr.

Link for ESO Official Site’s news page. Khajiit has it bookmarked, lol

I always find things out by browsing ESO's subreddit tbh.

Also I forgot the festival began today. Bring it on. (Don't think Eolan will be wearing the, ah, uniform this year.)

I have to admit = didn't wear the New Life uniform last year either; but boy did I love to see others in it! I think I did get one shot of one of my girls modeling one of the hoodie-hats though:


https://i.imgur.com/4BGSuNn.png

What is this uniform you speak of?

Ooh, thanks! I bookmarked it too!

I suspect perhaps it is the Nordic Towel with one of the hoods - all Festigifts and, of course, deplorable fashion-wise...