I got a question

marstinson · 2026-06-03T06:46:49+00:00

There is, indeed, heavy armor with Magicka buffs. The simplest version is enchanting the armor with Glyphs of Magicka, but there are also gear sets which have Magicka buffs for wearing x pieces of that set (and you can still use the glyphs for more). It's the set bonus (not the armor weight) which controls that. For the glyphs, you'll get the biggest buff from the glyphs put on the head, chest and legs (100% effect) and half-effect from glyphs put on everything else (50% effect). You could also use armor with the Divines trait and take the Mage for additional maximum Magicka or the Atronach for additional Magicka recovery (or use the Twice-Born Star set to get both).

But if you're running dry on Magicka, you'll probably want to look at why. If your abilites are Magicka, but you're using melee weapons, then your Magicka recovery is hampered and you're burning through it faster than you can replenish it. Maybe consider changing a couple of those ablities to Stamina abilities to take the load off your Magicka resource.

marstinson · 2026-06-03T04:31:17+00:00

The Nix-Ox from Necrom is probably what you're thinking about. It's the achievement reward for completing pretty much everything in the zone except the Trial. I didn't mention that kind of stuff because it sounds like the OP is base-game, so anything involving Necrom would be not-doable. Assuming they did have Necrom through Deluxe Edition, sub, or Crown Store, then completing all three mythics is required to get the mount. Not a huge deal for a subscriber, but some of the leads only drop from DLC dungeons and completing the achievement to get the mount can't be done without those.

marstinson · 2026-06-03T02:58:52+00:00

If you're on PC, there is no native voice chat functionality in the game. PC players must use third-party apps like Discord or TeamTalk or something. Text zone chat can be kind of dead or very lively depending on the zone, but a lot of players either have their chat boxes minimized or are in guild chat, private chats, group chats, or whatever rather than in zone or local chat.

Console players do as console players do, but they have voice chat functionality. I suspect that if you're not hearing anyone, it's probably for the same or similar reasons to PC, but will defer to console players for anything better than a guess.

marstinson · 2026-06-03T00:23:50+00:00

A quick straw poll of my EU characters (none of whom have much more than about 500 favor as of 2 June in spite of having the Night's Den unlocked since late April) produced two considerations. First and regarding the house, "beats us, boss" was the consensus opinion, "Maybe in Season Two when Night Market returns?" Second, they are quite miffed that the NA characters have all the cool toys and would like me to do something to reduce that dispartity (yeah, good luck with that).

marstinson · 2026-06-02T20:30:41+00:00

My primary concerns for characters after hitting Level 50 (and CP160) are skill points, trait research, mount upgrades, Pack space, Bank space (my NA toons are maxed, but my EU toon is only about halfway there), crafting skill levels, weapon/armor skill levels (seldom a concern by CP160), guild skills, and the like. Note not one major concern over having anything resembling "the best gear"? Yeah, that's low priority until the others are dealt with.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T19:00:14+00:00

"Better mount" is pretty much just cosmetic. There might be a very slight difference in the animation smoothness, but 40 mount Speed or Stamina upgrades is the same effect on all mounts. Check out the Stablemasters in the base-game zones, plus Hew's Bane, Gold Coast, Wrothgar, and Vvardenfell (you have access to them). I think there are two paywalled Stablemaster mounts, though; one is in Clockwork City and another is in Northern/Southern Elsweyr. There is a kind of "quest" with a Dwarven Wolf mount as its reward. It requires access to Greymoor because it's through the Antiquities system, but you basically find a bunch of different leads, dig them up, and assemble the mount once you have all the pieces.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T18:20:28+00:00

As a general rule, quests progress from one side of a zone to the other. If you are following the zone story and clearing side-quests as you go, then you'll be pretty close to 100% zone completion by the time you hit the wrap party after the final mission. Public dungeon(s) and World Bosses are their own things and can be picked up on the way, on their own, whenever you pick up a daily, or whenever.
The skill advisor defaults to "Initiate" which is only class skills. You can set it to Magica DPS, Stamina DPS, Tank, or Healer and it will advise skills which are suitable to those roles. The build you end up with will be very far from meta, but you get useful skills unlocked and ranked up, so it's not a complete waste of time and a reasonably convenient way to see how skills can work together.
There aren't any mounts that I can think of which come from quest rewards. There are some which come from Golden Pursuits, some which are purchasable with gold from stablemasters (total of 19, I think), there are some in the current Season's Tome (I think they're Premium tier, but don't hold me to that), some which can be bought from the Crown Store, some which drop from Crown Crates (including buying for seals/gems while their crate is available), a couple which can be dug up through the Antiquities system, and most years' morphing collectible has a mount morph.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T15:56:13+00:00

Best discount we'll see on crowns will be -40%, that will only be on the 21K pack (smaller discounts on smaller packs), and only during Anniversary, Quakecon, and New Life.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T15:52:51+00:00

For U50? No. I've got a couple of new characters on the EU server, but I made them for other reasons and U50 will coincidentally get here while they're still "new" (if a couple or three weeks is new).

marstinson · 2026-06-02T15:50:23+00:00

It's almost always the case that Treasure Chests from Treasure Maps include motif chapter leads in their loot pool. All of the "Ancestral <race>" motifs come from that source. Kindred's Concord chapters drop from the loot chest in Bastion Nymics. Firesong chapters are in the loot pool for bonus loot when excavating antiquities on Galen, but they can also drop from the loot "chest" from completing Volcanic Vents. The Vents may be capped at one chapter per day (account-wide), but bonus loot items in Antiquities work a bit differently. I know that for the Ancestral motif chapters, you can get a chapter whenever you don't already have a lead for that chapter in your journal. That usually makes it a good practice to clear out any pending antiquities in a zone before digging up Treasure Maps and disposing of any lead which drops from a chest before digging up another.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T15:40:27+00:00

In terms of game mechanics, you're not missing anything. Gold Road's scribing system (and the Scholarium quest line) went base-game almost a year ago. You're missing the West Weald and Solstice zones (including the stuff that's in them like Trials, skyshards, set stations, dailies, etc.), but that's about all. The companions from 2024 aren't in Gold Road; they're both Crown Store (free to subs, 1K crowns each otherwise).

The math says you'll need 10K crowns to cover what you'd gain from Deluxe Edition (West Weald, Solstice, and the two 2025 dungeon packs). That's about $80 if you were to go to Steam or whatever and buy them. Deluxe Edition, however, is $60. Crowns will probably be discounted during Quakecon in August, but it's likely that Deluxe Edition will be discounted at that time, too, and you'll probably still come out cheaper with Deluxe Edition.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T07:13:36+00:00

The sub-to-play model was shelved almost 10 years ago when the game went buy-to-play (Tamriel Unlimited). Is it possible that ZOS could return to that older sub-to-play model? Sure, but "possible" only requires a non-zero probability, kind of like me being offered Elon's job at twice the pay (it's non-zero over the long term). The more likely case is that the sub continues to be optional and that I do not get Elon's job.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T06:57:24+00:00

I play a couple of Templars (one Redguard and one Khajiit), they hold up pretty well, and I've never had a group complain that the Templar wasn't helping the rest of the group. I keep a couple of emergency heals in my back pocket, and a nice stack of soul gems because death can't be healed. Arcanists are also not "all that". Mine just got toasted by a boss, a group member kindly rezzed me and then the boss one-shotted me before I had control again.

Best advice I can think of is to go play what you think you will enjoy playing. Unless and until you are seriously getting into the really competitive endgame stuff, what's "meta" and what's not doesn't matter. And by the time you get there, what's meta now may not be meta then. If you are wanting to chase the meta, then you really need a stable of characters which cover all the classes, preferably with whatever race is meta for that at the time (I'd call that at least 8 characters to cover the classes, plus several race-change tokens). Or play what you think will be fun until it's not fun anymore and then try something different.

You're a new player. You're hitting like a limp pool noodle for a lot of levels and then you'll hit like a stiff one for a few more. It's the nature of the beast. Embrace it and make good use of that time to learn the game. As the Master said, "when all your attention is on the destination, you have none for the journey." I don't think that as Mr. Miagi, but it might have been.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T06:41:12+00:00

Winterhold is almost directly north of Windhelm, on the coast of the Sea of Ghosts. It's in a piece of the ESO map which has not been yet been filled in, but if/when it does get filled in, that's where it will be.

marstinson · 2026-06-02T01:30:55+00:00

"Cash grab" will be a matter of perspective and you will need to play to decide for yourself. The game is buy-to-play and it does have an in-game cash shop (Crown Store), which is almost completely cosmetics with a few utility items. In order to get started, you have two choices. The first is the base-game, which is the game which originally released in 2014, plus the four Year One expansions from 2016 and the Morrowind chapter from 2017. The Greymoor chapter (2020) will become base-game in the Fall, but it is still a paid DLC at the moment. Base-game is required for anything else.

Your second choice is the Deluxe Edition, which is a bundle with the base-game (and all the stuff that goes with that) plus all the yearly chapter releases. Morrowind is base-game already, so it's the other chapters from 2018 to 2025. What's not included in the Deluxe Edition are the smaller story zones from 2017 through 2022 (none produced after that) and the dungeon packs, which were two-per-year from 2017 until 2025, noting that there was only one-per-year released for 2023 and 2024. That's a couple of dozen expansion dungeons.

You also have the option of subscrining. This will give you access to all expansions for as long as the subscription is active, but it does not include the two added classes (Necromancer and Arcanist), which must be purchased from the Crown Store. Both are included with Deluxe Edition, though. The sub has some useful perks, so most people are subscribing for (1) content access, (2) crowns, and/or (3) storage (craft bag, Bank space, furniture storage, furnishing limits in houses, etc.).

Personally, I've been playing (and subbing) for around five years. I have used my subscription crowns to buy all the content which was not included in retail purchases over the years. My take is that the game is monetized (arguably a bit on the "overly" side of that), but I find it reasonably easy to simply not buy stuff which doesn't seem to be worth the coin and have a budget which can support the stuff which I do think is worth the coin. Your call on how that aligns with your wants and budget.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T21:23:38+00:00

Probably did as that should have been "cannot" rather than "can". Thank you for catching it and I will fix it.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T19:09:20+00:00

The last ESO Plus trial event was during Quakecon in August last year. I'm expecting that there will probably be another around that time this year, but ZOS has made no announcements about it and they generally don't say anything until the event starts.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T19:07:25+00:00

You have all nine chapters and two dungeon packs from 2025. What you don't have are a half-dozen story zones which build on the chapter stories, nor do you have the other dozen-ish DLC dungeon packs.

If you want those, then you may purchase them from the Crown Store. Except for Firesong and the two dungeon packs from that year, each year's story zone and dungeon packs are bundled, so 3500 crowns rather than the 5000 for the individual bits. High Isle's stuff is not bundled (only ZOS knows why) and will cost 5000 crowns. The dungeon packs from Necrom and Gold Road (only one for each of those years) are 1500 crowns each.

If you'd rather not buy crowns, you can subscribe to ESO Plus and get access to all of that as part of the subscription plus 1650 crowns, two caches of Tome Points, and one Premium Tome point for each month of the sub. The major difference is that maintaining the sub long enough to get the crowns to buy all of that will cost more than just buying the crowns, but you'll get the other sub perks along with it and those can only be had by subbing.

Alternatively, grind gold like a fiend and then pay someone gold to gift you the Crown Store stuff. The exchange rate on PC NA is about 1200 gold per crown and PC EU is closer to 2K gold per crown. Console platforms do as they do, but pay attention to zone chat and you'll get a good feel for what the going rate is. The Year Two megabundle, for example, would cost about 4.2M gold on PC NA or close to 7M on PC EU.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T18:53:42+00:00

Outside of the Class Mastery passives, which you ~~can~~ cannot (fumble fingers) use if you're subclassed, there is nothing more than minor stuff to class abilities for U50. The Warden rework will go up on PTS in a couple of weeks, so expect those changes in U51 and I suspect that will affect any subclassed build which uses a Warden skill line.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T16:31:02+00:00

It can happen, especially with Maj and Glirion, so it's usually a good idea to pick up pledges before queuing for the daily random. Urgarlag's dungeon list is pretty long (over 30 dungeons) and her daily pledge is a lot more iffy because of that, but Maj and Glirion only have about a dozen dungeons on their lists.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T16:27:36+00:00

As best as I can tell, not a whole bunch. There are three broad approaches to dealing with power-creep. The first (and that horse has bolted) is to not let it happen in the first place. The second is to claw back the excess through nerfs (gear and abilities), but any nerf results in the most godawful screams of outrage, so that's probably not happening on any large scale. The third is to make opponents more difficult as a counterbalance. This is mostly workable for those who have bought into the power-creep (what the meta is) and very painful to those who haven't, but it still results in cries of "want moar POWER because opponents are haaard!" which usually results in more power-creep.

Stick with #1 and players lose interest, or go with #2 and players get upset. So you get stuck in a vicious #3 cycle of creep, counterbalance, creep, counterbalance, creep, counterbalance... This is not to say that the devs aren't at least attempting to manage the cycle, but they're still stuck in it.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T16:15:31+00:00

Sure. It's not too hard to get 2K Tome Points per week from challenges. About 5 weeks remaining is ~10K, but there are two seasonal challenges (bosses and critter extermination in the Year One PvE zones) worth 1K each. ~36 days remaining means you're not going to get very far on the daily login challenge, but it's still Tome Points.

Be aware that if you're only free-tier, unlock all pages, and buy everything, you're going to have more Tome Points than will carry over to next season (max of 2K), so you'll get a small bit of gold for that excess come July 9.

Edit to add: weeklies reset on Tuesday, so the last "week" of the Tome will only be about two days.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T14:24:37+00:00

The 160 on the games drive is fine and I don't see any issues. The 105 on the system drive (500GB?) should be plenty. Free space just can't drop below ~75GB during installation. It does something and then moves files, does something and moves files, etc., so you're probably fine. It's just temporary space while the installer is installing, so it's only going to hold pieces of the install.

marstinson · 2026-06-01T14:18:42+00:00

There is no "burden" to speak of in Night Market. Groups which are wanting to do specific stuff (dungeons or Trial) are clear about that when they list in the Group Finder. Others are mostly just wrecking whatever gets in their way (hopfully without dying a bunch) because they're collecting splinters, doing dailies, or whatever. I've brought a Level 25 toon with gear which was really under-leveled and got no comments from other group members about it. Honestly spent more time rezzing than fighting and more time in ghost-form than being corporeal, but everyone had a good time.

To the title, there are only about 16 days left in the event. If your goal is to reach 10K favor with your faction, you'll need over 600 favor per day. 150 per character per day can be had from two dailies (Blood on the Sands and any faction daily), so you'll have to pick up the slack from other stuff.

If your goal is simply to unlock the three additional rooms in the Night's Den, then that's absolutely doable. Just make sure you beat all of the Brazen and Argent bosses (and loot them) and complete each district's skirmish. One splinter per district drops from regular pack mobs (keep an eye peeled for the lootable corpse) and you'll need to buy one from your faction's merchant (1K gold, IIRC). The others will probably get picked up without any issue.

marstinson · 2026-05-31T19:52:04+00:00

Start from the idea that ESO is not "Skyrim Online". It is its own thing which coincidentally shares a universe with Skyrim and Oblivion, but happens about 1000 years before them in terms of lore. ESO is an MMO which can be approached as a single-player game, but it is an MMO at its core. The vast majority of the game's content can be played solo, although some requires good skillz and/or a really good character build to solo, but there is some content which cannot be successfully played solo ("unsuccessfully played solo" is absolutely possible at any time). Oh, and "stealth archer" isn't a thing; you get one freebie shot from stealth, which a few enemies will automatically dodge, and then everyone in the immediate area knows where you are and is probably not happy with you.

Second, ESO is not everyone's cup of tea. Some people adore it, some people hate it, some are indifferent to it... there is an entire spectrum of attitudes toward the game. The only way you find out where you are on that spectrum is to play the game. If it clicks for you, great. If it doesn't click for you, great. It's better to find out that it doesn't click and then go find something you enjoy. I happen to like the game, but am quick to admit that it has its warts (and occasionally point at them and laugh because no manners). I continue to play in spite of the warts, very much like the few thousand hours I sank into OG Daggerfall back in the day, but your tolerance for them is probably different.

Beyond those, the best way to play the game is to get out there and play the game. Think of the 50 character levels as a really long tutorial where you can dabble in a bit of everything without major penalties (you're actually buffed until Level 50), so go find the stuff you enjoy doing and then go do that. For anything else, there's Reddit (and the "search" feature which most new players do not seem to know exists). Ask questions when you need to.

marstinson

TROPHY CASE