[ESO] Elder Scrolls Online Early Launch Day 1

Freshly kitted out Pyromancer at level 10

I didn’t set an alarm clock, but due to some health issues, I ended up up waking up yesterday morning at about 5:30 am.  Early access opened at 5:00 am for me, so the timing was pretty much right on.  I logged in to ESO and went on a character building binge in order to reserve the names for myself that I like to use and re-use from game to game.  Not a huge deal in this game since everything goes on your account handle, but still nice to have “my names” ya know?

Yes, it’s a spoiler. So sorry! You go back and rescue Lyris and kit her out while doing it.

After about an hour doing that, I logged back into the character that I plan to have as my main.  It’s my dark elf pyromancer, using the Dragonknight class for the fire-wizard skill lines, plus a fire-staff.  In case you care, I’m closely following this template, and there’s even a video of a guy using it to solo a 4-man public dungeon in the mid-40’s.  Looks pretty impressive to me!  And I’ve always liked fire wizards, so…. there ya go.  I’m running 5 light armor pieces, and then 2 heavy pieces to add just a touch of survivability as well.  I’m using the cuirass becuz it gives the most armor benefit, and then the helm becuz a) I can hide it and b) it gives the 2nd most armor benefit.  Something kinda funny about how this all looks, though, is that at level 6 it was all more or less looking like a set, but at level 10 the cuirass stayed looking like metal, but the cloth pieces are now dyed green, so it looks a bit odd.  Such is life, right?  Currently I’m level 11 on it and I can usually take on 3 mobs at a time without too much trouble, and I haven’t come to a boss yet that I couldn’t take either. Circle-strafing with the destruction staff while the dot ticks from my Unstable Flames ticks on it is a very viable playstyle for now, though once I get my 2nd weapon and gain the ability to more or less CC a mob into lockdown, that will change.

Sheogorath!

As I progressed through the game, the old phasing bugs seem to be largely gone, or fixable with a simple logout/login cycle, but there have been a few new bugs introduced, so on occasion I’d get a bit frustrated or be unable to advance, so I swapped over to another concept character I thought I’d give a try to — a medium armored, dual-wielding Khajit sorcerer.  The concept behind this character is that it makes use of the mage’s defensive and weapon buffs in order to maximize the so-called “white damage” from the regular mouse-click attacks while also having good survivability due to the defense buffs it also has.  I’m still trying to figure out exactly which skills I want to go for, but I think I’ve got the basic idea down now.  As it is, the character is currently level 7 and can easily take on 2 even-level mobs at a time while barely taking a scratch in return.

I really like the look of the Dark elf style for leather armor.

Nothing really earthshattering to report otherwise.  I’m a bit farther on the pyromancer than I ever got in any of the betas and I’m enjoying the quests and the stories they’re telling so far.  I’ve not yet done any group dungeons with my guild, nor headed to Cyrodil to check out the pvp action, but that will come — it’s very early days yet, after all.  My guild has chosen the Ebonheart Pact as its main faction.  But one can actually join 5 guilds, so I’m also wanting to join Belghast’s House Stalwart for my Daggerfall Covenant toons and perhaps Syncaine’s Inquisition for my Aldmeri Dominion toons too.  You can be in up to 5 player guilds after all.  Keeping that all straight is going to be very interesting. . . . . .

Lightning Form is a very impressive defense buff, no?

So anyway… fun was had, new content was seen, new bugs were found, but overall a very smooth launch so far.  ZOS has done a bang-up job with ESO, as far as I’m concerned.

Happy gaming and all of that, no matter what game you find yourself in!