Bethesda has revealed more information about its upcoming MMORPG Elder Scrolls Online. According to a post on the game’s official website, players can be multifunctional in their roles while playing. This essentially means that players can do other things regardless of their specialisation of being a damager, tank or healer.
For example, suppose your group’s healer dies during a boss fight, in most other MMORPGs, the whole group would be doomed to failure. However, in Elder Scrolls Online, a damager can switch from using a two-handed sword to a restoration staff, essentially letting you act as an impromptu healer for the group.
The company has also elaborated on how the game’s dungeons and groups will work. For example, unlike other games where tanks draw the attention of all the enemies to themselves, monsters will attack every player in Elder Scrolls Online. However, every character class will have damage mitigation abilities that will let them survive long enough for the tank to get the attention of the attacking monster.
Everyone can, and will be attacked. Don’t Panic.
The game will implement a system dubbed pack mentality, where every enemy in a dungeon room will be aware of each other. This means that when one of the enemies is attacked, all of the enemies in the room will take notice and get ready to fight. However, not all of them attack at the same time. Some enemies will stand back behind their front lines and prepare for battle..
The world of Elder Scrolls Online is set in Tamriel, which is the main continent where all the different provinces of the Elder Scrolls games are. Thanks to the layout of the continent, all the main player-versus-player happens in the province in the centre of the continent, named Cyrodiil.
The combat system, shown in the video, looks like a simplistic version of the combat system in Guild Wars 2 – which is a mix between real time combat and the hotkey-based combat from games like World of Warcraft.
The class system offers flexibility by not limiting the characters by forcing them to use certain armour and weapons. Characters can wear whichever armour and weapons they want, allowing combinations like a sneaky healer and a mage carrying a large two-handed weapon.