More about Tel Var stones - PVP risk/reward

Iselin

Note: You can watch these details being described and some IC fighting footage now over at the ZOS twitch replay of today's ESO live. (Starting @ around 1:05)

 

So with the new Imperial City specific currency, Tel Var stones, a big change to PVP risk/reward is coming to ESO PVP - but just within the Imperial City itself.

 

This new currency will be highly sought after as a source to buy VR 15-16 crafting material and VR16 armor sets that can only be bought that way. They drop from mobs with the greater the mob difficulty ranging from 4 to 400 per mob, they can be looted from chests and the new super chests, treasure troves, they can be looted from a special type of scamp (there will be two types - the other one drops gold and crafting material) that will act in a way similar to those goblins in Diablo 3 that will try to run away from you and you'll have to chase down perhaps aggroing many mobs also along the way... and from killing players (more about this in a bit.)

 

The stone drop rate also uses a multiplier system that determines how many stones will drop from all sources (except players) depending on how many stones you're carrying on you: 1-99, X1; 100-999, X2; 1,000 - 9,999, X3 and 10,000 or more X4. But here is the catch: if you're killed by mobs, you'll loose 10% of the stones on you and if you're killed by a player landing the killing blow on you, you lose them all. At least this is the way they will be when the IC goes to the PTS for testing and they've said they'll be looking for feedback and may adjust how many you lose based on feedback.

 

There're a couple of ways to mitigate the risk: you can bank Tel Var stones but the banker will take a cut of 50 for each banking transaction. But getting to the bank won't be all that easy. These banks are in your alliance's safe zone in the IC and you'll need to travel there through hostile mobs and other players... or you can buy a teleport stone to the safe base for 500 stones. You can only carry one of those on you, they have a cast time, and can't be used from stealth.

 

There will also be boxes of stones given out as quest rewards in there for the dailies and the one main quest line. Those boxes will go into your inventory and you don't need to open them... and they're not player lootable. You can also decide when and where to open them and take advantage of the bonus multiplier.

 

A couple of more notes: these stones can not be traded nor can they be mailed. Some of the things you buy with the stones are tradable though. These stones are only lootable by other players in the Imperial City, not anywhere else in Cyrodiil.

 

So what do you guys think about this new PVP risk/reward system?