Did subclassing kill diversity?

A complaint we’ve heard a lot since the release of subclassing with U46 is that diversity is dead and buried - but is that the whole truth?

The introduction of subclassing in ESO made update 46 - Seasons of the Worm Cult Part 1 the most disruptive patch in years in Elder Scrolls Online. Many were sceptical when it was first announced - I will admit I was squarely in that camp myself - some confidently announced that this would kill ESO as we know it. One of the biggest concerns was that diversity would be a thing of the past.

A few weeks in, it seems like that prediction was both fairly accurate and completely wrong at the same time.

Diversity in endgame groups

A quick look at the top 100 parses from the most recent trials shows that Arcanist base is by far the most popular choice in U46. Which is not a surprise, considering that ever since its release it has been by far the most accessible class for fights where you want both good damage and ease of use. Subclassing also lifted the damage potential for beam builds significantly.

For the Xoryn fight in Lucent Citadel (veteran hard mode) the top 100 parses in U46 looks like this (*):
87 Arcanist (base)
6 Necromancer (base)
5 Dragonknight (base)
1 Nightblade (base)
1 Sorcerer (base)

The Ansuul fight in Sanity’s Edge (veteran hard mode) does not look much better:
90 Arcanist (base)
6 Dragonknight (base)
3 Necromancer (base)
1 Nightblade (base)

So we’ve got 87% and 90% Arcanists respectively. The “diversity is dead” claim seems to be confirmed. But, before we head over to Reddit and write a long post where we slam ZOS for their poor judgement in a 1000 word I TOLD YOU SO-post, though, let’s take a quick look at the situation last patch:

Xoryn (veteran hard mode), U45:
80 Arcanist
16 Necromancer
2 Templar
1 Dragonknight
1 Sorcerer

Ansuul (veteran hard mode), U45:
78 Arcanist
7 Necromancer
7 Dragonknight
6 Sorcerer
2 Templar

Even though the numbers from U46 looks rather disheartening from a diversity perspective it really hasn’t gotten that much worse. Diversity was already very much on its deathbed, and now it has simply inched itself a bit closer to the edge. If we take the top two classes for each fight the numbers are even closer:

Xoryn is 93% Arcanist and Necromancer in U46 versus. 96% in U45 - so for this fight the numbers actually look better after subclassing. Ansuul is 96% Arca and DK in U46 versus 85% in U45, 92% of you add Necromancer as the third class. Admittedly worse in the new update, but most classes other top three are still few and far between.

So what we are looking at is that if you played Templar, Nightblade, Warden or Sorcerer nothing much has changed - apart from the fact that you now use Templar and Nightblade skills on your Arcanist. The hardest content will always be dominated by whatever setup is meta, that hasn’t changed. I understand that people want to do something else than beam builds, but let’s face it: you mostly weren’t allowed to do that before subclassing either. And if you are allowed, fact is non-beam Arcanists are stronger than beam builds, as illustrated by Charles in this video, even for the more challenging hard modes (link to Bahsei in video description).

Outside of HM trials

An important thing to keep in mind is that although the numbers above don't look very good, hard mode trials is not what the majority of ESO players spend their time on. And even though most prog groups might force their players into beam builds, subclassing has opened up a lot of possibilities outside of these environments.

A Templar base with Assassination and Herald of the Tome with Biting Jabs as spammable, for example, can easily do 140-150k on a dummy this patch. It’s still harder to use than a beam build, but it still opens up possibilities that used to be closed for these builds (unless wielded by the very top end players - which always could, and still can - bring whatever they want and outparse everyone else anyway).

The power creep - or rather power leap - that came with U46 was significant, and the result is that even builds put together in a role play perspective can be strong enough to bring to a dungeon trifecta run. Some might say that this means the harder content has become too easy, but that is another discussion altogether.

Even though beam builds are the “best”, subclassing has opened the door for a much larger variety of mixes for almost all content. For the majority of players - the ones who don’t care about score pushing and trial trifectas - diversity is not dead at all, you can easily make the argument that the game is more diverse than ever before.

You can love it or hate it, but the Season of the Worm Cult opened a lot of doors for a lot of players. Although the end game raid comps might have gotten narrower, the range of players who have the ability to participate in it has gotten broader. All things considered, my personal opinion is that subclassing has been a good thing.

(*): Numbers as of late June.