There have been so many changes to the Elder Scrolls Blades mobile game that I'm giving them their own article here. Earliest at the top. Error messages, login problems and possible fixes are now listed in a separate article that you can find here—
Bethesda also has posted this information about the 7/31/19 patch, with more info about PvP.
mostly fixes bugs and adds new quests. Looks like you need to do them in a certain order. I've noticed that after this update you'll see damage dealt to you numbers in red over your health bar. I've also seen green numbers over the stamina bar so I assume they show up on the blue magicka bar as well. I just haven't noticed that happen yet. Items you have to gather also need you to be closer than in the past to claim them. The diamond icon with the three lines that takes you to the character menu is also now yellowish at times. I have a feeling this indicates something but what, I have no idea.
, which will introduce a spooky night mode to your town with new music, as well as four new quests. This update hit on October 9, 2019. The button that takes you to the game goes orange, for Halloween pumpkins I guess. There are spider webs on the buildings, two moons in a dark sky, spooky birds flying in the sky above the town hall, all the trees look spectral white, plus there are pumpkins and candles around the various stores, etc. There are a lot of special Halloween-themed decorations (plenty of skulls) to buy in the Store but there are also items you can have crafted for you in the Workshops. The special nighttime environment ended November 5, 2019.
It also appears to me that the daily Jobs are harder. Most are at my level or above with 4-5 skull ratings. Even the jobs at or one level below me are more difficult than usual. The PvP NPC Jobs now have level ratings as well, which is something I've not noticed before. The skull ratings don't seem to match the level ratings in some cases. At any rate with most all the jobs and quests 2-7 levels above me, I am not playing for a while.
UPDATE: The quests are getting easier as we get closer to Halloween, so I am playing more. They aren't as easy as before, but not as hard as the first two weeks of this patch. Pay attention to the game telling you that you may have trouble with a quest if you don't upgrade your equipment. That's the truth, even if the quest is 4-5 levels below you.
The biggest news is that they are removing the timers on chests. They will open immediately. (loud cheers) When you log in after downloading this update, you'll be able to claim any gems you spent on upgrading the number of chests you could have. Since I am really cheap, I only got a few back. Apparently there will be more loot from taking down bosses in Jobs as well. (I've found this to be true and am busy accumulating gold and loot.) The other big news is that the PvP Arena will open when this update hits. You will have to be Level 5 or higher to participate in the best of three matches. You can change gear between the three rounds. It looks like players will be able to join guilds which will be reflected in PvP in some way. You will also be able to trade items with friends and visit their towns. I imagine that you both have to belong to the same guild but who knows? The final bit of news is that Blades won't be playable on the Nintendo Switch until "early 2020." Sorry. As you can see from the above, something called the New Life Festival which has a winter theme in the form of a "snowy wonderland" has been added. The name seems odd. No one celebrates new life in winter, after all.
https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/article/4QjMA9uIqFKleF1glfzLFu/blades-town-hall-update-1-5-is-coming
There are new places to find rewards—piles of glowing crystals among rocks, a tall pot, a globe, and a pot with a flat lid. There is also a skeleton set on top of and around a pile of rocks and a chest with a flat top. Treat as the gold skeletons (apparently the skeleton on rocks has replaced the gold skeletons) and whack. The old tree stump has been replaced by different—and harder to see—artwork of boards around rocks. If there are red mushrooms growing on these, there are more rewards if you whack it.
If you are going to try PvP, there are things called Emote packs in the Store. There is a free pack which I picked up. I think your character can use these stances before PvP. I like the dueling Salute but no way am I paying 100 gems for it. There are lots of other new decorative items to buy in the Store today for your town.
I think some changes have been implemented early. I just got a notice screen that I had finished Quest Whatever and it listed my rewards. This is the first time I've seen this sort of thing. It only happened once, though. And I had a quest with no hidden areas listed in the quest description turn up with a hidden compartment. Just happened to notice it as I was finishing the quest. I've also seen rewards change. I picked up 4 imp stools that flashed into 6 imp stools on the corner of my screen. There are bugs, in other words. However, overall the rewards are much better so take advantage of this update to add plenty of gold and good gear to your stash of goodies.
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On December 16, 2020, version 1.5.1 changed the Arena setting so that Ebony Mail and Rimelink Artifacts no long make players invincible. I have no idea what Rimelink Artifacts are, never having seen them in game. I found this about a sword called Rimelink.
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Rimelink
Other arena bugs were also removed.
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On January 12, 2020, version 1.6 appeared. This removes the snow on the ground and roofs from the December update and introduces Valentine's Day-themed decorations in the Store.
Note that the Quit Quest link has been removed and replaced by a Quit Quest button in the lower right corner of the menu screen. Apparently other menu changes have also been made--you can move between Guilds, Arena and Towns without going through the main menu. Bosses have been given new names and some may have new abilities.
If you have been effected by the login problems that started in December 2020, you'll probably have to uninstall and reinstall the game as described above in the first few paragraphs of this article. Just clicking OK when you get the error screen no longer lets you continue into the game.
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| Load Out Icon Upper Left |
The biggest change is the addition of "
load outs." From now on, once your town is Level Four or above, you can set up a maximum of five favorite weapon/armor/spells groupings. Once you set at least one up, you will see their button under the menu diamond (above). Click on it to choose. These can be changed anytime during PvE (Player Versus Environment regular play) or between PvP rounds. You can use background colors, icons and also name each of the five to help identify them visually. Load outs are done from the Character screen. Click on Loadouts under the Skills button and add items from your weapons, armor and skills. Icons and color coding for the button are done by clicking on the banner that indicates this set-up. Click on the Eye and Running Man icons to add skills and abilities. It doesn't appear that you can add poisons or resistances to your load outs. I can't figure out how, anyway.
I'll add important changes here as I find them. Check the store each day between Feb. 13-17 for free goodies. You can now wait to open chests instead of having them open automatically when you find them. That option is in the settings. If you wait to open them, there will be a chest icon on the left with the number unopened to remind you to do this later.
There are bugs, naturally. I took on a daily quest 17 levels below me and got the warning that it might be too hard for me. I also found a hidden area but the game showed I hadn't found it yet in the quest description.
Weapons and armor are color coded for rarity. You'll see the colors on their description in chests or in your inventory. Short version- purple is good.
Epic -
purple
Legendary -
goldenrod
Rare -
blue
Uncommon -
green
Small swarms of enemies have been increased, so watch out for those spiders and wisps!
You can turn off boss cutscenes in settings. There are new sounds in the game, especially around Valentine items and emotes.
Here are the full patch notes.
https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/article/7fhn5ImsPpqQudkKCEXEIE/the-elder-scrolls-blades-update-1-6-patch-notes
Here's a written summary of the changes.
https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/article/a502AyOEU87aLnWz7k4Xx/update-1-6-is-live-the-elder-scrolls-blades
Here is a video summary.
https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/article/5x3TQHPZPJJljWhdbXAfY/blades-town-hall-update-1-6
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After the
1.6.1 version hits approximately February 24, 2020, all Jobs are level 52 or higher with most having a five skull rating. Plus Abyss appears to be unaccessible from any menu. So I am taking on these high level quests and trying to get as much loot as possible before I'm killed but not spending gems or health potions on surviving.
You can also look at your character stats from the Character Menu by clicking on the bar chart icon under the Turn Helment On/Off icon on the right side upper corner.
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| Hints to Avoid Death Next Time |
I've also noticed if you are killed during a quest, you get tips on how to defeat the enemy next time. See above.
Version 1.6.2 is available to download on March 3, 2020. It is supposed to fix bugs such as the bug that reset skill cooldowns when a load out was equipped. Apparently there was a bug that ignored enemy weaknesses when determine a skull rating. Plus the skull ratings for higher level quests and jobs have been "improved." The Abyss is still locked.
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Version 1.6.3 hit on April 2, 2020. Supposedly this fixed a bug that locked the Abyss (Abyss is still locked for me at Level 49) and one that messed up trophy awards in Arena matches. Other bug fixes and improvements are promised. There's noting on the Blades website that describes any update. After download (which took several tries), I got the new character screen again and had to set up a new character from scratch after doing the movement tutorials. I had to access game, find the wrong character, log off to main menu, turn off/turn on Wi-Fi, access game, find wrong character, log off to main menu, etc. 4-5 times before I was able to choose between my regular character and the new one the game made me set up. Note that the Communication Error is showing up again. You'll either have to uninstall and reinstall the game or constantly log in every time you want to play.
Besides the problems with version 1.6.3, Bethesda has introduced a new Spirit of the Hunt event centered on available jobs in the woods. Starting April 1, 2020 do as many jobs in the woods as possible over the next two weeks. Rewards are going to be distributed to all players depending on how many of these jobs are done. Apparently enough forest jobs have been done to trigger a free skill reset April 18-19, so watch for that. If there are 150,000 forest jobs completed, there will be 2 golden chests handed out plus another free skill reset. If there are 200,000 forest jobs completed, there will be another free skill reset plus one elder chest will be gifts to all. Stay tuned.
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April 30, 2020 - Bethesda has announce early access is ending soon. The announcement reads: "The end of Early Access is ominous soon. We'll be giving thank you gifts to all Early Access players and releasing new quests! We'll also reset Arena trophies and give out rewards according to Arena and Rank. The higher your Arena, the better your main rewards, [including] a unique helmet for the top 1000, 500 and 100 players."
Patch 1.7 hit May 11, 2020. Early Access players are getting free gems and large decorations, there are six new quests for both low- and hi-level players. There's a massive new gladiatorial quest line to earn the Grand Champion Sword and Helm. The Arena Leaderboard has been reset with rewards for all who played Arena mode. A Guilds Leaderboard has been added. So far it looks like the bug that locked access to the Abyss is fixed but all the quest givers are bugged. None of their dialogue is showing in the dialogue boxes so you have to make choices at random. However, a quick update has fixed this for me. Once you get the automatic download when you attempt to log in, this no dialogue bug is fixed.
There's a new bug—if you are increasing the amount of potions you want to buy from an alchemist, then decide that you need to reduce them because you've gone over what you want to pay, the minus sign doesn't work. You have to abandon this page altogether and then return to get the correct number of potions you want made for you.
May 19, 2020 - Bethesda announced that Blades is now available on the Nintendo Switch.
Patch 1.7.1 hit June 12, 2020. This patch revised how Areana trophy rewards are calculated, fixes a Guild Leaderboard bug and also fixes interface bugs, quest progression blocks and crashes. Allegedly this fixes the bug that prevents one from reducing the number of potions you want to buy. This also fixes the bug that keeps Varro Marius from handing out the Minion Misfortune quest.
Patch 1.7.2 hit June 18, 2020. This appears to repeat all the 1.7.1 information. Update to this version to avoid the Communication Error (401-0-201-character name#number).
The latest update is
version 1.8 made on July 28-29, 2020. A new on-going Events feature has been added that apparently you must be Level 10 to access. Events are only available for 24 hours and there is 24 hours between Events. You access the current Event (if any) from a new tab called Events in your Quest section along with Quests, Challenges and Jobs. It apparently is an event you can complete over and over again—although it is supposed to get harder each time-- to gain a new currency called Sigils which you can use to buy weapons and armor, gems, limestone, etc. in a special Sigil Shop. You don't seem to be able to access the Sigil shop except during an Event, either. The best items are wildly expensive. I earned 3 sigils and 3500 gold from my first run-through while the most expensive thing in the store is a Lichslayer long sword costing 899 sigils. Goods available in the Sigil Shop change with each new Event.
The inventory has changed with this patch. Poisons and Potions no longer use inventory slots.
There is also new solo quest lines in Arena. Bethesda says, "Face epic encounters in an all-new, single player Arena quest line! Emerge victorious and earn the Grand Champion's Sword and Helm." I don't do Arena but if you do, you may wish to explore this further.
Patch 1.8.1 on August 11, 2020 adds "a shortcut button during Events for using relevant potions and poisons. Added packs of potions and poisons to the Store during Events." While in combat during an Event Quest, a button with a flask on it now appears where the health button normally is located to let you instantly use a relevant poison or resistance potion. If your health is critical, there is a Potion of Healing button instead.
For 325 gems you can buy the Ultimate Healing Pack which has 6 potions of ultimate healing and 5 scrolls of revival. For the same 325 gems you can buy the Deadly Elemental Pack, which gives you three each of the Prime Elixir of Resist Fire/Resist Frost/Resist Shock/Resist Poison, plus three each of the Deadly Aversion to Fire/Frost/Shock/Poison. I call that expensive. Plus bug fixes.
Patch 1.8.2 on September 1, 2020, added three new Event Quests that will start showing up soon. There were also bug fixes, particularly for a bug preventing heavy weapons from dealing extra damage on critical hits.
Patch 1.9 has the Halloween night mode in your town, with two moons, flying bats, clouds and spooky decorations around town. There's a new enemy called the Dark Seducer and new gear available in the Sigil shop. There will be new a new Event series, and leaderboards will reset each month with rewards for all participants and bonuses for top players and guilds.
