Tailor your overland and quest experience via Season Zero’s new Challenge Difficulty system.

If you want to make your adventures in Tamriel more dangerous and rewarding, Season Zero’s new Challenge Difficulty system (arriving when Update 50 goes live on June 8) is your opportunity to customize your ESO combat experience.

“Challenge Difficulty is probably THE most-requested feature from players,” explains Mike Finnigan, ESO’s Associate Design Director. “The goal is for us to give players a way to tailor their experience in overland and story content to their skill level.”

A completely opt-in system, Challenge Difficulty allows you to select between four unique difficulty options, each increasing the danger while also increasing the rewards!

• Adventurer
• This is the current and default Challenge Difficulty. There is no associated effect, and all rewards are as they are now. If you like how Overland currently operates, then this is the difficulty that is right for you.
• Seasoned
• You take 100% more damage from monsters and do 50% less damage. You receive 50% more gold and 20% more experience from monsters.
• Master
• You take 300% more damage from monsters and do 65% less damage. You receive 100% more gold and 75% more experience from monsters.
• Vestige
• The most difficult option at launch. You take 600% more damage from monsters and deal 80% less damage. You receive 200% more gold and 100% more experience from monsters.

To access and select your difficulty option, open your character’s Character Sheet and make your choice. You can switch back and forth at any time.

No matter which option you choose, you can still play with anybody else around since you aren’t separated from your fellow players simply because you have chosen differently.

Your choice has an impact on the challenge level (and rewards) of many in-game encounters, including:

• Overland encounters
• Such as roaming monsters, world bosses, world events, etc…
• Quest story instances
• Zone delves
• Zone public dungeons

[esosslfiles-a.akamaihd.net]Your challenge, your choice!

Note that four-player Dungeons, Trials, Arenas, the Infinite Archive, PvP game modes, and the Night Market are not impacted by your Challenge Difficulty choice.

“PVP, Dungeons, Trials, and Arenas generally have their own bespoke difficulty,” says Finnigan. “So, we wanted to provide a way for players to augment other areas in a similar fashion but with the caveat that we want to make sure players can still play together.”

When designing this first iteration of the system, the team wanted to ensure that Challenge Difficulty was both accessible and rewarding while allowing for future improvements.

“We wanted to make sure we provided players with some rewards, but we also wanted to initially keep the system light to ensure it’s adopted,” says Finnigan. “We plan to look at layering on rewards in the future in controlled spaces to punch it up.”

As always, the team paid close attention to the community’s early reaction to the system on the Public Test Server.

“The feedback has been great, and it directly led us to rebalance the numbers a bit. In particular, we received feedback about the Seasoned and Master options not quite being restrictive enough, so we took another pass at the damage players do to make them feel more appropriate.”

With the new Challenge Difficulty system, you can find danger and excitement in every corner of Tamriel. What level of challenge will you try first? Are you excited to explore a more dangerous ESO? Let us know via Bluesky[bsky.app], X (formerly Twitter), Instagram[www.instagram.com], and Facebook[www.facebook.com].  

The Challenge Difficulty system is part of Season Zero and arrives with Update 50 on June 8.

Discover how you can further focus your builds with the new Class Mastery system.

Arriving with Update 50 on June 8 as part of Season Zero, Class Mastery is a new way for you to further hone your builds while also being rewarded for your steadfast dedication to your class.

Introducing a new passive skill line for each of the game’s seven classes (each containing five unique passive abilities), Class Mastery allows you to lean into the mechanics that make your class and build special.

To make use of the Class Mastery system for one of your characters, you must first meet the following prerequisites:

•  Have reached level 50 for all three of your class’s skill lines
• You have to be a master of your class!
• Be not actively using the Subclassing system
• Class Mastery options are hidden while using Subclassing

With Class Mastery, you will feel more empowered than ever to hone your focus and specialize in your class’s original suite of abilities.

As mentioned above, each class gains access to a skill line with five new passives, but you receive only two Class Mastery Points total—you must choose which passives to activate based on your desired playstyle. 
[esosslfiles-a.akamaihd.net]Show your dedication to your class

Many of the new passives buff or expand upon the abilities already found within a class’s skill line. You can see the Class Mastery passives outlined below, but be warned, there’s a lot here to take in!
Update for May 14, 2026: We have made some minor fixes and tweaks to the below ability descriptions based on recent changes. 

Templar

• Bastion of Light: Heals you for every second that Sacred Ground is active. If you are at full Health after the heal, you generate Ultimate while in combat.
• Devout Guardian: Gives you a Damage Shield while Sacred Ground is active. The shield also grants Health, Magicka, and Stamina Recovery while active, and if it breaks, you gain Ultimate.
• Bright Harbinger: Upgrades rank 2 of Illuminate to grant the affected group members’ Weapon and Spell Damage, with a greater increase for you.
• Judgment’s Brand: Upgrades rank 2 of Burning Light to increase your damage done with Templar abilities a few seconds after activating.
• Steadfast Candescence: Increases the amount of damage you can block while stationary and causes you to gain Sacred Ground while Bracing.

Sorcerer

• Conservation of Energy: Upgrades rank 2 of Blood Magic to also activate off any ability with a cost, excluding cost per tick abilities, and to also restore Magicka and Stamina upon activation.
• Font of Power: Upgrades rank 2 of Exploitation to also activate off any Sorcerer ability and grants you Weapon and Spell Damage based on your Max Magicka or Stamina (whichever is higher).
• Static Reverberation: Causes your damaging attacks to have a chance for every percentage of missing Health the target has to trigger an additional hit of Shock Damage.
• This chance is further reduced for every permanent pet you have active.
• Calculated Defense: Gain a damage shield when you use a Sorcerer skill with a cast time. The strength of the shield is based on your Max Health. If the shield does not break before its duration runs out, you and nearby group members gain bonus Weapon and Spell damage.
• Sphere of Influence: Causes your damage shield abilities to grant an additional damage shield to the target that absorbs a percentage of Max Health as damage, scaling with the higher of your Max Magicka or Health. Targets also gain Health, Magicka, and Stamina Recovery.

Nightblade

• Nocturnal Inspiration: Upgrades rank 2 of Hemorrhage to have a chance equal to your Weapon Critical chance to grant you Ultimate.
• An Eye for Exploitation: Increases your Weapon and Spell Damage and reduces your damage taken, both based on your target’s missing Health.
• Above and Beyond: Increases your Critical Damage and Healing. It also increases your maximum potential Critical Damage and Healing.
• Cutthroat's Focus: Causes you to briefly dodge incoming attacks when activating a Nightblade ability while Bracing. Dodging any attack through any means causes your attacker to take increased damage.
• Share the Spoils: Upgrades rank 2 of Transfer to double the Ultimate you gain from it while also granting the nearest group members Magicka, Stamina, and Ultimate upon activating.

Dragonknight

• Inexorable Descent: Upgrades Landslide to also grant potency to damage and healing done, and damage shield strength per stack.
• “Potency to” means this bonus applies to the base calculation of these events, causing it to become multiplicative with other bonuses.
• Booming Voice: Upgrades rank 2 of The Storm Voice to also grant Health, Magicka, and Stamina Recovery per Ultimate spent.
• Wildfire Embers: Your Dragonknight Damage over Time effects now apply an additional DoT when they end. This effect stacks, increasing in damage the more stacks you apply.
• Resolute Defense: Increases the amount of damage you can block by every second you remain Bracing. Blocking has a chance to restore Stamina.
• Lead From the Front: Upgrades rank 2 of The Storm Voice to also apply Major Berserk and Protection for a time depending on Ultimate spent to you and group members.

Warden

Note that the Warden’s passives are generic and number-focused while we work on the Class Refresh experience for the class. Expect changes when the Class Refresh is complete.

• Tundra’s Maw: Upgrades the Chilled status effect to also apply Major Brittle upon application.
• Wild Adaptation: Increases your Weapon and Spell Damage for each status effect your target has on them. Note this can also apply to friendly targets!
• Glacial Obstinance: Upgrades Bond with Nature to also trigger off activating Winter’s Embrace abilities and causes the effect to grant you Weapon and Spell Damage if you are at full Health after the heal.
• Green-Keeper's Hide: Reduces your damage taken for every status effect on your attacker.
• Bountiful Harvest: Upgrades rank 2 of Nature’s Gift to grant you and your group Major Heroism and additional Magicka and Stamina.

Necromancer

• Nothing Wasted: Upgrades rank 2 of Corpse Consumption to grant a stack of Nothing Wasted when you consume a Corpse. Each stack of Nothing Wasted increases your Max Health, Weapon, and Spell Damage. Stacks of Nothing Wasted decay in sets of three, rather than all at once.
• Malevolent Promise: Upgrades rank 2 of Corpse Consumption. When you consume a corpse you mark the nearest non-player enemy with Death's Touch, allowing you to use corpse-consuming skills on them. Using this effect triggers rank 2 of Death Gleaning and rank 1 of Corpse Consumption's Ultimate generation.
• Cycle Unending: Upgrades rank 2 of Reusable Parts to also increase your potency of damage done based on how much more Health you have than your enemy.
• Pound of Flesh: Grants you a chance when taking damage to restore Health and some of your missing Stamina, up to once every second. This chance increases for every percentage of missing Health you have.
• Veil's Forfeit: Activates when directly healing a target below 66% Health, which allows you to use a corpse-consuming ability against them. Passively increases the duration of any source of Major Vulnerability you apply.

Arcanist

• Abyssal Emergence: Upgrades your Arcanist Ultimates to immediately generate Crux upon activation, while also granting Weapon and Spell Damage after activating.
• Fate Realigned: Upgrades rank 2 of Implacable Outcome to also generate Crux upon activation, and to grant Weapon and Spell Damage.
• Unbound Potential: Upgrades rank 2 of Fated Fortune to also increase your damage done.
• Erudite’s Rigor: Upgrades Fatewoven Armor to also apply Minor Cowardice to your attacker and Major Vitality to you and your group, while granting you Ultimate based on the amount of Crux you have.
• Ink-Scribe’s Verve: Enables you to generate a Crux when you heal or overheal while in combat. Generating Crux this way applies Major Force to you and your group.

Phew! Note that these are just outlines of how each new ability works. For a full breakdown of the numbers behind each new passive, check out our Patch Notes forum[forums.elderscrollsonline.com] when Update 50 launches on June 8. Furthermore, the team plans to continue to update and improve the above abilities based on player feedback, class refresh work, and how they’re being used in game—stay tuned!

If you’re a fan of playing “pure” classes, the new Class Mastery system rewards your dedication with powerful new boons. Don’t forget, you need to have reached max level for each of your class’s three skill lines and NOT be using Subclassing to make use of the new abilities. Have fun tuning your builds and be sure to share your tweaks with us via Bluesky[bsky.app], X (formerly Twitter), Instagram[www.instagram.com], and Facebook[www.facebook.com].



The Class Mastery system is part of Season Zero and arrives with Update 50 on June 8, 2026.