No cooldowns means exactly what it says, and that is no cooldowns. Resource management is entirely different mechanic which cooldown based mmos regularly employ as well. Autoattack isnt swing by far, its "enable attacks" and "disable attacks". The special moves are not cooldowns either, thats rather unique resource based ability where resource is being awarded for good tactical gameplay such as timed blocks and interrupts

So to sum it up, no cooldowns

Theres going to be simliar personal instances what we saw in SWTOR, hell even TSW used those. Its been confirmed theres also decision for player to choose from. Example they gave, do you help some spirit or kill them.

I hope theres some money sink, nothing is more foolish than no way to spend your money.

Nah, you just have to start considering the big picture.

It is the blueprint. When watching this video we know one thing for sure. Its going to be a lot like Skyrim (not 100% ofc) and not very much like WoW

They are not really cooldowns in my opinion, since they have nothing to do with specific abilities. It's just that when you waste your stamina, you can't do much. Abilities, but also sprint, block etc. are linked to it. And other mmo's have had a stamina bar as well. Also, cooldowns is the made-up word for special abilities, but im sure you know this already.

not exactly, cooldown means ability which once used trigger a "cooldown" period before it can be used again. Meaning ability isnt spammable

No cooldowns means spike damage is going to be really interesting (read, lots of forum QQ) in PvP, especially for mages. Oooh, I can just imagine, load up your skill bar with powerful damage spells so that you can unload them all at once at some poor sap. BOOM! Headshot.

Developers are aware of it, they probably wont incorporate powerful damage spells as you know from cooldown games, more likely tactical choices where spells/abilities have extra effects such as snares, stuns, cleave or aoe components and such.

Burning all your mana/stamina on one ability is possible, but that leaves the player without possibility of blocking, interrupting or breaking stuns. The game would probably be designed for a blocking player to endure such burst and leave the spammer defenseless after it

I do believe that the term cooldown refers to the actual 'cooldown' of the ability, not the ability itself in the first place. It's just been called that to refer to abilities which have a cooldown.

Yes I agree this is going to be interesting. Burst dps in PvP is one of the main QQ reasons in mmo's I have playerd. SWTOR at launch anyone? We will just have to wait and see how it turns out.

I think he is over-hyped because of his 2 earlier videos. One has his fan demands and the other takes on the negative arguments as a companion to the positive one you watched. Kind of builds up...

NOV 18 - 4 things Fans want: http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=GhL9ZN0ldKg

NOV 24 - A skeptics View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toDrEXYzMkc

DEC 1 - 21 Reasons to be interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8luBc0X3vIg

You forget, Skyrim did have fences.

OP thanks for the video.I really enjoyed it.

No not really. You have to manage your resource bars. Ability's will cost resources to activate so you won't be able to activate several at the same time because you won't have enough in your resource bar. Based on what we do know more powerful spells will cost more, so sure you could use one right away but then you won't be able to use others because you've spent it all and now can't even use your lesser abilities until you regen your resource bar. You'll have to manage your resource bar effectively.

Doesn't work that way. In order to ensure relatively fluid combat, you have to make sure that whatever resource players use in combat is enough to see them through at least one 1vs1 fight. Otherwise it becomes an exercise in frustration.
Anyway, if you want an example of a class with no cooldowns, look no further than GW2 Thief. No cooldowns whatsoever on their abilities, with a depletable resource that slowly recharges (initiative) required for most of their abilities. Thieves are kings of burst in GW2, precisely because they can spam a high number of abilities really quickly. So it is the spamming ability that reigns burst damage builds, not necessarily that individual abilities are highly damaging. Give me just one low damage spell with no cooldown and I can produce high burst damage just by spamming it repeatedly.

However, I highly doubt there will be NO cooldown in ESO, since even Skyrim has a cooldown on skills. It's called combat animation... your sword swing requires a certain amount of time to complete, as do your spells. That's your cooldown right there. GW2 Thief actually has none and you need to see one in action (looks like a ninja on steroids) to understand what combat would look like if every class was like that.

Well according to the devs it does work that way. I would suggest listening to the initial Game Informer interviews and I'm sure later info as well about how ability's will work and resource pools will work.

Ability activation is based on your resource pool. Ability's have varying amounts of resource cost to activate. Also dodging and such takes resources as well. So again you have to manage your resource pool to be effective. Sure you could spam a single ability but then you won't be able to defend yourself and also with the added mechanic of finesse you'll never be able to unlock you heavy hitting ability's. So to the point no you won't be able to spam ability's and hope to be effective.

And I can guarantee you that you will. Because of simple, unavoidable mechanics of resource-based combat abilities. No cooldowns doesn't allow for player reaction. If I can do my attack chain in under a second, you have no chance to react. This usually means that by the time you do start to react I have already whittled down your health and now have a huge advantage over you, even if it means I have to finish you off with my (also spammable) auto attack.

If every class will be like this, I guarantee you that combat will quickly devolve into keyboard mashing. But as I said, I doubt that will be the case, since there are combat animations to consider.

I hope they do Combat animations right!

No he's talking about combat animations being a small natural cooldown for most things, which is for the most part completely true actually.