Destiny Raid Groups/ General Discussion

[53Driver]

I guess the biggest issue with a "constantly evolving open world" is that there will be changes for both the good and the bad. I'm still trying to decipher everything I just read.

[f0rge]

I'm not sure how they keep saying "this is not an MMO" and then turn around and follow MMO DLC practices of out dating gear almost to the letter.

I'm trying not to get too annoyed by it, I may be less butthurt when I see the changes in real life as opposed to reddit where everyone has their pitchforks ready.

Although I gotta say, if I hadn't already pre-purchased the DLC like a sucker this latest "preview" would have put me off of it almost 100%.

I can't even imagine what the Bungie forums look like today

[53Driver]

Originally Posted by f0rge

I'm not sure how they keep saying "this is not an MMO" and then turn around and follow MMO DLC practices of out dating gear almost to the letter.

I'm trying not to get too annoyed by it, I may be less butthurt when I see the changes in real life as opposed to reddit where everyone has their pitchforks ready.

Although I gotta say, if I hadn't already pre-purchased the DLC like a sucker this latest "preview" would have put me off of it almost 100%.

I can't even imagine what the Bungie forums look like today

I feel like Buffalo Bill #Deej and the rest of the bungie crew are sitting above us as we play screaming "IT PUTS THE LOTION ON IT"S SKIN AND IT PLAYS THE CRUCIBLE AGAIN!!!!!!!! Why would you take away a simple mechanic that let us players that don't like PvP to get marks for our factions? I keep seeing people say that they didn't want people to trade Vanguard for Crucible marks but why would this matter? Do the math, I would be losing marks each time I tried to do that.


^Here's one example lol

[wheelhaus]

Originally Posted by MokSpeed

Here is my only major complaint. I don't get why you have to wait for dumb luck to upgrade your current exotic. How I'm reading this is that in order for me to even begin to upgrade my current exotic, I have to pray that Xur sells the upgrade material that weekend. That concept is completely stupid. Leveling should be a grind, not luck. Other than that most the new features seem fine.

I didn't get the random Xur luck at all from reading that, it sounds to me like Xur will sell you only one exotic shard each week, and you can apply it to any exotic. (This may be one per character, possibly one per acct, not sure). Its certainly possible they may put the exotic shard into a random rotation like the other items, but that doesn't sound like what f0rge quoted.
EDIT- looks like he will have a pool of 6 different exotic weapon upgrades each week.

What bugs me is that (especially after the huge open beta) they're making such drastic changes to basic gameplay elements only 2-3 months after release. Bungie, really?

I'm going to reserve judgement until I've experienced how the new bits work, but it seems like someone is REALLY driven to fix things that aren't broken, who has also taken the idea of "there will always be players you can't satisfy" as a core MO. A change in and of itself is not an improvement just because it's different. Hell I was perfectly fine with grinding for weeks to upgrade exotics, they're the rarest weapons in the game so why shouldn't they take way more time?

I'd love to be a fly on the wall during these meetings, to hear opinions and justifications for why these changes seem like a good idea, or why they're even being discussed in the first place.

[Ramster]

This makes me glad I didn't get the season pass for this game.

[wheelhaus]

Looks like that Reddit thread is being edited and updated in real time. f0rge's quoted text is already very different on reddit.

[MokSpeed]

Originally Posted by wheelhaus

I didn't get the random Xur luck at all from reading that, it sounds to me like Xur will sell you only one exotic shard each week, and you can apply it to any exotic. (This may be one per character, possibly one per acct, not sure). Its certainly possible they may put the exotic shard into a random rotation like the other items, but that doesn't sound like what f0rge quoted.
EDIT- looks like he will have a pool of 6 different exotic weapon upgrades each week.

What bugs me is that (especially after the huge open beta) they're making such drastic changes to basic gameplay elements only 2-3 months after release. Bungie, really?

I'm going to reserve judgement until I've experienced how the new bits work, but it seems like someone is REALLY driven to fix things that aren't broken, who has also taken the idea of "there will always be players you can't satisfy" as a core MO. A change in and of itself is not an improvement just because it's different. Hell I was perfectly fine with grinding for weeks to upgrade exotics, they're the rarest weapons in the game so why shouldn't they take way more time?

I'd love to be a fly on the wall during these meetings, to hear opinions and justifications for why these changes seem like a good idea, or why they're even being discussed in the first place.

I read both the Reddit post and Bungie's post not the summarized post on here. Not only do you have to buy the shard, but you have to buy the "upgraded version" of your gun. For instance if you want to upgrade your SUROS you will need:

-Your original SUROS
-The Exotic Shard
-7000 Glimmer
-The new SUROS (Which is dependant wheter or not Xur offers it for sale that weekend. As you've stated 6 weapons each week.)

It also would have been nice of them to announce this along with the patch seeing as I've already dismantled 3 exotic weapons to fully upgrade others. Had I known this I would've held off on doing anything. As I said before grinding should be a matter of how much time you're willing to put in and not dumb luck. This backwards circular logic is just plain stupid and the only apparent reason I see for it existing is to protect themselves from people reaching end game content too soon. Capping players in itself is a stupid concept.


Unfortunately, I'm one of those people who put all their eggs in one basket when the game launched and purchased all the DLC on launch date. So we will see how good this DLC goes. I look forward to all the new content. I just find it a huge waste of time having to re-level all my guns and gear again.

[f0rge]

Seems like someone at Bungie is really worried people are blasting through the (relatively lacking) content too quickly so they're trying to come up with ways to make everything happen more slowly.

That in and of itself is not bad, but I agree with Wheelhaus that something strange is going on over there that they're changing things so drastically so soon after launch. Considering they changed almost nothing after the beta I'm not sure where this is all coming from.

[f0rge]

Originally Posted by MokSpeed

For instance if you want to upgrade your SUROS you will need:

-Your original SUROS
-The Exotic Shard
-7000 Glimmer
-The new SUROS (Which is dependant wheter or not Xur offers it for sale that weekend. As you've stated 6 weapons each week.)

I'm pretty sure you also need ANOTHER exotic shard to max out the weapon, after you re-level it because all the upgrades have been removed.

And what happens in the second DLC? I have to do that AGAIN?

That ain't going to fly Bungie, not even a little bit.

[53Driver]

Originally Posted by f0rge

I'm pretty sure you also need ANOTHER exotic shard to max out the weapon, after you re-level it because all the upgrades have been removed.

And what happens in the second DLC? I have to do that AGAIN?

That ain't going to fly Bungie, not even a little bit.

Basically, IMO, they are not giving the majority of the people enough time to even max out and utilize their weapons before making them "obsolete" if this is how they are going to do things. I looked at my statistics the other day and so far I have put in over 300 hours in less than 3 months into this game. Now I know the first 100 hours really don't count as I didn't know what I was doing and thus played the game very inefficiently but still it has taken me a long time to get the weapons I do have maxed out to where they are.

Certainly having multiple characters who were level 20+ would help, but then again I'd just be playing even more just so I could use those characters. This is what I have leveled so far: 1 legendary hand cannon, 1 legendary auto rifle, 1 exotic sniper rifle, 2 legendary machine guns and 1 legendary rocket launcher. I have multiple legendary and exotic weapons that are completely unlocked but I am still short material. A few I have just started working on so now with all this talk of new weapons coming out, old weapons having to be started over and original legendary weapons becoming "obsolete", I'm not really sure what to make of it all. It really sounds like I am going to have to start all over for the most part and then maybe have to do it all over again in a couple of months when the next DLC drops? Doesn't make sense. I can understand raising damage levels on existing weapons and introducing new weapons but don't make everything reset back to zero. It'll become a never ending chase only to have to start over everytime you are about to finally get a decent inventory. Kind of like a dog chasing it's tail.

[MokSpeed]

Originally Posted by f0rge

Seems like someone at Bungie is really worried people are blasting through the (relatively lacking) content too quickly so they're trying to come up with ways to make everything happen more slowly.

That in and of itself is not bad, but I agree with Wheelhaus that something strange is going on over there that they're changing things so drastically so soon after launch. Considering they changed almost nothing after the beta I'm not sure where this is all coming from.

Well I guess that's the logistics of doing business with the devil. They changed nothing after the Beta, but it's sad that the Beta was in itself a majority of the game content a lot was actually changed prior to the release of the beta. If I can find it I'll go back and get you the links because it's an interesting read. Basically once Bungie signed with Activision, Bungie's head developer left shortly after. Knowing Activision, that was probably the result of drastic decisions such as gutting the story and diluting it into DLC releases as to maximize profit on the title. After that, it was basically a domino effect of people leaving one by one. What we call "Bungie" today is merely a shell of what it formerly was. Frank O'Connor is still with 343 and stayed with Halo. Joseph Staten is working on the Game of Thrones game, and so on.

[f0rge]

Originally Posted by 53Driver

Basically, IMO, they are not giving the majority of the people enough time to even max out and utilize their weapons before making them "obsolete" if this is how they are going to do things. I looked at my statistics the other day and so far I have put in over 300 hours in less than 3 months into this game. Now I know the first 100 hours really don't count as I didn't know what I was doing and thus played the game very inefficiently but still it has taken me a long time to get the weapons I do have maxed out to where they are.

Certainly having multiple characters who were level 20+ would help, but then again I'd just be playing even more just so I could use those characters. This is what I have leveled so far: 1 legendary hand cannon, 1 legendary auto rifle, 1 exotic sniper rifle, 2 legendary machine guns and 1 legendary rocket launcher. I have multiple legendary and exotic weapons that are completely unlocked but I am still short material. A few I have just started working on so now with all this talk of new weapons coming out, old weapons having to be started over and original legendary weapons becoming "obsolete", I'm not really sure what to make of it all. It really sounds like I am going to have to start all over for the most part and then maybe have to do it all over again in a couple of months when the next DLC drops? Doesn't make sense. I can understand raising damage levels on existing weapons and introducing new weapons but don't make everything reset back to zero. It'll become a never ending chase only to have to start over everytime you are about to finally get a decent inventory. Kind of like a dog chasing it's tail.

It is 100% that. People keep telling me this is what all MMOs do, but Bungie keeps telling me this isn't an MMO.

I guess it's to keep the truly hardcore occupied, but it seems to be at the expense of more casual players. I wouldn't really consider myself casual either, I play this game like 4-5 days a week but only 160 hours total. These changes will leave me in the dust.

[f0rge]

Originally Posted by MokSpeed

Well I guess that's the logistics of doing business with the devil. They changed nothing after the Beta, but it's sad that the Beta was in itself a majority of the game content a lot was actually changed prior to the release of the beta. If I can find it I'll go back and get you the links because it's an interesting read. Basically once Bungie signed with Activision, Bungie's head developer left shortly after. Knowing Activision, that was probably the result of drastic decisions such as gutting the story and diluting it into DLC releases as to maximize profit on the title. After that, it was basically a domino effect of people leaving one by one. What we call "Bungie" today is merely a shell of what it formerly was. Frank O'Connor is still with 343 and stayed with Halo. Joseph Staten is working on the Game of Thrones game, and so on.

Yeah Activision was a bad move for sure. You gotta wonder why they did that, Bungie had to have money in the bank from 5 Halo games. The loss of Joseph Staten was a HUGE hit, that guy is a genius.

[wheelhaus]

I'm going to try to steer this in a more positive direction...

Firstly, it makes sense to make higher difficulties to keep things challenging while moving forward. We can all agree here.

Secondly, they don't have to make existing gear upgradeable to these higher levels. If you want to, you need to get a few special items and re-roll it. Or, just find new gear while playing. Remember, many MMOs just release new gear that you'll need to get to remain competitive over new difficulties, old gear is typically obsoleted.

It only makes sense that ALL the legendary/exotic drops are of the higher level to make this fair. So long as the old exotics will no longer drop (unless its the same weapon, just v2.0). For instance, I just found a Monte Carlo as a nightfall reward. If I were to find another Monte Carlo, it should only ever be v2.0 (Even if it's under another name), v1.0 should not exist in the drop tables any longer.

Thirdly, once the new mechanics are in place, it should set the standard for how things will be moving forward. Its possible they were trying to get the game released on a specific date as promised, but had to leave some features out that hadn't been fully vetted yet. We were given a basic upgrade system, but it didn't address new higher level gear. This seems like a compromise that is at least somewhat reasonable while maintaining the balance between allure of the newest gear and utility of existing gear. They can't honestly believe that making massive changes every couple months will retain players, so once the new system is in place I hope it moves along smoothly.

Fourth, I believe everyone is taking exotics for granted. Exotics are supposed to be very unique items with very unique attributes, designed to make you question or change your strategies. I am OK with exotics having a bit of RNG luck for upgrading old gear. I'd like to see how this works, like the MC I mentioned above, if it rerolls and simply becomes MC V2.0, with all the new perks etc, then OK. If on the other hand, its as haphazard as Diablo 3's rare/legendary rolls, then you can expect to trash a lot of them to get the one that suits your style or damage requirements. Ugh... I haven't played since they revamped everything last year, but it was a mess.

I'm going to stay optimistic and see how this expansion plays out. I haven't purchased it yet, but I probably will this weekend because the game is still damn fun to play, regardless of major bitch-slap changes right out of the gate.