Fixes #1
As a player from day one, I feel thoroughly satisfied with Destiny in many areas. However, I feel as if there are certain areas that could be improved upon, certain additions that could be made, and several things that should be removed altogether.
- Remove many elements of RNG factors from the game.
- Introduce a heavily limited and sanctioned trading system.
- Introduce seperate patches to address gameplay in the PvP and PvE sections.
- Have faction vendors selling unique armors, rather than ones with different shaders.
- Address functionality and effectiveness of Exotics.
- Make Exotics harder to get.
- Remove weekly caps on some activities.
- Introduce more unique gameplay elements.
Now, to explain these points.
1. Remove many elements of RNG factors from the game.
RNG (Random number generator, or Random, Not Guaranteed, as I like to refer to it), means that rewards are random, and not based on rewards, or accomplishments. The reason I feel that this is a necessary move, is that, once you reach level 28, a level at which nothing that is important cannot be completed with some ease, further progression is no evidence of skill. A far more important indicator, I have sometimes found, is the Grimoire score, but its weight is lessened in my eyes when you can simply increase it but looking up ghost locations. For instance, I was in a lobby with a level 30, who had a grimoire score of 1885. Level 30 means absolutely nothing, as you could potentially receive the required raid peices in one run. It's based on luck, not skill. The Vault of Glass is easy now, let's face that. Provided you have any amount of skill, you can breeze through it with barely a hiccup in about two hours after the weekly reset. Even if you are awful, your teammates can drag you through very easily. There is absolutely no element of skill involved. It's just based on who was lucky enough to get the right pieces from the Raid. I have been waiting for Boots of the Hezen Lords for three weeks now, stuck at 29. It's incredibly boring, and I haven't received that raid piece once. I saw a post on the Bungie Forums, where a player suggested a currency-based system. This would be far more preferable, rather than simply playing the Raid again, and again, and again, and again, hoping, and failing to get my boots. And I am not the only one. Throughout my list of friends, there are people who have been stuck at 29 for weeks and weeks. Hoping and waiting for one piece of Raid Gear. What is the point? Why would you celebrate when you simply did the exact same thing, that has no sense of accomplishment involved, and you simply got lucky? Far from being the hardest thing ever, the Vault of Glass is simply a breeding ground for frustration. Level 30s have no respect for me any more. None at all. It's quite boring, actually, seeing one, because all I think is that 'the numbers favoured you.' Instead, a system, where you earn a mark-style currency per stage of completion, that allows you to purchase a particular piece of gear, would actually reward the skilled, rather than the fortunate. Level 30 means nothing, and when I get to 30, the only satisfaction I will get is seeing the rounded number.
2. Introduce a heavily limited and sanctioned trade system.
Wouldn't it be nice if you could actually do something with those materials? That glimmer you have? Wouldn't it be nice, if, instead of wondering around and returning to the same spots that spawn resources over and over and over again for hours on end, you could put your glimmer, ascendant materials, resources, to good use. I would suggest trade system that allows the trade of anything except for Raid Gear and Exotics. Exotics, I say, because I feel that their status should mean that I don't have almost every single one in the game. You could trade anything for anything. 100 Spirit Bloom for a Legendary you particularly want, so that someone can finally upgrade that armor they need to. You could buy 50 Relic Iron for 2000 Glimmer, so that someone can finally afford that Legendary shotgun for 10000 Glimmer. You could trade 50 heavy ammo synths for 5 Ascendant Shards, you could trade 100 ether seeds for 100 spinmental, you could trade 20 Silken Codexes for Ascendant Energy. All of these things would, could, and should be possible. It introduces an element of further interaction, and actually means that these things are useful, as I think they're fairly non-functional at the moment. Relic Iron. You essentially destroy 16 at a time, to upgrade a weapon's damage, that seems to make no actual difference to damage at all, that took you half an hour to collect. Upgrades seem to make very little difference, which is why it's so meaningless. Glimmer is used for virtually nothing at all, save for buying ammo synths. I have been capped at 25000 for about 2 weeks, until I got bored and bought my way to Cryptarch rank 68. You could even trade engrams, for that matter.
3. Introduce separate patches to address gameplay in the PvP and PvE sections.
A recent hotfix, entitled 'The one about the Mythoclast' heavily nerfed, you guessed it, the Vex Mythoclast. As someone who has completed the Raid on Hard - and although I have completed it once, all the way through, the way it was intended, since I realised that any other rewards in comparison to the Mythoclast were meaningless, I have never bothered to do it properly since, and have instead relied on the warlock 'method' to complete it. However, given that the original run took me about 4, 5 hours to complete, with a group of level 29s and 30s, I do not feel that the nerf, across all sections of the game, is justified. The Vault of Glass is defined by bungie as the hardest experience they've ever created. On Hard, it remains the hardest thing they have ever made. So the reward for completing the most difficult thing in the game is an exotic that is significantly less effective than other weapons, both in PvP and PvE. Suros Regime, for example, is far superior. The Last Word is also far superior. The list continues into the legendaries, for crying out loud. Shadow Price, Grim Citizen, Lord High Fixer, Vanquisher VIII, Fatebringer. Why would you bother? There is no possible reason for anyone, anyone at all to even attempt the Raid on Hard. Why? For an Achievement? The effort and pain you will put yourself through isn't worth it, at all. What Bungie have done is listened to a whining, bitching little section of the community. And I use little sarcastically. It's a large part. But unfortunately, it's also the part that will leave the game to begin playing Call of Duty, when Advanced Warfare releases. Satisfying these PvP focused twelve year olds, who will remove themselves from the game, who will not invest a significant amount of time into the game, is a massive mistake on Bungie's part. Of course, we must not forget who the blame really lies with. Activision, as publisher. I will be posting about that oversight, that most people have made. What I ask is that PvE remains unchanged. Dregs have balls that have dropped, and they also won't be complaining about how effective our weapons are. If you don't make a weapon effective, there is no reason to use it. Please, make our PvE experience an enjoyable one, instead of killing it without consideration, for the sake of PvP focused players. The patch was based entirely around PvP, and now Bungie have realised their mistake, they are backtracking like hell. It's quite simple, Bungie. Leave the PvE alone. Combat is extremely satisfying, and although a number of exotics need beefing up, nothing at all needs to be bloody nerfed. High Level combat is hard enough considering level advantages mean nothing at all for us, and huge damage bonuses and resistances for them. We need OP weapons. We need a serious arsenal, so don't butcher the PvE game for the sake of over-prioritisation of PvP.
4. Have faction vendors selling unique armors, rather than ones with different shaders.
I'm not sure if I'm the only one (sarcasm) who's noticed that the vendor armor for different factions are simply reskins of one another. Each faction offers the same warlock armor, with a selection of different colors, that mean absolutely nothing as...I'm using a shader. What is the point? Every single one looks identical? How are people meant to know which faction you have chosen? I used to feel that my FWC allegiance was special, and my Rank 3 Emblem in the first week made me feel very good. But the Astrolord set was not unique, despite the awesome name. Everywhere I looked, people were wearing the same armor, simply because it didn't matter which faction you ranked up, you looked the same. Why offer a choice of factions if they're virtually identical? It'd be a much more enjoyable and satisfactory experience if these armors actually offered some variety. Also, shaders would be nice for faction vendors, as detailed in the BETA.
5. Address functionality and effectiveness of Exotics. (And Make them harder to obtain)
I'll start off by saying that Bad Juju is the most appalling weapon in the game. This, I said to myself, as the useless weapon's bullets pinged off a Legionary, is an Exotic? Why the **** is this an exotic? What in heaven's name is the point of sealing off other Exotics for this? And this is the point. You see it with a number of exotics - Thorn and Bad Juju are particulary cases, for pretty much everyone, however, I feel that Invective, and Super Good Advice are severely underpowered as well. Why do these weapons offer this exclusive status if they are not worthy? Yes, I've unlocked their abilities. No, they're not worth the hassle. Now I have all the bounty exotics, I just delete any exotic bounty I get. They're not even worth giving to a second character any more. Please, if we can only have one of these beautiful things, make them worthwhile. Not to mention that they're incredibly easy to get, for something supposedly so valuable. What's the point, as well, of me having 20 exotics sitting on one character if I can only use two at a time? Why should I do it? I like the idea of owning every exotic in the game, but why would I bother? it's like a last resort, when I get bored. Which is fairly quickly now. These super-rare items, as well, are in a few cases barely a notch above some legendaries. If we can only use one of these, make them worth our while. Make them hard to get. Make people go 'wow' when they see exotics. And for christ's sake, up the bloody prices on Xur. I bought quite literally everything that I didn't have this week: Voidfang Vestments, Exotic Engram, The Armamentarium, Stealth Drive, Emerald Coil, and all the telemetries (all to add to the collection). And I still have 19 strange coins left. This is getting ridiculous. Why offer us such a choice of exotics, also being so easy to get, if we can only use one? I literally had about 5 by level 25. Why give us so many, so easily, if we cannot use them? Change the game, Bungie. 7
(6 in last point)7. Remove weekly cap on some activities.
Why do I play destiny more than once a week? Ill admit that the gameplay is still captivating enough to keep me going, but I cannot make any real progress or gain anything significant until that weekly reset. Come three, four hours, I will have completed the Raid, glitched the Hard Raid, finished the nightfall, and finished the heroic. There is no logical reason for me to play more than four hours, tops, per week. Why else bother, while I'm stuck in this limbo at level 29, 3 Light away from 30?
Not to mention that even though our Marks are capped at 100 a week, we can only hold 200 at an absolute max in our inventory. What possible fucking point does this serve. Not only can we only earn a limited amount per week, but we can't even let this stack. We are instead, if we wish to earn anything this week, forced to purchase, to spend, to invest completely bloody unnecessarily in something we do not want or need. Take away the cap. Or at the very least, double it. Make it interesting. Make it hard to hit the cap.
8. Introduce more unique activities.
Where is this grandeur, this sense of scale that we were promised, Bungie? I played Darksiders II yesterday, and that, a game for free, on XBL Gold, has more grandeur, a greater sense of scale, of epicness, of legendary quests and tales. We want opportunities to explore jungles, the sea, vast cities, make our way through a true labyrinth of tunnels under the earth, see the earth's core, EXPLORE. We want to get materials by raiding a mine run by gigantic Vex digging machines, we want to earn marks by engaging a Cabal general onboard a gigantic Land Tank that's MOVING, chasing him through mars on pikes and interceptors. We want to uncover a room full of chests filled with glimmer and rewards by charging with a fireteam of six through trenches of Fallen, ducking under mounted turrets and sniper fire from a defensive wall - we want to experience Destiny's D-Day. Such promise has been squandered with these admittedly pretty and well-thought out areas, but which ultimately bore us. There is no sense of scale. We want to go beyond the wall. Hunters want to pack rations, have water, food supplies, a tent, walk out into the desert and pitch for the night, but be attacked while sleep by Vandals and Dregs. Warlocks want to journey to a snowy temple guarded by frozen Vex to uncover an ancient text that gives us unique powers, to spend days poring over its fascinating language and lore, to gain knowledge and power from its pages. Titans want to fly to other planets, to visit monasteries, and learn techniques and tactics from the greatest fighters and warriors of the age. They want to join an expedition as security and retrieve a mystical rocket launcher from a chest buried beneath the earth.
Do these things, Bungie. Make our game worthwhile. Make our game special. Make our game interesting.
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