Tower Vendors & Faction Rep - What am I missing? (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Monday, January 26, 2015, 09:05 (3381 days ago)

I was looking through my vault yesterday, and I noticed I have 15 Vanguard commendations. I asked myself "When am I ever going to use these?" I starting thinking back through my memory, and was surprised to realize that I don't think I've ever purchased a weapon from a Vender (other than an Iron Banner scout rifle a couple months ago).

This got me to thinking about the Vendors in the Tower; did Bungie miss the mark with these shops & factions? Or am I missing out by not using them?

In my experience, there is very rarely any reason to buy from the vendors. In the early game (1-20) you get all the gear you need from drops and as mission rewards. Buying new armor and weapons at that point is all but worthless, since you don't keep any single piece of gear for more than a few missions. Everything gets upgraded and replaced too quickly.

During the 20-26 grind, I did find it necessary to buy a few pieces of armor to boost my light level. I could have purchased weapons at that point, but it never seemed wise to me; better to spend my marks on armor so I can level up and do higher level missions which will give me better weapons as rewards, right?

Now that all 3 of my character have reached end-game content (raids, nightfalls, etc) I can't see any reason to buy from the vendors ever again. I already get legendary and exotic weapons faster than I can upgrade them, simply by running the weekly content. As such, the tower feels like a pretty hollow place for me. I go from the Vault to the bounty station and back to orbit, with the occasional trip to the weapons vendor to buy heavy ammo synths.

On a related note, I wonder if anyone here could explain the appeal of building faction rep? Once again, I see very little point to it. The various factions don't seem to sell gear that is particularly unique or special. Plus, the fact that they only deal with Crucible marks is a big deterrent for me, since I rarely play the crucible.

Am I way off here? Is there more to the vendors than I realize? Or are they actually as useless as I think they are?