Prison of Elders Impressions (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Thursday, May 21, 2015, 06:05 (3271 days ago)

Just wanted to say a few things about the new PoE mode.

First of all, I typically love survival/horde modes. I was a huge fan of Horde in Gears of War 2&3, and ODST Firefight was a blast. So I went in to PoE expecting to have a good time.

I've run through PoE several times now: level 28 and 32 twice each (as a 32 Guardian) and I just now finished a level 34 run as a 33 guardian.
I did the 34 run just now with Cyber and Vortech. I had a good time as always, because they're both lots of fun to play with. But when I think about the experience of PoE itself, my first thought is "I don't want to do that ever again".

I think all great horde modes have 1 thing in common: they give your team the opportunity to fortify a location against incoming waves of foes. This is 99% an issue of map design and enemy spawn locations. Your team should have the ability to find a spot on the map and say "this is our base, let's lock it down". In a well designed map, these defendable zones are never bulletproof, but they offer a geometry layout that gives the player the ability to take cover, move around, react to flanking maneuvers, etc.

The arenas in PoE offer almost none of this. It's just messy chaos, all the time. There are very few positions that are in any way defendable, and the ones that are quickly devolve into the worst form of Halo/Halo 2 camping routines (you know, those battles where you spend the entire time crouching behind a box, moving an inch to take a shot, almost dying, move an inch back, repeat).

Adding to the mess is that enemies will sometimes spawn right smack in the middle of the arena. During a round against the Fallen, I took position on top of a large platform near the center. Not perfectly safe, but some decent cover and sightlines. Just as I though "let's see if I can make this work", a captain, 2 dregs and a servitor spawned directly on top of me.

The best horde modes reward teams for coming up with tactical formations and strategies, and allow room for improvement of execution (very much like raids in that regard). Playing on higher difficulty settings should feel challenging, but not limiting. The most coordination PoE really allows on higher difficulty settings is "everyone get in the bubble now".

I'm sure some people will love PoE, but for me it is a huge miss. The fact that PoE is all we have for top-level PvE content really bums me out. I thought I'd be ok with no new raid until Comet, but now I'm not so sure. Which is a shame. I really enjoyed the rest of the House of Wolves content (aside from Trials of Osiris... no interest in that, personally). I got my Fatebringer upgraded, and... Well I don't really want to play it anymore to upgrade anything else.

I guess this is how none-raiders have felt since launch? ;)