Is the Trials competition really so weak on Xbone...

That a guy playing on a drumset can make it to the lighthouse? :P

The only reason I don't quite consider it front-page-worthy is because he was mostly carried (though he did have some good kills too), but still, that's not something you see every day (plus, the way he has to play a drumroll in order to open the Lighthouse chest is gold.

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That a guy playing on a drumset can make it to the lighthouse? :P

The only reason I don't quite consider it front-page-worthy is because he was mostly carried (though he did have some good kills too), but still, that's not something you see every day (plus, the way he has to play a drumroll in order to open the Lighthouse chest is gold.

I played with a couple of guys Monday night, coming in when their 3rd gave up on them. One of them was complaining the whole time about how almost everyone they'd played seemed to have one (or two) super-good player(s), and one (or two) seriously sub-par players. (I saw this in the two cards we played, as well.) His theory was that on Monday nights, at least, a majority of the teams are regular joes being carried to the LH. He said this didn't happen to him at all on PlayStation, that he made it to the LH regularly there. (I've never played with him before, so I can't judge anything about him except what I saw in the hour we played together, but he seemed decent.)

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That a guy playing on a drumset can make it to the lighthouse? :P

The only reason I don't quite consider it front-page-worthy is because he was mostly carried (though he did have some good kills too), but still, that's not something you see every day (plus, the way he has to play a drumroll in order to open the Lighthouse chest is gold.

I played with a couple of guys Monday night, coming in when their 3rd gave up on them. One of them was complaining the whole time about how almost everyone they'd played seemed to have one (or two) super-good player(s), and one (or two) seriously sub-par players. (I saw this in the two cards we played, as well.) His theory was that on Monday nights, at least, a majority of the teams are regular joes being carried to the LH. He said this didn't happen to him at all on PlayStation, that he made it to the LH regularly there. (I've never played with him before, so I can't judge anything about him except what I saw in the hour we played together, but he seemed decent.)

He may be on to something. Apparently paid Lighthouse carry attempts (even by big-ish streamers) are a very common thing, even though it violates both MS/Sony and Twitch TOS. Twitch reportedly does nothing about it, so it's been growing and growing.
By monday night, the dedicated Trials teams have made it to the lighthouse, so I'd imagine that the competition is weaker on that day (people wanting to play out Gold packages), perfect for carry attempts.

Sounds like the Trials environment has grown toxic/not fun, so I likely won't be hopping back into it until Destiny 2's.

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Trials has always been pretty toxic, at least in streaming circles. Hardcore PvP will bring that out of people.

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His theory was that on Monday nights, at least, a majority of the teams are regular joes being carried to the LH. He said this didn't happen to him at all on PlayStation, that he made it to the LH regularly there.

Purely anecdotal, but I played Trials every monday night with the same team (slycrel and Peaksutah) for the better part of a year on PS4, and I didn't find the competition noticeably different than on any other nights that I played. The only trend I could pick up on is that Trials seems to have gotten progressively more difficult as time goes on. In early 2016, Slycrel, Peaks and I would routinely get to 6-7 wins before hitting "the wall" of truly stiff competition that we couldn't overcome. By September, we would often fail to reach 5 wins.

More often than not, I would play a few tickets with other players earlier in the weekend as well. These teams would quite often include lighthouse regulars; Thee Chaos, Ottermack, Korny, Speedracer, Cody, Cyber... back in the House of Wolves days, any combination of those players would almost certainly make it to the lighthouse within a couple hours of trying. But over the months, the competition got tougher and tougher, regardless of the night we played on. I went 6 months without going to the lighthouse, which is saying something considering I used to make it there 2-3 times per weekend.

I'm sure there are trends at work with regards to certain days being more competitive than others, but I haven't noticed it to a strong degree. There is, however, a different issue that I feel is effecting the skill-barrier involved in going flawless; it has to do with the way matchmaking tries to match your team against opponents with a similar number of wins in their card. Obviously, this means you are facing stiffer competition the closer you get to the Lighthouse. But I suspect there is something happening above and beyond that. While playing with people like Thee Chaos and Ottermack, I've noticed we will often sail to 8 wins with relatively little difficulty, then suddenly get knocked out by teams that are head and shoulders above anything else we've faced, multiple times in a row. I've wondered if the best-of-the-best teams will go straight to 9 wins, and the keep playing, either for fun or more loot drops, etc. I wonder if these teams just keep getting matched against other teams who are in the 7-9 win range. If this is the case, the matchmaking pool might contain a group of ultra good teams that spend hours at a time knocking out other teams who were themselves on the verge of reaching the lighthouse.

Total speculation on my part, and based purely on my own experiences, but it happens so often that I can't help but wonder if there is a concrete reason for it. The teams I face once I hit the 8 win mark are almost always leagues better than any other team I come across at an earlier point in the ticket.

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His theory was that on Monday nights, at least, a majority of the teams are regular joes being carried to the LH. He said this didn't happen to him at all on PlayStation, that he made it to the LH regularly there.

Purely anecdotal, but I played Trials every monday night with the same team (slycrel and Peaksutah) for the better part of a year on PS4, and I didn't find the competition noticeably different than on any other nights that I played. The only trend I could pick up on is that Trials seems to have gotten progressively more difficult as time goes on. In early 2016, Slycrel, Peaks and I would routinely get to 6-7 wins before hitting "the wall" of truly stiff competition that we couldn't overcome. By September, we would often fail to reach 5 wins.

More often than not, I would play a few tickets with other players earlier in the weekend as well. These teams would quite often include lighthouse regulars; Thee Chaos, Ottermack, Korny, Speedracer, Cody, Cyber... back in the House of Wolves days, any combination of those players would almost certainly make it to the lighthouse within a couple hours of trying. But over the months, the competition got tougher and tougher, regardless of the night we played on. I went 6 months without going to the lighthouse, which is saying something considering I used to make it there 2-3 times per weekend.

I'm sure there are trends at work with regards to certain days being more competitive than others, but I haven't noticed it to a strong degree. There is, however, a different issue that I feel is effecting the skill-barrier involved in going flawless; it has to do with the way matchmaking tries to match your team against opponents with a similar number of wins in their card. Obviously, this means you are facing stiffer competition the closer you get to the Lighthouse. But I suspect there is something happening above and beyond that. While playing with people like Thee Chaos and Ottermack, I've noticed we will often sail to 8 wins with relatively little difficulty, then suddenly get knocked out by teams that are head and shoulders above anything else we've faced, multiple times in a row. I've wondered if the best-of-the-best teams will go straight to 9 wins, and the keep playing, either for fun or more loot drops, etc. I wonder if these teams just keep getting matched against other teams who are in the 7-9 win range. If this is the case, the matchmaking pool might contain a group of ultra good teams that spend hours at a time knocking out other teams who were themselves on the verge of reaching the lighthouse.

Total speculation on my part, and based purely on my own experiences, but it happens so often that I can't help but wonder if there is a concrete reason for it. The teams I face once I hit the 8 win mark are almost always leagues better than any other team I come across at an earlier point in the ticket.

Concrete reason is Scarab Heart and the new emblem. I've always kept and played on 9-0 cards to try to get that emblem, which I'm sure is a pretty common grind for Lighthouse vets, though my last few 9-0 runs, I just stop playing.

I get the reasoning behind Bungie setting it up that way (bigger pool of players throughout the weekend, and folks trying to obtain prestige items), but it taints the fun of the challenge for me if I know that there is a deliberate wall awaiting me after a certain point. I won't complain about a challenge, but it's more that I don't like game devs manipulating me to keep me playing, so yeh, I've not bothered with Trials unless I've specifically been invited.

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Total speculation on my part, and based purely on my own experiences, but it happens so often that I can't help but wonder if there is a concrete reason for it. The teams I face once I hit the 8 win mark are almost always leagues better than any other team I come across at an earlier point in the ticket.

Concrete reason is Scarab Heart and the new emblem. I've always kept and played on 9-0 cards to try to get that emblem, which I'm sure is a pretty common grind for Lighthouse vets, though my last few 9-0 runs, I just stop playing.

When Zero, Squid and I made it to the lighthouse a few weeks ago I received a message at the start of the match from the other team asking where we were on our card. We were at 8-0 and they were already at 9-0. They proceeded to steam roll us in 5 games and then went on their merry way.

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

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I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

I did that a few weeks ago, too. It was a little sad, despite having not played the game in nearly a year.

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I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

I did that a few weeks ago, too. It was a little sad, despite having not played the game in nearly a year.

It's just become increasingly clear to me that Bungie has no intention of making the kind of game that I wish Destiny had become. And that's fine. They're doing their thing, and I'm sure lots of people will enjoy it.

Rise of Iron was a big blow to my relationship with the game, and festival of Lost was the nail in the coffin. I'll miss the few parts of the game I enjoy, and I really miss playing with the DBO crew on a regular basis, but it just isn't worth spending countless hours jumping through hoops that frustrate me :-/

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...That you didn't keep it on the hard drive long enough to at least join us for Cyber's Flawless Anniversary VoG raid as a good final send-off together.

(Then again, you do have 8 days yet to re-download for just that purpose if you'd like?)

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...That you didn't keep it on the hard drive long enough to at least join us for Cyber's Flawless Anniversary VoG raid as a good final send-off together.

(Then again, you do have 8 days yet to re-download for just that purpose if you'd like?)

I almost held off for that very reason, but I'm not actually going to be available on that day anyway. If something changes, I'll jump in :)

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Rise of Iron was a big blow to my relationship with the game, and festival of Lost was the nail in the coffin. I'll miss the few parts of the game I enjoy, and I really miss playing with the DBO crew on a regular basis, but it just isn't worth spending countless hours jumping through hoops that frustrate me :-/

That's pretty much the reason I didn't even get Rise of Iron. I just accepted that, even as fun as it was, Destiny isn't actually the type of game I want to play. I'm really glad it is for some people, and I do understand the appeal of just jumping in and grinding out strikes or bounties or whatever. There's just too much out there for me to spend my gaming time doing that. Honestly, I still think Diablo III is a much better loot/grinding game, and I do still jump into that from time to time to run through some Rifts. It's mindlessly fun in a way that Destiny just isn't for me.

I'm somewhat hopeful for Destiny 2. From the limited rumors and leaks we've seen, it sounds like it might be working towards something like what I always envisioned. But if it's ultimately just more Destiny as we know it, I'm honestly not sure how interested I'll be. Time will tell, I guess.

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Rise of Iron was a big blow to my relationship with the game, and festival of Lost was the nail in the coffin. I'll miss the few parts of the game I enjoy, and I really miss playing with the DBO crew on a regular basis, but it just isn't worth spending countless hours jumping through hoops that frustrate me :-/

That's pretty much the reason I didn't even get Rise of Iron. I just accepted that, even as fun as it was, Destiny isn't actually the type of game I want to play. I'm really glad it is for some people, and I do understand the appeal of just jumping in and grinding out strikes or bounties or whatever. There's just too much out there for me to spend my gaming time doing that. Honestly, I still think Diablo III is a much better loot/grinding game, and I do still jump into that from time to time to run through some Rifts. It's mindlessly fun in a way that Destiny just isn't for me.

I'm somewhat hopeful for Destiny 2. From the limited rumors and leaks we've seen, it sounds like it might be working towards something like what I always envisioned. But if it's ultimately just more Destiny as we know it, I'm honestly not sure how interested I'll be. Time will tell, I guess.

I think I've actually lost hope for Destiny 2, which is somewhat affecting the way I look at D1. It's clear that every Destiny release up to this point has been hampered by lack of dev time / technical constraints / etc, but I'm beginning to realize that there is a philosophy behind Bungie's approach to Destiny that I just can't stand. Even when there are little elements of the game that I absolutely love, the fabric that stitches everything together is a collection of design principles that I find aggressively unfriendly to the player. Even their idea of what counts as "content" often rubs me the wrong way ("new" guns that are essentially the same, or literally the same, as old guns, just with higher numbers, just as an excuse to continue the "grind").

The fact that 2 years into Destiny, we're still getting content releases that require dozens of hours of grinding (you heard me, Korny... DOZENS) just to cross the gap between the end of the story content and the end-game content (raid) shows that Bungie is totally ok with this style of game. It's not an accident anymore. It is completely intentional. And that just isn't for me.

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The fact that 2 years into Destiny, we're still getting content releases that require dozens of hours of grinding (you heard me, Korny... DOZENS) just to cross the gap between the end of the story content and the end-game content (raid) shows that Bungie is totally ok with this style of game. It's not an accident anymore. It is completely intentional. And that just isn't for me.

I haven't played much since just before Festival of the Lost, for what, at first, seems like a different reason, but I feel it really boils down to the same reason. I've fallen behind in my light level. I'm still low 370s, high enough to do the Normal Raid no problem, but not the Hard Mode. Most everyone have moved on, completed the Hard Mode & challenges, and are done with them (AFAIK, I haven't really seen any ps4 events over the past month excluding me and 2dorks attempting to work on that exotic quest). But being behind in light level isn't the root cause of me not playing much, the true cause is the grind. I need to grind to catch up and grinding isn't fun. Doing it with a party of friends might make it okay, but it's still user-hostile. I don't have much time to grind either, I usually only get to play video games for one maybe two nights a week, and unless I exclusively play Destiny I'm not going to be able to keep up.

Playing end-game content over & over just isn't that much fun anymore, and having to grind to get there isn't fun either. I feel like I'm stuck like I was in Y1, only instead of drops preventing me from moving on it's boring content grind.

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I used to think Destiny's problems were standard MMO problems. But then I played other MMOs.

In the last year I've spent about as much on FFXIV as I did on the first year of Destiny and got a lot more content out of it. Sure, it's still grindy (that is an MMO problem) but there's a ludicrous amount of variety. 12 very different classes, 50+ dungeons, 46 Raid Bosses (plus 29 significantly more difficult/complex HMs), 5 24-man dungeons, 16 Dungeon-lite activities, minigames, an actual plot (plus additional stories for 8 classes and 12 jobs), etc.

You can absolutely have grind that's still fun. Or at least varied enough that it doesnt wear on you. Destiny just isn't trying very hard.

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You can absolutely have grind that's still fun. Or at least varied enough that it doesnt wear on you. Destiny just isn't trying very hard.

And a lot of the "un-funness" of it is mitigated by its social nature. Playing w/ friends makes it more fun, but when you're behind that becomes less of an option. Sure your buddies may play lower level content with you, but if they do they're "wasting their time" because they're not getting the higher level drops they need.

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I'm in the same boat, dogcow. I know we're not in the same time zone, but maybe we can find some overlap?

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I'm in the same boat, dogcow. I know we're not in the same time zone, but maybe we can find some overlap?

That would be nice.

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I used to think Destiny's problems were standard MMO problems. But then I played other MMOs.

In the last year I've spent about as much on FFXIV as I did on the first year of Destiny and got a lot more content out of it. Sure, it's still grindy (that is an MMO problem) but there's a ludicrous amount of variety. 12 very different classes, 50+ dungeons, 46 Raid Bosses (plus 29 significantly more difficult/complex HMs), 5 24-man dungeons, 16 Dungeon-lite activities, minigames, an actual plot (plus additional stories for 8 classes and 12 jobs), etc.

You can absolutely have grind that's still fun. Or at least varied enough that it doesnt wear on you. Destiny just isn't trying very hard.

This is the corner that I fear Bungie have painted themselves into with this idea of an MMO/FPS hybrid. On the one hand, there is nothing else like it and they deserve all the credit in the world for that. But at a certain point, it does feel poorly thought out to me (benefit of hindsight and all that).

Most MMOs have staggering amounts of content compared to Destiny. And they NEED huge amounts of content, because breadth and variety of activities is what they are all about. The raw gameplay is rarely anything special on a mechanical level. It's all about taking the player to as many different places and doing as many different things as possible, coordinating with large groups to take on complicated challenges.

Part of what Bungie has done differently is to make the raw mechanical gameplay THE HOOK to the whole thing. And that's awesome. Destiny's gunplay is fantastic. The game feels wonderful to play. The trouble is developing content that is fun and challenging with such tight and refined mechanics takes a very long time. So in order for this whole FPS/MMO thing to work, Destiny would need to ditch some of the usual MMO design tropes... like grinding. Grinding in other MMOs can be made bearable because there is such a huge range of activities to do. The repetition doesn't need to become overwhelming. But Destiny doesn't have that wealth of content. Actually, I'd make the argument that Destiny does have a wealth of content, but most of it is not organized in a way that allows it to be incorporated into "the grind". So instead we have situations like Rise of Iron where you finish the story missions somewhere around level 340, and then there is 1 strike playlist that contains 6 or 7 old strikes that you need to grind for 15-30 hours before you level up high enough to do the raid. If those strikes were really fantastic pieces of content, then maybe it would almost be ok. But they're not. They're ok, but certainly not deep enough or diverse enough to hold up under that level of repetition.

That's the trap that Destiny has put itself in since the beginning, and continues to fall into with every release. Certain aspects of the game require a level of repetition that the rest of the game can't hold up under.

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I used to think Destiny's problems were standard MMO problems. But then I played other MMOs.

In the last year I've spent about as much on FFXIV as I did on the first year of Destiny and got a lot more content out of it. Sure, it's still grindy (that is an MMO problem) but there's a ludicrous amount of variety. 12 very different classes, 50+ dungeons, 46 Raid Bosses (plus 29 significantly more difficult/complex HMs), 5 24-man dungeons, 16 Dungeon-lite activities, minigames, an actual plot (plus additional stories for 8 classes and 12 jobs), etc.

You can absolutely have grind that's still fun. Or at least varied enough that it doesnt wear on you. Destiny just isn't trying very hard.

This is the corner that I fear Bungie have painted themselves into with this idea of an MMO/FPS hybrid. On the one hand, there is nothing else like it and they deserve all the credit in the world for that. But at a certain point, it does feel poorly thought out to me (benefit of hindsight and all that).

Most MMOs have staggering amounts of content compared to Destiny. And they NEED huge amounts of content, because breadth and variety of activities is what they are all about. The raw gameplay is rarely anything special on a mechanical level. It's all about taking the player to as many different places and doing as many different things as possible, coordinating with large groups to take on complicated challenges.

Part of what Bungie has done differently is to make the raw mechanical gameplay THE HOOK to the whole thing. And that's awesome. Destiny's gunplay is fantastic. The game feels wonderful to play. The trouble is developing content that is fun and challenging with such tight and refined mechanics takes a very long time. So in order for this whole FPS/MMO thing to work, Destiny would need to ditch some of the usual MMO design tropes... like grinding. Grinding in other MMOs can be made bearable because there is such a huge range of activities to do. The repetition doesn't need to become overwhelming. But Destiny doesn't have that wealth of content. Actually, I'd make the argument that Destiny does have a wealth of content, but most of it is not organized in a way that allows it to be incorporated into "the grind". So instead we have situations like Rise of Iron where you finish the story missions somewhere around level 340, and then there is 1 strike playlist that contains 6 or 7 old strikes that you need to grind for 15-30 hours before you level up high enough to do the raid. If those strikes were really fantastic pieces of content, then maybe it would almost be ok. But they're not. They're ok, but certainly not deep enough or diverse enough to hold up under that level of repetition.

That's the trap that Destiny has put itself in since the beginning, and continues to fall into with every release. Certain aspects of the game require a level of repetition that the rest of the game can't hold up under.

And the stuff that is really fun and fantastic to play is relegated (for reasons that are beyond my understanding) every time there's a new content drop.

Seriously.

Why the hell are VoG/CE/KF not part of the current endgame alongside WoTM?

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Why the hell are VoG/CE/KF not part of the current endgame alongside WoTM?

Because dude, these are OLD RAIDS. We've played them a million times. Upping the numbers isn't going to make them suddenly a cool new experience again.

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Why the hell are VoG/CE/KF not part of the current endgame alongside WoTM?

Because dude, these are OLD RAIDS. We've played them a million times. Upping the numbers isn't going to make them suddenly a cool new experience again.

oh yeah... that's right. Wait, why is it okay with strikes then? ;-P

edit: :)

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Why the hell are VoG/CE/KF not part of the current endgame alongside WoTM?

Because dude, these are OLD RAIDS. We've played them a million times. Upping the >>numbers isn't going to make them suddenly a cool new experience again.

oh yeah... that's right. Wait, why is it okay with strikes then? ;-P

edit: :)

[image]

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That's the trap that Destiny has put itself in since the beginning, and continues to fall into with every release. Certain aspects of the game require a level of repetition that the rest of the game can't hold up under.

I just don't get it, because TTK got it right (at least up until Normal mode King's Fall). You finished the storyline, which opened up other quest lines that basically led you right up into the raid. There was minimal grinding to get raid ready. Of course, after the raid, it turned into the normal grind of running the raid for drops to get ready for Hard Mode, or to get infusion fodder for Trials or Iron Banner. But, for me, that's okay. I just want to be able to play through a story and quests that lead directly into a Raid. Then I can feel "done" and hop in when I want to, but not feel like I'm falling behind when I don't play. I can do the raid, quit, then play the next expansion and do the same thing. If I can't do that, then I'm out. I'm not going to grind out bullshit numbers for a week to unlock the thing I actually want to play.

But that's been the complaint since the very beginning, and here we are, still complaining about it. Maybe Destiny 2 will actually fix it, maybe not. If not, it really will be time to hang up the hat, accept that Destiny just isn't for me and move on for good. I hold out hope (maybe naively) simply because I like the fundamental gameplay of Destiny, and I really like this community.

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So instead we have situations like Rise of Iron where you finish the story missions somewhere around level 340, and then there is 1 strike playlist that contains 6 or 7 old strikes that you need to grind for 15-30 hours before you level up high enough to do the raid. If those strikes were really fantastic pieces of content, then maybe it would almost be ok. But they're not. They're ok, but certainly not deep enough or diverse enough to hold up under that level of repetition.

#codywasright

I really think the MMOFPS is a dead end. MMOs rely on huge amounts of shit to do, and creating compelling FPS content takes a long time. If I were in charge, I would recognize this, and create a game as best I could around a set amount of content. This means abandoning the MMO genre.

Destiny would work perfectly as a co-operative RPG with FPS elements. They should be moving in that direction, but they aren't. Destiny 2 is simply not going to make any fundamental changes because it's going to stick to its MMO genre.

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Destiny would work perfectly as a co-operative RPG with FPS elements. They should be moving in that direction, but they aren't. Destiny 2 is simply not going to make any fundamental changes because it's going to stick to its MMO genre.

Oh, did they announce Destiny 2 already? I was expecting it this weekend during that PlayStation event or whatever.

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Destiny would work perfectly as a co-operative RPG with FPS elements. They should be moving in that direction, but they aren't. Destiny 2 is simply not going to make any fundamental changes because it's going to stick to its MMO genre.

Oh, did they announce Destiny 2 already? I was expecting it this weekend during that PlayStation event or whatever.

If they show more than a trailer for Sparrow Racing League 2.0, I'll be in shock.

(Not to take away from your point, which I agree with).

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Destiny would work perfectly as a co-operative RPG with FPS elements. They should be moving in that direction, but they aren't. Destiny 2 is simply not going to make any fundamental changes because it's going to stick to its MMO genre.

Oh, did they announce Destiny 2 already? I was expecting it this weekend during that PlayStation event or whatever.

Bookmark this post and return at a later date. Then be sure to reply with the correct hashtag.

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It's clear that every Destiny release up to this point has been hampered by lack of dev time / technical constraints / etc

This isn't really entirely true. It's hampered by lack of management in my opinion.

Bungie has always had a ton of talent, but it has always lacked solid management. The old games were created by pretty much just everybody doing whatever. Oh, this would be cool, let's add that! Oh, that bug needs fixing, I'll fix it. Development was very fluid and undirected. It was simply following the fun and doing awesome shit.

This works fine with small teams and games that aren't as complex, but when you are making a game that's as huge as Destiny it is a problem.

Ask yourself how it is that the year the game is supposed to ostensibly ship, Joe Staten is showing the 'supercut' of the story to much of the team for the first time. How does the left hand not know what the right hand is doing? How is it that Destiny 2 is being rebooted so close to release in a way oddly familiar?

It's weird that Microsoft was the best thing to happen to Bungie. Mostly because they were able to hold their feet to the fire a bit, and lend personnel. I don't think Halo would have come out the way it did if Bungie stayed independent. Here they are independent again, however this time their publisher isn't really fighting for them the way that Microsoft would.

I wonder if going back to independence was the wrong move without really nailing down better project management.

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

The Festival killed it for me. Oh well.

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

The Festival killed it for me. Oh well.

Why is that? Obviously, I didn't play or see it. Just diving deeper into the Eververse "give us money" hole or what?

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

The Festival killed it for me. Oh well.

Why is that? Obviously, I didn't play or see it. Just diving deeper into the Eververse "give us money" hole or what?

Pretty much. I had already stopped playing Destiny before Festival of the Lost began, but I had been planning on using FotL as an excuse to jump back in until I saw what it entailed. It was essentially just a bunch of stuff for sale. I was fine with the idea of a live team being funded by microtransactions if it meant they'd be adding things like new strikes or little story quests or even new patrol activities. But what they've brought to the game so far has either been terrible (April update), or just more stuff for sale (FotL), or a cool little activity that should have returned as a bi-monthly thing that was blown way out of proportion and made an annual event (Sparrow Racing league).

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

The Festival killed it for me. Oh well.

Why is that? Obviously, I didn't play or see it. Just diving deeper into the Eververse "give us money" hole or what?

Pretty much. I had already stopped playing Destiny before Festival of the Lost began, but I had been planning on using FotL as an excuse to jump back in until I saw what it entailed. It was essentially just a bunch of stuff for sale. I was fine with the idea of a live team being funded by microtransactions if it meant they'd be adding things like new strikes or little story quests or even new patrol activities. But what they've brought to the game so far has either been terrible (April update), or just more stuff for sale (FotL), or a cool little activity that should have returned as a bi-monthly thing that was blown way out of proportion and made an annual event (Sparrow Racing league).

That's odd, I never got a negative reaction to FotL. But I also didn't really play it very seriously. I finished the PvE missions, but never touched the PvP missions. I didn't care if I got all the masks, or really any of the masks. My guess is that people thought it was a money hole because they were expected to get all the masks by the end of it. I don't know what the reason is, but I hope they never get rid of these little mini events. Why? Because I love the atmosphere of them! They are awesome. It's a time to not give a shit about the game and go on random excursions. It was fun in my book. But I feel like most people were treating FotL as another Destiny expansions, which means, must get all the things.

But as you have said, Destiny is what people make it. So it might rub some people the wrong way. For me, I enjoy this stuff and don't take it that seriously. (at least that is how I see it)

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That's odd, I never got a negative reaction to FotL. But I also didn't really play it very seriously. I finished the PvE missions, but never touched the PvP missions. I didn't care if I got all the masks, or really any of the masks. My guess is that people thought it was a money hole because they were expected to get all the masks by the end of it. I don't know what the reason is, but I hope they never get rid of these little mini events. Why? Because I love the atmosphere of them! They are awesome. It's a time to not give a shit about the game and go on random excursions. It was fun in my book. But I feel like most people were treating FotL as another Destiny expansions, which means, must get all the things.

But as you have said, Destiny is what people make it. So it might rub some people the wrong way. For me, I enjoy this stuff and don't take it that seriously. (at least that is how I see it)

I think there probably are some people who approached it the way you described (needing to get everything), which is always a dangerous way to approach Destiny ;p

But a very common (and more reasonable, IMHO) complaint that I heard was that there was very little you could actually earn without spending money. Doing the quests would get you a couple items, and that's it.

For me, it's a bit of a different issue (some of which could possibly come down to a communication failure/unrealistic expectations/a combination of both). Since the unveiling of the Live team, my understanding was that the game would include microtransactions, and the revenue from those microtransactions would go towards creating new playable content. Based on the past year, we know the Live team has limited capabilities, and can only handle a small event every 2-4 months on average. Cool. So when one of those few events rolls around, and all it really contains is a bunch of stuff to buy (the art assets were already done; completely reused from 2015's FotL, unless I'm mistaken)... that's where I get a little bit of a bad taste in my mouth. It's one thing if microtransactions are funding the release of new playable content. But if microtransactions are predominantly funding the creation of more microtransactions... see where I'm going with this? Again, I'm sure this is all totally fine for some people. If you're already enjoying everything Destiny has to offer, this is just a little extra flavor on the side. But for those like me who's relationship with Destiny was already rocky, stuff like this only serves to push us further away.

Meanwhile, the first Titanfall update just dropped. It includes microtransactions. Players can buy new paint jobs for their guns and Titans, unique assassinations, and a few other purely cosmetic items. At the same time, we're getting a new multiplayer map for free. THAT seems like a nice, player-friendly way to handle microtransactions :)

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I like having the seasonal events, too.

Unfortunately FotL was quantifiably worse this year than the last. A lot of the other posts have explained why, but some things I didn't see mentioned:

You could earn free masks for completing the quests, but I already owned around 75% of them. None of the new masks could be earned without paying.

One of the quests required a mask that I didn't have, which meant that I would have to buy it.

Last year the questlines could be completely concurrently, but this year you had to complete them sequentially. There was no reason why, it just took more of the players' time this year.

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One of the quests required a mask that I didn't have, which meant that I would have to buy it.

Wait, what? I don't remember this. (I paid nothing this time around, and I completed all the quests on at least one character.)

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One of the quests required a mask that I didn't have, which meant that I would have to buy it.

Wait, what? I don't remember this. (I paid nothing this time around, and I completed all the quests on at least one character.)

I'm pretty sure all the masks that were required to complete the missions could be bought from whatshername for glimmer. Don't quote me on that.

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One of the quests required a mask that I didn't have, which meant that I would have to buy it.

Wait, what? I don't remember this. (I paid nothing this time around, and I completed all the quests on at least one character.)

I'm pretty sure all the masks that were required to complete the missions could be bought from whatshername for glimmer. Don't quote me on that.

They gave all required quest masks for free at the steps I thought?

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One of the quests required a mask that I didn't have, which meant that I would have to buy it.

Wait, what? I don't remember this. (I paid nothing this time around, and I completed all the quests on at least one character.)

I'm pretty sure all the masks that were required to complete the missions could be bought from whatshername for glimmer. Don't quote me on that.

They gave all required quest masks for free at the steps I thought?

That might also be true, but if you dismantled them for some reason, I think you could rebuy them

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Two of them, I believe. But the empty bags were free, so it was really just a questy way to give you the other masks. Wasn't completely obvious that this was what needed to happen at the time the quest was assigned, however.

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That reminds me, I need two more cards and would love to get to the lighthouse Monday. Two more times after titanfall? I know it will be hard.

I actually deleted Destiny off my hard drive, so I won't be jumping back in any time soon :-/

The Festival killed it for me. Oh well.

I didn't do the festival. Can someone explain why it was so bad this year? I've heard that elsewhere.

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I didn't do the festival. Can someone explain why it was so bad this year? I've heard that elsewhere.

They added a fun quest line that let you unlock quite a few of the masks for free, which was cool.
They added a handful of weird new consumables (Chromatic Jackolyte, Whim of Rahool, etc.), which was also cool.
They made it so that all of these new consumables were locked inside their Treasures of the Lost boxes that had to be purchased from the Eververse Store. Which was pretty lame.
They limited rewards for filling candy satchels were to a very small number of masks (may have just been one), a shader, and either the Flight of Shadows or the still broken Jackolyte.

It was essentially a one day event that they gave you two weeks to experience. You pretty much never saw anyone wearing the masks after day one because there was no reward. At one point I got tired of seeing the notification in the tower so I stood in front of Eva, deleted my full candy satchel, and walked away.

I'm pretty sure the two week event was just to give you plenty of time to keep buy Destiny lotto tickets in the hopes that you could win this year's rare items.

On that note, I spent $20 each on loot boxes for FotL 2015 and 2016 and I didn't get the flaming mask either year. I got the sparrow, masks, and ghost shells I wanted this year, though, so not a total loss.

-Disciple

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I went into FotL excited. Bungie released that fun trailer for it showing off cool masks and animations and spawn-in effects, and that awesome ghost Ghost. The actual quests and missions weren't too much different than last year but there was a bit of extra silliness like dressing up and killing things as Lord Saladin and the Broom Sparrow.

So, so far so good. A few funny missions and mini-quests, a fun limited holiday Sparrow, and tons of amusing and unique items like masks and holiday themed Ghosts I could get ~~by completing quests and having fun.~~ by paying money to Microsoft to pay Silver to Bungie to have a random chance to get the specific items I wanted.

I enjoy developer creativity and I don't really mind tossing a few dollars a developer's way for in game stuff, so I did that. Gave them $10 and got a handful of spawn-in potions, around 5 or 6 masks, and a shader or two... But I wanted the ghost Ghost... So I sat their slowly fuming towards a boil.

How much money would I have to pay to get a ghost Ghost? $10 was already close to the price for the entirety of The Dark Below or House of Wolves. What if I spent another $10? What if RNG still didn't pay nice? I'd happily pay a good $5 or so for a ghost Ghost so why won't they let me?!

To me, Festival of the Lost changed from a fun holiday event to what felt like a RNG tainted cash grab. I like playing Destiny. I would have played more Destiny for more chances at my ghost Ghost. But playing Destiny to get a ghost Ghost wasn't an option, or at least not a good one. (I think I could have swapped characters for two more chances.)

So, I quit playing Destiny about half way through FotL and bought Skyrim SE and the The Witcher 3.

TL;DR: The way Bungie apparently locked fun holiday drops behind pay-2-RNG made me angry. And I'm still a bit angry.

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That a guy playing on a drumset can make it to the lighthouse? :P

The only reason I don't quite consider it front-page-worthy is because he was mostly carried (though he did have some good kills too), but still, that's not something you see every day (plus, the way he has to play a drumroll in order to open the Lighthouse chest is gold.

I played with a couple of guys Monday night, coming in when their 3rd gave up on them. One of them was complaining the whole time about how almost everyone they'd played seemed to have one (or two) super-good player(s), and one (or two) seriously sub-par players. (I saw this in the two cards we played, as well.) His theory was that on Monday nights, at least, a majority of the teams are regular joes being carried to the LH. He said this didn't happen to him at all on PlayStation, that he made it to the LH regularly there. (I've never played with him before, so I can't judge anything about him except what I saw in the hour we played together, but he seemed decent.)

It happens all the time on playstation. My teams have found that putting the weakest team member as party leader seems to have some (placebo) effect at making our matchmaking less sketchy. That player is me, fyi.

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I stopped trying to get to the lighthouse after my second attempt. I won my first match, 3-0 then they left. I provided to never win a round again for my next 2 tickets. So the competition is there. I am not great, but I am a solid FPS player and understand flow and where people SHOULD spawn, so no clue what happened here. Makes me want to get taken through.

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I stopped trying to get to the lighthouse after my second attempt. I won my first match, 3-0 then they left. I provided to never win a round again for my next 2 tickets. So the competition is there. I am not great, but I am a solid FPS player and understand flow and where people SHOULD spawn, so no clue what happened here. Makes me want to get taken through.

There's no spawns in trials after the initial ones. The game is all about unpredictability, map control, and orb control. Gun skill actually has very, very little to do with success rates in the game because latency, lag, and/or netcode results in 1v1 fights being trades even against obviously unskilled opponents. The game is far more about movement, positioning, and team-shooting (necessary to avoid lag-trading).

The result is that you spend your game either catching someone unawares and then steamrolling the enemy quickly, or playing cat and mouse hoping to isolate a solo player and pick him off and then press your enemies, or catch them in a mistake as they push too far and overextend. It's fun, but it's not a classic FPS PvP skillset and almost zero of my Titanfall or CoD chops come into play in Destiny.

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Yea I agree, was just saying how I am generally a competent player yet have had zero success.

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