Character Levels in 1.0 and 2.0... It's Basically the Same.

This is how I understand TTK leveling to work. If I'm wrong, please let me know, but I feel like I've been seeing so many people acting like everything is changing that I'd like to clear this up.

Here's my understanding of leveling in TTK:

In TTK, Level 40 is the new level 20. It is not the new level 34.

Let's look at Destiny as it stands right now. Everyone can easily level up to 20 with just experience, and as you level up, you unlock the ability to equip more and more powerful gear. The most powerful gear has a light level associated with it, and that level adds to the 20 levels which you earned through experience alone. Rather than calling yourself "level 34" please think of it as "level 20 with a light level of 14 (from 168 light)."

In TTK, they're splitting out those numbers, but the meaning (and basic effect on your character) is - as far as everything I've read - the same.

Everyone can easily level up to 40 with just experience, and as you level up, you unlock the ability to equip more and more powerful gear. The most powerful gear has a light level associated with it, and that level adds to a "light level" value which is a measurement of your readiness for endgame content. That light level is above and beyond the 40 levels which you earned through experience alone. Rather than calling yourself "level 40" please think of it as "level 40 with a light level of X."

The formula is basically the same in both cases:
EXP level + Light level = Total level.

The difference is that TTK does not show you a total level. It just shows your EXP level and Light level as two separate numbers. EXP level is gained through experience and is easy to get through any activity. Light level is gained by equipping more and more powerful items, and is gained in the same way that high light level items are gained today: Raids, Nightfalls, Legendary engrams, crucible rewards, the Lighthouse, etc. etc. etc..

Some activities (such as Nightfall strikes) will list light level recommendations (I'm about to fully make up a number here) such as "Light level 28 recommended". This is the same as the strike saying Level 32 recommended right now, except instead of combining your exp level and light level into a single number, they're only using the value of the light on your gear as the guide. I actually don't know if you'll be prevented from entering if your light level is too low, but I know they mentioned that some activities will show the light level you should have in order to attempt them.

Can anyone confirm that this is right? It's what I took away from the Game Informer bullet points about how leveling will work. Instead of showing you "total level" which is derived from adding exp level and light level together, they're just going to show exp level and light level as separate numbers, but the essence of everything is essentially (see what I did there) the same.

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If nothing much has changed then it's actually a huge win for everyone. If the level system still works where being under level gives you big penalties to damage dealt and taken but being equal or overleveled gives you no added benefits then being able to simply play our way to the maximum of 40 means nobody gets left far behind as could happen where level was dependent on armor. Sure your Attack, Defense and Light values may be lower than someone else's and you'll deal a little less damage or be killed a little easier, but you'll never be stuck at two levels under hiding in a corner because everything one shots you.

Basically, as long as Level is the biggest deciding factor in your damage output and toughness then being able to simply play your way to max level, instead of getting stuck because you don't have some boots, means things have changed for the better.

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Basically, as long as Level is the biggest deciding factor in your damage output and toughness then being able to simply play your way to max level, instead of getting stuck because you don't have some boots, means things have changed for the better.

Light is the biggest deciding factor in your damage output according to those coming back from playing the game. Level is there to determine what you can equip. The system is much more confusing now, but it does have the benefit to a power ramp rather than stair steps. In short, being 29 was a huge penalty, whether you were just 29 or almost 30 in terms of light. Now, the changes are more fine, and any upgrade to your light will result in increased power.

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A lot of the talk from Bungie in that latest video was about avoiding that cliff where you could not progress any further until you randomly got a lucky piece of armor you lacked. They talked a lot about letting players progress by playing what they wanted to play. That doesn't really jive with merely shuffling the numbers around and everyone still needing that one lucky piece of armor.

But yes, some clarification would be nice as well...

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A lot of the talk from Bungie in that latest video was about avoiding that cliff where you could not progress any further until you randomly got a lucky piece of armor you lacked. They talked a lot about letting players progress by playing what they wanted to play. That doesn't really jive with merely shuffling the numbers around and everyone still needing that one lucky piece of armor.

But yes, some clarification would be nice as well...

When they said that, I don't think they were necessarily talking about the way the level and light systems work. I think it was more a general reference to the way loot works now. Increasing drop rates for gear you need, reducing duplicates, more activities give better gear, so more avenues to acquire high level gear, etc. Every expansion has made this more and more true, but now the Raid isn't the end all be all of gear, like it was in vanilla with VoG. You can get high level gear in multiple ways now, so you'll not just be doing the Raid for months on end waiting for that one drop.

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The system is much more confusing now, but it does have the benefit to a power ramp rather than stair steps. In short, being 29 was a huge penalty, whether you were just 29 or almost 30 in terms of light. Now, the changes are more fine, and any upgrade to your light will result in increased power.

I think things are a bit more subtly different than we are thinking. The idea is that the level is only used to determine the quality of gear you can aquire, while the light level tells you what you can accomplish in the game.

In Destiny 1, many players were confused by the system where you hit level 20 and started leveling up by acquiring gear. The new system is going to be more understandable to those people since they can basically ignore their character level entirely now. Instead they only focus on acquiring gear. So this change is more focused on the people who stopped playing Destiny.

Also, if I'm reading things correctly I don't think your level will adjust the damage output or ability to absorb damage from enemies of different levels. Instead light level will control that.

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If nothing much has changed then it's actually a huge win for everyone. If the level system still works where being under level gives you big penalties to damage dealt and taken but being equal or overleveled gives you no added benefits then being able to simply play our way to the maximum of 40 means nobody gets left far behind as could happen where level was dependent on armor. Sure your Attack, Defense and Light values may be lower than someone else's and you'll deal a little less damage or be killed a little easier, but you'll never be stuck at two levels under hiding in a corner because everything one shots you.

Basically, as long as Level is the biggest deciding factor in your damage output and toughness then being able to simply play your way to max level, instead of getting stuck because you don't have some boots, means things have changed for the better.

This is the opposite of what I was saying, actually. A level 40 character with 0 light in TTK is the equivalent of a level 20 character now. And a level 40 character with 168 light in TTK is the equivalent of a level 20 character with 168 light now (assuming the amount of light gives identical bonuses regardless of player level). In the current version of Destiny, a level 20 character with 168 light displays as "level 34" in order to give the players a sense of the relative strength of that character, and to show how much more powerful they've become as a result of the light on their gear. It's the same in TTK, afaik, except that instead of converting light level to character level, and only giving characters power bonuses in big chunks, the light level will give you power bonuses scaled directly with how much light you have. This means that if you're missing that one pair of boots, instead of being just as weak as someone missing all of the raid tier armor, you'll be 75% as strong as someone who is fully geared.

Caveat: Everything in TTK has light on it, including weapons and ghost shells, so you'll have much more gradual power increases than currently.

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I haven't been pouring over the news like I used to, but they way I understand it is that TTK basically replaced Light with the average attack and defense values of your stuff. Or can you actually get to level 40 while wearing blue armor? That's cool if it's the case, but I will miss that neat shiny number above and beyond experience alone :)

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Level is now based on experience. Presumably you can reach level 40 with the starting gun and armor if you grind long enough. That's where I'm unclear. If I'm level 40 and go to Mars wearing my starting armor will the Cabal one shot me? Or will it be like now where a Level 20 Guardian on Mars wearing white armor is somewhat weaker but can still put up a good fight?

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Level is now based on experience. Presumably you can reach level 40 with the starting gun and armor if you grind long enough. That's where I'm unclear. If I'm level 40 and go to Mars wearing my starting armor will the Cabal one shot me? Or will it be like now where a Level 20 Guardian on Mars wearing white armor is somewhat weaker but can still put up a good fight?

That's what I was thinking, you go to Mars with your starting armor and you are hosed because it's as if you were a level 1 vs level 20s in Destiny 1. You'll need to equip armor to give you a light level closer to the recommended light level to have a chance.

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Level is now based on experience. Presumably you can reach level 40 with the starting gun and armor if you grind long enough. That's where I'm unclear. If I'm level 40 and go to Mars wearing my starting armor will the Cabal one shot me? Or will it be like now where a Level 20 Guardian on Mars wearing white armor is somewhat weaker but can still put up a good fight?

Ultimately, seeing as your light level is just a reflection of your average attack and defense values, it isn't really the same as before. Your actual level and light level both factor in to your damage output and intake, but its based on values that mattered before, just now they matter more.

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Level is now based on experience. Presumably you can reach level 40 with the starting gun and armor if you grind long enough. That's where I'm unclear. If I'm level 40 and go to Mars wearing my starting armor will the Cabal one shot me? Or will it be like now where a Level 20 Guardian on Mars wearing white armor is somewhat weaker but can still put up a good fight?

The way I have interpreted all of this is as follows:

Your rank (1-40) has nothing to do with you attack or defense levels. All of those values are now tied to your gear. The reason your 1-40 rank matters is that your rank determines what gear you are able to equip. In other words, the higher your rank, the better the gear you are able to equip, thus making you more powerful.

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I suspect that levels will still matter just as much as they always have -- up until level 40. Then the new light system takes over. So while you aren't artificially kept out of things by level, there will be recommended light levels.

It will be interesting to see what the recommended levels are -- if they are minimum bars (i.e. you need to have x light in order to reasonably accomplish this task) or if they are more guidelines for saying "the average player should have x light in order to have fun here and play this as we intended". In the latter case, the better you are the less light required. But somehow I don't think that's what we will be seeing. It will be probably both overall better and less different than we think.

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Character Levels in 1.0 and 2.0... It's Basically the Same. (Destiny)