I think you missed my point (Destiny)

by narcogen , Andover, Massachusetts, Monday, February 01, 2016, 00:45 (3450 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY

They go and tarnish the "great team-based mode" by not making it easy enough to win playing solo? Gee, I can't imagine.

That's not actually what I said at all. My complaint is not "it is too tough for solo players to win". My complaint is that they add a secondary method for players to rank up that isn't dependant on winning (bounties), then twist that method so that it too requires winning.

If the bounties require winning they are not a secondary method that is not dependent on winning. You want them to be that, because they could be that, and perhaps in the past, they were that, but currently they are not.

So the question then once again becomes-- why would they introduce a team mode and provide every inducement, both carrot and stick, to get people to play in a team instead of solo?

Gee, I can't imagine.

I just got thrown in to 4 JIP matches in a row, on to the losing (and still short handed) team each time, against full 6-man-party enemy teams. And I can't make any progress because the 2 bounties I'm still holding require a win.

"Don't play if it's not fun". I know, that's the golden rule. But I HAVE to play if I want to buy that fusion rifle, and I won't have time later, and I won't have time to play again before the event ends.

You don't HAVE to want that fusion rifle. This is why I don't play IB. I had to play crucible to get some of the weapons I wanted and I may have complained while doing it, but there's a difference between complaining about something you don't like or enjoy and asserting that it constitutes a design flaw by the developer.

Obviously I don't "have to want it". I'm not a psychopath. But I looked at it and said "hey that's cool, I'd like to play Iron Banner >anyway and that looks like a great piece of gear to work towards". I played Iron Banner all week with friends, having a blast, but on my >last day I needed to go solo. That's when I found myself stuck in a situation where I simply could not progress because of the nature of >the activity combined with the specific bounties available. All I needed to hit rank 5 was 1 win OR 1 bounty... But the only 2 bounties left >required a win. Thanks to matchmaking, that took me almost 2 hours to get. That absolutely is a design flaw.

...

I have no words. Literally.

It is a design flaw because the system was not designed to cope with the fact that in order for you to get your fusion rifle on a day where you couldn't play with friends, you couldn't win any games and couldn't complete any bounties (because they required winning games). In a team mode where you were playing solo?

I think people keep wanting or expecting some kind of very smooth progression curve from Destiny, and I just don't get where the expectation comes from. Maybe because I never seriously played any other MMOs. I get that winning is more fun than losing, and that progressing is more fun than not progressing, and I get why grind is not fun-- if one structures one's gameplay in the way that creates grind, as in, "I am now only doing things that progress this quest that requires 50 things, so I will play and collect those things until I have all 50 of those things".

Good things that happen in the game are only good in opposition to things that aren't. Winning is sweet because losing is bitter. Getting loot is great because going home empty-handed sucks. Killing things is awesome because dying is a drag.

Why isn't this a cool story about that one time you almost ran the table during an IB week but lost out at the last minute because you couldn't get a win, and how much does that suck? Can't good stories about things that happen in Destiny be about bad things that happen?

Heck, I guess you're right, it isn't even that interesting a story because your complaint isn't that you didn't get what you want but it took two hours to do. I give up.

It's not a design flaw just because it sucked. It's not a design flaw just because you thought there ought to be two ways to your objective, and there COULD HAVE BEEN, but there weren't. Maybe because it was designed that way, to be the opposite of what you expected, or maybe because of bad luck (if bounties are random, for instance).

If bounties alone were enough to rank up in IB and get good loot, then you could just play without caring about winning or losing, just about the bounty-- which was probably what, kills? Great, more players going for individual stats instead of a team objective. Marvelous.