Thanks! Follow up questions: (Destiny)

by Funkmon , Thursday, March 31, 2016, 15:42 (3253 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY

Imagine a version of Destiny that existed without any form of rank or light levels. Our guardians could still unlock new abilities in our skill trees as we play. We could still acquire new, better gear that is more powerful or has unique perks or abilities. We could still "become more than we were" over the course of the game without having a 3 digit number assigned to all of our stuff.

This sounds awful. Needs numbers so we can analyze the stats. It's a loot game where we keep an inventory. It's not Halo or Doom. There are thousands of guns and they need to be comparable.

Would it not still be possible to compare weapons on a granular level without having a "318" next to it? What I mean is, there are still plenty of ways to make a gun different from the others or more powerful than others without having a global light level attached to it. A 320 Black Spindle does more damage than a 320 Thousand Yard Stare, for example, because it has a higher impact rating.

Yeah, it would, but you couldn't remove them entirely, however. Legendaries could do a base damage, then increase in damage as you upgrade them. You need a way to explain the damage increase and compare the damage of an un upgraded legendary to an upgraded blue. It could be done with a bar, but that requires comparisons to gear you already have. This would be fine, but not optimal.

This leads me to ask myself:

"what does the rank and light level system really add to Destiny?"

Difficulty choice in an online only game.

I'm not sure I agree with this one, because of the way Destiny handles power leveling. If I jump into Old Russia, I am no more effective against level 2 enemies now than I was back when I was level 8.

Yep. Sounds fine to me. Still very easy but fun to kill.

On the flip side, levels do give them a way to "gate" certain areas, but they could still do that without a level 1-40 system or a light level system. We could still acquire guns that do more damage and armor that provides more health over the course of the game, without tying any kind of 1-40 or light level system to it.

That's true. We could come up with a way of assigning a value to that particular gear signaling it allows you to take more damage or do more damage. Maybe we could use letters.