Thanks! Follow up questions: (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Thursday, March 31, 2016, 15:54 (3253 days ago) @ Funkmon

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.

I guess what I'm thinking here is that we have all these stats and ways to compare weapons, but they're tough to understand when you add extra layer of light level values. I can compare 2 sniper rifles and say "well this one has higher impact, so it does more damage... except its only 305, while the other one is 312, so now I have no idea which one does more damage". It just seems like a needless complication to me.