Scoring is great (Destiny)

by electricpirate , Thursday, April 14, 2016, 19:57 (3239 days ago) @ Cody Miller

First point, Scoring is a very flexible balance tool. You can assign a lot of value for different actions, you can separate that value out from other gameplay concerns. As for immersion I'm generally less concerned with immersion as a factor, as immersion is probably the single most overvalued aspect of digital games, but I've already made that rant. I mean, it's not like POE is selling some grand fiction, it's more of a direct window into Destinie's combat systems.

But yea, why scoring can be awesome:

Variable levels of performance: It's entirely possible that scoring/leaderboards could take off as a thing. I mean you were a speedrunner right? you saw how valuable people took that competition.

Allow for failure but still making progress, I think this is the goal of the armor vs. weapon numbers on the card. If you fail the score goal, you still made progress towards this other thing.

Easy to balance when the system isn't directly connected: How valuable should a headshot be, how valuable picking up an orb? You could assign their value their value directly in the system but then you've got all these complicated systems. For example restoring ammo on chained headshots, well that already intereferes with perks that do the same thing, and in theory could seriously overpower some weapons like the Sleeper stimulant.

All of that said, points are just inhereantly less exciting. There's no audio visual interest, it's just a dry number in the corner. There's confusion about when the game is actually over, which is anticlimactic. I would like if completing the score triggered an event that could resove the fight more quickly if you wanted. Maybe all the lethality turns up, or variks drops a boon. Or maybe there's a visible diagetic element in the arena that doesn't unlock until you clear the score threshold.

I dunno, Bungie was very conservtive with this system, which is disapointing, but we'll see how well the balance works over the coming week.