Competitive play and Meaning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlWFX4vfn9w

Datto's argument is that he is concerned because it appears that competitive players will not be rewarded when it comes to PvP in Des2ny.

You've got to let the good players be good, and reward them for it. I want to see people in Masters get a new weapon skin for being in masters… right now the vibe I am getting is that they don't want to make the competitive experience rich and meaningful and rewarding.

This argument is wrong, and he is operating under an incorrect assumption about competitive players. They don't need to be rewarded, because the competition is the reward. Playing good opponents and getting better is itself the prize, just how it has been since the days of Quake and Street Fighter 2. I agree that there should be some sort of system to help you gauge your improvement, like stats or a rank or something, but as far as rewards go, no true competitive player will care.

In fact, rewards for competitive play often lead to toxic behavior - just look at all the lag switchers in Trials and the like. This is because the reward takes precedence. Again, I cannot say enough how non intrinsic rewards poison everything when it comes to video games.

If your game is fun and deep, lets you play against skilled opponents, and lets you improve, then that is all the reward a competitive player will need to stay engaged and have meaningful play time.

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What does "ranked" play even mean? There's no "ranked" play in Destiny, so why were folks expecting it? Luke has already said that Trials (or something like it) will be returning. What are people complaining about now?

I'm not saying there shouldn't be a ranked playlist, I'm just confused where the expectation came from.

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There's no "ranked" play in Destiny, so why were folks expecting it?

Because they need a number next to their name to give them a sense of accomplishment.

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There's no "ranked" play in Destiny, so why were folks expecting it?

Because they need a number next to their name to give them a sense of accomplishment.

Destiny has that already. Hell, its got lots of numbers that all get bigger!

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There's no "ranked" play in Destiny, so why were folks expecting it?

Because they need a number next to their name to give them a sense of accomplishment.

I hated this with Halo 2. I felt that online play would have been much better if they didn't have those #'s right next to your name.

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I hated this with Halo 2. I felt that online play would have been much better if they didn't have those #'s right next to your name.

And you were right.

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I never noticed in halo 2, but it annoyed me in Reach.

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What does "ranked" play even mean? There's no "ranked" play in Destiny, so why were folks expecting it? Luke has already said that Trials (or something like it) will be returning. What are people complaining about now?

I'm not saying there shouldn't be a ranked playlist, I'm just confused where the expectation came from.

They're not complaining about it NOW, they've been complaining about it since the start. They've been complaining about it since the Halo 2 pistol was nerfed.

Eventually when they realized D1 wouldn't have ranked play, they staked their hopes on D2. They imagined that Bungie didn't do ranked in D1 because of.. reasons, but that surely they would do it in D2 if they only listened to their best (and loudest) fans.

Between Myth and Halo I think Bungie knows exactly what ranked play is. I think the reason why Datto is upset is that Bungie wants to try and somehow satisfy the itch that ranked play scratches for people without the toxic effects it often creates.

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I've posted this before, but it bares repeating here:

http://www.gamesradar.com/how-titanfall-2s-secret-high-level-game-blesses-a-modern-shooter-with-long-lost-old-school-...

edit:

A particularly relevant quote from the article:

"This sort of play, with its focus on the long-term discovery and honing of pure technique, was the lifeblood of a whole generation of shooters, these games’ systems - by accident or design - delivering a raft of high-level potential beyond their ostensible offering. Learning this stuff was a tough, optional road, but immensely rewarding, turning play into a kind of art, and making every success far more personal. There was no need for big expansion plans with those games. Yes, there were updates, and on PC, the community created loads of its own content via modding. But with such long paths of skill development within the fabric of the games, the playing was always the real focus."

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlWFX4vfn9w

Datto's argument is that he is concerned because it appears that competitive players will not be rewarded when it comes to PvP in Des2ny.

You've got to let the good players be good, and reward them for it. I want to see people in Masters get a new weapon skin for being in masters… right now the vibe I am getting is that they don't want to make the competitive experience rich and meaningful and rewarding.

This argument is wrong, and he is operating under an incorrect assumption about competitive players.

Wow. never thought I'd see a post where you're not worshiping the ground that that Datto tool walks on.

They don't need to be rewarded, because the competition is the reward. Playing good opponents and getting better is itself the prize, just how it has been since the days of Quake and Street Fighter 2. I agree that there should be some sort of system to help you gauge your improvement, like stats or a rank or something, but as far as rewards go, no true competitive player will care.

Competitive players are cancer. I dread the day that Bungie starts catering to them the same way the spineless 343i did.
They should not expect to get special treatment or "rewards" simply for being good, as if that's what makes the competitive experience "rich and meaningful and rewarding".

In fact, rewards for competitive play often lead to toxic behavior - just look at all the lag switchers in Trials and the like. This is because the reward takes precedence. Again, I cannot say enough how non intrinsic rewards poison everything when it comes to video games.

It exacerbates the existing toxic behavior, yes. And see, the thing is that this is clearly visible. Look at Overwatch. When the game came out, the community was ridiculously positive, the matches were about fun, and the game highlighted players for recognition when they contributed to their team in ways besides 'got the most kills". Articles were written about this miraculously "Troll-free Shooter"... And then Blizzard added "Competitive Mode".

Competitive Mode is everything bad about Halo 2's ranking system, but with a stronger emphasis on punishing players when their teammates aren't the greatest. Almost overnight, the game became a cesspool of toxic behavior, and much of that toxicity came from your own team. Because of the special rewards for doing well in competitive (gold skins for your guns and animated sprays), cheating (including the explosion of mouse and keyboard adapters for console) and hostility became rampant. Now articles are written about how Blizzard is combating the toxic community. And the worst part is that the Competitive mode is seasonal, so those toxic tryhards pour back out into the regular playlists periodically, and make everything worse for everyone. The game is intermittently unbearable. I've literally never played a single round of Competitive Mode, and I don't intend to; it's bad enough where winning doesn't matter.

If your game is fun and deep, lets you play against skilled opponents, and lets you improve, then that is all the reward a competitive player will need to stay engaged and have meaningful play time.

Like Cruel said, Titanfall 2 is this in spades. 100% of non-cosmetic unlocks can be unlocked at any time with in-game currency that you get simply from playing the game. Cosmetic unlocks rely on using the thing that you want to unlock the skins for. Nothing rewards the higher-tier players, and nothing punishes lower-tier players. The only incentive that you have to play the game is to have fun and get better.

Destiny had it right at launch when the lowest-skilled player in the match could get a Gjallarhorn to drop.

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Destiny had it right at launch when the lowest-skilled player in the match could get a Gjallarhorn to drop.

I don't disagree with basically anything you said, but just out of curiosity, how do you feel about stuff like the Black Spindle mission? It's not PvP, but it is (or was, I don't know if it's still difficult to obtain now) undoubtedly a special reward for at least somewhat skilled players. I guess I don't know the numbers, but anecdotal evidence of posts around here months after the mission was discovered by folks who were still attempting to get it shows that not everyone managed it. I like that it was a cool thing that was challenging to obtain, and I'm not necessarily sure why that shouldn't be true for PvP, too. It sucks, because I know its something I'm unlikely to see, but I'm not sure how much of a distinction between the two modes there should be. I feel like PvP players should be able to earn cool things, too, I guess.

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I believe rewarding successful hard mode raiders with superior weapons/armour they obviously don't need seems silly.

I don't mind a longer road to finishing a raid. Superior weapons/armour should be reasonably achievable by almost any skill level. If I have to wait until I earned the game-over gun, then at least I have a better chance at completing a Raid.

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I believe rewarding successful hard mode raiders with superior weapons/armour they obviously don't need seems silly.

I don't mind a longer road to finishing a raid. Superior weapons/armour should be reasonably achievable by almost any skill level. If I have to wait until I earned the game-over gun, then at least I have a better chance at completing a Raid.

I've been advocating this for a while. It was a major problem in WoW and it's a major problem in Destiny as well. Players who are capable of completing the hardest challenge in the game do not need that challenge to be made any easier. Doing so creates a situation where you get a bunch of players who, after clearing once, are then more likely to clear a 2nd time, and 3rd, by large degrees, until they have it on farm and everyone is geared in that stuff. Whereas a team that is struggling to clear the hard mode, and is even just one week behind the curve, ends up exponentially behind the other players in terms of gear.

The result is an underclass of players who, even though they can clear the hardest content in the game, are behind the curve in terms of gear, and are stuck in a grind they may not want just to stay competitive in "light level matters" pvp modes. I *hate* that I have to clear the hard mode raid umpteen times to get max light level just so I can be on even footing in pvp. I also hate that some raiders have to pvp endlessly to get certain weapons they "need" for raiding.

The real hard mode isn't "can you clear hard mode?" It's "can you stomach clearing hard mode every flippin' week for the next three months because we don't actually have enough content to keep you involved so we're using rare and challenging gear drops tied to a weekly lockout in order to increase our player engagement?"

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I believe rewarding successful hard mode raiders with superior weapons/armour they obviously don't need seems silly.

I don't mind a longer road to finishing a raid. Superior weapons/armour should be reasonably achievable by almost any skill level. If I have to wait until I earned the game-over gun, then at least I have a better chance at completing a Raid.

I've been advocating this for a while. It was a major problem in WoW and it's a major problem in Destiny as well. Players who are capable of completing the hardest challenge in the game do not need that challenge to be made any easier. Doing so creates a situation where you get a bunch of players who, after clearing once, are then more likely to clear a 2nd time, and 3rd, by large degrees, until they have it on farm and everyone is geared in that stuff. Whereas a team that is struggling to clear the hard mode, and is even just one week behind the curve, ends up exponentially behind the other players in terms of gear.

Agreed. The design needs to be progressive rather than regressive. I've long suspected that Crucible rewards are subtly weighted in this direction and that Bungie never admits it because of the internet rage it would cause.

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This is why In JRPGs at least, beating the super bosses often give no, or an inconsequential reward. Because, what's the point of a better item? You just did the hardest thing in the game.

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This is why In JRPGs at least, beating the super bosses often give no, or an inconsequential reward. Because, what's the point of a better item? You just did the hardest thing in the game.

The most frustrating thing I can remember doing in Destiny happened recently during a VoG run. I was with a group of people who'd already done it several times; it was my first time at 390. We got to the Atheon challenge, where everyone needs to shoot one oracle.

I had no weapons that worked well at shooting oracles. (Due to some stupidity on my own part, I had no special or heavy ammo, and was 3 or 4 minutes away from synthing either - and there's no way to 'pause' that encounter; once you wipe, it begins again, on a timer, so unless everyone wants to sit and get killed 3 or 4 times, you play it.)

Everyone else had oracle-killer weapons. (They drop regularly during the raid - I'd just been supremely unlucky in that I'd gotten zero weapon drops during the Templar fight.)

I was the cause of a large series of team wipes, as I went in, looking for 'my' oracle to kill (the team I was playing with assigned an order to oracle destruction, but since I had no clue how they spawned, I shot at whatever one was visible when I came in) - I couldn't kill any oracles at all. (Whatever weapon I was using - probably a max-impact scout - took more than a clip to kill an oracle, but it would get destroyed by one of the other players before I could finish it. So I'd be left with the last one, and I couldn't kill the last one fast enough to keep us from wiping.)

This problem DISAPPEARED once I got a Vision of Confluence. It didn't diminish - it DISAPPEARED. It was a nearly insurmountable problem (caused by a specific situation, yes, and one that I'd created myself, but still, in that context, nearly insurmountable) that became a trivial annoyance with the addition of a single gun - one that only dropped during the raid.

Before ANYONE has oracle-killer weapons, that section is doable, because we all take about the same amount of time to kill one (and because we usually have access to higher-damage weapons like snipers and heavies), but it's still hard, and I'm pretty sure most teams wiped a bunch of times trying to get the timing down. If you play as a regular team, you usually get those oracle-killer weapons together; almost everyone gets at least one weapon drop, and almost all the VoG weapons have that perk. But even if you're not in the same extreme situation I put us in (where 1) I had no oracle-killing weapons, 2) I had no heavy or special, and 3) I was much, much slower at killing oracles than any of my teammates), it's still hard, and easy to screw up, until you get VoG weapons. King's Fall showed us that when precision is required most of the time, many players will simply choose to not play - raids are fun unless everyone has to be 'on' 100% of the time. Oracle perks keep VoG FUN - as cheapLEY's video today showed, even the 390 version of the templar can be 3-manned. (In contrast, if we're running Oryx on KF, and we're only 1 or 2 rounds in, we'll wipe if someone dies, rather than try it with 5, because it's just easier.)

So just because you just did the hardest thing in the game, there's nothing that says you'll have more fun going forward if you get a gun that makes it a little easier. ;)

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Hey guys, my weapons are weak. How about I kill the last oracle? Everybody still inside put two shots on it, then let me finish it off.

Brains not brawn :-p

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Hey guys, my weapons are weak. How about I kill the last oracle? Everybody still inside put two shots on it, then let me finish it off.

Brains not brawn :-p

lol - we had that conversation at least 10 times. Every single time, someone's final bullet finished the oracle off before I could.

Still became 10000x easier with VoC.

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One thing I love about raid-specific perks (like VoG guns doing extra damage against oracles) is that it helps players feel extra powerful when they go back and replay the activity they just conquered without overpowering the other PvE activities.

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One thing I love about raid-specific perks (like VoG guns doing extra damage against oracles) is that it helps players feel extra powerful when they go back and replay the activity they just conquered without overpowering the other PvE activities.

I meant to make that point specifically and forgot.

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This is totally valid given the current loot system.

That being said, if the hard mode was rebalanced to be cosmetic items only, you would get things like oracle killer from the normal mode, and need them for the hard mode. It would be a situation where the hard mode would be every bit as finely tuned as it is now, but would not require current hard mode loot - it would require the best available normal mode loot because (hopefully obviously) hard mode loot wouldn't exist.

Like if Bungie just added a new, SUPER hard mode VoG that was light 410, dropped no loot at all save a guaranteed spaceship and shader on final kill, with a guaranteed emblem if you do it with no wipes. It would be hard as hell compared to 390 VoG, right? But still fully doable (I imagine), and doable without a need for weekly farming unless you were obsessed with getting flawless. Not doable for every raid group, but doable for the ultra elite groups who simply want more challenge.

You could even do a raid that, once anyone had cleared it, got 1 light level harder the following week for everyone attempting it. Then it would just be an endgame competition for the best of the best, purely for bragging rights. The initial balance would be upended by player ability, and not by somewhat arbitrary designer guesses as to what an appropriate difficulty should be.

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You could even do a raid that, once anyone had cleared it, got 1 light level harder the following week for everyone attempting it. Then it would just be an endgame competition for the best of the best, purely for bragging rights. The initial balance would be upended by player ability, and not by somewhat arbitrary designer guesses as to what an appropriate difficulty should be.

Kind of sounds like something Borderlands would do. In a good way.

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You could even do a raid that, once anyone had cleared it, got 1 light level harder the following week for everyone attempting it. Then it would just be an endgame competition for the best of the best, purely for bragging rights. The initial balance would be upended by player ability, and not by somewhat arbitrary designer guesses as to what an appropriate difficulty should be.

They could even make a banner you get for completing the raid that reflected the light level you beat it at. Give people something to chase/brag about that doesn't impact everything else.

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You could even do a raid that, once anyone had cleared it, got 1 light level harder the following week for everyone attempting it. Then it would just be an endgame competition for the best of the best, purely for bragging rights. The initial balance would be upended by player ability, and not by somewhat arbitrary designer guesses as to what an appropriate difficulty should be.

They could even make a banner you get for completing the raid that reflected the light level you beat it at. Give people something to chase/brag about that doesn't impact everything else.

There would be a max through at which point you can no longer damage your enemies given the way the light system works.

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There would be a max through at which point you can no longer damage your enemies given the way the light system works.

True. Maybe it stops at that point and you can finally say you beat destiny when that happens.

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I think it would divide the community, and discourage strong players from ever playing with anyone other than players at their level.

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I think it would divide the community, and discourage strong players from ever playing with anyone other than players at their level.

I would agree with you, except the ratio of strong players who would do this are far outnumbered by the weak players. Kinda like how the lighthouse has divided the people who have gone to those who haven't. Everything is divided, it's just where you draw the line.

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I think it would divide the community, and discourage strong players from ever playing with anyone other than players at their level.

I would agree with you, except the ratio of strong players who would do this are far outnumbered by the weak players. Kinda like how the lighthouse has divided the people who have gone to those who haven't. Everything is divided, it's just where you draw the line.

True enough, and I'm not trying to be selfish, but I don't want there to be more activities I'm shut out of because I don't measure up. I'd worry that this would extend the rat race of raiding, and it would diminish the part of the raid's life cycle I enjoy the most, playing the raid with friends (with a range of skills) while it's moderately challenging.

(I actually "enjoy" the experience of blind raiding the most, but that's short-lived and I couldn't handle the stress every week.)

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I think it would divide the community, and discourage strong players from ever playing with anyone other than players at their level.

I would agree with you, except the ratio of strong players who would do this are far outnumbered by the weak players. Kinda like how the lighthouse has divided the people who have gone to those who haven't. Everything is divided, it's just where you draw the line.

True enough, and I'm not trying to be selfish, but I don't want there to be more activities I'm shut out of because I don't measure up. I'd worry that this would extend the rat race of raiding, and it would diminish the part of the raid's life cycle I enjoy the most, playing the raid with friends (with a range of skills) while it's moderately challenging.

(I actually "enjoy" the experience of blind raiding the most, but that's short-lived and I couldn't handle the stress every week.)

I'm in the same boat as you. And if it makes you feel any better, this might be an amazing tool to figure out those people who are willing to raid with you and those that you probably don't want to raid with anyway :D

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True enough, and I'm not trying to be selfish, but I don't want there to be more activities I'm shut out of because I don't measure up.

I think by definition you are left out of a lot of the fun in games if you don't measure up, simply because for a good game, playing at a high level is intrinsically rewarding. Or it should be.

The solution is difficulty levels. Each player can select the difficulty level that is interesting and challenging for them, such that the game is interesting to play at all times. If they improve, they can bump up the difficulty. As long as a baseline challenge of certain activities is preserved across the difficulty levels, then everyone can have the best time possible.

All raids and challenges should be accessible on any difficulty level.

You could optionally scale the challenge as well as the difficulty, as long as the challenge starts in a meaningful place.

This was figured out decades ago. When you think about it, it's very odd that Destiny had no selectable difficulty.

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That's all well and good, but it doesn't really fix the problem, and creates a new one that I would hate. If I'm not good enough to play a higher difficulty level, I'd feel bad forcing the likes of you and Korny and Cruel or whoever else to play a raid at my level. You all wouldn't feel challenged, but I'd feel like a boat anchor playing at your level. So we end up in a situation where someone isn't enjoying themselves, or we just don't play together, and that sucks.

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That's all well and good, but it doesn't really fix the problem, and creates a new one that I would hate. If I'm not good enough to play a higher difficulty level, I'd feel bad forcing the likes of you and Korny and Cruel or whoever else to play a raid at my level. You all wouldn't feel challenged, but I'd feel like a boat anchor playing at your level. So we end up in a situation where someone isn't enjoying themselves, or we just don't play together, and that sucks.

I already feel bad asking them to play with me.

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That's all well and good, but it doesn't really fix the problem, and creates a new one that I would hate. If I'm not good enough to play a higher difficulty level, I'd feel bad forcing the likes of you and Korny and Cruel or whoever else to play a raid at my level. You all wouldn't feel challenged, but I'd feel like a boat anchor playing at your level. So we end up in a situation where someone isn't enjoying themselves, or we just don't play together, and that sucks.

I already feel bad asking them to play with me.

I've been playing with Korny for close to 3 years now... that should tell you that I'm happy to play with just about anyone ;p

Seriously though, no need to ever feel bad about that. <3

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That's all well and good, but it doesn't really fix the problem, and creates a new one that I would hate. If I'm not good enough to play a higher difficulty level, I'd feel bad forcing the likes of you and Korny and Cruel or whoever else to play a raid at my level. You all wouldn't feel challenged, but I'd feel like a boat anchor playing at your level. So we end up in a situation where someone isn't enjoying themselves, or we just don't play together, and that sucks.

I already feel bad asking them to play with me.

I've been playing with Korny for close to 3 years now... that should tell you that I'm happy to play with just about anyone ;p

Seriously though, no need to ever feel bad about that. <3

And Korny's been playing with ME! :-p

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That's all well and good, but it doesn't really fix the problem, and creates a new one that I would hate. If I'm not good enough to play a higher difficulty level, I'd feel bad forcing the likes of you and Korny and Cruel or whoever else to play a raid at my level. You all wouldn't feel challenged, but I'd feel like a boat anchor playing at your level. So we end up in a situation where someone isn't enjoying themselves, or we just don't play together, and that sucks.

How is that any different than now? You can either handle the hard mode raid or not. If you can't, you won't play it in either situation.

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True enough, and I'm not trying to be selfish, but I don't want there to be more activities I'm shut out of because I don't measure up. I'd worry that this would extend the rat race of raiding, and it would diminish the part of the raid's life cycle I enjoy the most, playing the raid with friends (with a range of skills) while it's moderately challenging.

(I actually "enjoy" the experience of blind raiding the most, but that's short-lived and I couldn't handle the stress every week.)

I'm with you. Our blind King's Fall (the only blind raid I've ever done) stands out as the pinnacle of Destiny for me. But our Crota and VoG runs over the past two weeks were just as cool, and even more "fun" in many ways. Even when we were having spots of trouble, it remained much more light hearted and relaxed than a blind raid ever could be, I think.

I never did do the whole grinding out a raid week after week thing, but I can totally see why people would. I probably would have too, but I just didn't think King's Fall was that fun of a raid to do over and over, and VoG and Crota were both irrelevant by the time I started playing. In a way, that was a blessing, because the folks I joined up with just wanted to do it for fun and help a newbie experience them.

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It is interesting because I usually really straddle the "gameplay itself as a reward" and "I want the new bobbles" line and KF is for me where that worked out best, even if it was a more stressful initial experience. But when I was doing it up to 3 times a week we were completing it in 40-ish minutes in most cases. Only for a very short while was the getting easier a part of getting gear and most of the time was refinement of roles and practice. It was rewarding to be that well oiled machine. But it was also rewarding getting those last drops I was looking for on this or that character.

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It is interesting because I usually really straddle the "gameplay itself as a reward" and "I want the new bobbles" line and KF is for me where that worked out best, even if it was a more stressful initial experience. But when I was doing it up to 3 times a week we were completing it in 40-ish minutes in most cases. Only for a very short while was the getting easier a part of getting gear and most of the time was refinement of roles and practice. It was rewarding to be that well oiled machine. But it was also rewarding getting those last drops I was looking for on this or that character.

I guess it's hard for me to judge--I never played KF enough to feel like a well oiled machine. Warpriest was fine, but every time I played the rest of the encounters, especially Oryx and the sisters were always absolute shit shows. And that's fine, I guess. That's the part where patience and practice comes in. But even if you were really good at all that, I still feel like it requires way more precision and could never match the casual fun of VoG or Crota.

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It really did. Our runs would often double in length if we had people we didn't play with as often there. We cycled about 8-9 people regularly. But it was wngaging because everyone played an important part. VoG is probably the best Raid overall in my opinion, but there were parts that felt like only one or two people were doing anything important. Same thing with CE. I don't think kF has the best encounters or overall experience of the Raids, but it does make everyone feel more important, if you ask me.

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I don't think kF has the best encounters or overall experience of the Raids, but it does make everyone feel more important, if you ask me.

Oh, I don't disagree with that at all. Don't get me wrong, I really loved King's Fall. As I said, it's the only one I did blind, and I had fun doing it a few more times after that. I like that it requires teamwork in a way that the others don't. I just think there's room for both types of raids, and I hope they can find neat ways to keep the old raids relevant once the new ones come along. That didn't really happen in Destiny 1, until Age of Triumph. I think what they've done there is awesome, and I hope they can just do something similar along the way, asnew content comes out in Destiny 2, rather than just waiting until the end.

We're lucky around here in that it was never really too difficult to find folks willing to run VoG or Crota just for the hell of it, even when they old and irrelevant to the current loot levels. But I also know people for whom that wasn't true. One of my old buddies from the Air Force couldn't get his group of friends to go back to the old raids once The Taken King was out, and that sucks. I get that the fun of it should be it's own reward, but I also just think it's be neat if they could keep old stuff relevant for that as the game moves forward.

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I don't think kF has the best encounters or overall experience of the Raids, but it does make everyone feel more important, if you ask me.

Oh, I don't disagree with that at all. Don't get me wrong, I really loved King's Fall. As I said, it's the only one I did blind, and I had fun doing it a few more times after that. I like that it requires teamwork in a way that the others don't. I just think there's room for both types of raids, and I hope they can find neat ways to keep the old raids relevant once the new ones come along. That didn't really happen in Destiny 1, until Age of Triumph. I think what they've done there is awesome, and I hope they can just do something similar along the way, asnew content comes out in Destiny 2, rather than just waiting until the end.

We're lucky around here in that it was never really too difficult to find folks willing to run VoG or Crota just for the hell of it, even when they old and irrelevant to the current loot levels. But I also know people for whom that wasn't true. One of my old buddies from the Air Force couldn't get his group of friends to go back to the old raids once The Taken King was out, and that sucks. I get that the fun of it should be it's own reward, but I also just think it's be neat if they could keep old stuff relevant for that as the game moves forward.

... but imagine a (Destiny) world where light level wasn't a thing:

Want the new hotness? Run the latest raid.

Want to run the old raids? They still drop loot that is just as effective as the new hotness.

The light level arms race KILLS variety. How many of Destiny's guns are just replacements for other guns with a higher number attached to them?

Get rid of Light Levels, and suddenly the onus is on Bungie to make each piece of new gear DIFFERENT than stuff that's already in the game. Y'know, NEW content, not just treadmill/reskin BS.

/angry rant

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I think it would divide the community, and discourage strong players from ever playing with anyone other than players at their level.

I hear you, but I'm not sure it would have that effect. I know that I probably would never play this mode. I'm just not that good and I don't imagine most people around these parts would be chasing it either.

I did VoG when it was hard and I was proud of that but I wouldn't want to do that over and over. I enjoyed playing it more post-Crota than before. The atmosphere was just a lot more relaxed and fun.

I would love to see the crazy-good players stream their antics on ridiculous settings. It gives them something to do that doesn't also give them an advantage in other parts of the game - just bragging rights.

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I believe rewarding successful hard mode raiders with superior weapons/armour they obviously don't need seems silly.

I don't mind a longer road to finishing a raid. Superior weapons/armour should be reasonably achievable by almost any skill level. If I have to wait until I earned the game-over gun, then at least I have a better chance at completing a Raid.

I disagree with this.

The raids are the ultimate challenge in the PvE side of the game. In a loot-driven shooter, it would be completely backwards to have players complete the ultimate end-game challenge, and give them no rewards of value.
(There is a case to be made for getting rid of loot-based rewards entirely, but that's a different conversation).

I do not feel this way about PvP, though. For a very specific reason; the raids are static experiences. They are built from predictable encounters with learnable mechanics. This means you don't actually need to be great at the game to complete them. You just need patience and practice. The whole fantasy of Destiny is taking your character and making them more and more powerful over time. Hitting max rank and filling out your ability tree happens quickly, so the only way to feel more powerful after that is with better guns.
That's also where a lot of Destiny's replay value comes from. Not the repetitive grind to earn new guns (I've been vocal about how much I dislike that element of the game), but in going back and replaying old content with crazy new weapons. It's what keeps things fresh and breathes new life into old strokes and missions. And because it's all purely cooperative, you're not harming anyone else's experience.

PvP doesn't work like that. No 2 crucible matches are ever exactly the same. And being an inherently competitive activity creates a desire for the fight to be somewhat fair. Giving the best PvP players weapon rewards that dominate other PvP weapons works against that sense of fairness. This is why I was such a fan of the Year 1 Trials adept weapons. They were very good, but not overpowered PvP weapons (except maybe the Messenger). But their Adept nature gave them Elemental damage, making them special in the PvE side of the game.

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I want and sometimes need, an alternative method to getting those special equipment (more powerful) locked behind HM Raids. I see little benefit to the 'already highly skilled' to get special equipment. Some may replay the Raids but making it easier for them makes no sense. If the Raids are good enough for replay, that's the only incentive required.

Bungie should have created alternative (perhaps more grindy) methods to get those same special equipment. That incentivises the lesser capable players to keep playing with the ultimate goal of doing Raids.

Bungie already recognizes that only 50% of the community finishing Raids is a horrible number. I hope they make better choices for D2. I have no confidence in their new LFG built in system. Seems like they were just too lazy to figure something better out. Like hire Cody. ;)

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I want and sometimes need, an alternative method to getting those special equipment (more powerful) locked behind HM Raids. I see little benefit to the 'already highly skilled' to get special equipment. Some may replay the Raids but making it easier for them makes no sense. If the Raids are good enough for replay, that's the only incentive required.

Claude just provided an excellent example of why it is sometimes a good thing for activities to be made easier over time.

Speaking for myself, I love the feeling of grinding against what feels like an impossible challenge, getting slightly better with each attempt, and then eventually beating it... once or twice. But I don't necessarily want it to be such an uber-hardcore slog every single time I want to run VoG with friends. In the long term, raids have become the primary social activity within Destiny for me and my friends. The rest of the game is just too easy, too mindless. Raids getting a little easier over time hits the perfect sweet spot for an activity that is still exciting and challenging, but not too sweaty. (Perhaps some of this could be alleviated if the rest of Destiny's content was as fun and replayable as the raids, but I'm basing my thoughts on what we actually have to work with).

There's also the Sherpa dynamic. If players who beat the toughest activities get gear that helps make those activities a tiny bit easier, that only helps them go back in and sherpa other players through. Again, we're talking about co-op experiences here.

Bungie should have created alternative (perhaps more grindy) methods to get those same special equipment. That incentivises the lesser capable players to keep playing with the ultimate goal of doing Raids.

As I already said, you don't need to be highly skilled to beat a raid. You just need practice, and maybe some friends to help carry you through. As far as more grindy methods to acquire top-level gear, IMHO that is the absolute worst thing that could happen to a game like Destiny. The game is already too grindy as it is. Within the context of a loot-based game, I'm a big fan of "you beat this activity, you get x reward".

Now I do think Bungie has screwed up the nature of their end-game loot many times since Destiny launched. I hated the King's Fall situation, where playing the rest of the game could get you leveled high enough to start the raid, but not finish it, and finishing the raid required grinding the first half of the raid over and over until you got the right drops. That was terrible.

In an ideal world, playing the rest of the game (story missions, strikes, quests) would lead the player right up to the raid, at an appropriate level to start and finish the entire activity (TTK is the closest we've gotten to that, but the raid itself totally screwed things up). Completing the raid would get you cool unique gear, perhaps specialized towards the raid itself, but not higher level than gear that is available elsewhere. Very much like the system we have right now, actually.

Bungie already recognizes that only 50% of the community finishing Raids is a horrible number. I hope they make better choices for D2.

I'm not sure I buy the "50% completion is a horrible number" argument. Most single-player games have lower completion rates than that. Most games sit somewhere between 20%-40% depending on length, last I heard. So if 50% of the Destiny community have beaten a raid, in spite of all the barriers Bungie put in their way (level-up grinds, lack of matchmaking, length of the activity), I'd say that's pretty darn spectacular.

It's just a philosophical thing, but I have absolutely no problem with Bungie including end game activities specifically for the more hardcore players... as long as they aren't leaving everyone else without stuff to do. Requiring the player to make specific commitments is not something that should be shied away from at all times.

I have no confidence in their new LFG built in system. Seems like they were just too lazy to figure something better out. Like hire Cody. ;)

I think Guided Games will work out great, for players who are willing to put just that tiny bit of effort into it. If a player can't be bothered to scroll through a list of groups and decide who to join, is that really someone you'd want to attempt a raid with?

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I want and sometimes need, an alternative method to getting those special equipment (more powerful) locked behind HM Raids. I see little benefit to the 'already highly skilled' to get special equipment. Some may replay the Raids but making it easier for them makes no sense. If the Raids are good enough for replay, that's the only incentive required.

Bungie should have created alternative (perhaps more grindy) methods to get those same special equipment. That incentivises the lesser capable players to keep playing with the ultimate goal of doing Raids.

Bungie already recognizes that only 50% of the community finishing Raids is a horrible number. I hope they make better choices for D2. I have no confidence in their new LFG built in system. Seems like they were just too lazy to figure something better out. Like hire Cody. ;)

The horror!

Guided games apply to regular raids only. I think their solution is creative (not lazy), and I'm interested in seeing how well it works. Raid matchmaking would have provided a lousy experience most of the time--worse than LFG. What other complicated, difficult, coordinated activity that you do with other humans requires no effort at all to join other than pushing a plastic button on a game controller while sitting on your couch? A better demonstration of commitment and interest is required.

Regarding raid weapons--they're raid weapons on several levels--you get them from raids and they have raid specific perks. They're among the coolest things in Destiny. That said, it's very common for non-raid weapons to become go-to weapons for specific parts of a raid. Bungie has said that they want people to experiment with a greater variety of weapons so maybe fewer weapons will feel like necessities. The challenge is creating enough guns that are effective in raids without diluting what makes weapons unique and coveted. (I actually think D1 did this, but perceptions of effectiveness run deep.)

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Like hire Cody. ;)

Why, when I could work for Naughty Dog and not have to move?

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Destiny had it right at launch when the lowest-skilled player in the match could get a Gjallarhorn to drop.

I don't disagree with basically anything you said, but just out of curiosity, how do you feel about stuff like the Black Spindle mission? It's not PvP, but it is (or was, I don't know if it's still difficult to obtain now) undoubtedly a special reward for at least somewhat skilled players. I guess I don't know the numbers, but anecdotal evidence of posts around here months after the mission was discovered by folks who were still attempting to get it shows that not everyone managed it. I like that it was a cool thing that was challenging to obtain, and I'm not necessarily sure why that shouldn't be true for PvP, too. It sucks, because I know its something I'm unlikely to see, but I'm not sure how much of a distinction between the two modes there should be. I feel like PvP players should be able to earn cool things, too, I guess.

I don't have an issue with exclusive PvE rewards. Those require coordination, teamwork, and skill, yeah. But they encourage positive interactions with others. The focus is on teamwork and going up a known quantity (and as an added bonus, not requiring you to deny other people success). PvE rewards encourage positive interaction, because you can always pick yourself up and try again, getting better each time. In Competitive PvP, if you or your teammates aren't doing the best, you fall further behind. You lose rank, or more familiarly, you have to buy another Trials card and start over from 0.

It tough to explain. Imagine if every time that we wiped in a raid, the reward pool got smaller and smaller (with the raid exotic being locked behind Flawless Raider), or we would have the number of wipes show up on our profile.
If the reward pool got smaller, people would flat-out refuse to raid with folks who weren't the absolute top tier. If would add toxicity to playing with your own friends (that is exactly what Overwatch's Competitive Mode does). As it is now, I'm happy to bash my head against a wall until 3am, because I'm spending time with friends, and the focus is on getting better and better.
If the number of raid wipes showed up on your profile, LFG raid groups might kick you out if your number was too high, even if you were the best player in your groups (other people mess up? Tough!). You wouldn't want to play with any friends if they were "liabilities".

Competitive multiplayer does this. Ranks do this, and exclusive top-tier rewards do this. They add toxicity. They damage the community simply to grant a small percentage of players a slightly bigger ePeen, and they give people incentive to play dirty (and when they play dirty, they will always hurt the experience of others).
And I've always hated that. And I especially hate when developers cater to this small crowd, because it changes the whole focus of the game. It changes what made it great. It's not the fact that there are rewards, it's that it twists people who want those rewards.

The good thing about Trials is that The Lighthouse (and the weapons and gear that you get from it) isn't the be all end all reason to play Trials. It's neat, but the weapons and gear are attainable even if you aren't the absolute best. As long as you fill out those bounties, or you win a few games, you will get rewarded. I know folks with zero chance of making it to the Lighthouse who still do trials regularly because it is fun to play the gametype, and they can set different goals for themselves (Bounties > Win drops > Five Wins > Seven Wins > Nine Wins), and they don't get punished for failing to win every singe match.

In Iron Banner, you don't lose rank. You get a medallion that rewards you for succeeding when you try again. And regardless of whether you win or lose, you get good loot. THAT'S the sort of reward system that works great, and I hope we get more of that in Destiny 2.

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It tough to explain. Imagine if every time that we wiped in a raid, the reward pool got smaller and smaller (with the raid exotic being locked behind Flawless Raider), or we would have the number of wipes show up on our profile.
If the reward pool got smaller, people would flat-out refuse to raid with folks who weren't the absolute top tier. If would add toxicity to playing with your own friends (that is exactly what Overwatch's Competitive Mode does). As it is now, I'm happy to bash my head against a wall until 3am, because I'm spending time with friends, and the focus is on getting better and better.
If the number of raid wipes showed up on your profile, LFG raid groups might kick you out if your number was too high, even if you were the best player in your groups (other people mess up? Tough!). You wouldn't want to play with any friends if they were "liabilities".

Okay, thanks. That break down explains perfectly where you're come my from, I think. It makes sense, and all of that would be super shitty. I genuinely hadn't thought of it like that. I guess it's just easy for me to ignore, as I don't engage with PvP anyway.

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The solution that would please everybody would be to allow the competitive players to self organize outside the game. Let them set the rules and whatnot. Private matches are kind of the bare minimum for this. ICCup for the original Starcraft is an example. I am sure something similar could happen for the PC version of Des2ny. Everybody wins, since the competitive players are segregated, yet because it's self organized they can set the rules and systems as they see best.

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This is a brilliant explanation of the problem.

Any ranked play should only provide cosmetic rewards, if any.

Hell, even tying non-cosmetic rewards to winning just makes future matches even more lopsided in favor of the victors, and drastically increases salt on the losing team. It's not fun at all.

If the same two teams play against one another 50 times, the hope is it would be a 25-25 split, but the reality is that, even if the teams are equally matched (but ties are not allowed), whichever team wins first and gets the non-cosmetic reward will now have an easier time in game 2. And so forth.

No loot system should be based on a "the rich get richer" system, and - unfortunately - Destiny 1's absolutely is.

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In a PvP context this has never been my experience with Destiny. My best rewards were often in losing matches. And the capability difference in Trials Gear, like all the Meta-Rolled gear, requires the end player to be able to use it. Smart play still beats out the numeric advantages of their gear.

Not that I like the functional Gear hidden in the Lighthouse. Just that the I have never seen a reward stream influnce subsequent wins in any major form.

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In a PvP context this has never been my experience with Destiny. My best rewards were often in losing matches. And the capability difference in Trials Gear, like all the Meta-Rolled gear, requires the end player to be able to use it. Smart play still beats out the numeric advantages of their gear.

Not that I like the functional Gear hidden in the Lighthouse. Just that the I have never seen a reward stream influnce subsequent wins in any major form.

For Destiny PvP, this only applies to Trials, because that's the only pvp mode where you could get higher than otherwise available in pvp light level gear (and, to a lesser extent, because adept weapons are very slightly overstatted). You would only notice any difference in Trials and Iron Banner because those modes are the only ones where light level matters.

I'm using a theoretical example to illustrate a point about potentially rewarding players for doing well on a ranked ladder system, which is rumored - it's not a real thing you could actually see and play right now, just a theory.

With that in mind, just as I mentioned that Destiny goes long stretches between updates, so too did trials gear top out at 400 and allow us plebs to get equal footing after a while. But those first weeks, if you didn't take 3 hunters to the lighthouse for gear, or luck into the right drops, you were at a disadvantage. There were definitely games I played where my 390 guy had to land 4 shots to kill a 400 player with the same gun who only needed to land 3 to kill me. It was noticeable. If there were grades of increasingly better rewards, as is typical in a ladder system, you end up giving the best players better gear, making them even better, while giving the worst players nothing, keeping them the worst. The result is that the game becomes harder for bad players and easier for good ones, and that's the opposite of what you want in pvp. You want everyone to feel like it's a challenge, rather than wanting to de facto segregate the good and bad players into a 1% and 99% situation.

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While I would agree that in theory such a snowball effect can occur, in my experience I have not seen it occur reliably or identifiably. Because the small numerical variance (how often do you take identical weapons against someone of a substantially different Light Level? Basically if you run a popular exotic?) has never been an issue unless I got caught in a disadvantageous position. I just don't feel that it is that much of an advantage relative to all of the other mitigating factors, that's all.

And yeah, I know people who both agree and disagree with my sentiment. So I don't know if it really is all perspective.

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The distinction between tangible reqards in PvE and PvP is wholly cooperative v. competitive. Your example sums up really well how you could make PvE competitive for rewards, and thankfully Destiny has not been moving in that direction. The act of PvE Sherpaing is really illustrative that the game keeps a lot of its activities cooperative. And some people even try to make the competitive activities as cooperative as they can.

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Wow. never thought I'd see a post where you're not worshiping the ground that that Datto tool walks on.

Really? Most of his opinions are bad and toolish for as long as I can remember. I don't recall agreeing with him on that much.

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Like Cruel said, Titanfall 2 is this in spades. 100% of non-cosmetic unlocks can be unlocked at any time with in-game currency that you get simply from playing the game. Cosmetic unlocks rely on using the thing that you want to unlock the skins for. Nothing rewards the higher-tier players, and nothing punishes lower-tier players. The only incentive that you have to play the game is to have fun and get better.

Correction, some things are only unlocked by playing in a certain way (ie, getting a certain number of kills or doing a certain amount of damage, etc). Most of those are only cosmetic of course, but the non-cosmetic upgrades for each weapon are tied to playing with that weapon long enough. You can't short-circuit your way to a different scope, silencer, etc without playing with that weapon long enough to level it up. That is one mechanic I wish wasn't in the game since it does give a player a disadvantage to using a new weapon until they can get the extra mods they want unlocked. It's not a massive disadvantage mind you, but it would really have been better to allow the player to purchase those upgrades with currency earned just by playing IMO.

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COD does that as well, and it's a large impediment to casual players. Getting 100 kills with no scope on a sniper, or 500 with a rifle, may be trivial to a player who plays for 2 hours a day all week, but if you can only play a few weekends a month you hardly unlock anything.

This is one reason why even though my friends all have TF2, Destiny and Overwatch, we pretty much end up playing only Overwatch together. There are no unlocks that we have to worry about, so no one feels like they have no chance because they haven't unlocked the longest range shotgun or don't have the scope and barrel for the best rifle.

Loot based shooters, even ones with defined guns like ME:A, suffer because you always have to play a certain amount to get access to most of the content. The Devs have to pad the loot lists for players who can invest 20 hours or more a week, but players who can only play a handful are always behind the curve.

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All it creates is account stealing / account parking, smurfing, and a whole lot of other issues.

Trials is about the way to do it. It's a reward for being good at PvP, but since it resets every weekend (heck, with every CARD), there's no point in smurfing or taking someone's account.

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I have spent half my life playing racing sims, working to get better at going around corners. There's never been any reward other than doing slightly better. I have yet to get bored of it.

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Personally, there are times when I just want to jump on and have some fun and not be dropped into super sweaty matches right away. Having some non-skilled based matchmaking would be awesome for those times when you just want to relax and get your mind off of things.

For instance, I came home from work around an hour early this last Friday and wanted to kill some time playing crucible. Just looking to do some of the weekly bounties and relax.

It was either my first or second game of the day and I get dropped into this match.

Someone had quit out and because of Bungie's wonderful JiP I ended up in that match just after heavy had dropped and the other team was running around with their 2nd round of supers. When you look up those players you can see there was literally a 2.93% chance that my team would be able to win that game. I ended up just backing out near the end of the game I was so pissed.

Game Link
Opponent #1
Opponent #2
Opponent #3
Opponent #4
Opponent #5

If I was able to jump into an unranked playlist and that same game had happened then I could just chalk it up to bad luck. Instead, you have this SBMM that for some reason decided I was a good fit for that match.

I'd love to be able to jump into some unranked matches to get warmed up and then jump over to some ranked playlists once I was ready for some hardcore matches.

As it stands now, I'm having to stop playing with fun loadouts if I don't want to just get slaughtered over and over due to SBMM. No Land + Sidearm is no longer a competitive option. Universal Remote + Sniper/Sidearm is not an option. Right now I'm basically forced into the meta of handcannon/pulse + sidearm/icebreaker if I want to have any chance at surviving when running solo.

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Join in progress should just die already. You're taking one bad experience and spreading it around even more but putting me in a game that's half over already. Just stop it already.

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Join in progress should just die already. You're taking one bad experience and spreading it around even more but putting me in a game that's half over already. Just stop it already.

Some games do it well. In Titanfall, if you join a match in progress and lose, it doesn't count as a loss against your personal stats.
In Overwatch, you get a "Backfill" XP boost. Sometimes you'll join a match just in time to see the "Defeat" popup. Bam, 500 free XP.

Destiny 2 should have a JIP buff. If the match is less than halfway over, you get a full Super. If the match is over halfway done and your team is behind, you get a full Super and Heavy. And in both instances, a higher chance of Legendary loot once the match ends.

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Include increased reputation gains and a planetary materials package (proportional to time remaining in the match) and I'm sold on that solution for backfilling.

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Join in progress should just die already. You're taking one bad experience and spreading it around even more but putting me in a game that's half over already. Just stop it already.

Some games do it well. In Titanfall, if you join a match in progress and lose, it doesn't count as a loss against your personal stats.
In Overwatch, you get a "Backfill" XP boost. Sometimes you'll join a match just in time to see the "Defeat" popup. Bam, 500 free XP.

I don't care about any of that. I've never been put into a match in progress and had fun. It's always an exercise in frustration.

Destiny 2 should have a JIP buff. If the match is less than halfway over, you get a full Super. If the match is over halfway done and your team is , you get a full Super and Heavy. And in both instances, a higher chance of Legendary loot once the match ends.

i still just think JIP is fundamentally spreading a bad experience to more players rather than just letting the original players deal with it. JIP has never solved anything--it always happens way too late in a match that it doesn't matter. Either you compensated for being down a player and pulled through somehow or you didn't, adding another body halfway through a match didn't help either way, and definitely didn't improve the experience of having teammates quit. In my experience, anyway, which is admittedly limited.

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I was really skeptical when it was introduced in Halo 4, but I've come around to it quite a bit. I remember going back to playing Halo 3 for a while, and just getting super frustrated every time someone would quit right at the beginning of the game, ruining the whole match.

Obviously joining early in the match makes way more sense, and most of the time when it happens (to me) these days the scores are still below 1000. But I've been joined in games before with my team down by 2000, and have come back to win. Yeah, sometimes there's nothing you can do, but then I just focus on getting one kill or something. It's usually just a few minutes.

I bet there have been loads of time when someone on your team quit and was replaced, and you didn't even notice. I bet you would have noticed being down a player the whole game.

With 4v4 in Destiny 2, it will be even more important to replace quitters quickly. Reducing the time it takes for them to load in would help a lot.

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I guess it really comes down to (for me) is why you're playing crucible. Is it to win or to do something fun? If winning is the only way you have fun then JIP is going to be terrible for you, but if you're playing "for the love of the game" then it really shouldn't matter.

(I'm not meaning to imply that CheapLEY has to win to have fun, we've all been at different points on that spectrum at different times.)

(also, I find winning more fun than losing, but even losing is usually fun, unless it's a complete blowout.)

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http://guardian.gg/en/pgcr/6505058760

Seriously.... FU Bungie if you think this is anyway fair at all.

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This is tough to comment on since I've grown to really dislike Destiny's PvP. I'm pretty sure the only reason I ever play it is for the rewards that are gated behind it. It's a literal chore.

In Y1 Trials of Osiris, I tolerated the lighthouse rewards (sans the lighthouse itself- locking that away was and continues to be incredibly stupid) since you could get all of them (minus the elemental perk on the primaries) just by playing the mode through those packages from the vendor. At some point that changed, earning my ire.

Should Destiny 2 PvP have ranked play? No. But it shouldn't have a lot of other things either. Like Hunters.

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Competitive players are better rewarded than they've ever been...

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Competitive players are better rewarded than they've ever been...

True enough. But streamers also need some metric to hook fans. A PVP rank fills that need. "I'm Diamond Ranked" is easy for fans to understand, compared to "I got a cool drop".

They could always implement their own systems, but that requires work and effort. Playing the game does not.

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