Not to me. (Destiny)

by Kahzgul, Sunday, July 30, 2017, 17:51 (2718 days ago) @ INSANEdrive

“Ok,” I say. “So what do you, INSANEdrive, want instead?”

I think it's pretty obvious. I think most everybody wants it so that a change to PvP balance or meta has no negative effect on the PvE balance or meta, and vice versa.

Oh boy. This would be disastrous. You think vault space was an issue in D1? If what you're asking for happened you could end up with one set of PvP only gear and another totally different set of PvE only gear. You would have to change every equipped item when you changed game modes. ...

Yet AGAIN you post something I have not considered! Fantastic! That said, I think it would be rather easy to attach two data sets into one gun, yes? That vault space problem would I think be easily remedied.

Happy to contribute.

I mean, I am assuming that any weapon or armor is usable in either pvp or pve, but that the stats are grossly unhinged due to balance changes, the result of which is that a weapon which is a pve monster is a pvp mouse, and weapons which are pvp monsters are pve mice. Having the ability to use something in either arena doesn't make it so people *will* use them.

Taking this to the logical extreme: A scout rifle the OHKs everything in PvE but deals only 1 damage per shot in PvP... You'd just never use it in pvp except to troll your teammates. And another scout that OHKs in PvP but deals only 1 damage in PvE... again, this is a gun that would get you kicked out of raids if you tried to use it, right? So both guns have two data sets, but - because of "balance changes" we landed in a place where they're just not viable in both modes, and you'd need twice as much vault space to accommodate them, plus the hassle of swapping gear left and right.

A less extreme, but equally frustrating example: Let's say there's a scout that is in a good place for pve. It deals OHK damage to the general grunt type enemies, but takes a few shots to pop shields etc. 30 rounds in a mag, 2.4x magnification when ADSed, doesn't kick too much. It's a great gun. But in PvP it's just too reliable and everyone is using it, so bungie balances the weapon for pvp. Now it has only 16 rounds in a mag and it kicks like a mule. it also deals a bit less damage at long range. You need to learn how to use this gun twice. That change in kick means your firing tempo is different. The damage drop off at range means you have to learn to gauge the distance at which you deal damage two times. The smaller mag means your "feel" of when to reload is different. It's a lot. What if they tweak the auto-aim a bit? A pve player will start missing shots in pvp that they *know* would have landed in pve. and so forth.

It's very, very risky to balance a weapon for one arena and not the other. It's is super critical that weapons have identical feel in both places so that the weapons themselves feel "real" to the players. Remember the very first thorn nerf? That gun used to feel good, and suddenly it felt like crap. It was like "is this thing on?" And then they buffed it so hard it felt like cheating. Now take any two of those sensibilities about the gun and imagine - one is pve, and one is pvp, and you have to hold that concept of the gun in your head at the same time when deciding what gun to take with you. It would be a nightmare.