I'm 528 now and I think I've spent a similar amount of time. Personally, I'm annoyed because it's going to take so long for people to want to do the new raid since we're normal people around here, not streamers. I don't want to be locked out of fun activities. I think Bungie wants the grind to be long though and I don't think it's because they want everyone to spend the same amount of time the streamers spend each week in Destiny. I think they want the content to stretch out for the average person up until the next set of DLC comes out so people can't complain about running out of things to do. Personally, I don't think stretching the grind out is the right way to accomplish that.

I do think it's annoying it's going to be awhile to do the raid... but I'm also kinda okay with that. Honestly, I jump in to have fun and burning though the fun just to play the raid doesn't seem fun to me. I'm still very much enjoying all the content of Destiny. I'm sure once I slow down and still don't have the Light level to play the raid then maybe I'll change my mind.

The better way is to build enough content to keep people engaged and make sure what is there is fun to do more than once.

I agree! In an ideal world it would be great if there was more content, but content is the hardest and has the most cost out of anything they can do. Content takes a TON of hours to do. More hours or employees means more money and that has to fall on someone...

I actually think extending the grind IS a decent way to lengthen content . . . if it’s done right.

I love Destiny. I’m totally in for the grind. I will hit the cap eventually.

They shouldn’t have the Raid be the goal of that grind, though. If they had put the Raid at 520, it would have been so much better. That allows most people to experience the Raid in a timely manner. Then hard mode could be 560 or 570 to fill in that final gap, with Iron Banner (and Trials, if it was still around) also being at the top due to level advantages.

If the Raid was 520, it’s not like I’d do the raid then quit playing. I’d do the raid, then keep climbing that ladder. This also ties in to my post about Y1 armor—the more gear and stuff you have to grind for, the longer they can make that part of the game last and have folks feeling like there’s worthwhile stuff to do.

As it is now, I bet tons of people realize how much of a grind it is to get to the raid and just quit playing. I don’t think having to grind to get to thevraud is going to keep people playing, but putting the raid lower would let more people play cool content. This honestly leads me to question Bungie’s motive. It no longer feels like they give a shit if people do the raid. They’ve done a complete 180 on their stance at D2’s launch, where they actively recognized that they want more people to get on there and get it done.

I am just trying to understand, whats the rush? Why do some people feel that just because they have put in ALOT of time these past 2 weeks, they should be able to do the raid? Maybe it is because that is how it felt in D1 and Destiny 2 expansions. I never really remember much of a grind to be able to do the raids prior to this one, maybe everyone liked that better?

Because we want to do it blind, and every day that passes now is just more opportunity to be spoiled, for a raid crew to fall apart. The whole notion of an “end game” is asinine. It’s all just the game. End game is arbitrary. They could put the Raid first and make Nightfalls at 580 and then they would be the end game activity.

For the purposes of this post, I'm not going to voice any judgements on whether any of this is good or bad. Just wanted to illustrate the amount of time it is taking for a "hardcore player" (<- not a term I like, but I think we all know what I mean by it) to climb up this level grind. I might reply to this post with some thoughts on the nature of the grind, but for now, I'll leave it at that.

I don't mind the grind. We needed a more gradual grind IMO. I don't mind slowly creeping up, so long as the game is fun and keeping me entertained. Most of the MMOs I have played follow this suit: Majority of players aren't grinding the raid on Day 1. To me that's OK!

Understandably, Everyone is excited and eager to get onto the new raid. I know I am!

SO, Lets imagine we were all "raid-ready" light levels this past weekend with the hours you, I and several others have put in thus far. By the end of this weekend we would have either beaten the raid, or played it long enough to get irritated/tired of banging our heads against it. See "The Taken King" raid. Then what?

Forsaken dropped 2 weeks ago tomorrow and alot of people are complaining they can't try the END GAME activity. If you have ever played a different game with Raiding, it takes time to be ready. Yes you can grind your days away to do it, but then what do you have to do until the next content drop? I feel like some people I have talked to just want to check the raid complete box and then go back to wanting more stuff to look forward to. Not everyone feels this way, and I am not even complaining, Destiny is YOUR game, play how you want. I just cant call it an END GAME activity if majority of active players are ready to raid on Day 1. Any other Non-Destiny MMO raiders that can back me up on that?

I am just trying to understand, whats the rush? Why do some people feel that just because they have put in ALOT of time these past 2 weeks, they should be able to do the raid? Maybe it is because that is how it felt in D1 and Destiny 2 expansions. I never really remember much of a grind to be able to do the raids prior to this one, maybe everyone liked that better?

I totally understand the "World's First" bologna Bungie is pushing, but that's all just for money/publicity. I imagine is just big whig corporate execs saying "hey if we push this, we get more attention and therefore more money/advertising. If we do not we "lose" out on all that". It has not made me feel the need to get there any faster. If we can go into END GAME activities 2 weeks into the expac, I would feel somewhat robbed of my money.

These are just my 2 cents, and in no way directed at anyone/group. Help me understand.

I can't say one way or the other with regards to this new expansion... its too new. But I can say with regards to previoius Destiny releases that the Raids were usually the most fun to replay activities in the game for me, by miles. It wasn't even close. I spent months playing VoG and CE multiple times per week, and loved it. In theory, it's the idea of being required to constantly replay a bunch of content that I'm not excited about replaying, just to reach the content that I will actually enjoy replaying, that rubs me the wrong way.
But game is in a very different state now. So I'm not going to make any judgements at this time as to how its all shaking out. Too soon for me to say.

One thought that sticks out in my mind when I think about this topic is the idea that there are different kinds of grinds, and they lead to very different experiences for me.

Unlocking my Whisper catalyst was a sort of Grind. It involved completing a very difficult mission, then completing a harder version of that mission, then going back in every weekend to beat it again and/or collect materials from hidden chests.

I loved every minute of it.

First of all, I loved the mission itself. I've probably run through it between 20-30 times at this point, and most of those runs were done helping other players beat the normal mode, which didn't count towards my catalyst progression.

On top of that, I knew exactly what I was working towards, and I could track my precise progress the whole time.

Finally, this "grind" was not locking me out of other activities that I might have wanted to do. There were no power-level gains involved. It was all about taking this awesome weapon that I love to use, and making it a little more powerful. This entire quest, IMO, is Destiny's "power fantasy" at its absolute best.

I would put "grinds" like the Ace of Spades quest in a similar boat. It has nothing to do with power level. It's all about chasing a specific reward that expands your power "outward" rather than "straight up". Same with Sleeper, Polaris Lance... even the new subclass missions.

I'm thoroughly enjoying the Dreaming City, in no small part because I'm chasing the Reverie Dawn armour, based purely on the asthetic. I'm constantly repeating the same patrols and public events, looking for chests and high value targets... just enjoying the atmosphere and the scenerie and the fun combat, all while working towards this goal of a complete set of armour. There are some bumps in this road (like getting my 6th pair of Titan boots before getting a single helmet), but that's a minor annoyance in an experience that I'm generally loving.

But then there's another kind of grind: what I would call a "vertical" grind. This is typically where power level comes into play, and certain activities are locked behind a power-level barrier. This is the kind of grind that I'm generally not a fan of (although it very much depends on the details). But regardless, I think it can be helpful to keep in mind the idea that there are different types of grinds when we talk about this stuff, because simply saying "I want more grind" or "there's too much grind" is actually quite vague.

Your idea of our power expanding outward vs upward is spot on. I love this game. I love nearly every activity in the game. I'm even starting to hate Crucible a little less. But I'm not a fan of chasing that vertical power grind.

I enjoy the gunplay and movement abilities enough to not mind grinding patrols for bounties, and I like most of the story missions and strikes enough that I don't mind running those a few times a week to knock out that milestone (though I could stand to see "Savathun's Song a bit less). But even if it seems like I dump a ridiculous amount of time into this game, my time isn't limitless. In order to play the content I enjoy most, I have to do a stupid amount of optimization to make sure that the time I spend in game is pushing that vertical power climb in the most efficient way possible.

(This part is dumb. You may want to skip from here...

Right now my daily/weekly grind involves running to the tower to talk to every vendor to collect bounties, knocking out crucible (if there's still a powerful reward on the table), then Gambit (again, if there's a powerful reward), if there are no more powerful engrams to be gained from them, all PvP bounties that will expire in the next 12 hours are dumped so that I've got room to collect wanted bounties (starting with any on Tangled Shore) and patrol bounties from Spider. I complete patrol bounties while bouncing between public events (occasionally ducking into a lost sector to nab an escapee), and returning to Spider every time I max out my Ghost Fragments stack so I can collect ALL of the wanted bounties. When the Tangled Shore bounties are done and local Prisoners are detained, I move to the flashpoint map.

On the flashpoint map, I collect my three bounties there (these are mostly important for the Ikora bounty, but planetary mats are at a premium now and the XP pushes gets me bright engrams which work toward completing this seaon's collect-a-thon), then jump into the daily heroic (unless a PE is about to start within running distance to any fast travel point), then back to doing patrols while bouncing between PEs and dipping into Lost Sectors to claim more runaway prisoners for Spider. When your flashpoint milestone is done, it's on to strikes...but only after hitting EVERY OTHER PLANET to collect their bounties as they can be completed during strikes that occur on that planet. Fun, right?!

Strikes are pretty straight forward as long as I keep an eye out for any weird loadout requirements for bounties, and check the roster to make sure at least one of the other players I'm matched with has the same elemental subclass, because it's really fun to keep players from earning progress on their milestones because neither of the players you matched them with are running arc subclasses during arc singe week.

Once things are handled in the real world, it's on to the Dreaming City. Petra needs me to complete two days worth of patrols and spend an hour running from bubble to bubble in the Well before she'll give me the gear I need to kill the thing she wants me to kill.

And this whole list doesn't even take into account that I now have to try and make sure to do the things that give me the less powerful powerful engrams before doing the things that give me more powerful powerful engrams because I didn't realize that was a thing until a few days ago because WHY THE FUCK WOULD BUNGIE DO THAT AND NOT TELL PEOPLE?!?!

...to here)

And while all of this sounds like a ridiculous slog, I actually enjoy all of these activities individually. But rather than have my checklist that has to be run in such a way that every thing I'm doing is making progress on at least three items on the list if I have any hope of completing said list, do you know what I'd rather do? I'd rather sign onto Destiny (appearing ONline), see what my friends are doing and play with them. Maybe every fifth engram gives me an item that is my current power level +1. It'll be a slow climb, but I'll get there by just playing and enjoying the game with friends.

On the other side of that, I love chasing new weapons and gear to expand my power. Everything that went into getting the Whisper and Polaris Lance and the Ace of Spades (even if they did try really hard to make me hate Gambit) made me appreciate those weapons that much more. This is the kind of stuff I want to do to expand my power. I mean, I've already killed a Hive god, the Hive god's dad, then the Worm god that created the Hive god. My power can't go upward much more before I'm using entire galaxies for platforming. I don't need more power. I need better tools to channel that power.

-Disciple