I’m arguing that it’s a part of the experience that could be better and not have a bunch of people feeling like Bungie doesn’t care about our enjoyment. There’s no way this isn’t designed explicitly for the folks that can play Destiny full time. We’ve had this argument before way too many times, so I guess it’s not worth rehashing.

You're not wrong. Raids traditionally are orientated toward being a reward for being hardcore. If you're not prepared when it drops, that's fine, it'll be there when you get there. It's a hardcore activity and Bungie wants to reward their hardcore fans. I realize that streaming culture has complicated this problem, because now a select few can be paid to binge the game. But even other non-MMO games over the past couple decades have structured content in certain ways to cater to the first few weeks of heavy player population. This particular way is just the most controversial and also happens to run counter to the way Halo presented its content.

Counterpoint: Being underleveled sucks and isn’t any fun at all. I don’t like feeling like I might as well just being throwing rocks. (:

It's all in your perspective. Your perspective is something along the lines of: "I can't do any damage and kill anything." Another perspective might be: "I'm gathering data each life to look for patterns and create strategies. Death is merely the rest on the gathering run." Until you've begun to try to execute the strategy, you're playing a different game entirely. That isn't just a player style that Raids tend to cater to, but a style that lives at the heart of what Raids are traditionally considered to be.

I can appreciate the sentiment of this post, but I can't see how it relates to the experience of playing a Destiny raid. How can you begin to solve the puzzles and mechanics of a raid if you can't stay alive, or clear the ads which trigger new phases within an encounter? You couldn't even really begin the process of figuring out the Bridge section in Crota's End if you can't fight off the Thrawl that swarm you on the plates, for example. It seems to me that being able to keep the ads at bay is a bare minimum requirement for any team hoping to make even the slightest bit of progress.

Again, I'm not arguing with the spirit of what you're saying... it just doesn't strike me as being possible in most Destiny raid fights.

Part of it becomes developing an "add-management" strategy to compensate for your lack of firepower. I'm not saying it's for everyone, but it is a classic aspect of raiding.

I feel like this is exactly what we did with Lair 2. We developed a strategy to handle the adds, and that involved fine-tuning our load outs and positions. That we weren't able to kill the final boss didn't bother me once we figured out how to damage him. The latter was what mattered. It proved we could beat him with enough time, but at that point the blind raid was over. I had no problem quitting and coming back at a higher level armed with better strategies.

My point is just that you wouldn't have been able to get to the final boss unless everyone was high enough level to handle the rest of the raid up to that point. And I think that's where a lot of the contention around this issue stems from; The vaguery surrounding what level is actually realistically needed to complete the entire raid, combined with the huge time sink involved with reaching that level, exacerbated by the RNG nature of that grind.

And it straight up spoils what the end boss of the raid looks like. I was trying to save that until I got to the boss.

Fucking bullshit.

Interesting. I see this as a huge step toward what Destiny always should have been. Remember the promise of a living, changing world? We're finally getting a little of that. Events elsewhere are affecting the entire Destiny population and are advancing the story.

To you, that's "fucking bullshit." To me? It is objectively better. And well worth the price seeing a hand-drawn, non-mechanic-spoiling depiction of a Raid boss that I was only going to not know about once in all the times I run this Raid.

Overall, I think I agree with you. I certainly agree in terms of my own preferences. I don't think spoilers matter much in the big picture, and I'd much rather have the raids integrated into the story progression. If that means the appearance of certain characters gets "spoiled", that's a price I'm more than willing to pay.

But I know that there are a lot of folks here (masochists ;p) for whom a blind raid is the pinnacle Destiny experience for them, and staying completely unspoiled is key to that. So I sympathize for them.

I’d feel more sympathy if they toned down the outrage a bit. ;)

Uh... are you sure you want to go there right now? ;p

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And it straight up spoils what the end boss of the raid looks like. I was trying to save that until I got to the boss.

Fucking bullshit.

Interesting. I see this as a huge step toward what Destiny always should have been. Remember the promise of a living, changing world? We're finally getting a little of that. Events elsewhere are affecting the entire Destiny population and are advancing the story.

To you, that's "fucking bullshit." To me? It is objectively better. And well worth the price seeing a hand-drawn, non-mechanic-spoiling depiction of a Raid boss that I was only going to not know about once in all the times I run this Raid.

Overall, I think I agree with you. I certainly agree in terms of my own preferences. I don't think spoilers matter much in the big picture, and I'd much rather have the raids integrated into the story progression. If that means the appearance of certain characters gets "spoiled", that's a price I'm more than willing to pay.

But I know that there are a lot of folks here (masochists ;p) for whom a blind raid is the pinnacle Destiny experience for them, and staying completely unspoiled is key to that. So I sympathize for them.

I consider myself in this category. I would prefer that most visuals from the raids be a surprise, but I don't mind so much a little spoilage regarding the what instead of the how. I mean, did we have any doubt that we would probably be fighting Oryx in some form for King's Fall?

I was thinking about this too. I think the main difference is that the Raid Boss Riven is very much a mystery if you haven’t gotten and read the Lore. I’m fine with this new direction, but my one critique would be that they needed to set up the boss a “little” diffently/more.

I'd love for the world to feel alive and change. But because of MY actions, not someone else's. Real Life works the way you want. Go experience that instead. I'd rather not have video games work that way.

So go play Halo?

Have you SEEN Halo these days? :-p

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Blades of Crota and Wolfpacks were the way to explore a world changing. New missions opening up periodically or new Crucible maps being available is another. If you want full story/gameplay segregation then whatever. But if you want hem to work together, then the Raid isn’t complete until you finish, regardless if some streamers were able to invest weeks of their lives preparing for this.