Detailed EG Article - DBO Forums

Jesse van Dijk: That cross-section of the experience is going to be very different from the experience from the beta, which was just the tip of the iceberg. It's not so much just a vertical branching out into more content, but it is also a horizontal one. We're offering you different ways to experience all of this world.

Jonty Barnes: For us in the studio, it was not something we were instantly worried about. The one thing we're not worried about Destiny is, is there enough game there? I can assure you, it's a huge undertaking. It's a huge game. I don't think anyone's got anything to worry about.

Oh, and Mercury. There is a multiplayer map, which is the only time you get to visit Mercury on the launch content of Destiny 1. And it's called The Burning Shrine. It's one of the most beautiful multiplayer maps. It's right by the sun so the skybox is incredible. Also it has changing Vex blocks, so your sightlines can be totally disrupted during competitive multiplayer. It's by far my favourite map, because it's changing reality.

Bungie on the Destiny level cap, raids and game size.

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There are four worlds to visit: Earth, the Moon, Mars and Venus. And within each of those just one place to explore. You must have seen the debate about the size and scope of the game on day one. What's your take on that debate?

Jonty Barnes: If I'm honest with you, it blew my mind, because it's the biggest game we've ever made. I don't think people understand the depth and amount of gameplay there is in Destiny. It was a big beta. So the first thing, I was like, well that was a huge beta. I don't understand how people could have that concern when you think about that and all the different planets we're going to open up and the gameplay we've got there.

It seems strange to me that the reason why people have that concern is something he doesn't understand. I thought people had been pretty clear in talking about how the reveal trailer talked about being able to explore all the way out ‘to those mountains’, how the areas are all more or less linearly-connected, and of course, the natural assumption that (with other locations on Earth having been teased) that we'd get to visit more places than just Old Russia.

Not that I think it's likely that Destiny will feel ‘small’, but there seems to be a disconnect between fan expectations and the way Bungie are thinking about this stuff internally if they don't understand why people might have those expectations.

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It seems strange to me that the reason why people have that concern is something he doesn't understand.

I agree. I suspect the diagnosis is a severe case of devbubbleitis.

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There was something about the way Jonty talked about raids and how people will self-organise that rankled, and I couldn't express why (the idea that people will just build raid finder websites is astonishing). Then I read the following in the comments on the article itself, which hits the nail on the head:

[image]

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The other issue is you need to be friends for raids. There's no matchmaking.

Jonty Barnes: We intentionally did that.

Some people are concerned they won't have enough friends to do a raid, and therefore miss out on the content.

Jonty Barnes: We're going to see people self-organise. We're seeing people in the Tower already gathering saying, who's going to commit for a raid?

It is about that commitment part. If you just casually matchmake... you can see people jump out of competitive multiplayer games in matchmaking. In Strikes you can continue with two if somebody jumps out. You can still have that experience and not feel robbed. A raid requires six. If you've got five players in the raid, you're not going to win. You're not going to get through. I can tell you now, it's really tough, and it's intentionally meant to be that way. We've all got roles to play. So it requires a commitment of six people. That was very intentional.

Here's the thing that I think is the problem with this: they're putting a barrier in place that not everyone will get over, and they're happy that this decision is a good one. I don't think it is.

I think they're looking at it backwards: they've decided to choose a gameplay mechanism that will arbitrarily shut out some players, in order to be able to use that gameplay mechanism, rather than choosing an inclusive gameplay mechanism from the outset and then trying to see how they could still reach the more interesting/difficult co-operative gameplay mechanics from that position.

So… *deep breath*… here's an analogy from World of Warcraft:

In the beginning, all dungeons and raids were entirely ad-hoc. If you wanted to join one, you were in charge of finding and organising a group of players to run the encounter with, and the only tools Blizzard gave you to help with this were the chat channels, and the (largely ignored) Meeting Stones. Essentially the best way to run any of these events was to join a guild, then schedule an event with guild members, using external tools. This wasn't particularly great, as it meant you all had to be available at the same time, and if anyone had to drop out for any reason it often meant the end of the event (not to mention, the role of guild leader often also encompassed running a website, setting up forum software etc.). Once guild rosters got bigger and focus switched to raids (which were, initially, 40 (!!!) players) things got more and more serious; players dropping out would face penalties, and so it became less fun and more of a job.

One of the other problems with the raid system was that it became increasingly discriminatory; in order to succeed in raids, you had to take on the serious attitude of a raider encapsulated above, and then in order to succeed at the next tier of raids you had to have already succeeded at the previous tier of raiding. This resulted in the undesirable consequence that by the end of the first expansion, The Burning Crusade, only a tiny percentage of players got to experience the final raid, in which the expansion's overarching story was concluded. Blizzard naturally viewed this as a design failure, which they sought to address in the next expansion.

In the third WoW expansion, Blizzard introduced the Dungeon Finder tool, which we would refer to as matchmaking: you sign up for either specific dungeons, or any random dungeon, declared which role you wanted to do, and it found you a group as quickly as it could. It was, to say the least, a revolution: it's become one of the most popular ways of playing the game for many people, as it changed dungeons from something you either had to schedule with friends, or spend ages hawking in town looking for random people to join you (which naturally resulted in some pretty obnoxious snobbery about who people chose to take, based on their gear; matchmaking sidestepped this to a degree).

By the end of the fourth expansion, Blizzard expanded the Dungeon Finder to also allow players to look for raids to join. This was a much more difficult problem to solve as, as with Destiny, the intention was for players to need a greater degree of coordination, and for the encounters to be require a particular strategy. But in spite of this, it was still an overwhelming success: Blizzard's solution was to tune the difficulty down for the LFR (Looking For Raid) encounters, but also to give concomitantly reduced-quality rewards.

This was still fine for most players, as it allowed them to upgrade from gear they'd picked up previously, but most importantly it meant that they weren't shut out of the story experience: the final raid concerned the demise of the expansion's main villain, the dragon Deathwing (a villain so significant he was literally sat right there on the login screen), and so letting all players who were capable of gearing up to participate in LFR finish him off was a great approach from Blizzard. By this time I had personally stopped regularly raiding, and so missed out on almost all of the raids of that expansion, but I was still able to see this final battle thanks to LFR.

Since then, LFR and LFG have become a core component of how a very large majority of WoW players experience content in the game. For the forthcoming Warlords of Draenor expansion these are being retuned further, to the extent that the LFR difficulty is now considered the ‘normal’ difficulty, with higher difficulties of ‘heroic’ and ‘mythic’ above this for the more organised groups. In general the way the difficulty levels work is they will involve bigger health pools, more additional monsters in events, and sometimes specific mechanics which are left out on lower difficulty levels (or are less frequently used), but the bosses and the storylines that accompany them remain the same.

How does this all relate to Destiny? Well, right now it's hard to say for certain because we don't know what raids will be like, exactly. But I'm convinced of one thing: it needn't be possible to put a brick wall in front of all players who can't organise into clans to do scheduled events (and experience has taught me: this is the majority of players) just to support the design goal of having a higher level of difficulty experience. It ought to be possible to present a matchmaking experience for the masses, and then a more difficult (and better-rewarded) experience for those who can organise into groups.

Perhaps that's something that'll happen later, but I'm (guardedly) concerned that out of the box, Destiny is designed to feature experiences that only a minority will get to enjoy.

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Funny, because after talking to my friend who was a very serious WoW and FFXI player, he said the raid finder was ultimately a bad thing, both for players and for raid design. Same thing with a bunch of folks on Destiny Reddit.

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Funny, because after talking to my friend who was a very serious WoW and FFXI player, he said the raid finder was ultimately a bad thing, both for players and for raid design. Same thing with a bunch of folks on Destiny Reddit.

The hardcore players hate it, because they consider it part of the wider theme of ‘dumbing down’ that they're convinced WoW has gone through. Personally though I think if it benefits the majority, and the minority aren't actually affected (which they're not, really) it's a good thing. But that whole hardcore gamer vs casual thing is a really prickly subject…

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The hardcore players hate it, because they consider it part of the wider theme of ‘dumbing down’ that they're convinced WoW has gone through. Personally though I think if it benefits the majority, and the minority aren't actually affected (which they're not, really) it's a good thing. But that whole hardcore gamer vs casual thing is a really prickly subject…

Causals would be hurt the most. Someone in your matchmaking raid party leaves, and you are shit out of luck since Bungie has said you NEED six to finish. Six is mandatory according to them. Would you like to be stuck after a few hours because some random dude had to eat dinner?

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Causals would be hurt the most. Someone in your matchmaking raid party leaves, and you are shit out of luck since Bungie has said you NEED six to finish. Six is mandatory according to them. Would you like to be stuck after a few hours because some random dude had to eat dinner?

The way matchmaking works in WoW, when this happens it starts looking for a replacement immediately and - good news! - it even prioritises your group over new ones.

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The way matchmaking works in WoW, when this happens it starts looking for a replacement immediately and - good news! - it even prioritises your group over new ones.

Who would want to get dropped potentially an hour and a half into a Raid?

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Who would want to get dropped potentially an hour and a half into a Raid?

Not everyone, that's for sure. It's a trade-off between keeping groups active and letting people find a group easily. If new groups were prioritised equally to existing ones missing a member, the group might think it was easier to disband and queue again, which is obviously not ideal.

Haven't people here already commented that Strikes sometimes matchmake you with a Strike in progress, through?

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Who would want to get dropped potentially an hour and a half into a Raid?

Not everyone, that's for sure. It's a trade-off between keeping groups active and letting people find a group easily. If new groups were prioritised equally to existing ones missing a member, the group might think it was easier to disband and queue again, which is obviously not ideal.

Haven't people here already commented that Strikes sometimes matchmake you with a Strike in progress, through?

A strike doesn't require the investment that a raid does, though. And you say it's not for everyone but what you describe would affect everyone. There's another trade-off. Finding a group easily = a less committed group. If groups are easy come, easy go, then dropping is less painful so everyone will experience more dropping.

The barrier for participating in raids is higher, so it requires a greater commitment to even enter that arena. Greater commitment means a better experience for those who make the effort to play. Less commitment means more dabblers who don't really care what happens.

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And you say it's not for everyone but what you describe would affect everyone.

It wouldn't necessarily (and in practice, in WoW, doesn't) affect everyone because it doesn't happen all the time. I'd say I've experienced being dropped into already-started raids maybe one time in 20. Sure, that's worse than never, but if it means a group is able to find another party member to complete the raid that's a good thing, right? What if it was your raid where a player left and you needed a replacement?

Finding a group easily = a less committed group. If groups are easy come, easy go, then dropping is less painful so everyone will experience more dropping.

The barrier for participating in raids is higher, so it requires a greater commitment to even enter that arena. Greater commitment means a better experience for those who make the effort to play. Less commitment means more dabblers who don't really care what happens.

I think you're starting to second-guess the motives and behaviour of people who would benefit from a matchmade raiding system. Characterising them as 'uncommitted' is a mistake; just because any given individual can't be online to play for 2 hours on a particular weekday evening doesn't mean that when they do have 2 hours available in a single block they're going to be constantly wandering away from the console, or might just decide to stop playing for no particular reason.

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And you say it's not for everyone but what you describe would affect everyone.

It wouldn't necessarily (and in practice, in WoW, doesn't) affect everyone because it doesn't happen all the time. I'd say I've experienced being dropped into already-started raids maybe one time in 20. Sure, that's worse than never, but if it means a group is able to find another party member to complete the raid that's a good thing, right? What if it was your raid where a player left and you needed a replacement?

Finding a group easily = a less committed group. If groups are easy come, easy go, then dropping is less painful so everyone will experience more dropping.

The barrier for participating in raids is higher, so it requires a greater commitment to even enter that arena. Greater commitment means a better experience for those who make the effort to play. Less commitment means more dabblers who don't really care what happens.

I think you're starting to second-guess the motives and behaviour of people who would benefit from a matchmade raiding system. Characterising them as 'uncommitted' is a mistake; just because any given individual can't be online to play for 2 hours on a particular weekday evening doesn't mean that when they do have 2 hours available in a single block they're going to be constantly wandering away from the console, or might just decide to stop playing for no particular reason.

Committed means you're there for the duration. Here's a novel idea. What if people who don't have time to play as long as their friends not start a raid with them? That would ensure a better experience for everyone.

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Committed means you're there for the duration. Here's a novel idea. What if people who don't have time to play as long as their friends not start a raid with them? That would ensure a better experience for everyone.

A better experience for those who do have time to play, surely? But what about people for whom it's not really about having time to play so much as what times they can play at? One of the other problems that Raidfinder solved for WoW players was accommodating those with antisocial work schedules, children etc. who might want to play during the day, or at weekends, or in the small hours (whereas most raids are usually scheduled between roughly 7pm-10pm on weekdays).

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There are these things called plans. Many activities that are worthwhile require them. Effort outside the game correlates to commitment in-game. You've got this forum and countless others. You've got the companion app. You've got clans and alliances. It's not like WoW though so somehow you know it could be better without ever having played a Destiny raid.

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There are these things called plans. Many activities that are worthwhile require them. Effort outside the game correlates to commitment in-game.

So I understand you correctly, are you saying that your response to the kind of people I talked about is, essentially: sucks to be you?

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There are these things called plans. Many activities that are worthwhile require them. Effort outside the game correlates to commitment in-game.

So I understand you correctly, are you saying that your response to the kind of people I talked about is, essentially: sucks to be you?

It's a matter of perspective, friend. I've come to value anticipation almost as much as the experience, and understand how much rarity makes the dessert sweeter. There are 14 year olds who are going to have much more time to play the game than I ever will. Sucks to be me. I have friends I'd like to play with on the west coast who get online about the time I want to go to bed. Sucks to be me. You're conflating frequency, accessibility, and opportunity with quality, and I think that's the wrong paradigm for raids.

When Halo 2 came out, all my friends I played with at LANs stopped playing for various reasons. The result was that although I played thousands of Halo 2 matches, I rarely had as much fun as I had had during Halo 1 LANs, when we had to lug CRTs from house to house.

If you have a passion to do something, you'll find time to do it and people to do it with, and that passion makes the game more fun when you do get to play. Gaming by appointment actually adds meaning to the activity. I know this from experience.

I contend that dropping in and out of raids would be detrimental for all concerned in that no one is getting the experience they are supposed to get. Bungie has put barriers to entry there for a reason, and I think the reason is to raise the quality and level of commitment of your teammates, which greatly affects the quality of the experience and probably is necessary for it to be a good one.

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Just throwing in my two cents here, but most people I know think that adding matchmaking to Firefight in Reach made it significantly worse than Firefight in ODST, both because you were matched with unknown quantities and the changes they made to make it more accessible. Take that how you will applying it to the Raid in Destiny, but I don't think you can "just add" matchmaking to all modes in a game smoothly, especially without compromising some of vision behind the game.

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Just throwing in my two cents here, but most people I know think that adding matchmaking to Firefight in Reach made it significantly worse than Firefight in ODST, both because you were matched with unknown quantities and the changes they made to make it more accessible. Take that how you will applying it to the Raid in Destiny, but I don't think you can "just add" matchmaking to all modes in a game smoothly, especially without compromising some of vision behind the game.

Yes, Firefight is a great example. The barrier to entry in ODST made for better games. Fewer but better. I'll take fewer but better any day.

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Just throwing in my two cents here, but most people I know think that adding matchmaking to Firefight in Reach made it significantly worse than Firefight in ODST, both because you were matched with unknown quantities and the changes they made to make it more accessible. Take that how you will applying it to the Raid in Destiny, but I don't think you can "just add" matchmaking to all modes in a game smoothly, especially without compromising some of vision behind the game.

Oh, I 100% agree. I think the decision to support matchmaking has to come first, and then inform the design goals of Raids from then on out. What appears to have happened with Destiny is the reverse, though: the design goals of Raids came first, and they then realised that this wouldn't work with matchmaking.

As ever, here's your WoW analogy: Prior to Raidfinder, raids were a single, lengthy instance with (usually) 10-12 bosses. From Dragon Soul onwards however, they were designed such that they could be split up into chunks of 2-3 bosses, and players could queue for any particular segment of the raid provided they'd completed the prerequisite previous segments. This change in design didn't break the experience for the non-Raidfinder versions of instances (since they continued seamlessly between each segment, usually with doors that didn't open in Raidfinder), but it did mean Blizzard had to approach the design subtly differently.

The net outcome was that you could queue for Raidfinder and run a raid instance of roughly 1/4 the usual length, but guilds could continue to run raids as an organised event on their own schedule (and get better rewards for it, too).

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Oh, I 100% agree. I think the decision to support matchmaking has to come first, and then inform the design goals of Raids from then on out. What appears to have happened with Destiny is the reverse, though: the design goals of Raids came first, and they then realised that this wouldn't work with matchmaking.

Nah. I figure it was a combination. "Let's build some really challenging stuff for the hardcore players." And that informed both the design and the lack of matchmaking. My guess is that they hope word spreads about how awesome the raid was and more and more players will branch out and attempt it with friends. This would be helped if the raid is part of the (side)story. I'd object to putting it in the main story, but having it as a nagging... Well there's still THIS unsolved mystery... status would be neat.

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My guess is that they hope word spreads about how awesome the raid was and more and more players will branch out and attempt it with friends.

Maybe that was the idea, but there's a difference between people not wanting to do raids and people not being able to do raids; the latter group are likely to want to do raids regardless, but can't, for whatever reason. No amount of hearing about how awesome raids are is going to help this group.

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My guess is that they hope word spreads about how awesome the raid was and more and more players will branch out and attempt it with friends.

Maybe that was the idea, but there's a difference between people not wanting to do raids and people not being able to do raids; the latter group are likely to want to do raids regardless, but can't, for whatever reason. No amount of hearing about how awesome raids are is going to help this group.

It'll help them get motivated to find some people to do the raid with. We're not even talking about needing to find a lot of people. Just five. And if they really can't find the time or people to do a raid this week there's shorter, matchmade activities for them to do. I don't think we've really realized it yet, but once all of Destiny is playable, not just half of one destination, there really will be something for people with of every mood and time constraint to do.

Ultimately if someone can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years there's probably no helping them. At some pint Bungie has to design their game for the people who are going to play it, not the people who aren't.

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Ultimately if someone can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years there's probably no helping them.

We keep going around in circles and coming back to the same point here, I think. It's not a question of finding five people, or a question of finding ‘a few hours’ — it's about finding five people, who can all play for a few hours, at the same time, on a regular basis. We're not buying this game to play it once and then throw it away now, are we?

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My guess is that they hope word spreads about how awesome the raid was and more and more players will branch out and attempt it with friends.

Maybe that was the idea, but there's a difference between people not wanting to do raids and people not being able to do raids; the latter group are likely to want to do raids regardless, but can't, for whatever reason. No amount of hearing about how awesome raids are is going to help this group.

It'll help them get motivated to find some people to do the raid with. We're not even talking about needing to find a lot of people. Just five.

I can tell you from years of experience-- and not just Customs Night, several other one-time, short-term, and recurring events too-- that five people can be a lot of people to get together.

And if they really can't find the time or people to do a raid this week there's shorter, matchmade activities for them to do. I don't think we've really realized it yet, but once all of Destiny is playable, not just half of one destination, there really will be something for people with of every mood and time constraint to do.

This isn't about that though, this is about people who already specifically want to play a raid.

Ultimately if someone can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years there's probably no helping them. At some pint Bungie has to design their game for the people who are going to play it, not the people who aren't.

What does that even mean?

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Ultimately if someone can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years there's probably no helping them. At some p[o]int Bungie has to design their game for the people who are going to play it, not the people who aren't.

What does that even mean?

It's pretty straightforward, I thought: it means if you're trying to decide whether to include a feature that might affect how MUCH people play, you should consider the ones that are sticking around more carefully than the ones would would move on quickly to other games anyway.

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It's pretty straightforward, I thought: it means if you're trying to decide whether to include a feature that might affect how MUCH people play, you should consider the ones that are sticking around more carefully than the ones would would move on quickly to other games anyway.

I'm confused too, now; are you saying that

… someone [who] can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years …

… is automatically considered to have ‘moved on quickly to other games’? I'm not sure if I'll be able to find time/people to join in on raids yet, but I'd be very surprised if this means I'll quickly move onto other games. Once again I find myself wondering if constraints beyond a player's control are being confused for disinterest.

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It's pretty straightforward, I thought: it means if you're trying to decide whether to include a feature that might affect how MUCH people play, you should consider the ones that are sticking around more carefully than the ones would would move on quickly to other games anyway.

I'm confused too, now; are you saying that

… someone [who] can't find five people and a few hours over the course of months or years …

… is automatically considered to have ‘moved on quickly to other games’? I'm not sure if I'll be able to find time/people to join in on raids yet, but I'd be very surprised if this means I'll quickly move onto other games. Once again I find myself wondering if constraints beyond a player's control are being confused for disinterest.

I didn't say anything at all like that. I simply reworded Kermit's statement. It was general - it wasn't necessarily being applied specifically to Raids, or even to Destiny as a game. You should really consider not looking for the MOST NEGATIVE POSSIBLE interpretation of any statement before responding to it.

I've kept my mouth shut in this discussion, for the most part, but you're really starting to sound like a broken record. Yes, we get that you think that intentionally limiting the pool of players is a bad call on Bungie's part, and that there are a myriad of ways they could have maintained the consistency of their experience without excluding people. They disagree. In this particular case, they've thought about it a LOT (Luke and crew have been working on this facet of Destiny for YEARS), and they've decided how they want to go forward. The game, in fact, is in production. Past describing your unhappiness, and your potential solutions (both of which you've done, a LOT)... I'm not sure what good continued discussion will possibly do. (If they come to their senses and realize what a terrible mistake they've made before the next iteration is complete, you can take comfort in the fact that they have a huge library of suggestions to look at for solving the problem.)

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Just throwing in my two cents here, but most people I know think that adding matchmaking to Firefight in Reach made it significantly worse than Firefight in ODST, both because you were matched with unknown quantities and the changes they made to make it more accessible. Take that how you will applying it to the Raid in Destiny, but I don't think you can "just add" matchmaking to all modes in a game smoothly, especially without compromising some of vision behind the game.

Oh, I 100% agree. I think the decision to support matchmaking has to come first, and then inform the design goals of Raids from then on out.

Maybe Bungie decided that these design considerations impaired their ability to make the type of raid experience they wanted, and so didn't include matchmaking.

What appears to have happened with Destiny is the reverse, though: the design goals of Raids came first, and they then realised that this wouldn't work with matchmaking.

What's wrong with that? All that means is that we are going to get some kind of unique experience.

As ever, here's your WoW analogy:

As far as I'm concerned, the less like WoW the better.

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It's a matter of perspective, friend. I've come to value anticipation almost as much as the experience, and understand how much rarity makes the dessert sweeter. There are 14 year olds who are going to have much more time to play the game than I ever will. Sucks to be me. I have friends I'd like to play with on the west coast who get online about the time I want to go to bed. Sucks to be me. You're conflating frequency, accessibility, and opportunity with quality, and I think that's the wrong paradigm for raids.

I hear you, and I do understand that the experience still has to be good for those who can play it, but I'm concerned that a whole category (and potentially, a very large category) of player — for whatever reason (and really, the reason isn't that important if it's out of their hands) — simply won't get to play it at all.

Probably this article was posted already earlier in the month, but it stands re-reading in light of this thread as I think it neatly encapsulates a lot of the reasons why I think this was potentially a misstep by Bungie. The one line that resonates most strongly with me is this one:

If Bungie’s reasoning is that Destiny’s raid content is only playable using voice, then maybe it’s the wrong content for the game.

They knew, going in, what their constraints would be, so it seems like a risky decision. If it does indeed turn out that it's something that only a fraction of the user base can enjoy, then that means that for every DLC, expansion or whatever they eventually release for the game, there's a portion some people will be paying for but can't get any value out of. If you were in charge of the team that builds DLC, you might ultimately start questioning the logic of committing development and art resources to building content that only 10% of your players got to see. And that'd be a real shame.

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It's a matter of perspective, friend. I've come to value anticipation almost as much as the experience, and understand how much rarity makes the dessert sweeter. There are 14 year olds who are going to have much more time to play the game than I ever will. Sucks to be me. I have friends I'd like to play with on the west coast who get online about the time I want to go to bed. Sucks to be me. You're conflating frequency, accessibility, and opportunity with quality, and I think that's the wrong paradigm for raids.

I hear you, and I do understand that the experience still has to be good for those who can play it, but I'm concerned that a whole category (and potentially, a very large category) of player — for whatever reason (and really, the reason isn't that important if it's out of their hands) — simply won't get to play it at all.

Probably this article was posted already earlier in the month, but it stands re-reading in light of this thread as I think it neatly encapsulates a lot of the reasons why I think this was potentially a misstep by Bungie. The one line that resonates most strongly with me is this one:

If Bungie’s reasoning is that Destiny’s raid content is only playable using voice, then maybe it’s the wrong content for the game.

They knew, going in, what their constraints would be, so it seems like a risky decision. If it does indeed turn out that it's something that only a fraction of the user base can enjoy, then that means that for every DLC, expansion or whatever they eventually release for the game, there's a portion some people will be paying for but can't get any value out of. If you were in charge of the team that builds DLC, you might ultimately start questioning the logic of committing development and art resources to building content that only 10% of your players got to see. And that'd be a real shame.

What makes Raids special might depend on precisely what they require of people who play them. Word of their awesomeness spreads, and Bungie yet again changes the way people play games. It's a better experience than what they're used to, but it requires more of them. That's generally how things work in life.

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Don't know if you saw this article linked from the front page, which is kind of a response to the article you linked to. She expresses my viewpoint pretty well.

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I'll have to finish the whole article later, but already I can tell she and I don't agree.

They want their audiences to grow much faster than barriers to entry allow. They want to make games that everyone can enjoy.

Did your hackles just go up? I don’t blame you.

Why would that make my hackles go up? Why would making games that everyone can enjoy be a bad thing?

Because there are a bunch of people in the troughs, where you start off, and so very few in the peaks, where not everybody makes it the easiest way to level things up and open the game to more people is to lop off the peaks and mine down to the level of the lowest common denominator.

This sounds like the kind of elitist snobbery I've encountered from hardcore WoW players that assumes that the only way to make an accessible game is to walk at the speed of the slowest. I don't buy it. Same goes for this:

No matter how often developers and PR managers talk about “scaling difficulty” and “lowering the barriers to entry” we all know what happens when a game has its fangs drawn. The fun goes out of it for the hardcore, and it’s the hardcore who build long-lasting communities and keep games alive.

We had a conversation about something similar on TSDIRC the other night, and whilst I don't dispute that the hardcore are an important demographic, I think the notion that these people are the ones that ‘keep games alive’ is pure indulgence. No; hardcore gamers don't keep the game alive, a thriving player population does, and that means you have to cater to them one way or another. You can argue that hardcore players help in providing aspirational moments that help sell a game to other players, but once they're attracted they have to be retained somehow, and you can't do that if you shut them out.

I've mentioned it before, but Blizzard tried this hardcore approach with raids in WoW (something like only 4% of players ever stepped foot inside the final raid of The Burning Crusade). The following expansion they abandoned this policy, and raids exploded in popularity.

I guess we'll have to revisit this in 12 months time or so and see how it worked out for Bungie. Maybe I'll be proven completely wrong about it and most players will get to participate.

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Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think the major difference we're going to see between WoW raids in their original state and Destiny raids at launch is that originally didn't raids need a lot more than 5 other people? I recall people talking about taking up to 40 people with them on a raid. There's a HUGE difference in finding 5 people to raid with and finding even 10 people to raid with.

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Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think the major difference we're going to see between WoW raids in their original state and Destiny raids at launch is that originally didn't raids need a lot more than 5 other people? I recall people talking about taking up to 40 people with them on a raid. There's a HUGE difference in finding 5 people to raid with and finding even 10 people to raid with.

Yeah, they did… but the game also launched with functional chat and guild systems :) It's a lot easier to organise a raid with people in-game if you can chat to them, even if they're not in your guild. Also, it's a lot easier to recruit people to your guild if you can chat with them, etc. etc.

40 member raids are definitely a relic of the past* — they moved to 10 and 25 member raids in the first expansion, then in the last expansion they introduced a ‘Flexible’ raid which could scale the difficulty based on how many people were in your group, which could be anywhere between 10 and 25. From the next expansion it'll be 10-25 flexible in both the raidfinder (now referred to as ‘Normal’ difficulty) and Heroic (previously ‘Normal’ difficulty), plus there will also be a hardest difficulty which is 20 person, now called ‘Mythic’ (previously ‘Heroic’).

There's a detailed series of articles on the changes to the raiding system in WoW over the years over on the Battle.net blog which I highly recommend as reading material regardless of your interest in WoW or MMOs, as it gives some real insight into the lessons they learned and how the game evolved to better suit players.

*This year is the 10th anniversary of WoW though, so they're going to re-release the classic Molten Core raid as a 40-man raid to try and relive some of the old days… that's going to be interesting!

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It wouldn't necessarily (and in practice, in WoW, doesn't) affect everyone because it doesn't happen all the time. I'd say I've experienced being dropped into already-started raids maybe one time in 20. Sure, that's worse than never, but if it means a group is able to find another party member to complete the raid that's a good thing, right? What if it was your raid where a player left and you needed a replacement?

Time will tell. If worse comes to worst and you can't find a crew, I'll take you through with my peeps.

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It wouldn't necessarily (and in practice, in WoW, doesn't) affect everyone because it doesn't happen all the time. I'd say I've experienced being dropped into already-started raids maybe one time in 20. Sure, that's worse than never, but if it means a group is able to find another party member to complete the raid that's a good thing, right? What if it was your raid where a player left and you needed a replacement?

Time will tell. If worse comes to worst and you can't find a crew, I'll take you through with my peeps.

I want in! :)

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Time will tell. If worse comes to worst and you can't find a crew, I'll take you through with my peeps.

…I'm assuming PS4 US and EU players can still play together, right?

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Time will tell. If worse comes to worst and you can't find a crew, I'll take you through with my peeps.

…I'm assuming PS4 US and EU players can still play together, right?

Yes. RC and I went to the moon.

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A large portion of my time playing the alpha and beta on PS4 was with some fellow DBOers from the other side of the pond (like SigbiasSilva for example). I have every confidence that between me, you, Cody, Kermit, Sigbias, TTLDemag0gue, Xenos, a several other DBO regulars on PS4 we will have ample opportunity to destroy the raids together.

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Excellent, appreciated!

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I don't even want to comment on this thread because, like the rest of us, all that you have played is the Beta. I would say: get the game, play 150 hours, and then tell me how the system doesn't work.

How are you going to partner up for a raid? Here are some options:
1) Get some of your friends to play Destiny with you (I am doing that)
2) Join a clan of people on your console. I can even recommend a few if you would like (I am doing that)
3) Meet people online that are exploring the same chunk of land as you (I did that).

There. Those are three great ways of meeting people to play the game with and if you want a "friendship" system hand-delivered to you on a golden-platter then I will just sit back and laugh, because you guys are ridiculous. The concerns you bring up about this game are pretty ridiculous considering you have only played a Beta.

I LOVE the fact that there is no RAID MATCHMAKING. I LOVE IT. I love that I get to know everyone in my raid squad and that we HAVE TO communicate and we HAVE TO work together.

And I will be completely honest: MAYBE DESTINY ISN'T A GAME FOR YOU. But it most certainly is working out great for me.

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I don't even want to comment on this thread because, like the rest of us, all that you have played is the Beta. I would say: get the game, play 150 hours, and then tell me how the system doesn't work.

Because that's how the world works, right? You can't analyse anything in advance, and you can't apply previous experience to new situations and surmise where potential areas of problem are going to be?

Please.

How are you going to partner up for a raid? Here are some options:
1) Get some of your friends to play Destiny with you (I am doing that)
2) Join a clan of people on your console. I can even recommend a few if you would like (I am doing that)
3) Meet people online that are exploring the same chunk of land as you (I did that).

Number 1 is fair enough, but both 2 and 3 involve some sort of communication, which as it stands will have to happen outside of the game. Hence: problems.

And I will be completely honest: MAYBE DESTINY ISN'T A GAME FOR YOU. But it most certainly is working out great for me.

I'm happy for you that you're happy, and I'm certain I'm still going to enjoy Destiny. But that doesn't obviate the problems that people have pointed out, nor does it mean that we should stop pointing them out. So I'll flip that on its head: if you don't see any problems, great! But perhaps you shouldn't get involved in discussions with people who do.

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So are you saying there is a problem in Bungie wanting people to foster communication outside of the game? So if I am Bungie and I want to create a game where motivated people pursue relationships and communication OUTSIDE of the four corners of your TV, then that is a problem? I actually think that is very bold of Bungie and I applaud them for it.

However, if the reason why that is a problem is because YOU personally have a hard time fostering that communication and those relationships then that is on you. Nevertheless, Bungie and the Destiny community have provided PLENTY of opportunities for that conversation to develop outside the game. It is up to each player to foster the boldness and the will to pursue them.

What Bungie is doing is very smart. They are allowing the creative and ambitious genius of players to take form and take shape. Why create a stupid-proof matchmaking system when we can foster raid team-building creativity on the side of the players? That's actually very "free market system" of Bungie to do.

At the end of the day, the employees of BUNGIE don't think like you. They want you to innovate. They want you to create. They want you to go outside your bubble and expand your community.

You see that as a problem. I see it as an opportunity for innovation.

Become legend kapowaz. Become legend.

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So are you saying there is a problem is Bungie wanting people to foster communication outside of the game? So if I am Bungie and I want to create a game where motivated people pursue relationships and communication OUTSIDE of the four corners of your TV, then that is a problem? I actually think that is very bold of Bungie and I applaud them for it.

First of all, let me say that I try my utmost to post things that I think are significantly important. If all I did was bemoan personal issues that I doubt many others would care about, I could quickly litter DBO with posts (and needlessly further my reputation as a curmudgeon). What I'm talking about here isn't something that I think will affect just me, but many, many players. If you take a game like Destiny that is likely to have millions of players, then a problem that affects any substantial percentage of those players could end up affecting hundreds of thousands, if not millions of others.

are you saying there is a problem is Bungie wanting people to foster communication outside of the game?

There's a difference between wanting to foster communication outside of the game and requiring that all significant communication in what is essentially a social game take place outside of the game. I have a big problem with any game (at least, those that are aiming for mass market success in the way that a triple-A console title does) that offload core activities of the game to outside of the game. That's a failing of design in my view; a game should be self-contained for all the things that are essential to playing that game. If it isn't, that changes the scope of requirements from a TV, a console and an internet connection to include a whole bunch of other things. It's fine to let these other things augment the experience, but they shouldn't be mandatory.

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And to that I say: welcome to the new era of gaming. #HardwareRequired

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And to that I say: welcome to the new era of gaming. #HardwareRequired

It's not a new era; that's how gaming used to be in the dark ages of PC games years ago. Standardising around a common, standard experience is part of the reason console gaming is so successful.

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But just to pick your mind, because I am freaking curious today, how would you do that?

If you had Bungie designers in front of you, how would you apply a function to gameplay that allow you to spontaneously communicate with players around you?

I am curious because I don't believe in complaining without providing solutions. No one answers to that. What are your actual solutions for that problem you perceive?

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But just to pick your mind, because I am freaking curious today, how would you do that?

If you had Bungie designers in front of you, how would you apply a function to gameplay that allow you to spontaneously communicate with players around you?

I am curious because I don't believe in complaining without providing solutions. No one answers to that. What are your actual solutions for that problem you perceive?

There's a common misconception amongst non-developers that the idea is everything, and that once you come up with a great idea all you need to do is build it and you'll have something great. That's simply not the case — ideas are worthless on their own, and even when you think you have a good idea, there's a good chance it won't work. Former-Blizzard lead systems designer Greg Street tweeted something the other day that I think is very relevant here:

Sage words from a friend/colleague: Game design is 10% ideas, 10% implementation, and 80% figuring out why your implementation didn't work.

So, with all that in mind, the simple answer to your question is: I don't know. I have a bunch of ideas, but none that I'd be 100% confident would just work, so I'm certainly not going to give you a satisfactory answer here, because I'd have to sell it on the idea alone, untested and unproven.

But some ideas I think would be a good starting point: proximity voice chat. Flagging yourself as being in a ‘sociable’ state, which allows other players in the same state to chat directly with you. A richer system of emotes and gestures. In-game message-boards where you can look for a clan to join, or recruit new members.

All of the above have to be very carefully considered, though, because the flip side to more free-flowing communication is the risk that antisocial players will abuse those tools. But just because there is a risk of abuse doesn't mean there's no happy medium, and throwing your hands up and saying just let players communicate outside of the game is a cop-out, because you sure as hell aren't preventing abusive behaviour if it's completely outside your control.

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So to be completely honest, I really like this post you just wrote because it is one of the first times around here that someone has provided ideas that lead towards a solution. And I wasn't asking you to provide the ONE SOLUTION that will fix everything. No.

But I much rather see posts like this one because that is the kind of brainstorming BUNGIE would listen to. If I were a BUNGIE employee surfing these blogs, I would much rather read someones ideas to help solve something than just a list of all the things are wrong and are "problems."

I apologize, on my part, for coming on aggressive on this thread. I stand by the fact that I, personally, will not have a problem with DESTINY as it is. However, I dislike it when problems are pointed out, time and time again, without anyone recommending ideas towards progress.

Unfortunately, 98% of forum talk is "lets point out what's wrong," and only 2% is "here are some good ideas towards the better."

Once again, I hope BUNGIE addresses your concerns and I appreciate your desire for a better gaming experience. It may not impact my gaming experience, but if it will make yours better, than I am for it.

Once again, I express my apologies and ask forgiveness for any aggressiveness I have expressed on this thread.

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Once again, I express my apologies and ask forgiveness for any aggressiveness I have expressed on this thread.

No worries; I certainly can appreciate that there is an opposite perspective on most of these subjects, usually centred around the fact that we've not actually got the final product in our hands yet. Some of the concerns that people have will probably turn out to be moot, and we'll probably discover other issues that nobody thought were a problem initially.

Ultimately the thing that we all have in common is that we want this game to be good, one way or another!

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Absolutely. 19 days.

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All of the above have to be very carefully considered, though, because the flip side to more free-flowing communication is the risk that antisocial players will abuse those tools. But just because there is a risk of abuse doesn't mean there's no happy medium, and throwing your hands up and saying just let players communicate outside of the game is a cop-out, because you sure as hell aren't preventing abusive behaviour if it's completely outside your control.

They are preventing it where it matters. In game. Yes, it's a gamble to have Raids without matchmaking, but it has nothing to do with Bungie's ability to prevent abusive behavior.... where exactly? Are Bungie now the decency police patroling every Destiny fan community looking abuse? I get what you're saying, but you've also crossed well over into silliness there...

My hope is that Raids are actually as challenging as Bungie says. If they aren't then no matchmaking begins to look like a mistake. But if they are, and if they require people to set up their Guardians to help out in specific role, then matchmaking where you get a random person who is unprepared or who has duplicated a role begins to make less and less sense.

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All of the above have to be very carefully considered, though, because the flip side to more free-flowing communication is the risk that antisocial players will abuse those tools. But just because there is a risk of abuse doesn't mean there's no happy medium, and throwing your hands up and saying just let players communicate outside of the game is a cop-out, because you sure as hell aren't preventing abusive behaviour if it's completely outside your control.

They are preventing it where it matters. In game. Yes, it's a gamble to have Raids without matchmaking, but it has nothing to do with Bungie's ability to prevent abusive behavior.... where exactly? Are Bungie now the decency police patroling every Destiny fan community looking abuse? I get what you're saying, but you've also crossed well over into silliness there...

My hope is that Raids are actually as challenging as Bungie says. If they aren't then no matchmaking begins to look like a mistake. But if they are, and if they require people to set up their Guardians to help out in specific role, then matchmaking where you get a random person who is unprepared or who has duplicated a role begins to make less and less sense.

Disclaimer: didn't read whole thread.

Regarding the happy medium, maybe Destiny won't hit that, but let's just consider that Bungie themselves unleashed many of the demons we've come to expect from matchmaking and perhaps now they're being aggressive in the other direction regarding communication with strangers. Perhaps this is all the result of asking one question over and over: what is fun?

-Fun is not some dudebro singing or playing music.

-Fun is not being abused for your skill level or your gamertag or your gender or your accent or what have you.

-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

On the other hand...

-Fun is playing and communicating in-game with people you actually know.

-Fun is playing with friends to tackle a challenge that requires coordination.

-Fun is when a game provides events (and I don't mean public events explicitly--I mean experiences that make it worth the effort to plan and schedule an activity with others).

Having some barriers that prevent any random person from ruining your game experience seems to be what this is all about. Leveraging human networks as they actually exist in the non-game world seems like a decent approach to foster the kind of experiences Bungie wants us to have.

Adjustments can be made, and it sounds like they will. Let's see how it works.

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- No text -

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Regarding the happy medium, maybe Destiny won't hit that, but let's just consider that Bungie themselves unleashed many of the demons we've come to expect from matchmaking and perhaps now they're being aggressive in the other direction regarding communication with strangers. Perhaps this is all the result of asking one question over and over: what is fun?

-Fun is not some dudebro singing or playing music.

Well, sure, in your opinion...

-Fun is not being abused for your skill level or your gamertag or your gender or your accent or what have you.

in your opinion...

-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

On the other hand...

-Fun is playing and communicating in-game with people you actually know.

-Fun is playing with friends to tackle a challenge that requires coordination.

-Fun is when a game provides events (and I don't mean public events explicitly--I mean experiences that make it worth the effort to plan and schedule an activity with others).

Having some barriers that prevent any random person from ruining your game experience seems to be what this is all about. Leveraging human networks as they actually exist in the non-game world seems like a decent approach to foster the kind of experiences Bungie wants us to have.

No one said there shouldn't be any barriers.

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Regarding the happy medium, maybe Destiny won't hit that, but let's just consider that Bungie themselves unleashed many of the demons we've come to expect from matchmaking and perhaps now they're being aggressive in the other direction regarding communication with strangers. Perhaps this is all the result of asking one question over and over: what is fun?

-Fun is not some dudebro singing or playing music.

Well, sure, in your opinion...

-Fun is not being abused for your skill level or your gamertag or your gender or your accent or what have you.

in your opinion...

-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about. I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

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Regarding the happy medium, maybe Destiny won't hit that, but let's just consider that Bungie themselves unleashed many of the demons we've come to expect from matchmaking and perhaps now they're being aggressive in the other direction regarding communication with strangers. Perhaps this is all the result of asking one question over and over: what is fun?

-Fun is not some dudebro singing or playing music.

Well, sure, in your opinion...

-Fun is not being abused for your skill level or your gamertag or your gender or your accent or what have you.

in your opinion...

-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about.

You're being over-dramatic. People will say awful (awful) things to you, that's how people are. Granted, games are usually supposed to let you escape from life, but it's a game where you're constantly playing with other people. Heck, I'm on your friends list and you talk to me on here and we're having (what seems to be) a heated disagreement. You cannot avoid people being unpleasant unless you just don't engage with society, and it bothers me that this game would allow you and encourage you to do just that in its virtual world.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

I don't see how you could fail to understand what I'm talking about, but I'll spell it out: I believe voice chat should be more open and more possible than it was in the beta, because a lot people (including myself) greatly enjoy it and place great value on it. I believe this in spite of people who don't want the evil randoms to intrude upon their ears, because it should and in all likelihood will be trivial for Bungie to put in functionality, and players to use functionality, that lets them mute individual players and shut out random players altogether.
I will say that certain people seem to have forgotten you can invite people to your fireteam or to party chat, but I believe those options are, to be frank, just not good enough (especially if they don't fix the thing where you have to go to orbit to form a chat-enabled fireteam). It's not good enough because people are reluctant to reach out to talk in-game or respond to others reaching out, and some have virtually no chance of reaching out in-game-- for example, you and I.
As for ceding a point, if it's a point I believe in, yes, wouldn't you do the same?

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Regarding the happy medium, maybe Destiny won't hit that, but let's just consider that Bungie themselves unleashed many of the demons we've come to expect from matchmaking and perhaps now they're being aggressive in the other direction regarding communication with strangers. Perhaps this is all the result of asking one question over and over: what is fun?

-Fun is not some dudebro singing or playing music.

Well, sure, in your opinion...

-Fun is not being abused for your skill level or your gamertag or your gender or your accent or what have you.

in your opinion...

-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about.

You're being over-dramatic. People will say awful (awful) things to you, that's how people are. Granted, games are usually supposed to let you escape from life, but it's a game where you're constantly playing with other people. Heck, I'm on your friends list and you talk to me on here and we're having (what seems to be) a heated disagreement. You cannot avoid people being unpleasant unless you just don't engage with society, and it bothers me that this game would allow you and encourage you to do just that in its virtual world.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

I don't see how you could fail to understand what I'm talking about, but I'll spell it out: I believe voice chat should be more open and more possible than it was in the beta...

At the risk of pulling a Vagueness and responding to an old thread, when I said I don't know what you're talking about, I meant I don't know what you're refusing to categorize as abuse. Furthermore, I don't know how you can criticize my word choice to describe the ABUSE I've witnessed when we weren't playing together, which is most of my playtime and ALL of my playtime when playing Halo 2 matchmaking, for example.

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-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about.

You're being over-dramatic. People will say awful (awful) things to you, that's how people are. Granted, games are usually supposed to let you escape from life, but it's a game where you're constantly playing with other people. Heck, I'm on your friends list and you talk to me on here and we're having (what seems to be) a heated disagreement. You cannot avoid people being unpleasant unless you just don't engage with society, and it bothers me that this game would allow you and encourage you to do just that in its virtual world.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

I don't see how you could fail to understand what I'm talking about, but I'll spell it out: I believe voice chat should be more open and more possible than it was in the beta...

At the risk of pulling a Vagueness and responding to an old thread, when I said I don't know what you're talking about, I meant I don't know what you're refusing to categorize as abuse. Furthermore, I don't know how you can criticize my word choice to describe the ABUSE I've witnessed when we weren't playing together, which is most of my playtime and ALL of my playtime when playing Halo 2 matchmaking, for example.

It's because of just what I said, it's a term that has a lot of weight attached to it. I don't think someone you don't know that's not anywhere near you can verbally abuse you in under 15 minutes (the longest an on-line game of Halo usually lasts).
I'm sure what you're talking about mostly falls under the dictionary definition of abuse (or a dictionary definition of abuse), but I see it as a psychological subject. I'm not a psychologist, so maybe I'm wrong, but in the absence of one I'm going with my impression that you're being over-dramatic, especially given the possibility of simply turning off voice chat.

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-Fun is not very often the result of voice chat with people you don't know.

very much in your opinion.
I have enjoyed all of those things before, although I will say "abused" is a pretty weighted term and one that I wouldn't have used.

Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about.

You're being over-dramatic. People will say awful (awful) things to you, that's how people are. Granted, games are usually supposed to let you escape from life, but it's a game where you're constantly playing with other people. Heck, I'm on your friends list and you talk to me on here and we're having (what seems to be) a heated disagreement. You cannot avoid people being unpleasant unless you just don't engage with society, and it bothers me that this game would allow you and encourage you to do just that in its virtual world.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

I don't see how you could fail to understand what I'm talking about, but I'll spell it out: I believe voice chat should be more open and more possible than it was in the beta...

At the risk of pulling a Vagueness and responding to an old thread, when I said I don't know what you're talking about, I meant I don't know what you're refusing to categorize as abuse. Furthermore, I don't know how you can criticize my word choice to describe the ABUSE I've witnessed when we weren't playing together, which is most of my playtime and ALL of my playtime when playing Halo 2 matchmaking, for example.

It's because of just what I said, it's a term that has a lot of weight attached to it. I don't think someone you don't know that's not anywhere near you can verbally abuse you in under 15 minutes (the longest an on-line game of Halo usually lasts).
I'm sure what you're talking about mostly falls under the dictionary definition of abuse (or a dictionary definition of abuse), but I see it as a psychological subject. I'm not a psychologist, so maybe I'm wrong, but in the absence of one I'm going with my impression that you're being over-dramatic, especially given the possibility of simply turning off voice chat.

I think you're being deliberately obtuse. Look up the word. Let's stick a fork in this one, GV.

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Abuse is the perfect term for what I'm talking about.

You're being over-dramatic. People will say awful (awful) things to you, that's how people are. Granted, games are usually supposed to let you escape from life, but it's a game where you're constantly playing with other people. Heck, I'm on your friends list and you talk to me on here and we're having (what seems to be) a heated disagreement. You cannot avoid people being unpleasant unless you just don't engage with society, and it bothers me that this game would allow you and encourage you to do just that in its virtual world.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's evident that you'd rather climb a tree to disagree than stand on the ground and cede a point.

I don't see how you could fail to understand what I'm talking about, but I'll spell it out: I believe voice chat should be more open and more possible than it was in the beta...

At the risk of pulling a Vagueness and responding to an old thread, when I said I don't know what you're talking about, I meant I don't know what you're refusing to categorize as abuse. Furthermore, I don't know how you can criticize my word choice to describe the ABUSE I've witnessed when we weren't playing together, which is most of my playtime and ALL of my playtime when playing Halo 2 matchmaking, for example.

It's because of just what I said, it's a term that has a lot of weight attached to it. I don't think someone you don't know that's not anywhere near you can verbally abuse you in under 15 minutes (the longest an on-line game of Halo usually lasts).
I'm sure what you're talking about mostly falls under the dictionary definition of abuse (or a dictionary definition of abuse), but I see it as a psychological subject. I'm not a psychologist, so maybe I'm wrong, but in the absence of one I'm going with my impression that you're being over-dramatic, especially given the possibility of simply turning off voice chat.

I think you're being deliberately obtuse. Look up the word. Let's stick a fork in this one, GV.

I'm absolutely not being deliberately obtuse. You didn't even really defend your position, you mentioned some topics of this apparently abusive stuff that was said to you and then you just kept stating that what you said was true, so I don't think I can really be blamed for thinking you didn't have much backing for what you were saying and were thus being over-dramatic.
Oh, and I still don't know what you mean with the whole tree analogy (I thought it meant going to certain lengths but now I'm not sure), but I think you might be doing the same thing in getting away from the point I raised (twice) about having barriers and options regarding voice chat rather than completely taking it away, which I raised because you were talking like it was an either-or choice without options.

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I'm absolutely not being deliberately obtuse. You didn't even really defend your position, you mentioned some topics of this apparently abusive stuff that was said to you and then you just kept stating that what you said was true, so I don't think I can really be blamed for thinking you didn't have much backing for what you were saying and were thus being over-dramatic.
Oh, and I still don't know what you mean with the whole tree analogy (I thought it meant going to certain lengths but now I'm not sure), but I think you might be doing the same thing in getting away from the point I raised (twice) about having barriers and options regarding voice chat rather than completely taking it away, which I raised because you were talking like it was an either-or choice without options.

Okay, maybe you're not deliberately obtuse. You're just obtuse.

My position doesn't need defending because, for one thing, I don't have a firm one in regards to voice chat--I just described the problems that Bungie's approach is trying to address. Your tactic was to deny that these problems are problems, and frankly, that came across as idiotic. Find one person other than yourself who will argue that verbal abuse doesn't happen in online gaming. Everybody who has had much experience with online gaming has witnessed it if, that is, they know the meaning of "abuse."

abuse - language that condemns or vilifies usually unjustly, intemperately, and angrily; harshly or coarsely insulting language

I could provide many more links but they all say the same, and I don't know what more is required for you to understand a commonly understood meaning of a word that is commonly used to describe what often happens in voice chat between strangers during online games.

You can want more open chat options in Destiny, and that's fine. I might want a little more than we have now myself, but the lengths you've gone to to disagree with everything I said are ridiculous. From my perspective, we don't need to continue this conversation.

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I'm absolutely not being deliberately obtuse. You didn't even really defend your position, you mentioned some topics of this apparently abusive stuff that was said to you and then you just kept stating that what you said was true, so I don't think I can really be blamed for thinking you didn't have much backing for what you were saying and were thus being over-dramatic.
Oh, and I still don't know what you mean with the whole tree analogy (I thought it meant going to certain lengths but now I'm not sure), but I think you might be doing the same thing in getting away from the point I raised (twice) about having barriers and options regarding voice chat rather than completely taking it away, which I raised because you were talking like it was an either-or choice without options.

Okay, maybe you're not deliberately obtuse. You're just obtuse.

My position doesn't need defending because, for one thing, I don't have a firm one in regards to voice chat--I just described the problems that Bungie's approach is trying to address. Your tactic was to deny that these problems are problems, and frankly, that came across as idiotic. Find one person other than yourself who will argue that verbal abuse doesn't happen in online gaming. Everybody who has had much experience with online gaming has witnessed it if, that is, they know the meaning of "abuse."

abuse - language that condemns or vilifies usually unjustly, intemperately, and angrily; harshly or coarsely insulting language

I could provide many more links but they all say the same, and I don't know what more is required for you to understand a commonly understood meaning of a word that is commonly used to describe what often happens in voice chat between strangers during online games.

I was going with what I thought was the common perception, things along the lines of child abuse and domestic abuse. Comparing some jerk saying mean things to you over Xbox Live... well, it doesn't even compare, to me. I've met people that have been abused and you don't strike me as one of them.

You can want more open chat options in Destiny, and that's fine. I might want a little more than we have now myself, but the lengths you've gone to to disagree with everything I said are ridiculous. From my perspective, we don't need to continue this conversation.

cool

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I was going with what I thought was the common perception, things along the lines of child abuse and domestic abuse.

Everything has varying degrees of severity, and there really isn't a "common perception" that is as narrow-focused as you seem to suggest. Or at least, Kermit's use of the word "abuse" seemed entirely appropriate to my eyes.

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Seems to me like the clan and alliance systems are the systems Bungie designed into Destiny to find people to play with. It should be the first place you go to find people to participate in a raid with you. Don't forget that all online clan members will show up in the UI in Destiny so it's not like you have to send friend requests to all of them.

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Agreed.

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I'm actually looking forward to seeing how this particular facet will work. I have a clan set up that will be for the six or seven RL friends that I usually MP and Co-op with but I would be looking to roll up into the DBO clan, with that as the alliance lead. Just still not 100% certain of the mechanics. That said I haven't really looked at it yet.

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Yep, I'm hoping that there will be a DBO alliance and I can then just have a clan with my normal Destiny friends in it.

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If there isn't one, I know that Guardian Radio is becoming a conglomerate of clans and alliances. Haha. They are like the NATO of Destiny.

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DestinyBungieOrg is already an alliance on B.net ready and waiting for clans to join up.

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[image]

So wasteful. Hmm.

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Sigh. Sometimes I wish I knew people's ages in this forum...

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Yeah, I agree.

If you have something to contribute, go ahead. But choosing only the parent post in a lengthy conversation (which I think had a pretty good outcome, with shared understanding of perspectives) and replying ‘+1’? Not contributing.

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Yeah, I agree.

If you have something to contribute, go ahead. But choosing only the parent post in a lengthy conversation (which I think had a pretty good outcome, with shared understanding of perspectives) and replying ‘+1’? Not contributing.

I'm just going to go ahead and say it: Lately you've been coming off as really, really whiny.

The topics you start and the comments you make in other threads are kind of a downer.

You don't seem happy about much.

On the scale of: Negative <-> Neutral <-> Positive the things you say fall to the negative category.

You are clearly driving a lot of people nuts.

-------------------

That said, I'm not saying you can't or shouldn't say those things, or to share how you feel. I'm saying you should realize how you are coming off, as you might foster better conversation if you didn't nit pick every little thing, actual, hypothetical, or imagined.

Carry on.

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Yeah, I agree.

If you have something to contribute, go ahead. But choosing only the parent post in a lengthy conversation (which I think had a pretty good outcome, with shared understanding of perspectives) and replying ‘+1’? Not contributing.

Jesus, get off your fucking high horse. You're not fooling anyone.

I liked his post; he echoed my sentiments. Therefore +1. Just deal with it. If you're expecting Charlie Rose level of verbal diarrhea at every turn, think again. Be glad I don't post as much as I do on this forum, or else these past 2 years or so I would've added a good percentage more of talk that would've been… hold unto your hat!… completely pointless. THE GAME ISN'T OUT. There's theorizing, and then there's navel gazing. This forum has been replete with it for the longest time, sorry to say.

It's only a few days before the *real* meat is served to us patient diners. Only then will I think it fruitful to sit around and bat around what's good and what's not.

Your posts? Not contributing, beyond just you wanting to hear your own negative thoughts linger in the air. You back-pedaling now is very sweet. It's not convincing, not even a little bit.

- M

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I feel like I've gotten off on the wrong foot with the DBO community. I'm not a troll, and I share everyone's enthusiasm for Bungie's works. All I hope to do on here is raise the issues I think are important, and offer some perspective based on my experience of a useful analog. I will word myself more carefully. Hopefully we can put this all behind us and focus on what really matters: our shared love of a unique video game studio.

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Words are overrated, but here I go anyway. Keeping in mind I speak as not to say there is, but just of what I see, kapowaz posts always seems to have an air of declared aggression, sometimes to the point of an absolute. There is discussion, and there is argument. They can be good if tended well, but it seems to me that this discussion is ultimately fruitless and wasteful because of reasons already stated in some of the very first posts. Its already open and shut... but its still going.

You know why?

Haters gonna Hate.

Oh... and 18 days. That too.

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Haters gonna Hate.

You got me all wrong, bro.

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And Emotes :D. And Pictures.

Amongst all those I reserve the right to be horribly wrong.

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It seems like you can get to level eight pretty quickly.

Jonty Barnes: For the beta.

But 30 is the level cap?

Jonty Barnes: Yeah.

Did you speed progression up for the beta?

Jonty Barnes: There was access to certain objects you got earlier than you would have done, because we wanted to give you exposure to them in the Iron Banner. But things have changed. That's one of the reasons for wipes. There were certain things you shouldn't be getting so early. It's a different world at launch, but not entirely unfamiliar.

Thanks for your time.

Thought so. I can hardly wait for the "We level up too slow" threads. Blame Sage, probably nerfed it.

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Great. I get to roll my eyes some more when those start popping up. Haha

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It isn't like they didn't say that upfront while the Beta was running. There was a notice in the Director I think that said "Advanced XP" or "Bonus XP" or "Double XP" was in effect.

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Detailed EG Article (Destiny)

Scale

Scale

A terrifying quote, indeed

On raids and self-organisation…

Furthermore…

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

Not my cup of tea

Not my cup of tea

Not my cup of tea

That's just your opinion man

That's just your opinion man

Cheers man!

Cheers man!

Cheers man!

Cheers man!

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Ding-ding-ding!

Oh please...

Oh please...

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Oh please...

Oh please...

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Oh please...

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Oh please...

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Oh please...

Alliances

Alliances

Alliances

Alliances

+1

-1

0 _0

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Zero sum.

Math is for nerds.