I created two new characters and on Friday night/Saturday (just before Dr Who) levelled them up to 20+. (Yay me!, I am keh-nackered now)

Anyway, now that I have multiple characters, I have noticed how clumsy it is to switch weapons between them.

I have two major problems:

• remembering what each character has
  
• clumsy mechanics to transfer stuff between characters

The vault isn't cutting it for me. I have to: logout one character, wait for a whole new/unnecessary menu to load, pick character, wait for shit to load, pick destination, wait for match-making, run to vault, load vault, try to remember why I started this long process. Imagine using this to setup three characters... 8-0

There has to be a better way.

I know Bungie wants to justify the existence of the tower and encourage people to use it so...

I want to say what I want, best, first then I will give a compromise that still involves using the tower.

What I would like best:

Ability to dip into another character's gear (and perhaps inventory) to:

• see what they have
  
• take stuff out
  
• put stuff in

This would be direct from my menu screens.

What I would like second-best:

The above but accessed via the vault.

In preparation for expansions:

I would like a bigger vault.

Destiny calls for attention unnecessarily.

Examples:

• when I have mail that I can't pick up because I have no room
  
• When Cryptarch has money for me that I have no room for

As some people are colour blind... please use a different shape for the person's icon when they have something for me but there is no way I can pick it up yet.

This would be a signal to me that there is something available that I need to make room for.

It is just annoying to go over to attend to an attention (exclamation) icon and find that the journey was wasted. Sometimes the journey is an entire trip to the Tower with all the loading screen, set destination, the trip, the sitting in blackness waiting for a new Tower instance to be created.

These are small(ish) annoyances but, given the other time sucks in this game, Destiny could do with some polish. Minor annoyances add up.

-PS I know that Bungie wants us spending as much time as possible in the game and time spent playing may even be some metric that Activision tracks and has a monetary value to Bungie but the time wastes are off-putting. Bungie used to be known for the polish that it puts on its games. The Destiny experience badly needs some polish. We need more fun and pleasant-experience-ness.

On a related note:

When I take a weapon from the vault: please don't show it as un-upgraded and then mark it as newly upgraded.

• The white border makes me think I have lost my upgrades.
  
• The plus signs are a call for attention (and I can't ignore those). I have to cursor over every upgrade slot to get rid of them.

What I want most of all is the ability to disassemble items in more contexts, such as:

• When comparing items, let me disassemble what I'm equipped with, and automatically equip the other.
  
• Let me disassemble items directly in the vault.
  
• Let me disassemble items on my character screen that I've opened while looking in the vault.

The first one might be problematic, but the second two seem to be no-brainers to me.

Sorting all items in any location by type or showing all of a certain type would be helpful.

Because of the process you describe, scarab, I've mainly reserved the transfer of items between characters to one-time transfers, mainly top-notch guns and special items that my stern warlock gifts to his lovely human huntress wife.

If Bungie must keep it in the game world, what I'd like, once my couple adopt their reckess titan daughter, is to have my own barracks (an super-quick elevator ride away, maybe?), where my characters that I'm not controlling hang out as NPCs. I can go there and we can trade items and read Kipling to each other and such. From the barracks, I'd have access to the vault and the ability to switch the character I control.

Yeah, I'm dreaming.

How often do you have mail that you can't pickup, and what kind of mail is it? I've never been unable to get the ascendant materials or engrams he generally has for me; the only times I haven't had room for my mail is when he's had a bounty lead (which hardly ever happens, especially post-level 20). I'm not doubting your experience, I'm just curious about what items and how often it's an issue for you.

Also, I totally agree that it's annoying as hell that your weapons all show upgrade-eligible every time you get them out of the vault. It took me a long time to figure out that you don't actualky have to scroll over every bubble to get the plus signs to go away though - just hitting triangle/Y to see the weapon and then immediately hitting circle/B to go back will still clear it.

Destiny calls for attention unnecessarily.

Examples:

• when I have mail that I can't pick up because I have no room
  
• When Cryptarch has money for me that I have no room for

As some people are colour blind... please use a different shape for the person's icon when they have something for me but there is no way I can pick it up yet.

This would be a signal to me that there is something available that I need to make room for.

It is just annoying to go over to attend to an attention (exclamation) icon and find that the journey was wasted. Sometimes the journey is an entire trip to the Tower with all the loading screen, set destination, the trip, the sitting in blackness waiting for a new Tower instance to be created.

I think I disagree with this suggestion. Having no room for stuff should never be a standard state or accommodated as if it would be. Unless this special icon also communicated more details about the item, you'd still have to figure out what's triggering it, and having the icon reveal more also takes away from the fun aspect of going to the Tower to open presents.

Also, given the polish of the UI, I'd be shocked if the Destiny UI team didn't test for issues related to color blindness.

How often do you have mail that you can't pickup, and what kind of mail is it?

Far too often even if the notification didn't involve a wasted trip to the tower.

Examples:

• Bounty Lead available from Bounty guy (that character is level 26)
  
• Gems or weapons that I didn't pick up because I had no room for them ;-)

I've never been unable to get the ascendant materials or engrams he generally has for me; the only times I haven't had room for my mail is when he's had a bounty lead (which hardly ever happens, especially post-level 20). I'm not doubting your experience, I'm just curious about what items and how often it's an issue for you.

Also, I totally agree that it's annoying as hell that your weapons all show upgrade-eligible every time you get them out of the vault. It took me a long time to figure out that you don't actualky have to scroll over every bubble to get the plus signs to go away though - just hitting triangle/Y to see the weapon and then immediately hitting circle/B to go back will still clear it.

Nice to know there is a faster way to get rid of the unnecessary annoyance but unnecessary annoyance is both unnecessary and annoying :-) If you can remove annoyance from your game then you should do it.

I think I disagree with this suggestion. Having no room for stuff should never be a standard state or accommodated as if it would be.

What does that mean? It happens and, for me, it is annoying. You seem to be saying more than it doesn't bother you. You seem opposed, in principle, to accommodating other people.

Bungie uses agile development. It should be easy to add this request to their product backlog. It seems to involve an if statement that calls the function that says if there is room for an item and using the result to select the shape of the icon behind the exclamation mark. You could fit that into a sprint along with other work.

It is not as if you have to do the work and, I'm sure, that the Bungie devs are the guys who can best make the decision to make the change or not.

Unless this special icon also communicated more details about the item, you'd still have to figure out what's triggering it, and having the icon reveal more also takes away from the fun aspect of going to the Tower to open presents.

It would not stop me from opening my presents but, to strain the analogy, it would save the disappointment of finding an IOU or a it's-not-ready-yet when I try to open my presents.

Also, given the polish of the UI, I'd be shocked if the Destiny UI team didn't test for issues related to color blindness.

I wasn't suggesting that they didn't know.

I am so afraid of disassembling high value items but something could be done to alleviate the problems of mistaken deletions. (Waste basket, cooldown, buy-back, whatever)

If that was in place then in-vault-deletions would be great. I have so many Legendary and Exotics equipped that it is a hassle to make room for something just to pick it up then delete it. And my vault was full until I created alt characters to hold weapons for me. I suspect that, in time, they will have accrued so much stuff that my vault will be full again ;-)

Since space is often limited in your weapon slots (it's especially bad if you are down to one slot)...

The Cryptarch and the postal service should get together and have the lost items posted directly to the Cryptarch.

Has anyone else only had one slot free and had to run back and forth several times between Post and Cryptarch? Most of the time it's just to decrypt then delete stuff you don't want.

I'd put stuff in my vault to clear space but that used to be full and it's still so much hassle just to do a simple thing.

I created two new characters and on Friday night/Saturday (just before Dr Who) levelled them up to 20+. (Yay me!, I am keh-nackered now)

Anyway, now that I have multiple characters, I have noticed how clumsy it is to switch weapons between them.

I have two major problems:

• remembering what each character has
  
• clumsy mechanics to transfer stuff between characters

The vault isn't cutting it for me. I have to: logout one character, wait for a whole new/unnecessary menu to load, pick character, wait for shit to load, pick destination, wait for match-making, run to vault, load vault, try to remember why I started this long process. Imagine using this to setup three characters... 8-0

There has to be a better way.

I'm almost entirely ignorant because I can't play the game, but isn't the entire point of the companion app and the ability to look at your gear on Bnet to ease this problem? You can use that to quickly and easily see what characters A, B, and C have equipped and in inventory while you shuffle things around.

The companion app/bnet already does almost everything he asked for and you can access it through loading screens without being kicked out. :p

...is still insufficient.

You can easily load and query each of your characters; see what they have in inventory and sub-gear/weapon slots. You can even equip different gear/weapons, but you can't dismantle anything.

You can also see what you have in your Vault, but you can't DO anything with it. I'd like the ability to at least send stuff to the Vault from the app; at least then the stuff I want to equip will be waiting there for me when I log into the desired character.

...is still insufficient.

You can easily load and query each of your characters; see what they have in inventory and sub-gear/weapon slots. You can even equip different gear/weapons, but you can't dismantle anything.

You can also see what you have in your Vault, but you can't DO anything with it. I'd like the ability to at least send stuff to the Vault from the app; at least then the stuff I want to equip will be waiting there for me when I log into the desired character.

I haven't been able to see what's in my Vault with the most recent update. Either it's gone or I can't find it.

At the very least, don't show the goddamn upgrade + signs when the weapon is fully upgraded!

...is still insufficient.

You can easily load and query each of your characters; see what they have in inventory and sub-gear/weapon slots. You can even equip different gear/weapons, but you can't dismantle anything.

You can also see what you have in your Vault, but you can't DO anything with it. I'd like the ability to at least send stuff to the Vault from the app; at least then the stuff I want to equip will be waiting there for me when I log into the desired character.

I haven't been able to see what's in my Vault with the most recent update. Either it's gone or I can't find it.

Yeah, I don't know why they removed it from the character menu, but it's still there.

It's in the Tower Map. Scroll all the way to the bottom. It's down there with the Postmaster and Special Orders.

But they removed the ability to inspect the items that are in the vault. Now, if you tap on them, they just say "return to the Tower to pick this up". LAME.

Instead of semding stuff directly to the vault from the companion-app, what if you could "send" it from one character to the Postmaster, via the app?! Then you just pick them up with the character you want. What else is a Postmaster for, right? ;)

We need both ways of doing things: web/app and via game ui.

Just giving us the ability to take stuff from inactive ALTs would be enough. (For game ui)

I don't really need to give something to an inactive alt because the alt can't use it right now. When the alt is active it could just take what it wants.

This would be via the menu as opposed to trips to tower and vault.

I know that the tower is a social hub but when I need to swap gear: I spawn, run to vault, do what I need, go to orbit. It's all mechanical and totally not social. I am a man on a specific mission.

And by the time the alt is active I might have thought of other things I need.

For the game ui I'm thinking that I could live with the ability to take from inactive alts via options menu, each alt a separate tab?

Got to post now because the bus is stopping.

Yes please!

This is just another good example of the poor interface design of this game. The whole thing is very slick, but very, very cumbersome to actually use.

My opinion is hardening against the UI WRT multiple characters the more I use it.

I keep forgetting things. I've vaulted: helium, iron, and spinmetal. Switch characters, set destination, run to vault, picked up shit. Try to upgrade something: damn, forgot spirit bloom.

It took me two days to remember to transfer that faster sparrow to my huntress.

I know that I am prone to hyperbole but the current system is, dare I say it, fundamentally broken :-)

OK, it's not broken(ish) but it does suck and blow chunks. It is a user interface crime of epic proportions.

One easy fix for a portion of the suck would be to share inventory except for bounties and missions. I don't need to swap anything because it's always mine.

I mean, when it comes down to it - all that stuff IS mine. I sweated for every part of it. My alts are different characters but it is me, the player, who did the drudge to get that stuff. The player paid for the game. It has always been possible to share this stuff so I'm not asking for something new. I'm just asking for it to be easy. I think that is a reasonable request.

Currently the resource slots hold 200 items at a time. I suppose that is to avoid hoarding and make it easy to transfer chunks of stuff between characters rather than transferring it all.

I suggest that they up slot limits to 3x solo values and just have that stuff always available to every active alt. We haven't introduced hoarding problems, chunking is irrelevant if you don't need to move stuff around, and we have eased the users' pain.

I call that win.

I think I disagree with this suggestion. Having no room for stuff should never be a standard state or accommodated as if it would be.

What does that mean? It happens and, for me, it is annoying. You seem to be saying more than it doesn't bother you. You seem opposed, in principle, to accommodating other people.

The best usability for everyone might not result from accommodating your individual annoyance. Perhaps my opinion will change as I get more valuable stuff that I want to keep, but as is I've got quite a few legendary items and several exotics, and the fact is, I don't need the space I have now for each character as I'm actively playing the game. The only time I've run into the problem with not having room for whatever the postmaster has is when I've failed to dump the green garbage I've picked up out in the field. I don't understand how you can say there is "no way you can pick it up." If you're ever going to manage you stuff and make room, isn't the Tower the ideal place to do it?

Bungie uses agile development. It should be easy to add this request to their product backlog. It seems to involve an if statement that calls the function that says if there is room for an item and using the result to select the shape of the icon behind the exclamation mark. You could fit that into a sprint along with other work.

Sure. I've worked at a software company for 15 years, and I work with UIs. The problem you describe what might be an outlying case. Items from the postmaster aren't that common if you've got room to pick up stuff as you go (and trash the trash as you go). Accommodating you isn't free either. You're asking them to add more complexity to an already complex UI.

It is not as if you have to do the work and, I'm sure, that the Bungie devs are the guys who can best make the decision to make the change or not.

Yes, and the fact is that there are pluses and minuses to your solution (the fact that two of their users disagree should give them pause as well). Accommodating a "simple" request often has unintended consequences. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. There's a logic to how they've implemented it. Is changing the nature of an infrequent event so that it doesn't annoy a fraction of users worth breaking the logic of how the system is designed to work? Isn't there already an expectation that if the postmaster has something it may be because I missed it or didn't have room to pick it up in the field? I don't view not having room for something as useful info to be communicated via the Director. I think that by design not having room for something is intended to be a very temporary state.

Unless this special icon also communicated more details about the item, you'd still have to figure out what's triggering it, and having the icon reveal more also takes away from the fun aspect of going to the Tower to open presents.

It would not stop me from opening my presents but, to strain the analogy, it would save the disappointment of finding an IOU or a it's-not-ready-yet when I try to open my presents.

I don't view those as disappointments. How can it not be ready? Got too much glimmer, keep an eye on it and buy ammo packs to keep you well under the limit. Items slots are full? Clear out the trash the moment you set foot in the tower, if not in orbit or even during breaks in the fighting on the planets.

I really do agree with you that item management can be improved. Where I don't agree with you is that I don't think the simple notifiers from parties in the Tower should be made more complex to indicate whether your pockets are full. I don't agree that that's the logical place to communicate that info.

- No text -

The best usability for everyone might not result from accommodating your individual annoyance. Perhaps my opinion will change as I get more valuable stuff that I want to keep, but as is I've got quite a few legendary items and several exotics, and the fact is, I don't need the space I have now for each character as I'm actively playing the game. The only time I've run into the problem with not having room for whatever the postmaster has is when I've failed to dump the green garbage I've picked up out in the field. I don't understand how you can say there is "no way you can pick it up." If you're ever going to manage you stuff and make room, isn't the Tower the ideal place to do it?

When I am playing the strike playlist I don't want to constantly return to tower to cash in decoherent engrams. I also want to carry a spread of weapons because there are a variety of enemy types/combinations between all the strikes. I will carry some exotics but can't equip >1 at a time so I need legendary alts. I may also want to level up one or more weapons, have my levelled up weapons in reserve and cover the three damage types.

Strikes drop so much loot that I am constantly shredding weapons and armour hence I would love a way to auto-shred this colour and below with the ability to lock my solo blue that picks up ammo.

I have to post now.

The best usability for everyone might not result from accommodating your individual annoyance. Perhaps my opinion will change as I get more valuable stuff that I want to keep, but as is I've got quite a few legendary items and several exotics, and the fact is, I don't need the space I have now for each character as I'm actively playing the game. The only time I've run into the problem with not having room for whatever the postmaster has is when I've failed to dump the green garbage I've picked up out in the field. I don't understand how you can say there is "no way you can pick it up." If you're ever going to manage you stuff and make room, isn't the Tower the ideal place to do it?

When I am playing the strike playlist I don't want to constantly return to tower to cash in decoherent engrams. I also want to carry a spread of weapons because there are a variety of enemy types/combinations between all the strikes. I will carry some exotics but can't equip >1 at a time so I need legendary alts. I may also want to level up one or more weapons, have my levelled up weapons in reserve and cover the three damage types.

Strikes drop so much loot that I am constantly shredding weapons and armour hence I would love a way to auto-shred this colour and below with the ability to lock my solo blue that picks up ammo.

I think returning to the Tower provides a nice break, and if you're suggesting that there be a way to decrypt items without the Cryptarch, then you're breaking the logic of the game. Sounds like you want to carry all weapon types with all damage types all the time, but that would take away some of the decision making (which weapons do I want to carry), which is changing a fundamental aspect of the game. I think your auto-shred idea is interesting.

Would be nice to have a way to convert ascendant materials. I almost always get shards from raids/public events/daily story/etc. I had enough shards to get 2 characters to level 29, and still have 55 shards left over.

I would love to be able to convert one to the other. They could make it was a 5:1 or 10:1 ratio to keep it from being abused, or to keep people from just flip flopping their materials back and forth. I've had to buy weapons just to break them down for energy.

I think returning to the Tower provides a nice break, and if you're suggesting that there be a way to decrypt items without the Cryptarch, then you're breaking the logic of the game.

This is already built into the game. When you first start out, you have to decrypt green engrams at the tower. After a certain point, they decrypt in the field. I kept expecting blues to eventually decrypt in the field as well, but that never happened.

I would love to have a setting to where green items are automatically brown down into weapon parts/hadronic essence as they are picked up. When you are above level 15 or so, there is no point in even having green gear other than for parts.

Or how about this: Let me sell gear i don't want to the Vanguard/gunsmith/factions for marks/rep. It would work just like the cryptarch rep, you would get very little for greens, a decent amount for blue. You can prevent abuse by not allowing the resale of items purchased from vendors, only items found in the field.

I think returning to the Tower provides a nice break, and if you're suggesting that there be a way to decrypt items without the Cryptarch, then you're breaking the logic of the game.

This is already built into the game. When you first start out, you have to decrypt green engrams at the tower. After a certain point, they decrypt in the field. I kept expecting blues to eventually decrypt in the field as well, but that never happened.

That's good! I didn't know that.