Fixing end game progression in a game about progressing

Destiny is firmly rooted in and probably not changing from a game about investment. So why is the end game so bad in Taken King? There's an easy fix.

The problem is essentially you reach a point where you still need to progress, but can't because you are not getting the drops. You could get a drop, but the light level could be too low to matter. So, you can play and not progress at all.

Bungie should consider adopting a rule:

The player will always progress, no matter how small when they play.

How could they do that? Simple. Allow you to infuse lower level items into higher level items. It would take more (perhaps a lot more) to start leveling up the gun, but if you had a light progression bar on the guns similar to you have on your character, and infusing simply raised that up, it would go a long way.

The higher light level the gear you are infusing, the more the bar goes up. Now, no matter what you get, you always have something you can use, and you can still have the "fun" of getting good random drops.

I see no downside at all. It even adds more decision making. Do I use this to level up a weapon, or do I dismantle it for weapon parts? Etc.

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Destiny is firmly rooted in and probably not changing from a game about investment. So why is the end game so bad in Taken King? There's an easy fix.

The problem is essentially you reach a point where you still need to progress, but can't because you are not getting the drops. You could get a drop, but the light level could be too low to matter. So, you can play and not progress at all.

Bungie should consider adopting a rule:

The player will always progress, no matter how small when they play.

How could they do that? Simple. Allow you to infuse lower level items into higher level items. It would take more (perhaps a lot more) to start leveling up the gun, but if you had a light progression bar on the guns similar to you have on your character, and infusing simply raised that up, it would go a long way.

The higher light level the gear you are infusing, the more the bar goes up. Now, no matter what you get, you always have something you can use, and you can still have the "fun" of getting good random drops.

I see no downside at all. It even adds more decision making. Do I use this to level up a weapon, or do I dismantle it for weapon parts? Etc.

So I think this is a cool idea. But I have another, more drastic suggestion: go back to the way character level and upgrading gear used to work in House of Wolves.

In the lead up to TTK, Luke Smith talked a lot about moving away from the "vertical" power climb and shifting focus towards a more "horizontal" power expansion. In other words, get players to their maximum power level quickly, then let them focus on expanding the tools and abilities at their disposal. Not to sound snarky, but I feel the current TTK progression system has created the exact opposite situation. At this point, ive scrapped hundreds of pieces of new gear, many of which may have provided interesting build options, because they were too low level to be viable. For someone like me who enjoys the most challenging end-game activities, light level is everything. And getting your gear up to the 300-320 range is such a long, tedious task that I simply can't expand my arsenal "horizontally" to explore options. I have my 1 set of armor and a half-dozen favorite weapons, and everything goes into slowly raising their levels. Frankly, it sucks.

Ironically, we already had the exact system Luke Smith was describing, back in House of Wolves. Players were easily able to hit max level within the first week or two. The "vertical" climb was minimal. Instead, the focus was on the "horizontal" expansion of gear. Acquiring new weapons and armor to allow our guardians to adapt and play different rolls. The icing on the cake was Etheric Light. With EL, we had the ability to take any Legendary gear in the game and boost it straight up to max level. Many players had vaults full of old gear, and thanks to EL those collections were brought into that "horizontal" expansion, rather than simply taking up vault space like all of our year 1 gear does now.

For me, the proof is in the pudding. 2 months after HoW launched, I had full sets of PoE, Trials, IB, and raid armor, and a bunch of other miscellaneous armor on all 3 characters, all of it max level. I could spec out any subclass for various different PvP builds, raids, PoE, night falls, or even just for looks. And I could do it all while maintaining that max level. Plus I had a huge selection of weapons, exotics, elemental primaries; weapons for any playstyle I wanted to try, all max level.

2 months after TTK, I have exactly 1 set of armor per character, and 2 of my 3 characters can't even do the heroic raid yet because their level is too low. And if I want to do the hard mode raid with the 1 character who is able to, I only have 1 specific combination of weapons that will allow me to do so. To me, the whole Light Level system of TTK is a complete train wreck.

Now if we could have TTK's fantastic content with HoW's end-game progression system, THAT would be something :)

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Now if we could have TTK's fantastic content with HoW's end-game progression system, THAT would be something :)

Yep, that'd be perfect. HoW's way of leveling and gear collecting was miles ahead of anything else Destiny has provided so far. It's odd how TTK's method seemed so good at first, but in the end turned out just as bad, if not worse, than anything else we've seen. HoW nailed it with multiple, reliable ways to gain end-game level gear. I can see where TTK tried to mimic that with infusion being a stand in for etheric light. But unlike etheric light, infusion isn't a reliable when you're waiting on drops.

Etheric light did exactly what you said, and let us expand our options, rather than having to use one specific set of gear that probably isn't ideal purely because of it's light level.

I would still argue, however, that for the average player, the current system is fine. You can get over 300 pretty easily, and that's more than enough for most activities. For those of us that want to do everything however, the grind can really bite. It's a large reason I haven't played Destiny in over a month. Until everyone migrates back to it from all of these new releases, I'm going to stay away. I don't want any part of that grind, unless it's happening naturally while I'm playing with friends.

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TTK actually WAS good, from 170 to 300. It provided a great way to consistently level without the need to grind stuff out. If you simply play all the story quests, you are raid ready and they even lead you there story wise.

The problem is after that. It's great and cool to have all of these sweet weapons which are viable and fun, but not when you can't even use them in the places where you'd most want to. Bungie simply isn't going to eliminate attack power on weapon even though that would solve so much. So the only remaining option is to add a way to incrementally improve your gear to the max.

Etheric light in house of wolves had etheric light, but that only was available in very specific activities. My solution would be of benefit to everyone, regardless of where they spend their time in the game.

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house of wolves had etheric light, but that only was available in very specific activities. My solution would be of benefit to everyone, regardless of where they spend their time in the game.

There were enough sources of etheric light that it wasn't too tough to get your hands on it, but I think Bungie could have made it more readily available. I do really like your solution. The only downside, in my opinion, is that it is still working within TTK's needlessly granular light level system. The more time goes by, the more I think it really has a negative effect on the end game. Now that we know your light level only really matters as you cross thresholds of 10, the entire thing feels rather pointless, doesn't it? Why is it possible for legendary weapons to drop at 273, or 286, or 313? It's all unnecessary confusion. It just means there are that many more potentially dissapointment dtops I need to earn in between drops that are actually useful :-/

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People who are stuck are stuck for basically the same reasons, so I guess it's pretty much the same in that regard. Still, I agree that it is VERY hard to try out the sandbox like we used to and Cody's suggestion would definitely help.

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The difference is, if you did PoE you were guaranteed Etheric Light. Doing the Raid doesn't guarantee you with a reward that helps you advance. I think Cody's idea is great, too, and I do think (hope) Bungie will do something about the rewards at some point in the future.

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I would still argue, however, that for the average player, the current system is fine. You can get over 300 pretty easily, and that's more than enough for most activities. For those of us that want to do everything however, the grind can really bite.

I don't know, I played a much more "normal human being" amount of time for TTK and we really stuck around the low 290's. Without Iron Banner last week I have no idea when I would have cracked 300. And to break 300 I had to play way more Crucible then I ever imagined I would.

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2 months after TTK, I have exactly 1 set of armor per character, and 2 of my 3 characters can't even do the heroic raid yet because their level is too low. And if I want to do the hard mode raid with the 1 character who is able to, I only have 1 specific combination of weapons that will allow me to do so. To me, the whole Light Level system of TTK is a complete train wreck.

Not to be overly cynical but this approach seems geared entirely towards keeping you playing as long as possible. I mean, that's what Destiny's progression system has always been about. Only they've moved away from HoW's "I want to keep playing to get cool stuff that I enjoy" it's "I have to keep playing so I can eventually do things I enjoy with gear I don't particularly enjoy, but it's that or nothing".

Not an improvement, if you ask me.

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2 months after TTK, I have exactly 1 set of armor per character, and 2 of my 3 characters can't even do the heroic raid yet because their level is too low. And if I want to do the hard mode raid with the 1 character who is able to, I only have 1 specific combination of weapons that will allow me to do so. To me, the whole Light Level system of TTK is a complete train wreck.

Not to be overly cynical but this approach seems geared entirely towards keeping you playing as long as possible. I mean, that's what Destiny's progression system has always been about. Only they've moved away from HoW's "I want to keep playing to get cool stuff that I enjoy" it's "I have to keep playing so I can eventually do things I enjoy with gear I don't particularly enjoy, but it's that or nothing".

Not an improvement, if you ask me.

My point is that if you are going to waste people's time, at least make them FEEL like they are getting somewhere by making sure that whenever they play, they progress. You could make that progress less and less the longer you play, but it should be there. It could still take just as long, but if you are always progressing towards that goal, it's going to feel a lot better than FINALLY getting the drop you need, even if the time spent is the same.

So have a baseline progression you know will always happen that you can set the rate of, but then have drops be a BONUS to speed that up.

I don't even LIKE these types of systems and already I thought of a better one :-p

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My point is that if you are going to waste people's time, at least make them FEEL like they are getting somewhere by making sure that whenever they play, they progress.

That's pretty much how TTK works until about 290. I think that's what is so jarring about reaching the end game. Bungie has recreated the Destiny year 1 problem all over again. 170-290 is the new "1-20", and 290-320 is the new "20-30".

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And 305-320 is the new, longer, somehow even more RNG-reliant 29-30. Sigh.

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I have one character that can hit 300 now and another that tops out at 299, but that seems kinda fair to me based on what I've done.

I've played a lot of Destiny since TTK, but I've played ~1 card worth of Trials, almost but not quite one complete run of TTK's Raid, only a single week of Iron Banner and zero Nightfall strikes.

Should my Guardians be at 320 despite basically having done little to no high level content? Shouldn't I be at a minor disadvantage in Iron Banner / Trials since there are Guardians who have completed more end game stuff than I have?

Sure, I'd like to hit 320, but by suggesting a system that always has you progressing are we maybe advocating handing out 1st place trophies to everyone regardless of how much they actually accomplished?

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Sure, I'd like to hit 320, but by suggesting a system that always has you progressing are we maybe advocating handing out 1st place trophies to everyone regardless of how much they actually accomplished?

I don't think that would be the case at all, with Cody's proposed system. It would be entirely possible to hit 320 by just running strikes or playing regular Crucible. It would take a LONG time to do so, though. It would make EVERY weapon drop good for infusion fodder (although that would really exacerbate the weapon parts shortage, which I hadn't really thought about). Doing the Raid or Trials or Iron Banner would still significantly speed up the process and provide good incentive to do those activities. But it would make it so they're not REQUIRED to reach maximum level.

And honestly, that line of thinking about handing out trophies is part of the problem. I shouldn't have to be in the top 1% of players to reach maximum level and get weapons that are worth a shit and actually fun to use.

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And honestly, that line of thinking about handing out trophies is part of the problem. I shouldn't have to be in the top 1% of players to reach maximum level and get weapons that are worth a shit and actually fun to use.

As far as I can tell, once your gun is 310 or above it'll do fine in all the hardest content: The raid, Nightfall, and Trials. So, as long as you can get it to around 310, you should be able to use it anywhere you want to.

The problem is that overall light level has an effect on damage too, and so armor becomes just as important. It was a pretty significant jump in damage during the Oryx fight from 310 to 311. That's one light level, so it shouldn't be that dramatic. There are still stair steps when it comes to enemy level - 10 levels below, 20 levels below etc. Wasn't this what the light system was supposed to avoid? It should be completely granular.

Because of that, it's really important to get to 311. Beyond that, at least for now, doesn't provide a huge benefit. It may in challenge mode, so who knows. I'm completely fine with the idea that max level is not required, but simply provides smaller and smaller benefits as you progress toward it. I am in no hurry to hit 320. Right now I'd just like to have options that keep me at 311.

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The problem is that overall light level has an effect on damage too, and so armor becomes just as important. It was a pretty significant jump in damage during the Oryx fight from 310 to 311. That's one light level, so it shouldn't be that dramatic. There are still stair steps when it comes to enemy level - 10 levels below, 20 levels below etc. Wasn't this what the light system was supposed to avoid? It should be completely granular.

Yeah, what's up with that? I was under the impression that gains would be very incremental, & it sure seemed like there was a big difference between 311 & 310, especially in the Oryx fight. Bug? I would like to do some testing to see what the damage difference is when you drop from 311 to 310.

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at 310 the enemies you are fighting have orange level nameplates, meaning you are under-levelled to be fighting them. At 311 this is not the case. It's like lvl 30 vs lvl 31 in crota hard -- it's that big of a difference. Enemies do more damage to you, yo do less damage to them.

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at 310 the enemies you are fighting have orange level nameplates, meaning you are under-levelled to be fighting them. At 311 this is not the case. It's like lvl 30 vs lvl 31 in crota hard -- it's that big of a difference. Enemies do more damage to you, yo do less damage to them.

Yeah, I remember them being orange & then white when I hit 311. I'd just like to know some actual numbers behind the difference as I was under the impression that it should be a gradual change, & not a major jump like it feels like it is. Perhaps it's not really a huge jump but is just our perception that it is, perhaps it IS a huge jump (larger than 311-312). You know me, I just want some hard numbers on this. :) "Measure before you optimize dangit!" It should be pretty easy to test with just 1 quick wipe & a gear change or two to get the different #'s.

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I'm speaking from experience I guess, so I've "tested" it but without recording numbers... 3-4 attempts on HM oryx, I died standing on the platform every time from the adds. Went to 311 and while I was low health a couple times, we were able to make it more like a regular normal attempt.

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I'm speaking from experience I guess, so I've "tested" it but without recording numbers... 3-4 attempts on HM oryx, I died standing on the platform every time from the adds. Went to 311 and while I was low health a couple times, we were able to make it more like a regular normal attempt.

I don't have any hard numbers to back this up, but it certainly feels like a full level disadvantage from the year 1 days.

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I'm speaking from experience I guess, so I've "tested" it but without recording numbers... 3-4 attempts on HM oryx, I died standing on the platform every time from the adds. Went to 311 and while I was low health a couple times, we were able to make it more like a regular normal attempt.

I don't have any hard numbers to back this up, but it certainly feels like a full level disadvantage from the year 1 days.

Yeah, I agree with both of you, that's certainly what it felt like. Maybe the "smoothness" of the light gains falls off a cliff when your facing enemies that are 10 light above you? If that's the case then how come we were able to take Oryx in normal mode when some of us (>ahem<, me) were seeing orange? Seems like there's shenanigans going on.

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I hate the whole "trophies for everyone" argument. People trot it out all the time as if it's somehow a bad thing to encourage people to take part even if they don't necessarily win.

If the choice is:

Everyone makes progress by working at it and doing what they enjoy, but some things (or performing better) are worth more - everyone has fun, but the best win and get better rewards
Only some things are worth doing and if you're not good at it or don't enjoy it you don't get to have fun - only winners have fun, losers are disincentivised to keep playing

then I'd definitely rather have the former.

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I have one character that can hit 300 now and another that tops out at 299, but that seems kinda fair to me based on what I've done.

I've played a lot of Destiny since TTK, but I've played ~1 card worth of Trials, almost but not quite one complete run of TTK's Raid, only a single week of Iron Banner and zero Nightfall strikes.

Should my Guardians be at 320 despite basically having done little to no high level content? Shouldn't I be at a minor disadvantage in Iron Banner / Trials since there are Guardians who have completed more end game stuff than I have?

Sure, I'd like to hit 320, but by suggesting a system that always has you progressing are we maybe advocating handing out 1st place trophies to everyone regardless of how much they actually accomplished?

Personally, I prefer the TTK approach: your rewards for beating the toughest challenges in the game were cool, unique weapons and armor, as well as etheric light. Players who consistently went to the lighthouse or beat Skolas every week had plenty to show for their efforts :)

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Don't we still have that? Raid gear. New Iron Banner gear. Trials gear. All that really needs fixing there is Bungie shouldn't have left all the PoE/Old Raid gear behind in light level. It's pretty silly that beating Skolas (which is still difficult?) only gets you weapons that hurt your light level.

Ultimately, I think there should be rewards only accessible by completing tough challenges, but putting players at a damage / health penalty vs other players is not one of those things. There should be ways to even out the penalties without needing teams of 3 or 6.

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Don't we still have that? Raid gear. New Iron Banner gear. Trials gear. All that really needs fixing there is Bungie shouldn't have left all the PoE/Old Raid gear behind in light level. It's pretty silly that beating Skolas (which is still difficult?) only gets you weapons that hurt your light level.

Well that's rolling a few different issues together, as far as I can see.

In HoW, the unique gear was the reward for any given activity. In TTK, each activity does have unique gear... but the gear itself doesn't feel like a reward unless it happens to drop at a high light level. The gear is no longer the focus... the number is what many of us are chasing. In HoW I went out of my way to collect all the Trials gear because I loved how it looked. Now, I'm not happy about getting a new piece of Trials gear unless it drops at a level I can use. That's the difference I'm talking about: in HoW many of us were chasing cool new toys, in TTK it's all about getting that light level up.

As far as the old raids/PoE, that content still has a place in the overall progression of the complete "Destiny" experience. Players who start the game from scratch need stuff to do on their way from level 1 to 40. That said, I do wish there was a way to bring them into the end-game economy in some way... Cody's suggestion at the start of this thread would achieve just that.

Ultimately, I think there should be rewards only accessible by completing tough challenges, but putting players at a damage / health penalty vs other players is not one of those things. There should be ways to even out the penalties without needing teams of 3 or 6.

I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you talking strictly about PvP activities?

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I'd like to see various high end content (Trials, Nightfall, Iron Banner, perhaps the Heroic strikes, etc) offer a guaranteed item that's above your current light level. Maybe once per week. Maybe a few times a week. Maybe every time? But, basically, if you do the hard stuff you are sure to advance even if only a little.

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I not only like this idea, I've had the same thought myself. One might argue that it would allow players to progress too quickly (vs. how quick Bungie wants them to) but IMO the simple and really obvious answer to that is to just re-do the scaling oh how much you get per infusion. If things were adjusted just right, Bungie could get things to where, on average, it takes about the same amount of time to level up as it does now. The important thing from the player perspective is that there's always SOME visible progress being made, as opposed to these droughts we have now where nothing appreciable happens. Progress doesn't need to actually be faster overall in order for it to FEEL better.

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I was actually taken aback when it turned out it didn't work this way.

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How could they do that? Simple. Allow you to infuse lower level items into higher level items. It would take more (perhaps a lot more) to start leveling up the gun, but if you had a light progression bar on the guns similar to you have on your character, and infusing simply raised that up, it would go a long way.

The higher light level the gear you are infusing, the more the bar goes up. Now, no matter what you get, you always have something you can use, and you can still have the "fun" of getting good random drops.

I see no downside at all. It even adds more decision making. Do I use this to level up a weapon, or do I dismantle it for weapon parts? Etc.

This is similar to what I was pondering the other night in the raid. I had the thought that it could be based on the rarity of the item. If it's a purple it will add 1 light when infused; blue would add 1/3 light; an exotic 1, maybe 1 & 1/2.

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http://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?mode=entry&id=97616

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I don't know if this has been mentioned, but don't forget we are supposed to have a use for etheric light soon. PERHAPS it will be for leveling gear, maybe 1 point per light? Seems reasonable to me? I just wonder if they will be bringing it back or not. If not I doubt it will be for leveling, but if they do it could be?

Here is for hoping!

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I don't know if this has been mentioned, but don't forget we are supposed to have a use for etheric light soon. PERHAPS it will be for leveling gear, maybe 1 point per light? Seems reasonable to me? I just wonder if they will be bringing it back or not. If not I doubt it will be for leveling, but if they do it could be?

Here is for hoping!

That would be… interesting. As far as I know the only way to GET etheric light now is PoE 34 and 35.

If etheric light does help level gear, then maybe that would solve Cruel's "chill" problem. The raid is for intensity, and PoE is for relaxing. Both progress you.

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I missed that. When did they talk about it?

I broke down all my Etheric Light within a few weeks of Y2.

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Its was in this bungie weekly update.

Looks like it will be for Petra. Which tells me it will more than likely not be for gear, but you never know.

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Fixing end game progression in a game about progressing (Destiny)

I like this idea, and I have another suggestion.

I like this idea, and I have another suggestion.

I like this idea, and I have another suggestion.

I like this idea, and I have another suggestion.

I was STUCK in HoW, and I'm STUCK at 299 in TTK

You "had" to play PoE then. You "have" to play Raids now.

You "had" to play PoE then. You "have" to play Raids now.

I have 7 x high 290's boots. Can I smelt them into 1 x 300?

That's what Cody is advocating for. Hell, we all are

I like this idea, and I have another suggestion.

All according to plan

All according to plan

All according to plan

All according to plan

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

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On the other hand...