Crucible is surprisingly not fun!

As someone who thoroughly enjoyed Destiny 1's PvP I am shocked by how much I do not like D2's PvP. I appreciate the change to weapons for the most part, but the focus on team shooting is really bogging everything down. Every map seems to boil down into lanes and doesn't have the same flow as D1's did. How do you Duders feel about the PvP experience?

I didn't think it was ever fun, PvP was never Destiny's strong suit.

@deathstriker: Having played over 4,000 games of Trials in Destiny I'd have to strongly disagree with that. Trials of Osiris is also what kept Destiny going for the past 3 years (when a Raid wasn't brand new obviously) in my honest opinion, and there is no doubt it's what kept it on the top 10 of Twitch almost every weekend. Destiny did two things amazingly well, it's 4 Raids and Trials of Osiris.

I totally understand where Brandon is coming from. Destiny was a very unique shooter with fast paced movement abilities, mediocre TTK (halfway between COD and Halo), and tons of abilities that could turn the tide of any engagement any time anywhere. Destiny 2 slowed down the pace dramatically, slowed TTK to Halo levels, and near removed all of those abilities that made it special outside of Supers. Almost all Grenades a trash in PvP and do next to nothing except put you in danger the vast majority of the time, and they are on an over 1 min timer anyways. Supers are still fun but you get less of them. The constant dangers from Special Weapons are gone. So what this has created is a Teamshot the Game situation where if you aren't standing 2ft from 1-2 teammates you are at a drastic disadvantage. 1v1 gunfights are almost non existent. So I can see how a slow paced game like that can rub Destiny Vets the wrong way.

My Clanmates have laughed because I have shared very similar sentiments with them. This PvP has brought out a lot of anger they rarely see. Especially when they all know how much I loved Destiny 1's PvP. Though I will say I very much have enjoyed the reissue of Trials of the Nine tonight. It's probably what I needed to get my spirit back up about Destiny 2's PvP. I just love the competitive nature of it, and rarely find it in other Console shooters. Especially ones that have weight to it like Trials since there is great loot tied to it.

@hestilllives19: I played the Destiny that they released, I didn't like it enough to get the DLC. The PVE was okay, the PVP was lame as hell to me. A lot of it was 3 or 4 people shooting down a hallway or cavern on both sides and throwing a bunch of grenades. It wasn't as bad as when Bioshock had PVP for no reason, but I definitely wouldn't put it in the same league as Halo back when it was good, BF4, BF1, Titanfall 2, and so on. Obviously some people liked it though.

Titanfall 2 has kinda killed it for me. I find the competitive modes to be fun when I play with my friends, we definitely have a good time and there is some tense moments/finishes to the rounds, but otherwise its a slow, corner peaking drag. If you aren't with at least one teammate you are dead, which is fine, I love Counter-Strike, but this isn't Counter-Strike. Destiny multiplayer should be more about movement and abilities and supers.

The speed and movement of Titanfall 2 just put Destiny's pvp to shame on consoles. I used to like the slide and the jumping in Destiny, but after playing so much Titanfall 2 the slide in Destiny 2 feels pathetic and the floaty jumps aren't much better.

But I'm still gonna play a bunch of it so what can I say.

I just wanted them to bring back big team battle. It's like they forgot what made Halo multiplayer great for a decade.

The sequel to Destiny having PvP that's not fun is actually the least surprising thing I can think of.

I thought the pvp in Destiny 1 was atrocious so destiny 2's being bad is probably the least surprising thing I can think of

I thought it sucked at first too. But now that I've played 200 plus matches, I dig it. I still wish there was a playlist that was the old school way. I think having both would be great.

I liked both the original and the new multiplayer, but I only play from time to time because it's connected to my PvE character(s). As a stand-alone MP game it's still above average for sure, but my time goes to Titanfall 2 or The Last of Us at this point.

Destiny is the only pvp I've ever been good at and I like 2 just as much as 1.

Destiny is the most fun I've had with PvP in any game. So far, I think D2 is at least close to it if not better than D1. Can't fully decide yet, the meta hasn't settled down and I haven't played Trials yet so I need to do further research.

That was my thought. I never did like it in the first place.

I used to love halo multiplayer(user base aside) but destiny's always felt bad and just an uninteresting way to pad that game out. Only tried destiny 2's in the beta but what i played felt even worse than that.

The pvp was actually the thing that kept me interested in Destiny 1 for a while. In Destiny 2 though, not so much. Although I think it was more of a "time and place"-thing. I tried it, seemed like more of the same really. But smaller, which doesn't exactly increase the fun factor. I mean, small can be fun if the game is super tactical. But we're talking about random matchmaking in a game driven by power weapons/abilities. It's mostly just people running around trying to blast each other to bits.

@deathstriker: I get that and to be honest if I was to judge Destiny solely on the first month of so of the games release I would agree with you. I hated Destiny's PvP for it's first 8 months. Then Trials of Osiris launched as basically a Raid like experience with Raid like loot for PvP. So I decided to give it another try. Turns out what I actually hated was how Destiny played in 6v6, which is to say, in my opinion, pretty awful. 6v6 in Destiny was always a mess, people shooting you from angles you didn't understand or could help, Supers popping off all over the place you couldn't avoid, it was pure uncontrollable Caos. I hated that. 3v3 on the other hand had so much nuance to it. There was map push/pull, you could control areas, know who on both your team and enemy had what and how to avoid/utilize that to your advantage. It was like a game of chess in full motion but with guns. I loved that, in made the game so cerebral. Every death (for the most part, Destiny always had jank) felt like you made a mistake and could correct it to become better.

For Destiny 2, I really don't like how, because it's such a team driven game, it just highlights both yours and your teammates faults quite glaringly. It becomes quite clear who can't hit a target to save their life, who doesn't understand how to read the radar, and who can't make quick decisions and callouts to inform the others what is going on in a situation. I have a hard time not playing this PvP like I play Trials, because to a degree it feels so much more competitive, even in Quickplay, but when I make callouts to crash on a lone wolf behind us and everyone ignores me only for me to get the kill but take so much damage that I get quickly pushed on by the other team while I'm stuck at low health it is frustrating. It makes it hard to want to play with friends outside your skill level and I hate that, because in my mind the game shouldn't force team play so much that I don't want to play with my less skilled Crucible friends. It's not their fault they didn't put 1,000 hours into D1 PvP and I hate the D2 makes me feel that way about playing with them. Luckily we did get them a win in Trials last night for the Trophy, so I doubt most of them will play it much anymore. I don't know how much I can take only winning when I go 28-4 in a Trials match (because that is an extremely rare situation), which sucks because I love playing with my friends, but Destiny 2 doesn't make me want to at all, and I hate that.

Note: Also, the recovery rate is atrocious right now. It needs to be dramatically improved. I shouldn't be stuck out of a fight for 15 seconds if I'm damaged. I hate that so much.

@deathstriker: I played Bioshock 2 MP and it wasn't bad. Just sayin, there are people out there that like stuff.

I love the Crucible, frankly. The 4v4 structure and high TTK helps it avoid the meatgrinder feel of CoD, and gives you some time to think about what youre doing - it really matters whether or not youre with your allies or just running around on your own. You have to be tactical and think about what youre doing. while the mobility offers a diverse set of ways to get around the (really well designed) maps. Add in the unpredictability of the classes and I've been having a really good time with it.

I have found that Destiny 2 PvP no longer chaotic due to the lower player count and the absence of vehicles. Destiny 2 is now more engaging and competitive. However, I wish that they have kept 6vs6 as an option for having a mindless fun.

There are people out there with different opinions? No way. I think the Bioshock 2 devs should've spent those multiplayer resources on the singleplayer. Co-op in Bioshock seems more natural to me than versus. As far as my taste go, I'd rather Bungie focus on the campaign and PVE stuff than put resources in PVP. A mute protagonist is bad enough, but your friends not appearing in cutscenes in a 2017 game that is co-op focused is pretty tacky when I think about it. I'd rather have more strikes and be able to choose the strike I'm doing than have PVP.

I like the quickplay playlist a whole lot but I wish quickplay was 6v6 and clash was it's own mode like in D1. There are times when I just want to relax with some clash and not the other game modes.

Yeah I felt like the PvP was a tacked on mode, and sorta filler for when PvE gets stale in D1, and it seems much the same in D2. Strangely, this thread has left me with a strong hankerin' for some BTB.

This is how I feel. I didn't play a ton of D1 ,but I remember its PvP being a clusterfuck. D2 4v4, while engaging, is elegant in comparison. The maps sizees all being pretty small is pretty great too. But now there's no mode to just mess around in. I wish there was a FFA or a gun game or something.

I vastly preferred the crucible to strikes because in the crucible I was able to simply do what the game is good at, which is shoot other moving targets and see them die at a reasonable rate. In the strikes, on higher difficulties anyway, you're just dumping insane amounts of ammo into bullet sponges with shields on top of the spongy part and half the time people were figuring out ways to hole up in some corner and cheese the thing altogether. Then again I was never a fan of playing games on the highest difficulty exactly for the same reasons why I didn't particularly enjoy the Nightfall strikes and such - dying from 2 shots but having to dump 20 clips into "elite" enemies is not challenging or skillful, it's just laborious and time consuming.

As a pure addendum my original comment was supposed to say "there are people out there that like that stuff" but I missed that one word and it came out sound a lot more snarky than intended.

It's fine, imo. I wasn't liking it at first either until I got some weapons that I was good with. There's not much content though... I guess there's plenty to do in the rest of the game so complaining about content in the PVP is a bit silly but theres like what... 4-5 maps? And each of the playlists only has two game modes.

I actually re-downloaded Destiny 1 to see how the PVP was again since it's been awhile. I loaded it up, though, and there are like 10 playlists and 9 of them require some DLC I never got. So basically it's unplayable unless I spend money (assuming people are even still playing it). The 1 playlist that didn't require the DLC I couldn't find any players.

While it is shitty the only game I can think of that doesnt do it that way is SWTOR. Other party based co-op games like The Division, Wildlands, Borderlands and Diablo all exclude your party and act like they dont exist in cutscenes.

As for the PVP i'm in the camp that thought it was always bad and from what i've played of the Beta they seemed to have made it worse. More balanced, less fun. Kinda esporty.

I think the problem is that there's no way to play Crucible casually anymore. I've found the quick play playlist to be terrible due to the fact that it's 4v4 now.

I have GREATLY enjoyed the competitive playlist. The game modes feel more appropriate for 4v4, and they require you to take the game a bit more seriously. When you do, it's actually very very fun.

I did my first ticket of Trials of the Nine yesterday and really enjoyed it as well. I think everything in the game (the weapon system, the ability cooldowns, etc.) are balanced almost perfectly for high-stakes multiplayer. It's just not as fun to jump into a casual mode and screw around. Pretty disappointing, but ultimately I think I'm okay with it.

I don't think there's anything surprising about that.

I wonder how the PC versions PvP will feel if M&K will make any meaningful difference at all.

I am actually fine with team shot, but it does made solo q a bit of a toss up depending on what kind of teammates you get. Playing with friends is still lots of fun to me. Haven't touch To9 yet. Other than that:

Played some crucibles matches this past few days, got a very mixed feelings. It's good that I don't get one shotted with matador every few seconds, but my god the pace is so slow in some of the matches. Some ended up with one side hunkering down somewhere, while the other side try to broke through. I hope it will get better as we the players learn the maps' layout.

Sidenotes, Mida Mini Tool can melt people so quickly it's ridiculous, and sniper flinch is still as annoying as D1

This was my feeling of crucible after a few matches that I post in another thread. The slow pace comment still stands in quickplay, I found it happening less in comp. Increasing your grenade damage by a smidge should help this, because in its current form, grenade is limited to being a zoning tool, and to finish up on weakened(almost one-shot health) enemies.

@fatalbanana: If the beta was any indication, it'll be a Handcannon meta.

Just comparing old Destiny 1 trials with new trials there is a real problem for anyone wishing to express their individual skill. Now it's almost impossible to make a good flanking maneuver work or to out gun people 1v1 because you're almost never 1v1. Every round is decided by 2 blobs of 4 people shooting at each other from as far as possible. If your blob is slightly out of position or missing someone you lose. There is no individuality. No creative play making. Or at least not solo. Everything needs to be performed as a duo or as a team of 4. If you move by yourself you will die. It's like the communism of PvP shooters and it is the worst.

I think Destiny 2's pvp is miles better than Destiny 1. I'm not sure why though. It might be the player count and the maps, we'll see if I hold this opinion in a month.

@galerian: I completely agree with your Grenade commend. I said this to so many people after playing the PS4 Beta. Bringing back lethality of grenades a smidge to prevent player stacking would drastically improve this PvP. Another huge complaint of mine and many players is the recovery rate. If they increased that by 2 seconds, I think it would also make a massive improvement to the current game.

The PvP in Destiny just feels so...flat and uninspired. On top of that, yeah, the focus on team shooting has killed it for me. I mostly just find it incredibly frustrating and not fun at all. Literally the only reason I will ever play it is to accomplish milestones.

I dunno. I've been solo queuing and winning way more often than I've been losing, having fun either way and basically always coming out with a kd of around 2.0 or more. Destiny pvp is the only pvp I've ever not sucked though, so that might be why I like it. It just clicks for me. I like the 4v4 better than the 6v6 of old too.

I'm generally not a PvP guy, but I have to say I've enjoyed myself more this time around (still sticking mostly with PvE, though). Ironically I enjoy myself more in the "Competitive" mode, maybe because I like those game types better. Or maybe because it seems like everyone is more willing to work as a team and actually play the objective? I wish they'd still let us pick which game type we wanted. Anytime I go back to the Quickplay mode I keep getting put into Control matches. I hate Control matches.

"You looked into Death's beady little eyes, and spat in them. You fiend."

@spamfromthecan: Shaxx is the best, regardless of the meta or state of the Crucible

PVP in Destiny feels tagged on. From legendary fights in Blood Gulch. To Generic map design + real generic / 2000 esque game modes. The only thing that's good about Destiny's pvp is the rewards you get.

@hestilllives19 I think we've always disagreed on the PvP in Destiny and I don't see it changing now. I much prefer the slower pace in D2 compared to D1. I am glad they are stepping away from chasing Call of Duty and are going back to Halo, in a sense.

I won't claim to know much about game development in detail, but I quite doubt not creating a PvP mode would somehow result in a voiced protagonist.

@zevvion: Some of the core changes, while I don't like them, I understand. Like the movement speed and slow TTK. I drastically prefer the quick movements in D1 and the mediocre TTK. I think D1's biggest problem was lining up those 2, as it either had a touch too slow TTK or a touch fast movement speed. Destiny 2 solved that problem like it did many by hitting it from both ends, thus just changing the problem all together. Now we almost have a different game. Add to that the fact that melee's do dick all and grenades aren't much better and are almost on 90 second timers each (only 3 per Super, are you kidding me), and it's basically just turned the ability filled game of Destiny into Halo with an occasional ability use. I don't think Destiny 2 is so far gone that it isn't fixable, but it definitely isn't fun like Destiny 1 was, it is actually rather boring. And this is coming from someone who is playing so much better in D2 than D1 stats wise, like drastically better. I still think my initial impressions of the Beta on PS4 are accurate. They fixed the Super cooldowns, so those are good now, but Grenades (especially area of effect that hit multiple opponents) need to hit like a truck (rather than for 75-90 damage, they need to hit back close to D1 ranges 125-135 range compared to the possible 201 in D1 range) and with two mods be able to be cooled down in 40 second range (they were 25 seconds in D1, so still a big nerf). All melee's should kill in 2 punches or above 100, so say 105, except combat flow, which should hit for about 130. Throwing Knives are butts now with the nerf, barely hitting for 100 on a Crit, so that needs to be bumped back up to the 140 range (it's one of the most skillful kills in all of Destiny PvP, so it should be rewarded as such). If they did all of that, plus tweaked the damage numbers a bit to make running Low Armor spec vs High Armor Spec an actual thing again, I would be happy. It would drastically improve the game in it's current state. It would punish hand holding a lot more (which Destiny 2 desperately needs less of), reward skillful 1v1 ability, and just overall put a lot more control in the hands of each individual player rather than how all 4 players work together (and by work together I just mean grab each others butts the entire time while shooting down the same lane).

Also, like I've been saying, they drastically need to reduce the base Health Regen timer, by at least 2-3 full seconds. It takes outrageously long to get your health back after being tagged right now, and being out of a fight for 12 seconds is not fun for anyone. This is noticed far less on a High Recovery Warlock, simply due to Healing Rift and Voidwalker Devour Proc, but it's a massive issue for both Titans and Hunters.

The first real competitive multiplayer game I have gotten into was/is Destiny. I think that I enjoyed the 6v6 chaos, lobbing trip mine grenades as far as I could and managing to stick them to people, having a scout rifle with exploding rounds making short work of people from across the map, popping golden gun and clearing out a whole control point... I worked so hard in that game over many Iron Banners to improve, and I think that I got pretty good by the end. Yeah, they nerfed those trip mine grenades and kept fiddling with the game so that the "meta" was always kind of being reworked, but I don't think I have ever become so engrossed in a multiplayer mode, outside of co-op stuff.

The new multiplayer hasn't grabbed me yet. I like the chaos of more people and bigger teams. I like being able experiment with new weapons and find ways that work with my characters. Right now I feel like the game modes, besides control which is still good, are working everyone towards playing a very specific way, and god forbid you don't go in with a fireteam or clan mates. You may as well sign up for an instant loss if you solo queue.

I don't know. I hope I get the itch again for it, but I hate supremacy as a game mode and am not fond of the size of the teams (smaller) with the size of the maps (big). I want mayhem clash and other goofy stuff. Destiny should be goofy, these are space wizards and magic ninjas we're playing as, so the fact that it feels so meh right now is kind of a shame. But, they are going to change stuff as it goes, so maybe they'll put in a vintage playlist/play type or something for people like me who like the old crazy versus the new stuff.

@hestilllives19: I could see grenades doing a bit more damage, though I honestly think most of them are fine right now. People keep saying nothing is a 1v1 in D2, but I win 1v2 quite frequently when my grenade is up. Granted, not against amazing players probably, but still.

I didn't like the ability spam in D1, so I'm not with you on decreasing the grenade cooldowns. Just chucking your grenade in the general direction of a player shouldn't result in a kill if you also tag him once. I don't like that, I have never liked that. If they are enabling that here in the future, it sure as hell shouldn't happen every second death of mine.

I think melees are in a great place right now. Seismic Strike and the like all kill in one hit + follow up melee as opposed to three, making them usable. Stormcaller's range is still insanity, so I am glad it doesn't happen literally every single encounter. I am very happy with the increased cooldowns for PvP. Having it be more about skill and less about reaction time is more fun for me, even if I am someone with decent reaction time.

As a side note, it almost seems like a side-effect that almost every gun is usable now. It makes trying out new guns great, though I have fallen in love with Vigilance Wing. I don't see myself using something else anytime soon.

@zevvion: If only I had a Vigilance Wing. I hear very good things though. I also wish I had a Nergal and Main Ingredient. Those are still two of my favorite weapons and I haven't got them to drop yet. Which I don't understand, I have like 5 or more of most of my Legendaries. I need to just break out the Wiki and locate exactly who Sells them, because I bet they are a Planetary Vendor I haven't leveled much. Right now I've been enjoying the heck out of The End Scout from Trials, Better Devils, and the Beta Shotgun for PvP. I think Nightshade is my other best Kinetic and works well with a couple of the Auto Rifles on smaller maps. I think I carried around a 1.7 K/D and a 2.0 KA/D in Trials this weekend with that loadout though. I had one game where I was trying to get my Admins the 1 win Trials Trophy and went 28-6 for a 6-5 win. That was pretty nuts.

As far as the balancing talk goes though, I don't think 40-45 seconds would be the ability spam we saw in D1. Those timers if you remember were in the 20-25 second range, and 5 seconds for Voidwalkers if they got a kill (and everyone had T5 Dis). With the way Mods work, I doubt very many people with have T2 Grenades and even hit that 40 sec timer, at least not right now. My biggest concern is the punch they pack, as I highly doubt you are killing 2 players that can actually aim ever who were full health from any grenade throw plus shooting currently, and in my opinion you should be able to. TTK against two players drops from roughly 1.2 seconds to 0.4 seconds (because that's how math works, 0 seconds for bullets 1 & 2, one from each player, and 0.4 seconds for bullets 3 & 4). But if you could fire 1 bullet to kill each, that changes things dramatically and makes engaging two players at full health a possibility when you can kill both in 0.4 as well. It will discourage players from standing so close that both will get tagged by the same grenade, which would be the entire point behind the change. It makes handholding a high risk high reward move, rather than a zero risk high reward move like it is currently.

@zevvion: Yes, I don't want the grenade to return to D1 damage where nade + one shot will kill. All I want is to make it a bit stronger, so it discourages the "death ball" group up where 4 players are clumped together roaming the map in qp. It's really hard to counter that in solo q. Usually when my team manage to break it (with a super or power weapon), guess what, it's our turn to be the death ball.

Yeah I am really disliking it as well. It has devolved into a team fight shootout in almost every encounter with the enemy. The other times are usually picking off those who have no support and are easy kills. It seems like a very bland version of Overwatch in the way that the ultimate abilities are eventually used, but without the strategic elements. It has no other comparisons to Overwatch, which I'm fine with, but it really doesn't shine in any other way.

I don't know how to describe it other than by stating that it is not particularly exciting at all. I wish there was more to it.

I like pvp in d2 slightly less than I did in d1 but I still enjoy it a lot. Been running a lot of trials and been doing well. It does require more coordination but I like that about It. The friends I play destiny with are pretty bad at pvp so I've been teaming up with random people through the app and that has gone pretty well so far. Exciting stuff totally does and can happen during a match. Things I dislike: sticky grenades are pretty weak. I wish they didn't bring back the MIDA. Feels like 95% of people use that gun now in Trials it's crazy.

I myself have been enjoying it a fair bit. I play multiplayer games pretty casually but have only run into overpowered teams a few times. I've had a few really exciting games of Control, Supremacy, and Clas. I am playing far more PVE than PVP though, even just alone.

Overall, I haven't sunk as many hours into a game as I have into Destiny 2 in a pretty long time, especially considering it's only been out two weeks. I am really enjoying my time with it and even at 2:45am I want to boot it up again before bed.

I kept oscillating between ''this is very bad'' after losing like 5 trials matchs in a row and ''this is fine'' after a couple of good quickplay games and a flawless card. Now it feels like I landed firmly on ''this is bad'' and I figured out why. In Destiny 2, it feels terrible to lose. In Destiny 2, when you lose it very rarely feels like you, personally, could've done something about it. When you lose it's because you chose the wrong play as a team or someone wasn't looking at the right lane at the right time or your opponents know the map better than you do. That stuff is largely out of your control. You can get better at shooting dudes and learn to do some sick flanking maneuvers but if your team isn't in sync you will lose every game. After losing like 80% of our trials matchs tonight I'm not sure I ever want to play this ever again. The way you win or lose each encounter is just not fun. These team shooting battles feel largely random and remote. Like you're barely participating in the action and your opponents are dying at random.

This is so far away from the PvP experience I fell in love with. The game where you could come back from a 4-0 in trials with some aggressive and creative plays. Now if you're losing this badly it's probably because the other team is better than yours and there is nothing you can do about that because there is nothing you can do on your own. There is nothing anyone on your team can do on their own.

@pyrodactyl: I actually quite enjoy the more team-oriented play of D2. It makes tactics that much more important. I went flawless with @hestilllives19 last night and whenever we lost a round it felt obvious to me what we or I was doing wrong. For example, I set up flanks quite often. I stray from the pack regularly to get angles and keep them distorted. But a couple of times I underestimated how long it took me to flank the opponents and my team was at a disadvantage because I wasn't there and they were outnumbered, getting killed. Next round we stuck together better and it was noticeable it worked much better.

For what it's worth, you can still 1v1 and even 2v1. It wasn't super rare that I won a 2v1, though I have to say Vigilance Wing is quite strong and Last Hope is just disgusting, which is what I was using. Striker also seems completely tuned to my playstyle so I felt comfortable.

Additionally, I am almost positive that Trials not matching you with similar skilled opponents is bullshit. My stats currently suck as I played with my clan just for fun a lot and it was quite noticeable when I teamed with hesti that we were facing better players consistently. You might just be real good and the game pits you against stacked players.