@ev77: Again, team whipping mechanics are part of the raid concept. If you could bumble your way through the way you can most of the rest of the game, it would't be the very challenging and demanding experience so many people enjoy. If you're taking your time and working through why you failed you can improve your strategy and come out on top. That process and the problem solving that comes with it are only possible because of the harsh penalties. The process and the sense of accomplishment that comes from succeeding are what makes Destiny special.
@twolines: Maybe it's because of our experience with the 4 other Destiny raids we did blind but our group didn't have trouble figuring out any of the mechanics except how you should shoot the buttons in the gauntlet encounter. That one was probably a bit too obtuse since there are dozens of different ways to shoot the buttons that also seem logical. Everything else in the raid follows a logic though. We were able to parse that logic and complete our first blind run just fine.
Not sure why people put so much emphasis on the puzzles anyway. If you don't care for them you can get hints online no problem. The most challenging part of the encounter is the optimization of your strategy. Tightening loose screws so people don't die or mess up certain parts. This is the part the giant bomb crew has the most trouble with and why this thing is taking them so long. Optimizing your strategy is very fun as it asks you to make use of all the tools at your disposal. You can consider a different loadout, a different subclass or ability combination that would work better or a more structured strategy. I personally think this is when the game is at its most fun and demanding. Those fun problem solving moments are the main reason why I can say Destiny 2 is a great game.
@ev77: what you describe as "shit design" are a number of mechanics in line with traditional raid design. From what I understand, WoW 6 man raids are just dungeons+, not raids. If you want that experience in Destiny you can play the Nightfall, which is pretty great.
Now the raid is and should be a totally different thing. It is in WoW and other MMOs. Everyone needs to execute almost flawlessly to succeed. Follow a set of specific "nonsensical" steps while making use of all the tools at your disposal and a lot of team coordination to succeed. This is what raids are. You might not be into raids, which is fine. Doesn't make them shit.
@neonbear: I've done this raid four times now, the last of which was completed in just over an hour. This is a bad raid. It's perfectly acceptable to love Destiny and dislike this raid. The vast majority of people claiming this is a "good" raid are doing so because they've completed it and want to feel good about their accomplishment. Some raid designer at Destiny got lost up his own ass turning this raid into a joyless team-building communication exercise, and I'm elated to see it trashed on a highly visible stream in the hopes that Bungie will get the hint and stop trying to arbitrarily increase raid complexity with each release. This is absolutely not how you create an endgame activity that is welcoming and accessible to new, casual players, and the results of those poor design choices are exactly the responses we're seeing here.
I personally don't think ''creating an endgame activity that is welcoming and accessible to new, casual players'' should be anywhere near the top of the list of priorities when designing a raid. Let's face it, 95% of the PvE content in Destiny was designed specifically for more casual players. Story missions, strikes, patrols, public events, side missions, quests, this new faction event, they're all incredibly easy and can be completed by anyone. You can hit max level in a few weeks without touching the raid or Nightfall.
Now for people looking for a bit more meat out of their loot shooter experience, this raid is the best out of the 5 Destiny raids. It is towering above the shitshow that was King's Fall. It's still the kind of content that you can't find in any other game out there and I hope Bungie doesn't compromise on any of it in the future.
If you or anyone finds this thing too demanding there is still 95% of the game you can play without worrying about communication or any of that stuff. But raids like this and the new Nightfall, to a lesser extent, are what make Destiny special for a lot of people, myself included.
@cxeq: It's no so much about just controls (although platforming with a keyboard, yuk), no it's about how the jumping feels. Bungie spent a lot of effort to make sure the traversal and jumping in Destiny felt great and responsive. You have incredible control over your trajectory in the air, the length and height of your jump, etc. Also note that platforming sections take care to put the camera in third person just so it's easier to handle for people not comfortable with first person jumping. Now Blizzard doesn't put the same emphasis on ''gamefeel'' in WoW. It's an MMO and like pretty much all traditional MMOs it doesn't have the tactile feel of action games. The movement of your character feels incredibly stiff and without any physical presence as you constantly clip through allies and enemies.
Seems like most people completely miss how the Destiny power system works. In Destiny, being overlevel is not very useful. For every 10 power your character is over the enemy power (280 in the raid boss encounter) you do about 5% more damage. That is not very useful. Now being underlevel hurts your damage output and defense more but it's not the end of the world. Maybe 10%-15% per 10 power under the enemy power.
It's not a night-and-day difference, but it's exponential in a sense. Even a few percent difference can be the difference a death (that might have been avoidable if you were playing better) and a narrow escape, which in turn could avoid a party wipe. When you're not as fatigued/frustrated, you then play better. Given how towards the end the main issue was e.g. Jeff saying he was making dumb mistakes, power probably matters more than the raw stats would suggest.
They aren't going to steamroll through it if they level up, but it would certainly be useful.
My point was more that you should prioritize good/appropriate guns over raw numbers. If you can use an auto rifle that is 280 instead of a 295 sub machine gun you should pick the auto rifle every time (for this encounter at least). If you can get a Man O War at 280 you should use that above basically any other power weapon no matter if they're 290, 300 or 400. Now if you don't have good 280+ guns than you should find some because anything below that makes more of a difference. To sum up: find a good 280+ gun loadout, don't focus on numbers too much. A sniper rifle with a 3% more damage than Man O War doesn't mean shit when you can't hit the boss most of the time. Same goes for submachine guns, shotguns and side arms.
Hell, one of the best loadouts for my money is 2 auto rifles and Man O War. You really don't need anything long range in any part of this encounter and auto rifles, especially uriel's gift, are very very good right now.
Seems like most people completely miss how the Destiny power system works. In Destiny, being overlevel is not very useful. For every 10 power your character is over the enemy power (280 in the raid boss encounter) you do about 5% more damage. That is not very useful. Now being underlevel hurts your damage output and defense more but it's not the end of the world. Maybe 10%-15% per 10 power under the enemy power.
Are you kidding? That's a HUGE difference. Yes, power is very important in raids.
Not really. They didn't die because they had too little power. Ben especially is totally fine at 280+. This is the raid normal difficulty. There are no ''kill all these very hard enemies very fast'' check. The only thing that comes close is the waves that spawn against the outside team, which should be composed of Brad Dan and Jeff anyway. Inside team just needs to shoot one psion at a time. You could be 260 and still manage that with the right weapon (the Uriel's Gift auto rifle for example).
No, what kills them is a lack of focus during the first ad phase and a lack of structure in other phases. Like I said earlier, they need a very structured plan for the inside team. A very simple step by step is:
look at your symbol and get ready to say it when it's your turn (always communicate in the same order)
Shoot your psion as it's spawning
Clean out the projections
Slide to the right spot so you don't launch from a ramp into space
So if you guys are adamant about doing this on Monday you need to keep a few things in mind:
Use the right weapons. The Man O War linear fusion rifle you get from the blue crown quest on Ioh is the best weapon you can have in the heavy slot for this encounter. It is much easier to use than a sniper rifle and deals more damage. If your character is above 280 make sure you use this weapon even if you have other weapon that are higher power. Any power above 280 is only marginally useful. Don't optimize for power with bad weapons or weapons you don't like. If you somehow trashed your Man O War you can buy it back from Asher on Ioh.
Get rid of sub machine guns, side arms, shotguns and grenade launchers. These weapons are bad for this encounter.
Establish a very structured and rigid strategy. For every death you need to figure out what went wrong and address why it happened. Trust me there's a solution to every problem this game throws at you. People whine about this part of the raid having bugs and glitchs but outside of connection issues and some light collision issues there is nothing really buggy in there.
To avoid collision issues have people inside the other world (team suck) always slide the exact same path. When you figure out a correct path you shouldn't have any trouble with people ramping off into space anymore.
Figure out a strategy to take care of the psions that bump you off into space. Once you do and execute on it they should't be a problem
You can use your super to damage the boss (golden gun, nova bomb) or to clear enemies every time after the damage phase (striker, arcstrider, stormcaller). Use it on every cycle if you can.
Don't forget to use class abilities. The Warlock rift can help deal more damage to the boss or save people when fighting enemies in between damage phases, the hunter dodge can help you reload faster when shooting skulls, etc.
Delay taking down Calus' shield as much as you can to give more time for people to shoot as many skulls as they can. You should have 60+ on every run. high 50s is ok. Anything bellow that hurts your damage output a ton.
If you establish a good strategy and execute on it rigidly you shouldn't wipe. From there you can take up to 4 cycles to take him down. Even with sub optimal damage output you should be fine. The key is to follow the game plan and focus on not wasting lives on enemies between damage phases. From there you have plenty of opportunities to deal enough damage to take Calus down. Good luck
Anyways, overall enjoyed the stream but I REALLY think they should not come back to this Monday. Just leave it be, or, come back in 2 weeks or something with higher equipment levels and some fresh energy and just do the whole raid again and beat the boss this time. I think if they try to force this on Monday, they'll just end up hating the game, and each other, a whole lot more.
I agree, if they try again on Monday it'll just be more of this. Allow for Abby, Ben and Alex to gear up properly, then come back fresh in 2 weeks.
Seems like most people completely miss how the Destiny power system works. In Destiny, being overlevel is not very useful. For every 10 power your character is over the enemy power (280 in the raid boss encounter) you do about 5% more damage. That is not very useful. Now being underlevel hurts your damage output and defense more but it's not the end of the world. Maybe 10%-15% per 10 power under the enemy power.
So everyone in this group is totally fine for the raid. Abby and Alex are not 100% there but that shouldn't matter. They're close enough. What they need is better execution and a structured strategy. Also they all need to look at their loadout. Sacrifice power for more appropriate weapons. Sub machine guns, side arms, grenade launchers and shotguns are all terrible for this encounter and should be removed.
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