Power Level Progression and The Lack There Of.

[Riff Machine 2,105]

Having a bit of time this morning, I jumped on to see if I could get a power level increase by running that stupid preservation mission.  During that run, I realized just how much bungie completely ruined power progression with the whole "pinnacle/powerful" drop nonsense.

 

Let's go back to the end of Destiny 1 and the beginning of D2.  In both cases, it didn't matter what you did, whether that be strikes, crucible, missions, vanguard rank up, etc.  You were ALWAYS guaranteed a power/light level increase depending on RNG of course.  So, if I had very little time to play on a certain day, I could jump on.  Fly down to the cosmodrome.  Run some patrols until my vanguard rank went up and boom.  A guaranteed drop that had a chance to be better then something I currently had.  Vanilla D2 was similar, and yes, I realize there wasn't much to do then, you still at least felt like you were making progress regardless.

 

That's one of my biggest issues right now with Destiny is making progress.

 

When this ridiculous change was made to hamper power level progression with the pinnacle system, It instantly put most casual/solo players at a disadvantage because now, they couldn't do those little things here and there that would offer increases in power by say, replaying a story mission or ranking up the vanguard.  Which was another thing that also burned everyone was having those drops be reduced to 10-15 below current power level.  

 

Locking a lot of the power progression behind higher difficulty activities is so flawed as a lot of people will simply not do them.  Having the freedom of choice to do whatever and make progress is taken, pun intended, away simply to artificially extend play time has not only ruined a lot of what made this game so good in the past, but also turned a lot of veterans players away from it.  

 

I could go on about a lot more, but for the most part, I want my time respected.  As it stands right now, jumping on for a half hour isn't worth it if I can't make any progression in power level.  This system needs to be dropped IMO.

 

 

 

[Teenwolf25 327]

Most of what you’ve said I agree with. It can be a right fucking grind. You can play for hours at times and at the end of it be no better off than when you started. 

I think this season tho has been the least grind of a season they’ve done so far. Usually when they bring GMs out and Master vog they made it such a grind to hit a reasonable power level that it wasn’t reachable for most of the player base. This season though master VOW will be doable power wise for nearly everyone which is good. 
Time is valuable I agree so doing specific thing to level can be a chore 

[GazzaGarratt 11,049]

They're moving ever closer to removing that 'searching for the bigger power number' over time and I think its 100% the right call. The hard part is they are then stuck in this loop where for the most part, the large population have played Destiny to see their big, yellow, nice font, number move to a bigger, yellow, nice font, number. Like 1153 to 1154. This has been the case for 7 years. So even when removing the objective of just getting higher numbered gear is a better idea, it doesn't play into the average gamer's hands as most people all they do is just chase the bigger number.

 

It always got to me when I wanted to do a raid to enjoy it, but we would sometimes be stuck when someone would say 'I ain't doing that, i don't get any bigger number (pinnacle) loot', to which I can't wrap my head around. Its a hard culture to break but Bungie are trying to do it by delivering fun, enjoyable instances/experiences in raids and dungeons so you remember the journey.

 

However, through all of this, i'm not sure how you ever take the power number grind out of an RPG/MMO game when its core to its way of design. Destiny is in a great spot for content but the average gamer wants to have fun objectives to complete and see all shiny. And those shiny things need to be better than the power number grind sensation.

 

So....yeah, I agree to this feeling Chad as i'm in the same boat. But I also think they could fix it by looking at what makes us tick better. I'd start with Triumphs and creating them in a better way to how they used to be....even then though, the 'bigger Triumph number' was probably the push to help us enjoy it! We love showing off our big numbered D's! 🤣