Exotics engrams decrypt up to 400, not, go on youtube

The forge is wildly inconsistent. Did forge for an hour or so last night helping blueberries out as part of charity fundraising, had friends coming in and popping purples whenever they had some, between 7 people we got a grand total of one ghost and two artifacts to drop, and at a grand total of 2 light levels higher than highest level, equipped, gear.

No, the forge is very consistent, it always gives 2 light levels higher above what you have. You have to go up in light elsewhere to get help from the forge though. I am currently 394 light, but I have a 396 ghost & 396 class item & 396 artifact. I can do forge forever, but it will only give me 396 light rewards until I get to 395 light.

Not exactly true. At 398 (with a 400 ghost) I was getting 399 ghost drops. At 399, I'm still getting 399 ghost drops.... [spoiler]in addition to several 400 drops, ofc[/spoiler]

Of course, not every drop is going to be guaranteed 2 light above what you have. Once I hit 398 light, I will get all of my 400 ghosts, artifacts & class items for my 3 characters and be done with the forge just like PoE.

Not true. I just spent 2hrs at forge and got artifacts and ghosts at my light level

This is false once again, only way you are getting artifacts & ghosts at your level is if you are 400 light. Otherwise the drops are 2 light above or lower. I just spent another hour in the forge, got 396 artifacts and ghost again. It will stay this way until I get my light up to 395, then I will get 397 drops.

You want to give me back my two hours?

You must have worlds worst rng. I hit 395 last night, went to the forge for an hour and received a 397 ghost & 397 class item. What a surprise-not. Like I said earlier, forge is very consistent, you will get items 2 light above your current level.

Not true for you, like I said, wildly inconsistent. One person in my regular group still has a grand total of 3 skeleton key drops after 3 weeks of doing strikes. Some people get the rng luck, others don't.

[quote]there are ways to hit 400 without stepping foot in the raid -Nightfalls rewards up to 400 -Archon Forge up to 400 ghost, artifact and class item - Exotics engrams decrypt up to 400 anything although slower to go up - Skeleton Keys up to 400 for strike loot, cloak and artifact - Decyrpting legendaries and even blues have a change to drop exotics up to 400 light[/quote] Sure there are, but no real consistency without the raid to fill specific spots. 1) nightfalls are good, but when you get SC, 3oC, and those sparrow/emote rewards, there isn't much room here for getting things you may need. 2)Good source for the ghost, artifact, and maybe the class item, but you can literally spend hours here and not get any rewards period (think it's funny they capped the forge armors and weapons though) 3) agreed though my drop rates have been abysmal for exotics from 3oC 4) skeleton keys take forever to grind, and then RNG in getting that hundredth grass skirt when you needed that primary (Just an example, as Bullets McSponge is best for primaries and not undying mind). Not to mention both boots and chest plates are unavailable this way. 5) extremely low chance of this happening. Probably lower than actually getting a skeleton key to drop for you. Problem is that pvp has fairly direct methods to gaining light levels these days, IB drops, Trials drops, Basic Crucible drops (for weapons and class items only). PvE ones, while there have a long and tedious task of obtaining anything for the light increases (minus the raid, of course). Personally I think if PvE didn't have to rely on a fn low drop rate item (the skeleton key)to be able to get a chance at a light increasing reward, the argument here would be less prevalent. However, that's not the case, and with them capping rewards from vendors, it just feels like there is zero point in getting that reward (personally I feel they capped it due to the boosters being purchasable from Eververse, but its only my theory)

You must be doing something wrong. I hit 400 a few days after the Hard Raid was out, without doing a single Hard Raid run. So either you're doing something wrong, or you are not really trying hard enough. IF you really want to get to 400, go run the exotic loop on all 3 characters, play forge and do some SIVA Crisis strike playlist. Mix these up in the right way, and you will get there easily enough. You just have to be willing to put some time in, and make sure you don't do silly things like opening a chest piece engram when you really need a ghost. But honestly, there's no need for you to get to 400 in a hurry if you are not participating in any of the end game activities... You can do almost everything in this game at 385 and be just fine.

So why exactly are those acceptable and ranking factions not?

factions way too easy to level up. tons of ppl have enough faction level ups to go from 390 to 400 without leavin the tower. u only need 400 if u plan to engage in endgame. 390 is more than enough for everything else. its easy enough and dumbing it down helps no one. if i can hit 400 with factions the might as well have sold lv30 gear from vendors during vanila. its fine to hit 390 with faction allowing everyone enough light for any activity they choose

Again, how does leveling factions differ from Archon Forge, crucible, 3oC. You're arbitrarily drawing a line when none of them are remotely difficult or in any way endgame.