I'm just going to put this right here and try to keep it on topic. I played a fair-ish amount of Iron Banner. I used the Hunter and solely Gunslinger subclass. I was not 400 light level and flaunted basic New Monarchy gear. I do not have a 400 light-level Ice Breaker nor do I have a 'Wormwood'. I don't use sidearms that often in Crucible, yet I was regularly doing very well and placing on average within the top-3 in the matches. I used my fusion rifle. I used some scout-rifles and hand cannons. I enjoyed myself, so when I see posts like this claiming that the Crucible 'requires' specific gear and specific loadouts I just shake my head because it just isn't true. If it was true, would I have been able to enjoy myself AND do well at the same time? If a person is claiming that they need a specific weapon to do well in Crucible, can that person be labelled as 'skilled' as the community so readily states? Should players that don't have the skill to do well also have access to items to help give them a leg up? I thin so. You say you can [quote]ask anyone and they will probably say year 1 was the best. Go back to the roots of destiny with fun guns and higher kill times.[/quote] Awesome. Some people enjoyed it more and some like it as it is now. I won't deny that many weapons have had reductions in their lethality. Primary weapons are slower to kill and special weapons are less forgiving. This is fact. What [i]isn't[/i] fact however is the idea that it is worse because of it. What has the reduction in lethality done? It has lead a to rise for more strategy between players and more consideration in perks and loadouts. I hear this everytime my friends are going through an Elimination match. I can tell the differnece from now and during House of Wolves. They are more careful and choosing of what they do. The play-by-play aspect has become more focused on the players knowledge of the game and less reliant on the general killing potential of their weapon. Does a faster kill-time lead to a better competitive multiplayer experience? It depends on the context of game for that. Looking at the popular Rainbow 6 franchise, you can see how high lethality can be good. It makes choices more important and actions more impactful. This also works however because of how punishing the game is should I the player make a wrong decision. The risk balances out the power available. Then you look at Destiny and see that there is very little risk in dying (in standard Crucible). During the majority of 2015, players could simply rush around in Crucible matches and get by with little to no repercussions for deciding to act like a lunatic. Were weapons more lethal? Yes. Did it enhance the game-play experience on more tactful level? That's more subjective but some may say no. I'm one of those. Faster kill times don't always equal better game-play experience, on a broad scope. That high lethality needs to be coupled with punishing risks. A tactful and involved game-play experience needs to have rewards for risks taken but also needs to punish players for making the wrong decisions and failing. Destiny's Crucible experience was lacking this and due to the involvement players had with special ammo, that death becomes that much more impactful to the common player. Is the loss of special ammo on death hurting many players? Yes. I view this as evidence to support the idea that special weapons were relied upon too heavily during the course of Crucible and players became too reliant on weapons didn't require as much attention.