Hello everyone! I just logges off from spending a bare minimum of 30 mins as each class by Zavala's side defending the Evacuation pods. I tested multiple weapons, perk combinations, classes, & what little subclass customizations we could make. So, as many PMs asked: What does the Bnet Armsday guy think? Well I have already been vocal about the removal of RPG aspects, the building of D2 from the ground up for PVP, & how I too feel they need to seperate the 2 modes. So I won't go into that. As per any Beta what I played may have already been changed. But for the sake of Testing/Feedback it needs to be treated as if it is the near final version. All my feedback is 100% PVE orientated. So let's get the boring stuff out of the way: Story: This is good. Played Homecoming A LOT, ran the strike a handful of times. Narrative is good. Controls: Gunplay is spot on & as smooth as ever. Characters however...feel...different. Hunter jumps feel absolutely amazing, Titan jumps feel powerful, Warlock jumps feel floaty yet controlable. Yet characters feel slow/choppy/sluggish. It's odd. Classes/Subclasses: The Class abilities are a very welcome change. Every class except Hunters brough something to the table. (More on this later.) Even without voice chat. Players used abilities to great effect. Love Rifts. Love Shieldwall. Hunter dodge however has too long a timer for its benefits. It's a dodge + free reload/melee cooldown. The timer needs a dramatic reduction. IMPO Hunters need an ability that grants them evasion or like Smoke Bomb allows them to allow their teammates become invisible or unhittable for a few seconds. It needs some form of team synergy... Right now the dodge is overshadowed by Warlock & Titan abilities. Nova Bomb Sucks. Needs a dramatic speed buff, damage buff, & tracking buff. (I had a Cabal jump over mine...) Dawnblade is decent. Kind of lackluster tbh. Seeing as there is NO sword combos, the sword feels unnessicary. Remove the sword & just let us throw fireballs DBZ style. Or change the sword into a Wand. Arcstrider was alright but suffers from all Bladedancers problems. It needs a Gap closer, & perhaps a shield/reflect/guard so it can not be shut down so easily. Striker was quite awesome. No complaints honestly. Sentinel was good to, shield throw should NOT have charges. (See Borderlands the Pre-sequel's Athena for a good way to do a shield special.) Grenades are far too weak. I can't even go into detail how weak due to the character limit. They are hands down WAY too weak to justify the cooldown timer. RPG 101: Less Damage = Faster Cooldown. More Damage = Slower Cooldown. Melee abilities (except Arcstrider Combo) are to weak to justify the risk of CQC & the cooldown timer. RPG 101: Less Damage = Faster Cooldown. More Damage = Slower Cooldown. Now onto what I cared about more than even I thought...weapons & perks. Please note my Feedback is 100% PVE oriented. [b][u]Primary Weapons[/u][/b] [u]All Weapons[/u] Need a damage buff. [u]Auto-Rifle[/u] So at long last Auto-Rifles are in a good place. None of the beta Autos had stability issues, they were all very manageable, they hit hard enough for their rate of fire & honestly were smooth, responsive, & good to use. Well done. [u]Sub-Machine Gun[/u] So...these suck. They are the D2 version of Auto-Rifles. Their damage is pathetic, their stability is horrid, I found myself hating every SMG I tested. Under extreme pressure from NPC forces these did not get the job done. I actually got killed using these. I suffered no deaths except when using SMGs. They need stability & a damage buff. [u]Sidearm[/u] This breaks my heart. The sidearm provides was terrible. It had good handling, but that was it. The damage output was laughable even for a sidearm, the stability was terrible so rapid fire was discouraged. What makes Sidearms stand out from Hand Cannons is the damage, stability, & rapid fire capability. Without the ability to fastfire there is no reason to be using a sidearm instead of a Handcannon. Need a stability & damage buff. [u]Scout Rifle[/u] These need work. They handle as expected, but hit very weak, they had significantly lower range than usual. The low magazine + low range + low damage made using a Scout Rifle feel like punishment. As this is a long distance weapon it needs to hit hard enough to challenge sniping NPCs. During The Inverted Spire I found my Pulse Rifle to be more reliable at Sniping NPC Snipers than my Scout Rifle. That is NOT right. Needs a buff across the board. [u]Pulse Rifle[/u] These are awesome. Fun, handle well, damage wise they are at the sweet spot; not too hard not too soft. They have longer range than I anticipated. But overall Pulse Rifles are perfect. [u]Hand Cannon[/u] These feel exactly like they do in Destiny They feel heavy, & hit like a truck. The bloom wasn't very noticible or detrimental (a good thing), the magazines were a decent size. No complaints. Good job Bungie. [b][u]Power Weapons[/u][/b] [u]Fusion Rifle[/u] Well...these look cool. Aside from that these were a let down. I found playing with the Fusion Rifle to be tedious. They were very weak, and overall brought nothing interesting to the table. I hit a few Cabal with a full charge & to my horror they had a tendency to survive. If Fusions are now Power Weapons they need to hit like one. Why should players use this as their Power Weapon? I don't know how to fix this. [u]Shotgun[/u] These were powerful, did what was expected of a shotgun. However the risk vs reward aspect makes these not worth using. Diving headfirst into the enemy in order to make use of the shotgun made me a liability to my team, & it lacked the damage to make using it on the Inverted Spire's final boss worthwhile. Like Fusions, these need to have a reason to be used. What is the draw? [u]Sniper[/u] Hrm, the only Sniper I was able to acquire felt smooth, sounded weak, but was great on Yellow Bar enemies. However it felt weak vs the strike boss. I found it very hard to use it over the Grenade Launcher which both does heavy damage & clears out groups of enemies. These need a damage buff. [u]Grenade Launcher[/u] This was fun to use, felt great, cleared groups of enemies, did heavy damage. Magnificent! [b][u]Weapon Perks[/u][/b] If the Beta perks are a sign of anything... It is that Bungie has figured out how to make perks worthwhile. I didn't see a signal useless perk. I had a blast mixing & matching perks to see how the gun performed. [b][u]Weapon Mods[/u][/b] So, it looks like Mod slots are for Weapom Shaders (and I assume Adornments), & to my pleasant surprise...Elements (Elemental Cores)? I admit, I felt slightly disappointed that the mod slot is limited to this. But as we didn't get to toy with this during the Beta...the jury is still out. [u]Energy Weapons[/u] These need to be removed or buffed heavily. Honestly, I barely ever used Energy or Power Weapons, barely saw a desire to use one. Kinetic Primary is all players need now. That said, forcing energy use by buffing enemy shields is NOT the solution either. That is just petty. Energy weapons for PVE are in a very bad place. [u][b]Overall[/b][/u] I won't sugarcoat things. PVE felt slow, the fast pace, intense action, & fun factor is gone. I am disappointed. Fights with NPCs were not exciting, enemies took an absurdly long time to kill, abilities are too weak. Basically every gunfight felt dragged out. The Inverted Spire boss had great mechanics, too many adds. I found my groups spending more time focused on Adds, Ignoring the Boss altogether. In a Boss fight, The Boss should be the main attraction. However I understand adds are needed to fuel player ammo. The 2 Primary System is very dull for PVE. While it has its merits, hardly anyone I played with cycled to their second primary. They chose between Kinetic & Energy & used that 1 gun. I do not how to remedy this... I realize launch is a month out... Hopefully Bungie can address most of these issues or already have. Welp! That my current 2 cents. And... Yes this is a Beta not exclusively a Server Stress Test. Beta tests are how companies get feedback on a product in order to make improvements. Feedback must be given. Just tucking your head in the ground & saying its a Beta & the final version will be better is how games like Destiny 1, & Final Fantasy 14 (Before A Realm Reborn was made.) come into existence. Edit: Various corrections, clarifications.