Bad design. Weapons Desgin Lead for D2----Jon Weisznewski (who left Bungie back in the Spring)----was a guy who had a clear bias towards PVP...towards Destiny as primarily a shooter rather than an RPG.... ...and I believe wanted the Crucible to become the next Overwatch and an e-sport. So EVERYTHING in the sandbox in Y1 of D2 was designed to LIMIT the range of player power, and to simplify balancing the sandbox for PVP. So that PVP would be kept a game of SHOOTING SKILL. Which resulted in a vanilla D2 that was basically designed around a PVP end game..... ....and it BROKE PVE. A vault full of exotics that no one uses is the wreckage left behind by Weisznewski's agenda...and his being out of touch (imo) with the identity of the game, and what the community as a whole wanted from the game. No personal disrespect to Weisznewski----I've listened to dozens of hours of interviews he'd given about the game, and he seems to be genuinely nice guy...smart guy----but when Luke Smith talks about a **unified** vision of the game, I believe he's refering to the split between himself and guys like Weisznewski and Hamrick. Guys who kept working against the effort to make Destiny into a satisfying MMO-action-RPG hybrid that Smith (and Chris Barrett) wanted the game to be. Because they were committed to PVP...and turning Destiny into a spritual successor to Halo and it PVP legacy. That legacy---which includes the wreckage in your vault----has been an anchor around the neck of the game, and has kept it from realizing its potential. Hopefully---and its starting to look like it---this anchor has been lifted now that most of these guys have left Bungie.....and the game can turn a permanent corner.

well its about the meta in pvp from what i can tell in threads here. what happened was, exotic drops, its really good, pvpers then use nothing else, everyone complains its overpowered, it gets nerfed to be no better than the others and legendaries (in case some ppl dont have the exotic to compete with it anyway) and then everyone complains again. and then there is a new meta be it the latest new exotic, pre-nerf, or a combo of other weapons. i see a thread here about wardcliff coil, rock and dust or something combo. 3 weapons apparently being complained everyone is using. thats the current meta and will likely vanish next patch as one, two or all 3 weapons are nerfed. personally i never run the meta, because if im in pvp its usually in rumble to do a bounty or a quest for a weapon. so i take my normal pve loadout into rumble. i play weapons that feel right for whatever class, so hunter runs ace of spades and main energy is ringing nail, with a machine gun. warlock has ether doctor, and the monarch bow (she has other bow and ringing nail also) with machine gun. my titan was gonna run an exotic machine gun and ringing nail, and maybe the kinetic bow you get in forsaken campaign - but there doesnt seem to be an exotic machine gun. yet.

On my warlock the only two exotics I use are Lunafactions and Transversive steps.

The exotics aren't useless. Just other stuff is too strong.

As a warlock I dont really feel the need to where exotic armor, but when I do I equip ophidian aspects because it just has a more niche utility for crucible rather than most warlock exotics that are more useful for pve

Bungie ruined Skull. It's literally useless now. Thanks, elitists.

I mean, the fact that the stag literally requires you to die to actually be effective is the most stupid thing I've ever heard of.

Wait for the exotics that you can buy during battlepass

People would use them more often if they actually competed against shotguns. I like playing with rat king for instance, it's fun to get a kill, go invisible, pop out on an enemy and kill them too. But, that is extremely rare when all you see is every scrub dipshit player in this game use a shotgun that ohk you from 40 feet away. By the time you get two rounds out, you die instantly. You can put the sub machine gun (forgot the name right now) Again, it's fun to use, but by the time you get someone half health. you die instantly to a shotgun. Exotics don't need a buff, shotguns just need a nerf or to be removed from pvp all together. The only shotgun in pvp should be chaperon. It's damn good, but it misses a lot. It also requires the user to actually sort of arm at the head to proc a ohk.

Exotics aren't meant to be overpowered ( Although some are more or less because of overall utility) . I would say more exotics have a niche use. You dont have to play optimally all the time, sometimes you can just kickback and have some fun. Throw on the rat king and invis shoulder charge people in the crucible Throw on the helm of saint 14 and put you bubble in high traffic doorways or blind people with you shield Throw on the ashen wake with grenadier and throw fireballs non-stop Throw on the Lion Rampant and the Skyburners and rain death from the skies. The point is, most exotics might not be for every activity, but they can all be used in certain scenarios for the mix up fun factor. Not to mention catching people off guard with weird setups is funny.