This thread is inspired by another: view original post
I think it's about time we take a harrrd took at the actual purpose of power in this game and if there really couldn't be a better way.
I'm sure most will just look at it as the cut and dry method of progression so that you can actually get to the point of being able to do higher-level activities. It's that vain sense of progression every season that I feel like I see more and more complaints about overtime like:
8 layer RNG to get an average clearance level to content.
The constant reclimbing of the same hill with the only thing really mattering being the power difference between two beings and not the values themselves, eventually capping out.
Power tries to be canonical as a reflection of how strong our Guardians are [i]really[/i] getting, however, this feels faulty (Crow saving Osiris with a sunset sword?) and is more of the arbitrary game mechanic for the sake fo game, except with even less purpose.
Do we even really need this system, or could we do something better? I feel like we can. There are already relatively describable difficulties within the various power deltas, from grey dregs you'll find on Earth, to the red boys worth actually paying attention to, the red skulls that are scary, and the question marks of death. What if we translated some of this to enemy specific difficulties? Like other shooters, let's use Halo for an example, an easy grunt is quite literally nothing, while one on Legendary can actually mess you up. How would this be any different from Destiny? Easy grunt you're just way overleveled while the legendary one is up in red skull territory. It's somewhat of a parallel, it just looks different.
Would this be better? It could feel relatively the same, but could also be slightly different:
For one, instead of some random 1050 thrall, it could just be designated as 'Easy' with an appropriate icon or something else distinctive.
Raids can get their easy mode for learning/teaching at the expense of rewards. Can get even harder for more.
RNG could be effectively eliminated from player progression.
What would have to replace this RNG in the level things drop at and still provide about the same sense of progression, such that the "power grind" is not lost, but liberated of RNG. I feel this could be easy, XP. XP is very much still a thing and only serves the season pass and artifact, it used to serve character level too. Why not bring this back? Was anything truly wrong with it? Character levels used to serve as the gates from content, too low and you just wouldn't even be allowed in. We can learn something from that. Don't need to level gate everything to the extreme, but somethings could probably benefit from having them. Something like Trials.
If everyone starts at say 0, so do cheaters, which means quite the road ahead in order to even attempt to ruin people's time. Could easily be a deterrent if it's just too inconvenient.
I want to develop this more with the community with feedback or other ways to make it better. I would love suggestions because I truly think we need a change for the better, the system Luke designed for four year olds has grown to be tediously arbitrary and overly dependent on RNG where it is unnecessary.
Plus, you can't power cap things when there is no power, let the sandbox control what people want to use, not some stupid number.
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1 ReplyPower NEEDS to be more rewarding because it really does just feel like a difficulty slider every season. You don't keep anything from growing power, not even the tiniest boost to stats in any way. It exists solely as a way to gatekeep players from just obliterating content and every season it always feels exactly the same. Theres no permanence to what you get from spending HOURS farming it besides a number that makes you kill one set of enemies just as fast as the respective power enemies last season and the season before that. There is no real growth to playing the game other than when bungie tunes the sandbox. It's a loot game where everything is basically pointless, including the loot, because 9/10 times it's just going to be used as infusion for something else you like better to make you kill that same acolyte with a different color in the exact same amount of bullets as last season. There's literally no permanence to the game, not even weapons or armor anymore and they've only made this feeling of exhaustion worse. I don't have any solutions on how to fix it because I honestly don't think you can. It's not a proper leveling system, it's just an artificial gatekeeper, nothing more and nothing less.