This direction bungie took is negatively bad for them. this expansion leaves thousands of paying customers behind . those solo players and those who don't raid nor want mechanics that require talking to strangers to play. no class item no exotic heavy. bungie should of left a back door to acquire these items via other means. as of this date that haven't addressed the problem. or have made even one statement regarding the major flaw in this release .

[quote]For a strictly solo player, this is- arguably- the worst expansion to date. Solo players have been locked out of what can only be described as essential content. That includes access to the exotic class item, as well as access to the new exotic weapon Microcosm. Both of which would have likely been attainable by anyone if Bungie had followed their own established exotic mission trends. For perspective, I'm a ten year veteran of the game who has been playing since the alpha of Destiny 1. I've done just about everything under the sun, with a fireteam and without. These days I play solo, because time was not friendly to my fireteam, and for one reason or another we no longer play together. I still dip into the raids and other endgame content when it seems interesting (or worthwhile). I'm a fairly capable player at this point, both in terms of experience and skill. Playing through the legendary campaign solo I found to be a draining and tedious experience. What enjoyment I had in seeing mechanics make their way into fights was quickly overshadowed by the sombering realization that they'd treated every single fight in that manner. Every. Single. Fight. Each became a laborious timesink. Every boss had health gates. And every death required a restart, even the ones that weren't earned (teleporting in one-shot tripmines to a dynamic battlefield midway through a battle is a cheap trick, not a fun mechanic). I don't expect to waltz through a legendary campaign, but given my skill and experience levels, I expected to have a smoother time than I did. This wasn't an enjoyable bump in difficulty in my opinion. It was a frustratingly drawn out experience laden with cheap mechanics and behaviors that soured my enjoyment of the story at large. Then we move on to the introduction of the Pathfinder system. Ostensibly, this system is meant to enable players to do what they want and earn rewards that Bungie has removed from the traditional bounty system (which has largely been eliminated from the game, with a few exceptions). In practice, though, it is again a case of Bungie saying one thing but doing another. Despite repeatedly talking about giving players more agency, more ability to play their way, Pathfinder seems to force players into different activities- regardless of what they want. For some reason, the Pathfinder board is shared between Vanguard and Crucible, even though Bungie has demonstrated that they can separate the board by activity (the Pale Heart has its own, for instance). That means if you're a PvE player that refuses to engage with PvP content, you will not be able to earn the rewards that you previously, normally would have using this new system. Similarly, if you're a PvP player that doesn't engage with the story content, you will not be able to earn those rewards either (despite previously being able to). There is no way to change the nodes, so- despite the actual system being agnostic to what you do- Bungie seems inclined to force you into playing what they want. In my case? I done been there, man. I am not interested in PvP even in the slightest, not even for ten seconds. It is enormously frustrating, then, to be locked out of rewards I normally would've been able to acquire via bounties because Bungie has replaced them with this half-assed system. This frustration then extends into the next two areas of concern for our strictly-solo players at large.. In the case of the exotic class item, while solo players can actually unlock access to the mission, completing it requires two- and only two- players, and that's not optional. It utilizes rune mechanics that require two people to complete, and it has a timer. This is, notably, bad for both fireteams and solo players. A fireteam in Destiny is three players. This means that even if you have a regular fireteam with whom you play, one of you will not be able to join the other two in completion of this mission. This also means that, subsequently, one of your friends (or you) will be doing twice the work, since they'll need to repeat it with the person who was unable to join the first time around. For individuals with anxiety or social interaction disorders, this activity requires active communication. You will not be able to simply work it out together with bullets and intuition. With regards to the new exotic weapon Microcosm, Bungie has locked that behind 'coop focus' missions. Despite the name implying it, there is no matchmaking here. Once more you'll need to reach out and find a group, and again you will need to communicate with those individuals. If you have anxiety or a social interaction disorder, this activity requires active communication. These missions are not soloable. Not because of difficulty, but because they've specifically inserted enemies and mechanics which- by design- require multiple players and active use of the communication channels. I'm not sure who approved this decision, but it was a mistake in my opinion. While Bungie heavily advertised these rewards, they never indicated at any point that they'd be locked behind activities that require this level of interaction. To some, this may seem trivial, but for folks with the aforementioned issues something like active communication can be an insurmountable barrier. It's also in direct contradiction to the established trend for exotic missions. At the end of the day, some people will not be able to get something they probably should be able to acquire. This issue doesn't have to impact me personally to see it as problematic. I would argue both Microcosm and the class exotic are essential for this DLC, and that all players are entitled to earn them regardless of their play preference. In other words, I believe both should be achievable by anyone by themselves, or with a partner, or with a fireteam. This isn't a competition- we're all on the same side. If you're a solo player that is fine with some limited interaction, your success will vary. The game isn't very conducive to text chat, and even when I've used the text chat in the past people have just straight up ignored it. Though, in this case given the communication is a forced expectation they may be more likely to pay attention. The mission is timed and there are few opportunities to convey a message, so if you're typing, you'll want to be quick. It just seems like another unnecessary hurdle in an expansion that's been filled with them. Who, exactly, is calling for all this? It feels too easy to simply fall into the trap of blaming streamers and their audiences, who seemingly have a disproportionately large impact on audience perception. But, glancing around the forums and the myriad messages from upset players, it does seem a bit like Bungie has catered to a relatively small percentage of their playerbase. To what effect, one must ask. Especially in light of the abysmal launch. Beyond Bungie completely bungling the 24 hour maintenance downtime (in fact, it was some 26 hours before they were "back"), the game was inaccessible by many nearly two days after it was meant to launch, and for some remains so. The raid was subsequently stilted by the poor launch, with world's first teams suffering from disconnects and crashes. Those that streamed their attempts- and parternered with Bungie to profit in the viewership- did so with black or blurred screens, muted voices, and/or full-screen face cams. Entire chunks of the raid were a miss, because teams were so competitive, so incentivized to withhold information, that they frequently left fans with larges swathes of time watching nothing, listening to nothing. Remind me how that's good, again? And they were stuck like that for some 19 hours, because the raid was so difficult to complete. The streamers and other raiders might tell you they had fun; but, having seen their sallow, sweaty, disappointed faces after being hours into a raid and making no progress, I'm not so sure. I hear them say that, but I just don't [i]see[/i] that. Remind me how something that difficult, that inaccessible, is meant to revive interest in the raids? Bungie actively identifies and laments how few engage with their endgame content, but then continues to make that content beyond accessible for the majority of its playerbase. As a solo player, this campaign felt like a confusing insult. The Pale Heart is a solo instance! You can unlock the exotic class mission solo! Bungie regularly rewards solo completions with emblems. But this time they suddenly decide to scrap all of that? The messaging across all this makes no sense. I am unhappy with this release. I'm even unhappier for my homies who won't be in here telling you how upset this makes them, because the community can be so toxic they refuse to engage at all. To me, Bungie lost sight of the fun in their chase for difficulty. While there is a lot of potential here, there are also some serious missteps with regards to accessibility that I think Bungie needs to address.[/quote] Bump.

A long thread, but I read and agreed with every word 👏👏👏 No doudt the Destiny Defense League will go to town on you though.

My feelings almost exactly. Well said by you. I physically can’t use headsets because I have poor hearing. It causes a lot of anxiety and frustration for me when I’m having to depend solely on auditory cues. I’ve always been a visual person and it’s become more and more necessary as I’ve gotten older and my hearing has worsened. I’ve had severe Tinnitus in both ears for over 20 years. I never have even a second of silence. I can’t even begin to describe to someone how terrible it is. I try to mask it using EarPods and background sounds and music but it keeps me from being able to adequately focus on speech in a headset. I rely on subtitles with just about every bit of content I watch and play. It has created a lot of social anxiety for me, to the point that I don’t like talking on phones or ordering food in drivethrus. I know it’s a sensitive subject in video game communities but companies (Bungie not the only one) are catering more and more to streamers and content creator communities. I know that is like free advertisement for your game and company in a very competitive market but it’s actually putting them out of touch with most of their actual game community. I’ve played Destiny since the very first year and I’ve spent way more money (content and silver) on the game than most. I love the game, but I loved it because I can play the game in so many ways with the time and shortcomings that I do have. I’ve never raided because of the problems with anxiety and my ears, but I can still play PVP and match made activities and feel like I’m helping other people get through things. It has enabled me to feel like I’m part of fireteams. The Final Shape is very good and creative content but it is heading in a direction that I fear will make me need to leave the game for good (I recently came back after a couple years break to play other games and reset a bit. I’ve had a ball with Onslaught and so many other things like Iron Banner and even patrolling around. However, the latest campaigns and now the class item missions are just telling me that it’s gonna be too hard and not fun to continue as a solo player. The campaign on normal and even legendary is not impossible to do solo but the mechanics are just a little over the top and annoying just to get through that story to unlock other content. It’s too raid-like and really needs fireteam interactions to truly enjoy it. It’s perhaps a ME problem, but it’s a problem nonetheless. I want to keep having fun but it’s just heading in a bad bad direction. I do recognize the brilliance of the work that Bungie has put into it all. Just needs to be a bit more in touch with the majority of the community.

Very well put, and very good points. Agree totally with them all. Prepare for incoming this is an mmo and suchlike comments.

Exceptional feedback imo. Personally I’ll continue to play solo, the only activities I really enjoy doing are dungeons and while a solo player can complete them I find it more enjoyable playing with buddies from clan, although anymore trying to get any of them to do so is few and far between because to them the rewards are lackluster they’d rather run raids and I just don’t got time for them anymore as opposed to running them multiple times a week like I used to in D1. I whole heartedly agree on the microcosm mission and pathfinder, the exotic class item to me is just not worth it to even bother with the mission. Hope this post is noticed though this is the kind of feedback they should be paying attention to.

Well said, sir.

Great post - I agree 100% with just about everything you said. I’m in a clan, but everyone has conflicting schedules, so there’s typically only three of us online when I can log on. When we decide to run the mission, one guy will need to sit out of the first run. Then one guy will need to run it again. That’s what is most frustrating and disappointing to me.

Great post. Valid complaints followed with sound reasoning and examples. I didnt preorder the expansion. Learned my lesson. Still haven't bought it. I wanted the game to get me excited. Sure the cutscene are a step above what they've been before. But I'm not incentivized to play with the new subclass. Lot of abilities I'd like to use aren't available. New fun new guns to play with to entice me out the money down. Even the first mission in echoes doesn't pay out squat. Pathfinder is an exercise in tedium to find the best route to progress with the minimum amount of engaging on your least favorite activities. And i feel like a lot of the new menu UI's are visual noise that I hate looking at. Just my 2 cents

Strictly a solo player myself and seeing both Microcosm and these class items behind such levels of communication is stress inducing. Already have to deal with anxiety alone so any stress just amplifies all that. Not to mention that while I do have friends that play this, our time is very limited and both are New Lights who only own WQ and LF (due to them having been on PS+). The toxicity around the place is why I refuse to look for anyone to play with. Not to mention finding more fun when running around alone. No clue who at Bungie decided these two missions should require near to raid level communication but that wasn't going to end up being received well by many. I have done raids as well as GMs but those levels of communication was too much. Even done all legendary campaigns solo. But the Pale Heart remains the most mind numbing thing with these exotics. WHY in all that is alive do we need to use the optional LFG feature to get these? For raids I get! Dungeons are the same deal. GMs included. But why an exotic that halts an entire side quest due to needing a premade fireteam and a complex unlock that can be solo requiring specifically 2 people? I understand clearing it once per character allows you to solo farm them but that mission alone can be too much to near impossible to so many players. Not everyone out here is capable of soloing a GM or use loadout swapping. A small percentage of the playerbase takes on raids due to how bad the LFG experience can be. May not be bad for some but for others, they'd probably rather walk on a path made of Legos with nails pointing up than risk being belittled or bullied. Only way I learnt to have fun was to screw whatever was meta and just use what I enjoy. Example: Unbreakable. I hear people saying it's bad but having used it since unlocking: the fun of getting on overshield to recover health in the heat of combat paired with a specific fragment (can't remember the name of it) just gives so much up time to stay fighting. And one more thing with the class items: Bungie promoting them as a key part of Prismatic only to do this shows how much they listen to the majority of the community. Too busy trying to please everyone that everyone ends up angered by something. Then the toxic side decide to capitalise on it and fuel the fire.

This, what you said, OP, is totally correct and very well formulated too. Hats off!

Very well said, cheers! While I do not mind some limited interaction & multiplayer as someone with a disability, I find it easier to either play solo or with the one other friend who plays D2. I would love to see some changes to make solo play more rewardable and / or to make using a microphone a truly optional choice. Perhaps a ping system? Or something along those lines. Accessibility is a huge thing & currently I feel Bungie is not paying any mind to it.

I couldn't have said it better myself, man you're spot on

I support your view. Bungie has lost contact with the needs of their player base.

Yeah, totally on board with you ! 1. It's really not that simple for some people. 2. It shouldn't be necessary, esp in a game that hasn't made it necessary for 10yrs. Simply no reason. This is more of bungie's control freak dev style, forcing people to play bungie's way. Players have no freedom in this game. Dont use the excuse "this is an mmo/multiplayer game", because there are guardian rank objectives to beat dungeons solo. solo play is an integral part of the game, sure i understand for raids and dungeons (if your not good enough to solo) but for everything else there just isnt a -blam!- reason for this.

Very well said 👍 This is great feedback. Good luck to you and all Guardians and whatever content you are playing/ attempting.