We haven’t heard exactly how much easier it’ll be to upgrade exotics once the DLC drops. That being said, I still feel robbed. I know I’m not Destiny’s target audience. I’m a filthy casual who sometimes manages to scrape together enough time for a real grind (i.e. Iron Banner). I have, as of this week, just managed to get two characters to level 29. I don’t raid much. I simply don’t have the time to dedicate to finding a group and then make it through. I’ve done it start to finish once. I’ve leveled up a few exotics, and it felt like they took forever. Because as of next week, it’s taken 3 months for me to get my characters and equipment to the point they are. I can’t even imagine those who have invested more time than me and leveled so many exotics it makes my head spin to think of the time/materials/shards(energy)/glimmer involved. I was really looking forward to the DLC, as I know a lot of us were. The new content was going to be a welcome addition to a game that I was thoroughly enjoying despite some of the minor/major annoyances. When the patch hit and I could buy materials instead of having to spend my limited time farming them was like a hand from above reaching down to help lift me up out of the grindy quagmire and into the meat of the game that I loved so much. My Bad Juju felt amazing. My Mida was a powerhouse. I won’t lie. I’m a full-grown man and tears sprung unbidden to my eyes when I read the blog post outlining the changes coming with the DLC, especially those that affected exotics. With blurry vision from wet eyes, I read how the efforts and TIME I’d invested to get where I am would have to be wiped away in order to continue progressing in the game. To say time is limited for me is an understatement. I work two jobs, I have a young child, and I’m attending college part time. Whenever I got a chance to play, I would excitedly pick up bounties and hope for some blessed RNG to help me progress even further. I still played a lot. A lot more than I’m comfortable admitting, but it was an act of love. Even the grindy bits left me satisfied when I saw the light at the end of the tunnel and even felt like I’d truly accomplished something after playing IB enough to get 3 characters to rank 4 from scratch and farming glimmer to buy the equipment. Then I had fun levelling all of it up and sinking my hard-earned shards into it to bring me to level 29 with anticipation of hitting 30 with the DLC. Now I’ve learned that despite how much I enjoyed the time I spent with Destiny to this point, it was pretty much all for nothing. My legendarys won’t aid me in the new content. I have to farm reputation, which is painfully slow in coming, in order to purchase gear that is better than what I have but still not as good as what can be achieved in the raid (which I still won’t have the time or the team to do). The exotics that I’ve painstakingly levelled with limited shards, glimmer, materials, and TIME have to be taken back to the start (albeit with upgraded damage) just to keep them viable. My 29’s will face an uphill battle for new gear in the weeklies with the level being raised to 30. My 28 titan will be all but useless, even with her Iron Banner gear that at this point seems pointless to upgrade. Why? Why did you take all that I’ve given to this game since it launched and turned it on its end, dumped it onto the ground, and told me to scrape myself together and start over? Why have you made my efforts to this point pretty much meaningless? Why do those of us who have given so much to your game, through all the iterations up to this point, have to cross our fingers yet again, load up a level, and pray that we get something worthwhile at the end? And our time, Bungie, our time is irreplaceable. We have spent countless hours in your game world that was shipped with a fraction of the content that was promised. One has only to look at the dev art that cycles through when patches are loading to see what Destiny could have been versus what it is. But we stuck it out. We stayed with you through the hurdles and the learning curves to this point. We enjoyed a lot and were pained by more than a little. And at the end of the day, you’re asking us to wipe away everything we’ve invested up to this point and start over fresh? Why not go that little step further and just hard wipe the servers like you did after the beta? Why not send us all back to square one? Because at least then those of us who have invested more hours than we like, and those who have invested far more hours than me, wouldn’t feel so cheated when an exotic weapon goes on sale with Xur and we have to pay for the privilege of starting over on our upgrade path while someone can drop a few coins more and be at the exact same point we are. I didn’t mind the grind up to this point because, especially with Iron Banner, it really felt like I was getting somewhere. Now the veil has been lifted and I see that I’ve actually been running in place all this time. No, sorry. Worse than that. I’ve actually been walking the wrong way: blowing shards and energy and materials and glimmer and TIME on exotics that have to, for all intents and purposes, be repurchased and then re-leveled just to remain viable. Are you really telling everyone that while their early adoption of the game and their countless hours of troubleshooting your broken system have been appreciated, we have to pretty much start all over again? I don’t have the TIME for that. I don’t have the energy (or the shards). You’ve moved the carrot so far back that it feels like I’m waking up in that rusted car graveyard again. Only this time, the novelty and promise of what is to come has been stripped away and I can see, in all its horror, what waits for me after innumerable more hours have been invested: absolutely nothing. Have I enjoyed the time I’ve spent with Destiny? I’ve loved it. But part of that love came from the naïve idea that I was working toward something tangible: a goal, a light level, a maxed exotic, new gear. You have, in one tragic moment, stripped away what I thought I accomplished and told me that it’s not good enough and thrown me back to where I was weeks ago. My 29 is, as of December 9th, what a 27 is now: not entirely useless, but far from the character I worked so hard to gear up, level up, and get to this point. You’ve taken it all away and given nothing in return but promises of better gear, RNG based upgrade paths, and a miniscule amount of new content. You promised us something great, Bungie. You delivered something that fell far short of greatness. We stuck with you through it all. But this is worse than a slap in the face. This is a knife in the back. I wish I could have back the time I spent with the game to this point. Since it had to be wasted and thrown aside with nary a thought, it would have been nice if I could have invested it in something that wouldn’t be taken away from me as soon as I achieved it. I hope that with time you come to see the error in your logic. I hope that the investments of your players amount to more at some point in the future. Until then, I’m sorry to say that I have to step away. This has stung me in a way that even things in my real life don’t. I feel robbed. I feel abused. I feel completely forgotten, unappreciated, and downtrodden. I feel like everything I’ve given to Destiny up until now has been repaid with a beautifully wrapped box that when opened turns out to have been empty all along. …We’re sorry, but your princess is in another castle… And at the end of the day, the place that Destiny held in my heart now feels empty. All that remains are the promises of what could have been, what should have been, and what actually is. And everywhere, the stunned silence of guardians who stand in disbelief at how our efforts have been rewarded. "And silence still. Nothing but silence."