This Week At Bungie – 02/04/2016

Derek: After the update, players will start certain matches without Special Ammo. Once the match has begun, those green Special crates will behave in the same ways you’re used to (although you may be looking for them a bit more).

Derek: The PvP team wanted to increase the use of Primary weapons, especially at match-start. Sniper rifles and shotguns, in particular, inspire great happiness or sadness depending on which end of the weapon you find yourself. We wanted to somewhat delay that gratification (and sadification).

Derek: Please don’t say “Meta.”

Derek: All 3v3 playlists will feature the new Special Ammo behavior. Skirmish, Salvage, Elimination, Trials, and any rotating 3v3 playlists are covered. I will take special care to say that Rumble is not a 3v3 mode, and is safe from this change.

Derek: There’s no proof of that. No, seriously, there are several reasons to limit this change to the 3v3 modes. First, the larger gametypes are generally less sensitive to initial conditions, which gives us more freedom to have Special Weapons going from the beginning. Also, smaller gametypes like Skirmish are a bit more hardcore, with more weight applied to each player in the match, so we felt we could try pushing Primary weapons for those initial engagements. Conversely, Control is the friendliest place to enter the Crucible, so we wanted to make sure that we don’t present new players with a fundamentally different game than what they’re used to.

Jerpie: Freelance 6v6 and Freelance 3v3 are mixed-mode playlists that are only accessible by solo players – no Fireteams allowed. Freelance playlists will be available sporadically on the weekly rotators in your Director.

Jerpie: The design goal of Freelance playlists was to facilitate an even playing field. Both teams will be on equal ground, though an advantage can be gained by opening a voice channel to Team Chat. A secondary goal was to provide playlists with a wider variety of engagements. Featuring mixed-modes with all of their associated maps means players will have a much more diverse experience and see less repetition in the combinations selected by matchmaking.

Jerpie: Freelance 6v6 features a mix of Clash, Control, and Rift. Freelance 3v3 features a mix of Elimination, Salvage, and Skirmish.

Paul: "Damage Referee" is our code-name for upcoming changes to the way Destiny handles things that can go wrong when you’re playing games online. Our goal is to give you a better experience in the Crucible when there are Internet problems outside of your control.

Paul: In short, we're trying to fix the Internet. Streaming movies, wireless connections, the speed of light, and a host of other things are all conspiring to harm your online experience. Normal network latency is bad enough, but even simple problems become extremely complex when the information your console is sending and receiving can be unexpectedly delayed, dropped, duplicated, folded, spindled, or mutilated. It's impossible to solve completely, but Damage Referee is our latest attempt to improve things for the vast majority of you.

Paul: If your connection is good, a typical Destiny PvP match should feel like your best ones do now. Obviously things won't always be perfect, but we think you'll notice a positive difference pretty quickly. Your weapons will feel a bit more reliable, your kills will feel a bit snappier, and players with poor connections should be less frustrating to fight.

Paul: If your connection is bad, we'll be giving you even more reasons to improve it. Expect to lose fights a lot more often, even if you think you shot first or escaped behind cover in time. Things will get much better once you fix your connection, but at least you'll receive fewer angry messages in the meantime.

Paul: Not necessarily. The connection bars we show in-game are designed to give you a moment-to-moment idea of how good or bad each player's connection is to all other players in the game (not to our servers). There are many factors that go into determining your color on the coded scale. Even if your own connection is the best it can be, terrible performance elsewhere on the Internet can still compromise your experience.  When you see a red or yellow bar next to somebody’s name, it indicates problems with their average connection to other players (and usually to you, too).  If it’s your own bar that’s stuck on red, our Network Troubleshooting Guide has some tips to help you improve it.

Gavin: If you’ve ever been the “runner” in the Daughters of Oryx encounter, you’ve probably encountered an incredibly annoying issue where your camera would snap back to a default position. We’ve fixed that, which should make the runner’s job more enjoyable.

Gavin: We thought teleporting ogres in the Oryx encounter were totally OP, so we nerfed them into the ground! Actually, there was an unfortunate issue where the bombs were capable of blocking the Ogre’s pathfinding. That resulted in them occasionally making a very frustrating teleport to get past the blocked path. Oryx Challenge Mode should be a little more forgiving now.

DPS: Thursday, Feb. 4, Destiny servers underwent maintenance in preparation for Update 2.1.1.

With each update, we encounter reports of players being required to re-download all update content in order to play Destiny once again, or general issues installing the most recent update. We’re aware that some consoles attempt to verify previously installed patches to ensure there are no issues with previously downloaded content. Do not cancel out of this verification, or you will be required to re-download all previous updates.

Please ensure that you have enough memory present on your console to accept the most recent patch. Additional information can be found within this Help Article. Additionally, if your download stalls for an extended amount of time, you may need to cancel your download and update manually. 

If you experience any console specific error codes when attempting to download Update 2.1.1, troubleshooting can be provided by PlayStation Support, or Xbox Support.

Finally, Crimson Days will begin February 9th when Update 2.1.1 is deployed. Look to help.bungie.net for the Crimson Days Guided Support and FAQ, which will become available when the event goes live.

Cozmo: Thank for joining us for another Movie of the Week. We have selected several exciting films for you that were created by members of the Community. The winner and honorable mentions will all be awarded a special emblem to commemorate their accomplishment. Would you like to see your video featured as a future MOTW? Submit it the Creations page and we will give it watch.

Enjoy this week’s batch.