No mercy! If your still in the fight you’ve got a chance. The number of times I’ve trailed 3-4 rounds in countdown to pull it back and win. If your a player short that’s a different story.

To rare for most players to be a factor. 9 out of 10 times if you lose 3 rounds in a row your going to lose the match.

I know I just don’t like to give up!

Its not a matter of giving up. Its a matter of math, being farmed, & draging a losing game out longer than it needs to be. Matches should not be fist to win 6 rounds (meaning you can go for 7,8,9 even in theory 11 total rounds) in countdown. It should be best of 6. First team to win 4 rounds wins the match, if both teams win 3 rounds there is a tie breaker round. Same with other multi-round matches. Right now they take waynto long.

Totally agree that they take to long. I just don’t agree with a mercy kicking in. If your still in the fight you still have a chance. Plus you have to take into consideration host migration. It might be that the first few rounds they have host advantage. You don’t want to be mercied before you get host and the chance to bring it back.

Host dont change unless the host leaves. This is also not COD the host does not work the same way in a P2P environment vs a dedicated server one. In P2P regardless of who is host your signal may be routed through 2 or more other players before reaching the "server" that updates the other players & you, unlike in COD setup where you have a direct connection to the host only, who acts like a security guard & corrects for any time difference (lag) with players in the game.

So why can the first few minutes of a match everything feels nice and crispy, shots landing as they should and the likes. Then all of a sudden it goes to pot. Shots don’t register or there’s a delay in them registering. Then all of a sudden they make a miraculous come back. I’ve had it the other way round too. Starting off the match with shots not registering then finishing the match with everything being crispy and is making a come back. If it’s not host migration/damage referee is it some kind of catch up mechanic?

Its neather. Its lag & the way P2P system handles the data moving around. Peoples internet fluctuates. Lag & speed go up & down. There is a thing called buffer bloat that creates lag, as more data flows in to the person router it gets buffered & sent in bursts. The more devices on the router & more data (than the router can handle at one time) the worse the buffer bloat. Now in P2P your not connected to a server or host per say. Every one tries to keep a connection to everyone, even if that connection has to pass through another player. So as the match starts & data starts flowing peoples routers & upload bandwith get over loaded. Lag moves in. Connections may switch around very rarely. What you experience is a persons laggie connection your connected to calming down or acting up when the game changes, then you have to factor this over 8 players. You might be crispy to player 5, but 5 cant register shots on you due to his connection back to you going through player 2 with a poor connection first. But you cant hit 7 for the same reason & 8 is teleporting becouse he cant hold a stable connection to anyone. As the game goes on players internet, router, wireless, stress on console/pc, the route (path through internet to others), hops (internet hubs the packets pass through as they travel point to point), either start to act up, lag, go down & have to be rerouted, packets get lost & have to be resent, & so on. This stuff is not as simple as people think it is. But its why most games go with a dedicated server & not P2P. With only 1 path it removes alot of variables & chances of problems, but at the same time opens the door for the 1 person picked to act as the "host" to get a slight advantage & the possibility to use mods (like you have seen in past COD games, it requires you to be host to use the mod menu) to cheat in PVP. Hope that helps to explain some of how networking works.

It does, thank you very much for taking the time to explain and in a way that’s understandable! Would a gaming router help in any way for Destiny or are they just a waist of money? I’ve read mixed feelings about them here on the forums and can’t decide if they’re worth the investment.

Depending on what router you have, it may be better than the one you have. The real thing with gaming routers is not so much the hardware as it is the software that runs them. They tend to handle the buffer bloat better than standard routers, but a good midgrade one can to with some tweaking & maybe reflashing with a aftermarket firmware (not recommended with out some knowledge of what your doing). As far as hardware goes thats just a matter of how many devices you have, download & upload speeds, how much wireless range you need, & what "extras" you want (like network storage, 3g/4g backup internet, vpn support, & all that). The more devices, the faster the speeds, & the more extras the more ram & faster the cpu needs to be. I think the asus routers (if you pay for the access) has there own back end servers to help limit lag & stuff (by rerouting your game traffic through there own relays). From a company called WTFast. I dont use it. It sounds good on paper but only if every one is using it. If your using it you have good low lag to them, but they may still have bad high lag to you. Its also not free (limited free usage in the asus routers) you have to pay for a subscription to it. Is it worth $300+ for one of those routers? In my opinion no. Unless gaming is your life, income, & done competitive daily (as in with others who would have the same kind of router) then maybe. But you can get a good Asus, Linksys (gpu), or any other Linux based router & with proper configuring & maybe a firmware change get really good performance for $100-$150. You have to remember whats on your end is only 1/3 of the problem. The other 2/3 is the other players routers & everything between you & them. Real question i guess would be do you want to save $200+ or buy a router "mostly" preset to prioritize what game traffic it can detect.