It's a short barrel gun. You can stand at that distance and aim a 44 mag in the same exact spot and never hit the same hole.

I'm going to explain this the best I can, no tl;dr here because it won't make sense, here it goes: Take a real life situation, if you have a pistol, the aim is only so big, the aim on that pistol is only so effective after X range. After X range has been reached, the sight is now covering over more than just a headshot, there's a larger "invisible cone" of where the bullet could possibly go, that's larger than the sight. The bullet can travel anywhere inside of this invisible cone. Now going back to triple's video: You will see that he shoots his hand cannon in the exact same spot from the exact same range every time (hence, this is a controlled experiment). Some times he gets a headshot, sometimes a body shot, and sometimes it misses. Triple wreck is partially correct when he says that there is "RNG aim," but I believe he doesn't fully understand. At the range that he was at in his video, he had reached that X range I talked about earlier, which means there was an "invisible cone" in which the bullet could go anywhere inside of it. This explains why some bullets hit his head, some body shot, and some near his head. The RNG aim in this situation only applies inside of this cone, not the actual aim. Edit: dang... Replies are almost 50/50... This post wasn't made to be an attack, just showing that the test in this video didn't check all it's bases. That being said, it's still quite possible that ghost bullets are a thing, but this video didn't prove it

0:47 "Our shots aren't disappearing into another dimension" Soon followed by proof that the bullets are in fact still there, hitting the wall behind the target. So no, Ghost bullets don't exist. Confirmed in this video. Thank you. :) [spoiler] When we say ghost bullets don't exist, that doesn't mean don't know bloom does. We've just been trying explain you that no, the bullets aren't just disappearing.[/spoiler] The funny part about this is that EVERY WEAPON has this effect at SOME range, not just hand cannons, but people seem to think it should be precise at any range for hand cannons.

It's Blume

Sometimes, half of my deaths are because I know I landed that final headshot to kill, so I stop shooting.....only to find out it missed and he shooting back.

The only thing this video shows proof of is that a short range weapon doesn't stay pin point accurate at the edge of short to mid range. The supposed "ghost bullets" hit the wall behind the target. They did not just dissappear.

Isn't this the same thing that everyone hated in Halo Reach?

He isn't for one second concluding they they are ghost bullets. He is clearly demonstrating that the accuracy has been randomized. The most relevant point is that having rng decide whether you win or lose a gunfight in an FPS is idiotic. Between this and lag, the frustration is real and constant, whether it is me or any streamer I tune into.

He is out side of the hand cannons effective range, and at that point so bullets will go off of the crosshairs (as bullets are never 100% -blam!-ing accurate) And as for bloom, every gun has it, it's called recoil.

Why would you even listen to triple wreck yeah he's a good player but he only ever uses the op stuff, give him a underpowered weapon and watch how crap he really becomes

Bungie, please explain how my shotgun missed at the end of this video. There's no possible way that I missed. Edit: Host had poor connection. http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/Lykaon/video/21439925

Stop bitching , I'm bad and I'm just tired of blaming every death on lag or ghost bullets. Just play and if your internet sucks then fix it or suffer . Now walk away

So I shoot a guy square on the bloody nose with my sniper and the game will not register it and says I miss, guy misses the head of the three guardians completely and the game gives him a triple kill and bungie awards him a movie of the week award . Bloody game

The thing is this is not bloom, this is something else, hit detection most likely. This issue can be found on shotguns and scouts as well. My guess is that Bungie is attempting to artificially level the playing field between those that can shot and those who can't.

I don't think it's a "bloom" or "ghost bullet" factor. . It's bungie nerfing some of your shots to give lesser skilled players a fighting chance..

Do you see his reticle on the handcannon. It's a little dot. With a barrier on each side. It looks like they just make it so at a certain distance it has a chance of landing anywhere within those barriers. Which means if he was closer, he would have hit more bullets. If the target takes up the entire space between barriers, it will always hit. If he is across map, and his head is the size of the reitcle, it has a much smaller chance of hitting, even if dot placed perfectly on head. It makes sense. It's a handcannon not a sniper. Test it standing at a very close range and show me ghost bullets. Then I'll believe you. Kind of like what happens with my shotgun at point blank.

I think the hard part for most people is understanding that the fine folks at Bungie really are trying to model what shooting a large caliber pistol is like. Without a lot of specialized attachments, the range on pistols (sidearms) and handcannons is much less than even a basic sport rifle. You really need to take your time and line up your shots. I imagine the basic gun physics sandbox is shared between all weapons, and they have to go in and add special packages on top of it to make certain adjustments for certain weapons. So handcannons obviously have additional scripts that kick in to simulate worse accuracy at distance and that kick we all know and love that requires a deft hand in real life. What they're doing in terms of mechanics makes sense. How they are representing it in-game could be improved. That's probably not possible for Destiny, but it's probably something they are looking at for Destiny 2. Even a little tracer line or some other visual cue that showed that your aim was true, but the gun had other ideas, would be good. The mechanical balance is actually at a good spot. The representation to the player of it needs work. Unfortunately, whereas most realistic games treat pistols like the secondary weapons they are, Destiny made them a primary and forces them into a role that they aren't used for in real modern combat. But genre and sci-fi often treat pistols and blasters (Han Solo, Firefly, westerns, a lot of manga) as the only guns you need. I think hand cannons should be rolled into sidearms as a secondary weapon, giving clarity to what sidearms of all varieties are actually for. You can rework the entire class to represent a spectrum of options. They really are that trusted weapon at your side when everything else isn't working. I think you could then take high ROF/ low impact auto rifles and pulse rifles and carve out a carbine/SMG primary class for close to mid engagements and leave everything else alone. Yes, that's pretty close to BF4, but those gun classes worked well. Finally, a general idea. What would be awesome in Destiny 2 is to have them tie in the attributes as a factor. Every tier in Strength gives you a small Stability boost and Ammo Carried Capacity for Primaries across the board. Discipline boosts reload and equip speed. Intellect boosts Aim Assist and ADS speed. Just some ideas to differentiate characters more and add additional considerations for making choices.

No it's fine, it's called intended range for that gun archetype. Shooting from any range outside of it's intended range will produce these results .

Ghost bullets = misses being outside the cusp of the intended range. Take 2 steps forward and I'm willing to bet every shot will be a hit. This isn't rocket surgery or Halo for that matter.

What exactly is bloom? Edit: thank you both, I now get it. It seems bloom is the closest thing to what shooting a gun actually is. Id hope its on all guns. As aggravating as people find it, what would be the suggestion to replace it?

If you understand the range stat and the "cone" that defines accuracy at range, this is easily explainable. Here is a more in depth video about why those bullets weren't "accurate." Keen Koala https://youtu.be/7XwGBy9MAQs

I think u have to redo this experiment at a closer range to backup the ghost bullet theory. A lot of ppl on here are blaming the range. So if u can do it at a range where it's obviously within the guns, it could be solid proof. Edit: I meant have the op of the video redo it.

Honestly. If a weapon is shooting outside of its intended range isn't the obvious solution to it being less effective damage drop-off? No, bungie decided that instead bullets would randomly miss entirely, and it's not even outside it's intended range. The people who think this is OK are morons. The game is basically punishing me for using my weapon properly.