Read before you comment. I touch on many topics, a reader will likely find things they agree with and disagree with. After reading the latest TWAB, my concerns are many and varying. I’m going to discuss my issues about certain buffs, followed by my complaints about needed buffs we aren’t getting. Firstly, my question is why does Bungie CONTINUE to buff Titans in PvP and ignore all the requests for buffs in PvE? This is a two sided coin. Bottom tree Striker with One Eyed Mask is basically the PvP meta right now. As a Hunter main, I am willing to say I find it annoying. I don’t have much of a problem with OEM, I think it’s fine where it’s at. [spoiler](Id like to see some kind of buff to Wormhusk Crown though. Maybe a slightly longer dodge cooldown with the original health regen on dodge effect.)[/spoiler] My issue is with bottom tree Striker. It’s currently the Titan version of pre nerf Nova Warp and Spectral Blades. This is a result of three culprits: health regeneration on kills, Super energy regen on kills, and the light attack cost being 85% less than top tree. These factors make it a monster. It takes far less actual skill to utilize effectively than its top tree counterpart. Top tree CHEWS through the Super bar like there’s no tomorrow, and has no regen. Bungie has made the same mistake with this as with Top tree Dawnblade vs Bottom tree Dawnblade. (Cozmo has made comment on Reddit acknowledging concerns about these subclasses.) The mistake is that [b]A SUPER SHOULD HAVE EITHER SUPER ENERGY REGEN [u]OR[/u] ANOTHER INTRINSIC PERK, NOT BOTH.[/b] What I mean by this is that bottom tree Striker and bottom tree Dawnblade have two bonuses that the top tree counterpart does not. For Striker this is the Super regen and the reduced cost for the light attack. For Dawnblade this is Super regen and increased tracking. This makes the Super low risk, high reward. With both supers you can just spam in the direction of the enemy, the Super does the work for you by tracking to the enemy, and you’re rewarded more Super energy to keep doing the same thing. And as a result there’s no reason to use the top tree except Icarus Dash or Seismic Strike. Which don’t make enough impact to warrant it. My solution is simple: make one tree high risk, high reward, while the other is low risk. Top tree Dawnblade should gain increased tracking, but have no Super regeneration. Each swing is a likely kill, but once you’re done you’re done. Bottom tree retains the Super regen, but loses the enhanced tracking. Each swing isn’t guaranteed to kill without good aim, but if you pull it off you’re rewarded with more super energy. Same thing with Striker. Bottom tree wouldn’t expend Super energy as fast, and you’d get a few kills for sure, but once you’re done you’re done. With top tree you’d chew through that bar faster, but with each kill you’d get a second wind. It would simultaneously buff the less used top tree while reigning in the bottom tree. Let’s get back to Titans. Shield bash is going to Suppress. Shield bash is going TO SUPPRESS. This isn’t a PvE buff. Suppression doesn’t work on higher tier enemies, and the radius of the new aftershock isn’t big enough to make it worth using on trash adds. Only way I can see this helping in PvE is if it works to suppress mid tier enemies like Blockers in Gambit or Knights in CoS. Which I’m fairly certain doesn’t happen with Suppressor Grenades (correct me if I am wrong.) So we now have a melee ability that can not only one shot regular guardians but can shut down supers. Currently the only way to melee shutdown a Super is to be a Titan and use Peregrine Greaves and be airborne. Balanced due to the fact that it requires an exotic and being airborne. Don’t get me wrong here, I love my Peregrines and think it’s absolutely fun to knee people out of Super. But this new Shield Bash is going to shut down Supers without any exotic needed? Suppressors are deadly in the hands of the skilled, but this is going to take much less skill than Suppressors. [spoiler]Side point that it’s dumb that Titans can one shot melee a Super but Hunters have to get a headshot on a highly mobile target with a SUPER. Not saying Titans SHOULDNT one shot supers with Peregrines, but Three Shooter Goldie SHOULD OHK body shot Supers. It did it for three years in D1.[/spoiler] TLDR; Striker needs to be tuned and Shield Bash suppression is a bad idea. [b][i][u]ON TO THE IGNORED BUFFS[/u][/i][/b] Congratulations on making it through the wall of text to this point. Most people will have already likely called me a whining Hunter main and stopped reading by this point, so props to you for having an open mind. [b]THUNDERCRASH CONTINUES TO BE IGNORED.[/b] A request for a damage increase to Thundercrash has been a point made since Forsaken. The community managers have even acknowledged it along with Ward of Dawn, yet we’ve seen no change. It’s a concentrated damage super similar to Blade Barrage and Nova Bomb, but the key difference is that those two are THROWN while Thundercrash IS THE TITAN. You’re putting yourself at higher risk of getting stomped into oblivion, so shouldn’t you do at least the SAME DAMAGE as the others? Now Thundercrash has an advantage over the other one hit wonders in the form of Skullfort. The Super generation speed in PvE is nothing short of jaw dropping (particularly if you have Hands-On). You can go from 0 to Super much quicker which is a solid advantage over the other two. However I still think it should do comparable damage due to the risk factor of it. Additionally you can buff its damage with Synthoceps (I’m gonna come back to Synthoceps in a second) but it’s still not comparable. And Inertia Override is really only useful for montage scenes where you body shot someone with a Sniper in the 5 seconds Override is active. [b]BURNING MAUL[/b] Another meh Subclass receiving no buff. It’s utility is limited due to its limited range and functionality. It has nearly zero aerial ability, the light attack barely kills anything but chews through the Super bar, and the heavy attack is limited in its usage due to needing to be in a straight line from your target with zero obstruction. Additionally the damage of the Super is only competitive when you have both Roaring Flames active to max and SYNTHOCEPS (told you). [b][i][u]BUT WAIT, THERES MORE[/u][/i][/b] Know that little tidbit in the TWAB about damage buff stacking? How there’s only going to be one personal buff and one enemy debuff, and they won’t stack? Uh oh. After Shadowkeep comes out BIOTIC ENHANCEMENTS AND ROARING FLAMES LIKELY WILL NOT STACK. So they’re actually nerfing Maul. Yikes. Usage is dropping steadily. And we’ve continued to ask for an exotic armor piece that allows us to call the Throwing Hammer back to our hand Thor style but so far have heard nothing affirmative. (Seriously, even if you have to stand there with your arm out waiting for it to come back it would still be good.) [b]BOTTOM TREE SUNBREAKER[/b] The point about buffs not stacking will apply to Sun Warrior as well. Bottom tree Sunbreaker will no longer be able to stack Sun Warrior with Synthoceps, cementing Top Tree Sunbreaker as the more effective Hammers. Additionally the Mortar Blast melee ability for bottom tree continues to do LESS DAMAGE THAN A NORMAL MELEE EVEN WITH THE BURN DOT. This makes the melee more annoying than useful. I continue to be confused and astounded by the continual buffing of Titans in PvP and seeming deafness when PvE enters the mix. The only upside to the TWAB is that the Shield Bash will probably make some people give up Bottom Tree Striker and that WARD FINALLY GOT BUFFED. (Don’t get me wrong, I’m SUPER excited to be a Defender again and extremely thankful to Bungie for this one.) But we need more balance between classes, instead of having them lean so far into one facet of Destiny and so far away from the other. I like Hunter because I think they do this well, utility in PvP due to their mobility and utility in PvE due to things like Goldie for DPS and Tether for Add Control. But Titans just rock in PvP, without making much splash in PvE. And I think that’s sad. Thanks for coming to my TED talk, and suffering through my wall of text. Hope I didn’t step on too many toes. Or if I did, well... sorry? Be nice to each other. Edit: [b][i][u]NERF TITAN SHOULDER PLATES, MY FEMALE TITAN LOOKS LIKE A MAN WITH THE SOLSTICE ARMOR[/u][/i][/b]