Board Thread:Destiny Forum/@comment-25548717-20141214094721

I've notices some pretty intense and negative feedback on Bungie's web site in response to the way that the game has added the new weapons and armour introduced by "The Dark Below"... Most of it seems to come from players who managed to reach level 30 by dint of completing the "Vault of Glass" - something I've yet to attempt. At first I was similarly annoyed - basically it looks as though we can only get the benefit of the enhanced hardware by virtue of abandoning our existing Legendary Gear and starting over from scratch with yet more grind.

But on closer inspection I think the changes do have one tiny thing going for them... which is that it's now possible to obtain and upgrade gear in a reasonable way.

For example, I just upgraded by pre-Dark-Below "Armamentarium" Titan Body Armour [which I had maxed out at 439 Armour Value] with a replacement version of the same. I bought the upgrade from Xur, and it cost me 16 Strange Coins [I think...] On the bad news side of the equation, it effectively resets all my accumulated bonus values, so I now have to start again. So I've lost my second grenade, I'm back down to reduced ammunition volumes for both secondary and heavy weapons, and so on. *However*, on the plus side of the balance, I notice that it's now possible to upgrade this piece "to the max" without the need to obtain any more Ascendant Shards whatsoever. There is another "new" (to me) item called an "Exotic Shard", but, again, I can buy these from Xur...

Also in the positive column, the "base" armour rating of my "new" Armamentarium was 444 points - already 5 above the 439 at which the older edition maxed out. I don't know what it's maximum armour rating will become.

However, taken overall, I think I am entirely happy with having to "start over" with my Legendary gear, purely in order to be able to get upgrades without the extremely frustrating wait for Ascendant Materials. On the subject of Ascendant items, one other change I've noticed with "Dark Below" is that I to seem to be getting more of them. So for example I quite like to take on a "Fallen Walker" if I get the chance, even better if I get to take it solo... But I've noticed that on the first successful win of the day I might get an Ascendant Energy, but later I might get an Ascendant Shard as well. Alternatively, if I go to the site of a different daily event, I can double down and get another. Has anyone else seen this? Am I right in thinking that Bungie have been listening to players?

Anyway, what do you think? Has the "Dark Below" been a good thing for Destiny, or is it too little and/or more of the same to make it worthwhile?

Interested to know what others think... 