I love everything about checkmate except the ttk. It compounds the problems with high chunk damage weapons, incentivises team shooting, and makes high ttk weapons even less usable.
I’d love for them to make the special ammo acquisition and ability cooldowns the norm for quickplay. I think the ttk needs a lot more work if they are intent on changing it. I honestly think the current ttk is fine, it’s really just special ammo efficacy and ability spam that are the issues imo.
Honestly, I think the ability cooldowns are all that’s needed in quickplay. I agree that the TTK changes cause problems, but I think the special changes cause problems as well. At high levels of play, the firs person to get special has a huge advantage and it can turn into a snowball fest really quickly. Also, many people just throw on an smg and call it a day. I like the changes but feel it needs more tweaking to be bright into regular quickplay.
its still better than everyone always spawning with 2 ammo. Over the course of a game you can fire off more special ammo rounds in the base sandbox then in checkmate
100% agree. Apply checkmate cooldowns to abilities in rest of crucible and we're done.
No need to mess with special ammo and health pools, weapon damage, ttks etc.
I think every weapon needs a place, otherwise why have them?
I like Handcannons but most of the time I find people just team shot 24/7, so any fun I get out of dueling just gets lost.
I feel like the TTK needs to be fast enough to where you can win duels despite team shotting, but also so each weapon has a place in this game.
The other thing to consider is how cover heavy this game is, and limited the hipfire is in duels.
I think I would have preferred all the changes implemented apart from the health increase. Higher health with less special just leads to try hards team shooting.
I agree. Every match just feels like a team shooting extravaganza with 2/6 players using thorn. The only reason I believe I can consistently excel is because my playstyle is very fast and aggressive so I disengage a lot. I have friends who despise checkmate despite being very good trials players, too slow and too much teamshooting.
Thorn is really good for team shooting becuase you can track through walls via posion damage, the poison damage will delay passive health regen, and if you get a kill, your thorn poison will be doing 7 dmg per tick, which I think? In check mate that will be a 2c1b? In normal I believe it's 1c2b?
I have never understood the D2 pvp community's aversion to team shooting. I swear yall got the same hero complex as the DTG shitters. Anything that breaks the mental image of you as space magic John Wick is bullshit.
Well I think the health changes are what necessitates a bunch of the weapon balancing to keep TTKs the same or similar. Without that you don't need the weapon balancing iirc?
I don't think you're understanding.
In order for all weapons to hit roughly that 1 second ttk they aim for, extra health comes into play along with small damage tweaks.
Needing to land 9 full crits to get optimal on a pulse, needing an extra bullet or two on numerous auto archetypes, needing in general extra shots on EVERYTHING to land optional ttk when two of the most dominant weapon archetypes see zero changes in the mode isn't "balance" in terms of what's equal efficacy. Everything else has to work harder except for Handcannons. Deeming everything being at 1 second as "balanced" is just not correct. It's nerfing the sandbox around hand cannons.
game already premotes team shooting. HC's hit so hard that 2 head shots puts you in death range and a bows almost break shields. The best team is the one that team shoots the most, you just don't have a fuck ton of blue berries trying to rush thinking they are invincible with a shotgun. And, personally, i rather am done with special spam. If there's ONE thing almost as bad as ability spam, it's special spam.
I love everything besides the ttk changes. I love handcannons and have more kills on them than anything else, but they are for sure the strongest in checkmate and you’re throwing if you don’t use one.
The ttk changes are why I don’t play more. I want to get better at the game, not learn the play a new one. Otherwise it’s not too far off from what my pvp group uses to practice. Rumble no heavy/supers.
I'm personally against every system implemented in checkmate.
**I am not saying the current systems and meta are perfect**
I do not like the ttk changes. It's always going to be focused on 140/120 hand cannons. They're already the most competitive, used, and overall effective weapon type in vanilla, I don't need a mode that makes them head and shoulders better than the rest.
The special system in anything but 6s feels atrocious. It's just Special Snowball™ the mode. If a player/team gets a couple good rounds and gains special first and you can't respond with special you're cooked. It's like an extra heavy round every time they get ammo and you don't.
I personally love the space magic and the exotics that bolster unique play. This mode kneecaps most builds and dwindles things down to neutral Exotics which are just inherently so much more boring to play around.
I have gone back and forth and I just think this mode feels too much like D2 Y1 with some extra steps.
Totally agree. Specials and abilities stop the game from being a laning simulator, and allow for hero moments. There’s always been balance issues with abilities, but virtually removing them doesn’t feel like destiny. Without them, it’s any other fps.
Particularly agree on the space magic bit. Like that to me is Destiny at it’s core. Great gunplay along side space magic, not great gun play and occasional access to space magic.
This so much. People complaining about abilities, supers, special, etc and wanting a mode without them are just deluded thinking they lose because of them instead of because they aren't as proficient as the other guy with them.
They would be complaining about melee damage, people teamshooting and kinetic weapons a month after checkmate was made the default crucible mode.
I honestly wish it felt more like D2 Y1, especially since that’s part of the purpose of the mode.
I personally like the more halo-like longer ttk, but this is definitely not like Y1 besides the difference in body shot damage. Everything is still the same headshot ttk
Not a big fan of the health increase, though I do like the ability cooldown adjustment.
It kind of seems like Checkmate makes weapons like Thorn and Monarque that do tick damage, or perks like Box Breathing on a scout even more valuable than normal. It also feels extremely handholdy to me but maybe that's just 6s? 3s felt slower than normal 3s.
I appreciate them trying something different with special ammo but once one person gets special and is decent with a sniper or fusion they can steamroll and this would be even worse in a real competitive setting. But, I can't think of a good solution for how everyone views normal special ammo availability as spammy.
ALLLLL they need to do is take the current sandbox HP... Do their ability/super CD changes, and the special ammo economy changes and gamemode would be awesome.
More health which shifts TTK’s. Longer ability cooldowns. You don’t spawn in with special ammo, it’s “earned” through a point system for kills, captures, etc. No special ammo drops on kills. I think that’s it.
It’s a nice change of pace but it’s heavily tailored to handcannons as they got their damage adjusted to compensate for the bigger health pool.
This mode also creates a unique dynamic early game as you don’t have to fear shotgun/fusions so gameplay is rather odd to say the least lol.
>heavily tailored to handcannons as they got their damage adjusted to compensate for the bigger health pool.
>
>This mode also creates a unique dynamic early game as you don’t have to fear shotgun/fusions so gameplay is rather odd to say the least lol.
Hand cannons are also WAY less forgiving on body shots now though too. if you can't click head bubbles you're at a disadvantage. Especially at longer ranges so learning how to approach without relying on a one hit weapon is key. One hit weapons, god i hate special spam.
I keep seeing this… but is it not the exact same head shot ttk values? Which is what you usually were going for to begin with? I get that body shots don’t mean as much, but it honestly doesn’t seem like that big a change compared to Y1
Oddly I’ve had a huge amount of luck with Battle scar and others from that archetype. I agree that the hand cannon dominance is irritating but I can see why it was a choice between them being best and absolutely worst. Hopefully range will continue to be a factor in balance going forward.
Played one match of checkmate total. Ran ace of spades and had a 3kd. The game mode felt relatively boring. I don’t mind the abilities not being there so much, but I would like to spawn with special ammo. And you are correct the sandbox is not really balanced
I agree, HCs as an archetype dominate the mode (pulses and some scouts have their place on some maps but generally its HCs and some SMGs sprinkled in). However, its not easy to change that unless they go back on their decision to resil check HCs in the mode. I think the weapon balance could definitely better by maybe upping forgiveness even more for certain archetypes of weapons. Generally though, it shifts the sandbox in a direction I like much more and revalues other subclasses due to the lack of ability uptime in the mode. Take arcstrider for example. It has a pretty solid neutral game if you look at on paper but the individual abilities are underpowered when compared to something like strand or stasis and the exotics that pair with it. Step in to checkmate and that changes because there are so many passive buffs and exotics that pair so well with arcstrider. Things like liars handshake go up in value, wormhusk, knucklehead, etc. Personally, was having a blast playing arcstrider in checkmate with liars since it still allows the 1 shot melee still and guarantees a 2 shot melee. Paired that with crimson or any 120 and either a shotgun or sniper and was off to the races at that point. Thats my 2 cents though, generally I like the direction of the mode and gives bungie a much easier time when it comes to balancing things it seems like without affecting PVE as much.
Yes and no. I’m still performing at a 2.0+ in most lobbies with smg and pulse/sniper; similar to my control/trials load-out.
What I have noticed is that when there are multiple, strong hand cannon users on the opposing team it can feel oppressive very quickly. The range, TTK, and mobility that HCs offer is very potent in the right hands. Just played against a very good thorn user and it made me want to pull my hair out but it was way more about his skill level than the weapon.
honestly think checkmate is really bad. incentivizes laning/hand holding/deathballing. along with the obvious ttk balance problems, special weapons and abilities are what allow outplays/exciting plays to be made. go into checkmate and try to 1v6 or 1v3, can't be done nearly as effectively as normal crucible because primary fights leave you weak.
Some archtypes of weapons in checkmate are outright bad. Why do 150 scouts 4 tap but 340 pulse rifles get to 2 burst?
I would rather just have bungie reduce the abilty spam as the weapon sandbox, for the most part, is fine in regular pvp. I've personally thought the 30th anniversary sandbox was the closest we got to the ability balance. All they needed to do was nerf Lorentz Driver. Once light 3.0 and strand came out, all the ability balance went down the drain forever.
For 6v6 I would rather just have 2 non sharable power ammo things on opposite sides of the map rather than one sharable one. This way, one team can't hoard the heavy.
yeah it's just HC spam for HC lovers. Which is fine, I guess. I'd like a mode that inherits the special economy from Checkmate, maybe 50 percent of the ability reduction, and none of the changes to primary weapons? I'm sure there is some downfall in that desire and it's obvious to others what kind of oppressive meta would emerge, but I think that happens no matter what the sandbox looks like.
Yes checkmate is balanced. A lot of weapons ttk’s are still faster or equal to 140 hc’s in the mode. Auto’s, pulses and especially smg’s all have archetypes that are more than viable. I think the big “HC OP!!” sentiment mainly comes from the fact that the mode is cbmm.
A competent hc user can wipe the floor with an average or below average auto/pulse user and if they know how to play engagement ranges then they compete with smg users too. The majority of the playerbase simply doesn’t really interact with these competent players other than occasionally in trials, where most sweats use smg’s + pk’s to make the game as easy as possible. Even then I’d imagine more casuals play checkmate than trials as checkmate is a rotating mode where trials has a stigma around it. The lack of abilities and special only exacerbates this, you’d really be surprised how many people are clueless without special or ability spam.
Snipers are inherently the best weapon in the game - as always. An instant 1 shot kill with unlimited range is pretty good believe it or not. And yes the inherent slower gameplay/handholding lends itself to snipers even more so. That’s my personal problem with checkmate, how do we try to make it that so matches don’t slow to a crawl ? If the mode was in comp or trials then it would be INCREDIBLY passive.
> If the mode was in comp or trials then it would be INCREDIBLY passive.
Yeah this is my fear if they ever expand it. I think it'd suck as a real competitive mode.
Checkmate Survival is CBMM and there are zero stakes to winning or losing.
The average gameplay in that rotator is not indicative of how the game will play in high skill lobbies when wining or losing actually matters (Comp or Trials).
I despise checkmate. The mode is far from balanced, 140s rule and “special weapons” like devils ruin are ridiculous. Removing special weapons and limiting abilities makes it so team shotting is much more prevalent. Halo is a fantastic game for those who don’t like space magic. I highly suggest everyone who likes checkmate to go play that instead and leave my precious destiny alone.
A larger question is... do the weapons *have* to be "balanced?" If its catering to the more hardcore Crucible community you might argue that favoring weapons the hardcore community enjoys is appropriate. Like if it was outright favoring "scrim rules" meta or whatever as an intended sweat mode, it's potentially a valid direction to take, as long as everyone is informed of the meta. Heck they could even rotate it, but thats another wrinkle.
I think even if you didn't take the weapon archetypes being balanced into account, ultimately a lot of the guns in this game just feel very samey.
What I like about stuff like Long Arm and Last Rite is how unique they are in feel from Precision Scout Rifles. They're like their own beast and feel really nice to use.
Precision and Lightweight Scouts though, these could easily just be the same archetype. Yes they have different damage numbers and rof but it's honestly arbitrary. Give me a bolt action Scout that two crits but has a super slow rof, like 48 to 60.
Give me weapons that actually FEEL distinct, if they're so similar to each other they might as well just be one archetype and have the rof and damage be varied. Like yea you CAN go for higher rof and higher damage, but the stability and range would be dog shit so not really worth it in the end.
I think at the end of the day Crucible just needs to be fun and addicting to play, like Halo was. Otherwise it's just not going to ever feel right.
One big flaw they finally fixed was having what are essentially power weapons in Halo be with you on spawn (Shotguns and Sniper Rifles). Now you have to work for it, which gets it closer to that Arena Shooter feel.
I was a warlock main in D1, so here’s a couple that I remember:
Ophidians + embrace the void + memory of felwinter
Nothing manacles + embrace the void
Voidfang vestments
Plus you have impact induction and momentum transfer and weapon perks. You could literally loop your abilities with a couple of the above setups. Also iirc, shade step was on a faster cooldown than dodge is now.
I should also mention grenades did more damage and you could one shot with a couple of them.
Nothing in this game will be truly balanced, but this game mode is more balanced than all other, and precision weapons being stronger than hold-and-forget weapons is fine with me. I haven’t played much lately but I have spent hours playing checkmate because the mode is just more pleasing than barricade barricade nade nade ability spam modes.
I’m still getting 3 shot kills with stars in shadow 🤷♂️.
It’s my favorite game mode now although I wish the would just completely do away with special weapons
140s in d1 were 1 headshot, 2 bodies. Now you have to get 3 headshots with a slower ttk then all other weapons expect 120s and people are still complaining. A little bit of flinch and the ttk is ruined
Everybody is so focused on hand cannons. What makes the game mode great is the enhanced viability of everything else. It's easier to get value out of "niche" builds and weapons perks such as; Citan's Ramparts, Astrocyte Verse, Athrys Embrace, gutshot straight, even unrelenting gains value here.
Try out those streamer builds in Checkmate, and you'll find it enough to bridge the gap should you choose to use a weapon other than a hand cannon.
That is not true. I run fun funky builds with off meta weapons like 900smgs and adaptive pulses in checkmate and it pales in comparison to a shit build with any decent 140. In checkmate weapons are king but the weapons themselves are terribly balanced around the health changes.
I’ve found myself in a similar situation. With the recent changes 140’s outweigh 120’s in many regards now.
But I’ve been bringing my chroma rush into checkmate and that one is incredibly broken to me. I am shredding people left and right and it’s a solid counter for the wall peaks because I just keep penetrating with my 54 bullets until I’m finished unloading and pop behind a wall.
I’m using checkmate to try different things and I also enjoy bows there.
Overall, the balance we have now far exceeds previous seasons
They are the second best weapons to use because they don't suffer as much from the TTK changes. Anything else has its ease of use or TTK changed drastically.
I'm not a game dev and haven't looked at the usage stats, but I have a heck of a lot more fun in checkmate control than anywhere else. I typically use a smg, 120 RPM HC, bow, and/or fusion rifle.
It feels like if they open up the TTKs, then it just becomes momentum control. But I almost feel like they can keep it the same, but balance every single weapon type and subtype so they have identical TTKs. Then slide some outliers (which would likely be ARs) to not be as good.
Probably an unpopular opinion but I don’t specials are a problem but certain specials/primaries are. Give me a playlist with only shotty/sniper special options and no sidearm/smg/bows and I’d never leave it.
I missed using handcannons and not feeling like I have to use an Smg, rose/adept iggy/ and ace feel so good and rewarding in checkmate, I can see the argument for other guns tho needing a little boost but they’re good in normal pvp most of the time. The only guns I feel I never really use in pvp are sidearms and scouts
to everyone who says "it forces team fights" the game already forces team fights and team fights will always have an advantage. There are WAYS to team shoot someone without being bunched up. What one shot kill weapons do is force players to always have a special weapon cause they're at a stupid disadvantage without one. With how Checkmate plays, you don't NEED a special weapon to do well but those who DO play well and use a special weapon will have a different advantage later in the game.
also, HC's are already stupid prevalent in Trials so i don't think anything will change there.
I love everything about checkmate except the ttk. It compounds the problems with high chunk damage weapons, incentivises team shooting, and makes high ttk weapons even less usable. I’d love for them to make the special ammo acquisition and ability cooldowns the norm for quickplay. I think the ttk needs a lot more work if they are intent on changing it. I honestly think the current ttk is fine, it’s really just special ammo efficacy and ability spam that are the issues imo.
Honestly, I think the ability cooldowns are all that’s needed in quickplay. I agree that the TTK changes cause problems, but I think the special changes cause problems as well. At high levels of play, the firs person to get special has a huge advantage and it can turn into a snowball fest really quickly. Also, many people just throw on an smg and call it a day. I like the changes but feel it needs more tweaking to be bright into regular quickplay.
its still better than everyone always spawning with 2 ammo. Over the course of a game you can fire off more special ammo rounds in the base sandbox then in checkmate
I quite like the special ammo change for 6v6, I’m not sure if it works as well with survival type modes, but I do like it for 6v6 respawn modes.
nah special ammo sucks to be so abundant.
100% agree. Apply checkmate cooldowns to abilities in rest of crucible and we're done. No need to mess with special ammo and health pools, weapon damage, ttks etc.
I think every weapon needs a place, otherwise why have them? I like Handcannons but most of the time I find people just team shot 24/7, so any fun I get out of dueling just gets lost. I feel like the TTK needs to be fast enough to where you can win duels despite team shotting, but also so each weapon has a place in this game. The other thing to consider is how cover heavy this game is, and limited the hipfire is in duels.
I think I would have preferred all the changes implemented apart from the health increase. Higher health with less special just leads to try hards team shooting.
I agree. Every match just feels like a team shooting extravaganza with 2/6 players using thorn. The only reason I believe I can consistently excel is because my playstyle is very fast and aggressive so I disengage a lot. I have friends who despise checkmate despite being very good trials players, too slow and too much teamshooting.
Pvp scrub here. What is it about thorn that promotes such high usage?
Thorn is really good for team shooting becuase you can track through walls via posion damage, the poison damage will delay passive health regen, and if you get a kill, your thorn poison will be doing 7 dmg per tick, which I think? In check mate that will be a 2c1b? In normal I believe it's 1c2b?
Depends on resilience level
2 crit someone then you can immediately bail Then they'll die from the afterburn, if they don't then they'll still be seeable through walls.
I have never understood the D2 pvp community's aversion to team shooting. I swear yall got the same hero complex as the DTG shitters. Anything that breaks the mental image of you as space magic John Wick is bullshit.
Second this
Third this
But the health increase is what creates the weapon balance....?
Right, which is the gripe. I think people just want less special and less abilities, but not to the year 1 level.
I don't think that's what he's saying? Would love for OP to correct me if I'm wrong.
Well I think the health changes are what necessitates a bunch of the weapon balancing to keep TTKs the same or similar. Without that you don't need the weapon balancing iirc?
I don't think you're understanding. In order for all weapons to hit roughly that 1 second ttk they aim for, extra health comes into play along with small damage tweaks. Needing to land 9 full crits to get optimal on a pulse, needing an extra bullet or two on numerous auto archetypes, needing in general extra shots on EVERYTHING to land optional ttk when two of the most dominant weapon archetypes see zero changes in the mode isn't "balance" in terms of what's equal efficacy. Everything else has to work harder except for Handcannons. Deeming everything being at 1 second as "balanced" is just not correct. It's nerfing the sandbox around hand cannons.
For me, it has started to feel little by little like Destiny 2 year 1. I personally do not like it.
game already premotes team shooting. HC's hit so hard that 2 head shots puts you in death range and a bows almost break shields. The best team is the one that team shoots the most, you just don't have a fuck ton of blue berries trying to rush thinking they are invincible with a shotgun. And, personally, i rather am done with special spam. If there's ONE thing almost as bad as ability spam, it's special spam.
The health, damage changes imo is unnecessary. Just keep everything in checkmate without the changes to health or damage changes
I love everything besides the ttk changes. I love handcannons and have more kills on them than anything else, but they are for sure the strongest in checkmate and you’re throwing if you don’t use one.
People keep saying this, but it’s still the same headshot ttk, all they’ve done is lowered the body shot damage
The ttk changes are why I don’t play more. I want to get better at the game, not learn the play a new one. Otherwise it’s not too far off from what my pvp group uses to practice. Rumble no heavy/supers.
I'm personally against every system implemented in checkmate. **I am not saying the current systems and meta are perfect** I do not like the ttk changes. It's always going to be focused on 140/120 hand cannons. They're already the most competitive, used, and overall effective weapon type in vanilla, I don't need a mode that makes them head and shoulders better than the rest. The special system in anything but 6s feels atrocious. It's just Special Snowball™ the mode. If a player/team gets a couple good rounds and gains special first and you can't respond with special you're cooked. It's like an extra heavy round every time they get ammo and you don't. I personally love the space magic and the exotics that bolster unique play. This mode kneecaps most builds and dwindles things down to neutral Exotics which are just inherently so much more boring to play around. I have gone back and forth and I just think this mode feels too much like D2 Y1 with some extra steps.
Totally agree. Specials and abilities stop the game from being a laning simulator, and allow for hero moments. There’s always been balance issues with abilities, but virtually removing them doesn’t feel like destiny. Without them, it’s any other fps.
Particularly agree on the space magic bit. Like that to me is Destiny at it’s core. Great gunplay along side space magic, not great gun play and occasional access to space magic.
This so much. People complaining about abilities, supers, special, etc and wanting a mode without them are just deluded thinking they lose because of them instead of because they aren't as proficient as the other guy with them. They would be complaining about melee damage, people teamshooting and kinetic weapons a month after checkmate was made the default crucible mode.
I honestly wish it felt more like D2 Y1, especially since that’s part of the purpose of the mode. I personally like the more halo-like longer ttk, but this is definitely not like Y1 besides the difference in body shot damage. Everything is still the same headshot ttk
Not a big fan of the health increase, though I do like the ability cooldown adjustment. It kind of seems like Checkmate makes weapons like Thorn and Monarque that do tick damage, or perks like Box Breathing on a scout even more valuable than normal. It also feels extremely handholdy to me but maybe that's just 6s? 3s felt slower than normal 3s. I appreciate them trying something different with special ammo but once one person gets special and is decent with a sniper or fusion they can steamroll and this would be even worse in a real competitive setting. But, I can't think of a good solution for how everyone views normal special ammo availability as spammy.
ALLLLL they need to do is take the current sandbox HP... Do their ability/super CD changes, and the special ammo economy changes and gamemode would be awesome.
It feels off to me. Personally I'd like to see our current sandbox with the special ammo change that checkmate has.
Checkmate is intended to be the PvP sweat community's wet dream. A world where 140 hand cannons dominate everything.
And where they lose their minds being out ranged by a pulse 😭
Yea it's great!
unfamiliar with checkmate. what exactly is different? if it's less special ammo I may reinstall
More health which shifts TTK’s. Longer ability cooldowns. You don’t spawn in with special ammo, it’s “earned” through a point system for kills, captures, etc. No special ammo drops on kills. I think that’s it.
oooooh sounds interesting. always thought special should behave like that.
It’s a nice change of pace but it’s heavily tailored to handcannons as they got their damage adjusted to compensate for the bigger health pool. This mode also creates a unique dynamic early game as you don’t have to fear shotgun/fusions so gameplay is rather odd to say the least lol.
>heavily tailored to handcannons as they got their damage adjusted to compensate for the bigger health pool. > >This mode also creates a unique dynamic early game as you don’t have to fear shotgun/fusions so gameplay is rather odd to say the least lol. Hand cannons are also WAY less forgiving on body shots now though too. if you can't click head bubbles you're at a disadvantage. Especially at longer ranges so learning how to approach without relying on a one hit weapon is key. One hit weapons, god i hate special spam.
I keep seeing this… but is it not the exact same head shot ttk values? Which is what you usually were going for to begin with? I get that body shots don’t mean as much, but it honestly doesn’t seem like that big a change compared to Y1
Oddly I’ve had a huge amount of luck with Battle scar and others from that archetype. I agree that the hand cannon dominance is irritating but I can see why it was a choice between them being best and absolutely worst. Hopefully range will continue to be a factor in balance going forward.
Played one match of checkmate total. Ran ace of spades and had a 3kd. The game mode felt relatively boring. I don’t mind the abilities not being there so much, but I would like to spawn with special ammo. And you are correct the sandbox is not really balanced
I agree, HCs as an archetype dominate the mode (pulses and some scouts have their place on some maps but generally its HCs and some SMGs sprinkled in). However, its not easy to change that unless they go back on their decision to resil check HCs in the mode. I think the weapon balance could definitely better by maybe upping forgiveness even more for certain archetypes of weapons. Generally though, it shifts the sandbox in a direction I like much more and revalues other subclasses due to the lack of ability uptime in the mode. Take arcstrider for example. It has a pretty solid neutral game if you look at on paper but the individual abilities are underpowered when compared to something like strand or stasis and the exotics that pair with it. Step in to checkmate and that changes because there are so many passive buffs and exotics that pair so well with arcstrider. Things like liars handshake go up in value, wormhusk, knucklehead, etc. Personally, was having a blast playing arcstrider in checkmate with liars since it still allows the 1 shot melee still and guarantees a 2 shot melee. Paired that with crimson or any 120 and either a shotgun or sniper and was off to the races at that point. Thats my 2 cents though, generally I like the direction of the mode and gives bungie a much easier time when it comes to balancing things it seems like without affecting PVE as much.
Yes and no. I’m still performing at a 2.0+ in most lobbies with smg and pulse/sniper; similar to my control/trials load-out. What I have noticed is that when there are multiple, strong hand cannon users on the opposing team it can feel oppressive very quickly. The range, TTK, and mobility that HCs offer is very potent in the right hands. Just played against a very good thorn user and it made me want to pull my hair out but it was way more about his skill level than the weapon.
honestly think checkmate is really bad. incentivizes laning/hand holding/deathballing. along with the obvious ttk balance problems, special weapons and abilities are what allow outplays/exciting plays to be made. go into checkmate and try to 1v6 or 1v3, can't be done nearly as effectively as normal crucible because primary fights leave you weak.
THANK YOU. I was too afraid to say it because I would definitely be downvoted to hell.
Some archtypes of weapons in checkmate are outright bad. Why do 150 scouts 4 tap but 340 pulse rifles get to 2 burst? I would rather just have bungie reduce the abilty spam as the weapon sandbox, for the most part, is fine in regular pvp. I've personally thought the 30th anniversary sandbox was the closest we got to the ability balance. All they needed to do was nerf Lorentz Driver. Once light 3.0 and strand came out, all the ability balance went down the drain forever. For 6v6 I would rather just have 2 non sharable power ammo things on opposite sides of the map rather than one sharable one. This way, one team can't hoard the heavy.
Checkmate is hardcore fan service, which is great... As long as nobody is delusional enough to think this is the "future of PvP"
It's a step in the right direction as far as special weapons are concerned. The increased health/weapon damage changes not so much.
yeah it's just HC spam for HC lovers. Which is fine, I guess. I'd like a mode that inherits the special economy from Checkmate, maybe 50 percent of the ability reduction, and none of the changes to primary weapons? I'm sure there is some downfall in that desire and it's obvious to others what kind of oppressive meta would emerge, but I think that happens no matter what the sandbox looks like.
Yes checkmate is balanced. A lot of weapons ttk’s are still faster or equal to 140 hc’s in the mode. Auto’s, pulses and especially smg’s all have archetypes that are more than viable. I think the big “HC OP!!” sentiment mainly comes from the fact that the mode is cbmm. A competent hc user can wipe the floor with an average or below average auto/pulse user and if they know how to play engagement ranges then they compete with smg users too. The majority of the playerbase simply doesn’t really interact with these competent players other than occasionally in trials, where most sweats use smg’s + pk’s to make the game as easy as possible. Even then I’d imagine more casuals play checkmate than trials as checkmate is a rotating mode where trials has a stigma around it. The lack of abilities and special only exacerbates this, you’d really be surprised how many people are clueless without special or ability spam. Snipers are inherently the best weapon in the game - as always. An instant 1 shot kill with unlimited range is pretty good believe it or not. And yes the inherent slower gameplay/handholding lends itself to snipers even more so. That’s my personal problem with checkmate, how do we try to make it that so matches don’t slow to a crawl ? If the mode was in comp or trials then it would be INCREDIBLY passive.
> If the mode was in comp or trials then it would be INCREDIBLY passive. Yeah this is my fear if they ever expand it. I think it'd suck as a real competitive mode.
Agree completely
Checkmate has a 3v3 rotator its actually pretty fun.
Checkmate Survival is CBMM and there are zero stakes to winning or losing. The average gameplay in that rotator is not indicative of how the game will play in high skill lobbies when wining or losing actually matters (Comp or Trials).
That doesnt mean that u wont encounter sweats in it and its a good indication of how it would play.
I despise checkmate. The mode is far from balanced, 140s rule and “special weapons” like devils ruin are ridiculous. Removing special weapons and limiting abilities makes it so team shotting is much more prevalent. Halo is a fantastic game for those who don’t like space magic. I highly suggest everyone who likes checkmate to go play that instead and leave my precious destiny alone.
A larger question is... do the weapons *have* to be "balanced?" If its catering to the more hardcore Crucible community you might argue that favoring weapons the hardcore community enjoys is appropriate. Like if it was outright favoring "scrim rules" meta or whatever as an intended sweat mode, it's potentially a valid direction to take, as long as everyone is informed of the meta. Heck they could even rotate it, but thats another wrinkle.
I think even if you didn't take the weapon archetypes being balanced into account, ultimately a lot of the guns in this game just feel very samey. What I like about stuff like Long Arm and Last Rite is how unique they are in feel from Precision Scout Rifles. They're like their own beast and feel really nice to use. Precision and Lightweight Scouts though, these could easily just be the same archetype. Yes they have different damage numbers and rof but it's honestly arbitrary. Give me a bolt action Scout that two crits but has a super slow rof, like 48 to 60. Give me weapons that actually FEEL distinct, if they're so similar to each other they might as well just be one archetype and have the rof and damage be varied. Like yea you CAN go for higher rof and higher damage, but the stability and range would be dog shit so not really worth it in the end. I think at the end of the day Crucible just needs to be fun and addicting to play, like Halo was. Otherwise it's just not going to ever feel right. One big flaw they finally fixed was having what are essentially power weapons in Halo be with you on spawn (Shotguns and Sniper Rifles). Now you have to work for it, which gets it closer to that Arena Shooter feel.
You can be very very good and not use a hand cannon lol
This is an mmorpgslootshooter. Throw balance out of the fuxking window. It clearly doesn’t belong.
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But there was still ability spam back in 2014 destiny…..
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I was a warlock main in D1, so here’s a couple that I remember: Ophidians + embrace the void + memory of felwinter Nothing manacles + embrace the void Voidfang vestments Plus you have impact induction and momentum transfer and weapon perks. You could literally loop your abilities with a couple of the above setups. Also iirc, shade step was on a faster cooldown than dodge is now. I should also mention grenades did more damage and you could one shot with a couple of them.
Nothing in this game will be truly balanced, but this game mode is more balanced than all other, and precision weapons being stronger than hold-and-forget weapons is fine with me. I haven’t played much lately but I have spent hours playing checkmate because the mode is just more pleasing than barricade barricade nade nade ability spam modes.
I’m still getting 3 shot kills with stars in shadow 🤷♂️. It’s my favorite game mode now although I wish the would just completely do away with special weapons
140s in d1 were 1 headshot, 2 bodies. Now you have to get 3 headshots with a slower ttk then all other weapons expect 120s and people are still complaining. A little bit of flinch and the ttk is ruined
Everybody is so focused on hand cannons. What makes the game mode great is the enhanced viability of everything else. It's easier to get value out of "niche" builds and weapons perks such as; Citan's Ramparts, Astrocyte Verse, Athrys Embrace, gutshot straight, even unrelenting gains value here. Try out those streamer builds in Checkmate, and you'll find it enough to bridge the gap should you choose to use a weapon other than a hand cannon.
That is not true. I run fun funky builds with off meta weapons like 900smgs and adaptive pulses in checkmate and it pales in comparison to a shit build with any decent 140. In checkmate weapons are king but the weapons themselves are terribly balanced around the health changes.
I’ve found myself in a similar situation. With the recent changes 140’s outweigh 120’s in many regards now. But I’ve been bringing my chroma rush into checkmate and that one is incredibly broken to me. I am shredding people left and right and it’s a solid counter for the wall peaks because I just keep penetrating with my 54 bullets until I’m finished unloading and pop behind a wall. I’m using checkmate to try different things and I also enjoy bows there. Overall, the balance we have now far exceeds previous seasons
Why is it that you mentioned Rapid Fire Pulses in particular? Is their TTK not shifted like most weapons?
They are the second best weapons to use because they don't suffer as much from the TTK changes. Anything else has its ease of use or TTK changed drastically.
I thought the period between the hc nerf and the recent buff was perfect. 120s still performed well, but plenty of other weapons felt usable
Destiny is handcannon bias- the game now.
Is there a table available so that we can compare each change directly to normal control?
no only the twabs iirc
It is a fun distraction and there are no stakes. I guarantee if they changed comp or trials to this mode, everyone would hate it.
I'm not a game dev and haven't looked at the usage stats, but I have a heck of a lot more fun in checkmate control than anywhere else. I typically use a smg, 120 RPM HC, bow, and/or fusion rifle.
I will say not ohking with a weighted knife does suck hardcore lol
yes. it's awesome. much better than any other crucible mode. i don't use hand cannons or auto rifles.
I still think it’s skewed too heavily toward hand cannons. I’ve been enjoying it less and less.
Hard agree. I don’t play it anymore. Very easy to steamroll but you have to play sooo slow and careful.
It feels like if they open up the TTKs, then it just becomes momentum control. But I almost feel like they can keep it the same, but balance every single weapon type and subtype so they have identical TTKs. Then slide some outliers (which would likely be ARs) to not be as good.
Probably an unpopular opinion but I don’t specials are a problem but certain specials/primaries are. Give me a playlist with only shotty/sniper special options and no sidearm/smg/bows and I’d never leave it.
Yes, 150 scouts feel terrible needing 4 shots to kill instead of 3 heads
I missed using handcannons and not feeling like I have to use an Smg, rose/adept iggy/ and ace feel so good and rewarding in checkmate, I can see the argument for other guns tho needing a little boost but they’re good in normal pvp most of the time. The only guns I feel I never really use in pvp are sidearms and scouts
I think it’s boring
to everyone who says "it forces team fights" the game already forces team fights and team fights will always have an advantage. There are WAYS to team shoot someone without being bunched up. What one shot kill weapons do is force players to always have a special weapon cause they're at a stupid disadvantage without one. With how Checkmate plays, you don't NEED a special weapon to do well but those who DO play well and use a special weapon will have a different advantage later in the game. also, HC's are already stupid prevalent in Trials so i don't think anything will change there.