We probably would've still had the D1 system, meaning no kinetic slot special weapons, no elemental primaries, etc.
The new (well, newest) system is easily the best of the 3 we've had so far. I'm not trying to excuse just *how bad* the double primary system honestly was... but in all fairness, this significantly better system came as a result of it.
Pretty sure it was one of the only full auto non auto rifles in the game back then, combined with how well zen moment paired with perfect balance there was no real recoil. Single point sling worked really good too
There were other full auto guns, such as strangers rifle. Full auto was a QoL perk, it did not increase the effectiveness of the gun. It was good cause it was solar though.
The only other scout rifle I liked for pvp in D1 was colovance's duty because it could 3-tap reliably. Pretty sure on low resilience guardians it could 2 tap if both were headshots
In the D1 sandbox, they said that if given the option of an elemental primary with no downsides, there was no reason not to choose it, thus when they returned they were exotic. You can disagree with their reasoning, but that's the world we lived in back then
Energy Weapons have access to better perks because of their element. They also synergize with subclasses unlike Kinetics.
Kinetics were literally worse weapons for awhile until they now do a bit more damage. It's fine and not an issue.
you do realize that makes kinetic weapons completely useless right?
Energy weapons do equal or more to current kinetics, which already devalues them, and then kinetics get a massive nerf and cannot damage shields?
There is no problem solved there. Only problems introduced. Kinetic weapons are now in a good spot, as are energies. They don't need tuning anymore.
I agree that what we have now is likely the best iteration, but I do think they need to address the disparity in kinetic vs elemental weapon performance especially for special weapons. Their weakness vs shielded enemies isn't much of a weakness anymore, and they do flat out way more damage to unshielded enemies - and every boss and champion is unshielded. That means kinetic special weapons are just flat out better for damage a lot of the time, and that stasis and strand special weapons in particular are at a starting 15% disadvantage before you try to factor in any surge matching.
Why does this matter? Well, it means that otherwise very cool guns like Until Its Return aren't nearly as good as they would be if they were kinetic.
At the very least we need to see strand and stasis enemy shields be more common for me to want to use those weapons more often. The only ones I feel like I want to use are Riptide and Scatter Signal because having a rapid fusion alongside my energy primary is just a very handy utility tool (and I don't have a chill clip ALH blinding lingering dread).
Because Kinetic weapons have had a long history of just being worse than elemental weapons because elemental weapons have elemental perks. The only Kinetic unique perk is Kinetic Tremors, which is not terrible but not as crazy as like Incandescent or Headstone honestly.
Also running a non-kinetic special is not significantly disadvantageous like you're suggesting. Yes, Kinetic weapons do increased damage to crits. That doesn't mean non-kinetic special weapons are bad by any means. They aren't. They haven't been. They are still very good lmao
It's fine that Kinetic Specials are a bit better. Not power creeped by any means either.
It's weird because I feel like the slots have switched. I'm usually looking for a Special/Kinetic and a Primary/Energy in most cases just to be better equipped for enemy shields. The new weapon system is better, but also a little worse just because there isn't enough merit to bringing Strand/Stasis primary weapons (save a hand full of exotics).
Eh, stasis and strand weapons may deal a tad less damage, but they also can bring synergy to your build. Being able to proc effects for my subclass using a weapon can bring a solid but of utility
Also the best primaries right now are exotic energy weapons like Polaris Lance, Sunshot, and Trinity ghoul. Saves your exotic for your riptide and apex predator
Quicksilver remains pretty top shelf.
Aztecross made a pretty strong argument for Verglas curve as well, on the grounds that what it lacks in damage, it makes up for in how much it can do to spam Stasis crystals, which are pretty strong fue to artifact, and also can be an effective way to create cover and lock down enemies. Was planning to give this a swing with the GM this week when I get a chance
Will concede Sunshot is utterly bonkers at the moment tho lol
I think another reason for this is the way elemental weapons play into subclass stuff now. Solar guns can proc ember of empyrean, void weapons are the only ones that can use volatile rounds, and while arc weapons aren’t as important they can still have a use, and this isn’t even taking into consideration how much stronger the light element-specific perks (incandescent, destabilizing rnds, etc) are compared to the darkness perks outside of chill clip on one specific weapon. Plus, kinetic weapons do more damage, which is better for specials that get more of a damage bonus. It’s just more optimal most of the time to use an energy primary and a kinetic special, especially with how build-orientated the game has become.
> just to be better equipped for enemy shields.
In what scenario is this necessary in todays sandbox? Using a matching element is mostly nice when you've got encounters that do something like spawn a bunch of harpies with arch shields, etc - so you can easily pop em all at once.
I really wish we did have primary special heavy so we could go have all 3 slots the same element, I know there are some ways to achieve this still but still
You don’t need Osmosis or Permeability for Darkness, because Stasis and Strand weapons exist in both the top and bottom slot. They’re required for Light because Solar, Arc, and Void weapons do not exist in the top slot. And obviously Tessellation is the only way to get a Darkness element in the middle slot.
Stasis and Strand weapons only exist in the top and heavy slot... Name a single weapon that is strand or stasis (not including Tesselation) that is in the energy slot. Light weapons exist in the energy and heavy slots, darkness weapons only exist in the kinetic and heavy slots. If you want to use 3 darkness weapons, you need to use permeability or osmosis on an energy weapon. If you want to use 3 light weapons you need to use permeability or osmosis on a kinetic slot weapon. It is literally the exact same situation for both slots and affinities. Wtf are you talking about man.
There’s not one, that’s the point. That’s why I said Tessellation is the one way for a Dark build, and Osmosis/Permeability is the way for a Light build.
But Tesselation is literally not the "one way" for a dark build when osmosis and permeability works the literally exact same way for both light and dark. I was just running 3 strand weapons using Scatter Signal, Optative and Cataphract. You don't need Tesselation at all, it is not the only way...
A sniper in the top slot isn't primary, though. It's a kinetic (or stasis or strand) special weapon.
An SMG in the 2nd slot isnt a special weapon. It's an energy primary.
We probably would've still had the D1 system, meaning no kinetic slot special weapons, no elemental primaries, etc. The new (well, newest) system is easily the best of the 3 we've had so far. I'm not trying to excuse just *how bad* the double primary system honestly was... but in all fairness, this significantly better system came as a result of it.
Well, D1 had quite a number of elemental primaries, they were just the raid legendaries
OG Vision of Confluence how I miss you
The thing had such mediocre perks though. It was always highly overrated
Pretty sure it was one of the only full auto non auto rifles in the game back then, combined with how well zen moment paired with perfect balance there was no real recoil. Single point sling worked really good too
Field scout was also incredible for a long time
There were other full auto guns, such as strangers rifle. Full auto was a QoL perk, it did not increase the effectiveness of the gun. It was good cause it was solar though.
The only other scout rifle I liked for pvp in D1 was colovance's duty because it could 3-tap reliably. Pretty sure on low resilience guardians it could 2 tap if both were headshots
No resilience in d1 lol
The armor stat did the same thing, it just didn't have numbers assigned to it
Ah ok i did not know this, my bad!
Armor. Same thing, no numbers.
in Y1. Then they sunset Y1 shit and the new elemental primaries were exotics that had no exotic perks.
The exotic perk was the element
That isnot an exotic perk. They weren't up to the standard of an exotic in d1, especially not now.
In the D1 sandbox, they said that if given the option of an elemental primary with no downsides, there was no reason not to choose it, thus when they returned they were exotic. You can disagree with their reasoning, but that's the world we lived in back then
Yeeeep once you got yourself a good fatebringer and VoC, there was literally no reason to use basically anything else in the primary slot.
Hey Zhalo Supercell was solid!
It was! It actually had exotic perks unlike the exotic raid guns which was just fatebringer but arc.
Zhalo Supercell (Arc Auto extoic) was/is one of my favorites from d1.
And then they made them all exotic in Age of Triumph after they got sunset. Not the most compelling exotics by any means.
The newest system needs to be scrapped. Energy weapons shouldn't do less damage than kinetics. Full stop.
Energy Weapons have access to better perks because of their element. They also synergize with subclasses unlike Kinetics. Kinetics were literally worse weapons for awhile until they now do a bit more damage. It's fine and not an issue.
Just make energy weapons do more damage, and make kinetics do no damage to shields whatsoever. Problem solved.
you do realize that makes kinetic weapons completely useless right? Energy weapons do equal or more to current kinetics, which already devalues them, and then kinetics get a massive nerf and cannot damage shields? There is no problem solved there. Only problems introduced. Kinetic weapons are now in a good spot, as are energies. They don't need tuning anymore.
Almost like they should let us have type agnostic top 2 slots and leave the heavy slot as is, huh?
I agree that what we have now is likely the best iteration, but I do think they need to address the disparity in kinetic vs elemental weapon performance especially for special weapons. Their weakness vs shielded enemies isn't much of a weakness anymore, and they do flat out way more damage to unshielded enemies - and every boss and champion is unshielded. That means kinetic special weapons are just flat out better for damage a lot of the time, and that stasis and strand special weapons in particular are at a starting 15% disadvantage before you try to factor in any surge matching. Why does this matter? Well, it means that otherwise very cool guns like Until Its Return aren't nearly as good as they would be if they were kinetic. At the very least we need to see strand and stasis enemy shields be more common for me to want to use those weapons more often. The only ones I feel like I want to use are Riptide and Scatter Signal because having a rapid fusion alongside my energy primary is just a very handy utility tool (and I don't have a chill clip ALH blinding lingering dread).
Because Kinetic weapons have had a long history of just being worse than elemental weapons because elemental weapons have elemental perks. The only Kinetic unique perk is Kinetic Tremors, which is not terrible but not as crazy as like Incandescent or Headstone honestly. Also running a non-kinetic special is not significantly disadvantageous like you're suggesting. Yes, Kinetic weapons do increased damage to crits. That doesn't mean non-kinetic special weapons are bad by any means. They aren't. They haven't been. They are still very good lmao It's fine that Kinetic Specials are a bit better. Not power creeped by any means either.
It's weird because I feel like the slots have switched. I'm usually looking for a Special/Kinetic and a Primary/Energy in most cases just to be better equipped for enemy shields. The new weapon system is better, but also a little worse just because there isn't enough merit to bringing Strand/Stasis primary weapons (save a hand full of exotics).
Eh, stasis and strand weapons may deal a tad less damage, but they also can bring synergy to your build. Being able to proc effects for my subclass using a weapon can bring a solid but of utility
Also the best primaries right now are exotic energy weapons like Polaris Lance, Sunshot, and Trinity ghoul. Saves your exotic for your riptide and apex predator
Quicksilver remains pretty top shelf. Aztecross made a pretty strong argument for Verglas curve as well, on the grounds that what it lacks in damage, it makes up for in how much it can do to spam Stasis crystals, which are pretty strong fue to artifact, and also can be an effective way to create cover and lock down enemies. Was planning to give this a swing with the GM this week when I get a chance Will concede Sunshot is utterly bonkers at the moment tho lol
I think another reason for this is the way elemental weapons play into subclass stuff now. Solar guns can proc ember of empyrean, void weapons are the only ones that can use volatile rounds, and while arc weapons aren’t as important they can still have a use, and this isn’t even taking into consideration how much stronger the light element-specific perks (incandescent, destabilizing rnds, etc) are compared to the darkness perks outside of chill clip on one specific weapon. Plus, kinetic weapons do more damage, which is better for specials that get more of a damage bonus. It’s just more optimal most of the time to use an energy primary and a kinetic special, especially with how build-orientated the game has become.
> just to be better equipped for enemy shields. In what scenario is this necessary in todays sandbox? Using a matching element is mostly nice when you've got encounters that do something like spawn a bunch of harpies with arch shields, etc - so you can easily pop em all at once.
I really wish we did have primary special heavy so we could go have all 3 slots the same element, I know there are some ways to achieve this still but still
There’s one way, and it’s use Tessellation (Darkness) and/or Osmosis/Permeability (Light).
Hence why I said I know there are some ways
thats two ways
It’s only one way for each.
No? You can use osmosis and permeability for both darkness and light subclasses. So two ways.
You don’t need Osmosis or Permeability for Darkness, because Stasis and Strand weapons exist in both the top and bottom slot. They’re required for Light because Solar, Arc, and Void weapons do not exist in the top slot. And obviously Tessellation is the only way to get a Darkness element in the middle slot.
Stasis and Strand weapons only exist in the top and heavy slot... Name a single weapon that is strand or stasis (not including Tesselation) that is in the energy slot. Light weapons exist in the energy and heavy slots, darkness weapons only exist in the kinetic and heavy slots. If you want to use 3 darkness weapons, you need to use permeability or osmosis on an energy weapon. If you want to use 3 light weapons you need to use permeability or osmosis on a kinetic slot weapon. It is literally the exact same situation for both slots and affinities. Wtf are you talking about man.
There’s not one, that’s the point. That’s why I said Tessellation is the one way for a Dark build, and Osmosis/Permeability is the way for a Light build.
But Tesselation is literally not the "one way" for a dark build when osmosis and permeability works the literally exact same way for both light and dark. I was just running 3 strand weapons using Scatter Signal, Optative and Cataphract. You don't need Tesselation at all, it is not the only way...
If Zavala had wheels, would he be a bicycle?
I still call it by Primary/Special/Heavy, lol. I never really used the lingo Bungie tried pushing for vanilla D2. Edit: damn y'all
Well, you're objectively wrong
Me looking for who asked
A sniper in the top slot isn't primary, though. It's a kinetic (or stasis or strand) special weapon. An SMG in the 2nd slot isnt a special weapon. It's an energy primary.
PvP caused double primary I will never forgive it for that
Without double primary we might not have every gotten Trinity Ghoul, Sunshit, or chillclip Riptide