In Hotfix 5, we made a few changes to reduce the effectiveness of a humbling number of economy exploits. Check out these Destiny Dev Notes to read a summary of our impressions since launch.
Activities
Missions
Reduced drop rate of engrams following a hard wipe [fixed in 1.0.1.4]
Queen's Wrath Event
Material rewards for dismantling Queen's Wrath gear will no longer provide ascendant materials, but missions will continue to drop Legendary items
World
Destinations
The Hive of the holy “Treasure Cave” have realized the futility of their endless assault on Skywatch and have retired to lick their wounds and plan their next attack.
Respawn timers for monster caves in Skywatch have been normalized to 40 seconds (increased from 6)
Respawn timers for monster caves in Forgotten Shore have been normalized to 40 seconds (increased from 10)
Respawn timers for monster caves in Ember Caves have been normalized to 40 seconds (increased from 10)
Respawn timers for monster caves in the Shattered Coast have been normalized to 40 seconds (increased from 10)
Respawn timers for monster caves in the Barrens have been normalized to 40 seconds (increased from 20)
He Who Shall Not Be Named Long ago during development, the Cryptarch decoded engrams of a given color into gear of that same color. Early in 2014 we added randomness, both for better and worse, to the decrypting process. The result was that end-of-session engram decoding got a lot more exciting and the Cryptarch himself suddenly acquired a personality. Both of these experiences were positive additions to the game.
But we didn't adequately communicate the potential random outcomes of decryption. Players see what looks like the familiar metaphor of item identification, while the Cryptarch thinks he's opening a grab bag of loot. Rage sharding of blues ensues. Expect to see changes to address this soon.
Destiny: The Cave The social experience of a cave farming run is amazing: the herding to get a team of Guardians all behind the line and firing in the right direction, the rush to grab the loot, the scramble when the panic wave starts, the beckoning glow from inside the cave. The speed at which the community organized around this activity was inspiring and humbling to us.
But shooting at a black hole for hours on end isn't our dream for how Destiny is played. Our hope is that social engagement in public spaces is only one part of the Destiny experience. Expect changes soon which decrease the efficiency of cave farming and correspondingly increase engram drops from completing activities.
Reward Celebration Growing more powerful by acquiring new upgrades, gear or progression is central to Destiny's player experience. Our goal is to always celebrate when this occurs, both as a reward in and of itself and to communicate to players what is going on.
During development we sometimes prioritized making a system functional over celebrating its rewards, for example:
• The Vault of Glass contains highly coveted loot but the actual moment of reward happens without fanfare and can be easily missed. • The lowest level of the Daily Heroic gives great XP and Reputation rewards, but neither of these progressions appears on the postgame screen.
We will slowly be addressing these and other issues going forward.
Social
Voice Communication Our vision for Destiny is that all players, even matchmade players in the Crucible, Strikes, the Tower or public spaces, be able to communicate with one another in a way that promotes positive socialization. Voice communication is the easy answer, but existing voice paradigms, including those in our own Halo games, have not done enough to protect players from abusive griefing from a minority of players.
Destiny's near-term solution will be to allow players to opt-in to voice communication during matchmade activities. Work on this feature was underway at launch and should be rolled out this year in Strikes and the Crucible.
Activities
Strikes Strikes are intended to be a fun, combat-filled romp and stomp with a big boss and cool rewards at the end. Better with cooperation, but doable in a pick up group.
Since launch we've tracked down an issue which has made Strikes more challenging than originally designed by both increasing damage taken by players and decreasing the damage inflicted by players on the boss. Expect to see this addressed soon, and for Strikes to become a little less grindy as a result (sorry, Raiders - incoming damage is working as intended in the Vault of Glass).
Balance
Our goal when balancing Destiny is to never have one player choice-- for example a choice of class or weapon-- either be so much better than the alternatives that it is the only valid choice or to be so much worse that it would always be a mistake to choose. When we are successful with this kind of balance the result is a wide set of equally compelling player builds, some of which may be preferred by one player or another but none of which is an absolute right or wro /
hopefully they don't quick it before the engram patch hits.
kkrambo Bonerfart
Subject: Re: Destiny Patches Sat Sep 27, 2014 12:32 pm
Bungie wrote:
The 1.0.2 patch will go live next week, and includes several changes to the Cryptarch and Engram experience. These changes guarantee that Engrams will always decode into items at or above the quality of an engram.
Only Engrams that drop after 1.0.2 are subject to this change.
Cryptarch Changes Cayde-6 took the Cryptarch aside and showed him a sack of doorknobs. He decoded that mystery pretty quickly. Legendary Engrams will always produce Legendary or better quality items, including Materials or Exotics Rare Engrams will always produce Rare or better quality items Rare engrams will have an increased chance to produce Legendary quality items
Activity Changes Daily Heroics, Weekly Heroics, and Vanguard: Tiger Playlist activities will include Rare and Legendary Engrams in addition to their existing rewards
Item Changes Ascendant materials have been promoted to Legendary to closer associate them with the gear they are used to upgrade Legendary Engram items that exist in your inventory will be demoted to Rare quality when the patch goes live, so decode them while you can. But let’s be honest--even if you don’t, we all know they were blues already...
frankthetoad NOMaster
Subject: Re: Destiny Patches Wed Oct 01, 2014 12:31 pm
With this patch, we address some widely-discussed concerns with how Engrams are earned and claimed. Strikes have become more rewarding, and the rewards gained from them are more predictable. Also affected is the rotation of maps that appear in the Crucible.
Cryptarch
Legendary (purple) engrams will always produce a Legendary quality item or higher Note: Legendary engrams that exist in your inventory will change to Rare quality items when the patch is applied. However, decoding these engrams will still produce the same results as beforeRare (blue) engrams will always produce a Rare quality item or higher Chance for Legendary gear increasedMaterials: Ascendant Shards and Ascendant Energy promoted to Legendary quality (from Rare quality)
Rewards
Rare (Blue) and Legendary (Purple) Engram drops added to the potential rewards for: Vanguard: Tiger Strike PlaylistDaily Heroic Missions (first time per day)Weekly Heroic Missions (first time per week) Known issues When selecting a higher difficulty for daily missions, XP Bonus not show in the reward display You will still get the XP bonus, you just won't see it in the UI.
Crucible
Reduced time limit on Bastion and First Light in Control and Clash from 15 to 12 minutes, bringing them in line with non-vehicle maps in those playlists Lowered weighting on Bastion and First Light in Control and Clash so they appear less often in those playlists
eclipz Bonerfart
Subject: Re: Destiny Patches Wed Oct 29, 2014 9:07 am
It is done.
Quote :
Update 1.0.2.3. - Patch Notes - 28 OCT 2014
Summary This update makes Destiny a more stable experience for all players. We’re also changing the player experience in the Raid to ensure that the activity provides an endgame challenge that meets project goals for the intended level of difficulty.
General Fixed an issue in which multiple errors reported with Zebra error codes Errors previously reporting as Zebra will now display as their own separate codes Fixed a rare issue related to being Kicked To Login repeatedly Fixed a rare issue that resulted in a Kick To Orbit reported with the Cockatoo error code
Servers Fixed an issue where some players would occasionally be erroneously kicked at the beginning of an activity due to a server error Increased protection against account corruption
Raid Fixed an issue where Atheon was not choosing random targets for teleport through the timestream during the final encounter on the Vault of Glass Fixed an exploit where Atheon could be forced off his platform
More updates are to follow as we continue to support Destiny. Future enhancements being worked on include Exotic Weapon tuning, new features for voice communication between matchmade teammates, and the ability to hold more Bounties in your pocket at any time.
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