[u][b]TLDR at the bottom[/b][/u] We all understand that Destiny 2 has gotten more and more easy, with the only way of adding difficulty is making end-game content (GM/Contest modes) more tedious in regards to how you engage with enemies. This is fine and I have become accustomed to the current flow of content. My issue now with the new blog is the tedium that is Power leveling. Since they are refreshing the difficulty on strikes and Vanguard ops/seasonal content as a whole, I was hoping to be pleasantly surprised with how they may implement changes to difficulty rather it be more "mechanics" ( tormentors potentially invading strikes) or adding Lucent hive in strikes that serve as mid bosses. [u] [b] What I read however perplexed me, a lot of these changes do the following:[/b][/u] 1.[i] Invalidate the power grind[/i] that at this point it feels redundant to have levels at all if all post-game content power caps you UNDER the power level anyway 2. [i]Making strikes cost 200,000 across multiple runs is better for solo players, but also adds on more grind[/i] so even though solo players can now get pinnacles it becomes more tedious for those not playing Master/GM content. A classic 2 steps forward and 3 steps back, that Bungie is known for at this point. 3. Lastly, it confuses players by having [i]such tone def changes[/i]. This causes players to feel like they are heard but not really understood. Players didn't dread grinding vanguard playlists/seasonal content because it was too easy, but rather on a whole it is largely unrewarding. [u][b]The "Challenge Problem" and Reward Systems [/b][/u] Increasing difficulty for the sake of making things "harder" by changing uptime on abilities or increasing damage while also not implementing new ways to make old content engaging is not rewarding or fun. This just makes the playlist that much more tedious. Couple this with the fact that the more tedious you make basic content, the more solo players suffer. I know Bungie is being pulled in multiple directions by not only the community but also their obligations to Sony (12 new Live IPs) and what they want Destiny to ultimately become. I think that heading into Lightfall, LFG not being implemented until season 23 (in-game) and the core loop seasonal content not being overhauled until I believe about season 22 may leave large swaths of the Destiny community disillusioned or fractured more so than they seem to be now. I know core players like myself and others will still play the game but it is unfortunate for Bungie to have missed this mark on something as unanimous as this. Destiny has gotten easier and a lot of the content can be trivialized to a degree, but this is largely due to the fact that Destiny 2 was initially supposed to be a more casual focused experience. It's understandable that changing the ground work of the game is going to take a lot but pairing a spike in difficulty should have been paired with QOL changes to how rewards are farmed. This could be in the vein of daily lockouts, making exotic cypher's able to roll high-stat armor from Xur, or even make Vangaurd armor not suck stat wise. This would make the current changes much more palatable, allowing for players to have a reason to engage with these forgotten ritual playlists. It doesn't have to be guaranteed God-tier armor either, but a layer that adds to the already existing ways to farm high stat armor to give players even more reason to log hours into the game. As it stands now (since we don't know how good these weapons will be until they are released) this relies much too heavily on players faith in Bungie rather than explanations of the power of these new class of weapons/perks to justify grinding this content. Watching level go up, at this point is not enough since many systems are invalidating the power grind. Making an already arbitrary stat at the end-game, even more so. The way weapon crafting was handled/implemented also doubly hurts many non-adept drops in weapons since a lot of high tier content is affected by these marginal advantages. [u][b]Truly Lost Sectors [/b][/u] When they mentioned Lost sectors finally getting some QOL changes I was hoping for maybe armor focusing or better stat drops guaranteed but for a more sparse drop rate, instead we got "we are changing stat levers". I understand they are adding the new weapon drops in the Lost Sectors but it just doesn't hit at what players have been conditioned to farm Lost Sectors for: Exotics. [u][b]Conclusion[/b] [/u] The content is not out so this is not a hard position on these systems but just me explaining how their could be a lot of these that do go wrong with these changes. Hopefully by season 23 a lot of these changes will be ironed out or even be better, actually good implementations in game but just bad on paper (Looking at you Menagerie) . We shall all see next week what some of these changes will bring. I am still excited for the future of Destiny 2 but wanted to share my thoughts about what the system changes of Destiny 2 going into Lightfall mean to me. Comment below on what do you think about the direction the game is heading coming into Lightfall; Do you like the changes? Are you trying to wait and see? Do you also feel they missed the mark. Let me know below if you don't mind. [b]*Tldr; Bungies changes as they are written in the latest blog post undermine core systems in the game to redundancy while simultaneously missing the mark as to why ritual playlists outside of crucible don't have much engagement. [/b]