Posted July 26, 2015 Here we are on the other side of 2.0 and it's fairly safe to say that at least half the community are angry over the broad sweeping weapon nerfs that are going to hit the game. I think the biggest shock of the announcements was the sheer amount of weapons being affected. I think everyone expected to see Thorn and TLW be altered in some way, but to see the entire Hand Cannon weapon class get hit was pretty shocking. The same for shotguns, most I think expected the few with extreme range perks to see some tweaking, but again there were wholesale changes across the board. Fortunately for shotgun users, their ability to at least trump Fusion Rifles will be unhindered because Bungie decided that Fusion Rifles need to just not exist. Throw in the nerfs to Gjally, Black Hammer and Icebreaker and it's been a tough update to swallow for a lot of players. My point in writing this today is that, while as bad as the last week has been for those who love their weapons, things may be about to get much worse in The Taken King. I would argue that the single biggest contributing event to the current raft of nerfs was the addition of the Trials of Osiris with HoW. Until then there were nerf Thorn posts, but they weren't as prevalent and they certainly didn't have as much backing. Trials changed the dynamic because, where Thorn was visible in the Crucible, it wasn't everywhere. Suddenly with ToO, you could be facing a team of 3 all using Thorn and it sent people over the edge knowing each kill was to that weapon. The majority of players polled have always been anti-nerf, but the margins grew much closer. Pre-HoW most polls showed 80-20 against nerfing it. Post-HoW, that number shrank to 60-40. This is all important because, even though it was never close to a majority calling for nerfs, we still ended up with our second major weapon tuning in the last 6 months to severely alter the way weapons are able to perform. Which brings me to The Taken King. To fully understand the impact that these sweeping changes have on this game, you have to not only look at what is happening now, but possible ramifications going forward. When 1.1.1 hit, I don't believe there was any real thought that went into how it could affect the way the game would be played here 3 months later. Could anyone imagine last February that we'd be here with all these changes today? Things started with the isolated nerf to Vex, followed by ARs and Suros taking a hit... which led to ARs being massively nerfed, Hand Cannons gaining popularity, pulse rifles being buffed and special ammo being removed in PvP... which led to ARs being re-buffed and hand cannons, shotguns, fusion rifles and some pulse rifles being nerfed along with a slew of exotics. Were some of these weapons occasionally overpowered? Probably, but let's be honest, in most cases the better Guardian was going to come out on top in a gunfight regardless of the weapon they were using. The cries of weapon injustice are too easy to make when we lose and somehow we ignore the other half of the time when we win. Now The Taken King is bringing a new game mode into play and anyone who loves the way their classes play need to be nervous as hell for what it will mean to our Guardians going forward. [quote]Mayhem is a brand new competitive mode in the crucible. We wanted to see what happened when we let ability energy recharge and super energy recharge really quickly and that's where the name Mayhem comes from. So essentially it's team deathmatch, but everything is turned up to 11. -Lars Bakken (Design Lead)[/quote] I don't think any of us have to play Mayhem to know what is going to happen. All our characters are going to get nerfed. You can engrave it in stone right now, because if you think the Thorn posts were bad, they're going to be nothing compared to what's coming. Nerf Self Rez and Fusion Grenades!!!! Nerf the number of GG rounds!!! Nerf tracking on Axion Bolt!!! Nerf Stun grenades!!! Nerf Helm of Saint 14!!! Nerf the AoE of Fist of Havoc!!!! Nerf tracking on Nova Bomb!!! REMOVE ARCBLADE FROM PVP!!!! And I don't see a way that it can be prevented. There are just too many people who have shown that they are all to willing to come onto the forums to cry nerf rather than try to find a way to overcome their enemies in-game and Bungie have shown they're all too willing to cater to that crowd. I hope I'm wrong. I don't want to see Lightning Grenades do less damage or take less ticks. I don't want to see Arcblade lose it's damage reduction. I don't want to see Axion Bolt or Fusion Grenades nerfed, but the posts are going to come and the forums are going to get much uglier. Anyway, whether you have agreed or disagreed with balancing to this point, I hope that going forward people really consider the ramifications of asking for nerfs and really ask themselves if it's the game or something they can improve through practice and effort, because I want my Guardian to grow stronger as we progress in this game and to this point we've gone backwards more than forwards. Effort is OP. You can be too.