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Destiny

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6/17/2016 12:23:15 AM
5

Grenade Archetypes and their Intent

In light of recent changes to Tripmine I felt we should discuss grenades as a whole, their archetypes and intent. I believe there is and always was a grey area of understanding of grenades in Destiny. It was the changes to Tripmine that made me come to now suspect what Bungie may have orginally intended for grenades. Bungie has never officially stated anything like this, so if Cozmo and Deej would like to chime in that would be great. Perhaps ask Jon Wisenewski (sp?) to see if my post is accurate. Let’s start with identifying the types of grenades: Sticky/Attachable - (Fusion, Magnetic, etc) These are designed to be one hit kill grenades (OHK) on a single target. It can, on occasion, kill multiples if another opponent is unfortunate enough to be standing right next to the blast victim but that is rare. The blast radius of a sticky that misses and does not stick is weaker and does minimal damage to anyone in the area of effect (AoE). These reward precision throwers with the guaranteed kill. Area Denial- (Lightning, Pulse, Spike, Vortex, Tripmine, Thermite, Voidwall, etc) - These are designed to control area and restrict enemy movement. There are degrees of strength in this category (Strong, Medium, and Weak tick damage types). With the exception of Tripmine pre-nerf, none of the Area Denial types were OHK. Yes, I know, some are certainly better than others- (Lightning is quite deadly, Thermite is laughable). But in the end it always took at least two ticks of damage by an Area Denial grenades to kill an opponent. Stand long enough in any Area Denial grenade and it should kill you (I have not tested every grenade so don’t jump down my throat). Tripmine was unique as it’s the only Area Denial with one tick of big damage and, pre-nerf could OHK. Tactical - (Suppressor, Flashbang, Axion, Scatter, etc.) - These are specialty type grenades designed to do unique things, intended to sway an engagement to your tactical advantage. Suppressor and Flashbang are obvious in their use, and something like Axion is used to flush people out of cover. People scurry from cover can then be shot down while they run, take the damage from the Axion and are now weaker for the impending gun battle, or they have to flee and by doing so are conceding the fight. None of these grenades are OHKs. Types like Axion "could" be if both/all Seekers hit you but they can be outrunned so easily and only if you’re the only target in range for the Seekers to track. DoTs - (Incendiary, Firebolt, etc.) - These are designed to place Damage over Time (DoT) on enemies. Primarily to increase your DPS on a target in conjunction with your gunfire but also to delay health regen of your opponent forcing them on their heels to pull back. They used to be OHK pre-update if the detonation of the grenade was right at the feet of the target, but now cannot. Yes, I noticed- I did not include every grenade possible. The purpose of this is to show the archetypes not to perfectly categorize every grenade. Now, knowing the types I hope you can start to see and understand Bungie’s grenade corrections. The OHK type grenades were supposed to only be Sticky/Attachable. Pre-nerf, other types were capable of serving that same purpose while doing other things, and by doing so they diminished the value of Sticky/Attachables. Why carry a Fusion when Firebolt and Incendiary can get the guaranteed kill just the same plus a DoT to deny regen if it doesn’t? Tripmine- an Area Denial type that can also double as a OHK Sticky and even if it doesn’t stick it could still OHK on a trip? Hell yes, I’ll take that. These grenades were getting unfair double value in their usage. All grenades are now properly positioned into their purpose- to augment gunplay. They all do it differently but ultimately that’s their purpose. Sticky grenades augment gun battles the least, because if a sticky connects the gun battle is quite brief. But for something like an Incendiary or Pulse, you hit the target, then need to move in to eliminate the target with your gun to take advantage. Yes, Bungie took too long to correct this. Because of that delay, a lot of people are now so used to their grenades they are upset that the dual-purpose types no longer exist. Dying By DoTs- As we all can all relate, Thorn before it’s nerf was the most aggravating BS way to die due to it’s DoT. This was fixed and Thorn’s DoT now performs the way a DoT should. So why would people expect Incendiary and Firebolt to get a free pass? Death by DoT is a lame experience no matter what delivers the DoT. It makes perfect sense to unify the design of all DoTs to the same purpose- weakening targets, delaying health regen, and forcing opponents on back on their heels to hide and replenish health. Thanks for taking the time to read this. I hope this can help to quell the uproar over these grenade changes. TL;DR- All grenades have archetypes. Some grenades overlapped into the purpose of others which devalued others. Bungie finally fixed this. Also, dying by DoTs is crap. We hated it during the Thorn era and we still hate it just as much. Now all DoTs are unified in their purpose.

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  • Edited by NefariousNarwhal: 6/17/2016 5:30:02 PM
    As a quick note; tripmines can still OHK players not running high armor builds.

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  • Edited by JollyBunny75730: 6/17/2016 4:33:13 AM
    So take the only worth a damn grenade hunters have, in pvp anyhow, and make it useless not to mention the throwing knife. It took a long time to get halfway decent with the throwing knife and now it's not even worth throwing. And of course you must have noticed that the skip grenade was the only good one for blade-dancers. Way to make a class that is supposed to be quick, fluid and deadly feel clunky. In my experience for some time now hunter melee has felt much weaker than the other classes, I assumed that since we are softer than the other classes that our evasion skills were to make up for that, and shade step wasn't super powerful but falls under my blink issue. All of this isn't as important in pve where the encounters are timed but in pvp it's starting to feel a lot like hunters are getting the short stick, pvp was fine before the April update, I'm not great in crucible but it felt like I was as capable standing toe to toe with the other classes now it's not really fun to play a hunter in pvp for me. I know I'm pissing in the wind here, but I was just getting used the power shift from April and now my hunter feels kind of clunky, to me anyhow, unless that's how you guys wanted the hunter to feel during gameplay. Would have been nice if we could re-roll our guardians i.e. change sex, appearances, race, without having to start over, with a new character, or maybe letting us infuse year one legendaries, or just upping the light level on year one raids, make heroic Vog 320 something that feels like you want to keep us around not just attract the squeakers with short attention spans. That's my 2 cents, the longer blade dance duration is nice tho I will say that, without the tracking that the button smash gave us it would be nice if we could curve the lunges a bit but I haven't played with it much. And on a side note the doctrine wouldn't have seemed as OP if you haven't taken high caliber rounds off of Mida, just my opinion but the flinch helped against the hi rof autos as well as snipers

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  • Edited by Swarthy_Grandeur: 6/17/2016 4:25:50 PM
    I don't agree with your arch-typing. It's broad and doesn't incorporate how the grande works or should be use, just how they damage. There is something about fire and axion bolt that is a comply different to flash and suppression. I feel tripmine should be capable of killing in one hit if the enemy is close and so I disagree with the damage nerf.

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  • I knew just from the title what this post was going to be about, and it was perfect. 10/10. I've been thinking this since I read the update. Let's hope people actually read it.

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  • Dude stellar post! Most nades aren't meant to kill but assist the fragging process. I think you put that main idea out there with massive detail and analysis. Well done!

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