Another Character

In Year 1 and 2 of Destiny, one thing became abundantly clear – if you wanted to get the best loot out of raids, you’d better make multiple characters of the same class. Given how bad the drop rates were for Vault of Glass and Crota’s End (especially when it came to helms), many players resorted to creating the same class and completing the game numerous times for chances at more loot.

After forgetting to bring an Exotic weapon last week, Destiny’s Exotic vendor Xur has returned to the Tower for redemption. Or so you’d think – we’re not sure who could be satisfied with this week’s inventory. You can find Xur near the large door across from the Speaker in the Tower, where he will remain till 2 AM PDT, July 26th.

What’s tentacle face carrying this week? The Armamentarium (Exotic Titan chest), Young Ahamkara’s Spine (Exotic Hunter gloves) and Starfire Protocol (Exotic Warlock chest), each for 13 Strange Coins. On top of having some rather shabby stat rolls, these armour pieces have already been on sale multiple times.

If that weren’t enough, the Exotic sniper rifle Patience & Time is also available for 17 Strange Coins. It’s an excellent sniper rifle, especially if you don’t have one for Strikes with Arc Burn, but it’s again nothing special. The overall stock this week isn’t very good for hardcore players but if you’ve just started playing Destiny (lord help you), then it’s worth checking out.

Exotic chest engrams are also on sale for 23 Motes of Light so if you don’t find anything you like in the standard inventory, you can take a chance with RNG.

The Trials of Osiris has returned to Bungie’s Destiny this week and takes Guardians to The Cauldron, a map from The Dark Below expansion which features a central hub branching out into numerous passageways and platforms.

As Destiny’s end-game PvP content, the Trials of Osiris works a bit differently from normal Skirmish. Teams of three face each other to see who wins five rounds first. Respawns are disabled, which means you can only be revived by your team-mates, and you need a certain number of match wins to purchase gear from Brother Vance in the Reef. It should also be noted that each fireteam member has to purchase a scorecard and those who reach three losses first are out (until they pick up a fresh scorecard that is).

Fortunately, you can purchase buffs from Brother Vance to either forgive your first loss, start with a win on your scorecard or make the next win count for two wins. The loot this week includes The Infinite Theorem (a heavy machine gun); Cover of the Exile (Hunter helm); Hood of the Exile (Warlock helm); and Helm of the Exile (Titan helm). Thoughts on this week’s map? Let us know in the comments.

In spite of a lot of criticism, Destiny ultimately went on to be successful, and become a fixture in millions of players’ now playing lists- a lot of this owed itself to the endgame in Destiny, which introduced real loot based stats, grinding, and exclusive content, such as the raids, which led to a self fulfilling, self perpetuated grind, which kept players playing. The best part of Destiny was considered to be its end game raid, the Vault of Glass. And when its first expansion, The Dark Below, was widely panned, the raid, Crota’s End, kept people playing.

Given, then, that Destiny’s success so far has owed itself entirely to the end game raids, you would think Bungie would be doubling down on those, right?

You would think wrong. The upcoming expansion, House of Wolves, will have no raid.

‘House of Wolves will not have a Raid activity,’ Bungie said. ‘We didn’t make this decision lightly. Our team has been humbled by the reception of Raids in Destiny and we are creating a new Raid for a release later this year. House of Wolves will have a new cooperative end game activity focused on variety, replayability, and skill – a new battle Arena called The Prison of Elders.’

What I don’t understand is… why? Bungie, after Destiny and The Dark Below were criticized, specifically delayed House of Wolves, because they wanted to incorporate player and community feedback. They specifically promised that the new expansion would reflect community sentiments about the game, and double down on what was good about it, leading to a fresh new direction for the game. Then why is this expansion the exact opposite of what was promised? What has Bungie been doing all this while? Why exactly was House of Wolves even delayed?

House of Wolves will launch for Destiny later this year, on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PS3, and PS4.

People are dedicated to Destiny, and it is not hard to see why. In spite of all of its flaws, Bungie has managed to craft a uniquely addictive and fun multiplayer shooter, and people are clearly willing to invest a lot of time in it.

Which is why we keep getting news of all the crazy stuff that people do in the game. Take this, for instance. In Crota’s End – the end game raid that is made available as part of the Dark Below expansion pack that was released for the game back in November – a player has apparently managed to, all by himself, finish it up without ever firing a single bullet. In case you don’t understand, this is a big deal. 

Of course, the player in question used offense – it would have been impossible to win otherwise – but he used only his Warlock’s melee abilities, as well as its quickly respawning grenades. The entire thing was streamed live on Twitch, and can be caught in the video above.

He said it couldn’t be done when the hard mode for Crota’s End, the de facto raid of Destiny’s The Dark Below expansion, first went live. However, The Legend Himself finally managed to defeat Crota – that too, solo – while playing as a Hunter for the initial portions and a Warlock for final battle. Check out the video above for more details.

You can head here for more information on the different set-ups that user slayerage employed to pass different portions of the raid. The Hunter’s invisibility perks come in handy for the Abyss and interestingly, Timur’s Lash is employed for the Bridge portion, likely due to its high impact. The use of the Sunsinger Warlock for the final battle is obvious – Fusion Grenade is very powerful and can be effectively used to down Crota when combined with rockets.

What are your thoughts on The Legend Himself finally soloing Crota on hard mode? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Destiny’s Guardians will be facing their toughest challenge today when the Hard Mode for Crota’s End goes live at 10 AM PST. To prepare for the same, Bungie has dropped a new hotfix which corrects a few remaining glitches beforehand.

Aside from activating Hard Mode, the hotfix will make it so that players can no longer de-spawn enemies after activating the bridge plate and then holding a point. An issue has also been fixed wherein Crota would stop summoning Oversouls when players would die.

Though there are still a fair number of exploits remaining, it seems that the majority of strategies for cheesing Crota’s End have been nullified enroute to Hard Mode. This will ensure that players need to work to legitimately earn the newest loot, namely the raid’s primary weapons.

Are you preparing for Crota’s End Hard Mode? Let us know what you think of the latest hotfix, as well as what you expect from the raid, in the comments below.

Destiny’s newest raid, which launched with The Dark Below, will finally be receiving its Hard Mode variant on January 21st. Crota’s End originally launched in December 2014 with the expansion pack but only had the Normal Mode available. Though players could obtain all the raid gear from the same, the primary weapons can only be obtained from Hard Mode.

Bungie has no intention of making things easier for players either. It’s recent Weekly Update hints at new challenges, including a good chance the Chalice of Light won’t be available for healing in the last raid portion. Enemies will also be tougher this time with Hard Mode starting at level 33.

Along with four new primary weapons, players can pick up a new shader, ship and the Crux of Crota which is necessary for upgrading the Eidolon Ally into the Exotic assault rifle Necrochasm.

Crota’s End Hard Mode goes live on 10 AM PST this Wednesday. Are you looking forward to it? Let us know in the comments and stay tuned for more information on the same.

Expect to hear even more about Bungie’s Destiny this month – not only is the Hard Mode version of The Dark Below’s raid due but a new patch has been revealed for January 13th.

Along with fixing an annoying bug in the Vault of Glass that gave un-upgraded Exotic weapons, the patch will address the various exploits players have discovered to cheese Crota’s End. You can read up on all on the changes but suffice to say, your old bag of tricks won’t help you get through Hard Mode when it goes live.

Speaking of Hard Mode, Bungie stated that, “We’re not going to spoil any hard mode surprises here. You’ll need to learn a new trick or two, but given your past performances, we’re pretty sure plenty of you will find a way to come out on top and earn some shiny new trophies to take with you on your next adventure.”

You can read more about the patch and other interesting details in the latest Bungie Weekly Update. What are your thoughts on the changes though? Let us know in the comments.

Bungie’s Destiny is a fun experience if you’re not high on in-depth plots and emotional stories but it has its fair share of glitches. Many of those glitches can be found in The Dark Below expansion’s new raid “Crota’s End” which have caused several players to solo or cheese major portions within minutes. Those aren’t the only glitches to emerge though.

This interesting glitch concerns a Thrall which seemingly found a chest and then alerts all of its friends about the same. Pretty weird…until all of its allies come running out and just hang around that last area as if collecting loot. Though most of the story is ad-libbed, it is extremely odd to see so many Thralls not attacking the player, much less running out towards a single point for no reason.

What are your thoughts on the epic chest run of the Thralls? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.