Destiny 2

[Rangers]

I dunno if Phosphorus is really "better" but yeah. They are the same family. I think there's a third. I didn't say it was the only one.

Anyways I looked again and Antiope can hit 28m range with the 2nd scope. The 2nd highest SMG hits 20m. Why would Bungie make such a vast discrepancy? No wonder Antiope rides alone. Granted most plebes wont change off the default scope.

I guess the only pushback is I'm not sure how controllable SMG's are at farther ranges regardless of their range on paper.

I've moved on to Last Hope temporarily! Faster TTK and 14m range (long scope) challenges most non 600 RPM SMG's. I wonder why people like SMGs so much, easier to aim with a "rifle"?

 

[DrJay24]

I thought you were saying ti was the only one, hence the "otherwise not attainable".

SMGs and sidearms are basically the same range, which is crap. They just have low TTK.

 

[djskribbles]

Yeah SMGs and burst sidearms have similar TTK and range. The two standouts are Antiope and Last Hope. Last Hope has a faster TTK, but Antiope has considerably more range, and therefore is more versatile. That's probably why it's more popular than Last Hope.

Personally I prefer SMGs. I think they're more fun to use and I seem to be more consistent with them. Maybe it's because I barely use sidearms.

Personally my favorite SMGs are Antiope, Hero's Burden and Stochastic Variable (in that order).

 

[Rangers]

According to Destiny Gun Stats Last Hope/Omolon SA does have a significant edge in TTK over Submachineguns. .73 for Last Hope vs .9 for Antiope.

 

[djskribbles]

According to Destiny Gun Stats Last Hope/Omolon SA does have a significant edge in TTK over Submachineguns. .73 for Last Hope vs .9 for Antiope.

I see 0.8 vs 0.9 on mercules spreadsheet for optimal TTK (7 crits, 1 body; 10 crits respectively). Bodyshot TTK is 1.13 vs 1.2.

But now consider the optimal range on Antiope is considerably further than Last Hope. To be able to consistently land crits with Last Hope, you have to be pretty darn close. Outside of their optimal range, Antiope is more forgiving and more consistent.

So if you can stay within Last Hope's optimal range, sure.. it will outgun an SMG every time, all things being equal. Outside of Last Hope's short optimal range, Antiope will win every time, all things being equal.

 

[Rangers]

Of course, that's always the tradeoff. Kill faster, less range. But sidearms are higher on that circle. They kill the fastest and have the least range...

I was using this spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...iyDzrxUyefUtrKDnvsndY_V8E/edit#gid=1154896375

I like that it has outcome based TTK as well. I think that's an interesting concept at least.

I agree SMG's are more meta and thus probably (almost certainly) better right now. Some of the very best players seem to run Last Hope though (well, at least a couple in the Xbox top 5 on DTR) . SMG's are more fun too.

My problem with Last Hope is somehow I accidentally sprint with it a lot when in pitched battle, so I stop shooting at the worst moment and get killed. I dunno why this is an issue but so annoying when it happens. Does this happen to anybody else? Guess I'm bearing down on the stick too much...it can happen with SMG's too but seems less.

I kind of want to do an objective test, ten games sample size each, of Mida/Hero's, Uriel's/Anti, and Mida/Uriels, and record my k/d over the ten games with each to compare. I figure those are representative of the very best loadouts. See which kills best for me. Although when I was using Mida/Uriels, I found myself seemingly using Uriels all the time.


However as always I kind of fear all it will really tell me is lobby quality over those ten games. And it will be pretty grindy. Still want to.

It's funny the Meta basically breaks down to: Do you want to run Mida? Ok you dont get Antiope, adjust. Do you want to run Antiope? Ok you dont get Mida, adjust.

I still think we need to get away from 4 players so bad. It's so sweaty and annoying. Think about it, in D1 3 players were the sweaty playlists. 4 players is basically that. Rumble will be nice too.

Plus 4 players just makes teamstomping so oppressive. At least with 6, it's harder to get 6 players together so it wont be so oppressive. And even if you have 6, the other side will probably usually have a team or two of 2-4 itself.

I dont see why this is taking so long, once the gameplay is done it should be a doddle to just adjust player count. All of this should have been in D2 from the beginning, just like private matches too. Sad.

 

[djskribbles]

Of course, that's always the tradeoff. Kill faster, less range. But sidearms are higher on that circle. They kill the fastest and have the least range...

Right, I'm just answering your question as to why SMGs are more popular, it's because they're more versatile and it's not all about TTK numbers.

I kind of want to do an objective test, ten games sample size each, of Mida/Hero's, Uriel's/Anti, and Mida/Uriels, and record my k/d over the ten games with each to compare. I figure those are representative of the very best loadouts. See which kills best for me. Although when I was using Mida/Uriels, I found myself seemingly using Uriels all the time.


However as always I kind of fear all it will really tell me is lobby quality over those ten games. And it will be pretty grindy. Still want to.

It's funny the Meta basically breaks down to: Do you want to run Mida? Ok you dont get Antiope, adjust. Do you want to run Antiope? Ok you dont get Mida, adjust.

Yeah it's a good idea to play quite a few games with a loadout to find out what you truly like. There are a small handful of maps that have longer lanes where you might need or perform better with a different loadout. If you know the map well enough, you can always alter your play-style to suit your loadout, but that's not really optimal.

The type of people you play against also might affect your choice in loadout. Skilled players are usually more aggressive because they have the confidence and skill to push people, hence why CQC weapons are popular amongst the top players. Below average or average players will play more passively where you might not even need a CQC weapon, and you might be better off with a scout + AR. In regular PVP, it doesn't really matter because you can change your loadouts on the fly, but in trials where it locks your loadouts, it's really just best to find what you're most comfortable with and stick with it.

When making a loadout, I like to cover as much range as possible, leaving minimal 'gaps' in effective range, and even having some overlap. I basically only have like 3-4 loadouts that I use, and 90% of the time I use the same loadout, since most maps are medium'ish sized. The loadout I use the most is Uriel's/Antiope. Antiope covers close-midrange well, and Uriel's covers mid to mid-long range. The large majority of the maps in D2 are not long range and rarely do I even consider using a scout rifle.

For maps with long lanes (like Eternity) my preferred loadout is Antiope/Manannan. Mida and/or Purpose with Hero's Burden is another loadout I like for ranged maps for aggressive players since the 900RPM SMGs seem to melt quicker at close range. And Mida/Purpose with Uriel's is a loadout I like for passive players.

Everyone has different play styles, skill levels and preferences though. There is no one meta loadout that suits everyone. Basically just look at the pool of meta weapons, try them all, and see what you're best at. It's also a good idea to get comfortable to multiple loadouts to handle different situations/maps.

 

[Rangers]

I was looking at a few random top 5 players (Trials and Clash) and their loadouts on Xbox on Guardian.gg. I would say the most common loadout on those guys is actually Mida/Last Hope, with a strong 2nd of Mida/Mida Mini,. so that's...intriguing. Playstation top 5's was more Antiope/Uriels (AR's are so boriiiing) last what little I looked. Weird that different consoles could have somewhat different Metas. Makes me wonder if it's a different controller nuance thing somehow. Or just culture? Which would be even bizarre.

I've been using Mida again lately and pretty much raking with it. It's still sogood.jpeg. Just picks up so many slays, especially with my playstyle.

I noticed same top guys again above most common exotic was Stompeez. So I put them on too LOL. Knucklehead is kind of redundant when running Mida anyway.

I'm not sure what good Stompees will do, but at least the increased sprint speed when not running Mida Mina is an advantage I guess. You can sprint around people with your sub/sidearm. Mida Mini should max sprint roughly too so stompeez would be redundant again. Well except the higher double jump thing, not sure how or if that's considered a relevant advantage. i normally defaulted to triple jump before anyway...

As i understand Stompees wont even help when equipping Mida because Mida already pretty much maxes sprint. It isn't like any exotic helps you a ton though. I'd just default back to Foetracer which is ok but nothing fantastic.

Gemeni Jester is...interesting but they dont strike me as catching on very meta, which basically means I tend to overlook them.

Searching for a sub to pair with Mida I can say Heros Burden is out. Range or not it's too difficult to control IMO. Maybe if you ran a CB mod, maybe I dont know, but I need my triple ability cooldowns. Stochastic variable is so much better IMO. It's only 1m less range but drastically more controllable (with phase change mag). Range is useless if you dont have the stability to use it, and the effective range of Stochastic is IMO much better than Burden's. Even Mida Mini I prefer over Hero's Burden.

On a general note, Datto made another malaise laden vid about what he thinks Destiny 2 should do, and he kept mentioning how loot is so non compelling currently, and the highest level content should give you the highest gear. To me that's basically code for restrict power cap gear to nightfall and raid again.

I've been against that sturdily, but I have to say, I might just be wrong. It does kind of devalue things when you can hit 335 doing anything. Also, effectively max gear being limited FORCES you to run the raid, for better or worse.

I would say if Bungie does that just be sure to never limit max gear to challenges or prestige raid. Normal raid should ALWAYS get you max gear IMO, since the latter are too stressful under LFG.

About Masterworks, well I've masterworked so far Nameless Midnight, Antiope, Uriels, Sins of the Past. Masterworks mostly only matters for PVE because of the orbs, and nameless/uriels/sins is about the best PVE loadout so now what? Thing is I'm now sitting on 17 masterworks cores or whatever they're called, and there's nothing I'm just dying to user them on at all. Hell exotics being non masterwork knocks out about 50% of my rotation weapons right off the bat. Still, I am glad for something else slightly meaningful to grind for. The only thing, almost, once you are comfortably 335!

 

[Rangers]

Beat Argos. It wasn't too hard. Only 2nd attempt.

I guess I sort of like these bite sized raids. At least they dont require such a time investment.

So that was pretty much last thing on my checklist to go back into Destiny hibernation. I'll probably putter around in crucible for a few days though.

Want that IB scout, I played a ton of IB today and had 56 tokens (takes 60 to buy a weapon)...then unthinkingly used them all on packages. Doh. Oh well got 19 more already.

It's a 260 scout so it'll suck anyway but, love me some scout rifles. It'll be the Destiny usual, grind hours for something, put it away after five minutes LOL.

The other reason for this post is there was a leak on Xbox store...basically the next expansion is on Mars but deals with...Rasputin! My favorite character in Destiny probably. Such as that has any meaning.

I feel like Bungie are bound to screw it up sooner or later like they do everything else, though. Probably with this expansion.

The key to Rasputin is he is mysterious, enigmatic and somewhat neutral. It's a fine line to keep him intriguing and I'm sure they will screw it up with a whole expansion based on him. Still, excite.

I feel like after everything he should be like the final boss in year 10 of Destiny. Yet even after all that he should not be able to be pigeonholed as bad or good. Or maybe he should help you beat the ultimate baddie?

Edit: Frostmire's Hex (IB scout) is a lot of fun. Dunno if it's meta but I'm enjoying it. With Full Auto it basically plays a bit like a slower, longer range AR. Plays quite different from other common loadouts. The first scout I felt like FA was definitely good on too that I can recall.

The only worthwhile pairing with it is Antiope though, like so many other loadouts. This way you get some decent range synergy. If you run an AR they duplicate range a lot and it's not as fun or probably effective.

 

[Nisaaru]

Had a few really strange games the last 2 days. One bizarre with 18 kills, 1 assist, 0 death and 34 points where everything I did was gold without noticing any lag and a few other >10KD/A games. I really wondered what the other team thought when they saw the stats after the game. Usually you see 1.x to 3.x in most games there.

But then I also had a few sub 1KD/A where I lost almost every encounter even if both used the same weapon.

I play more lone wolf than team-shot and Top ELO was 1565 but I don't really see myself as good. Also I can't get shit done with a Hunter and I see so many players who are so much better especially with a Hunter with a vertical game.

The game feels completely inconsistent to me.

 

[Rangers]

Speaking of good games, I might forever remember my best game in D1...by now all the details have eluded me, but I know I had over 30 kills. Like 34 or 37 IIRC. Against maybe like 7 deaths? It was rift gametype. I remember even my last move was popping a arcblade midair and getting a couple more kills as time ran out. It was like I couldn't die. Even though I never ran much with spark in general in Rift, towards the end the other team was coming back, I had to grab the rift, do some jukes and approach from the right, under a roof, under heavy fire from multiple opponents, jump up to the platform, I went for the slam, I had like 1% health left, instead of dying I got the slam and killed like 3 opponents with it too. Ginormous swing in one play to seal the win at practically the last second.

It was a combination of things of course, not great opponents (although they weren't total stiffs) and just everything going totally right for me that one game. I must have seemed like a beast to the enemy...even though I'm not lol.

You dont see games like that in D2. Dont see 30+ kills. IIRC my longest streak in D1 was like 18 kills (and I was always kinda disappointed because my other tops were higher, but my longest kill streak was relatively unimpressive), I can barely imagine 18 actual kills without dying in D2. Everything gravitates to .500, most games are like 8-10, 10-8, 7-5, in k/d. If you go 12-5 k/d it feels like you dominated in d2.

 

[Nisaaru]

https://ibb.co/eQYsW6

To keep a memento of this bizarre game

 

[djskribbles]

My best single game kills (actual kills, not defeats) in D2 PVP is 26, and my longest streak is 16 kills, according to destinytracker. Nothing too special, but my kill potential is reduced in trials and playing with 1-2 other good players because they steal my kills.

Honestly I don't play much PVP outside of Trials. I actually had some fun in IB this week though... it's a nice change of pace from Trials. Trials is D2 PVP on steroids... all hand-holding/team-firing. IB was actually more spread out with mostly randoms or teams of two with the occasional full squad.

Played 31 matches and finished with a 358/197 for a 1.82 K/D (or 2.6K/AD), winning 77.4% of my matches. A decent amount of matches I had full teams just leave at the start, or had everyone but 1-2 people stay in a match and had new people come in and out.

Mind you I was usually playing with 1 or 2 other people (and a few with a full squad)... I never solo-que in D2 PVP anymore.... it's really frustrating with the potatoes I get teamed with.

I'm slowly getting used to this slow-paced, team-firing D2 PVP, but I still find myself trying to go for montage worthy solo plays like in D1 and end up getting put in bad situations. I'm just an impatient player. Still, my K/D has risen to 1.49 and my K/AD at 2.29 overall. I still think I have a lot of room for improvement.

edit: Played quite a bit more IB and bumped my overall K/D to 1.52 and K/AD to 2.33. Started with a 1.47 or 1.48 K/D IIRC. Finished IB on a 45 win streak. Last 25 games I had a 2.43K/D with 296 kills and 122 deaths. Actually had quite a bit of fun.

 

[Nisaaru]

Even with the mentioned game from above success in D2 feels cheap to me(Cluster Rockets or Colony, team shot or killing solos when they enter a kill zone due the horrible radar) and failure if you're on the other side of the equation is frustrating.

 

[Rangers]

Saw a different loadout recommended on Reddit. I'm all about different loadouts.

It's Time Worn Spire, and then either Valkadyn (the original recommendation) or Heros Burden.

I found Valkadyn to have no use at all in a couple games, maybe I'm missing something. Felt TWS much better with my trusty Stochastic Variable. I was too lazy to get Burden out of the vault.

Part might be getting used to it but while fun and all I still always felt at a disadvantage not running meta. Or near meta. My current near meta go to loadout is Seven Six Five+Antiope. Seven Six Five I noticed has noticeably better stats than Eternal Blazon and it's noticeable. Seven Six Five is as close as you get to Mida in the energy slot IMO. That loadout is really good, lets call, it meta competitive (because it is meta I suppose, being basically Antiope and a Mida-like).

I noticed at Shaxx he has the crucible armor ornaments, but I'm not qualified for one piece because I avoid the Competitive playlist for the simple fact if somebody drops they wont be replaced. You need 25 competitive playlist wins for that piece. So I've begun grinding that a bit. I find the game is more fun if I have some goal, even if incredibly minor. For example most of my time in D1 crucible was spent chasing various grimoire. who knows how many hours getting 100 rumble wins alone took me.

I dont really want the armor set because the stats wont be what I want for PVP, but who knows maybe just once I could look cool in the game. For shits and giggles. I saw somebody rocking the full prestige raid set in the tower the other day and it was pretty cool.

Competitive has been actually pretty fun and less frustrating (maybe because of more strict SBMM?) than quickplay surprisingly, so far. The matchtypes really do feel pretty darn tense IMO.

Another fun thing has been using the Legend of Acrius (now fully upgraded). Since I never saw it much in crucible I figured it just relatively wasn't meta so not worth trying. And maybe so, but it's kinda nasty too. The thing just kills anything nearby. I got a double kill in crucible with one shot with it! Pairs well with the nightstalker invis meta of course. The main advantage over a RL is potentially more kills with 4 rounds (although I guess in theory a RL can get many kills too with multi kills per rocket).

So the patch notes are all about major changes and making TTK's faster and such. Umm, IDK.

 

[djskribbles]

Just looking through my old clips and I forgot how good fusion rifles are. I have been mostly using rockets or admittedly colony the odd time for fun.
I bring this up now because Bungie is looking into ways to make them more prevalent. They're very good already, they're just not used as often because they at least require SOME skill (basically just pre-charging/timing), and rockets and colony are so good and basically require no skill.

Trying to get used to using them again as I think they will be very strong after the sandbox changes.

 

[Nisaaru]

It's not that Fusions are bad. I used Main Ingredient during the first few months. But at least since Mayhem I only ran around with Sins even with the RLs reload weakness. Any time you run into another heavy or a Fireteam you better shoot quick. A Fusion you might get one shot of but you're dead afterwards in these situations most likely.

 

[Rangers]

NECRO BUMP

I saw random youtuber proclaim "Best Destiny 2 crucible loadout" recently....it's Nameless Midnight, Uriels Gift, and The Colony. So I tried it and, it is indeed top tier IMO.

You have to sub out Nameless for Mida to get The Colony, but it's worth it probably. That thing is suffocatingly dominant and good for possible multiple more kills a game than other heavies which is great for the old k/d. I'm still just learning it. So far I guess you just point it in people direction and shoot. With a rocket you generally leave yourself a lot more vulnerable.

From what I've noticed hell Nameless may be as good as Mida anyway. I also like having HCR on basically everything.

So yeah great loadout.

I noticed on Xbox most played games list randomly seen, Destiny 2 is like 12th. That's pretty bad and indicates the userbase bleed off is more than just on Twitch. I am a bit worried about if there will be problems finding crucible games.

I ran up a Warlock to level 25, so now I have all 3 classes. Now just upping my Titan from 20 to 25 by going through COO campaign a mission or two per day.. I find it fun to go through the campaign with alts from time to time.

I guess after I get my Titan to 25 and get 25 competitive playlist wins (currently at 16) I'll go on break again. I might get the crucible armor/ornament set then, first time I'd ever have a armor set matched. Because with masterworks, I can reroll any armor to have the stats I want. Though then I still gotta acquire/apply all necessary mods (a few are sometimes troublesome)....and hell as soon as I do that they'll probably patch and Nightstalker wont be meta anymore anyway!

I thought about going for the prestige raid armor, but I think it's too much trouble. You'd just have to have it all drop for you, right? You cant buy it from Benedict or anything...so yeah, probably too time consuming for a cosmetic.

I havent done any crimson doubles. A sparrow? Who cares. I should though, just to see if D2 plays any different/better outside of 4v4.

 

[BadTB25]

That's the loadout I've been using for a while now.

 

[Rangers]

Anyone play the go fast update?

I find playing without knowing the new meta a bit fruitless, but anyway.

Also I haven't played in a while so I'm not super tuned in to the feel differences, as I would have been if I had been playing a lot all along and the new update dropped.

I was using Last Perdition, it seemed like a real beast and I felt like I was pretty much outgunning everybody. I was running Antiope too, but LP was so strong I rarely felt like bothering with Antiope!

As for subclass, I was still using my last-meta 3 ability cooldown nightstalker. It still felt pretty strong, as I understand you can now dodge every 13 seconds with 3 cooldowns.

Heavy dropping from defeated enemies felt chaotic and fun. You only get one rocket now, but heavy spawns so much more often it more than made up for it.

I did encounter one annoying guy spamming the crap out of Last Colony. Hopefully that wont be an issue.

Overall I definitely felt faster, more able to take one 1+ enemy solo, and it felt more frantic, so at first glance it seems Bungie succeeded. Just waiting on the inevitable balance issues to arise...

My NS was specced for like 3 mobility I think, so I haven't tried what a high mobility build might do.

I love pulses, as much as I claim to be a scout guy I probably enjoy using pulses more than anything, so this seeming pulse meta will be great for me.