If you are as powerful as an OP anime character in Destiny 2, you will probably be nerfed soon. Why is being too strong a problem in the action MMO?
This is what makes Guardians fun: When you feel really powerful as a player, soaring high through the air, dodging bullets and taking down half a dozen enemies with burning swords, you are having a blast in Destiny 2.
Bungie now explains why it’s “too anime” and why you will unfortunately need to be nerfed. We’ll take a look at how the Destiny developers design classes and why the balancing act between “Anime as Fuck” and balance is not always easy.
Where did Bungie philosophize about animes? Recently, the two leading Bungie developers Kevin Yanes and Chris Proctor were questioned by community experts for almost 3 hours. We have already dealt extensively with the important information from the conversation on MeinMMO here.
In the podcast, Chris Proctor dryly attests to anime enthusiasts: “People with anime characters as profile pictures are intelligent, rational, and I stop everything and listen to them immediately.” Quite funny, but the topic of anime is much more important when it comes to class balance and how powerful a Guardian can feel before it gets annoying for their teammates.
Movies and Series as Inspiration for Power Fantasy
It’s no secret that Bungie likes to cater to these “I feel like the greatest hero in the universe” fantasies. Many classes resemble iconic figures from cinema and comics: Captain America is the Void Titan, the Emperor is the Stormcaller, even Superman is represented, and for some time now, finally as strong as in the comic.
Especially with the Chaos Warlock, the “Dragon Ball” fanboy comes out in Yanes. The class is not overpowered, but it is at the top of the anime spectrum. The power fantasy here is Son Goku firing his iconic Kamehameha. There you have it, the community has been using this reference since the Super exists, and Bungie has now confirmed it.
Community experts then abruptly pull Yanes out of his daydream. They argue that, like in Dragon Ball, the power of the Chaos Warlock can’t be contained and just blasts through walls. Yanes admits, yes, that shouldn’t be the case; the team was always working on that.
However, as they will never completely separate the PvE and PvP sandbox in Destiny 2, such “Anime as Fuck” classes are unfortunately not sustainable in the long run.
This is how Bungie designed the OP Titan: Bungie also works with so-called power fantasies when designing classes. The overpowered Stasis Colossus was internally called the “Frost Hulk.”
According to Yanes, they had exactly the image of the Hulk in mind as he jumps between buildings and smashes aliens in the first “Avengers” film (2012). And this feeling was then implemented in the game – when the Titan entered the game far too strong.
You can check out what Yanes meant here:
Especially Supers that last long after activation and can then score a ton of kills are at the top of the power fantasy scale. But players should not be as overpowered as a pumped-up Super Saiyan or anime villain.
It should be obvious that such an ice monster was too strong in the actual game, right? Yes, Bungie was aware of this and admitted that they brought the class live and assumed they would need to nerf it 3 or 4 more times:
Why should too much power be bad for Destiny 2?
Experts agree in the podcast that movement skills and Supers currently constitute a large part of a subclass’s power – especially in PvP.
This is the dilemma: Bungie looks at it from the victims’ perspective. Sure, it feels great. But it makes it no fun for others to not be able to hit a jumping, rolling, and sliding Hunter. When a Guardian flies around in full anime boss mode, everyone else doesn’t have such a pleasant experience.
- In general, all abilities should have pros and cons.
- When the Stasis Hunter combo terrorized the PvP, there was hardly a choice. Everyone played the combo or was at a disadvantage.
- Movement skills like the “Icarus Grapple” or “Hunter Dodge” offer virtually no downsides and make classes with these abilities the top choice in PvP.
According to Bungie, continually ramping up the power of all other classes is not an option either. The rule remains, if you are too high up on the anime scale, a nerf is sure to come soon.
This is what the future should hold: Bungie wants to emphasize the “identities” of each subclass more strongly in the future. For example, the Nova Bomb should focus more on having the devastating, singular attack more often. Yanes describes it as, “Oh, I see red on the radar a room away, I have the solution for this problem [namely the Nova Bomb].”
Easy-to-land abilities should be weaker, but available more often. Heavy skill shots should pay off when they hit. Will that eventually apply to Jötunn too?
Bungie gives the all-clear: The game will never be as slow as in Destiny 2 Vanilla again. They just want to shift the focus more towards weapon play starting in Season 15 and rethink the role of abilities in duels.
What do you think of the anime scale that Bungie uses for the fun but also the power of a subclass? Would you like to be overpowered – because when everyone is OP, no one is OP – or is a balanced equilibrium important to you? Let us know in the comments.
