In Destiny, the Timestream ability of Atheon is likely to be changed as early as next week, making the battle more difficult because it will be more random. This frustrates some fans and dominated the discussion about Destiny over the weekend.
Timestream now selects three random players
The most important ability of Atheon, the raid boss in “The Glass Chamber”, for the battle’s course is the “Timestream”. Until now, the three Guardians farthest from him are thrown into another time plane. There, they need to make their way back to the portal as quickly as possible, or the raid will wipe. The other three players must try to open the gate in the present, or the raid will wipe. It’s not as simple as it sounds, as there are surrounding circumstances and difficulties, the trickiness of the object, so to speak. At the end of the article, you will find a video that explains the battle mechanics of what is considered the hardest boss fight in Destiny in more detail.
Since it was clear beforehand who would be teleported and who would not, players could agree in advance on who would take on which task. One was the “Away” team, the other the “Home” team. The players accepted their roles, could prepare for them, and eventually mastered them.
This classification is exactly what Destiny wants to abolish in the next hotfix. Atheon is supposed to randomly select three players. The specialization of players into individual tasks does not suit Bungie. Everyone must be able to do everything; after all, Atheon represents the climax of the raid, as stated in the announcement for the fix.
Why are players so upset about this?
Chaos or order – Boss mechanics require a different procedure
Such boss mechanics, where a raid splits in advance and assigns specific tasks, have been known in MMORPGs for years. For example, in early boss fights, a tank had “Add duty” and only had to take care of the adds, having no idea what the “Main Tank” was supposed to do.
In World of Warcraft or other MMOs with raid traditions, it is quite normal that before the pull, it is already clear which player will “go into the portal” to take on a special task there. In such fights, it ultimately only requires “practice”, as each player does the same thing at every pull until everything works well enough for the boss to go down.
However, there are also always boss encounters in MMOs where it is random which player has a critical task during a pull. These “random” elements often annoy “normal” raid groups—especially in loot runs with numerous players. Because in every raid, there are “weak links” who struggle to fulfill special tasks. Others groan when they hear: Darkhexx0r23 now has the buff and must give the princess twenty-four hand kisses, but definitely not twenty-five. Because they know: Darkhexx0r panics when he has to do something like that and always loses count.
The introduction of a random element into the equation and the breaking of routine makes it more difficult to learn a boss. However, the fights are more dynamic and often count as highlights of a raid. Especially demanding boss fights at the end of a “raid tier” not only require automations that can be practiced but also players’ ability to react quickly and correctly to randomly occurring events while maintaining raid coordination.
So, both “boss mechanics”, both random distribution and a more static one, are fundamentally common and normal. And they alone wouldn’t be a reason for the current frustration—even among players who are rather inexperienced in raids, which can be assumed in Destiny.
Problems with the change lie in scheduling and communication
The planned change with Atheon annoys Destiny players because it clearly complicates the “mechanics” of the boss fight and Bungie has not communicated this. It is dismissed as a “fix”—just like the prevention of knocking (which was a clear bug).
This change to the Timestream is not a bug fix but a retroactive change in design. Bungie has changed its mind.
“We are making the boss harder after he has already been established for 5 IDs” is a rather unusual approach in raid design. In most games, bosses become significantly easier over time. However, Bungie is still new to boss design—and with only 6 players, it might be realistic to expect that everyone can handle all tasks. Some “chaos” in the process and a more hectic gameplay is surely beneficial for a shooter like Destiny. Although it would have been better to design the boss like this from the start.
