This week, a new extra hard challenge is available in Destiny 2. While Destiny streamers like Gladd, Fallout, and Saltagreppo are still dancing around the topic of who will start first, one has already completed all strikes. However, his conclusion is sobering.
Which challenge is it about? Normally, a high power level is the key in Bungie’s loot shooter. Higher power levels make it easier for players to succeed in many activities. Yet while some Guardians want to raise their power level as high as possible, the best players in Destiny 2 thought last week about how to get rid of it.
The reason for this was a change by Bungie. Until recently, the toughest content, the Grandmaster Nightfall, was subject to a minimum power level. Without that, you could not start the activity. However, this restriction for Grandmaster was lifted last week.
- The required power level for entry has been lowered by 25 to 1,580.
- The overall power level for Grandmaster activities is lowered by 10 to 1,620.
Anyone can now play a Grandmaster faster: Now anyone can quickly get there to finally start a Grandmaster Nightfall and experience pure endgame feeling. Provided you dare. Because this lifting of the often-criticized restriction also means that your enemies at the start with the minimum power level will have an unstoppable 40 power levels above you.
Only those who increase the artifact or their power level can make the activity easier. In Season 19, this goes up to power level 1,595, so all enemies will then only be 25 power levels above you.
For the best players in Destiny 2, who are really looking for challenging and punishing content, this lifting and the under-powering of minus 40 levels, however, was the perfect challenge. They challenged each other on Twitter to play the six Grandmaster Nightfall with minus 40 power level and solo. It can’t get any more underpowered right now. But only one made it through in the end.
Esoterickk plays 6 Grandmasters -40 Power Level
While Destiny streamers like Gladd, Vendetta, AllThePlayers, Saltagreppo, and Fallout were still discussing on Twitter, their followers, on the other hand, were already sure. If anyone can successfully pull off this new challenge, it is the god of PvE Esoterickk. And they weren’t wrong.
Esoterickk didn’t beat around the bush and completed the new toughest content first and within a few days. He shed the power levels he had collected so far through gear adjustment and played all available Strikes in Season 19 in the following order:
- Terminus of Insight, on Nessus
- The Scarlet Fortress, on the Earth Moon
- Birthplace of Evil, in Savathun’s Throne World
- Mirror Corridor, on the Ice Moon Europa
- The Corrupted, in the Dreaming City
- Guardians of Nothing, in the Tangled Shore
You can watch his runs with maximum under-powering through the strikes again here:
Basically, a great challenge. But it also clearly revealed a previously suspected insight among players. Since their introduction in Destiny 2, the Nightfall strikes have become much easier. Nowadays, anyone can achieve that, and Esoterickk also has a clear opinion on that.
The hardest content in Destiny 2 is not hard enough
Challenge shows how easy it has become: After the top PvE player completed all the strikes, he made a sobering conclusion: The hardest content in Destiny 2 is no longer challenging enough – even with -40 power level.
Esoterickk wrote under his video on YouTube:
In the past, a handicap of -40 at a Grandmaster Nightfall would have made it nearly impossible to succeed in many cases. This stands in stark contrast to how it is now with some of the toughest content the game has to offer. […] Grandmasters were originally launched with the idea that they would challenge even the most dedicated fireteams, but season after season, we’ve seen them become easier and easier, with changes made to make them more accessible to all. Now they are just the equivalent of another triumph that can be checked off each season without any satisfaction for the more dedicated players being challenged.
The “Grandmaster” mode simply no longer lives up to its designation as “the hardest content.” Most players could complete the strike “Terminus of Insight” this week with some careful play and knowledge of the mechanics, even with a minimum power level of 1580 and thus reap double loot.
At the start of the activity, it was already a tough challenge with minus 25 power levels that only the best could handle.
Destiny 2 needs at least 1 brutal content: Esoterickk thinks it’s good that the Grandmaster Nightfalls are currently likely at a very good point for the majority of the player base.
He continues:
They are accessible enough to be doable even by some of the least engaged players and by the majority of the player base that wants to complete them. […] Being able to survive as much as possible while also eliminating entire groups of enemies without much effort shows in -40 content solo how strong we are. […] But ultimately, I think it would be nice to have at least one brutally challenging content in the game.
Has Destiny 2 become too easy? Of course, the statement “The game is too easy” also depends on how much someone plays. Destiny 2 is constant repetition, and hence players get better at Nightfall strikes the more they play.
Nevertheless, there is a desire in every player to be challenged. That one special activity through which one has to really struggle is currently missing from Bungie’s loot shooter.
What is your opinion on this topic? Is Destiny 2 now easier than before? Or do you think the challenge for players has reached a better point? Feel free to share your opinion in the comments.
Other changes in Destiny 2 sound like they could change everything in Lightfall:
Destiny 2: Lightfall will radically change the build system – should be a fresh start
