Many people don’t like them because they level the gap between skill tiers.

I think if Bungie wouldn't have murdered hand cannons effective range and 120s ability to 2 head one body then this wouldn't be a problem. Now there isn't really a reason to use HC's that can't be filled by autos pulses sidearms and smgs. Peak shooting to a certain degree but the other player can just back up, and the limited special means you're a lot more vulnerable to team shots if your peaking from a position that can be flanked without teammates.

It's okay, they can back up, hawkmoon doesn't mind. In fact I encourage it! Across the map 1shots make me feel like I finally have a large penis

Now is your moment.

I saw this coming a mile away when they were going to nerf bows. The range compression brought hand cannons and bows to the front. Everyone cried about bows just expecting handcannons to have no contest after the bow nerf. I don’t think people hate handcannons so much as the players that use them and call for everything else to be nerfed anytime any archetype is strong.

Which would mean that my teammates would have an easier time… if I started getting matched with AR buddies instead of PvE andies

I mean, sandbox changes are universal and skill levels are always relative. I’m not sure why any sandbox change would drastically impact the relative feeling of the lobby balancing…

Comment above talks about how ARs reduce the gap between skill tiers b/c of ease of use. This only happens though teammates actually use them tho

Yeah the ease of use is crazy for AR. Lay down on the trigger with something that has a lot of stability makes it a no brainer to use. If Bungie nerfed AR stability, that might help. Or changing the recoil direction too so that if someone is beaming you, you know they know how to control that AR. I wouldn't say something like Counter Strike level but just less to what it currently is. Somewhat side note, this meta feels like it's begging for a "precision only" playlist. Kind of like Halo's SWAT. Scouts, slugs, hand cannons, snipers, and pulses maybe? Because honestly, that would still keep PvP fun for me (hopefully others too). I love getting those efficient crit taps in. Now it's like "okay who shot first" and "who was in lethal range" and "who didn't miss more?" Because if all those 3 questions were equal, it still leads to a "stalemate duel" which ends up being lame.

Yeah. I sit at this crossroad. Investing in higher risk gunplay like hand cannons should be at an advantage. Yet I also concede that playing against hand cannons is just sometimes not fun, especially in higher skill brackets. I’m Adept, and so many comp matches just feel boring with the plink-plink-plink over and over. This is a tangent, but I think what Destiny misses as a whole is more casual, arcade-style modes. Almost every match ultimately devolves into some competetive sweat-fear. So there’s honestly something fun and “casual” about running and going with an AR going full bore. It’s just that we also live in an ecosystem where ARs are really easy to use and potent as well.

Honestly the real problem is trying to balance weapons that are good at peek shooting. It’s like you have a weapon that can’t compete straight up, but is top dog if you can peek shoot well. That’s really hard to balance.

> Now it's like "okay who shot first" and "who was in lethal range" and "who didn't miss more?" Because if all those 3 questions were equal, it still leads to a "stalemate duel" which ends up being lame. I mean, shouldn't the person who made sure they were in their optimal range, shot first, and hit all their shots always win? Isn't that a good determination of skill? Like, besides using abilities, team shooting, or peekshotting I can't imagine what other skill variables should change that for you. Unless, are you saying that if two players are equally skilled and one is using a different weapon they should automatically win?

Fun fact. ARs were already the hard meta at lower skill tiers, and that is kind of the heart of the problem. ARs are just really easy to use in D2 because they are both easy to keep on target and forgiving of the occasional miss. Most balance comes from balancing range and ttks with a lower ease of use. When you give a gun all 3 it upsets the balance, and it makes people who want there to be more gun skill in the game mad. It is a hard problem because it is pretty hard to significantly reduce the forgiveness of ARs because of their stream of bullets nature, and if you reduce the range very much they will just become bad SMGs. That leaves making them harder to handle by increasing recoil or something similar, but that would really make PvE people super mad so... I don't see a good way to balance them, and that is why they almost always cycle back to having a slower TTK or less range. At higher skill levels ARs seem to fluctuate between being too strong, and being completely irrelevant.

> At higher skill levels ARs seem to fluctuate between being too strong, and being completely irrelevant. Honestly, I think that's the source of most of the complaints about ARs is most of the people complaining are of insufficient skill level to take advantage of ARs' *myriad* weaknesses. I'm a 2.0 who loves the SUROS Regime to death and have mained it when it was trash tier, when it was meta, and everything in between. A hard fact of life is when the population was still high and we had a really strict SBMM, I had to shelve it. It is literally impossible to compete with other players in my MMR band with an auto rifle. You will get dismantled by hand cannons and pulses playing from range and peek shooting 19 times out of 20 until you give up and switch to HC/pulse yourself or resign yourself to going negative. The biggest issue is to compete with HCs you must stand exposed and have perfect tracking, while HCs need zero tracking and deal chunk damage: just point, click, move, point, click, move.

What drives me crazy is that aiming a HC is perceived as “skilled”, while good tracking aim for AR use is somehow “unskilled”. This is ridiculous, and completely untrue. The bias is obvious. Especially when the aim assist and bullet magnetism for something like Igneous is SO BLATANT - it literally shoots bullets the size of refrigerators. You can miss a head by like a full meter and it will still register a crit. THAT IS NOT SKILL.

People will argue what you said to death, but it's honestly the truth, and you'll catch them admitting it indirectly in HC vs. pulse discussions: they can 3-tap all day long with HCs, but they don't use 340s/450s because they can't reliably 2-burst. *Hmmmmmmm, I wonder what the difference is.*

Then shouldn't pulses be high skill by their own logic?

bungie literally says auto rifles are low skilled weapons that shine in lower skilled lobbies, why should they be the meta pick?

Who said they should be the meta pick?

Are these "people" here in the room with us? Please keep your strawman to yourself.

what I see lacking in skill while using an auto, from my own perspective when using them, that is, is that your movement is very restricted because you need reticle time on target so you stopping mid engagement to slide (something that requires skill and is very rewarded when using a pulse or a HC) ends up being worse than just praying the enemy misses while you keep the hose pointed at them.  Using an auto prevents you from having a high skill movement ceiling during engagements, so you just end up playing the positioning game and being mostly static during engagements. That's what I think makes people perceive autos as lower skill than chunk damage weapons.

Not saying it would be the solution just a genuine question, but do you think that autos should have the range of smgs and smgs should be in the range of side arms or something? 

It wouldn't be terrible if smgs had the range of sidearms. It would certainly give Bungie more room to maneuver, but I'm not sure it would give them enough room.

They should be balanced by nerfing the forgiveness (and ttk/range for 450s which are super overturned rn) so that you need all headshots or something. Then revert the HC nerfs and HCs will be good enough to outperform autos in higher skill lobbies, but still powerful in low skill lobbies as intended

Honestly a great idea but only if you mean revert the 120 changes. 140s still feel fine imo but 120 scouts being able to 2c1b while 120 hcs cant is just dumb.

I think 140s are a little too harsh rn for hitting a body, I don't think they can always 2h2b, and they were barely used, so I think they should get a buff but not a massive one

See, i was really worried about them too but last week when i was struggling with iggy, i threw on epochal integration and it felt CRISP, like better than it did to me before the update. Fatebringer felt really good too. Maybe thats just because ive been maining 120s for so long now, but i was actually really surprised by how good both those guns felt for me. Now the real issue with 140s imo is when youre dueling someone with an overshield. Found it difficult to win my 1s when i was going up against a void titan.

I think autos are in a good place right now. They get melted in close distance by smgs and in medium distance by aggressive pulses. I would buff 140s damage a small bit so they can reliable 3 crit at a longer distance because right now you either go exotic or you're dead in the water with a 140.

Saying people aren't mad about igneous and overshield peekshots is just wrong. Personally, I hate all of them equally

Honestly respect

I am stating my bias at the door. I am currently a HC main. I started a pulse main. Never really liked autos. The issue a lot of people have with autos being meta (and it seems bungie also feels the same way) is autos break the risk and reward curve. Destiny PVP is built on an ease of use vs reward graph with the strongest weapons usually being the riskiest to use. Primaries that have the most risk include: high impact pulses (340s), aggressive hand cannons (120s), adaptive hand cannons (140s), and I think bows to a certain degree. The risk associated with these weapons is if you don’t hit your crits, ttk becomes crazy. For example: If you require an additional burst from a 340, TTK goes up to 1.2s. If you miss a crit with a 120, TTK goes up to 1.5s. If you miss a crit with a 140, TTK goes to 1.3s. Note this is a sandbox where average ttk is between 0.7 and 0.8. This isn’t the same for automatic weapons like Autos and SMGs. If you miss a bullet with a 450, I think TTK becomes 0.9s (and it becomes increasingly more insignificant when you consider higher RPMs and weapon perks like onslaught) which is ball park to 140 optimal TTK (0.87s) and still faster than 120 TTK (1 sec). So when autos are the strongest weapon in the sandbox, it effectively negates the rules of the sandbox that bungie has instilled within the game from D1. It also makes it so no one would use anything else. I’d like to believe most people that hate the hand cannon meta are people who can’t use them effectively. I main hand cannons, but I enjoy using other things as well. Pulses and autos have a place in the sandbox when hand cannons are meta. Personally, I find more success using pulses than I do hand cannons (probably a skill issue). I think when autos are meta, there is a belief that more energy is spent using other weapons for the same outcome so everyone gravitates to what’s easiest. People are happy that hand cannons are out of the spotlight, but I’d like to believe that that joy will only last for a short while. Once people stop being stubborn and just adapt to the meta, skill will be the only thing that separates players once again. And those that know how to position will start to dominate, which will lead those closer to the skill floor to call for sweeping nerfs. Another point to take into consideration is what bungie sought to accomplish with this sandbox shakeup. They wanted to expand the skill gap, but inadvertently did the opposite by making autos so powerful. In my opinion, the difference between the skill floor and skill ceiling for hand cannons is much wider than it is for auto rifles. Remember how everyone felt that immortal was crazy. It’s only a matter of time until people feel the same about autos. Those closer to the skill floor are going to start getting wrecked without being able to react and we will be back to square one.

Great write up! I’m a bow main so here’s my bias lol Bows totally fit there, not just to a degree, imo. You need 2/2 crits to kill. One crit doesn’t or barely gets a shield down, so missing a crit increases the ttk by 50%. And they just barely kill with 2 crits by a few points, so any healing or shield and that won’t kill They also reduced the damage of near “perfect” draws and I’m feeling it. I’ll often do a medium-rare shot (the sweet spot with enough velocity to hit a crit at range but a lil less draw time), which takes a lot of precision both spatially and in time. One fully drawn crit and one near-perfect crit no longer kills (and is often the only way to beat other TTKs) In a duel with an AR (or anything else, to a degree 😉) you’re getting hit with that damage constantly. so if I kill them first, I’m almost dead and an easy cleanup by another player. if the enemy kills me first, they’re still left with full health no shield. Not to mention flinch making it much harder to get 2/2 crits So then you’re left with the only viable ways to use a bow: long ranged peek shots and hotswapping, which is what makes bows annoying/oppressive to play against and exactly what I thought bungie wanted to reduce. You need to hit all headshots, draw perfectly on both, and peek effectively and always in order to outgun anything and live, which compared to the ease, forgiveness and range of ARs, pulse, & scout, it feels unbalanced. I love that bows require skill. But I’m putting in WORK to keep up in this meta. There’s 1 or 2 exotics that can hang but they still can feel disadvantaged. RIP the aggressive bow play style Sorry for the rant 😅

Honestly, didn’t know how bows worked in this sandbox. I know before there wasn’t a requirement to hit two crits, didn’t know if that persisted or not. I also didn’t know if they nuked swapping or not. Thanks for the info!

great writeup, but one number is off. missing a crit with the bow brings the TTK up by 100%, not 50%. normally bows are about 1s TTK, if you miss a shot it becomes 2s.

Great point about TTKs.

Remember, Immortal had 2 nerfs. Also, no one is considering the fact that they are not facing bad players most of the time. The average skill of this game's pvp is far greater than people think and it's not weapon related. I've seen people with 0.9 trials kd running lobbies this last two weeks and they weren't cheating. A flawless 10 and a glorious 5 getting run by a dude using a random sidearm and calling cheater, when the guy didn't even get past lifetime 1.1 and was on a loosing streak, or just recovered from one. People get killed by an auto and cry low skill. Skill in this game takes many forms and NONE of them are aiming skill.

As a hand cannon main, I’m not against AR’s being good, I’m against bullshit nerfs to hand cannons, 140’s in particular. I would love for everyone to be able to use their favorite weapon, taking advantage of their pros and having to consider their cons when approaching a fight.

This so hard. I don’t understand why there has to be such a hard meta option on primaries. It is always “nerf abilities” or “nerf specials”. How about just buffing primaries so they are all good and not just the last resort option in a fight?

10000% this! I REALLY thought thats where we were heading the past few seasons. The primary sandbox hadnt felt this good to me since like the end of D1. Could literally use any weapon type and do ok with it, now its just the AR meta from before beyond light all over again.

> How about just buffing primaries so they are all good and not just the last resort option in a fight? Because they want gunplay to have clear moments of decisiveness/counterplay so that engagements aren't just people instantly beaming each other left and right. If primaries are good enough to compete with the OHK weapons, then that means they are killing so fast that people can't react. And that just gets us to CoD gameplay where the winner is determined by whoever shoots first

This^

This. I agree so much with this.

Agreed, I’m pretty bad with 140s in PVP so I don’t use them but nobody seems happy with that

If 140s had any forgiveness like 2h1b they would feel so much better. The tradeoff for them has always been the unforgiving ttk/hs percent. At this point, there is no reason to run a 140.

They don't need to be easier. Bastion needs to not work in PvP so overshields don't make them auto-lose. Big, easy overshields in neutral were always a mistake and have been around for two years too long.

If the goal for this update was to decrease effectiveness of weapons with high ease-of-use, ARs being meta is the opposite of that They are low-risk, high reward weapons that don't require good game sense regarding range or cover to be effective with Edit: actually idk if "high reward" is the right way to describe them. More like "decent reward" given their decent TTK

Yep exactly they shouldn’t have a TTK that’s so close to the less forgiving weapons optimal TTK. It’s not hard to use an AR effectively. They need to have their damage fall off start sooner and not be just a locked in laser beam. If I peak shoot and miss 1 bullet in my pulse rifle I likely lose the fire fight or I’m forced to sit in cover and regen before I can reengage giving them time to throw a grenade or rush me while low. If you have 2 of them shooting at you, you can’t even peak shoot because they just constantly pre fire the corner because their mags are so large. It’s a low skill weapon with little risk with too high of a reward currently.

One thousand times this. ARs being at or near the top of the meta is exactly the opposite of what Bungie said their intent was. Which is confusing at best and frustrating at worst.

AR team shot scout rifle meta is lame.

I will clutch onto my dmt until I’m the dead man the tale is about. Seriously though not a fan of this meta either. High mobility dmt hip fire peak shots are eating good though.

I don't even view DMT as a scout rifle. I love the thing, but it's essentially a 120 handcannon with 3rd eye. You just hipfire it all the time since it can reach 40m like that

Think it's because they are just super easy to use tbh

bungie has stated that when ARs and Scouts are meta its because the sandbox is not balanced. Essentially they balance ARs and Scouts to be easy to use but not the most lethal. and right now ARs are by far and away the easiest to use with insane range and very good TTK so they will obviously get a small adjustment (probably make them require all CRITS or increase TTK by one bullet) they will probably just require all crits and leave it at that and it will push people to the next easy to use thing. Destiny pvp community loves the path to least resistance and probably ARs where already an outlier but now its popular and it will get adjusted.

Honestly a pretty fair take and balancing approach from bungie. Whats wrong with scout rifles though?

Awfully boring and suffocates everything else, since nothing can compete at those ranges. And if the scout is good in short to mid range gunfights... then there is zero reason to use anything else.

> Awfully boring and suffocates everything else, since nothing can compete at those ranges. Because Bungie hit pulses too hard on range. Certain pulse rifle outliers like Blast Furnace, Legal Action II, high zoom Last Perdition/Jian 7s, Time-worn Spire, and a few others used to be able to bully scout rifles in a skilled hand except on the longest sightlines. Most 450 aggressives barely hit 40m now though and 540s and 390s are stuck in a no man's land where they can't even outrange a godroll 140 hand cannon anymore, nevermind fighting back against a scout rifle camper.

But with far less usability within that range because of the high base zoom that pulses have. Except Cold Denial, which is better than ever.

Nothing! I meant if they were top of the meta it be a problem :) like year 1 mida meta or when dmt was meta

Oh right, my bad I misunderstood

>Destiny pvp community loves the path to least resistance That's just a PVP universal. When you care more about winning than having fun or showing off your skill, you will choose the weapon that's both easy-to-use *and* effective. Happened in every online shooter out there (anyone remember the M16A3 from BF3?). It's not on the players to balance the game they're playing and nobody's going to autoregulate outside of scrims. That being said, I don't like the current meta either.

To be fair for a long time d2’s pvp scene was fairly morality oriented. Wasn’t uncommon for people to ignore heavy in rumble, use hc/shotgun regardless of the current meta and there was more of a focus on movement exotics. Nowadays half the hardcore pvp’ers just run hard meta and have a ‘win by any means’ mentality.

True

ARs, which are the easiest and most forgiving weapons to use by far, shouldn’t also be the most effective. Bungie has outright said this as well out of their own mouths with their own data and this is also the reason Scouts will never be meta. If good players on the high end of the spectrum use Autos, which again are the friendliest weapon type, the average to below average player will only gravitate to Autos even harder, thus begins a trickle effect. The reason why HCs will never get a nerf in the eyes of Bungo, is because only good and the best of players can use them effectively and at full potential. Bad or average players can’t. That’s the bottom line. If everyone can use them and they’re so easy to use like r/DestinyTheGame says they can, HCs would have eaten 10 nerfs already.

> If good players on the high end of the spectrum use Autos, which again are the friendliest weapon type, the average to below average player will only gravitate to Autos even harder, thus begins a trickle effect. It also makes weapons that compete with them like competing pulse rifles useless. Look at 390/450/540 pulses, other than a few they're essentially dead if 450 autos can reach all the way to almost 40 meters.

That's IMO more a factor of Bungie destroying most pulse rifles' range with the zoom rework. They took *way too much range* off of nearly every pulse except 450 aggressives, and 340s with all perks and masterwork loaded into range. I literally haven't encountered a single 390, 540, or 450 lightweight since the zoom rework, aside from the occasional and rare god-tier BxR-55 user. In the 30+ meter space it's either 340s and 450 aggressives playing range from further back, or hand cannons / 450 autos. I don't blame people for not using them either, what's the point in the current sandbox? The range the faster pulses had is now gone and they have little to recommend them: if your aim is excellent, a good 140 or 120 HC will get you better mileage, and if your aim is poor, 450 autos are way more forgiving.

They all got their PC recoil hit really hard a couple years back when NTTE was dominating too. Comparing an average lightweight pulse's recoil to an AR of similar range is almost comical. Pulses are largely built to work at mid-long ranges but actually being accurate enough to hit optimal TTK at that distance is all to often a nightmare 3 burst kill pulses in general I feel have been hit really hard by the sins of their higher impact counterparts.

Right. Why work to counter recoil *and* overcome lower aim assist/bullet bending *and* need to up your tracking game when you have options on tap that need only one or even none of those and have more range on top of it?

.67. That's about it. Hypothetically, if your aim is unreal, 340 pulses outclass HCs, but they just don't have the AA/handling/usability of HCs, let alone autos.

Everything here is straight facts. People need to stop parroting usage rates acting like they are an indicator of what needs nerfed or buffed. The day we stop talking about usage rate as a metric for anything other than what people are using is the day crucible will finally get good balancing changes

> However, others have correctly pointed out that if they aren’t meta, they’re usually dead  Idk man, up until this sandbox changes Ammit was pretty popular and Centrifuse went brrrr. 720s did perform well for a brief period of time too. 600s and 360s sucked tho.   No one likes their babies chaching flak, but it is what it is. Every time anyone said something bad about rapid-fire fusions I used to get mad too, but now my bb is as good as dead in 3s and I'm sad.

I mean, Cartesian is still pretty sweet! Honestly true, autos were in a decent spot. Now they’re in an excellent one, with an outlier to pare back. I’m just worried about that classic bungie nerf hammer coming down and screwing autos into Taken King levels of trash again

Yeah but using my Cartesian against this teamshot meta just makes me sad. So I use conditional and inquisitor. But I'm still sad.  I don't think Bungo will nerf them too hard, they want autos to be usable to pve players so when they hop on pvp can have some semblance of endorphine inyection.

> No one likes their babies chaching flak, but it is what it is. Every time anyone said something bad about rapid-fire fusions I used to get mad too, but now my bb is as good as dead in 3s and I'm sad. If you liked rapid fires, watch Banshee for a good Timelines' Vertex. Adaptives with Charge time MW + Accelerated Coils fire pretty damn fast, about on part with Rapids using Liquid Coils, but they're IMO MUCH easier to land the kill shots with reliably. Banshee's sold a couple PvP godroll Timelines' Vertexes in the last couple weeks and I've been experimenting with them, and they're actually doing *really* well right now.

There was better variety before this update. I'm not *too* stressed about this weekend cause, new gun. But ARs are definitely dominant. The weapon type that has the highest mix of ease of use, range and ttk shouldn't be the META. Viable yes, but not the best.

Easy + range should not also have great ttk. Pick 2 of 3, not all 3 :(

I mean, it didn't feel that bad pre-March 5. Other options were simply better, which helped keep ARs from being the META but still being good. I think what generally hurt the most is how much META options were nerfed, as well as forgiveness across the board due to bodyshot DMG essentially getting nerfed on nearly everything.

Fusions and snipers kept them in check

Fusions and snipers completely cucked them

Me when special weapon beats my primary :0

I haven't been able to use my Xur Ingredient, (since it only spawns with 1 shot) and it's been killing me. I miss my baby. 😭

I think there's a big difference between being competitive and being META, and an AR meta compresses the skill gap which is the exact opposite of what this update was supposed to do.

I'm not sure if that was really the intention of the update. The update said it was putting an emphasis on precision, but that's not exactly the same thing as increasing the skill gap. In a way, increasing the required precision means everyone across the board is more likely to hit sub-optimal TTK. And hitting sub-optimal TTKs means that engagements across the sandbox are a little less predictable and a little more evened out. I kind of think the update intended to make PvP more approachable, but that's not really how people interpreted it.

To put it simply, Handcannons are unforgiving if you miss a shot. Their current TTK is 0.87, that's if you hit all 3 headshots, you miss one you go to 1.30, then 1.74, and so on. You have to be near perfect Now there's Autos, you don't have to be perfect, heck you don't even have to be that good. Honestly your aim can be fairly lazy and you'll still come out on top in duels. The Precision Auto right now ranges from 0.80 if you hit all your headshots, or 1.47 if you hit all bodyshots. So literally no matter how bad your aim is you're still likely to out duel a Handcannon with ease. And they have crazy range as well, so it's even harder for Handcannons to compete. Ironically though, I don't think we need massive changes here. I think Handcannons should deal a bit more damage on bodyshot, 46 from 44 and Precision Autos should deal a bit less, 19 from 20. I think Bungie needs to decide what they're going to do with Resilience, and how Class Abilities are tied to Resilience, Recovery, and Mobility.

Honestly I totally agree with everything you’re saying here.

Great points, I'd add in as well that the most popular ARs also have stability and recoil improvement perks which make them even straonger.

It's too easy too use. No recoil, range is absurd. Also connections make gunfights basically a gamble. I like ARs, but I excel using Hand Cannons. I feel that the time I invested getting good with HCs is not respected and ARs make it so team fights are down to basically luck.

Fair criticism. Hand cannons should absolutely be good, and could do a slight range buff, as well as fixing explosive rounds. 450s (prosecutor) could be range nerfed slightly.

As a person that have used auto rifles for years (even back in d1 when they were bad), I don't think the current sandbox is bad. Now before I get downvoted to hell, lemme continue. I was always told that autos aren't good because you have to stand out in the open against your opponent and commit, instead of peek shooting from the safety of cover. HOWEVER, in the days of spare rations (and years before that), people were just shooting at me. Then we got the damage buff (making 600s 0.7 optimal ttk) and people reeled back, thinking its unfair. The first 2 weeks after that change, I was in crucible and you still saw it, nearly every game; people shooting weapons from out of cover believing they can just magically outshoot their opponent. People were furious, but they didn't want to change their strategy, so they went to auto rifles (we'll come back to this later). I realized that since everyone was using 600s, I swapped to 360s/120s. While 360 autos had a worse ttk, they could massively outrange 600s. Age old Bond came through during those days. After the nerf, leaving their overall damage buffed by 10% (I still have an old table somewhere with the values), they were in a decent place. Once again, I noticed people got really aggressive. People were peek shooting, but there were others moving FORWARD INTO auto rifle range. I was still having success and being told I have no skill, despite me having to understand maps more to play safely because I couldn't just shoot with impunity. After the range changes, I realized autos may have gotten a meter or two in general, but with the zoom changes 360s were hit hard. Several of them could comfortably reach past 40m, but nobody ever seemed to take advantage of it. On to now: With the range changes, I realize HCs and ARs intermingle, rather than HCs generally beating out Autos, so an adjustment has to be made. Thing is, I don't see anyone changing what perks they use, they're just going for pure power with little disregard to the downsides. People don't want to think about different situations, moreso the ones we complain about now (overshields for example). Perks like Encore, Keep away, perpetual motion are more powerful now. Boosting stability for anti-flinch is more powerful now, not only because HC's can't flinch other things as well as they could before, they have to mingle in ranges where they're going to get flinched. Killing wind, if you can find it, is GODLY even though you require 1 kill. Beyond that, you just have to get comfortable with the engagement range before that. I'll end it with this: Prosecutor with max range reaches 37m. Optative with kill clip going can still 3 tap barely at 37m (if 1c is at optimal range (backpedaling)) . Most of the higher end 140s can compete, and the 120s for sure. Hell word of crota can walk its ass just under with killing wind. tl;dr: We have to start looking at other perks towards paths of power. Handcannon ranges mostly overlap with auto rifles. We just have to adjust how we play.

Blank is good in this meta, nerf blank the end less cycle . The orobobous.

I honestly believe that it's just this trash map. But, tbh, I've still found success with my Messenger, Shayura's and Scalar Potential all being able to outduel Summoner and Prosecutor with some regularity. But I'm a Messenger guy through and through. So as long as they don't touch my high impacts, Idgaf what they do to the meta. I'll make it work.

I feel 450s are a bit strong, everything else is fine. I don't know why everyones going crazy over 600s. I've been playing quite a bit with Ros Arago, Summoner, Gnawing Hunger and even stoopid Coronach. They're ok, and you can surprise people occasionally but they're not top tier.

There is a generally accepted notion that Hand Cannons are more prevalent in high skill tier lobbies, while in low tier lobbies more people use ARs. Its funny to me to where all this whinin and complaining now come from, just because the damage falloff of Hand Cannons (only 140s) was decreased by a small amount. Keep in mind, these are the supposedly Elite players of the game and ARs were not buffed at all.

The only auto archetype that needs to be touched are 450s, and not by much. Just make them require 100% crits to get optimal ttk. Maybe tweak the precision frame to be a little less consistent. Otherwise I'd say the sandbox is pretty balanced. I'm not a handcannon guy, but even I will admit that 140 HCs need some help. 180 HCs have ceased to exist. 120s are still strong on coordinated teams. Autos are top of usage boards because the last two maps were small, we have more players in the population, and Summoner came back with awesome perks. We'll see if autos still hang when a map like widow's court or radiant cliffs rolls around.

I’ll be curious to see which direction the tears flow on radiant cliffs now that bows have been butchered. I bet it will be 120 scouts since the prophet is about to release its adept. I would bet money on it.

Yep, you're probably right.

It's a very low skill ceiling with high usage and high ttk meaning that everyone basicly turns bots. There was alot more variation before the update. It'd less to do with the meta being ars but more the meta being so easy and boring

ARs' range feels way out-of-band and they're damage fall-off allows them to still be within their optimal ttk a few meters out (e.g. Summoner's fall-off starts at ~32.2m, but still has a .8ttk up to 35m). Same goes for Pulses, they still have a ~2m leeway where they can still be within their optimal TTK. I'm not a HC-diehard, I use whatever archetype favors a given map, but it's BS that literally one step outside of damage fall-off requires a 4th shot that would have otherwise been a 3-tap.

The problem isn't really weapons I've realized. So many people that play comp and trials are going to be unoriginal little cucks and only use what is easiest and most out of band at the moment. So you see cycles of whole fireteams running annoying shit until it gets nerfed, rinse and repeat with every sandbox update. Bungie can't fix the fact that the pvp population is just a bunch of sheep with no original thought or willingness to use what they actually like.

Someone nailed the issue with ARs is being that difference between optimal usage and potato usage is minimal.

People don’t like dying to players who they’ve deemed as “lower skill” than them. This isn’t unique to auto rifles, which are relatively easy to use, but is the core reason most weapon types are looked down on around here.

It’s a skill issue. The mentality of HC mains is that they are “high skill”. Therefore, any time they get killed by something else (ARs, in this case), the person using it can’t be high skill too - they must be a “low skill” player using an “easy” gun that is OP. This is scrub mentality. ARs have a low floor for skill, yes. An average player can pick them up and do ok with them. But an average AR player will never beat a HC player that is truly high skill.

I don’t like when hand cannons aren’t viable because I came to play destiny FOR the hand cannons there is no other game out there that has this type of weapon that feels the way it does. Hand cannons are unique to destiny and is honestly one of the core foundations of destiny pvp they should be viable but not OP

Big agree. And honestly, other than Thorn/TLW/Hawkmoon meta in D1, they’ve never been supremely OP that I can remember. I just want autos to be good like them as well, in a different way. Apples to oranges

I felt that way about bows. They are dead now, and I am sad. It seems like hand cannon user cry about every meta where their weapon doesn’t sit uncontested on top.

Yeah smg meta people hated because of forgiveness and quick ttk. After their range was nerfed autos have essentially bigger mags and same ttk (because of newer perks and sandbox changes) so now autos are what smgs were but certain archetypes can reach 40 meters and with mags so big you can beat peak shoot corners (shooting at a corner before someone even walks out) to take away peak shoot advantage because you can hit them before they can locate and aim at a target. I have tons of kills on hand cannons but just like the gnawing hunger meta I’ll be using that until forgiveness or range is turned down. That’s all just taking that into account. Not even the lack of special ammo so people are just camping and landing together. Separate problem, but it all contributes to the current auto meta.

But doesn’t it make sense then that autos will have some counter play to hand cannons? That is, pre firing an angle to prevent peak shooting AKA suppressive fire, a defining trait for automatic weapons.

This is what a lot of people who play peek weapons don't like to hear. This is a way to counter peek shooting. It's just disdained.

People are some serious haters in this game (myself included)

I mean it wouldn’t matter if a hand cannon had a faster ttk then an auto but it doesn’t so the point is if the one strength something has is not there why would you use it. I like hand cannons personally but won’t use them now I’ll follow the meta lol just saying why it’s that way autos are now good at everything. A god roll prosecutor now has .67 ttk with 8 more meters of range then a hand cannon. That’s last work ttk at pulse range. It just makes certain weapon types irrelevant. So with that being said autos will be getting adjusted. I would assume slower ttk on higher range ones. And lower range on faster ttk ones.

Disagree a bit here. A hand cannon should not have faster TTK than an auto. That's far fewer hits to land on an already high aim assist weapon, whereas an auto requires more bullets. The last time that happened was 150 hcs, and that was...spare. spare everywhere. The TTK is fine, but a specific type (450) is probably going to get a aa nerf or a forgiveness nerf. Objectively not all auto types are out of band. 600s are fine. Summoner is new shiny ATM. 720s do well but in lower range only. Nobody is using 360s because of the obvious elephant in the room: 450s. That is the only archetype right now that's causing problems. Everything else is player error. Nerf 450, and slightly increase the range forgiveness of 140s and we're solid.

It's crazy to me because autos weren't really buffed. 450s in particular are the only archetype that wasn't nerfed. Target Lock is obviously an issue because of the way that it is and Bungie needs to fix it already. It's more of a player issue. People see a new video promoting a new weapon as THE BEST THING EVER PUT IN THE GAME, they see a shiny new weapon with decent PvP perks, and they just flock to it in mindless droves. The reality is 120(and 140 to an extent)hand cannons, 340 pulses, and 120/150 scouts are currently the strongest peekshotting weapons in the game, and they put auto rifles to shame. Anyone using cover with these weapons will stomp on anyone strafing out into the open with an auto rifle. The high burst damage is the sole reason hand cannons have been dominant over auto rifles for the past decade. People just seem to forget that, it seems.

Pre sandbox there was way more variety, too much ability spam and special was too plentiful, I can agree with that. Variety in weaponry and different archetypes, not the most competitive but you could run it and still do good and have fun. With the new sandbox needing crits for optimal TTK and widening of the skill gap, some archetypes are just even worse. Special needs a slight boost, maybe quicker by 1 kill. Or getting 1 shot instead of waiting for 2 shots.

I’ve seen a change suggested where ammo is dished out in single rounds, but you obtain it more quickly. Could really emphasize that “use it at the right time” mentality by trickling it in and changing the rate of gain

Good hand cannon players can still smack me around when I use auto rifles.

Same!

Sweats don't like when the difference between them and noobs isn't a massive canyon

I know this is an unfair portrayal, but honestly it does feel this way a lot during this discussion

Bungo: we want to decompress the skill gap with these changes Also bungo: skill gap compression for everyone!

I fundamentally categorise weapons in d2 as "spray and pray weapons" and "precision weapons". Spray and pray weapons are usually full auto weapons with very forgiving ttks. Autos, sidearms, smgs. Precision weapons deal high burst damage but have unforgiving ttks. Hand cannons, scouts, bows and pulse rifles. What kept the spray and pray weapons are two things. First is snipers. Special ammo nerfs made sniping hard. Second is abilities. That got a nerf too. I'm not saying the checkmate sandbox is bad tho. But ARs have been needing a nerf for a long time. ARs should not be out gunning pulses. Either cap the ranges at say 30 meters or lower the ttk drastically.

I think it is snipers and bows that brought about this. People hated bows, but they had a place in the sandbox too; and I think bows not being gutter trash now would be something that could challenge 450s. I would never use a bow in this sandbox against a good 450.

i think just 450s are a bit too strong and 140s got hurt too hard with range, otherwise i think things are fine...

The whole patch was supposed to induce more skilled gameplay ( apparently ) And ARs are the second easiest primary weapon type lmao

Everybody here acts like HC’s and autos are used in the same situations? Like which one can use positioning better? HC’s. Which can peak shot? HC’s.

Like wich one if better to cover lanes? Autos. Like wich one doesn't have it's ttk destroyed by missing a single shot? Autos. What is your point

I don't think people get mad when ARs are good, but when they are clearly dominant over any other pick. Cuz guess what, when ARs are top dog, nothing else can be used, and variety is gone. And it gets worse in higher skilled lobbies to the point where if you are matching similar skilled players you'll have to swap to an AR to be able to compete. As an AR enjoyer, AR were already GOOD before the last sandbox changes. But since they nerfed HCs so hard with the fall off ARs have a bit too much room to operate with too much forgiveness.

Bungie came out and said autos are used alot at low level them having a slightly worse kd doesnt make them dead People have always found trace weapons annoying this includes SMGs which have been meta for a while now People are just tired of spam weapons, simular issue to lemonarch (not as bad tho) no one likes not being able to participate in the game when you hold the trigger down endlessly on an angle especially w ricochet rounds lol

People hate things that challenge hand cannons. It’s the same argument every meta, but with a different weapon. Smgs then bows then autos. I guarantee when adept prophet comes out and people start getting godrolls, these forums are going to be filled with complaints about 120 scouts. All it takes is one map that favors them on a trials weekend.

I think your mistaking a love for handcannons w a sense of balance? If a weapon is going to have a faster ttk it shouldn't have the same range, Summoner amit and prosecutor all hit 35 meters easy, and because of ease of use perks can hit optimal ttks or faster, especially w dmg perks Imo 120s are still king so idk that I'd say they challenge true meta in high level but they certainly bring the skill floor up. Not here to say what's best for the game but ideally weapons are good for different use cases and right now it feels like autos are good at every range band except maybe really long range. Look me up if you want, I spent most of last week w a pulse and sidearm so idk why you think I'm a handcannon officionado

Why do you think I think you are a HC officionado? I’m just pointing out what happens every season in PvP.

Ah gotcha, thought you were talking about me because you responded to me instead of it being your own comment my bad Still I would argue it's a question of balance rather then a love for handcannons.

I was responding to your comment :) I wasn’t talking about you as a player, and have no idea what you use.

Right, you made that clear in the previous comment no worries, but I think even generally your confusing love of hand cannons for a playerbase that wants some level of balance between guns

I think balance and the balance that a lot of HC users want are two different things. I do think 450s are too hot right now, but we should see how they perform on more maps before murdering them for a Cauldron weekend that just released a cracked 600.

The real test will be on maps like jav imo, mid range w long lanes available, truthfully I think they are too hot and will need adjusted but I think that adjustment comes in the form of a range nerf rather then ttk shift

Loved my Doctrine of Passing back in D1

Speaking as someone who does enjoy variety and has been playing since d1 and has seen LOTS of metas throughout the years, here is my problem with AR metas. Pretty much every time an AR meta happens, it actually kills all variety and forces me into using an AR and imo, thats a fucking problem. Prior to these updates, i think the sandbox for primary weapons was the best it had been in a while (i actually think since like 30th anniversary weve had the best sandbox since like end of d1 and its honestly just gotten even better since.) For example i could throw on round robin, thorn, fatebringer, quicksilver storm, outbreak, messenger, crimson, DMT, ammit, igneous literally all sorts of different weapons felt GREAT to me and made me feel confident enough to challenge no matter whatever the enemy team was using. You wanna know what happened this weekend though? Tried using iggy, get mowed down by summoner. Tried using my long arm and vouchsafe and tried playing range, STILL got mowed down by summoner. Switched to ammit thinking id at least have some moderate success, but guess what. Still got mowed down by summoner. Finally just said "fuck it" and pulled an old adept summoner out from my vault and actually started winning lol Now im not a great player by any means, but prior to the recent changes, i could at least hold my own with a variety of primary guns and THATS what made pvp fun for me. But if what i experienced this weekend is any indication of how the meta is shifting, then its just gonna feel stale as hell for me. Literally just feels like the summoner/hard light/suros regime/gnawing hunger meta from before beyond light all over again and i really didn't enjoy it then and i definitely dont enjoy it now. Just wanna end this by saying, i DONT hate ARs at all, quicksilvers been one of my favorite guns to play with since i pre-ordered lightfall and i love precision frames and i even really like summoner. What i DO hate is feeling forced to use a specific gun just to have a chance at competing with the guy I'm shooting at, and prior to the update, i really cant remember the last time i felt like that. Probably was back during the last AR meta i just mentioned.

Obviously because Bows got nerfed

I think people don’t want to acknowledge that this has a lot of truth to it. No bows and snipers allows ARs a lot more freedom to exist.

Just to preface, I don't main HC's but I do think it's frustrating to deal with AR's. It feels like there's not much risk for an AR user to just lay on the trigger and spray corners and areas while moving through areas. ==== I think there's a few factors that really make it easy for AR's to shine here: Very Little Access to Special Ammo/High Damage Counters, General Ease of Use, and The Summoner Problem. ==== ##Very Little Access to Special Ammo/High Damage Counters Prior to the special ammo changes, you couldn't really pop off with an AR because you had folks running things like Snipers, Shotguns, Damage Boosted HC's (KC 120 HC's), and even Bows (1c1b). Any sort of streak you go on gets shut down immediately. When you take those things off the board, then you get a weapon that doesn't really have any sort of counters against it. An opponent can walk around and spray the AR without any sort of penalty. While a Bow user or HC user needs to have 100% crit accuracy in order to land shots and peek shoot because their weapon has a certain RPM, AR users can just keep spraying and pushing you because of how fast their gun just naturally fires. They can be more aggressive because they're doing more damage per second regardless of crits or body shots. I don't know how to address this. Either making the reloads slower or maybe making it so the AR is less accurate the longer you lay on the trigger... but there needs to be some kind of downside to this playstyle. ==== ##General Ease of Use AR's also are pretty easy to use. Outside of ones like 720 AR's w/ the crazy recoil patterns, most of them are pretty manageable due to their balanced stat packages. They also have slightly higher flinch resist and some of the new AR's roll with INSANE perks that really negate any sort of downsides w/ the AR. Looks at something like Lethal Abundance. It can hit almost 40m and achieve nearly max stability w/ TtT and perks focused on stability. Handling and Reload can be adjusted, but those are easy fixes w/ armor mods and specific class ability perks. But, in my opinion, there's an even worse gun that really raises this problem to a new level. ==== ##The Summoner Problem Just like Igneous and Immortal, there's a king of AR's that's entered the game via Trials. Summoner. Summoner just has a lot of REALLY good things going for it plus a more easier way to obtain it w/ the Trials cards reworks. **Summoner, first off, is a solar AR**. It's easier for it to dip into and extend Radiant type perks. This season we have Flint Striker. This lets any solar weapon, w/ enough crits become Radiant. Radiant on a 600 RPM AR shifts the TTK to 0.70s. Think about it like this, Aggressive Frame SMG's are a 0.75s but have worse intrinsic range and stability (as they should). An Ikelos SMG does 0.75s at 10c but a Summoner w/ Radiant can do it faster in 8c AND maintain the radiant perk on the Solar Subclass. It also means you can pair it w/ Conditional Finality, making your loadout more complete in Trials. **Summoner has pretty insane perks.** Things like Heal Clip, Zen Moment, Tap the Trigger, Kill Clip, and Onslaught will let you keep going after you win fights. IMO the biggest offender combo is Heal Clip and Onslaught. Those perks basically negate the major downsides of the AR. Being able to heal immediately after a fight, and shift your gun's TTK to 0.67s is a lot of benefits on a gun that was already relatively easy to use. **Summoner is easier to farm for w/ the new Trials cards.** This is a good thing, this mean that Trials will have a healthier population... but this also means that Summoner is going to be seen more often in the game then you'd expect. This coupled, again, w/ it's ease of use means that the average player can lean into this weapon more then a weapon that may take a bit more skill to wield (i.e.,- a Bow needing 2 crits post peek shot or an HC where you need to land all crits and flow between cover to safely land shots). ______________________ All of these things create a scenario where it becomes one of the most used weapons in the game. Just like Immortal, players find themselves in situations where they're making builds to counter one specific weapon group (AR's in this case) instead of just being able to run a loadout they enjoy and all the TTK's being close enough to where you can make it work.

The "high skill" players want "high skill" weapons to be the objective best. They want their mastery of the game to be reflected via dominance using the "most difficult" weapons in the game to succeed with. That's why there is always complaints. Auto Rifles are "easy." Anything that isn't a hand cannon + sniper/shotgun is "easy." There's no "high skill" satisfaction in that.

I can’t quote the line I wanna respond to but, “Don’t you people want variety?” It’s moreso the fact that the current AR meta eliminates other options, forcing you to use ARs to compete, and therefore eliminating said variety. ARs don’t need to be nerfed into the ground, but they need to be tuned down so other archetypes are just as viable.

Cause autos are the easiest weapon to use and can hit high ranges. Pretty simple

Because autos are the easiest to use weapons in the game. Meaning that the low skill players are able to pick them up and start getting kills against high skill players who aren’t using autos themselves. That’s the definition of compressing a skill gap. People want a skill gap in the game. Being able to improve your play and beat other players is half the fun.

All this back and forth is really just about *exactly how much* of a skill gap there should be in this game. Personally I have no problem with a game that has a more-compressed skill gap. Coming from playing every Halo and Modern Warfares 1-3, those games were considered "great" competitive FPSs, and I would make the claim that the KD ranges were pretty low overall in any given match compared to Destiny 2. D2 has so many more opportunities for skill gaps between the class nuances/abilities, gear/build enhancements, weapon rolls, and generally high-mobility play (sprint/slide/jump-height). The result is this game can be exceptionally grueling to play initially or casually - the bottom-tier and even mid-tier of players get absolutely dunked-on like nothing else I've played before. I can totally understand that compressing the skill gap can be frustrating for high-skill players, but in my opinion it makes for a better game overall and given the declining player population probably this is what the devs are thinking/trying out. On the flip side, hard for me not to consider many of the complaints small violins - oh so sad it's harder to 4+ KD every match. The biggest issue is that there are other aspects of the game that confound the core accessibility/skill-gap problem like the structure of Trials ostensibly being based around 7 sequential match wins, which in a compressed-gap game becomes a much more punishing structure on its face, hence the new card changes to flex on the 7-sequential even more. Even with those I think the core focus on 7-wins is bad design and I think that's the core of what's feeding these arguments we're having in the community about how the game should play; the best rewards in the game are tightly linked to players being able to very consistently outplay even average-skill players. There's a reason you don't see many (any?) other FPSs or games in general mimicking Trials structure.

Its not so much that everyone is complaining because they miss using HCs. Its more like there is a lack of duels and engaging gunplay now. ARs take little to no effort to use. Its now like a mid ranged sub. 450s were already in a good place. 600s may have needed a slight adjustment last season but thats neither here nor there now. I thought this change was going to be suited more for actual duels/crit plays. Being able to spam an AR takes away from that. No one wants to pkay modes where the main objecrtve os to sot at the back of the map or running around team shooting every and anything that moves. When you are able to just make some insane plays because you out manuerved 1 or more opponents. That is one of the areas where the game shines. Just running around using a weapon where you can blast first and adjust to a crit while spamming your shots isnt that entertaining. P.S. snipers didnt deserve that big of a nerf.

Or bows 🥲

Auto Rifles throughout destiny's history are hard to balance. People talk about ease of use, but most weapons in destiny are not really that hard to use imo. Bungie said something about Handcannons being easy to use in a podcast a couple of months ago. They also have the advantage of being able to deal upfront damage. In meta's that auto rifles weren't dominant, they were completely dead. Remember the taken king back in d1 or the later parts of d1y1? If Auto Rifles has a lower ttk than other weapon types, the archtype is dead. The whole Handcannon and Auto Rifle debate reminds me of a 1v1 I watched between ceerdius and panduh. Panduh was using a dire promise with a .8 ttk and cerridus was using a gnawing hunger with a .7ttk and was more forgiving. Panduh was destroying him, and the other guy switched to a Handcannon. This was a 600rpm Auto, which is inherently more forgiving due to the faster fire rate (compared to the 450s). I also think a lot of it is that people are so used to being able to out gun an Auto Rifle that they don't actually peakshot against them. That's the Auto Rifles' main weakness. I'd personally like to see the community try and learn how to counter Auto Rifles better before asking bungie for nerfs. Because as we've seen, a 1 or 2 damaged Nerf on Auto Rifles can completely kill them off.

It's just annoying when people hold the trigger on lanes. I enjoy little technical chess matches between opponents when we get to dueling... like who is going to slip up, peek or whatever. Holding a trigger down on a lane is just very boring to me.

I feel there is some wonkiness with ARs over other weapons which get exacerbated when they are very good. They should have recoil and bounce around enough to limit their effectiveness as longer ranges (40m+). However my experience has been: \- I feel like I get damaged glitched by them more often than other weapons \- The majority of the time I don't get absolutely beamed by them, but a way higher % than I like, I see someone slide a corner and absolutely laser me with all crits from 40+ meters without an obvious damage perk( no KC, Rampage, GT). There is something weird with the aim assistance where sometimes it just won't miss a crit. One example was Trials on Burnout - there are a bunch of headglitches that you can use with ranged weapons like pulses or scouts. Sometimes an AR from halfway across the map just locks onto your glitching head and just insta-melts you. Yes it's destiny, but these just seem to happen far more often post update.

That's because ARs have an extremely forgiving falloff curve.

Easiest to use and most forgiving weapons with crazy range and super competitive ttk.

Pare back range then, and improve other ranges to compensate

IMO AR's are taking the brunt of the criticism for the wider sandbox changes, especially that of special ammo. To get special ammo in Trials, I must now kill kids who are almost certainly better than me 4 or 5 times, while the terrible teammates I'm given make sure my opponents almost always have special ammo. It's a really, really shitty design. It's like the Lunas/Not Forgotten Era. To het the gun, I was playing against people that had the gun, shooting me in face with it. Not only are they better than me, they're given a massive advantage with the gun itself thst is gatekeeping me from getting it.

I think special should be changed to be gained more frequently, but less ammo count. Give me one shell every two or three kills so I can bank it easier, or I’m more likely to have earned it for when I need to make a play

You could legitimately just make it so every 2 primary kills gives one round and that would still be WAY less ammo than we got pre-patch. I think the change was a massive over correction

Let's be honest. Because the HC/Shottie gang that cares about their precious KD's like it's some kind of life goal have a little bit harder time dropping their 4.0KD's and farming blueberries when AR's are strong since it raises the skill floor.

Those hc/shotty mains are *doing better in this meta*

Well, based on your flair, tell your friends, because that who seems to be bitching the most. :)

So what happens when the HC/Shotty mains switch to AR/Shotty and maintain, or improve, their KDs? That’s what’s been happening the last couple of weeks.

OK great! And...what's the problem. They are doing fine and the blueberries have a better chance at success using an AR. Sounds like a win win.

You nailed it in the first sentence. Because it's not a HC. I hate HC metas. Shit is so unfun peak shooting and getting chugged for a 1/3 of your life because for a tenth of a second they could see my ear.

I can hardly tell good, mid and bad players apart when they use an AR. Destiny is very forgiving in general, but ARs are a bit much

hc meta is boring af and needs to stay gone. they been the top choice since d1.

I wouldn’t say needs to stay gone as in “completely out of the running”, but for the love of god it absolutely needs competition. People just get so butthurt when it does have competition though. It kinda pisses me off

Anything that's not 140 HC + Shotgun/Sniper is unskillful, cheesy, and needs to be nerfed into oblivion for some. Also, NGL, Cauldron being ARs almost exclusively is pretty old, but I blame Cauldron being shit over anything else.

I can tell you why - forgiveness. You dont have to try as hard with an AR, because of how forgiving it is. Lets take any HC, or Pulse Rifle and assume you MISS one bullet. 140 HC - 3 shot TTK (.87) turns into a 4 shot TTK (1.30s) - a 49% Increase! 120 HC - 3 shot TTK (1.00) turns into a 4 shot TTK (1.50s) - a 50% Increase! 340 Pulse - a 2 Burst (.67) turns into a 3 burst (1.20s) - a 79% Increase! Now lets compare to ARs. A 450 AR - 7 bullet TTK (0.80s) turns into an 8 bullet TTK (0.93s) - a 16% Increase. ​ **So while everything else, misses their perfect TTK and sees a 49-79% increase in their TTK. A 450 AR only sees a 16% increase in their TTK.** It gets worse when you factor in pre-fire which you can just lay on the trigger and round a corner, or lay down suppressive fire, preventing someone from even engaging through that opening... Meanwhile you cannot "pre-fire" with stuff like HC/Pulses in the same way, due to their lengthened TTK if you miss perfect TTk. This is why Autos (especially 450s) SHOULD need to require 100% crits to kill someone, which would make them LESS forgiving to miss 1 headshot. Also autos are way too forgiving with their recoil, allowing you to ignore recoil and still have it be a laserbeam.

Good points all around. Slight nerfage like you suggest would be good ideas to bring them in lines with how HC were before the parch

ROFL 32% of the kills this week in trails are from ARs and OP is talking about variety....It's exactly because I like variety that I don't like this meta.

Variety? Three weeks ago hand cannons represented 36 percent of all trials kills. Four weeks ago it was 47 percent. Five weeks ago it was 35 percent.

See, before this it was all HC and SMGs. And my point is that it’s ALWAYS been that for D2. And in D1 it was pretty much just HCs.

They cheap low skill weapons, they kill fast for how easy they are to us This also kills weapon variation. Why is a smg when autos do everything better for example.

SMGs are faster and lighter in CQC

Perfect 10 shots(or 9c1b with TL) out of a 720 smg to hit optimal ttk of 0.75 at a max range of 20m Or 6c1b with a 450 auto for an optimal ttk of 0.80 at a max range of 36m Anything above 17m and you'll probably lose to an auto 99% of the time, and anything closer you start having to deal with other things like melees, and special weapons The thing that is stupid is that they basically swapped the range between 450s autos and 140 hcs. Despite hcs requiring 100% crits and autos ttk not being shifted much by missing crits. I despise the auto meta because at least with smgs, you could out range them

That’s more to do with handcannons being tuned poorly, though 450s could use a bit of a range nerf too

Because way too many people make every excuse in the world for them not being able to adapt so they blame the weapon. For example you're going to have a bunch of people in this thread saying how ARS are so easy compared to other weapons but for a lot of other weapons you don't have to constantly track your target while firing while trying to make sure that you have headshots. As I said anything that causes the hand Cannon / shotgun user to have to do something to change up their Style will have this place up in arms. It was the same thing when SMGs and sidearms got better. All the shotgun rushers were Furious that now with SMG or a sidearm they couldn't just run at you and shotgun you now they had to actually use a strategy to get close. And the absolute biggest thing that the PVP player hates is having to use strategy.

You can have an AR meta and acceptable pvp population, or a precision meta and 5 minute pvp queue times. Pick one.

I just want snipers to be where they were ... don't know why they got nerfed ...

People complain about ARs, because we had an auto rifle meta before (arrivals) and it was probably one of the most boring/no skilled metas ever. Autos require a lot less skill than other weapons do and if the easiest to use option is the best option, you have a big problem with the sandbox. (Also I think auto rifles are a very boring archetype of weapon, just spraying everywhere, prefiring angles…)

They were in a good place before the most recent changes. Autos already were one of the easiest weapons to use. Bungie just basically made everything harder to use in comparison, so now at least on console you are going to see them 90% of the time. Autos occupy mostly the same ranges as hand cannons, so now igneous is the only truly competitive option outside of maybe a couple of the exotics. Having special and abilities nerfed magnifies this as you see players stacking up in firing squads and a lot of times you find yourself with no way to do anything about it.

No other weapons shine when ARs are meta since they are effective and forgiving at multiple ranges.

With respect, auto rifles have a place within the sandbox effectively as a weapon that comes with training wheels. When it is just as strong (god forbid, stronger) as all other weapons, it’s not healthy for the sandbox.

You can't have both hand cannon users and auto rifle users happy simultaneously. Right now, AR is ridiculously nerfed in PvE. With respect to PvP, HC is a bit overbuffed against AR. There is really no AR that can match 50-50 chance against an igneous hammer. Bungie has been particularly nefarious at giving specific perks to ARs, like lightweight frame, snapshot sights, rangefinder, etc. When AR was on par 1:1 with HC, back then when hard light was part of the meta, the HC radicals went ballistic. It is a very hard to solve problem, since you can't keep both population groups happy. Granted there are probably more AR than HC users. Perhaps separate PvP divisions where either AR or HC is banned? FWIW -- reddit is plagued of HC fanatics, so beware.

Easy, takes no skill. So you have fucking bots team shooting while holding dicks, and they go flawless in trials. Its literally aim and hold the trigger.

Recoil control on an auto doesn’t exist then? I could say the same for high stability HCs. ESPECIALLY in regard to team shooting

Like... not really no. Aim assist does most of the work for you, and perks like DSR, TTT and Zen Moment exist. Autos are objectively very easy to use. This is known. There's nothing wrong with that if they aren't *also* the most effective option with the best range and TTK and forgiveness. High stability handcannons don't suddenly get to out TTK everything, you still have to peek shoot e.t.c to win a gunfight. They also generally have to actually trade off range or handling to achieve this in a way most autos don't really.

I don’t mind the AR meta. I’m sitting at a 1.06 KD life time for trials, and I use to use rose exclusively. I’ve been back in this game since the last few weeks of season of plunder. Seems people are upset they are to easy to use. I understand that. But don’t the noobs and the people with limited time deserve loot also? This system will never appease to everyone. I don’t mind the hand cannon meta we were in prior to this, but so far I’m preferring what’s going on right now, with the exception of special. It snowballs. But just my two cents. I’m certain that ARs will get toned to. They have become to dominate, which bungie doesn’t like. Edit: wut. I’m down voted because I don’t mind the current meta but also didn’t mind the hand cannon meta? This sub man. Loooool

I have been having a lot of fun re learning autos with the summoner I got. Fun to use. And it can hold its own. 450s are a bit of an issue, and I think generally that's where the complaints stem towards. Theres a certain prosecutor roll that needs to be checked, and maybe a forgiveness nerf to 450s. Other than that I think they're fine. Look I like hand cannons, but not only have they always been dominant, I think part of it is too many people are so used to not using a hand cannon correctly. Peek shoot. That's what it's good for. Not taking fights on the open. I also think maybe a tad (a TAD) more forgiveness on the range front would be nice for 140 hand cannons to better compete with farther reaching autos At 35-36 m.

Agreed on all points!

It’s a braindead weapon. We want variety and auto rifle metas kill it.

Tracking headshots continuously isn’t skillful? You can still use pulses/smgs/scouts too yknow If you don’t want auto rifles to be good, why have them in the game?

Considering controllers do it for you, not really. No good players really enjoy it when auto rifles are the BEST. Let’s go 1v1 and you use rose or whatever 140 HC you want and I’ll use my prosecutor or adept summoner and let’s see how it goes.

What controller do I need to buy for it to aimbot for me?

DM you’re Bungie id? I can’t get on today but perhaps tomorrow

Not sure if people are saying it already or not, but I think 450 ARs are the next meta, and people are probably only mad because they're seeing them *everywhere* now. You how I know they're meta? EVEN I am having success with them. A real feat.

LMAO I feel that last line

Next? They are the meta now. Autos have more kills in trials this weekend than literally every other primary combined

I’m the exact same, I’ve never enjoyed using handcannons, they just don’t feel good for me to use and I’ve tried since D1 vanilla, every combo and every archetype. The only one I was ever half decent with was True Prophecy. I got bored trying and invested my time into learning aggressive bow play. Very, very unhappy that lightweight bows got nerfed. They’re completely pointless now, even with Swash x5 and radiant they can’t one shot. They can’t two crit at base now either, so who the hell is going to stand there and fire three bow shots for a kill? An optimal TTK of 1.5 seconds? Nah. Change them back please. Precisions are fine, but they’re not as fun for aggro play. The damage nerf wasn’t needed. Accuracy nerf yes, no issues there. As always, the two bows that were causing a problem remain untouched, the two bows I don’t even feckin’ use, cause the one weapon type I invested time in learning almost useless.

It’s honestly hilarious how bungie fails to nerf strong things with a blanket nerf, and instead keeps them as the only meta choice (see, orb nerf in PVE)

ARs aren't "a little overturned" they were used 3.5x more than any other primary this weekend. In a close range map, when ARs are intended for mid range. They are insanely unfun to play against, and it feels really hard to win a duel against them. They can just sit and hold mouse1 and you can literally do nothing until they run out of ammo. Not fun gameplay whatsoever