Destiny 2 players trying their hand at the Crucible PvP multiplayer after the launch of the Beyond Light expansion are aghast at how much the new Stasis powers break the game's balance. Beyond Light, which was timed for release alongside the next generation of consoles this week, is a massive shift in how Destiny 2 operates. The first upgrade to the game created solely by Bungie without publisher assistance, it reintroduces content from the original Destiny while also taking some maps and activities away in order to keep the game at a manageable size. Bungie has said that content will rotate in and out alongside each expansion, but some players are still disappointed that the game they paid for is shirking somewhat.
Chief among those players are those who enjoy the Crucible, the seemingly overlooked portion of the Destiny experience. Because Destiny keeps its weapon balance between all its modes, Bungie has had to make sacrifices at various points that have angered both Crucible and campaign players. Now, as Beyond Light lands, it seems that Bungie is focusing solely on the campaign experience. Modes from the Crucible were hit hard in the update and the new Stasis powers have made multiplayer into even more of a sideshow.
Paul Tassi over at Forbes collected some of the responses to the Stasis power by prominent members in the Crucible community. As seen in several video clips, players with Stasis powers are able to damage opponents across the map, guard objectives extremely efficiently, and halt ultimate moves dead in their tracks. It's to the point where even someone who doesn't play the game regularly can see that there are balance issues. The consensus among all these parties is that the powers, while fun to use in other modes of the game, have no place in multiplayer at their current strength.
Problems like this are the reason why most deathmatch and multiplayer modes feature a vastly different balance than a single-player experience. Games will often sport different weapons in multiplayer or change existing weapons to make them make sense when used against other players. Bungie has never balanced Destiny like that, but they may have to if they want the Crucible to remain a viable component of the Destiny whole. Of course, since the game isn't tied to any eSports or other ongoing events in the game, it's just as easy to see the developer sunsetting the feature and focus on where the majority of players spend their time.
Multiplayer in Destiny 2 has always been a curious thing. Here was Bungie, creators of the first console FPS and a game that launched a thousand LAN parties before online play was even a thing. Halo's multiplayer is such a strong component to those games, and Destiny's never felt nearly as vital. It's an afterthought, a bullet point put in the games seemingly because people expect it more than anything. This latest patch seems to exemplify that even more, and it will be interesting to see if Bungie breaks its own rules, breaks the chilling powers in single-player, or just lets the Crucible rot on the vine.