So, yeah.  Crucible and the Iron Banana.  I've had a bit of a rough go this time around for the first day or so.



I'm getting kinda bummed out by the weapon balance, or lack there of.  For most of my PVP adventures, I like using a max agility hunter.  I like being fast and speedy, strafing quickly with Mida, or using Radiant Dance Machines and something like Suros or Red Death.



Problem is, max agility/low armor hunters die very easily.  They die very easily, when everyone is shooting at you with Thorn or The Last Word.  I think the exotic hand cannons are a little too good for their own good.  Here, let me spell out the PVP load out for probably 60-70% of players in normal crucible, 80-90% of players in Iron Banner, and 90-100% of players in Trials of Osiris:



Thorn or The Last Word

Felwinter's Lie/Judgment VI/Matador 64/Party Crasher with shot package/hammer forged or rifled/reinforced barrel, or a final round sniper in Trials

Grenades and horseshoes equipped rocket launcher



That's a very, very frustrating combination to play against.  In COD, I prided myself on using all kinds of weapons and attachments, some good, some bad, and doing pretty well with most everything.  In this game?  If you aren't using Thorn or TLW, you're instantly at a significant disadvantage against someone who is using that shit.  That's just bad weapon balance, it makes for boring and frustrating games.  I feel like I can't use my max agility/low armor hunter effectively because I die with two Thorn headshots, three body shots with Thorn, or one normal and one glitched headshot with TLW.  



There are certain things in the game that basically make it where I can't play how I want to play and consistently do well with it, I guess.  I'll probably resort to a max armor sunsinger warlock with the Ram and Red Death to give me the best chance of surviving against the thousands of Thorns out there.

You-know-who is in the tower this weekend, to the right of the stairs as you enter the hanger.

Skullfort, Raspberry, Veil, Universal Remote, helm engram.

 
I'd do Fang first, then VoC.


Reason being, most times you're using VoC in the prison, you're gonna have solar burn, and at 300 attack it's still pretty powerful with a burn.


Fang has hive disruptor that procs every shot, and max damage in the hive sections are what you want. VoC's oracle disruptor works when shooting mines, but that usually isn't a huge deal since mines don't shoot back and usually several people will be shooting them at once. And 365 attack isn't super useful in the Vault of Glass, at least I haven't really noticed a significant difference between 300 and 365 VoCs there.

Therein lies the problem.



Thorn and TLW are so powerful that there's no real reason to use anything else.  How do you counter someone using Thorn?  There's three ways I can think of immediately - use Red Death, use Thorn, or use TLW.



There's a bajillion different weapons in the game, but ultimately PVP boils down to people using the same four or five weapons no matter where you go or what you do.

TLW is filthy if you can make it work for you.  For me, it's very inconsistent, I have games where I do well with it, then I have games where I can't hit the broadside of a barn.



It is one of the fastest, if not the fastest killing weapon in PVP.  If you get one of the bonus 111 damage headshots to proc (which is glitched and sometimes procs when aimed down sight), and follow it up with a normal headshot, that thing can kill in about 350 m/s.  You're dead before you really know it.



 

A handier tool still is this thread.  Cam, Hammr, God and myself are on right now playing Banana, and I could probably use a Prison later if you need help with it.



 

I'm in for whatever as always.  Still have a hard Templar checkpoint for any of you guys looking for VOG weapons or gear.

I'm joining Hammr in a little a Black Ops 2 tonight. The skills have waned.

Anyways, if yall get something together, just send me a message. I had a few really bad Iron Banana games and decided to take a break from it, PVP at least. If you need a raid or a POE or something, I'm in. Just no more crucible tonight for me.

I know field scout doesn't exist anymore, but anyone know if you can roll extended mag on a new Jolder's Hammer?

I'm about 20 motes in so far and haven't gotten it yet.  



Thinking about it, I dunno why I really even grinded for this stupid thing.  It's a pretty neat machine gun, but I've already got machine guns to fit all of my PVP and PVE needs.



 

I finished my trip through the Iron Potato for this month tonight.  Got my hunter to level 3 for the etheric light (which I don't really need), got my warlock to level 5 for two etheric lights (which I don't really need) and Jolder's Hammer (which I didn't really need either).  I suck with the titan and Fist of Havoc in PVP, so no titan adventures in the Iron Cucumber for me.



Overall thoughts - Thorn and TLW are too damn good.  Very, very frustrating to play against packs of animals using exotic hand cannons.  I used Red Death for most of the banner this time around just to try and survive Thorn, and really only felt comfortable with a max armor sunsinger warlock with the Ram.  And even then, I died fast to multiple Thorn shots.  Iron Banner with a hunter this time around was super painful, almost impossible to get into a rhythm and do well.



Connections were absolute garbage.  Worst I've seen in the past few Iron Banners.  I'm not really savvy enough to tell whether it's lag switching or just shit servers, but the connections were horrendous.  My last few games tonight were a rubber-banding, shoot-first-die-first fest of epic proportions.  I'd have my shotgun out, I shoot first and nothing happens, they shoot me, I drop dead and as they turn to go elsewhere my shot connects like one or two seconds later and they die.



I think I'm mostly done with PVP in this game, might be mostly done with the game in general until new content comes around.  I've done everything there is to do I think, the only thing I lack is the grimoire score for a few crucible specific things, and the card for the salvage game mode.  I think 3565 is the max grimoire score currently, and I'm at 3470.  I've unlocked all the achievements except the thing for like ten captures in salvage, and flawless raider.  I've owned all of the year one exotic weapons and armor at one time or another, and while I don't actually have all of the new exotics from the Elder Cipher bounties, I've got two more ciphers chilling that need to be worked on so I can get the other weapons.  I've got everything from both raids except the stupid Necrochasm.  1318 hours total played, three max level characters, lots of weapons I don't even use.



I think I'm gonna take a little break from the game.  I know a few others have.  I'll probably hop on after resets to do my nightfalls, but beyond that, I don't really think I have anything else I really want or need to do.

The Shadow Thief. Arc burn and specialist.

Weekly is Devil's Lair with solar burn.

 
I'll run the 35 with y'all if you want tonight. I've got a couple Elder Ciphers I need to work on anyways.


 

 
Only thing I'm missing are five gold chests.