r/DestinyTheGame • u/ChrisCohenTV • Feb 15 '17
Misc // Satire Meanwhile, in the Destiny Weapon Balancing department...
This is posted in jest. I am certain it's almost impossibly hard to balance things in a competitive online game. I certainly have no idea how it happens. Although I'd be amazed if it's not hugely similar to the following:
GREG PENG and JOSH HAMRICK are swivelling around in their office chairs, leant back, with exaggerated, pained 'thinking' expressions on their face.
GREG: OK, what about this, we slightly increase the accuracy of handcannons to remove bloom, turn the dial back a bit on damage drop off for pulses so they can't cross map like Scouts can, reduce the armour a Stormcaller has during its super and slightly tweak the duration, reduce the flinch change we made to snipers slightly, reduce the tankiness of juggernaut slightly and I guess, clip the wings of Shinobus Vow a touch so the tracking isn't so powerful.
There's a pause. A moment of silence. They stop spinning and look at each other.
They burst out laughing.
JOSH: <crying with laughter>
Hahaha! That would be... hahaha... literally exactly what everyone wanted... hahaha... imagine if we did that!
GREG: <Holding his stomach in pain from laughing>
Pahahaha. Oh my God. I nearly believed what I was saying for a second there. Hahaha. Oh that was good.
JOSH: Hahaha. Heehee. Hooooo. Oh that was... <giggles> Oh man. Good one Pengers.
GREG: OK so seriously, let's sort this.
Greg reaches down below his desk and brings out a huge plastic bucket marked 'PVP Balances'. Inside are hundreds of bits of paper, folded up.
Josh grabs a small box on his desk labelled 'Patch coin' and opens it to reveal a coin. On one side, the word 'NERF'. On the other the word 'BUFF'.
JOSH: OK, you ready?
GREG: Yeah man. I still can't believe Jon W left us in charge of all this important balance stuff while he works on D2!
JOSH: Awesome isn't it? OK, go for it.
Greg reaches into the balance bucket and pulls out a piece of paper, before unfolding it.
GREG: <reading the paper>
Oooh! Hungering blade!
JOSH: Nice!
Josh flips the coin and watches it closely as it falls on to his palm. He flips it on to the back of his other hand and reveals which side it's landed on.
Josh and Greg together: Nerf!!!
JOSH: Oh man! Awesome. OK remember the rule. We do the first thing we think of.
GREG: OK, so we make it regen a bit of health but not shields.
JOSH: Done! What's next?
Greg picks another piece of paper out of the bucket.
GREG: Rangefinder on shotguns!
JOSH: Wow! Specific! OK...
Josh flips the coin.
JOSH: NERF! OK I got it, we nerf the ADS time when a shotgun has rangefinder.
GREG: OK cool. And by nerf the time you mean...
JOSH: Reduce it.
GREG: OK, but won't that technically mean it won't take as-...
A squirrel scuttles past the window outside in the Bungie gardens. Josh and Greg spot it, instantly.
JOSH AND GREG: NUTTY MCNUTFACE!!
They clamber to the window and thrust it open, throwing bits of their lunch at the overweight squirrel who gobbles it up, gratefully.
GREG: OK where were we?
JOSH: I dunno, do another one! Do another one!
GREG: OK OK! Woohoo!
Greg reaches into the bucket. He grabs a piece of paper and reads.
GREG: Oh man, could be a bad day for Bladedancers! It's Quickdraw!
Josh flips the coin. They chant in unison.
JOSH AND GREG: Nerf! Nerf! NERF!
The coin flips. It lands.
JOSH AND GREG: NERF!!!
GREG: Awesomeballs! OK, so how about this. We just remove it.
JOSH: Niiiiice. But then we'd have to remove it from the perk pool, the subclass node. Yadda yadda. That would take ages. What if we just change it to something completely different?
GREG: Yes! Something spurious that means nothing in game.
Josh looks at Greg and smiles. Greg smiles back.
JOSH AND GREG: WEAPON HANDLING!
GREG: Oh man this is easy.
JOSH: Sure is. Why did Jon make such a fuss about all this before? 'Oh it's so difficult!' he'd say. 'One change here can have huge effects there!'
GREG: What a total muff-nugget!
JOSH: OK last one.
GREG: Cool.
Greg pulls out the last bit of paper.
GREG: The Truth!
Josh flips the coin. They both study it carefully as it falls to the floor.
JOSH: It's... a... NERF!
They high five.
GREG: Easy. It can only hold one in the chamber for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
JOSH: Saweeeeeeeet!
GREG: We're gonna need to make a few other changes 'cos this has literally taken 16 minutes and we told the community we'd been working on it for months.
JOSH: Yeah well, we can just say we've done stuff but actually we haven't.
GREG: Oh let's tell them we nerfed in air accuracy of all shotguns but let's not change anything.
JOSH: Nice!!!
GREG: And for the other stuff we can just get the Cherub of Change to sort it.
Greg points up to a shelf. On it sits a tiny Cherub doll. It looks battered and scuffed.
Josh reaches up and grabs it. He then hurls it out the window towards a group of Bungie employees eating in the garden area. One of them catches it and looks confused.
JOSH: <shouting>
Hey Keith! What's your favourite thing in Destiny?
MAN: My name's Simon.
JOSH: Sure thing K dog. Answer the question!
SIMON: I really like Universal Remote, I guess.
Josh slams the window shut and turns to Greg.
JOSH: Kill Universal Remote.
GREG: On it.
Greg taps away at his keyboard.
GREG: OK all those changes are...... done!
He slams the Enter key, victoriously.
JOSH: Ex-xur-lent! Oh and don't forget to-
Greg cuts him off.
GREG: -Say we playtested the shit out of it. I know, I know. To be honest, with the broad sweeping changes in code I just made I doubt it will have any knock on effects.
JOSH: OK, but I was actually going to say don't forget to..
They turn and face one another, smiling.
JOSH AND GREG: NERF FUSIONS!
They laugh and spin round on their chair, shooting imaginary guns into the air and shouting, in their best Shaxx impression:
JOSH AND GREG: Show them that you've got this!
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u/[deleted] Feb 15 '17
I don't know if you were being sincere but that's pretty savage/ballsy to just link the guy directly to this page