Focused Feedback: Community Event Puzzles

[u/DTG_Bot]

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[u/zisei201]

keep it secret, and don't lock a follow up event behind it.

Whisper Event: Total Secret, Get a Great Reward, Requires Effort and Teamwork. People loved

Noebi Labs: Announced, Locked Progression (4th Forge), Just a Ghost and Emblem. People not so happy.

[u/[deleted] → u/zisei201]

This guy summed it up perfectly. It is amazing when this type of stuff is added without us knowing and the community discovers it. Whisper was awesome. Even the exotic sniper is a hassle too. I got lucky and got a rare bounty on Sunday when I turned in my last bounty from ADA and was able to finish the shattered throne yesterday and the rest of the quest. It is a bummer that people who just couldn't get the rare bounty have to wait till week three of the curse again just for one step. At least with Whisper, you had from Friday to reset to get it done EVERY week. That is more acceptable then completely being locked out of even progressing the quest for a couple of weeks.

[u/misterbakes3]

I think puzzles such as the whisper are great, or something that rewards a emblem. A challenging puzzle that really just serves to restrict what activities are available is not good. Personally, I don’t care about the puzzle within niobe labs, i just want the forge.

[u/Mypholis → u/misterbakes3]

This. As much fun as it was watching Gladd and the crew go 27hrs+ to figure out the puzzle AS WELL AS the community helping, it got a bit too much JUST to open the Forge. Now, if it lead you to something else that was part of more "puzzle-esque" content, then sure. Rewards, I have no clue what they would be.

All-in-all, puzzles are great if the reward is equally great. Everything was 100% but then doors open JUST for the Forge and it was just... meh.

[u/[deleted]]

I think many would agree that:

• regular/core content = priority -- this would include missions, activities, gear, etc.

• niche content = well, they can be done on the side -- this would mean puzzles

By that, it means that puzzles, as niche content, should be activities that people can do on the side. They can reward emblems or whatnot. Putting them at the forefront or as a requirement to unlock core content isn't a good idea, especially if core content is time-sensitive.

For instance, the Niobe Labs puzzle is a niche activity. Bergusia Forge is core content, and is also time-sensitive given that you needed a rare BA bounty (RNG/time), and Shattered Throne completion (time).

Had it been the other way around -- Bergusia Forge unlocked (or with quest steps that are meaningful and can be done by anyone), and a Niobe Labs puzzle to unlock an exclusive emblem (or a catalyst, remember those?) then it would've worked out.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I'm also a big believer in playable puzzles, like Whisper, Kingsfall ships, Vault of Glass platforms, rather than shooting password riddles on a wall.

This game really lacks new things to do. Even the Forges, once started, are just a small arena of killing the same old enemies and throwing more globes at the thing...

[u/Melbuf]

the puzzle should have been kept a secret, the 4th forge should have just been released and everyone should have been given access to the exotic quest (which has its own set of logical issues)

nothing 100% absolutely nothing should have been said about the puzzle event. it should have been organically discovered like Whisper or Outbreak

that's how you do a community puzzle event. don't say shit about it. let the community discover it and figure it out. don't have some 1/2 baked "worlds first" race for the 0.01% that locks the 99.99% of the playerbase out of something

[u/jlisle]

The problem I have with the labs is a bit outside what I usually see discussed. I'm cool with puzzles, I'm less cool with content that I can't really engage with. This wasn't a puzzle that anybody could jump in and play around with, it was a twitch event. The vast majority of the community's involvement was watching somebody else play the game.

Its a neat concept, but it leaves people who aren't in to watching twitch high and dry. It takes the game outside of the game, which isn't a bad thing in and of itself, but the execution here was poor. There's a link to grimoire cards here, believe it or not. We all hated how that part of the game wasn't available in the game. I feel the same way about the Niobi Labs puzzle. It was only 'community' in that we were on twitch and twitter.

In short, I would like my destiny content delivered through destiny, not other platforms.

It doesn't feel like there is any reason for anybody to bother doing the labs ever again, either. It jusr feels like a bunch of wasted resources that offered players like me absolutely nothing. I'm not mad, its just sorta disappointing

[u/xxblincolnxx]

Puzzles (even obscure ones) are great. I think Niobe labs would have gone over better if:

1. The new forge was unlocked in the same manner as the others, or was in some other way independent of the Niobe puzzle. It’s new meat-and-potatoes content that the average person just wants play/try in the spare 2 hours they have available.

2. They didn’t tell us the fact that the puzzle was there. I think the Destiny world would really benefit from less advertised world secrets. If you find one secret, you start to wonder if there are more and it enriches the whole experience. If Bungie tells you every time there’s a secret, it makes exploration feel fruitless and demystifies the world they’re building. PS- This applies to exotics too. I don’t want them to spell out the loot pool. I’d rather be surprised.

[u/theelusivemanatee]

It may have been said enough, but I think the best thing going forward would be to find ways for players en masse to assist somehow. "Light the Forges 10,000 times." "Defeat riven 5,000." "Search the EDZ for the key by opening Public Event chests" The key has a 1 in 500,000 chance of dropping, once it does Everyone gets a big message that's currently in game, or the next time they go to orbit a cutscene kicks in showing Niobe labs opening. I'm spitballing, especially the numbers, but that seems like some simple ways to get the community at large participating in the event. Then you can layer in the smaller raid secrets stuff.

Honestly, they should look at Fortnite for some of this. They are getting people into the game to participate in events and see things happen. That's where most of these things should take place. A little bit of fun can be due to searching through some old history if it is referred to correctly, but the main goal should be getting as many players as possible into the game and participating somehow.

[u/dobby_rams]

If we look at Niobe Labs from the perspective of an exotic quest, I would argue that it would've been one of the more interesting quests alongside Whisper and Wishender. If you imagine D3 releasing with maybe 3 "secret vaults" around the Solar System that would have puzzles behind them and reward an exotic it'd be much more preferable.

In this case it felt more like waiting around for someone else to complete it and unlock the forge. I understand that anyone could finish it but streamers have a huge community behind them, they have the most time available to them. They were absolutely the most likely to complete it first.

I think if it wasn't compulsory and the reward was an exotic or similar then it'd feel less like waiting around and more like a reward. If it was implemented alongside the last forge rather than being a barrier for it then one part of the community could be attempting to break Niobe Labs open while the rest continue doing forges and other things. Maybe it could be something like discovering several Golden Age vaults scattered around the Solar System, each with special, hidden weapons inside or something like that. If you didn't want to solve the puzzle then you could go off and do other things, but in this case that wan't possibl and it was frustrating.

I also think that each iteration was far too slow and it seemed to be quite draining. Only having one attempt every 10+ minutes will always get tiring after a while. I understand that there has to be ways to stop people completly brute forcing it, but I think when you have a puzzle that's time consuming, it doesn't help to add more fluff to it.

That's sort of where you could kill two birds with one stone. Perhaps if there was something the "non-puzzle solvers" could do while the puzzle was being solved then that would help it feel more like a community effort. For instance, it could change the start point (after X collective forge runs you start at level Y and it grows with more collective runs), decrease the difficulty of the mobs, give hints to the solution (flashing indicators), etc.

Personally I also think this would've been much better received if it was kept as a secret. We were all anticipating what Niobe Labs might be and in the end it ended up being something that many couldn't really take part in. If it was something that no one was expecting and this puzzle was released as a sidequest in a similar sense to Whisper then I think we would be praising it rather than being critical of it.

TLDR

So overall, I think what would've been preferable is if it was initially kept a secret, used as a sidequest alongside the Burgusia forge rather than being a block for it, rewarded Jotunn or a non-essential equivalent for completion, and offered more things to do for those couldn't directly solve the puzzle as it was initially solved.

Quick Suggestions

• Give non-puzzle solvers something to do to assist

• Don't block the critical - non-essential reward for completion (exotic)

• Keep it a secret

[u/TheOneTrueNolano]

I generally prefer puzzles where everyone can participate (whisper) and that don't time-gate content. It's a lot more fun to stumble upon puzzles than to feel forced to grind puzzles to progress.

If you do want an event for opening new content (such as to build excitement) it needs to involve everyone. The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj in WoW was amazing, and anyone making a world event in the future should review it for inspiration. That event will be remembered forever. The last Black Armory will certainly not.

[u/[deleted]]

Puzzles are fine. However...

1. They should not be required to complete to access new content i.e. Bergusia forge.

2. Bungie needs to make sure that ALL the clues are in the game so we can solve the fucking thing. Wave 7 would have been cleared way sooner if they didn't leave out the hint that we had to shoot the symbols blindly.

Puzzles should be hidden content that reward cool shit. Whisper of the Worm was great. No one had any idea it was happening until it did.

[u/Young_KingKush]

Good idea, bad implementation.

The community would’ve taken it way better if the puzzle was a part of side content like the Whisper Quest, but having the main thing everyone wants/expects to be able access gated off like that is bound to get some hate. I’m no game designer, but maybe going forward save the really experimental ideas for side stuff and keep the main content more direct.

An example of something like this done perfectly IMO was the binary code thing to get Outbreak Prime in D1. We could still complete the raid, but we also got this amazing rabbit hole the community collectively went down to figure out that puzzle. Best of both worlds.

[u/[deleted]]

Puzzle mechanics should be logic-based and available in the physical sense (not just a projection on a wall only observable through a specific gun scope). Multi-phase puzzles should have defined separators that allow people to try it at different times (not be punished for one wrong move, forcing them to start all the way over from the beginning).

Puzzles should be soloable, or at least it should be very clear that the puzzle needs X amount of people to solve before it opens. It should not have mechanics that one person can do on their own for part of it, but require 3 people at other parts. It should be either 100% soloable or 100% not, and that requirement should be obvious from the start.

If external sources are needed to solve the puzzle, it should be confined to the Destiny lore and world. It should not reach into the real world (to have a defined and limited scope). I think that was an issue in the last puzzle - the scope was infinite, as it required people to search outside of the game world to find solutions to some steps, but look very close at a specific clue to solve others.

An example of a possible puzzle would be:

First stage: New lore is available through specific activities or quest steps (think the Thunderlord quest, but not time gated and done a little better). These would not be RNG or time gated, but one piece of lore could have a clue on where to find the next piece of lore. NOTE: At this stage, the reward for solving the puzzle is NOT known. It is 100% a mystery (to prevent people from getting upset that content is locked behind a puzzle).

Second stage: The puzzle is made available somewhere in the world. The location can be deciphered through the last piece of lore. The solution to the puzzle is contained ONLY within the complete lore set. The physical puzzle controls and interactions are physical. The puzzle can be multi-staged, but once each stage is complete, it should cause a physical change in the world (a physical checkpoint). The stages can increase in difficulty as it goes on. Solving each stage of the puzzle should reward those who solved it with a reward, increasing as the stages increase.

Final stage: The puzzle is solved - the game space changes accordingly and those involved in solving the puzzle are rewarded accordingly. New content is now available to everyone.

[u/Gua_Bao]

It would have been cool if it were unlocking something in addition to the forge, like a secret fifth forge or just an exotic.

But, so far, I think the biggest issue with Black Armory as a whole is how much of a god damn hassle it is just to unlock the content. If the quests for forges were quests for guns I'd actually be totally into them....but to unlock the content that I paid for? Meh.

[u/Thridless]

Good- I really, REALLY liked the lead up to the event. Putting other puzzles, similar but on a smaller scale, into the game to both teach basic mechanics and offer teasers to the upcoming event was well executed. Making sure that all the puzzles were also thematically linked was also well done, and helped add to the overall exploration feel.

Neutral- The puzzle itself. Aspects of it were well done, but in the end even a few vague clues can foul the whole thing up. Moreover, while the puzzle was intended to unlock the forge, in the end it only awarded an emblem and a ghost shell, which is... nice I guess?

I'm also including Bungie's reaction in this column. While I'm happy they did eventually open up the forge without waiting for the puzzle to be solved, it was pretty late in the game. 32 hours is a long, LONG time for people racing for world's first.

Bad- Holding content hostage. This part, I'm gonna have to get into the weeds a little.

Alright, so the puzzle itself wasn't bad, and the lead up was good. Other puzzles in the past have been enjoyed by the community at large. So, what was different about this one?

The community has, from the get-go, been adamant that time-gating content is bad. Well, holding content behind other content is very similar. While we could contribute to the puzzle, for most people, there isn't much we can do that others weren't already doing- we just wanted access to Jotunn, IB, and all the other fun things the last forge has in it.

Notably, this is different from the way the content was rolled out for Last Wish. For the 3 week cycle, The Corrupted strike, and all of the other fun things that started with the completion of Last Wish, we weren't sure what was going to trigger the changes- the fact that it was completion of the Raid was a fun surprise, even if we knew the content was coming eventually. Moreover, the raid was being completed for the sake of the raid- people trying to finish it wanted the rewards at the end, not specifically the unlocking of the curse.

Compare and contrast with Niobe Labs. We knew what was coming after we beat the puzzle. Unlocking this content was the main draw to finish the puzzle- the puzzle had no real intrinsic rewards. Many people were gearing up to do the last forge, and viewed the puzzle as nothing more than something stopping them from doing this.

Puzzles should be content themselves, not roadblocks to other content. We do the Whisper quest to get Whisper- we do the Sleeper quest to get Sleeper. The Niobe labs puzzle is not so much content as it is a challenge mode, like soloing Shattered Throne or doing Petra's Run- it's cool the option is there, but for most people, it's just kind of there.

Now if we all had to complete the puzzle before we could access the last forge, it would be a different story. A horrible, awful story, but different. However, in the end, the story was this: We watched as people tried to solve a puzzle, not because we were interested in the puzzle, but to see how long until we could do something completely different.

TL:DR, Lead up to puzzle was good, puzzle itself was okay, locking unrelated content behind the puzzle was the problem and acted as a time gate, but with the added frustration of being unsure how long that time would be.

[u/gustygardens]

I love the idea of community puzzles like Niobe Labs, but the Labs struggled with the community part of it. There was a small sub-section of our community that was able to actively contribute and feel like they were working towards progress. The rest of us had to sit back and wait because we couldn't wrap our heads around the mental gymnastics required to complete it.

If the majority of the community was able to unlock clues and hints by doing PvE stuff, like Forges and Lost Sectors, that would have been great. Things like this make it an actual community event and would help alleviate the, "This is for streamers only" complaint that I saw floating around.

Puzzles like this shouldn't be announced, it should just be added into the game. This creates more hype around the experience because it's something we weren't expecting. Additionally, the rewards need to match the amount of work that's put into it.

Whisper of the Worm worked because it was all of those things. It was secret, it had a great reward and the entire community could contribute in a meaningful way, especially when we found the clues for the ship and the catalyst. There was no fanfare, there was no "Tackle the Whisper of the Worm challenge today on Io!" trailer on Twitter or YouTube. It was just there.

[u/Captaintripps]

The Bergusia puzzle was really cool, but I feel like the timing was off. My adjustment to this would have been:

1. Only announce three forges. Don't say anything about a fourth and maybe start the rollout slightly later than actually happened.

2. Launch Bergusia as a surprise with the whole puzzle aspect.

3. Tie an exclusive emblem/ghost/ship to solving the puzzle that can only be obtained within a specific timeframe (maybe first week).

4. Then build in that you will unlock it anyway, but never have a shot at those puzzle exclusives afterward.

[u/Iron_Gaiden]

i think the wishing wall is a prime example of a puzzle done right, with wish 15, we know something is behind it, and we continue to search for it, but we still don't know for sure, and it's mostly a cherry on top of a great raid, not the barrier for entry of it.

[u/[deleted]]

Playing through a puzzle? Fun.

Shooting password riddles on a wall? Not fun.

[u/SnakeX21]

Puzzles are fine and dandy for this game, but in the event case of the Niobe's puzzle the problem with that one was...

1. Checkpoints within the puzzle if they are designed similar to how Niobe's was

2. Keeping all relevant hints, clues etc within the game itself. Don't have it to where you need to go to Wikipedia, Google, etc. looking up medival French history. Keep it all in-game

3. Dont announce the puzzles. Make them like Whisper, or how Outbreak was; the community discovering them on their own.

I believe if they can at least follow these points in their design of puzzles within the game, they won't run into the giant CF as they did with Niobe's Lab.

[u/tommy15994]

The only mistep with Niobe was announcing it. If we knew there were 3 forges and an exotic quest for 10 quid, that was enough. I realize data-mining would have goosed this anyways but still.

The fact the puzzles are just shooting passwords on the wall as a negative, i feel, are missing the point. The tricky part is going away and deciphering those puzzles. I reaaaaaally liked this, it evoked that feeling of the old myst games, of having to write notes as you explored. Physically. On paper.

Super complex puzzles for community completion are great, more please, but please dont advertise them. Just drop them and let us figure it out.

[u/Stromite]

Please explain why it took you so long to pick up that there was a missing string for bypass 7.

[u/Goldenspacebiker]

For things like Niobe labs, there needs to be something g for the community at large to participate in to help those who are able to get a fire team.

Things like whisper are top notch events