After few hours of game play in the new update there are a couple of things that feel rather strange. First login in with my Hardcode toon I noticed we now have a weekly project that grants an exotic. And it gave me exotic knee pads at level 500, my initial thoughts were okay, to bad it wasn't 515 or near that but still it's one component. Open a few crates in city and it was all junk, much worse then before. So I switched to regular toon, couldn't do second weekly project, it was completed already. And I thought okay, only one per account then, but at 3rd login I had another one, were I got exotic gloves also at level 500 (+1 component). Now that was interesting...
So far didn't see any major differences in overall game play, all NPCs still go down quickly and roaming the city isn't that much of a challenge. Did level 4 check point and also didn't feel very hard to complete with another agent. But what did get my attention after awhile is that loot has become horrible, you find purple items 440-475 range and yellow ones aren't that much better either. If seems that there aren't any 500+ items anymore when looting and best items (2x out of many) found were at 487, including ones I got from the check point. If this is the new mechanics behind the loot I can only say it hasn't approved, and the mentioned 'generosity' surely doesn't apply here. Or do we also have to wait another week for it to improve and actually get items at GS515 regularly, as was the case before this update. Maybe it also scales with world difficulty for level 30 players as well but there is no way to change it. If that is required to get better loot in the game when opening loot crates that are placed in the city, well then I am truly lost for words.
I watched a video last night that showed how much you would have to pay for 'best' weapon skin in another game and it amounted to $99 for required credit bundle. Best part was one comment in which that person stated he was happy that prices were that outrageous. It kept him from buying anything and I can now say that the same applies for me with this game. If they keep doing these things with each update I can't see any reason why I should invest more.
Put in about an hour and half of game play and made slight improvement on the loot part. Highest score increased to 491, if this is the new norm where 515 items have become rarer then exotics in give up. What is the point of the 'looting' part in this game when all you do is collect rubbish. Fortunately I got my library completed and stash filled with maxed out items because I can't see how anyone can collect the parts needed for maximum attributes used in the re-calibration station.
Other issue found, when standing on the grey circle (mini map) in the city which indicates the location of the mission dialog it wasn't visible. Only accessible when opening the map, I think it was the American Space Museum mission. First though was great that they removed those but later got to another mission and it was visible. Would have liked to see those info-popups removed and same when entering another area. These walls of text only disturb visibility when engaged with NPCs and only vanish (temporarily) when aiming, just like those annoying loot columns.
I'm experiencing the exact same.
before TU10 I was getting 510 to 515 gear for grinding.
Now getting well under 500 gear on average maybe 470 to 480.
Was going to get DLC if things were good after this patch, not going to bother now. Will give the game a break hopefully they fix it.
Back into the game trying find some more 'quality' items, not that I need them that much but I just like to go out looting and see what you can find. But after the update that is just wasting your time, there isn't anything worth the time holding down the button on my controller anymore. Again today maximum value of loot found 485 (yellow). not to mention the actual attribute values on it. They have turned this game into a shooter and genially feel sorry for those players leveling up without being able to find decent items. Happy I did completed my Hardcode commendations before this update, apart from the raid of which I have interest in playing anyway.
Another thing I discovered today was an issue with my assault turret, went in cover deployed it but it wasn't placed. Then couldn't fire my weapon (which happens rarely) but since they were red ones, no chance of survival for the NPCs. It feels they have become so weak you can kill them with 5-10 bullets. After the fight I noticed that my turret although it didn't deploy also wasn't on cool down. So there I stood with a useless skill, no chance of getting it back so it seemed. But during the time it took for me to post this reply it appeared to have restored itself. There is definitely something with the server responses and the reason I say this is because there are now so many places on the map were I need to wait until loading icon disappears. That didn't happen before, but don't think this is related to the update, but more quality of service problem at their end. Wonder were this will end...
For me there isn't any incentive to continue playing as the game turned into a shooter only. So it's back to Wildlands again which as a shooter is so much better, no skill issues and don't need any loot to improve my gear, pick up any weapon you like. Most important, it doesn't have bullet sponge elites, all NPCs are killed with a single head shot and there is stealth. Which is another issue I have with this game, why do I go into combat with NPCs that are above me, but impossible to see me. This seems to happen a lot last few days, suddenly you are in combat but you can wait for minutes and no NPCs turn up to fight. I feels rather silly and you should only go into combat when you're actually under fire, not because you are near (under or above) them.
There will be people saying buy the DLC and you'll get more out of the game but as others mention that this is the kind they were getting at level 40. Well, if that is the case I really can't be bothered even if you do get more activities to play. I truly wish we as level 30 players could revert back to TU7 which was the best state the game has ever been in.
EDIT: Issue with turret wasn't one time event. It now happens every time I try and deploy it, no turret and not on cool down, just greyed out, useless.
After almost three weeks of TU10 I have gotten less than 5 pieces of GS515 gear, weapons none. Running around the city opening boxes, doing missions on all difficulties, many activities, aerial drones, and this is what you get. About 70% of the drops are purple 450-460s, sometimes you get items that are around 480 but not often. Anything above 490 has become a rarity, you can actually buy better gear at the vendors nowadays. So that pretty much debunks the argument for this so called effortlessly opening loot boxes while roaming in the city. But worst of all you'll have to wait a whole week for new items to appear.
According to a tracker site I collected thousands of items during these 3 weeks. Not sure if correct but it might very well be, which surprises me even more. I managed getting the Shepherd level 25 commendation and for that I did spend lot of time in the game. And yet the end result is less then 10 gear items I actually kept, and two exotics out of 4000+ items. Probably never going to use them in the future, but that is another story. I am getting really fed up opening loot boxes and see those useless purple 450 items drop over and over again.
They said that loot at level 30 isn't working as intended. Okay, but still it was designed to work that way. At SOTG they mentioned next updates will come at later time, but not sure whether they will include changes for loot. This because quote, "it is a complex system", which they actually created themselves, so why is it complex? But apparently they can't come up with the idea to revert it to previous state before the latest changes. I'm not even going to call it patch anymore because it fixes nothing, it mostly alters what was working fine into something completely useless.
If this is just an attempt to make me buy the expansion I can only say it isn't working. As is the same for any future DLC they plan to release next year. Wouldn't be surprised if you need Warlords for it as well or else you can't even play it. But I can't convince myself to spend money on this game anymore for features I do like, then dumb ed down or taken out completely in the next update.
So my final conclusion is, this game and those responsible have gone a-wire.
I had posted my updated report card for my TU10 experience on another thread. Here it is...
Here's my personal report card from farming loot (over 1500 items) via various open world activities and a few challenging missions at Gear Score 515 since TU10 Tuesday...
1. 99% of the 1000+ regular loot drops were under Gear Score 500. I got 2 yellow high-end items at 511 and 514 and a few purple items 501 to 503.
2. Exotic drop rate seemed slightly up for me early on. I got 2 items at 503 and 506. One from a named NPC and the other from an regular weapon crate.
3. Named item drop rate seemed WAY up for me. I got 12 different items but they were ALL under 500.
4. Yellow high-end item drop rate averaged about 1 out of 3 items looted or awarded for me. EVERYTHING else were purple items.
5. I don't recall getting a single gear or skill mod over 500. I could be wrong but I DO know that I never got ANYTHING I wanted to keep or use.
6. The green Gear Set drop rate was up for me early on but fizzled later. Nothing was over 500 though. I'm not refering to "Targeted Loot" Gear Set areas, just random drops.
7. Honestly, "Targeted Loot" drop rates seemed just about the same to me. I'd hit a run of them back to back to back and then nothing for a while.
8. CACHES - opened roughly 10 field caches. I got 1 mask at 512. My 2 weekly exotic cache rewards were 506 and 509. Haven't opened the exotic cache third yet.
9. Vendors still selling Gear Score 500 or under items. Correction: I recall one vendor selling ONE 501 weapon once.
That's all the relevant stats I can think of posting about.