Destiny 2’s Pathfinder system isn’t the Bounty replacement players were hoping for
BungieThe release of The Final Shape changed much about Destiny 2, including many of the in-game vendors and bounty systems. As part of these alterations, Bungie released the Ritual Pathfinder system, which has not been well received by players.
The Ritual Pathfinder system was designed to act as a direct replacement for the traditional Crucible, Vanguard, and Gambit bounties. This amounts to a series of objectives that provide a direct path to gear and Bright Dust rewards for playing the game.
In addition, the main Pathfinder tree is filled with objectives drawn from the new Pale Heart of the Traveler location. This encourages Guardians to get involved with various activities, while completing a set of Pathfinder objectives also serves as a Guardian Rank requirement.
Unfortunately, player responses to the new system have been mixed, with many upset at its implementation. The major complaint has been that it is fundamentally at odds with the streak system, which provides greater rank rewards for sticking with the same activity.
In addition, arbitrary restrictions are frustrating players. The clearest example is that players cannot pick specific Strikes to satisfy Pathfinder requirements. For example, getting a certain number of Taken kills in Strikes is quite time-consuming if you can’t select instances with high numbers of the enemy.
Many called for the activity types to be separated in future iterations. One said, “I believe a lot of the issues with Pathfinder will be fixed if they created three Pathfinder maps that are each composed solely of nodes relating to a single ritual activity. A Vanguard Pathfinder, a Crucible Pathfinder, and a Gambit Pathfinder, with each having general nodes like the ‘Get X amount of final blows with Hand Cannons.'”
Another added, “The problem with the ritual pathfinder is that it’s an amalgamation of vanguard, crucible and gambit objectives. Would work better if each line at the end was for each activity so you could focus only on Crucible and still reach the end. It’s all mixed up, making it annoying to need to swap activities.”
What exactly Pathfinder will look like after this initial run is unclear. With so many calling for change, it may undergo several refinements.