Destiny (Beta) Level & Progression System
I’ve been asked a couple times now about how exactly the level and progression system in Destiny works. How do you level up? Are your singleplayer and multiplayer levels the same? What impact do they have?
Context
In order to understand Destiny’s leveling system, you have to understand how the characters work. Unlike typical console shooters, instead of having one set of menus through which you choose your campaign missions or multiplayer and jump into a game - and then later choose a character class or loadout - in Destiny, you choose your character before doing anything.
Everything about your character - equipment, stats, level, etc. - is unified and tied to.. your character. It is one character. You move between PVE missions and PVP matches based on that character. This is just how things are handled in most MMOs.
Level vs. Rank
From this, you can quickly grasp that your character only has one main level for progression. There may or may not be a smaller, separate ranking system put in place for PVP progression - as is typical of MMOs but has yet to fully be revealed for Destiny. However, I would not consider this to really be considered a “level,” it would only be a “rank.”
A rank is strictly a reflection of your performance in PVP, a leaderboard statistic, and nothing more. This has no impact on your gameplay, and is just another badge you wear to show your worth in PVP.
PVP rank is not implemented for the beta, so I cannot comment on opinions on it in action, but that is how it would most likely function in Destiny.
A level, however, directly impacts your gameplay experience. Your character can progress through to level 20, unlocking various skills, abilities, and higher-level armor and weapons. (The beta has a level cap of 8, however.)
Your character can also unlock access to specific subclasses and specializations at a couple different level milestones. (For example, in the current beta, it says you can unlock your second subclass at level 15 - beyond the reach of the beta.) Higher-tier armor, weapons, and abilities require a higher level to use.
Players can level up their characters through either PVE or PVP gameplay, however PVE will provide the most experience towards level progression.
Impact
The last area of concern is regarding how much your level impacts your gameplay experience.
In PVE, your experience is completely dependent on your level. Your gear, weapons, abilities - all of that affects how you experience the game.
AI enemies in PVE also have levels, so the higher your level is in comparison to enemies - the easier time you will have fighting them.
If an enemy is 4 or more levels above you, your attacks will do almost zero damage to them, and it will be near impossible to kill them. You may also encounter enemies which are very much higher level than you and will appear as level “??” - which you will not be able to kill.
In PVP, however, after around level 5 (when you automatically unlock The Crucible) your rank starts to have an insignificant impact on your experience. PVP gameplay does a pretty good job at balancing everyone out and minimizing differences in level, stats, and equipment stats.
While technically someone can get an awesome weapon or piece of armor in PVE and bring it into PVE, direct player skill will take priority every time.
On the off-chance you jump into PVP below level 5, however, you will be at a huge disadvantage - as you have not yet unlocked all of the simple mechanics (grenades, melee attacks, supers, Sparrow) that other players have.