Destiny's House of Wolves: Bungie was right to delay the raid
Stop freaking out. It's for the best.
Play the new content, get better at PvP, suck all the life from the strikes, story missions, new playlist and two new modes and boost your gear. Then you'll be ready for the raid later this year. As will Bungie.
The most surprising aspect of Bungie's announcement that House of Wolves won't include a raid isn't the news itself. Despite leaks powerful enough to fox even the smallest Dutch boy failing to make even the slightest mention of a new equivalent to Vault of Glass or Crota's End, the clan email lists and chatrooms yesterday were full of shock. It's as if Destiny players have been trained to raid, that raiding is the end-game and alternatives are treason. Time to gird those loins. Things are about to change, and it seems as though you've got a real fight on your hands if you want House of Wolves' end-game gear.
Trials of Osiris appears to be the main gear event in Destiny's second expansion. While Bungie is yet to talk of it officially (you're going to have to wait until April 29 for final details), leaks are pegging it as a 3v3 PvP mode fought only on Mercury's Burning Shrine stage. You can buy your way in with a Mote of Light under certain circumstances, but normal tokens to enter are earned from Crucible victories. Lose in the Trials three times and you need to earn or buy another token. Fight well in the Trials and you can win some of the new armour and weapons teased by Bungie in the House of Wolves reveal, or even the Eye of Osiris emblem, Destiny's only exotic name badge.
The comments were inevitable. What about PvE? Yes, there's going to be Prison of Elders, "a brand new three-player cooperative multiplayer arena," but there's been no mention of any level-boosting gear here. Many don't like PvP (hunters tend to enjoy it most: can't think why), and the raid grind has, up to this point, been the only way to earn Destiny's top gear and hit the level cap.
But you should quit whining. Bungie made the right decision.
Head-to-head
Now raidless, House of Wolves is the award Destiny's PvP community deserves. Bungie's PvP heritage is unparalleled, and should be properly celebrated. Holding back a raid from House of Wolves means everyone wanting to reach the cap will need to hit PvP hard, and will be forced to raise their game if they have any aversion. It may be that Prison of Elders also deals the gear required to reach the level limit, hopefully silencing the PvE-only players, but there's yet to be any solid indication of this.
In addition to giving a huge nod to Destiny's PvP players, the delay of a third major dungeon means you won't just smash through the accompanying story content and start rinsing the raid. You're going to have to dwell on the new missions and strikes before hitting the raid later in the year. Just think how pumped you're going to be when it finally arrives after you've spent months upgrading all your purples (yep: legendaries, not just exotics, will now have "upgrade paths"), to finally be able to strip the raid of new gear alongside the entire Destiny user-base. Delicious.
Even if you really aren't prepared to get involved in the Trials of Osiris at all, there's still the rumoured Dragon strike playlist to hit. This is supposedly at level 28, two above Roc, and will enjoy the inclusion of the two new strikes.
And look. There's still a huge amount we don't know about House of Wolves, which is sure to have enough content to keep you going for months. But even from what we have right now, it seems the decision to delay the new raid, whatever it may be, was the right one. Play the new content, get better at PvP, suck all the life from the strikes, story missions, new playlist and two new modes and boost your gear. Then you'll be ready for the raid later this year. As will Bungie.