Seriously, why would a level 30 and level 32 be treated identically?

If not, then that's probably why.

So while you were playing 5 levels below your opponents, you were functionally only 3 levels down. According to Bungie players within 3 levels of yourself are only at a slight advantage or disadvantage, but that gap increases at 4 or greater level difference.

Tl;Dr - Allegedly(!!!), Lvl 27 should have little issue with 32s, but 26 and under should see more of a difference.

You're right of course. But this time it really was true. :-)

It was really infuriating. We'd all be planning our strategy telling people when we're going to pop the heavies, and then this guy would just open it up for himself while we were all gathering together. There was no external enemy pressure to prompt the hasty open. He just was doing it selfishly. Meanwhile the enemy team was coming at us with everything they had. It was a close match that we lost because of ammo management. That is lame.

Anyway, I'll stop bitching. We should have adjusted our strategy around that after the first experience of it.

Hey, I warned you. 9:15. 6:20. 3:15. Get there early!

It was really infuriating. We'd all be planning our strategy telling people when we're going to pop the heavies, and then this guy would just open it up for himself while we were all gathering together. There was no external enemy pressure to prompt the hasty open. He just was doing it selfishly. Meanwhile the enemy team was coming at us with everything they had. It was a close match that we lost because of ammo management. That is lame.

Anyway, I'll stop bitching. We should have adjusted our strategy around that after the first experience of it.

I actually like Thorn on Anomaly if I'm standing across from B where no pays attention to you hand cannon sniping away at them suckas trying to cap B. :) Will adjust when the hand cannons get nerfed for range though.

This is why even though it's only 300 attacks, I'm using TDYK in Iron Banner. First if all, it's still a 3 shot kill, so the difference in attack doesn't matter, and second, it has INSANE range for a hand cannon. Great fate of fire and stability really make it hard to beat.

Again, we've been sold short on the value of gear in IB. It's frustratingly small. I guess level 20 characters might have some trouble, but at 5 levels below cap and 4 below the average player, the only thing I noticed was the sniper body hits. I didn't more quickly than my level 31 hunter, and my time to kill was basically the same, too.

What gives?

I had thought that the sharp drop-off occurred five levels below the target, but in this game (that ended up being 3v4 in the enemy's favor), the 25 on their team (6+ levels below us) had the highest score (which might explain why the three of us wrecked them)... So there's definitely shenanigans going on...

For some reason, I'm actually able to accomplish 'not completely pathetic' once and a while. Even if it's just a matchmaking illusion, I still vaguely have fun.

It's almost as if I'm supposed to. It's weird.