At first it seemed like a bad idea. But most games don't let you move gear along like that. I ditched my Ebony Armor when I could get stronger Dragonbone armor in Skyrim. I can still keep it, and still use it, it just isn't as effective for the tougher parts of the new material. Same thing with all ny awesome Borderlands/BK2 gear when I got the DLC. Deleted most old stuff except for a treasured few, stocked up on more powerful gear to take on the next challenge. The reason everyone feels this way is because if the absolute nonsense of leveling up in vanilla Destiny. Collect 18 ascendent materials for [i]each[/i] piece of gear and each weapon just to be able to survive the Vault of Glass, and then run the Vault a hundred times to get a complete armor set, and then you must collect another 18 ascendent materials for each of those weapons or armor pieces? Absolutely insane. So when Crota came out and everyone got to just go to the Vanguard and buy higher-level gear, it was like, wtf? Why even try? So by the time Wolves came out, it seemed like a really good idea to find some way to make that grind useful. And it was a good idea, in relation to what people had been through. But if the game had used a realistic and sensible leveling system in the first place, people wouldn't have spent so much time grinding. Then they wouldn't be so invested in that complete Vault set. But they also would have stopped playing for months before Crota came out, because vanilla Destiny had so little to do beyond the Vault and PvP. The gameplay was artificially extended to an insane degree. I say, let people ascend armor at least. It looks like most exotics are going forward for both weapons and armor, that's at least something. There were clearly some balance issues, and if dropping some exotics is the only way to remedy it, so be it. Reforging also seemed like a great idea at first, but it narrowed the PvP meta so drastically that now it's impossible to continue that for TTK [i]and[/i] fix balances issues, and that's why legendary weapons can't move forward.