You must be slow... I'm 270 light... it only takes like 2 hours to reach level 20 lol... The reason you play the story first is you have to play the story anyway and it gives you enough xp to reach 20 so why do any other way when you have to do the story anyway to unlock shyt..
270? nice....i'm 230+ on avg with all characters, getting 240 engrams (with 2) and i've only done titan in the story....still gotta do titan with my hunter, and he one of the ones getting 240 engrams lol.....so, i'll be at your level pretty soon, since i have more story to go.....also, by the end of the day i'll have given my clan 15k in rep, the max for the week, which shows i'm doing my part...another thing: it takes longer than 2 hours to reach 20...just letting you know so you not surprised....
no, in a game like this you dont have to play the story first....if that was true, the only thing they'd let you do is the story, which we both know isnt the case....the reason you do other shyt besides the story is cause you want to...there is no wrong way to play this game, you play how you like....just cause others choose to play differently doesnt mean it's wrong nor they hustling backwards....
you chose to get 1 character to a high level & open all the end game stuff for said character, that's cool.....i chose to get 3 characters to a high level and open all the end game stuff at the same time, that's cool too....play how you want...
have fun guardian...