Update, January 16: Destiny 2’s director has been discussing some of the planned changes to the game.
Christopher Barrett has been tweeting about some planned changes coming to Destiny 2’s PvP. The game’s director implies changes to certain weapon types are on their way in future updates.
Predict the future like Osiris with our Destiny 2 update tracker.
Last week, Barrett published a blog post discussing those changes in more detail, but more recently took to Twitter to explain some more of the logic behind them. Barrett says “Destiny 2 needs more weapons that matter, both in power and the hunt to acquire them. Exotics need to live up to their name.”
Destiny 2 needs more weapons that matter, both in power and the hunt to acquire them. Exotics need to live up to their name. The most skillful or visceral weapons like Snipers, Shotguns, and Fusion Rifles need to return to glory. We’re on it.
— Christopher Barrett (@cgbarrett) January 13, 2018
Barrett also teases a return to PvP a little more akin to Destiny 1, saying “The most skillfil of visceral weapons like Snipers, Shotguns, or Fusion Rifles need to return to glory.” The changes are apparently on their way; in a second tweet Barrett says “the sandbox team is an amazingly talented group and are hard at work on changes.”
Replying to a player in a seperate tweet from yesterday, Barrett also confirmed that specific loot for Lost Sector and the game’s Strike mode was coming; “more thematic loot that drops from named bosses and unique activities is definitely something we plan to add.”
Original story, January 12: Destiny 2 co-director Christopher Barrett has published a huge update announcing sweeping changes to the shooter, roughly a month and a half afterthe last one. The fixes address the concerns of long-standing Destiny players, and include reworked raid rewards, changes to Eververse, the return of 6v6 and Rumble (free-for-all) to the Crucible, and much more.
Reworked raid rewards are coming in an update on January 30. Raid gear will now feature mods with raid-specific perks, and an item will drop from each major raid encounter. Benedict, the raid vendor, will also directly sell both Leviathan and Eater of Worlds armour and weapons, in exchange for Calus tokens and legendary shards. There will also be a new Ghost with raid-specific perks, which has a chance to drop from both raid bosses. The January update will also introduce Masterwork armour, which reduces damage taken while your Super is active.
When it comes to Eververse, more new cosmetics will come from activities, meaning some Ghosts, Sparrows, and ships will be put in reward pools. Barrett also promises to “give players more direct purchase options,” and to provide a gameplay path to earn both Bright Engrams and event engrams.
Some of these changes will be rolled out for the Crimson Days event, which kicks off on February 13, and more will come in season three, when the Bright Engram will presumably refresh again. During Crimson Days, leveling up will award both a Bright Engramanda Crimson Engram, each of which is strongly weighted to drop non-duplicate rewards. On leveling up, Bungie are still investigating changes to XP earn rates.
Another update, scheduled for sometime in February, will replace the Nightfall’s time-limit mechanic with strike scoring. This was a system introduced in Destiny 1, in which killing enemies and completing objectives earned you points. New emblems will reflect your Nightfall High Scores and unlock rewards. This update will also add text chat to the Tower on PC, mark fireteam members on the in-game map, and even bring a full rework of the mods system, which will see mods have a greater impact on your power. Bungie warn the scope of the rework “could push parts or all of it out to early spring.” Since mods are currently in Bright Engrams, Bungie are tuning this rework to avoid pay-to-win.
In the longer term, Bungie are incorporating feedback from Curse of Osiris to the second DLC, and making many big changes to the Crucible for season three. Private matches are finally coming, as is a 6v6 playlist (the original Destiny had both 6v6 and 3v3 game modes). Mayhem – a mode in which abilities recharged faster, and one of the few bright spots of the Dawning – will return as a limited-time event on a regular basis.
Ranked play is also coming to the Crucible. You’ll be able to earn two forms of rank, which will refresh each season: Glory, which goes up when you win and down when you lose; and Valour, which goes up as you complete matches. PC clan chat, equipping multiple emotes, and tweaks to Vault space are also planned for the spring.
Some far more vague changes are forecast out to autumn 2018 (or sooner), including the return of Rumble to the Crucible, Masterwork Exotics, shaders and dismantling, weapon slot and archetype improvements (interesting…) and “pinnacle weapon and gear improvements,” whatever that means.
Our take: it’s all very positive. More meaningful raid rewards, and a direct purchase option for them (which would be a first for the series) makes us immediately more interested in returning to Destiny 2’s endgame. Putting more of Eververse’s shinies into the loot pool and adding direct purchase options for them, too, will go a long way to restoring players’ goodwill about microtransactions. These are the most important changes right now, and it’s good to see they’re coming sooner than the rest.