Bungie says that Destiny 2 has a FOMO problem, and as part of an effort to tamp down the fear of missing out, it’s about to be easier to miss out on Legendaries. The developers essentially plan to put an expiration date on Legendary gear about a year after it debuts, so that players constantly have a reason to get new weapons.
In the future, Legendaries will have power caps. After a certain number of seasonal updates increase the power level, you’ll no longer be able to infuse your weapons, which means you’ll have to switch to new gear in order to keep your level up. Some “shelved” Legendaries may come back in future updates, or as part of community events.
As director Luke Smith explains on the official site, “The simplest version of how it is going to work is: Legendary weapons will have fixed values for how high they can be infused. Those values will project the weapon’s viable-in-end-game lifespan and we think that lifespan is somewhere between 9 and 15 months.”
The changes don’t affect Exotics, so your Destiny 2 Shadowkeep Exotics will probably live forever. Naturally, you’ll be able to use any weapon you want in any activity that doesn’t take power into account, but Bungie hopes this change will let it focus on creating more fun, powerful new Legendaries at the top of the pyramid.
“The more specific nitty gritty for this will come a little bit further down the road but we wanted to get some of thinking behind it to you sooner rather than later,” Smith says, so don’t expect these changes to be immediate.