The celebrations in Destiny 2 for the 30th anniversary on December 7th are not far away. Bungie is already working in the background on the largest future update yet, which will fundamentally change the game in December 2021 and February 2022. We summarize the adjustments in this compact overview for you.
The current Season 15 of Destiny 2 is the longest the game has ever had. The seasonal story quest around Savathun and Mara Sov is currently at a standstill. For this reason, in less than three weeks, the “30 Years of Bungie” package will be released. It aims to sweeten the time for players until the next expansion in February 2022. Bungie has also been working for weeks in the background on the largest balance patch of all time.
Currently, it almost sounds like Bungie’s birthday party in December will also herald a completely new era for Destiny 2 and its players.
Prepare for major changes: Many changes will be introduced to the game in December 2021, bringing the first significant changes for players. Further innovations will then affect future gameplay with the release of “The Witch Queen” on February 22, 2022. All these adjustments are enormously extensive.
- Adjustments to Exotics and various weapons and perks
- In-depth balance adjustments for abilities with differentiated cooldowns
- Expansion of the Light classes through aspects and fragments
- A completely new way of weapon crafting and its optimization
- New enemies and selectable difficulty levels, making the game more challenging
1. Extensive tuning of weapons, mods, and perks
Bungie will make significant changes to various weapon archetypes, mods, perks, and exotics in December.
Legendary weapons will be stronger in PvE: Slug shotguns will lose 10% damage in PvE, but pellet shotguns will receive a 10% PvE damage increase. Various swords will now consume less ammunition for a heavy attack, and bows will deal 10% more damage against normal enemies. All linear fusion rifles will deal 10% more damage.
Exotic buffs and nerfs will provide fine-tuning: The most notable changes will affect popular exotics such as Whisper of the Worm and the Sleeper Simulant. The Sleeper will receive the smaller of the two buffs, with a damage increase of 6% (along with an additional 10% damage increase for linear fusion rifles) and an extra round in the magazine.
The Exo-Sniper Whisper of the Worm, which was previously the preferred DPS weapon for players in nearly all battles, may make a grand comeback. In addition to the 10% damage increase, the Catalyst perk “Breath Control” now triggers faster. Additionally, with three rapid precision hits, a bullet is returned to the magazine from thin air.
You can read all the changes to the exotic weapons in this article:
Exotics without catalysts will generate orbs
The biggest disadvantage of exotics without catalysts will be removed. In the future, Bungie will introduce a solution that no longer makes the generation of orbs of power dependent on the presence of a catalyst. Primary weapon exotics will also receive a “tuning pass” to make them more useful.
Also coming are adjustments to perks and mods: Many mods and perks will also change. Among them is “Vorpal Weapon”. While the damage against supers in PvP remains unchanged, Bungie is adjusting the damage buff in PvE. Instead of 15% on all weapons, it’s now 10% on power weapons, 15% on special weapons, and 20% on primary weapons.
Additionally, there will be a new accessibility mod “Full-Auto Retrofit” available for legendary hand cannons, sidearms, scout rifles, and pulse rifles. It activates full-auto while the trigger is held.
Bungie wants to give players a reason in February 2022 to use two weapons of the same element and stat type. However, we don’t have any further details on this yet.
2. Your abilities will soon feel different
Starting in December, every ability and every super will gain more identity, making them unique. Player builds will become more flexible. It also means the end of the “super clock” in the Crucible. It is quite possible that these changes will feel different for many players.
The distinction between the two areas will become more important in the future, as a PvP build will need to be more tailored than a pure PvE build. A Hunter should reconsider his 100 mobility, as the cooldown for dodging will be increased from 11 to 14 and from 11 to 18 seconds.
However, these changes only affect the Crucible. There will be no change in ability refunds for PvE fighters.
You can read all about the changes for cooldowns and the super tier list, which will come into the game with the “largest balance patch of all time,” here:
3. “Void 3.0” will be the first to expand the Light class system with aspects and fragments
As we know, the dream of further Darkness classes in The Witch Queen has not been confirmed. “Venom” and “Vapor” are no longer topics for speculation. Instead of bringing more Darkness classes into the game, Bungie is boosting the existing Light classes so that they can continue to compete.
The combination possibilities that players can expect with Void 3.0 (from February 2022) are diverse. Combining spectral blades and fade step is possible, as well as dawn shield with controlled destruction. Also, the combo of hand supernova and devouring.
Some things will be removed and a few really crazy abilities will be added.
- The Sentinel Titan will become the protector with Void 3.0.
With its Void 3.0 update, it will take on the role of a “frontline protector” and will be able to cover its team. If things get tense, it can aggressively decimate enemies with its new shield throw, thanks to overshield. - The Hunter will dive devilishly into Void 3.0.
In the Destiny 2 showcase from August 2021, you can see a clip in the YouTube video, where a Hunter performs a kind of “dive jump” with Void, similar to the Stasis Shatterdive. Even though Bungie has not revealed anything accurate about this yet, it still looks promising what all will be possible for the Hunter with aspects and fragments.
- Voidwalkers will become more threatening and turn into Void 3.0 vampires.
If you liked the Stasis turret of the Warlocks, then you will want to try out the new Void 3.0 Warlock right after this information. With the update, it will gain the ability to create a black hole. It will target your enemies by itself, drain their energy like a vampire, and weaken them.
Arc and Solar are also expected to be updated and expanded over the course of 2022, through subsequent seasons.
What you can expect specifically from Void 3.0 is detailed here:
4. Targeted weapon crafting for more space in the vault
This may solve the vault issue for many players. Instead of keeping hundreds of variations of the same weapon in the vault, players will soon be able to remold their weapons for every situation and customize them. This will affect all mods, shaders, and stats of your weapon and will be the next step after the Umbral Engrams.
We believe: If you invest so much time into a weapon, then it is okay for us if you can create any version of it that you want.
—Joe Blackburn
This is how the new weapon crafting will work: The more often you use a weapon and the more related tasks you complete, the more customization options you unlock for that weapon. However, crafting will initially only be limited to the weapons of the Throne World, from the new raid, and the seasonal weapons at the release of Witch Queen. The first self-crafted weapon will be the “Glaive”.
However, throughout the year of the Witch Queen era, legacy weapons will also be added to the feature.
In this article, we summarize everything about weapon crafting:
5. Destiny 2 plays good against evil “Space-Jedis” with selectable difficulty
With the new expansion “The Witch Queen”, players will face a completely new enemy experience. The “Radiant Brood” is like fighting a mirror image of yourself. It sounds a bit like Star Wars, where we are the good Jedi and they are the evil Sith.
We are no longer the only immortals: This new, light-bearing, and equally immortal Hive hybrid race will pose a new challenge for players. Nothing compared to the current champions, especially as these new enemies are equipped with our abilities. The “Radiant Brood” has its own Void Titans with Sentinel shields, Bladefeather Hunters, and Chaos Warlocks. They use the same class abilities as the Guardians of the Traveler. In addition, Savathun’s brood has its own ghosts that must be destroyed in order to ultimately defeat them.
What the new enemies look like and what they can exactly do, we reveal here:
More activities with selectable difficulty
“The Witch Queen” campaign will add a selectable legendary difficulty that sounds as if it would present a more serious challenge even for long-time players.
How hard will the legendary campaign be in 2022? Joe Blackburn, Game Director at Bungie, noted that players should not have to solo a dungeon. But the campaign should feel engaging. So if you’re breezing through a legendary Lost Sector or harder Nightfalls, you will likely feel comfortable with it. New players will not feel overwhelmed by the freely selectable difficulty levels.
That’s a lot that will significantly change the player experience in Destiny 2 in the coming months. Practically, many adjustments to weapons and abilities will already be introduced before the new expansion. This gives players time to get used to everything, before they face Savathun.
How do you find the multitude of innovations that are coming to players in December? What do you like best? And where do you see the biggest challenges?
