Some players have discovered issues with a Hunter super in Destiny 2 and are now bringing it to Bungie’s attention. Apparently, since the start of Season 14, Hunters using a version of the Golden Gun are not hitting as hard as usual. What has happened?
Currently, Bungie is having a rough time with bugs and issues in the game – from overpowered Exotics to broken mods, this season has seen quite a lot. And fixing these problems doesn’t seem to be going smoothly either. When a patch is applied at one point, something else seems to break at another point almost immediately.
Now players have discovered an issue with a Hunter super and are alerting the developers on Reddit. This issue also appears to be directly related to a nerf elsewhere.
This is the super in question: It concerns the upper skill tree of the Gunslinger Hunter (Way of the Outlaw), specifically the super “Golden Gun”.
“Golden Gun made into a Golden Pistol”
This is what players have noticed: The upper skill tree refers to the Golden Gun version that is focused on shorter ranges. However, attentive players have noticed that the effective range of the super has apparently been noticeably shortened – and this seems to have been the case since the beginning of the current Season 14 at the beginning of May. However, this was probably not intended and was also not communicated in the patch notes.
This is what has happened in detail: In PvP, a shot from 34 meters, for example, can no longer take out a Guardian with just one shot. At 23 meters, the super now has a damage drop-off. In short, this means: You cannot one-shot with this super even at the average range of hand cannons in PvP, so you have to take a second shot. The average legendary hand cannon essentially has a higher range than this version of the Golden Gun – essentially a ranged super.
In the relevant reddit thread with over 5,400 upvotes (after a day), it is said that it is no longer a Golden Gun; it is a Golden Pistol.
What’s the reason for this? The cause also seems clear to many. It appears that this “range nerf” coincided with the weakening of 120 hand cannons at the beginning of Season 14. They too were cut down in their range (regarding damage fall-off). Since then, the Golden Gun has also been affected. Many players report this. And according to some guardians, this seems to happen almost every time there are changes to hand cannons. The Golden Gun then seems to be automatically (and probably unintentionally) altered in the background.
Currently, the super of the upper skill tree essentially equals the exotic hand cannon The Last Word. Somewhere in the code, it seems that the Golden Gun and hand cannons are intertwined, which sometimes causes unwanted side effects.
In short: If you enjoy playing with the Golden Gun from the upper skill tree, you should be cautious at the moment. The range is apparently not what it used to be and what you would expect. Therefore, some kills you thought were certain may elude you.
What does Bungie say? Even though Bungie is trying to quickly address the most severe issues of this season, there has been no official statement regarding this problem so far. Whether or when a potential fix will come, or if this change was perhaps even intended, is unfortunately still unknown.
Have you noticed any inconsistencies with the Hunter’s Golden Gun this season? What are your experiences? Are there any other bugs that are currently ruining your gaming experience? Let us and other readers of MeinMMO know in the comments.
