In the MMO shooter Destiny, the new DLC “House of Wolves” is upcoming. Today, Wednesday evening, April 22nd, developer Bungie wants to reveal the first details about the new social space, the Reef. And they want to tell the Guardians exactly how the upgrades work.
The stream is set to start at 20:00, we will link it here in this article on mein-mmo.de and then provide live updates in German about what is happening. We would love to hear your opinion in the comments.
Officially, it should be about the new “social space” in House of Wolves, the Reef. And they want to reveal how exactly the upgrades will work this time.
19:00: As expected, a bunch of people are already here, looking forward to the stream starting. But it’s still an hour away. Apparently, there are global issues with calculating the correct time. It starts at 20:00.
19:15: For those who need a refresh: here is the trailer for the stream, which is supposed to start at 20:00. Yes, Destiny is now making announcements for the days on which part of the new content is announced. That point has now also been crossed.
19:30: For those who missed it, two things are supposed to be covered today. First, the “social space”, the Reef. In the last DLC, they simply placed Miss Morn in the Tower of Destiny, and that was it. Now they are apparently heading to a completely new area where the Queen resides.
And secondly, which is probably more important for actual gameplay: They want to reveal details on how upgrading will work this time. Apparently, one will be able to bring Raid armor and Raid weapons up to the new maximum values. That did not happen last time. However, there is still very little information available. For example, nothing is known about exotic items yet.
19:35: Bungie is also getting ready. They posted this at 19:00.
One hour. http://t.co/LMmWoBi2E0 pic.twitter.com/UoRknnIhar
— Bungie (@Bungie) April 22, 2015
19:45: For us, the most important topic: How will upgrading work? Bungie has to find a balance between “it’s too easy and players are done in a few days” and “it’s too tedious and feels unpleasant.” Clearly, players desire as much variety as possible at the top level. But the question is whether there should be weapons that stand out from the crowd? The exotics that came with “The Dark Below” did not have the shine of first-generation items. However, there are now indeed many of them. If one could slightly elevate the “old” exotics and raid items to the new level, it might negatively affect motivation.
This could become one of the most important questions for the future of the game: Do they want players to run around with the currently best weapons for two years and just upgrade them from DLC to DLC? Or do they make something new with a “harder” item reset?
19:55: So, now everyone goes to the restroom one last time and then it begins.
19:57: 35,000 people are currently watching Destiny. At least half of them worship Datto cultishly. Have you heard the latest? He and his fireteam supposedly defeated Crota while wearing blindfolds! I mean, while they were wearing blindfolds, not hitting him with a piece of cloth.
20:00: Okay, it has reached 60,000 viewers. And on the West Coast of the USA, it is currently 11:00 AM. So much for “Does anyone still play Destiny?”
The old event items from The Taken King are now available from Petra Venj, the new Eris Morn
20:02: They start with the teaser, nothing wild. In the middle is Community Manager DeeJ, on the left the Creative Director, on the right a streamer. (So everything the guy on the left says is extremely important.)
20:05: 90,000 people are watching. Background story: The Fallen are under the control of the Queen. The House of Wolves is rebelling against her. The Queen is now calling on the Guardians to help her. Oh, the first new vendor. There will be a new reputation system like with Eris Morn. Petra Venj will be this reputation vendor, with loot quests and rewards.
20:10: The new vendor has the shaders from the old “Taken King” event and also the Awoken ship from back then. So it doesn’t look like the old PvE event will come back. The streamer is asking the tough questions about “too little story, will you do more this time?” – This seems to make Bungie somewhat uncomfortable. However, they promise they have made an effort to tell a coherent and interesting story.
In the “Prison of Elders,” there will be a complete new set and weapons that are at the new maximum values.
20:12: There will be at least one more reputation faction: House of Judgement. It seems to be associated with the Prison of Elders. There will also be new ships, class items, and shaders available here. The new arena “Prison of Elders” will likely have new “cores” for weapons and armor as a reward. You need these to purchase new items here. These are available from the vendor Variks, whose inventory will change weekly. The arena will be subject to a weekly lockout – like with Raids or Nightfalls.
The new maximum light level is indeed 42 (for armor), allowing Guardians to reach light level 34.
20:15: They want to rely less on randomness in the new arena (which they actually didn’t want to talk about at all) and introduce more “purchaseable items” for Guardians to work toward. DeeJ doesn’t seem pleased that the streamer Goliathon is already extracting so much information about the Prison of Elders from the Creative Director. Good job!
Trials of Osiris will be a PvP event for the weekend
20:17: There are now first details about Trials of Osiris. It is supposed to be a competitive multiplayer event for the weekend. Und with similar opening hours as Xur – perhaps a bit longer. So it won’t come once a month like Iron Banner, but rather be a weekend event. New information about Iron Banner is supposed to be provided next Thursday in the Weekly Update.
20:18: Unlike the sterile, clean, and civilized Tower, the Reef is supposed to look a bit run-down and inhabited: a dangerous place with pirates and scum. This should also be reflected in the music and lighting.
20:20: In the Reef, there will be the same “base” NPCs as in the Tower: Vault, Bounty Tracker, Postmaster, and the new hate figure Master Ives replacing Rahool.
20:22: The streamer asks good questions. Will the new arena replace the raid? The arena will be different, it will change and be a bit different every week. It is supposed to be another endgame activity alongside raids, Nightfalls, and weeklies. To enter the arena, players must first complete the new story.
20:23: DeeJ says nothing about Xur and seems to have some fun doing it in as many words as possible while speaking like a mysterious PR man. He has a bit of a marketing shaman vibe.
20:25: It seems to be about the upgrades now, this will be exciting. DeeJ is currently getting himself out of the “Vex Mythoclast will never be upgradeable” situation.
The Speaker will be able to exchange materials
20:28: We’re back in the Tower. The Speaker will be useful and can transform a lot of old stuff into other stuff. Shards into energy and vice versa. Ascendant shards into energy and vice versa.
20:30: The faction armors start with light level 36 (which can bring Guardians up to level 32). The three factions have new weapons and armors. The weapons start with 331 damage.
20:33: Lord Shaxx also has new Crucible armors. And there are new weapons. A lot of red this time.
20:35: To upgrade old items, one needs “Etheric Light”, a new item. This can be obtained from the Trials of Osiris and from the Prison of Elders. These items should also drop “rarely” in Nightfall or Iron Banner.
20:36: When the old items are upgraded, they retain their “old” upgrades: They will not be stripped. The Vex Mythoclast can now also be upgraded to 365.
All legendary and exotic weapons and armor can be upgraded to the new maximum values
20:37: DeeJ just laughed in the face of a reddit dataminer who recently circulated a terrible rumor that Gjallarhorn would become “irrelevant” with the DLC and debunked him: The exotic weapons can be upgraded to 365. This applies to all legendary weapons and armor (not just raid items, as previously thought). You don’t need Xur or anything, just this new item “Etheric Light.” Also, the old materials for upgrades are required.
20:39: Oh, wow. There are actually weapons that can be reforged by the “Gunsmith.” This used to only apply to Iron Banner weapons. A lot of people have been waiting for this. This applies to weapons with a very specific trait, which you can see in the screens below, it’s the symbol with the crossed hammers.
20:42: There is now a massive selection of armors and weapons that players can wear at the new maximum level. They want to keep as much “relevant” as possible. This is significantly more generous than expected.
20:44: DeeJ is not bitter about not having a Gjallarhorn. Really not … he prefers the Thunderlord anyway. The Creative Director is currently giving player trading a pretty clear rejection: It would take too much away from the game. We more or less said this in that rumor article as well.
20:48: Wow, really good, compact stream. Full of information. Those who usually know how these things go might be positively surprised. Typically, it goes about 30 minutes with nothing happening, and then they throw all the information into the last 5 minutes. This was distinctly different. There was enough material to analyze in the coming days. In the end, 130,000 people watched and had an entertaining 50 minutes. Thanks to the format, with a streamer from the community involved, DeeJ couldn’t steer the conversation as much, and a lot of interesting information came out.
20:52: We are now polishing up the ticker a bit. We took some screenshots that we will also include. Tomorrow we will summarize the essential points in articles: for those who find this too confusing. It’s nice that you were here. We from mein MMO wish you a pleasant evening.
