The latest
This Week at Bungie update
doesn't reveal the name of Destiny 2's next season, I'm sorry to say,
but it does offer a look at some of the changes coming to weapons when
it begins in March. It doesn't sound like the adjustments will be as
dramatic as the recently-announced
overhaul of swords,
but various archetypes will undergo "finer tuning" for the advent of
the new season, impacting damage values, range, and even aspects like
reload cancelling.
Sniper rifles, grenade launchers, shotguns,
fusion rifles, and auto rifles will all be tweaked to varying degrees in
the new season. The PvE damage boost that Sniper Rifles were given in
Shadowkeep is being taken away, as it was "giving them too much of a
leg-up on their closer range counterparts." Grenade launchers are also
being toned down somewhat, while "oddities" in the aim-assist for
shotguns and fusion rifles that could actually cause unexpected misses
will be eliminated.
Auto
rifles are being adjusted with the goal of making them a little more
effective in the Crucible, although the changes will have an impact on
PvE as well. "The nature of the way Destiny is played tends to have
Semi-Auto based weaponry be more effective in general and so we’re
compensating for that with these tweaks," Bungie explained. "These are
fairly modest changes intended to give Auto Rifles more of a chance in
an open fight without attempting to drag the TTK of the entire game
down."
Some specific weapons are also being tweaked, most notably Izanagi's
Burden: It will have its Outlaw trait replaced with No Distractions,
while the animation speed of Honed Edge has also been changed so it will
no longer be affected by the reload stat.
"Since the removal of
auto-reload effects from Rally Barricade and Lunafaction Boots, as well
as the introduction of a catalyst for Izanagi’s Burden, it’s seen a
significant uptick in use," Bungie said. "Izanagi’s Burden solidified
itself within the majority of endgame builds due to its excellent burst
damage, sustained damage, ammo economy due to Special ammo, and safety
due to being a Sniper Rifle. The Outlaw trait was swapped out for No
Distractions to be more in-line with the fantasy of the weapon and to
ensure the trait on the weapon would still work with Honed Edge."
Lord
of Wolves is also being adjusted so that its accuracy will be
"significantly" reduced when the Release the Wolves perk is active—"With
this change, Release the Wolves should be used at extremely close
ranges against large targets instead of just being a better version of
the default behavior," Bungie said—while The Last Word, which "became
quite dominant due to its extremely forgiving maximum time-to-kill," is
being made a little harder to handle, so you'll actually have to put a
little effort into your aim if you want to hit what you're shooting at.
The
changes will go live at the start of the next season, whatever it ends
up being called, but Bungie said that some of them are actually in
preparation for a new, tougher "Grandmaster" difficulty for Nightfall
Strikes that will be rolled out later in the season. Which is an
interesting bit of news in itself, although details won't be shared for
awhile yet.
Officially, the next season of Destiny 2 remains shrouded in mystery, but based on the efforts of some
enterprising dataminers it will be called Season of the Worthy, and will start on March 9 (
Update:
Or maybe March 10, as a reader has pointed out that the 9th is a
Monday, and new seasons normally begin with Tuesday resets)—and will
also very likely bring back the hardcore PvP mode Trials of Osiris.
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