This week at Bungie, there is just a lot going on right now.
What a week. It started out with a brand new ViDoc showcasing Bungie developers giving you a behind-the-scenes look at what we've been cooking up from home. Now we'll pause the TWAB for 15 minutes so you can go watch it in all its glory. Even if you already watched it, go watch it again. Don't worry, we'll wait on you.
That was your first look into Season of the Hunt, as well as a deeper dive into Beyond Light, Stasis, New Light, and our plans for Year 4. We also mentioned that most Seasonal content is going to be sticking around throughout the year and showed off a new calendar for Beyond Light and Season of the Hunt. Start writing these dates in your calendars, or I guess like - programming them into your virtual calendars. You do you.
We followed that up by pushing out the Beyond Light launch trailer this morning featuring some good vibes and a familiar soundtrack. It's one of the last action-packed previews of Beyond Light you'll get before it launches in less than a fortnight. We'll pause the TWAB one more time so you can watch it, but this is it. No more pauses after this!
That's all we got for you this week...
Nah, just kidding. We got a lot more to cover. Let's get to it.
The start of any new Destiny expansion begins with a Power climb as you experience the campaign and play through the story missions. After finishing that up and completing some additional quests and activities, you're usually around what we call the "Soft Cap" and will need to start earning Powerful rewards to continue to increase Power so you can tackle some of the more aspirational activities in the endgame. After you reach the "Hard Cap" then there is an additional 10 Power you can earn through earning pinnacle rewards if you choose to hit the "Pinnacle Cap."
Here are the new Power Caps you are aiming for when the next Season begins on November 10:
When you first log in next Season, all of your weapons and armor will be at 1050 Power or higher. If you have anything already over 1050 it will be unchanged, and anything under will be brought up to 1050. All new players will start at 1050 as well.
We've heard a lot of feedback from players for more opportunities to earn Powerful rewards from the activities you enjoy most. We have a change coming that will allow you to have a chance to earn Powerful rewards from strikes, Gambit, Crucible, and from Seasonal drops all the way up until the Hard Cap. It will still be much quicker to continue to complete all the Powerful reward sources each week, but if you just want to play strikes or Crucible matches all day every day, you can continue to earn Powerful rewards.
We hope this helps you to continue increasing your Power during the period when you are still close to the Soft Cap and may find completing some of the Powerful sources like The Ordeal very difficult.
Destiny is at its best when you are shooting aliens, getting loot, and becoming more powerful. That gameplay loop breaks down when the best way to increase your Power can be standing in the Tower, handing tokens to Lord Shaxx.
Starting next Season, gear received from Collections and turning in tokens will have a lower Power than in previous Seasons. Gear earned through token purchases will be 20 Power below your Power Level and Collection buybacks will be capped at 1050 Power.
Some currencies and items have changes coming either at the end of this Seasons or in the near future. Here is what to expect when you login next Season.
With several destinations going into the Destiny Content Vault, many of you have been wondering what is going to happen to the currencies found in the areas currently underneath the Pyramids. The simple answer is that there are no changes to these currencies in Season of the Hunt, and you will be able to continue to spend them at vendors normally.
Starting in Season 13, Phaseglass Needles, Alkane Dust, Simulation Seeds, and Seraphite will be no longer accepted by vendors. For those of you that still have unspent stockpiles at the end of Season of the Hunt, Spider will be kind enough to offer a small Glimmer exchange to take them off your hands. But you'll realize the best value by spending them before that point, so make sure you turn in your stockpiles before the end of next Season.
There are other items that will be removed from your inventory at the end of Season of Arrivals. Some, like Faction Tokens, have not had a purpose in quite a while, and others, like Expired Ramen Coupons, never really had a purpose but held some sentimental value. We know that it might hard to part with those, but it's time to let them go.
Check out this Help article for the full list of items that will no longer be in your inventory at the start of Season of the Hunt.
Back in late April, we shared some plans on how to tackle the problem of "bounty fatigue." We have made some shifts to seasonal bounties and reduced their importance on earning seasonal currency and seasonal progress. We're happy with these changes, but still want to continue to improve the bounty system overall.
One of the plans we previewed was to eventually replace weekly bounties with a new mechanism to provide players with a set of non-expiring and account-scoped objectives each week that will grant lots of Season rank progress. We're still working on that system and will share more on it before its targeted release of Season 13.
The Season Pass you've come to know since Shadowkeep is largely staying the same. There will be new weapons and armor to earn off both the free track and the owned path. One big change we are making is adding Bright Dust to the Season Pass.
As mentioned before, we wanted to change the way you earn Bright Dust and move more towards account-specific paths to give players with only one character significantly more Bright Dust than they've been earning over the last year. Here is the high-level look at the changes coming next Season.
With these changes, the vast majority of players will be earning more Bright Dust than before. One of our goals here is to not have a system that pushes you to try to grind out every weekly bounty on all three characters every single week. Whether you are a three-character player or only play a Hunter, Bright Dust will be more available when earning ranks on the Season Pass. We will also be making a change to the timing of Season Pass rank purchases which will be available starting in week five instead of week nine.
We have more plans for improving how you earn Bright Dust coming in Season 13 and will continue to monitor your feedback.
I've been talking a lot. Let's change it up. Here is Design Lead Justin Dazet to tell you about some changes Spider is making to his wares and to answer a question we have been seeing about the customization updates we are making to your Ghosts.
Spider's Dealings
Justin Dazet: Spider is going through some changes in Beyond Light. Though a notoriously savvy black-market dealer, our favorite four-armed friend has been largely the same for quite some time now. But the impending journey to Europa has finally given him a reason to tune up the materials exchange and make two key changes.
First, Spider will no longer be selling Legendary Shards. This exchange was removed mainly because it was not seeing enough use, particularly when compared with the other exchange offers. After reviewing player balances and the frequency with which this exchange was accessed, it was an easy decision to free up the space for something much more interesting.
In place of the Legendary Shard exchange, Spider is now selling Enhancement Prisms. These highly valued items come at a cost - 400 Legendary Shards per Prism - and he's stingy with them so you can only purchase three a week. But we wanted to give those of you with higher balances a way to transmute your Legendary Shards into something a little more valuable than planetary materials and Upgrade Modules.
Second, we've taken another look at how the Enhancement Core exchange works and made some changes. The ascending cost mechanism has been removed, and in its place, Spider will now sell you five Enhancement Cores a day for fixed price of 30 Legendary Shards each. While this does limit the number of Cores you can acquire from him each day, we feel a consistent price is a clearer experience with less chance to accidentally spend large quantities of Legendary Shards.
More importantly it's also cheaper. In the old purchase model, you'd pay 310 Legendary Shards for five Enhancement Cores (10, 20, 40, 80, and then 160). In the new model you'll only pay 30 Shards each, which equals out to 150 Legendary Shards for five Enhancement Cores. So, while it does limit your acquisition rate, it actually will save you 160 Legendary Shards every five Cores!Got to Go Fast
Finally, we've seen a few people wondering if you'll be able to equip the Ghost mod Speed Demon with other mods like Guiding Light in the new system, and we have some good news for you: You won't need to. Starting in Beyond Light all Sparrows, both Legendary and Exotic, will innately summon instantly, even without the Transmat Preloader perk. As a result, there is no need for a Ghost mod to impact this functionality, so Speed Demon was not carried forward into the new system.
If you're already driving around a Sparrow with Transmat Preloader, you can keep using it and it will work just fine. Or you can pull it from Collections again and get two new perks. Newly created Sparrows will no longer roll on Transmat Preloader, so you have a chance to get yourself an extra perk and still retain that instant summon speed.
Hop on that newly instant-summoning Sparrow and zip on over to check out Spider's new offers. He's ready and waiting to wrap those four greedy arms around some of your wealth and make you a deal you can't refuse.
Starting in Season of the Hunt, Bright Engrams will now contain all Eververse content from Season 1 to three Seasons prior to the current Season (excluding content from special events like Festival of the Lost, the Dawning, etc.). Here are some practical examples:
As always, as you open more Bright Engrams, your chances for earning things you don't own increases. There will be instances of duplicate drops, but the Engram will be weighted to grant you things you might be hunting.
It's time now to check in with our Player Support team for the latest on known issues and important information on the state of the game.
This is their report.
WORLD ACTIVITIES
When Beyond Light and Update 3.0.0 release on November 10, 2020, some world activities will be removed. These removals are not related to the Destiny Content Vault but are general game updates.
Players should complete any activities and quests they have left if they want to claim rewards from them.
- Flashpoints (Weekly Engrams should be claimed before November 10 or they will be removed).
- All Destination Adventures.
- World Quests from Year-1 locations, such as Enemy of my Enemy, Exodus Black, and Data Recovery.
INVENTORY ITEM REMOVAL
With the start of Year 4 and the introduction of the Destiny Content Vault on November 10, certain items will be deprecated from player inventories that correspond with Vaulted destinations, activities, and campaigns.
Click here to review a list of items, quests, and currencies that will be removed from player inventories at the start of Year 4. Some items listed can be used or turned in for rewards, such as Glimmer, weapons, and armor, so be sure to do that before November 10.14-HOUR DOWNTIME
On November 9, Destiny 2 will be taken offline for maintenance.
Maintenance will begin at 7 PM PST (0300 UTC), ending on November 10 at 9 AM (1700 UTC) with the launch of Destiny 2: Beyond Light and Update 3.0.0.
Stay tuned to Help.Bungie.net and @BungieHelp on Twitter for updates.PlayStation 4 COLLECTOR'S EDITION CODES
Earlier this week, we informed PlayStation 4 players who purchased the Destiny 2: Beyond Light Collector's Edition that they may have received an email about a possible account lockout if they used their Collector's Edition codes. The issue resulting in account lockouts for early code redemption has now been resolved, and players can now safely redeem their codes prior to November 10.TITLES AND SEALS
With Moments of Triumph and Season of Arrivals coming to a close, players are strongly encouraged to claim and equip the titles located in their Seals so that they will correctly count as claimed.KNOWN ISSUES
While we continue investigating various known issues, here is a list of the latest issues that were reported to us in our #Help Forum:
- The Warlock's top tree on the Dawnblade subclass can trigger the Icarus Dash cooldown when playing on PC.
- Players can't dismount from their Sparrow using the dismount button on a controller if their Ghost is out.
- Some players report that they're receiving the Baboon error more frequently.
For a full list of emergent issues in Destiny 2, players can review our Known Issues article.
Players who observe other issues should report them to our #Help forum.
It's now time for our Movies of the Week. For those unfamiliar with our weekly tradition, this is where we find a few of our favorite fan films to feature. To enter, just make a Destiny 2 related video and upload it somewhere we can see. Our Creations page is always a good place we like to pull from. If you win, we will send you a special emblem as a reward for your effort. Without further interruption, here are this week's winners!
Destiny Lo-Fi/HipHop Beats to Wait for Beyond Light to
Memories
It's been a fun week filled with several early mornings for us on Pacific time. It's always nice to start off your day delivering a new ViDoc or exciting new launch trailer. The train carrying the hype is nearing its destination though, and Beyond Light will be arriving in less than two weeks! It's almost time to start counting the sleeps until the big launch.
Next week we will have a preview of some of the patch notes coming with the big update on November 10. We want to leave plenty for you to discover on your own in Beyond Light and Season of the Hunt and are excited to let the game do the talking, but we will still check in next week for one last TWAB before launch.
See you then!
<3 Cozmo