This Week At Bungie - 5/27/2021

This week at Bungie, we exposed vulnerabilities in the Vex Network.

It's been another jam-packed week of Season of the Splicer content. Guardians have infiltrated deeper into the Vex Network through the new Expunge mission and a new Override six-player activity is now available on Tangled Shore. Get in there and help Mithrax stop this endless night!

Over the weekend, the Vault of Glass raid opened up for the first time in Destiny 2. Fireteams of Guardians have started diving down into its depths, to be greeted with familiar feelings and new twists. Here is a quick teaser if you still haven't stepped inside yourself.

There were some initial worries that a new bug may allow players to once again yeet to defeat Atheon. However, some additional testing showed that he has adapted over the years and is not as easy to persuade off of ledges. We'll continue to keep an eye on things.

Speaking of keeping an eye on things, we got the pleasure of watching along as the World First race raged on over the weekend. It's always exciting getting to watch fireteams face off against new raid content. If you missed it, go dig up a VOD from your favorite creator or check out the replay of Broman and Reck following the race with their Raid Day Tailgate. They did an awesome job!

VOG Champs

Thousands of teams lined up to take on the Vault of Glass, but in the end, there can only be one World First fireteam. This time around simply clearing the raid was just the first leg of the race. Teams then had to finish it again and solve additional challenges to complete the Tempo's Edge Triumph. Clan Elysium not only finished their initial run first, but no one was able to catch them as they pushed their way through the challenges that followed and crossed the finish line.

After verification we're proud to congratulate our Destiny 2 Vault of Glass World First winners, clan Elysium!

? Cruz
? Kyros
? Moople
? Quazz
? Saltagreppo
? Slap pic.twitter.com/nkNCMP26hY

— Destiny 2 (@DestinyTheGame) May 22, 2021

We reached out to the World First fireteam to get some inside knowledge behind their victory. Here is what they had to say.

First off, congratulations on your World First finish for Destiny 2 Vault of Glass! Tell us a bit about your fireteam.

Cruz: We're all from Clan Elysium. Some of us have been here for several years at this point and others only joined a handful of months ago. We actively pursue the most challenging pieces of content in the game for fun and have a formed a pretty great team through our mutual interests.

What kind of preparation and planning did your team do before raid day? Were you feeling good about this run beforehand?

Cruz: We each did a bit of refreshing in terms of how the Destiny 1 version [of Vault of Glass] functioned mechanically and was paced, as well as how it could translate into Destiny 2. Saltagreppo and I went back to two-man Vault of Glass to get super familiar with the layout of each area/encounter. As the days crept towards the World First race, we discussed so many different things that could impact how we'd perform. Whether it be the class composition, what loadouts we'd want to prepare for each encounter, and of course, what the challenges could be for our second run.

The night before we set our plans for the day in stone. We definitely felt like this was a realistic goal. We all believed in ourselves as well as in each other. I don't think any of us really thought that this was it until we heard that we got the first clear of the normal version from chat. Once I knew that, I knew that this was our chance to get a World First.

Moople: I felt very confident about the team going in, there was no doubt in my mind that we would place well. We did a lot of discussing mostly around how we wanted to approach the challenges for Tempo's Edge, and ultimately it paid off.

What was the trickiest part of the race for your team? What was the key to overcoming that obstacle?

Cruz: The Gatekeeper challenge and then the nerves on our final stages of defeating Atheon just before claiming the prize of World First. I went back and calculated what percent of our day-one was spent doing that challenge and it turned out to be ~27% of our entire day-one experience. Eventually we found out what we needed to do and then it was just about execution.

Saltagreppo: What was the key to overcoming the Gatekeeper challenge? We just kept going — trying to remain as calm and focused as possible. We believed in ourselves and we knew we would figure something out sooner or later.

Kyros: [The trickiest part was] figuring out the Gatekeeper challenge and, for me personally, also oracle call outs on Atheon. Also just not getting overwhelmed by the pressure and anxiety was a bit of a struggle, but I was able to get through it with the encouragement of my teammates.

What did you think of the addition of Triumph challenges to the World First race? Your team finished the first run and would have won anyway, but did you ever get worried you might get caught during the second leg of the race?

Slap: The idea of Triumph challenges are good for a race in which we have already known about certain mechanics and add an extra layer of challenge. For new raids I would like the raid itself to be the challenge instead of the Triumphs surrounding it. During the challenge run, I definitely had a moment of worry when we took longer than any other encounter to figure out the Gatekeeper challenge, but I was still confident.

Quazz: I think the addition of the Triumph challenges were very good for the reprised raid. We were worried about getting caught at Gatekeeper during the challenge run as we got stumped and couldn't solve it for over an hour.

So where are you planning to hang your Titles?

Cruz: I'm going to place mine to the side of my gaming setup so that any time I come in here, I'm reminded of the World First and the accomplishment.

Saltagreppo: I'll place mine well visible behind my station to have it always there while streaming!

Slap: My ceiling.

Kyros: On the wall above my monitor so I can see it when I'm playing.

Quazz: I am going to hang mine up on my wall beside my setup so I can always be reminded of the triumph we felt and the overwhelming emotions going through us as we learned we had become World's First.

Moople: Definitely going straight next to my setup. I want to be reminded of the accomplishment and feel the same excitement I did on the day we finished.

Congrats again! Anything else the VOG champs would like to say before you get back to crushing our PvE content?

Cruz: Nothing other than thank you to Bungie and the community. As well as just a shout-out to the rest of my team and to check out our Twitter. We'll be back for Witch Queen to defend our title as reigning champs.

Saltagreppo: Thank you Bungie for providing us those awesome day-one experiences and for creating such a wholesome community!

Quazz: Thanks for another great raiding experience. Playing Vault of Glass for the first time in 2014 got me hooked to the game and then to win the World First race in the reprised version of the raid was such an amazing feeling. I am looking forward to Witch Queen and another amazing experience.

Moople: Thanks for keeping the game I've been playing for seven years going strong. Hope there's many more and I can't wait for Witch Queen. Keep an eye out for our names.

Slow Down

I'm just going keep this short and introduce Sandbox Lead Kevin Yanes to give you an update on Stasis on behalf our Gameplay team. They have a lot to say so let's get to it.

Kevin Yanes: Hey, all. Kevin from the Gameplay team here. I wanted to take a second to talk to you all about Stasis, our vision for Guardian vs. Guardian combat, and the road that gets us there.

Ice Ice Baby

First, let's chat about Stasis -- our fourth damage type in Destiny, and the newest to join the fold. We've heard a lot of feedback about Stasis since its launch alongside Beyond Light in Season 12, and we've been using that feedback to help shape the future of the damage type. It's clear the vision we had for crowd control in PvE is succeeding and players are finding it both useful and fun. We love how Stasis plays in PvE and we want to preserve that experience, but we agree with many in the PvP community who say that Stasis is too dominant in the Crucible for too little effort or skill required.

Over the last few weeks, we've been open with you that we're taking this feedback to heart and working hard to reel in this great new power. We adore the long legacy of Bungie PvP games and want the PvP combat sandbox to live up to that adoration. This means we want the Crucible to be as fun for as many players as possible while also serving up those moments of skillful execution and incredible plays. It's a tight rope to walk, and frankly we overcorrected during development when considering whether Stasis would live up to Arc, Solar, and Void. Stasis and crowd control are key components of the Destiny combat sandbox -- they're not going anywhere, meaning it's up to us to ensure Stasis plays well across all activities, regardless of skill level. What you'll find detailed in this TWAB is a series of changes we believe will more evenly position Stasis alongside Void, Solar, and Arc subclasses as an equal option rather than the dominant one, while retaining what is fun about the ability set.

"I Need a Weapon..."

Since Forsaken, we've been slowly creeping towards a Crucible where it feels like gunplay has taken a backseat to our sweet cosmic magical powers. We believe this is the wrong place for the Crucible to be, and we want to shift the balance more toward weapons. To us, the Crucible plays best when weapons and abilities have complementary usage in any given encounter. When we set out to define what our vision looked like for the future of Guardian vs. Guardian combat, it boiled down to a few key pillars:

• Weapons are the primary way players engage with combat.
• Non-Super abilities accentuate or augment the combat, but should rarely solve an encounter by themselves.
• Abilities have clear strengths, weakness, and counterplay.
• Build-crafting is rewarding within the moment-to-moment combat loop of Destiny.

Behind the scenes, we've been executing on these pillars by planning out a roadmap of patches that we believe will not only get Stasis to where it needs to be for PvP, but also sets us up to shift the PvP combat sandbox in a meaningful way toward more gunplay.

"Don't Make a Promise..."

Our first patch in this roadmap was released in March and was developed separately alongside Season 14. Unfortunately, due to the pieces already moving at the time, some changes were made that buffed Stasis and were not consistent with our goals. We're working hard to ensure that when we release hotfix patches, we can realign all of those moving pieces to exist more cohesively. Please pardon our dust as we work to get fixes and new features out to you in a timely manner.

Next, we have some details for next week's hotfix below. As you'll see, there are a lot of changes to go over here, and they're all focused on Stasis. This patch is something we've moved up from Season 15 to help smooth over some of the pain points players have been feeling. It's important to note here that shifting our focus like this comes at a considerable cost to the team, so it's unlikely that mid-season patches of this scope will become a regular occurrence.

Once this patch has shipped, we'll be diving back into Season 15, where we are planning to deliver another balance patch focused on updates to the Light subclasses while continuing to iterate on Stasis. The goal here is to address some key pieces of feedback and make more of the Light subclasses viable across the game.

After Season 15, things become a little more nebulous because we're still early in development. What I can talk about are our areas of focus to help paint a picture of where we're headed. We'll be looking at ability regeneration rates and redesigning how the ability-energy economy works across the game. Our goal here is to keep the PvE experience largely similar to the state of the game today but reduce how often abilities are used in the Crucible. After that, we'll be taking a long hard look at the Void, Solar, and Arc subclasses to re-examine each subclass path and how they fit into the combat sandbox.

"Our Best Days are Still Ahead..."

I know some of this feels like a tease, and I hope to speak to you all again in the future when we have more to show. Like Joe mentioned in our Beyond Light ViDoc, Destiny's best days are still ahead of us. I truly believe that. Our love for this game burns bright. I hope what's written above speaks to that and inspires you all the way I feel inspired when I think of our future. With that, I'll hand it over to Gameplay Designer Eric Smith to talk you through our upcoming balance patch. <3

Heating Up

Eric Smith: Hey, Guardians. The Combat Gameplay team is currently working on changes to Stasis gameplay abilities aimed at improving the Stasis experience in the Crucible. We had originally planned to ship these changes in Season 15 alongside a larger subclass balance patch, but we've decided to move several of the Stasis gameplay changes up to Hotfix 3.2.0.3, which is planned to go live on Thursday, June 3rd. We're still hard at work on additional ability changes that will launch in Seasons 15 and 16, but we wanted to get these Stasis changes into players hands sooner rather than later. Without further ado, here are the changes:

General Stasis

Stasis Freeze

• Reduced duration of all non-Super freezes vs. players to 1.35s.
  • Note: This freeze is too short to break out of, so breaking out is now only possible when frozen by a Super.
• Reduced Special-weapon, Heavy-weapon, and Light-ability bonus damage vs. frozen players from +50% to +5%.

Stasis Slow

• No longer reduces weapon accuracy.
  • Now increases weapon flinch when under fire.
• No longer suppresses class ability and air moves (e.g., Icarus Dash).
  • Known issue: The Stormcaller's Ionic Blink is still suppressed when slowed. We plan to address this in a future release.
• Reduced movement speed penalty while slowed by ~20%.

Whisper of Hedrons Fragment

• No longer increases weapon damage after freezing.
• Now increases weapon stability, weapon aim assist, Mobility, Resilience, and Recovery after freezing.

Whisper of Rime Fragment

• No longer provides overshield while in Super.

Coldsnap Grenade

• Seeker no longer tracks targets after initial target acquisition.
• Increased arming duration before seeker spawns from 0.3s to 0.8s.
• Reduced detonation radius vs. players from 3m to 1.5m.
• Now bounces off walls and detonates on the ground.

Titan Behemoth
Looking at recent gameplay data, the Behemoth generally has the highest win rate of any subclass in most 6v6 game modes and is also among the strongest in 3v3 modes. In Trials of Osiris matches, for example, only top-tree Dawnblade has a higher win rate. We've taken these strengths into account when balancing the Behemoth's abilities. Between Shiver Strike and Cryoclasm, the Behemoth has incredibly high mobility, making targeting the Behemoth frustrating for controller players in particular. We've taken steps to make the Behemoth more targetable while moving, which should hopefully alleviate some of this frustration.

Shiver Strike

• Reduced flight speed and distance.
• Reduced knockback vs. players.
• Removed slow detonation on player impact.

Cryoclasm

• Now requires the Titan to sprint for 1.25s before activation when not in Super.
• Removed cooldown.

Howl of the Storm

• Reduced angle of initial freezing/damage cone.
• Reduced crystal-creation freezing radius.
• Slowed down sequence of crystal formation to allow victims more opportunity to escape.
• Now spawns a small crystal on walls if performed into walls.

Glacial Quake

• Reduced heavy slam vertical freeze range vs. players.
• Reduced damage resistance from 50% to 47%.

Hunter Revenant
The Revenant's Crucible win rate, kills per minute, and average efficiency is generally within the top six of all subclass trees, but its usage rate is incredibly high. In Trials of Osiris matches, it has the fifth-highest win rate of any subclass tree, but is used by a whopping 36% of Trials players. This high usage means players fall victim to its abilities more often, multiplying the frustration of being slowed by Withering Blade and Winter's Shroud. We hope that the changes we've made to being slowed, paired with the adjustments to the Revenant's abilities, make this experience better.

Withering Blade

• Reduced slow duration vs. players from 2.5s to 1.5s.
• Reduced Whisper of Durance slow-duration extension vs. players from 2s to 0.5s.
• Reduced damage vs. players from 65 to 45 (after one bounce reduced further to 30).
• Reduced projectile speed by 10%.
• Reduced tracking after bouncing off a wall.

Winter's Shroud

• Reduced slow duration vs. players from 2.5s to 1.5s.
• Reduced Whisper of Durance slow-duration extension vs. players from 2s to 0.5s.

Touch of Winter

• Coldsnap seeker no longer has increased movement speed or travel distance.
• Coldsnap seeker now spawns a small Stasis crystal on detonation.

Warlock Shadebinder
The Shadebinder's Crucible performance is generally within the top ten of all subclass trees. In Trials of Osiris matches, it had the 9th highest win rate of all subclass trees. (BTW - I'm pulling all this data from the weekend of 5/14/21, but it generally doesn't deviate much between weekends. VOG launch weekend shook things up a bit though.) While the Shadebinder may not be the most powerful in competitive play, being frozen by its abilities takes a large emotional toll on the victim. We've adjusted Penumbral Blast to require more accuracy vs. players in order to turn this ability into more of a skill shot given its powerful effects.

Penumbral Blast

• Reduced tracking and proximity detonation size and tracking vs. players.
• Reduced freeze radius vs. players when impacting the environment from 2.7m to 1.5m.

Iceflare Bolts

• Seeker now only chains once when spawned from a player shatter.

Winter's Wrath

• Freezing-projectile tracking strength now ramps down to 0 after 2s of flight.

We hope these changes have a positive impact on your Crucible experience. While the Gameplay team is very busy working on future releases, Crucible and the PvP community are incredibly important to us, and we'll continue to monitor gameplay data and community feedback regarding Stasis and subclass abilities in general. We'll continue to update Stasis until its win rates and usage rates are in line with the Light subclasses. Expect more updates in the future.

Expunged

Our new Expunge mission went live this week as part of the weekly Seasonal quest. We hope you are enjoying directly infiltrating the Vex Network to venture... inside the computer. We caused a bit of confusion on rewards by referring to this as a "Weekly Pinnacle Mission" and wanted to give you a better idea of what kind of sweet loot you can expect to extract from this new mission over the weeks to come. Here is Senior Designer Mike Profeta to share some reward details with you.

Mike Profeta: With the removal of Seasonal armor in the Season Pass reward track, we still wanted to provide players with a way to earn a full set of high-stat Seasonal armor. With the Seasonal storyline quests requiring completion of Expunge each week once introduced, that felt like a great source for those armor rewards.

For the first four weeks of new Expunge missions, players should expect to earn a piece of high-stat Seasonal armor in addition to some Decrypted Data on their first time through each mission. Once players have earned their high-stat armor set by completing the first four missions, remaining weekly Expunge missions, upon first completion, will reward a Seasonal weapon with an additional perk choice in the final column instead of an armor piece.

Starting on June 15, a new Pinnacle activity challenge will roll out connected to Expunge missions, providing an additional Pinnacle reward source each week for the remainder of the Season. This coincides with an additional layer of replayability being introduced to Expunge missions along with unveiling the final three Splicer Gauntlet upgrades, which will provide additional rewards and a source of high-stat/double-perk Seasonal gear from Expunge each week for as long as the activity is available to players.

Lights

We had a hotfix last week, this week, and have another one coming up next week. So, there are a lot of fixes flying around and our Player Support team is keeping track of the issues and crossing them off the list.

This is their report.

Known Issues List | Help Forums | Bungie Help Twitter

HOTFIX 3.2.0.3

Hotfix 3.2.0.3 will go live Thursday, June 3, at the daily reset. Maintenance windows and expected downtime can be viewed here once they are made available.

Here is a sampling of the issues being addressed:

• The Empty Tank Lost Sector will correctly reward leg Exotics when they are advertised.
• The Couturier Gauntlets will no longer obstruct a player's view when using Bows and will appear again as intended.
• The Archon's Thunder Machine Gun and Riiswalker Shotgun can now be acquired from Lord Saladin, Iron Engrams, Bounties, or post-match Iron Banner rewards.

A full list of patch notes will be made available when Hotfix 3.2.0.3 is released.

Missed Notes

The following notes were missed in the original publishing of the patch notes for Hotfix 3.2.0.2 but the changes are currently live in the game. We have updated the Patch Notes and added the missing items.

• Removed Glimmer cost to apply shaders.
• Fixed an issue where players were unable to use the /Join command on Steam.
• Fixed an issue that prevented Reverie Dawn armor from taking shaders.
• Reduced the kill requirements to unlock Null Composure's Gambit ornament.
• Fixed an issue where the Contender Plate Titan chest ornament would not show up under universal ornaments for those who purchased the Guardian Games bundle.

BEAGLE ERRORS

Since the release of Hotfix 3.2.0.1, we have been consistently monitoring an increase in reported BEAGLE error codes from PlayStation 5 players. While we investigate this issue, some players have reported that moving their Destiny 2 installation to an external SSD and back to the PlayStation 5 may temporarily alleviate this error.

We are continuing to investigate this error code and its increased reports. Players are also recommended to keep an eye on our Known Issues article, our #Help forum, and BungieHelp on Twitter for any updates.

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:

• Shaders that came pre-built on armors, such as Iron Banner shaders, appear before the Default option in the Appearance Customization menu.
• The Grips of the Exile Hunter armor does not properly display the effects of the Magnificent Solstice Gauntlets when used as an ornament.
• We are investigating issues related to several color-blind modes obscuring the Oracles in Atheon's Throne Room.
• The Feast of Light perk on the Star-Eater Scales armor is not working as intended when stepping in a Well of Radiance.
• Obtaining Exodus Down armor does not count toward the Red War Collections badge.
• Some weapons that can be obtained from the Gunsmith are missing Masterwork slots.
• The Cache of Kabr chest at the end Vault of Glass may list incorrect perks and weapon types on available Weapon Caches.

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. 

Camera

Welcome to Movie of the Week. This is where we spotlight videos made by our community and share them with the world to see. Usually, I like to use this space to meander but you've already been reading for a while now so bless you if you are still here.

Movie of the Week: Mytho-blocks

Movie of the Week: Jebaited

Movie of the Week: All the Snipes

Action

It's art time, let's get into it. We love our community artists and this is where we get to share some of the cool creations they come up with. Here are some of our favorites this week.

Art of the Week: Guardians Make Their Own Fate

Guardians Make Their Own Fate

Likes & RT's much appreciated!#DestinyArt #Destiny2Art pic.twitter.com/LsvPdcg0Jv

— B.SΞRIØUS (@bserious) May 21, 2021

Art of the Week: Lone Survivor

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A post shared by 3D Art / Gameart ? (@ohlac3d)

Thanks for chewing your way through this meaty TWAB. To get you back to your day I'll just leave you with this: Supplicants only want hugs, please show them some affection.

<3 Cozmo