This Week at Bungie, we are saying goodbye to Season of Defiance and welcoming Season of the Deep! In other words, it's the last week of the Season and we have tons of new content dropping in less than five days. So, let's start on the right foot recalling what we talked about last week, shall we?
Last week topics:
And now, what's on the menu for today:
Now that you all know what's coming, let's scuba dive into the TWAB, shall we?
With Season of the Deep almost upon us, and with all the information we have already shared about it, some of you might need a refresher. Worry not, we are here to help.
Economy might sound boring at first, but when you start noticing how many things in the game depend on it... well, you start paying more attention to how it fluctuates. At the start of Season 21, we will have several updates to Destiny 2 economy. You can read in detail about them on the May 4 TWAB, but here's a recap of the major changes:
During Season 20, we introduced a lot of changes to weapons, as well as special reticles that better represent the perks and different firing patterns that some of them have. We are doubling down on that for Season 21, with more informative and more visible reticles at high field of view (FOV) for Fusion Rifles, Hand Cannons, Sidearms and Trace Rifles, as well as special ones for several Exotics, like Devil's Ruin's charged shot or Lumina's Noble Rounds.
There are also some Exotic weapons buffs (Worldline Zero is back), reworks (Salvation's Grip), some nerfs (Thunderlord was cheating a bit) and some damages fixes (Winterbite was scolded). And of course, there's also adjustments to some Legendary archetypes and perks. You can read all about it in the weapon preview article that went live yesterday.
For abilities, the best you can do is go and read the preview article we published on May 3. Lots of buffs for Supers on PvE, more Fragments slots for several Aspects, improved melees for Strand as well as lower cooldowns for Grapple, a few buffs to Stasis, and a long, very long etcetera.
Same story as with abilities. We have an in-depth article about the changes coming to more than 20 Exotic armor pieces. There are some big buffs in there, as well as complete reworks and a few nerfs to bring some outliers into line.
We are also introducing several Quality of Life (QoL) updates in Season 21. Here's a list of them, with further details available in the May 4 TWAB.
In addition to bringing the classic Meltdown PvP map into rotation, we are making several changes and updates to how Trials of Osiris will work in Season 21. Our intention is to make a more rewarding game mode without taking away the challenge.
There's plenty of information about it in the May 4 TWAB in case you want more.
Just two weeks ago, we teased the new Aspects coming to Strand in Season 21 as part of a new quest in which Lightfall owners will learn more about the Veil in Neomuna and earn a new Legendary weapon. We felt like you wanted to see a bit more, so even though you will be able to test them by yourself in a few days, we recorded some short videos so you know what to expect and you can start thinking of new builds. Enjoy.
Activate your class ability to leave behind a decoy woven from Strand matter that draws the attention of nearby combatants. After taking significant damage or when combatants approach, the decoy detonates, dealing damage and releasing Threadlings that seek out and attack nearby foes.
While sliding, activate your charged melee ability to leap into the air, knocking nearby targets away and dealing damage. While airborne, activate your charged melee again to launch a cluster of damaging, unraveling projectiles. Repeatedly activating melee will chain additional throws.
Tangles you throw attach to enemies and detonate into a suspending burst. Threadling final blows create a Tangle.
Are you ready to wield your new NPA Repulsor Regulator? That's your new Seasonal Artifact, treat it well or Drifter might use you as bait.
Remember that the Seasonal Artifact has changed a bit recently. With Lightfall, mods from the Artifact changed into perks that are always on when unlocked and you don't have to slot them into your armor pieces. Starting with Season of the Deep, another change is coming: you will have the option to refund perks from the Artifact individually, one by one, so adapting to each activity and crafting the most focused build will be a bit faster and easier than before.
But in order to make the most amazing builds, you need to know the perks. That's an easy fix:
Anti-Barrier Auto-Rifle:Your equipped Auto Rifle fires shield-piercing rounds and stun Barrier Champions. Additionally, Auto-Rifles are always overcharged when that modifier is active.
Unstoppable Hand Cannon:Aiming down the sights of a Hand Cannon for a short time loads a powerful explosive payload that stuns unshielded combatants. Strong against Unstoppable Champions. Additionally, Hand Cannons are always overcharged when that modifier is active.
Overload Scout Rifle:Landing consecutive hits on combatants with any Scout Rifle you are wielding causes disruption, delaying ability energy regeneration and lowering combatant damage output. Strong against Overload Champions. Additionally, Scout Rifles are always overcharged when that modifier is active.
Overload Trace Rifle:Uninterrupted fire from your equipped Trace Rifles causes the beam to stun combatants, delaying ability energy regeneration and lowering their damage output. Strong against Overload Champions. Additionally, Trace Rifles are always overcharged when that modifier is active.
Unstoppable Glaive: Glaives you wield fire a powerful explosive payload that stuns unshielded combatants. Strong against Unstoppable Champions. Additionally, Glaives are always overcharged when that modifier is active.
Authorized Mods: Arc:The armor energy costs of all armor mods affecting your Arc weapons are significantly discounted.
Authorized Mods: Void:The armor energy costs of all armor mods affecting your Void weapons are significantly discounted.
Authorized Mods: Strand:The armor energy costs of all armor mods affecting your Strand weapons are significantly discounted.
Authorized Mods: Melee:The armor energy costs of all armor mods affecting your melee are significantly discounted.
Technicolor Siphon:Grants access to Helmet armor mods that combine the effects of the Strand Siphon and Arc Siphon mods.
Improved Unraveling:Increases the amount of damage dealt by unraveling a target.
Deeper Origins:Greatly improves the benefits provided by the Unsated Hunger, Nanotech Tracer Rockets, Harmonic Resonance, and Noble Deeds traits.
Unto the Breach:Defeating a Void Debuffed targets creates a Void Breach while your Void subclass is equipped.
Electric Armor:Stay amplified longer while your Arc subclass is equipped.
Thunderous Retort:Grants bonus Arc Super damage if cast while critically wounded or while amplified. Lasts until the end of the Super activation.
Strand Soldier:Your Strand weapons gain Unraveling Rounds whenever you gain Woven Mail while your Strand subclass is equipped.
Overcharged Armory:Weapons with the Unsated Hunger, Nanotech Tracer Rockets, Harmonic Resonance, and Noble Deed traits are always overcharged weapons for you when that modifier is active.
Protective Breach:Picking up a Void Breach gives you an overshield or refreshes your existing overshield.
Counter Charge:Gain a stack of Armor Charge when you stun a Champion.
Amped Up: Gain damage resistance while amplified.
Conductive Cosmic Needle:Targets affected by Strand debuffs take increases damage from Arc and Void abilities.
Shock and Awe: Arc final blows while you are amplified summon a burst of lightning that damages and jolts targets.
Supernova:Picking up a Void Breach causes your next source of Void damage to create a large weakening pulse.
Squad Goals:
Lightning Strikes Twice:After throwing an Arc grenade, gain increased grenade recharge for a short time. Arc final blows extend the duration of this benefit.
We have one more update coming with Season of the Deep, one we haven't mentioned until today: we are changing how enemy shields look. To tell you all about it, here's the Destiny 2 Combat Team.
Destiny 2 Combat Team: Over the past few years, the Destiny Dev team has introduced numerous changes to the core game experience as we've overhauled internal systems, as well as endeavored to make the game more accessible to our audience. The change we are about to talk about touches on both of these topics.
With the launch of Season of the Deep we're introducing a change to most combatant shields that will update their visuals across the entire game. This update had the explicit goal of not affecting Destiny's existing gameplay, so this will be a visual-only change.
This is how shields are now
This is how shields will look starting next season:
Given that the majority of these shields have been in service since 2017, the number of bespoke combatant shields has become more difficult to maintain as we've significantly expanded the number of enemy combatants in the game. To address this challenge, we've made a large backend shift to a new shield system that will be easier to maintain and improve upon. Which brings us to our next point: accessibility.
When we decided to overhaul this system, we took the opportunity to create visuals that are more accessible for colorblind players and players with other visual impairments. As such, we've minimized visual information that is not relevant to gameplay in favor of bringing to the foreground more combat-relevant details. This primarily takes form in more clearly surfacing the unit's shield element. Right now, the color of combatant shields are the only way a player can tell what the optimal element counter is. In the new system launching with Season of the Deep, we've included more visual artifacts with each shield type that indicates to players which elemental weapon types are best to use.
As a final detail, we'd like to note that Immunity Shields (white shields) and shields for specific boss encounters will not be receiving this update. Due to their slightly-more-complicated nature, we're avoiding making any broad changes which could unintentionally impact encounter mechanics, designs, etc.
And now, a note from the Engineering team: As part of the work to prepare for Lightfall, we embarked on a large technical upgrade to improve our Destiny 2 services and hardware. This work included updating our services to use new technologies as well as preparing for hardware upgrades. In the long run, this investment in the back end of Destiny 2 should lead to a more stable and reliable experience for all players, and faster recovery in instances where service downtime does occur. The launch of Lightfall was a great example of this, with high stability and uptime for both launch day and the Root of Nightmares World First Race.
However, as millions of players have interacted with these services, we have discovered some issues that we are working on addressing. A prime example of this is our background service update system. Typically, several days before one of our Tuesday updates, we will "stage" the update on our servers. This upgrades our backend services to the new version and means that during the Tuesday patch, we only take a brief amount of downtime before letting players back into the game. However, with our new libraries and code, we've discovered cases where the background update has put our services into a bad state, forcing us to bring Destiny 2 offline for extended maintenance.
So, what are we doing about this? We have a team focused on making corrections to our new services, so that we can safely perform background updates again. However, while we do that work, we also want to make sure your Destiny 2 experience is as predictable as possible. Therefore, starting with Season of the Deep's launch (Update 7.1.0), we are moving to a scheduled downtime model where we bring Destiny 2 offline for an expected 1.5 hours on our update days. This will allow us to do our "staging" and rollout on the same day and should make the experience more stable and reliable. In the meantime, we will continue to monitor performance, upgrade hardware, increase service reliability, and work to give you a great experience each time you play the game.
It's the final week of the Guardian Games, have you made your class proud? Because Titans certainly are as they hold a big lead in the final stretch. No matter the class, watching you all take part in this friendly competition is always tremendously fun. Keep banking medallions till the end to earn more rewards!
And how is the Guardian Games Cup going? Several teams are still getting their points in, and we have raised over $125,000 dollars for the Bungie Foundation. Thank you, everyone!
May is Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Heritage Month, and we're proud to introduce the Asians@Bungie.
Asians@Bungie began at the end of 2021 in response to the rising discrimination and violence against AANHPI communities. Their mission is to uplift their fellow AANHPI employees, provide Bungie diverse insight of AANHPI cultures, and to support local AANHPI communities. After many rounds of discussing creative directions, revising designs, and generous support from internal Inclusion Diversity & Equity and Consumer Products teams, they're ready to debut the Stand With Asians pin and accompanying Harmonic Waves emblem:
The design of the pin reflects Bungie's geographical relationship with the AANHPI communities across and within the Pacific Ocean. The background is a topographical outline of the Pacific Ocean, the clouds represent our one sky, and the seven petaled tea flower is our hope in sharing a cup of tea with all seven continents, and because Bungie.
For the month of May, all proceeds from the Stand With Asians pin will go to International Health Care Services (ICHS), a non-profit health care organization based in Seattle that welcomes people of all backgrounds in need of care. Celebrating their 50th anniversary, ICHS was formed in 1973 by young Asian American activists to disrupt the systemic racism that denied health to Asian immigrant communities. Today, ICHS remains deeply rooted in the Asian Pacific Islander community and continues to serve immigrant and refugee patients in over 70 languages. They have been a leading voice in challenging anti-Asian hate and championing health equity for communities of color.
We invite all allies to stand with AANHPI communities by pre-ordering the Stand With Asians pin which comes with the Harmonic Waves emblem at the Bungie Store and the EU Bungie Store. The Harmonic Waves emblem will be available without a pin purchase starting May 23 directly through the Bungie Foundation for a $10 donation. All donations received in May will support ICHS.
Emblems! Don't you love emblems? Because we have a new one for you. Well, not only for you, but for everyone that takes part in a Twitch Subscription bounty on their favorite content creator's channel. Say 'hola, buenos d'as' ("hello, good morning") to the Pulsar Approaching emblem.
If you don't know how that works, or if you want to have one on your Twitch channel, we got you covered: just head to our Destiny 2 Twitch Extension support article in here. Those who have completed the Twitch Sub bounty can collect their new Pulsar Approaching emblem from Rahool in the Tower starting May 28 at 9am PST.
I bring less of a "Kingslayer" and more of a "Star Baker" energy to raid nights.
Known Issues List | Help Forum | Bungie Help TwitterPATCH LANGUAGE CHANGE
Beginning with the release of Update 7.1.0 and Season 21 on May 23, 2023, we will be simplifying the language surrounding our patches.
Previously, our Seasonal launch and mid-Season patches were called updates, and any patch between these two major releases were called hotfixes. We were also able to update some parts of the game outside of these planned maintenance vehicles. These updates haven't had names and were only announced via @BungieHelp.
Moving forward, any planned maintenance patch will be called an update. These will be communicated ahead of time via @BungieHelp as usual, will require players to download a new patch, and will change the game's version number. Any unplanned maintenance patch will be called a hotfix. While we will still be announcing hotfixes via @BungieHelp, our goal is to also provide localized patch notes on bungie.net for any player-facing hotfixes.UPDATE 7.1.0 RELEASE SCHEDULE
Next Tuesday, May 23, Destiny 2 Update 7.1.0 will be released. View our Destiny Server and Update Status page for maintenance times, as well as the timeline below (all times are Pacific):
- 7 AM: Maintenance is scheduled to begin.
- 8:15 AM: Destiny 2 is brought offline.
- 10 AM: Destiny 2 will be brought back online. Update 7.1.0 will be playable on all platforms and regions.
- 11 AM: Destiny 2 maintenance is scheduled to complete.
For more information, please visit our Destiny Server and Update Status help article.LAST CHANCE BUNGIE REWARDS
As both the Season of Defiance and Guardian Games end, so does the chance to earn certain Bungie Rewards.
Players looking to earn the following Bungie Rewards should complete the associated in-game achievements before their earn-by deadlines by May 23, 2023:
- Lightfall Legendary Pin
- Root of Nightmares Raid Pin
- Queensguard Title Pin
- Champ Title Pin
- The Hawk Replica Ship
- 2023 Guardian Games Medal
- Guardian Games Pendant
For specific earn-by and purchase-by deadlines for each item listed, please see the Bungie Rewards page.PREVIOUS SEASON PASS AND VENDOR REWARDS
As we approach the end of Season of Defiance, players should ensure that they have collected any earned but unclaimed rewards from their Previous Season Pass page for Season of the Seraph.
Previous Season Pass rewards can only be claimed up to one Season after a Season concludes. Once we transition into Season of the Deep on May 23, 2023, the Previous Season Pass page will be updated for Season of Defiance rewards.
Players should also ensure that they have claimed any rewards from Tower and H.E.L.M. vendors, since those rewards will reset when Season 21 launches.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 Guardian Games title, Champ, does not progress Guardian Rank objectives for earning titles.
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.
Ivan: This is the first time I'm selecting #Destiny2MOTW without watching the video until the end. However, it's a special case because this video is eleven hours long. Strangely enough, it's very soothing to watch it, considering how hard this impressive achievement is. Congratulations!
Movie of the Week: All Dungeons Solo Flawless B2B on All 3 Characters
Hippy: Look, we're not here to say this isn't a valid point but hear us out: toxicity. Feel free to blast Britney Spear's brilliant pop hit Toxic to get better in the mood but have you seen the water in Grasp of Avarice? We're not here to judge but... it doesn't look to be the most hygienic liquid to be swimming in. This is just looking out for you, you know? Because we care.
Art of the Week:The physics, Mason, what does it mean?!
I thought guardians can't swim #seasonofthedeep #Destiny2 #Destiny2Art #Destiny2AOTW pic.twitter.com/fcoqzeUhl2
— Kilo(🌰) (@kurikusuri) May 8, 2023
Sam:The Bow. The linework. The big butterfly. The little butterfly. Okay you can see it yourself obviously, but this is one of the coolest Destiny 2-weapon tattoo inspiration pieces and of course we had to share it.
Art of the Week: Le Monarque
Le Monarque tattoo inspo 🏹 #LeMonarque #Destiny2 #Destiny2Art #AOTW #tattooart #tattooinspo #blackandwhite #DestinyTheGame pic.twitter.com/Q2YuPptG8s
— ✨PL Art ✨ (@psycholumaca) May 11, 2023
Hippy: Hey, sorry, me again, but with it almost being time to go beneath murky waters in Season of the Deep, and many of you having a good old-fashioned trip down Nostalgia Lane thinking back on the 'ol long boy in the soup, we just had to.
In honor of the horrific mysteries that await beneath deceptively soothing waves, both in real life and in games, let's all come together to agree on at least one thing: Drifter would totally try to cook up shrouded-in-mystery beasties.
Bonus Art of the Week: "The bigger, the better." - Drifter, probably
Drifter watching the Season of the Deep trailer and seeing another alien creature he can cook: #Destiny2 #seasonofthedeep #b3d pic.twitter.com/WmahxCEVtk
— Monoceros3D (@Monoceros3D) May 11, 2023
Less than a week before Season of the Deep. Don't forget to finish those Seasonal Challenges you might have pending, maybe even unlock one more ornament for your ritual weapon or get one last Taraxippos roll. That and getting my vault in order is what I'll be doing, though I might need some help for that last thing, because I promised myself I would go under 450 items...
'Hasta Luego'
Br1.
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