The developers of Destiny 2, Bungie, have revealed a season-long upgrade for the Main weapon category. The difficulty boosts in Destiny 2: Lightfall has helped bring attention to the disappointing state of Primaries, which has been a long-requested change by players. Nonetheless, the majority of Primary weapon archetypes have succumbed to the steady power creep, with the exception of a few weapons, such as the Osteo Striga SMG, which has managed to defy the pattern thanks to amazing perk combinations.
At its core, Destiny 2 is a looter-shooter that allows gamers to battle enemies with numerous weapons, occasionally switching up the gunplay with magical abilities. Every weapon class in Destiny 2 is viable, which will enable gamers to explore and find a set of weapons they feel comfortable using. This is an important component of the game’s rich gunplay. Each weapon type in Destiny 2’s vast arsenal has a specific purpose, so it’s not just for show. Primary ammunition-based weapons are typically used to combat weaker mobs, while Special and Heavy ammunition-based weapons are used to defeat boss-type enemies. These distinctions can easily be made based on each weapon’s ammunition type.
What Weapon Changes will come?
Chris Proctor, Senior Design Lead at Bungie, gave the following information:
Airborne Effectiveness:
- All Primary weapons now have improved baseline airborne accuracy and aim-assist.
- Certain already-existing bonuses have had their static airborne effectiveness boosted.
- Some exotic weapons’ base AE stats have been increased.
- Several Main weapon subfamilies that weren’t performing well in PvP were tuned.
- Increased pellet Shotgun damage in PvE.
- Increased ammo per Special brick for Glaives, Forerunner and Eriana’s Vow in PvP.
- Linear Fusion Rifles no longer receive increased flinch in PvE (will still receive increased flinch in PvP).
ON PRIMARY WEAPONS, AIRBORNE EFFECTIVENESS (AE)
When Season 17 first launched, we were careful to avoid making weapons too simple to use while in the air. We preferred to take our time learning the situation and then boost the game appropriately rather than needing to nerf. We are confident that we can safely, significantly reduce the airborne accuracy and aim-assist penalties on Primary weapons because we have seen this occur in the game for several weeks.
WEAPON ARCHETYPES
| Hand Cannons: | Precision (180 RPM) Hand Cannons have languished for quite a while, and we took some time to soften their time to kill in PvP. In playtesting we find this makes them a lot more competitive, particularly with their innate +25 bonus to AE. Increased body shot damage from 37 to 40, crit moves from 57 to 60. Can now kill in 2 crit 2 body against Guardians, and kills in 1.33s in body shots. |
| Auto Rifles: | Precision (450 RPM) Auto Rifles have fallen behind other AR subfamilies, partly because they were more reliant on hitting a higher proportion of crits to reach their optimal time to kill. Increased body shot damage from 19 to 20, precision multiplier moves from 1.6 to 1.5 (crit damage stays the same at 30). |
| Scout Rifles: | While we don’t want Scout Rifles to be too effective (we generally don’t want long-range weapons to compete with short-range weapons for ease of use or time to kill) there’s some room to make Scout Rifles a little better in PvP and add some Primary weapon competition to snipers at longer ranges, so we’ve adjusted two of the Scout Rifle subfamilies: Precision and High-Impact. Precision (180 RPM). Increased body damage from 34 to 38, crit moves from 54.4 to 60.8. Can 2 crit 2 body against 197 HP (health + shields) or lower, kills in 1.33s in body shots against 190 HP or lower, 1.67s against higher resilience’s. High Impact (150 RPM). Increased body damage from 38.2 to 42, crit moves from 66.9 to 73.5. Can 2 crit 1 body against 189 HP or lower, kills in 1.60s in body shots. |
| Shotguns: | Pellet Shotguns felt like they could use some love in PvE. Increased pellet Shotgun PvE damage bonus from 10% to 25%. |
| Linear Fusion Rifles: | The flinch increase on Linear Fusion Rifles was fairly effective, but since it was global it hurt their usability in PvE—we’ve made a change that applies this increased flinch to damage coming only from players instead. |
| Glaives: | When scavenger mods were disabled in PvP, Glaives were no longer able to get enough ammo for a kill from a single brick, we’ve corrected that issue. Increased ammo per Special brick from 1 to 2 in PvP. Damage scalars on Trace Rifles (Killing Tally, Ager’s Scepter in will give Form mode), Eriana’s Vow and Fighting Lion were not functioning as intended—the fix for this will restore that functionality for most weapons, but an update to Fighting Lion will come later, currently planned for Season 18 launch (note that this issue may also have affected other weapons or perks). |
The gameplay in Destiny 2 has changed in recent seasons from focusing on guns to spamming as many abilities as you can. Players have argued that only SMGs remain relevant in endgame scenarios in the controversial Destiny 2 Raid Root of Nightmares contest mode, and they have urged Bungie to fix the failing Primary weapon categories in a future patch. Bungie stated via the Destiny 2 Team Twitter page that a mid-season balance pass with improvements to the Primary weapons is in the works after taking feedback into consideration. Many Destiny 2 players were concerned that the balance pass would lower the SMGs’ damage ratings, but the tweet made it clear that this wouldn’t happen.
The tweet also mentioned changes to the Exotic SMG Tarrabah and Legendary Ikelos SMG from season one would be made to PvP in the future. Discussions in the comments section suggested that the developers were working on numerous additional balance changes for Destiny 2, but they would not give any other specifics. Since the release of Lightfall, when machine guns and grenade launchers received significant damage increases across the board, this upcoming balance pass will be the first to address an entire weapon category.
This decision to empower players is a good development for the community in light of the recent controversy surrounding Destiny 2. But, the probability of a delay is still strong because a number of obvious problems persisted even after the most recent patch, and new defects continued to appear.
