Category: Bungie News

• Destiny 2 is too large to efficiently update and maintain.
• The size and complexity of the game are also contributing to more bugs
  and less innovation.
• Instead of building a Destiny 3 and leaving D2 behind, each year, we
  are going to cycle older, less actively played content out of the live game and
  into what we’re calling the Destiny Content Vault (DCV).
• This will allow us to add to and support D2 for years, including the three
  new annual expansions we announced today, starting with Beyond Light this
  fall.
• The DCV will include all content from Destiny 1 and anything that
  cycles out from Destiny 2. 
• We will bring back (or “unvault”) activity and destination content
  from the DCV each year. 
• Unvaulting starts in D2 Year 4, with the Cosmodrome coming back, as
  well as its three strikes and the return of the Vault of Glass raid.
• The primary D2 content leaving the game and going into the DCV this
  fall are the destinations – Mars, Io, Titan, Mercury and Leviathan – and their supported
  activities.
• There will be new ways to earn the Exotics originally linked to content that
  has entered the DCV.
• When Beyond Light ships, the Director will have the following
  destinations: 
• Europa (new)
• Cosmodrome (unvaulted) 
• Moon 
• Tangled Shore 
• Dreaming City 
• European Dead Zone 
• Nessus
• This approach allows us respond to player feedback more rapidly,
  enable more innovation, and will keep Destiny 2 and your characters thriving for
  years to come.
• More details to come
  soon and throughout the year.

Earlier
today, we laid out a vision for Destiny’s future, built right inside of Destiny 2. A future where we maintain your
characters, accounts, and continuity with our game systems and build on each of
them for years. This fall ushers in a new era in Destiny’s journey, launching
off a trilogy of expansions where your Guardians will explore the true nature
of Light and Dark:

Put plainly, we are investing in Destiny 2 for years to come. But to
continue your Guardian’s journey and deliver on this roadmap, we need to make
some changes to our ever-growing world so it can flourish.   

The Limits of Growth

Over the
past couple months, we’ve mentioned the problems that come with maintaining a
game the size of Destiny 2; and we’ve said that it cannot grow infinitely.
After three years of non-stop growth, the scope and complexity of Destiny 2 has
ballooned to unprecedented scale.

As of this
writing, Destiny 2 features nine destinations, 40 story missions, 54
adventures, 42 Lost Sectors, 17 strikes, 31 PvP maps, 12 one-off special
activities (like Menagerie or Zero Hour), seven raids, six Gambit arenas, three
dungeons, many, many
quests, patrols, public events, and of course, thousands of associated rewards.
All of that, plus hundreds of game systems which layer on top of that content.

This
unrelenting growth has resulted in a game that requires players to download up
to 115GB to play, as well as huge patches tied to frequent updates. And those numbers
are rising rapidly, as we’ve been adding approximately 25GB of content each
year to Destiny 2 since launch. Those sizes not only stress hard drive capacity
but also push the limits of patching capability. It also makes the time to
generate a stable update for the game after all content is finalized, tested, and ready to go balloon to literal days instead of hours.

Worse
still, that 115GB includes a lot of content that isn’t relevant anymore – and
can’t remain relevant – as we evolve the world and introduce new experiences
that will take center stage instead. For example: Warmind’s campaign represents
only 0.3% of all time played in Season of the Worthy and yet the Warmind
Expansion accounts for 5% of our total install size. This dramatic
imbalance between player engagement and overall cost to maintain is found in a lot
of our legacy content.

Impact on the Live Game

Our
ambition is for Destiny 2 to be the best Action MMO in the world and that means
being far more agile and nimble than we are today. But the simple fact is that our
game’s size and complexity prevents us from improving Destiny as fast as we –
and you – would like. 

The “Destiny Content Vault”

To set a
new maintainable foundation for the game this fall and to create room for Beyond
Light and the future roadmap, the first Destiny 2 deposit into the DCV will
be larger than those to come in the future.

Curating the Vault

Going
forward, our explicit goal will be to try to keep the scope and scale of Destiny
2 at a relatively consistent size in order to increase our agility and to be
able to properly support and maintain the game. Over the course of each year,
the game’s content scope will grow as we add new destinations and activities in
our expansions and Seasons. As we approach the next expansion, another cycle of
content will go into the DCV to make way for a new influx of destinations and
activities. 

We will
always do our best to give early notice of what’s being cycled into the DCV, to
help you and your friends plan around how you want to complete your collections
and build up your account before the new Destiny year starts. The vast majority
of content we choose to vault will also be from destinations and activities
that have been free for all players for several months prior to their
departure. For example: the Curse of Osiris campaign, which has been free since
Shadowkeep launched in October 2019, and part of the Destiny 2 experience since
December 2017, will go in the DCV later this year. 

Year 4 Destiny Content Vault
Preview 

Here is an early
preview of some of what’s going into the Destiny Content Vault (DCV) and what’s
returning in Year 4.

Returning from the DCV

– Destiny 2
Dev Team

This Week At Bungie, Season of the Worthy is ready for departure.

Before we talk about anything else, we’d like to maintain your focus on the events unfolding around the world. You may have seen demonstrations in your town, or like many of us here, down the street from the place you call home. 

Support does not end with a single statement or action. We’ll continue to use our games and our shared voice to make the world a better place. We hope you’ll join in supporting these efforts by visiting the following resources noted above, and more, by getting directly involved.

Diversity Comittee: Our Pride pin was specifically designed to include black and brown stripes, in an effort to be inclusive and show support for people of color within the LGBTQIA+ community. In that spirit we want to continue our support for all intersectional communities; including LGTBQIA+ individuals who are also part of the Black community currently fighting against racial oppression, demanding justice and equality. We can support the Black Lives Matter movement and the LGBTQIA+ community at the same time, because without the leadership and heroism of Transgender Black and Brown individuals, like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, today’s LGBTQIA+ rights would not exist. And so now is a time to do more to help both, rather than dividing our efforts.  

If you snag a pin, you’ll also receive a code for the True Colors Emblem to show your support in-game when playing Destiny 2.

We’ll continue sharing Bungie initiatives to support LGBTQIA+ communities throughout the month of June, so stay tuned. Our commitment to racial justice is just getting started, so you can expect to hear more soon.

Within Destiny 2, you may have been watching the approach of the Almighty. You’re itching to see the conclusion of the Season, but you’re also starting to hear whispers of what’s coming next. Join us on Tuesday, June 9 at 9 AM PDT to learn about the future of Destiny 2.

See you soon.

Preview 2.9.0

Destiny 2 Update 2.9.0 will become available next week, meaning we have a pile of patch notes to get through. Let’s take a quick moment to look through some of the changes.

We’re expecting to have an update later in Season 11 on further changes to Bright Dust acquisition, so keep your eyes peeled.

Sandbox

NOTE: Drop chance begins at 10% and increases to a max of 50% over 20 clears.

Trials Rewards

Hope you enjoyed this appetizer. Full course (and more) coming on June 9. See you then.

Mixing a Green Thumb with a Bumper Jumper

So, we heard you like patch note previews. They’re short, sweet, and to the point. This topic, though, needs a bit more time to get through. Today, Staff Designer Lisa Brown takes center stage to walk us through the upcoming Controller Remapping feature that the team has been working on.

Lisa: Greetings, Guardians! I’m Lisa, a staff designer on the sandbox team here at Bungie, and I’m going to give an overview of the controller remapping feature for gameplay actions that will be coming to Destiny for all players in the Season of [REDACTED].

Although we have controller presets in Destiny, these aren’t enough to meet basic accessibility guidelines for motor control and mobility. We’ve been working with some amazing accessibility consultants – Cherry Rae Thompson (https://www.cherryrae.com/) and Ian Hamilton (http://ian-hamilton.com/blog/) – to create support for remapping buttons on the controller. Here, I’ll give an overview of how to use the feature, what it can and can’t do, and then share some setups that have been used by various Bungie employees as examples. As a quick note, all of the below examples will be shown using Xbox button layouts.

Overview

Players can create a custom controller layout by going to the Controller section of the Settings screen and choosing Button Layout. A “Custom” option is available in the list.

On this screen you’ll be able to customize mappings for gameplay actions on your character, in vehicles, and in general settings (like emotes and interacting with prompts).

If you’re like me and you typically use a preset other than Default, you can use the “Reset” button to start from one of those presets.

To rebind a button, select the button mapping next to the action you want, and the next screen will allow you to input the button you want to remap to.

Verbs, Verbs, Verbs

One of the challenges with controller remapping in Destiny is that we have a LOT of player verbs. Think of verbs as actions – throwing grenades, triggering your Super, jumping, sprinting, sliding, etc. With PC remapping, there’s a whole keyboard at your disposal to map buttons. On the controller, though, there’s only so many buttons, and we have many more verbs than buttons.

To solve this, we allow the player to map an action not just to a button, but also a type of input. Our three supported input types are:

As an example, some of our Exotic weapons (Borealis, Symmetry, Hard Light, etc.) have an alternate weapon action, which has typically been activated by holding the reload button. Now this can be mapped separately, to a different button or different input. For example, I like to change it from long press X to double press X. Now when I want to switch Symmetry’s firing mode, I double press the X button.

For the Double Press input type, you can also increase the amount of time between button presses for it to register as a double press. This option is on the main controller page.

Chord Support

In addition to mapping actions to an individual button, we also support mapping to Chords, meaning two buttons pressed simultaneously. In the default layout in Destiny, pressing the Left and Right Bumpers together to execute your Super is an example of a Chord.

Here’s a custom layout example where a player has mapped some of the basic character options to just the face button using Chords:

We’re excited to bring another form of accessibility to Destiny 2, and will be watching as this first iteration goes live.

Last Call

It’s pretty much closing time. You don’t have to go home, but you should definitely get your Triumphs done before the servers go offline next Tuesday. Player Support has a full roundup.

This is their report.

CLOSING OUT SEASON OF THE WORTHY

When Season of the Worthy ends at the weekly reset on June 9, 2020, there will be a number of items, activities, and Triumphs that will no longer be available to players. Some of these items include:

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.

Last Screening of the Season

This is our final MOTW of the Season. How time flies, eh? We’ve featured hundreds of creations in this space, and this week had the most individual contributors of any creation we’ve selected so far. Congrats to all of the Guardians who are taking a W home as Season of the Worthy comes to a close.

Movie of the Week: Quarantine Guardians

There are so many important things going on in the world, it’s difficult to maintain focus on much of anything right now. I’ve been spending a lot of time with friends in Discord servers while hitting weekly milestones, talking to them about their health, thoughts, and feelings concerning current world events. Much of our attention has been on what’s happening right outside our windows. The thing is, this isn’t new. This has been happening since well before many of us were born. It’s time to listen and learn from our neighbors and communities. Check in with your fellow Guardians, friends, and family. Take action to help them out if or when they need it. It’s perfectly OK to press pause, put your controllers down, and focus your attention elsewhere – especially if you’re going out there to demand justice and to support the Black community. You may find many of us out there with you in the greater Seattle area. Destiny will still be here when you want to sit down for a few games. It isn’t going anywhere.

Be well, be safe, and we’ll see you starside.

-Dmg04

When words are not enough, only action can bring about change. Taking a stand against systemic racism, injustice, and prejudice is everyone’s responsibility and it begins with education and engagement. Here is a list of suggested organizations that we encourage you to visit and donate to.

We at Bungie are making a commitment to stand up on behalf of our Black community; including our players, developers, fans, and neighbors. Racial injustice surrounds us, and we need to help create positive change.

Bungie is making financial contributions to these organizations and matching the donations made by any of the people on our team. This will not be our only contribution to the fight for justice in our country, and globally. We have a platform, and we plan to use it.

Black Lives Matter.

This week at Bungie, we look to the sky.

Ever since this Season began, the Almighty has been hurtling through space on its collision course with Earth. The Cabal are not known for their graceful defeats. Every day we spend preparing our long lost Seraph to mount a response, that derelict destroyer rockets ever closer to our home, spelling certain doom for the City.

Rasputin is at full power. We’re as ready as we’ll ever be. Now, eclipsing our own sun is a stark reminder that a great threat approaches. Eyes up!

What’s Next?

Diving Deep

In recent editions of “This Week At Bungie,” we’ve taken the cue directly from the community on what we should talk about. Our attention has been focused on your feedback. Our words have pointed toward what we plan to do to bring the game into alignment with what you’ve been talking about. With a summary of what we’ve promised and some updates on our progress, here is Production Director Justin Truman.

Justin: Hey everybody.  

Five weeks ago, we promised a series of deep dives on the state of Destiny, and how we plan to change it in Season 11 and Year 4.      

We enlisted seven members of the Destiny Team to provide as much detail as we could, and I’d encourage you to go back and read any of the topics you may have missed:  

We covered a lot of ground, and while we are going to continue to provide updates each week to topics you care about, we want to shift our focus in the coming weeks.    

We’ve said a lot about changes coming in Year 4, but we haven’t talked about how Year 4 begins. Very soon, we’ll do just that.

I kicked off this series of deep dives with some promises, but I want to end the series on a more personal note. Being unable to go to the office, trying to figure out how to keep building this game we love from our laptops and our couches has had me thinking a lot about commitment.  

Videogame development is messy. Evolving Destiny 2 in an open, transparent way involves showing (and shipping) plenty of missteps along with the improvements. But it continues to be worth it, every step of the way, because I can honestly say this is the most welcoming, most passionate community of players I have encountered, in any game.  

We’re committed to this game, to staying transparent about our plans, and to this relationship we have with our community. The reasons we started on this journey 10 years ago haven’t changed. We’re committed to building a world anyone can be a part of, where everyone can feel powerful, and where you might reconnect with old friends or make some new ones.

So we look forward to continuing this conversation, and continuing to evolve Destiny together. And in 12 days, we can’t wait to show you more of what we’ve been working on.  

Stay safe out there, Guardians.  

---

Ready for Prime Time

Triumphant

From one Season to the next, from one expansion to another, one constant is that that Player Support Team will be there to monitor your reports from the wild frontier. The #help forum is their base of operations. Their mission is to keep you out there fighting the darkness.

This is their report.

SEAL THE DEAL

• Almighty 
• Flawless
• Conqueror

Players must earn these Seals and equip the associated Titles by the weekly reset on June 9, 2020, in order to be eligible for the Bungie Reward. Reward codes must then be claimed from the Bungie Rewards page by June 12, 2020, 9:59 AM PDT.

SEASONAL TRIUMPHS

As we approach the end of Season of the Worthy, certain Triumphs will no longer be available to earn in-game. Triumphs leaving at the weekly reset on June 9, 2020, include:

• Full-stack Warmind Security
• Object-Oriented
• Season 10: Nightfall
• Season 10: Vanguard
• Season 10: Glory
• Season 10: Power Bonus
• Multi-Threaded Spelunker
• And more.

THE LIE

Last week, Hotfix 2.8.1.3 was released to resolve an issue preventing players from progressing “The Lie” quest. Players will now have until the end of the Season of the Worthy to complete this quest and claim the associated reward before it become unavailable.

Players who continue to observe issues with the quest “The Lie” should report them on the #Help Forum.

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 Bonus Clan Bounty is not gaining progress from Nightfall: The Ordeal completions at Grandmaster difficulty.
• Zavala’s Authority ship shows the left engine thruster before the ship appears in orbit.

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.

Trending Now

You know that old question about the tree that falls in the forest when there is no one around to hear it? The Movie of the Week is our answer. If a Guardian fires their favorite Exotic weapon, and it didn’t make it into a montage, did it make a sound? Here are some of the finest existential moments we discovered during our online wanderings this week.

Movie of the Week: Bunker Rave

Honorable Mention

The filmmakers have received the most storied emblem as evidence that Bungie is their number one fan. If you want your work to reach our eyes, your best venue is our Creations page.

Don’t call it a TWAB. I’ve been here for years.

Sure, @A_dmg04 and @Cozmo23 own this beat, but I wanted to take a shift. I’d love to be dusting off my travel luggage right about now. I’ll miss seeing your faces and making new connections out there in the world. That will happen again. For now, the traditions that shape what makes a Guardian a Guardian, year after year, must be obeyed. We’ll be firing all our cannons very soon.

We hope you’ll be around to enjoy the fireworks.

DeeJ, out.

Steps disappear into the darkness below. Bulbs begin to buzz and flicker to life, revealing the shape of the room. A low platform extends through the center, flanked on both sides by hastily abandoned desks and consoles. Soft mechanical clicking and whirring sounds fill the air as data storage bays awaken under a blanket of dust.

Code begins to scroll across a massive collection of monitors hanging in a circular pattern in the center of the room. Random at first, the text begins to coalesce and take shape – growing to fill several of the screens with a bright golden orb that quickly scans the room before setting its gaze on the entrance. The eye of Rasputin waits.

And wait he must. The image of the Rasputin’s bunker vanishes from Dima Goryainov’s monitor as Bungie’s senior concept artist alt-tabs into a conference call. It’s 3:30 PM and that means it’s time for his team’s daily coffee break. “It’s our time to chat,” he says. “Usually we’re pretty heads down, so we try to hang out and talk about whatever’s exciting us – things that inspire our creativity.”

Finding inspiration in his peers and outside of games is something Dima is no stranger to. It’s an approach that has served him well while working on Destiny – particularly when he was tasked with designing a space in Season of the Worthy that would help players grow closer to a legendary character not known for his interpersonal skills: Rasputin, the Warmind.

A tall order, considering that at this point in Destiny’s story, Rasputin’s relationship with the Vanguard was tenuous at best. But when a new threat appeared in the skies above the Last City, a choice presented itself to both parties: work together and survive or perish alone. For Guardians, surviving meant partnering with Rasputin in a way they never have before.

The team at Bungie knew that Rasputin being open to an alliance was only half the equation – the easy half. Getting Guardians to trust him with their lives would be much harder. It required heavy lifting from writers, designers, engineers, and artists like Dima. And so, the task of making the most powerful military intelligence ever created a little more personable began.

A DIFFERENT APPROACH

Dima has a unique style – a blend of graphic design and concept art that can be found throughout Destiny 2. From signage hanging on walls to the logos and iconography representing fictional organizations and foundries, it’s an aesthetic that has become inextricably linked with Destiny’s world building.

He explained that entering the game industry from a different direction began with the choice to major in graphic design and digital media instead of game art at the University of Advanced Technology. “The game art program was focused on taking direct inspiration from games and translating that into assignments. That seemed totally legitimate, but I felt that doing a program like graphic design would give me a more unique skillset. I was always interested in graphic design, industrial design, architecture, and comic books – things outside of games that I wanted to bring into concept art.”

Among the areas outside of games he draws inspiration from, he finds the dark and mysterious style of medieval design appropriate for Destiny. “A lot of it has this occult feeling to it,” Dima said. “The way it’s drawn is naive, like they’re not paying attention to anatomy, but it still works. I feel like that fits in a dark fantasy space opera.”

He also admitted a few personal influences he tries to not overuse. “I’m from Russia and I like to use things from my childhood that inspire me. Old Russian fairytales like Koschei the Deathless, Ilya Muromets, Baba Yaga, and many others. The summers I spent exploring the forest and the countryside in my great grandma’s village were a huge influence. I think I’m constantly trying to get back to that feeling I had when I was a kid.”

It’s the kind of goal that often results in work that feels tangible.

“Maybe it sounds cheesy,” Dima said. “But I credit that time with having an interest in stories about searching for adventure and mystery in different worlds. It’s why I became so interested in the world of Destiny and why I can’t believe I get to contribute to its development.”

A KINDER, FRIENDLIER WARMIND

When it came time to create the look of Rasputin’s bunkers, the request from the Design team was straight forward. They already had the gameplay systems in place and needed an area where players could communicate with Rasputin – a space that could evolve over time.

Dima had a very specific mood in mind. “On my reference board, I have a photo of Deckard’s apartment from Blade Runner,” he said. “I knew that was the feeling I wanted. It’s a dark-lit, super intimate, quiet place where players could go and hang out. I like moments in our game where you have silence. Where you’re not being shot at and you have a moment to relax and take a breath. I wanted it to be a space that you would like to be in even if you weren’t doing the mission or grinding the content.”

He thought back to one of his favorite games that had a similar vibe. “Deus Ex: Human Revolution is one of my favorite games of all time,” he said. “If I was in between missions, I could go back to Adam’s apartment and just sit and listen to the music and absorb the ambience – I wanted the Destiny version of that space.”

As pleasant as that sounded, it presented an interesting puzzle since the story called for Rasputin to be in this room with the player. And it’s one thing to make a space feel safe and inviting. It’s an entirely different thing to make that space feel comfortable when there’s a huge digital eyeball tracking you from the center of the room. Dima and his team worked to try and find subtle ways to make Rasputin less intimidating.

“Usually when you see Rasputin, he’s really far away in that massive chamber,” said Dima. “But in Season of the Worthy, the small bunker is a new place where you can be one-on-one with him as he slowly opens up to you while you learn more about him.”

Dima credits Bungie Senior Art Lead, Rob Adams with the idea to bring players physically closer to Rasputin. “It was Rob’s idea to bring Rasputin so low to the ground that you could come up to the screens and be face-to-face with him. Even a lot of the lighting decisions came from how close you’re able to stand to him. Drawing parallels between your physical and emotional distance was intentional.” Form followed function.

RASPUTIN GOES RETRO

Beyond resonating emotionally with the player, there needed to be an in-universe reason for the design of the room. So before putting pen to paper, Dima asked the question: Why did this bunker exist before players found it?

“As soon as you walk in, you understand that place was used for something,” Dima said. “This room had a purpose and a function – it wasn’t just made for gameplay. I had the idea that these bunkers were where Seraph researchers would speak with Rasputin and decode his communications.”

The relationship with the Narrative team immediately became apparent. “We work together as much as possible,” Dima said. “Sometimes Narrative will come up with ideas for a design or how a graphic should speak to specific elements. Other times, I’ll pitch something visual and it’ll end up working into the fiction.”

In this case, the fiction spoke directly to what excited Dima’s about Destiny. “Since these bunkers were from earlier versions of Rasputin, I knew that they were going to feel older technologically and that’s a big part of what Destiny is to me. Obviously we have holograms, but it’s not really super sleek Iron Man stuff – everything is tactile. Everything in Destiny feels like it has a history behind it and that it’s been touched. That’s way easier to do with physical things like screens and buttons.”

Dima leaned into the look of this older age and drew from his interest in industrial design. “There’s a single speaker in the room that Rasputin used to talk to the researchers,” he said. “The big cluster on the ceiling has all these cables, sensors, and cameras that point to the center of the room allowing Rasputin to see the person speaking to him. And as they’re speaking, there are people sitting at consoles recording everything that Rasputin is saying – decoding and storing it. So when you walk into a bunker, you start to understand the background of the Seraph researchers that made Rasputin.”

TURNING ON THE LIGHTS

The bunker is filled with elements that contribute to the atmosphere of the room while also adding to the story. Some flourishes, Dima admits, were added simply because he was looking for an excuse to design them. “I really wanted to have this analog map with physical bolts that light up,” he said. “But I kind of did that for me, because I really wanted it.” And why not? After all, who hasn’t fantasized about playing with a giant Lite-Brite?

“I didn’t really think that the map was going to get much of a reaction or that anyone was going to pay much attention to it. But from what I’ve seen, a lot of people have gravitated towards it and started speculating on what it might mean. People have messaged me and told me that it’s their favorite part of the bunker, so that was kind of cool.”

Inspiring elements continued to come from peers across the studio. One from Senior Artist, Eve Campbell and the Environment team instantly became one of Dima’s favorite things in the bunker.

“They made the screen effects look really cool when you’re talking to Rasputin,” he said. “The way he moves on the screens and tracks you across the room. It’s meant to be this intimate space that’s really comfortable but there’s this degree of uneasiness with him silently and constantly watching you. Even if you jump up and down his eye moves up and down with you.”

Instances like this, where creative partnerships resulted in something unexpected, kept surfacing. “Over time, we’ve evolved the collaboration process and it feels really organic,” Dima said.

Throughout his five years at Bungie, Dima has worked alongside peers invested in building living breathing worlds. Speaking with him leaves the impression that if you work with passionate people, a good idea – like a warmly lit bunker with a giant glowing eyeball – never stays hidden forever.

Please join us in celebrating our creative and talented community with these limited edition collectible products. Each artist receives a revenue share of sales from their product design. The program is currently by invite only and we plan on adding more designs throughout the year.

My name is Jen Whaley. Online I’m known as Jennwhale! While I have experience working in various styles, my main focus is line-work; using both digital and traditional mediums. Bungie has wonderful artists that create incredibly gorgeous experiences that I love to celebrate with my own art. I love the Moon, Dreadnaught, and all things Hive! Creating fan art to spread the joy of Destiny was the goal, but in return, I got much more: a loving community and acknowledgment from the company who originally created the beautiful game I draw fan art for!

Drawing has always been my favorite hobby! Around five years ago, I discovered Prismacolor Premier Pencils, they are amazing at blending and I love working with them!

I really enjoy drawing characters and space, as I am super into astronomy. My style tries to reflect realism and I often choose to include gold in my artwork! Destiny is a huge source of inspiration for me as it is so aesthetically pleasing – I see it as an interactive masterpiece. Last year I graduated university with a Bachelor of Arts in Game Development. I am now a full-time freelance artist, pursuing a career in concept/illustration!

Hi! I’m Nathaniel and I started creating art at a young age with the work of the late Quinton Hoover (RIP) being my biggest inspiration. I love mixing genres and creating customized art from existing properties while trying not to illustrate what’s already been done. It’s both a fun challenge and my way of getting lost.

I love how Destiny combines styles from different cultures – I’m looking forward to an Oceanic theme! Making art is an extension of what I enjoy in Destiny and as long as there are good stories and characters, I’ll keep making art that the community can hopefully enjoy!

This week at Bungie, something unexpected happened on the way to the Moon Bunker.

Many of you have been chasing a Lie. Last week, you began your hunt with Ana, successfully defending Seraph Towers in the Winding Cove, Anchor of Light, and the Rupture (or watched as your fellow Guardians carried the weight…). You burned through a thousand enemies with your trusty Shotgun. Sadly, your quest for answers came to a halt on Sunday evening, all thanks to a faulty door on the Moon’s bunker.

Earlier this morning, Destiny 2 Hotfix 2.8.1.3 was released, unblocking your journey in finding truth behind The Lie. While we hate to see a bug ship, we’re excited to right the ship as quickly as possible.

Now, we look to what comes next. Season of the Worthy is winding down, which means it’s time for a round of previews from the team. This week, we’re hyper focused on Legendary Engrams and weapon tuning.

Decrypting the Future

Last week, we did a deep dive on how loot will be evolving Season over Season. With the upcoming addition of a Max Power Level to your gear, players have been asking how acquisition methods will be changing. We have a breakdown from the Destiny Dev Team on how we’re keeping the items you earn from Legendary Engrams and core activities relevant during a given Season.

Today we’re going to talk about some changes that are coming in Season 11 to the way the world loot pool works.  Because the world pool serves as a baseline of legendary gear that can be earned across different activities, we want to update and refresh it seasonally with meta relevant weapons, some of which were previously exclusive to specific activities like Gambit or Crucible. 

This shared pool can also be unwieldy — if you’re looking for a specific roll of a specific weapon, a pool too large can make it statistically challenging to find, much less with the roll you want. Starting in Season 11, it will be curated both for relevance and overall size, to strike a balance between number of rewards and the chance to get a sought-after drop. Every season gear from previous seasons will be added, and any gear that would no longer have a Max Power Level greater than or equal to the current Season cap will be cycled out to ensure that drops are Power relevant in the current Season. 

The World Pool for Season 11 will consist of the following weapons: 

• Uriel’s Gift 
• Elatha FR4 
• The Old Fashioned 
• Mos Epoch III 
• Hawthorne’s Field-Forged Shotgun 
• Last Hope 
• Timelines’ Vertex 
• Interference VI 
• Dire Promise 
• True Prophecy 
• Jian 7 Rifle 
• Enigma’s Draw 
• Distant Tumulus 
• Escape Velocity 
• Honor’s Edge 
• Gnawing Hunger 
• Arsenic Bite-4b 
• Main Ingredient 
• Outrageous Fortune 
• Truthteller 
• Nature of the Beast 
• Last Perdition 
• Bad Omens 
• Night Watch 
• Toil and Trouble 
• Wishbringer 
• Last Dance 
• Lonesome 
• Long Shadow 
• Steel Sybil Z-14

If you still need a weapon or weapon roll from the current Vanguard, Crucible, or Gambit playlists that isn’t on that list, go grab it now! 

Lock and Reload

Alongside the changes to the World Loot Pool, we have some changes coming to Destiny 2’s Sandbox. This week, we’ll be focused on weapons – specifically perk tuning. Here’s a quick breakdown from the team on what to expect:

Reload Perk Updates 

We’ve observed that players lean towards picking perks that increase their damage (e.g. Kill Clip) or reduce weapon downtime (e.g. Outlaw). 

The damage perks were adjusted quite a while back, but reload perks still don’t feel like choices. This tuning pass aims to keep them feeling powerful without being so dominant that no other choices seem viable. 

First, some information on the stats that impact reload: 

• Reload Stat: 0-100, and maps onto an archetype-specific reload animation speed. 
• Reload Duration Scale: Most reload perks also apply a small multiplier to the reload animation, so that if reload stat is capped, you still see a small speed bump.
• Reload Empty Duration Scale: As above, but only applies if the magazine is empty.

Note that because most weapons have fairly high reload stats, decreasing a reload stat bonus from +100 to +50 will still max out the reload stat most of the time, and so doesn’t slow down the actual reload as much as it seems. 

The following perks that alter these reload stats are being updated: 

• Outlaw – Slowed this down a little bit. 
• Reload stat from +100 to +50.
• Reload Duration Scale from 0.8 to 0.9.
• Feeding Frenzy – This was strictly better than Outlaw, so we’re changing functionality to be based on number of rapid kills.
• Functionality changed to increase reload speed based on number of rapid kills, up to 5.
• With 2 kills, reload speed is equal to updated Outlaw. 
• With 3+ kills, is faster than Outlaw. 
• With 4+ kills, is the fastest reload in the game (except Alloy Mag). 
• Max possible reload duration scale from 0.83 to 0.8.
• Max possible reload stat unchanged at +100.
• Rapid Hit – Gave a huge amount of reload and stability for very little work, front-loaded onto the first precision hit. We have updated it so that it still feels good, but isn’t quite as powerful.
• Adjusted stacking bonus to give less benefit for the first hit and more with subsequent hits.
• Max possible reload stat from +100 to +60.
• Max possible reload duration scale from 0.8 to 0.925.
• Max possible stability stat from +50 to +25.
• Drop Mag – Situationally really powerful without a massive drawback, as good as a perk, but in a magazine column. 
• Reload duration scale from 0.85 to 0.9 (just brings it in line with Outlaw).
• Field Prep – Unchanged, but for reference:
• Reload stat +50.
• Reload duration scale 0.8.
• Alloy Mag – Unchanged, but for reference: 
• Reload empty duration scale 0.6666.

Additionally, we’re fixing an issue where perks that grant partial weapon ammo did not respect shot count for burst weapons. This means that these perks will now work correctly on Pulse Rifles, Fusion Rifles, and Burst Sidearms, so these perks will be more common on those weapon archetypes in the future:

• Slideways  
• Slideshot  
• Ambitious Assassin  
• Subsistence  
• Overflow  
• Lead from Gold  
• Clown Cartridge  

General Perk Retuning 

With opening up space by adjusting reload perks, we also retuned some other, underused perks, based on our internal testing and perk popularity and effectiveness data from our internal analytics. 

• Dynamic Sway Reduction — Adds 10 Stability over time in addition to accuracy (this is way more powerful than it sounds).
• Reduced reticle movement from Stability should now tell players this is working. 
• Pulse Monitor — Take critical damage and you can quickly switch to your now-fully loaded Shotgun!
• Reload amount from 0.35 to 1.0.
• +50 Handling.
• 5% faster swap speed.
• This works on stowed weapons too, which was already the case but makes it a lot more useful.
• Hipfire Grip — Now helps you hit shots closer to ADS ranges, still doesn’t affect damage dropoff or magnetism.
• 1.2x aim assist falloff.
• +15 aim assist.
• +1.7 degrees precision hip fire angle threshold.
• By default, when hip-firing a weapon, the center of your reticle must be over a target in order to get a crit, otherwise aim assist will give you a body shot. This change gives you a little leniency, so if the center of your reticle is not directly over a target you will still get the crit if you’re within this angle.
• Has no effect on Sniper Rifles. 
• Sneak Bow — Actually makes you sneaky now. Stealth buff! 
• Now doesn’t ping radar when shooting. 

New Perks

Next Season, we’ll have new perks rolling exclusively on the Season of [REDACTED] weapons. Additionally, Iron Banner will be receiving two new perks on two reprised weapons. In future Seasons, these perks will begin to roll on other weapons.

While we don’t want to spoil the fun of discovering and testing new perks, we will leave you with the names of upcoming Iron Banner perks: Iron Grip and Iron Gaze. We are excited to see the community break these perks down when the new Season begins.

Upcoming Archetype Buffs 

Next Season, we’re taking a quick pass on a few weapon archetypes that have been underperforming.

• Slug Shotguns are underused in PvE, because they require crits to maximize damage, and didn’t reward that precision with higher damage per second.
• Slug Shotgun PvE Damage + 30%.
• High-Impact Pulse Rifles are underused in Crucible. While they have a very fast optimal TTK, that TTK was very hard to achieve, so we decided to soften that a little. 
• High-Impact Pulse Rifle damage per bullet from 21 to 22. This changes it from 6 crits to 5 crits/1 body to kill a Guardian in PvP at most Resilience values. 
• In analytics we see Bows are underused in challenging content, and locally we’ve observed that it feels terrible when a Bow leaves a red bar enemy at low health. 
• Bow PvE damage VS minors + 10%.

Future Archetype Updates 

We’ve been evaluating feedback and our analytics data, and while we’re not done yet, we wanted to touch on three community pain points. Our current goal is to touch on these in Season 12, but we’ll be sure to let you know if plans change. 

• Sniper Rifles – Community feedback has been that Revoker and Beloved dominate, and looking at analytics they account for 86% of Sniper Rifle usage in the Crucible – and if we include other low-zoom Sniper Rifles, the number gets even higher.
• We’re specifically looking at how zoom translates into ease-of-use for Sniper Rifles. We’re investigating changes that make choosing a Sniper Rifle zoom more of an interesting choice. 
• Hand Cannons – We’re evaluating the Hand Cannon subfamilies.
• As an example, we’re breaking out Aggressive Hand Cannons to let us tune their range independently of the others.
• Adaptive Auto Rifles – Auto Rifles in general are highly represented in Crucible, but generally feel balanced. Adaptive Auto Rifles are a little higher, so we’re looking at them. 
• We’re not rolling back the Season 10 buff, but we’re adjusting the tuning a little to give other Auto Rifle subfamilies a chance to shine. 

Moving forward, we plan to make more regular weapon balance changes, we’ll have more to share on cadence and scope later.

In the know

You may have noticed, @BungieHelp on Twitter is freshly verified. If you don’t follow this account, get to it! Player Support, partnered with the Bungie Network Operations Team (BNOC for short), runs this account to keep you up to date on maintenance timelines, bug investigations, and more. Accept no substitute. If you want more details on what’s happening outside of a 280 character limit, read on.

This is their report.

HOTFIX 2.8.1.3

Earlier today, May 21, Hotfix 2.8.1.3 was released to players. This hotfix was designed to resolve the issue with “The Lie” quest not progressing, and the bunker door should now open as expected.

As a result of today’s hotfix, the Felwinter’s Lie Shotgun will not appear in player Collections once acquired. This will be resolved in a future update.

If players are continuing to observe issues with the quest “The Lie”, please report them to the #Help Forum.

ITEMS LEAVING AT END OF SEASON

As the end of Season of the Worthy approaches, several items will be removed from Destiny 2 on June 9, 2020, at the weekly reset. Some of the items leaving at the end of the season include:

• Access to the Seraph bunkers on the EDZ, Moon, and Io.
• Warmind bits.
• 4th Horseman Exotic quest.
• The Lie quest.
• Legendary Lost Sectors.
• The Warmind Khanjali Seasonal Artifact.

CURRENT 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:

• We are continuing to monitor increases in BEETLE, RABBIT, BEAVER, and ANTEATER error codes. 
• Some players still have the Guardian Games milestone visible on their characters.

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.

Clip it

Good play? Clip it. Team wipe? Clip it. Idea for a montage? Write that down, do the thing, clip it. Got a bunch of clips? Splice ‘em. Got a Creation? Submit it.

Movie of the Week: Brightside

Honorable Mention: Wonderful World(s)

And once again, we come to the end of a TWAB together. How many have we shared together now? The last few have been filled to the brim with news on upcoming changes, and we’re only a few short weeks until the next Season of Destiny 2.

Wait, what’s that? The Season’s almost over? Sorry, gotta cut this short. I have a Conqueror title to earn.

Cheers,

Dmg04

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PlayStation Xbox Live Steam Stadia Twitch Battle.net

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From time to time, I scour the depths of the community looking for pieces of art to inspire different builds in Destiny. Some pieces inspire my Gunslinger to embrace a darker vibe, or my Warlock to adorn the bones of a slain Ahamkara to enhance their Void abilities. Not only does this push me to some role-playing, it also improves my fashion game as I search for the perfect look for an Arc-charged Titan.

Our designers also frequently reference concept pieces to guide their hand on the feel of a season or activity. It’s pretty magical what a piece of art can do, and the subject of this week’s Community Focus has created some great content that, as a Destiny player, you can feel in your heart.

Please give a warm welcome to our friend, Aviixe.

Good morning! Hope you’re doing well. Let’s get you introduced to our wonderful community. Tell us a bit about yourself.

Aviixe: My name is Stephen, most people on the internet know me as Aviixe. I spend much of my time as a “self-taught” artist, always pushing to improve my skills, and I do commissions alongside that as well.

I played videogames pretty early into my childhood, my earliest memories being dominated by Halo and the LEGO games. My other siblings and I enjoyed playing four-person split-screen multiplayer on Halo CE, Halo 2, and Halo 3. I was always a pretty avid artist, drawing on anything and everything I could, but it wasn’t until shortly after the original Destiny came out that I decided to take art seriously. The game itself and its concept art looked beautiful, to put it simply.

You’ve got strong beginnings, Guardian. Let’s talk more about your art. When creating new pieces of Destiny art, how do you usually get started? What’s the spark of inspiration that gets you going?

A: I find just about every visual aspect of Destiny equally inspirational, whether it be a set of armor, a fun, new exotic, or a grand, gorgeous vista. But I think what I like most about Destiny are those moments of camaraderie between fellow players, strangers or friends.

Whether it’s a moment like having a dance party with some random players in the Tower, successfully completing a Seraph Towers public event without failing a charge cycle and everyone in the local chat is excited over getting the Triumph, or making a nerve-wracking comeback in the Trials of Osiris and your fireteam is recalling the highs and lows of the match. Those kinds of feelings are what I want to instill in my art.

Let’s talk gear. What Exotic have you been using lately?

A: Guardian Games has made me rediscover my love for the Sunbracers Exotic. It was actually the first Exotic armor I got back in Destiny 1, and the ornament that was introduced for it in the Black Armory season made me love it even more. The normal appearance and the ornament both look beautiful and I think it’s difficult to find an armor combination where they don’t look good. It’s also obviously very fun to be able to spam a ton of grenades with the right armor perks equipped, which made it super handy to quickly farm laurels in the Guardian Games. I don’t use Sunbracers as often as I’d like to, simply because different activities demand different loadouts, but they definitely stand out as my favorite Exotic.

Good on you for helping Warlocks secure the Silver bond from Guardian Games. Where do you find yourself most often when playing Destiny?

A: Honestly, my favorite mode is patrol. I really enjoy walking through the different beautifully crafted environments, looking through all the nooks and crannies, taking in all the little details, watching the clouds roll over or the sun setting.

I could spend hours with the HUD turned off, sitting against rocks, and taking screenshots from various vantage points. It’s kind of more fun than having an actual photo mode, though it’d be super awesome if that could be introduced to Destiny!

A true Wayfarer. You have my respect. If people wanted to follow you or your artistic endeavors, where would they find you?

Anything you’d want to say to the community while you’re in the spotlight?

A: The Destiny artists community is insanely supportive and I’m grateful for all the friends I’ve made over the life of the game. Their art is incredibly inspirational and they help me strive to be a better artist every day. Shout-outs to IanPesty, PlainBen, Lucero, Matt Oishi, COSMICraven, Lazesummerstone, Lilly, Lintu, Faysal Mekki, Dulcamarra, Marou and countless more wonderful community members. Lots of love and appreciation to my Destiny playmates as well, past and current, for providing a myriad of fun memories. Shout-outs to Gabe, Phil, Ethan, Nate, Tim, Matt, Dillon, Paul, and both Jons. Also, thanks to Bungie for all the work you do on Destiny. <3

Thank you for spending time with us, Aviixe. It’s always a pleasure to have artists in focus. Have a great weekend, and we’ll see you starside!