Category: Bungie News

Bungie News and Destiny

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This Week at Bungie – 12/14/2017

This week at Bungie, we delivered Masterworks.

Update 1.1.1.1 introduced more than just a few extra 1s to the version number. There are some new ways to invest in your favorite weapons, overhauls to vendors, new ways to gift rewards to your fireteam, and more. The Patch Notes can be found right here. Give them a read, and see if any of them address things you’ve been talking about—or wishing for secretly.

These are some of the first significant changes to the player experience that are based on your feedback. Iterating on Destiny has always been a process that involves you, and that process will continue. We have more updates to Destiny 2 planned for the New Year. Once January arrives, we’ll talk about what we have planned for the next one. And then for the one after that.

In the meantime, your voice is a welcome addition to this conversation. If you’re talking about Destiny, we’re listening. More importantly, we’re adding features and content to the game.

Origin Story

Next week, we’re launching a webcomic series, starting with an Osiris and Ikora origin story, “Fall of Osiris.” 

Margaret Stohl, Destiny 2 Narrative Director (who currently writes Marvel’s The Mighty Captain Marvel) notes:

“Destiny’s first-ever original comic short is written by Eisner-winning, New York Times bestselling writer Ryan North (Dinosaur Comics, Marvel’s The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl) in collaboration with our own super talented Destiny 2: Curse of Osiris narrative lead Christine Thompson, with interior art by Destiny community fan favorite Zé Carlos. Here’s a peek at the cover, by Marcio Takara (All-New Wolverine).

Osiris was once the champion of the Last City. Vanguard Commander. Seeker of secrets and discoverer of wonders. And then everything changed. How did Osiris go from hero to traitor? 

Coming soon, for free, on Bungie.net!

Before the Dawn

The celebration of a new Golden Age is about to arrive at the Tower—and the Farm.

Check out what you’ll find in Destiny 2 as it becomes a winter wonderland.

Adding without Subtracting

Earlier this week, we updated this same blog with some notes on how we intend to handle expansions differently going forward. You should read ’em. Essentially, our goals are to continue adding new challenges to Destiny, and to keep old challenges relevant without taking them away from anyone. It’s a delicate balance, and we intend to do a better job of striking it.

In the most immediate version of the future, that means making changes to Faction Rallies and Iron Banner so that they include everyone, no matter their level of investment in new content. We’ll talk to you more about that work as it gets done. These events will come back very soon, and they’ll be available to all.

Argos Defeated

Last week, the race to World’s First was held for the “Leviathan, Eater of Worlds” raid lair. The unexpected happened, and we’d like to congratulate the rag-tag team of Guardians who conquered their new foe with speed, grace, and deadly coordination. Not only did this fireteam form up the evening before the raid lair went live, their quick troubleshooting and in-game skill led them to take the crown. You can hear their reaction to earning the title here.
Additionally, we’d like to give props to the Traveller of Guardians clan for their completion of the raid lair. This fireteam consisted of six deaf players, communicating via video chat to troubleshoot the puzzles laid before them, leading to the defeat of Argos. 

These reactions are pure gold, and fantastic examples of what the teams at Bungie wish to create: unforgettable experiences, with new friends or old. Cheers to all who have made it through the Eater of Worlds.

As always, thanks for playing.

To All a Good Night

This is the last weekly address on Bungie.net for 2017. The conversation about Destiny 2 won’t stop, but the blog is being laid down for a long winter’s nap. Communication will continue on our forums and social media, where it can happen faster and from anywhere our holiday travels take us. We’ll be reading your feedback about the Dawning. We’ll be calling the shots for the live game. We’ll be addressing issues if they arise.

Here are some places where you can make your voice heard.

We’ll be back on the blog upon the conclusion of the Dawning to put the next conversation on your radar. We’ll even celebrate the triumphant return of Cozmo to the front lines! I won’t be disappearing, mind you. Now that I’ve taken a turn at the CM lectern, I’ll be a more visible member of the Player Support team that serves the Guardians every day.

A Patchwork of Notes

When bugs launch a full-scale attack, Destiny Player Support is on hand to fight for you in the war rooms at Bungie. To us, the only good bug is a dead bug. Would you like to know more?

This is our report.

Destiny Update 1.1.1.1: Known Issues

For a list of issues that were resolved with Destiny Update 1.1.1.1, see the most recent Patch Notes. The following issues have recently been confirmed, and are currently being investigated by internal teams:

  • Masterwork Weapon Cores are not properly forwarded to the Postmaster when dismantling Masterwork Weapons with a full consumable inventory. As we investigate this issue, we advise players to ensure proper inventory space prior to dismantling their items.
  • Masterwork Multikills on Floating Enemies: We have verified an issue where multikills on floating enemies do not produce Orbs of Light as intended. This is currently under investigation.
  • Quickplay Challenges: We have identified an issue where Challenges do not appear to players when they are entering Quickplay in the Crucible.
  • Ikora Waypoint: We have identified an issue where players are witnessing a waypoint over Ikora when they do not have enough tokens for a reputation package. This is currently under investigation.

Bungie.net Patch Notes

The following items were implemented alongside Update 1.1.1.1: 

  • Players can now submit reports from postgame carnage reports for games they played in (web, Android, and iOS)
  • Added support for kill trackers on Masterwork weapon details (Android and iOS)
  • Players can now preview their forum posts before submitting them (web)

Movie of the Week

Guardians around the globe have found inspiration in the worlds of Destiny, leading to amazing content uploaded to the Community Creations page. You can find many players taking on the role of directors, animators, or even actors in their own content. It’s always a pleasure to see the films and to reward people who showcase their creativity or overcome challenges. Winners are crowned in-game with the “Lens of Fate” emblem.

Roll the film!

Movie of the Week: #Selfie

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Honorable Mention: Leviathan: Flawless – Zero Communication – No HUD

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As always, make sure to note your PSN ID, Xbox Live Gamertag, or Battle.net ID when you make your submissions. If you do win, emblems should be rewarded within a week. If you’re not seeing the emblem, let me know!

With all that said and done, we still have work to do. While the blog will be silent for the weeks to come, we’ll still have many in the studio dedicated to keeping things running throughout the holiday season. Keep the conversation rolling, and we’ll keep the communication flowing. @BungieHelp will keep you updated on known issues and server status. I’ll be collecting and responding to feedback wherever I can.

Once we enter the New Year, we’ll have more info concerning updates planned for early 2018, and we’ll keep the conversation going throughout the year.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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The Dawning

“The Traveler is awake. For Humanity, a new Golden Age has begun. This year’s Dawning is unlike any other—it’s not just the renewal that a new year brings, but the dawn of something greater. Now more than ever, we must gather together in the Tower, at the Farm, and all across the system to give thanks. Our Light has returned—and it illuminates everything around us.”

—Ikora Rey, Warlock Vanguard

Happy Dawning to All

It may be cold outside, but there’s a warmth in the air. As the year comes to an end, the Tower and Farm are decorated with festive cheer. It’s a time to celebrate your Light.

Snowball Fights

Guardians aren’t just arming themselves with weapons. There are snowball piles everywhere you look. In the Tower and at the Farm, you can tag your friends for bragging rights. In Strikes, you can blast an enemy with a snowball to stun them and deal big damage. Stay frosty out there.

Mayhem in the Cold

Keep your blood warm and your heart pumping in the Crucible. Mayhem is back, so your abilities recharge faster. Point values are cranked up enough to melt the ice. It’s anarchy—and it’s awesome.

Milestones of Winter

Engage in Crucible Mayhem or become legend in Strikes and you’ll be rewarded. Every week, complete a milestone for a Dawning engram. Get in the giving mood with new consumables that give rewards to everyone you’re playing with. If there’s a specific Dawning item that you have your heart set on, Tess will refresh her inventory each week, enabling you to use your Bright Dust reserves for your holiday shopping. On one week or another during the three-week event, you’ll find every Dawning-themed exotic (ship, ghost, sparrow, emote) and every Dawning-themed legendary armor piece on her shelves.

Gifting and Receiving

Pick up a Dawning Gift Schematic from the Bazaar. Venture to other worlds and craft a unique gift for the vendors and agents you find in the Tower and beyond. Then, give the lucky recipient their gift and receive a gift in return. You can participate in the season of giving every day of the event.

The Dawning begins on Tuesday, December 19.

The Dawning ends on Tuesday, January 9.


Let’s usher in a new year, and a new Golden Age together.

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This Week At Bungie – 12/07/2017

This Week at Bungie, we launched Curse of Osiris.

Your invitation to Mercury is waiting with Ikora in the Tower. Get ready for a new journey, discovering the mysteries of Osiris and exploring the Infinite Forest. If you missed the launch trailer, give it a look:

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With the release of Curse of Osiris, Season Two has also begun. Destiny Update 1.1.0 has brought resolution to a few issues we’ve been tracking, along with changes to seasonal activities and new rewards. It’s all documented in the patch notes.

Another update is impending. Next week, Destiny Update 1.1.1 will bring more changes to the Destiny 2 experience. Expect patch notes to become available when the download is live.

The Eater of Worlds

Tomorrow, the race will begin once more. Players from around the globe will be seeking the title of World’s First, looking to solve puzzles and conquer enemies with speed. 

It has become a ritual for the Raid team to gather in our studio theater to watch, in real time, as the community progresses through these lovingly-crafted challenges. I’ll be joining them to share their reactions as players make their way through the belly of the beast.

As a note, there are some known issues that may provide players with a leg up in the competition. While we were not able to address these prior to release, we did not wish to postpone the availability of this content.

Keep it clean, lest ye be judged.

Prepare to Rally

The first Faction Rallies for Season Two begins on December 12, running through December 19. This time, the armor you’ve won from your leaders will have new ornaments you can apply to make them look even more awesome. You’ll earn them by completing specific challenges issued to you by your faction of choice.

Dead Orbit

Future War Cult

New Monarchy

If you’re new to this event, the faction that awards the most engrams will be declared the winner. For the duration of the Victory Week that follows, the vendor of the winning faction will have a Winner’s Offering available for purchase. The amount of Glimmer you’ll be expected to pay depends on your loyalty. Check out the guns that hang in the balance this time.

We’re excited to see who comes out on top. So far, Dead Orbit and New Monarchy have seen their banners waving in the wind over the City. Will this be the moment for Future War Cult? It’s up to every player on every platform.

The Balance of Power

Whether you’ve met Osiris or not, Destiny 2 has some changes in store for you. With the beginning of Season Two, some of the ways that all Guardians fight have changed. The Patch Notes tell the full story, but the game designers can tell you to story behind the notes. Jon Weisnewski has some developer commentary about the updates to combat.

Jon: Hello Guardians. First item of business: We know about the Prometheus Lens. It’s not what we intended. The weapon shipped with a bug, which we intend to fix with Destiny Update 1.1.1, along with everything else in the December update. Until then, please go easy on the players who have yet to get their hands on one (we know you won’t, but it’s been said).

As for the rest of the sandbox, whether you’re a long time player or reading one of these for the first time, we’re glad to have the chance to give you a quick update on the first of many Destiny 2 tuning passes. Our process for making these changes relies on a combination of absorbing raw player feedback, consulting detailed player data, and reconciling those learnings with our own experiences as players of the game. We then playtest and fine tune the changes we make as much as possible.

In terms of DPS output, our data from the first few months of gameplay is showing that various categories of weapons are reasonably balanced. A resounding theme from players has been to address the stronger outliers without making them too weak or changing their identity. We agree. We hope this update reflects that.

Rather than try to address every feedback item with a potentially disruptive kitchen-sink update, we’re taking a more targeted approach for this first round of changes. The main focus was bug fixes, tuning adjustments, and a few specific changes meant to address common feedback items.

Just because we aren’t addressing a feedback theme in this release doesn’t mean we aren’t aware of it or have no plans to address it in the future. This was a calculated and stable approach for 1.1.0. We’ll see how this one plays in the wild and reevaluate going forward.

Thanks for reading. Thanks for playing.

Feedback Frenzy

Since taking on the role of Acting Community Manager, I’ve temporarily relieved Cozmo on the front lines of player feedback. (Don’t worry, he’ll be back soon.) As part of keeping our promise for more communication between players and developers, I’d like to give an example of our process. How is feedback collected? How is it shared across the studio?
Whether it’s a post on Bungie.net, a community forum, or social media, feedback starts with a conversation. You and your fellow players chime in, expressing agreement or disagreement with the given feedback. As the conversation grows, we share emerging trends with the entire team in a report that we deliver about twice a month. When we identify a more pressing matter, we share it directly and immediately with the teams that can make a difference. Here’s one example:
  • As a player, I wish to earn more meaningful rewards from pinnacle activities.

Next week, Masterworks will be implemented to add more value to rewards that can be obtained from a variety of sources, including gear from end-game activities – but the work doesn’t stop there. Planned for early 2018, we’ll be looking at how Raid rewards can be updated to create more meaningful experiences. How exactly this will be realized in-game is something we’ll detail closer to deployment, but this is one example of feedback being investigated by our team. We’ll talk more about all the changes you can look forward to in the New Year once it arrives.

You won’t need to wait until next year to track our progress in responding to your feedback. Next week, we’ll be deploying a batch of changes in Update 1.1.1. that are based on your chatter. You can find an itemized list of what’s included in the same article linked above, including some updates to the way Vendors play a role in your hobby as a Guardian.

Keep the feedback coming! We’ll keep reading it, even during the holiday break. And we’ll talk again once it’s over.

The Age of Osiris

With the addition of Mercury to your Director, the Destiny Player Support team has been investigating issues as they are reported to the #Help forum. We identify issues, confirm their existence in the game, and forward them to the appropriate teams to be addressed.

This is our report.

HDR

Shortly after launch, an issue was discovered that impacts the functionality of HDR settings for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 4 Pro. When enabling HDR settings through platform or in-game settings, changes are not properly applied by the Destiny 2 application. We are seeking to address this issue with Destiny Update 1.1.1, which we have targeted to become available next week.

Eater of Worlds Prestige Raid Ornaments

While Prestige mode for the ‘Eater of Worlds’ Raid Lair has not yet been announced, ornaments are currently available for preview. We have identified an issue where the unlock requirements displayed in ornament tool-tips are currently false. We are seeking to address this issue as soon as possible.
  • These ornaments require completion of the Eater of Worlds activity on Prestige difficulty
  • The descriptions for the Head and Leg objectives are currently reversed

Trophies and Achievements

We are aware that there are some Destiny 2 trophies and achievements that have become unavailable to players who have not purchased Curse of Osiris. We are committed to fixing this issue, and are currently investigating a solution. Please stay tuned for more updates on this topic as progress is made.

Other Known Issues

  • The Prometheus Lens Exotic Trace Rifle is currently impacted by an issue where the damage output is higher than intended.
    • Note: We’re addressing the issue as soon as we can. Trials of the Nine is still on this weekend.
  • Players who are running Destiny 2 on PC above 60 fps cannot reach Public Event pillars, as they die on impact after launching through cannons.
  • Some players are unable to launch Heroic Adventures, as they’re noted as “Already Active”.
  • Players may encounter issues where textures from the Future War Cult Simulator Gloves intercept their camera.
  • Emblems may not be present within the Emblem Collection when players collect over 84 emblems
  • Increased reports of PC framerate stutters or performance drops.
  • Players can temporarily lose access to previously owned gear if they infuse items with a higher level requirement than the current level of their character.
  • When completing Infinite Adventures, players are sometimes required to fast travel back to the Lighthouse to exit the Infinite Forest.
Stay tuned to @BungieHelp for updates on these and other ongoing investigations.

Movie of the Week

As Destiny sees new content, so does the Community Creations page. We’ve seen some players asking “What does Bungie look for in a Movie of the Week? I want that sweet emblem!”

See below.

Movie of the Week: Destiny 2 Rap Battle

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Honorable Mention: Emperor Calus Sculpt Timelapse

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If you want to win, make sure to note your PSN ID, Xbox Live Gamertag, or Battle.net ID when you make your submissions. If you do win, emblems should be rewarded within a week.

Tomorrow will be a rush. After many test sessions with Team Velveeta, I’m excited to see what strategies are used in pursuit of the World’s First crown. Seeing players going counter-clockwise on Calus plates during the race for Leviathan was completely foreign to me, and I’m betting some of you will find success in ways that we could never think of. Let the race begin.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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This Week at Bungie – 11/30/2017

This week at Bungie, we’re looking forward to new reasons to play Destiny 2.

The development team has shared some details on how the game is about to change. We’ve started an ongoing conversation to discuss the state of Destiny 2, and outlined the direction we’d like to take moving forward. Updates are inbound to add new content, alter existing systems, and address some bugs that have impacted the player experience. If you haven’t tuned in, we have two ways to get caught up:

We’re actively monitoring the #Destiny2 and #Feedback portal for your thoughts. Dive in and make your opinion known. Upvote a thread or start your own. While we can’t respond to every thread, know that your voices are being heard. I’ll be forwarding feedback to the team as it comes, and we will be looking at ways we can improve our communication with you moving forward.

Curse of Osiris: On the Runway

If you were looking forward to the fashion show that was cancelled this week, we still have a small glimpse of the gear that’s coming with Destiny 2’s first expansion. If you wish to remain unspoiled, scroll on. We fully understand the desire for discovery while you’re playing the game. If you want an idea of what gear you’ll be adding to your inventory, here’s a taste:

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These new pieces of armor and weapons, and more, will be waiting for you next week, out in the wild.

Pre-flight Check

If you’re like Cayde-6, you may jump into battle without preparing for what’s to come. Destiny Player Support is here to keep you from falling victim to any Vex traps that may cause infinite time loops.

This is our report.

Server Maintenance: Final Countdown

Planned maintenance that was originally scheduled for Thursday been postponed to Friday, December 1, 2017. All information concerning this maintenance window may be seen on the Destiny Server Updates and Status Help Article.
  • 8 AM PST: Maintenance start
  • 9 AM PST: Remaining players removed from activities
  • 2 PM PST: Expected completion
Additionally, we are planning a final maintenance period for Tuesday, December 5, 2017. At the conclusion of this maintenance, Curse of Osiris will be released. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp for further announcements detailing expected downtime, and the expected release time of Curse of Osiris.

Pre-Load and Storage Requirements

Players may begin to pre-load Curse of Osiris starting at 8 AM PST on December 5, 2017. The following storage requirements must be available to begin pre-loading content:

  • PlayStation 4: 88 GB
  • Xbox One: 44 GB
  • PC: 68 GB
For additional information on storage requirements, please see this Help Article. If you have any issues during the download and update process, please follow troubleshooting steps listed here.

Daily and Weekly Reset Change: 1700 UTC

As announced in a previous update, Daily and Weekly Reset will be changing next Tuesday with the release of Curse of Osiris.

The following is a short list of time zone conversions from 1700 UTC. If you do not see your local time below, we advise using an online time zone converter to prepare for the upcoming change.
  • 9 AM PST
  • 12 PM EST
  • 5 PM GMT
  • 8 PM MSK
  • 2 AM JST
  • 4 AM AEDT
  • 6 AM NZDT
We’ll be monitoring the #Help forum throughout launch to ensure a smooth takeoff. Stay tuned to Help.bungie.net for upcoming support content about Curse of Osiris.

Keep ‘em rolling

This week’s Movie of the Week was difficult to call. Too much great content on the Community Creations page. The skill required for the videos below is something to behold – one displaying handcrafted armor, the other showcasing sniper rifle precision that made my jaw drop to the floor.

Movie of the Week: Destiny Girl

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Honorable Mention: Antagonize

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Winners of the Movie of the Week will find a sweet emblem within their vault collections. I’ll let you know when the goods have been delivered. Major props, and thanks for the great videos!

It’s been a busy week. We’ve begun a conversation that we’re looking to continue as Destiny 2 evolves. While Cozmo is out, I’ll be collecting feedback and forwarding it to the development team, whether it concerns our recent round of blog content or how you feel about Curse of Osiris once it’s in your hands. Even after Cozmo’s back, I’ll continue to lend a hand in the process. Your concerns are heard, your passion is vital, and we’re looking to keep you coming back for more.

Next stop, Mercury.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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The State of Destiny 2

Hey everyone,

With Destiny 2’s console and PC launches behind us, we want to take some time to talk with you about Destiny 2 – specifically where it’s at today, and where it’s going. Our team has been reading feedback and working on updates to improve the game. We’ve also been reading some tough criticism about our lack of communication, and we agree we need to be more open. 

Going forward, Destiny 2’s post-launch game systems, features, and updates are being designed specifically to focus on and support players who want Destiny to be their hobby – the game they return to, and a game where friendships are made. We want Destiny to be a game that fits into your life, providing you with reasons to log in and play with your friends, clans, and families. We want Destiny to be a world you want to be a part of.

A month ago, we published a list of improvements on the blog. Today, we’re going to revisit that list and update its status, and share some of the work the team is readying for December, January, and beyond.

We know it’s frustrating when there isn’t enough of a dialog with the development team. You have our commitment that we’re going to do a better job going forward.

– Luke Smith & Chris Barrett

Upcoming Updates Overview

  • New systems and rewards to give our most engaged players additional, optional pursuits, including:
    • A new Weapon Tier: Masterworks, which will feature stat trackers, random, re-rollable stat bonuses, unique item tooltips, and item details screens (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
    • Improved vendor rewards, adding ways for people to purchase items directly with their Legendary Shards and Tokens (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
    • Adding Armor Ornaments that grant visual permutations of armor as players complete specific Challenges (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
  • Better incentives for players who complete challenging Prestige activities
    • We’re targeting a January update to provide better incentives to complete Prestige activities
  • Better rewards and replay value for Strikes, Adventures, and Lost Sectors
    • In December, we will be introducing a Heroic Strikes playlist and more generous Strike rewards
    • Rewards for Adventures and Lost Sectors are still on our radar, but will not be delivered for our December updates
  • Private matches for the Crucible
    • Still targeting early 2018 and expect to have better insight into exact timing in the New Year
    • We are also moving Ranked PVP to the top of our priority list for next year to support the competitive community
  • Crucible tuning like adjusted Supremacy scoring and better spawning rules
    • In December, we will introduce additional updates and bug-fixes intended to improve these areas of the Crucible
  • Better incentives for completing Crucible matches (and penalties for quitting competitive games)
    • A “Quitter Penalty” system is currently in development, and you can expect an update on the deployment of this system in the New Year
  • Continued improvements to Iron Banner and Faction Rallies, including uniqueness of rewards
    • The next Iron Banner and Faction Rally will introduce improvements in both these areas (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
  • Changes to make the mod economy more interesting and impactful
    • The Gunsmith will have some updates to how Mods are acquired (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
    • We are exploring more updates to this system in the New Year
  • Ongoing improvements to Exotics, including adjustments to reduce instances of duplication
    • We plan to tune under-performing Exotics and will continue to make targeted updates and improvements
    • Duplication protection will be added for Exotics in the New Year
  • New ways to spend surplus currency and materials (looking at you Legendary Shards)
    • Players will be able to spend Tokens and Legendary Shards on Vendor inventory (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
    • Xur will have new items, as well (see the December Update Details section below for more info)
  • An emote interface that allows players to equip Salty, Spicy Ramen, Six Shooter, and Flip Out all at the same time
    • Emote interface improvements are still on the list, and you can expect an update on the development of this system in the New Year

We will continue to revisit and update this list in the weeks and months ahead to keep you up to speed on what we’re working on. Below, you’ll find more specific detail about each of the features and updates you can expect to land in December.

December Update Details

There are four key areas we’re targeting for improvements in December. Some of these updates will arrive with the December 5 update, and some additional updates will be included in a patch that will be deployed the following week on December 12.

Both updates combined include improvements set against the following goals:

  • Deepen Rewards for advanced players
  • Provide More Player Control over obtaining rewards
  • Make Shards Useful by adding things to use them for
  • Provide General Quality fixes wherever possible

The following changes are the first steps towards achieving these goals, with more planned for our next release in January. Here is a preview of impending changes to Destiny 2. Each category is marked with a forecast delivery date.

Masterworks

  • [DEC 12] Legendary Weapons will drop as or be upgraded to become Masterworks versions
    • Masterworks will have a few advantages over the baseline Legendary weapon:
      • Track and display the number of kills with that weapon (with choice between total count or Crucible-only count)
      • Generate orbs for you and your allies on multi-kills
      • Add weapon stat bonuses that are selected randomly from a small pool and are re-rollable
    • Masterworks drop from any source of Legendary weapons for characters above 250 Power
      • Unwanted Masterworks can be dismantled into materials that can upgrade an existing Legendary Weapon into a Masterwork
      • Raid and Trials of the Nine Weapons will have a very high chance to be Masterworks
    • We have future plans to extend Masterworks to other gear and expose your kill counts in more places (e.g. Crucible kill screen)

Armor Ornaments

  • [DEC 5] Armor Ornaments will be added to some existing Armor sets for more visual customization without losing your Shaders or Mods
    • These ornaments will be unlocked by completing objectives specific to each set, and are permanently unlocked account-wide, just like Exotic Weapon ornaments
    • They will be applied to the base pieces that you may already have collected, and can now unlock on Vendors if not
    • In Season 2, the following sets have ornaments unlocked in their respective activities:
      • Vanguard Faction Armor
      • Crucible Faction Armor
      • Trials of the Nine Armor
      • Iron Banner Armor
      • Dead Orbit Armor
      • Future War Cult Armor
      • New Monarchy Armor
      • Eater of Worlds Raid Lair Armor
  • [DEC 12] Faction Armor and Weapons will be unlocked for purchase for Legendary Shards and Faction Tokens on most Faction Vendors
    • All five Armor Slots will always be present, and Weapons will rotate weekly on Factions that have them
    • Slots will be unlocked by claiming Reward Engrams from the respective Faction
    • You will get credit for engrams you may have already claimed since launch
  • [DEC 12] Xur has some new offerings for players collecting Exotics:
    • Every week, you’ll be able to acquire one of the new Fated Engrams using Legendary Shards that will decrypt as Exotics that aren’t already in your collection
    • A simpler Three of Coins that boosts Exotic drop rates from any source for 4 hours
      • No obscure stacking mechanics or need to re-apply before every boss
      • These cost Legendary Shards and you can have as many as you like

General Investment

  • [DEC 5] Banshee has some updates on the Weapon and Armor Mod front:
    • For players wanting to clear some Mod inventory space, Rare quality Mods will dismantle into Gunsmith Materials and have a chance to produce Legendary quality Mod Components
    • For players chasing specific Legendary Mods (including Legendary Kinetic Mods), Banshee will offer a selection of specific Legendary Mods for direct purchase, with a selection that will rotate daily and cost Legendary Shards and Mod Components
  • [DEC 5] For players chasing a world Legendary or looking for Masterworks, Master Rahool will sell some of his rumored hoard of Legendary Engrams for Legendary Shards
  • [DEC 12] Commander Zavala and Lord Shaxx will sell Gift consumables for Legendary Shards that can be used during a Strike or Crucible Match that will serve the following functions:
    • Grant bonus rewards to everyone in that activity upon completion, friend or foe alike
    • Award anything from Faction Tokens to a round of Exotics for everyone in the match
  • [DEC 12] Exploit safeguards on Chests and Resource Nodes are greatly relaxed and players should encounter them less frequently
    • Even if they do, drop rates for Tokens is only reduced to 30% instead of 0%, and Glimmer will be unaffected
    • We want to associate a visual indicator with this in a future update, but we weren’t able to pull that off in this update (but we hear you!)
  • [DEC 12] Vendors will now beckon you to hand in your Reputation Tokens only when you’re carrying enough to earn a Reward Engram
  • [DEC 5] Changes affecting Reputation Tokens:
    • Daily Challenges will have Reputation Token awards increased across the board
    • Cayde’s Treasure Chests still offer variable rewards, but now guarantee (at minimum) a payout of destination appropriate Reputation Tokens
    • Strikes will drop a larger number of Vanguard Reputation Tokens
    • Common quality Destination Resource Tokens will have their drop rates increased to 100%, and values per Token increased as well (by 50% for common quality Tokens and 250% for rare quality Tokens)
    • On the balance, Reputation required per Reward Engram will increase for Destination Factions (+37%) and Gunsmith (+50%)
    • Leviathan Raid Tokens will be redeemed at Benedict immediately upon obtaining a Token, instead of requiring a full clear before unlocking

With the launch of Curse of Osiris, and the beginning of Season 2, you can expect to see a full suite of patch notes that will document all of the changes outlined above, as well as additional gameplay and sandbox tuning changes the team is making to improve Destiny 2. We’ll also soon be providing pre-load and launch day details, as well as a roadmap for our Season 2 content, which includes The Dawning in mid-December.

XP Mechanics

Last weekend, we disabled a scaling mechanism that adjusted XP gains up and down without reflecting those adjustments in the UI. Our intention was to keep slower-paced activities as rewarding as high intensity grinding without confusing variations in displayed XP values, but the silent nature of the mechanic betrayed the expectation of transparency that you have for Destiny 2.

We were able to disable the system with a server-side change, but a new solution is now needed to rebalance XP in Destiny 2. We have begun that work, and will continue to provide updates to you about timelines and specifics. The values coded into our website API are being updated today (and may already have been as you read this post) to reflect the removal of this scaling mechanism. In a future update, we intend to link these internal and display-only values together for greater consistency, and to ensure that when changes are made they are accurately reflected everywhere we report them.

We already see that the newly adjusted 160K XP per level value means that leveling is too slow for some activities, and we have begun the process of collecting data and recalibrating XP earn rates to improve them as quickly as possible.

XP boosts, including both consumable items and passive bonuses like the Well Rested 300% bonus, were always applied after this system and never resulted in early slowing of XP. They should be unchanged by the disabling of this system and will continue to provide their stated increase in XP gain.

Expect to see a lot of conversation from our team on this front, as XP rewards are updated and brought back in-line with player expectations.

The Future

Going forward, we plan to continue this dialog as openly and frequently as possible. This will be an ongoing process, but one that we are committed to.

This week we’ll be publishing a new episode of the Bungie Podcast where we will sound off on the current state of Destiny 2, how we think about our communication challenges, and what it takes to update the game in the wild. You’ll be able to listen on both Apple and Android devices. 

Thank you for playing, for being passionate about the Destiny 2 experience, and for working with us as we look to continuously improve our game and studio communication.

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This Week at Bungie – 11/22/2017

This week at Bungie, we explored Mercury – in two timelines.

Curse of Osiris will send you to a new destination, where you’ll learn its fate in the past, present, and future. At the heart of the journey is a forest of endless realities.

If you missed it, here’s the recap.

[embedded content]

Next week, we’re back with a parade of the gear you’ll earn, including some details on new ways to earn it.

Sustaining Operations

Working with the Destiny Operations Center, Destiny Player Support keeps a finger on the pulse of the Destiny 2 population. We investigate error codes, and we share our findings through @BungieHelp for community awareness.

This is our report.

Buffalo, Part 2

Last week, Hotfix 1.0.7.1 was released to address Buffalo errors on PC. We have discovered that some players are receiving erroneous Buffalo errors within the game client that are caused by alternate factors. These issues sometimes relate to network stability, or having multiple PCs connected to Destiny on a local network. Please follow steps within the Network Troubleshooting Guide to ensure you’ve applied the correct settings for Destiny 2 gameplay. Additionally, follow steps for configuring UPnP if you have multiple PC’s on the same network.

Continued Investigations

  • Faction Rally Tokens: We have identified an issue where Faction Rally tokens are removed when players create new characters within Destiny 2. We are seeking to resolve this issue prior to the first Faction Rallies event of Season 2.
  • “Leviathan” Raid: Calus may sometimes become immune to damage during the final phase of the encounter
  • Black Screen when Loading into the Tower: Players may sometimes encounter a black screen when loading into the Tower. This may resolve itself after one minute, or players may workaround this issue by visiting an alternate destination and loading into the Tower once more
  • Bright Engram Ornaments: Sweet Business and Sturm ornaments within the Bright Engram may display “Already added to Collection” before a player acquires these items. This issue does not prevent players from earning these items.
  • Hunter Survivalist Perk: The Survivalist perk on legendary Hunter leg armor does not grant the intended Recovery stats.
In the coming weeks, we will be issuing Destiny Update 1.1.0 and Hotfix 1.1.1 to address some known issues alongside the release of Curse of Osiris. Stay tuned to the Updates page of Bungie.net for patch notes.

Back to the Box Office

 Another week, another round of content found on the Community Creations page. Whether you’re looking for tutorials on increasing your skill or seeking a record of a comedic moment in battle, this is the place to find it. Winners receive the Lens of Fate emblem within Destiny 2 to commemorate their victory. If you’re aiming to earn the emblem, make sure to tag your submission with #MOTW and list any contributors within the video description.

Take your seats, turn off your cell phones, and enjoy the show!

Movie of the Week: Arcstrider PC Montage

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Fragment 2

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Shaxx likes puns

[embedded content]

Winners should get their reward within one week of being featured. If you haven’t found the emblem within your Vault Collection, let us know in the #Help forum.

This week, we’re publishing this article a day early, as Bungie will be dark on Thursday and Friday. We’ll be celebrating Thanksgiving here in the United States, sharing time with friends and family. Some will be engaging in food prep, while others will be jumping into the Iron Banner for some friendly competition.

Next week, we’ll return with fashion on the mind. Tune in to our Twitch channel on Wednesday, November 29, at 11 AM PST to get a preview of new rewards coming with Season 2 and the Curse of Osiris expansion.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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This Week at Bungie – 11/16/2017

[Editor’s Note: Cozmo, your friendly neighborhood Community Manager, has taken a temporary leave of absence to begin work on a new passion project. Everyone at Bungie wishes him and his family all the best! Until his triumphant return, dmg04 will be lending a hand as Acting Community Manager. To let you know who you’re dealing with, we have released a series of #dmgfacts. The following is the first weekly blog update authored by a player who has been reading them for over 13 years. You have the comm, Dylan…]

This week at Bungie, we unmasked Osiris.

Curse of Osiris is the new story we’re telling in the world of Destiny 2. During our first stream, we introduced new characters and took a tour of some of the new spaces you’ll explore as you encounter them. We also squared off against a new vision of the Vex.

If you missed it, here’s the recap.

[embedded content]

Next week, we’re back with a live fire exercise to show off some of the new activities you’ll tackle on this new adventure, including the biggest public event we’ve ever delivered in Destiny and a shooting tour of the Infinite Forest.

The final stream will be all about the gear you’ll earn, including some details on new ways to earn it.

Stay tuned for more.

Defeating Dead Orbit

Tuesday morning brought a surprise to some members of the community, especially those who had assumed that Dead Orbit would continue to dominate the Faction Rallies. Reward package totals for each faction have now been tallied across PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. The result: New Monarchy has claimed victory.
 

Players who pledged their loyalty to New Monarchy may acquire the Honor’s Edge for 1,000 Glimmer. Those who pledged to Dead Orbit or Future War Cult will have the opportunity to obtain the same item for 50,000 Glimmer. No matter your allegiance, you have until 1 AM PST on November 21 to add this item to your arsenal.

There’s no need to weep over these results. Faction Rallies will return in Season 2. Changes are being made in response to player feedback and you’ll also discover new rewards you can earn. Will Dead Orbit reclaim the throne? Or will Future War Cult rise to the top? We can’t wait to find out.

Earn your Iron

 

Begins: November 21, 1 AM PST

Ends: November 28, 1 AM PST

The game is Clash.

While this will be the second round for console players, PC Guardians are invited to their first Iron Banner event. To compete, you must meet the following qualifications:
  • Complete the Destiny 2 campaign – the only way to reach the Tower
  • Visit Lord Saladin in the Tower to begin the Iron Banner Quest
  • Launch into the Iron Banner playlist

Iron Banner rewards may be earned through reputation tokens turned in to Lord Saladin. Challenges will be offered each day for additional token rewards, along with Milestones to track progress.

This Iron Banner is your last chance to earn the Season 1 Iron Banner Emblem, Shades of Radegast, granted when completing the Seasonal Milestone:

Iron Banner will return in Season 2 with new rewards and new ways to earn them.

What’s Up, DOC?

 

While I normally write the content you find in this portion of the article, Destiny Player Support is a team. Each of us are dedicated to assisting players that encounter issues when attempting to play Destiny or Destiny 2. We monitor the forums for reports of issues and provide troubleshooting steps to impacted players. Best of all, we have the chance to aid the development team as they investigate solutions.

This is our report.

As a final note, help.bungie.net has recently received an upgrade. Working with the Bungie.net team, search functionality has been improved to help players get to the content they’re looking for faster. If you encounter issues finding articles or guides, post a report to the #Help forum detailing your experience.

Reel Time

 
Even with Cozmo out of the office, Movie of the Week lives on. For those new to the ritual, we watch player-created videos that are submitted to the Community Creations page. Those that entertain us the most earn a spot in our hearts, and a sweet emblem in the game. Emblem grants may experience a slight delay before they appear in your vault. I’m a bit new to all this!

Grab some popcorn, sit back, and enjoy the show:

Movie of the Week: -SNIPER-

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Beyond Light

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Entering a Public Event with Style

[embedded content]

Winners: Stay tuned to @A_dmg04 on Twitter; I’ll blast a message when the goods have been delivered.
With that said, we come to a close. It’s a pleasure to write this up for you all. I can say without a doubt, it’s something I’ve wanted to do since joining Bungie.net as a community member in 2004. I have to admit, though, I sure miss Cozmo. Send him and his family some love this holiday season, as he’s added a third member to his fireteam.
As mentioned last week, there will be double XP to earn through the Clarion Calls event starting tomorrow, November 17, at 10 AM PST. Join a clan, now or during the event, to earn double XP towards Season 1 Bright Engrams by completing activities with members of your clan. Next week, we’ll host the second stream in our series about Curse of Osiris to reveal new activities on Mercury, and beyond.

Thanks for stopping by, and we’ll see you next time.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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This Week at Bungie – 11/16/2017

[Editor’s Note: Cozmo, your friendly neighborhood Community Manager, has taken a temporary leave of absence to begin work on a new passion project. Everyone at Bungie wishes him and his family all the best! Until his triumphant return, dmg04 will be lending a hand as Acting Community Manager. To let you know who you’re dealing with, we have released a series of #dmgfacts. The following is the first weekly blog update authored by a player who has been reading them for over 13 years. You have the comm, Dylan…]

This week at Bungie, we unmasked Osiris.

Curse of Osiris is the new story we’re telling in the world of Destiny 2. During our first stream, we introduced new characters and took a tour of some of the new spaces you’ll explore as you encounter them. We also squared off against a new vision of the Vex.

If you missed it, here’s the recap.

[embedded content]

Next week, we’re back with a live fire exercise to show off some of the new activities you’ll tackle on this new adventure, including the biggest public event we’ve ever delivered in Destiny and a shooting tour of the Infinite Forest.

The final stream will be all about the gear you’ll earn, including some details on new ways to earn it.

Stay tuned for more.

Defeating Dead Orbit

Tuesday morning brought a surprise to some members of the community, especially those who had assumed that Dead Orbit would continue to dominate the Faction Rallies. Reward package totals for each faction have now been tallied across PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. The result: New Monarchy has claimed victory.
 

Players who pledged their loyalty to New Monarchy may acquire the Honor’s Edge for 1,000 Glimmer. Those who pledged to Dead Orbit or Future War Cult will have the opportunity to obtain the same item for 50,000 Glimmer. No matter your allegiance, you have until 1 AM PST on November 21 to add this item to your arsenal.

There’s no need to weep over these results. Faction Rallies will return in Season 2. Changes are being made in response to player feedback and you’ll also discover new rewards you can earn. Will Dead Orbit reclaim the throne? Or will Future War Cult rise to the top? We can’t wait to find out.

Earn your Iron

 

Begins: November 21, 1 AM PST

Ends: November 28, 1 AM PST

The game is Clash.

While this will be the second round for console players, PC Guardians are invited to their first Iron Banner event. To compete, you must meet the following qualifications:
  • Complete the Destiny 2 campaign – the only way to reach the Tower
  • Visit Lord Saladin in the Tower to begin the Iron Banner Quest
  • Launch into the Iron Banner playlist

Iron Banner rewards may be earned through reputation tokens turned in to Lord Saladin. Challenges will be offered each day for additional token rewards, along with Milestones to track progress.

This Iron Banner is your last chance to earn the Season 1 Iron Banner Emblem, Shades of Radegast, granted when completing the Seasonal Milestone:

Iron Banner will return in Season 2 with new rewards and new ways to earn them.

What’s Up, DOC?

 

While I normally write the content you find in this portion of the article, Destiny Player Support is a team. Each of us are dedicated to assisting players that encounter issues when attempting to play Destiny or Destiny 2. We monitor the forums for reports of issues and provide troubleshooting steps to impacted players. Best of all, we have the chance to aid the development team as they investigate solutions.

This is our report.

As a final note, help.bungie.net has recently received an upgrade. Working with the Bungie.net team, search functionality has been improved to help players get to the content they’re looking for faster. If you encounter issues finding articles or guides, post a report to the #Help forum detailing your experience.

Reel Time

 
Even with Cozmo out of the office, Movie of the Week lives on. For those new to the ritual, we watch player-created videos that are submitted to the Community Creations page. Those that entertain us the most earn a spot in our hearts, and a sweet emblem in the game. Emblem grants may experience a slight delay before they appear in your vault. I’m a bit new to all this!

Grab some popcorn, sit back, and enjoy the show:

Movie of the Week: -SNIPER-

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Beyond Light

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Entering a Public Event with Style

[embedded content]

Winners: Stay tuned to @A_dmg04 on Twitter; I’ll blast a message when the goods have been delivered.
With that said, we come to a close. It’s a pleasure to write this up for you all. I can say without a doubt, it’s something I’ve wanted to do since joining Bungie.net as a community member in 2004. I have to admit, though, I sure miss Cozmo. Send him and his family some love this holiday season, as he’s added a third member to his fireteam.
As mentioned last week, there will be double XP to earn through the Clarion Calls event starting tomorrow, November 17, at 10 AM PST. Join a clan, now or during the event, to earn double XP towards Season 1 Bright Engrams by completing activities with members of your clan. Next week, we’ll host the second stream in our series about Curse of Osiris to reveal new activities on Mercury, and beyond.

Thanks for stopping by, and we’ll see you next time.

Cheers,

-dmg04

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This Week At Bungie –11/09/2017

This week at Bungie, we’re tallying the rally. 

The battle for resources between the factions is raging on all fronts. Can New Monarchy or Future War Cult rise to the occasion and knock Dead Orbit off their black throne? Their fates lie in your hands. 

Each leader sits on their perch in the Tower, waiting for you to do their bidding in the wild. Which one will you choose? We will find out who awarded the most packages and declare them the winner on November 14. Their banners will adorn our home and their chosen weapon will be available to all. The price you pay will depend on where you pledged your loyalty.

High Fidelity 

The holiday season is nigh, so you might be compiling your wish list. The PlayStation 4 Pro and the Xbox One X are now both out there in the wild, and either of them would make a great gift – even if it’s one you buy for yourself. We’ve seen a lot of questions about whether or not Destiny 2 would scale to meet the potential of new hardware. On this festive occasion, the answer is “Yes!”

On December 5, along with the launch of Curse of Osiris and Season Two, we’ll be deploying an update to Destiny 2 that will deliver stunning gameplay with high dynamic range (HDR) lighting to these new consoles. You’ll also see adaptive 4K resolution on the PlayStation 4 Pro and 4K on the Xbox One X.

If you’re migrating to these new consoles, or already have, we’ll make it worth your investment.

Answer the Call

Starting on November 17, the first Clarion Call for Destiny 2 will be live all weekend long. This will be an opportunity for you to earn double XP for everything you do with a fellow clan member in your fireteam. If you aren’t in a clan, this would be a perfect time to join one. Your increased gains will run from 10 AM Pacific on November 17 to 10 AM Pacific on November 20. If you are dedicated to playing solo, there will be future Clarion Calls that won’t require you to play with a clan.

Social Cues

Since the first launch of Destiny 2, we’ve seen a lot of feedback about the social features you use to share your adventure with other players. Social Designers M.E Chung and Steve Dolan are here to shed some light on Guided Games, in-game chat, and that emote wheel we talked about a few weeks ago. 

How is Guided Games going?

M.E.: Well, one thing we’re really happy to see is that Guided Games has enabled a bunch of new players to play the Nightfall and/or Raid for the first time (since Destiny 1).  Our goal with Guided Games for end-game content is about helping players find tight-knit communities to join, but we see and are very aware of the current issues. For example, we know that the lack of reconnections causes all kinds of problems with unintentional oathbreakers, that the lack of audio feedback when a clan is found is causing players to miss the queue, that guides lack proper incentives, that we need a guided games option for Trials of the Nine, etc.

Steve: We have several of our superhero engineers working on really important things, like network stability across the game, but we hope to continue making progress on Guided Games as soon as possible. Here are some short-term fixes we’ll deliver with the release of Curse of Osiris on December 5: 

  • We’ve added an audio cue so that you know when you’ve found a guide.
  • Full clans can now guide.
  • Added reminders that if you reject a clan, you’re still at the front of the line, so you can only pick guides with a mission statement that looks appealing.
  • Guided games will support the new Nightfall and Raid content you’ll find in Curse of Osiris (and you’ll learn more about that next week on our first livestream).

Why aren’t there checkpoints in Guided Games?

M.E.: The original goal was to prevent checkpoint farming (where players would start a game with a pickup group and drop right when they reached the right checkpoints to take to their buddies), but not having checkpoints causes different issues that we’re not happy with either.  We’re still looking at this.

Steve: We also wanted to make sure every player had the same expectation of where you would be starting.  When you go into a guided game, you will always start from the beginning.  We considered breaking up the starting points by checkpoints, but our fear is that if we split up the matchmaking pools on a per-checkpoint basis, we would make queue times even longer. It’s always a balancing act when putting new players together to play endgame content. 

Why can’t players talk to their clans in the game chat?

M.E.: Oh, man, we want it in the game too! Getting clan chat into the game is one of our highest priorities, and we hope we can get it into a release as soon as possible. 

Steve: And yes, we’re interested in a Tower/zone chat too, but we have to prioritize it against all of other asks. 

Will we see improvements to chat functionality?

M.E.: We can do a waaaaayyyyyy better job in the game to encourage players to communicate, like making more obvious public/team channels and a good time to enter (i.e., NOT when the player gains control when boots are on the ground), or letting players know about chat setting defaults up front when you start the game, or letting you know when someone is trying to whisper you, etc. These are the kinds of things we have on our backlogs, but again, everything is prioritized against all other asks.

What about that emote wheel we just heard about?

M.E.: Yes! No one wants this more than me, and we’re trying our best to make it happen as soon as possible.

Steve: I’ve wanted this forever! Even without an emote wheel there has been amazing content put out by the machinima community. I can’t wait to see what y’all create once the wheel is out and it’s easier to chain your favorite moves together.

Thanks for your patience, for sending feedback, and being a passionate community!

Resetting the Reset

The DPS team is always working diligently behind the scenes. They are making sure you have the info you need to have the best Destiny 2 experience. Player Support Specialists are your tireless advocates behind the scenes – in the meetings, repeating what you talk about on our forum.

This is their report.

Curse of Osiris: Reset Changes

With the release of Curse of Osiris, Ritual Resets will no longer take place at 1 AM Pacific. Starting December 5, resets will occur at 1700 UTC.

Throughout Destiny 1’s lifespan, players would frequently encounter an issue where weekly resets would not always coincide with content releases. This would prevent impacted players from earning new rewards. Countermeasures were taken by disabling activity playlists, but we were unable to prevent every scenario. Additionally, we’re seeking to align the Milestone resets with event availability, such as Trials of the Nine or Iron Banner, to provide a uniform experience for players to follow each week.

The following is a short list of time zone conversions from 1700 UTC. If you do not see your local time below, we advise using an online time zone converter to prepare for the upcoming change.
  • 9 AM PST
  • 12 PM EST
  • 5 PM GMT
  • 9 PM MSK
  • 2 AM JST
  • 4 AM AEDT
  • 6 AM NZDT

Stay tuned to help.bungie.net for future Support updates regarding the Curse of Osiris and the start of Season 2, releasing on December 5, 2017.

PC Support:

We are actively investigating general issues and crashes impacting Destiny 2 that have been reported to the PC Support forum. This chatter is helpful and we invite more of it.
Framerate Stutters or Hitches: Hotfix 1.0.6.2 was deployed this week to address issues introduced in Hotfix 1.0.6.1. Some players are reporting continued framerate stutters or hitching. We advise the following troubleshooting steps:
  • Ensure you have installed the latest Windows updates
  • Ensure you have the latest graphics drivers available for your GPU
  • Attempt running Destiny 2 in true Fullscreen mode
  • Set clock speeds for hardware, including memory, to manufacturer-recommended defaults

General Gameplay Crashes: As we continue to investigate general crash reports during Destiny 2 gameplay, we advise the following troubleshooting steps:

  • Ensure you have the latest graphics drivers available for your GPU.
    • Note: AMD Vega and AMD R9 380 GPU’s have been reported frequently to the #Help forums.
  • Set clock speeds for hardware, including memory, to manufacturer-recommended defaults.
  • Some anti-virus programs may interfere with Destiny 2. Please consider temporarily disabling the program to see if this resolves your issues. If so, please report your findings to the #Help forum.
  • If you are receiving a “Run a scan and repair” error when crashing, yet seeing no improvements after doing so, attempt installing Destiny 2 to an alternate hard drive if available.
Additionally, we are investigating reports of issues encountered when attempting to visit the Third Spire destination during Trials events. Players may circumvent this issue by using in-game vsync settings or the framerate_cap setting in their cvars.xml file to limit framerate to under 100. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp for updates on our investigation.

Movie Madness

Seen any good movies lately? We have. And now we are going to share them with you. Every week we sift through all of the good submissions on the Creations page to pick out the great ones. If your movie gets chosen, we will send you a special emblem in Destiny 2. To enter, just send your movie to the Creations page. Here are this week’s favorites. 

Movie of the Week: Voice Effects

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Fragments of Time

[embedded content]

Honorable Mention: Drawing a Nightstalker

[embedded content]

Next week, we will start a series of streams to give you more info on Curse of Osiris, Season Two, and more. The first stream is next Wednesday at 11 AM Pacific. Join us live to learn about the new stories we’ll tell.

Are you excited yet? I am. We have some cool stuff coming up and we are looking forward to sharing more of it with you soon.

<3 Cozmo

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This Week At Bungie –11/09/2017

This week at Bungie, we’re tallying the rally. 

The battle for resources between the factions is raging on all fronts. Can New Monarchy or Future War Cult rise to the occasion and knock Dead Orbit off their black throne? Their fates lie in your hands. 

Each leader sits on their perch in the Tower, waiting for you to do their bidding in the wild. Which one will you choose? We will find out who awarded the most packages and declare them the winner on November 14. Their banners will adorn our home and their chosen weapon will be available to all. The price you pay will depend on where you pledged your loyalty.

High Fidelity 

The holiday season is nigh, so you might be compiling your wish list. The PlayStation 4 Pro and the Xbox One X are now both out there in the wild, and either of them would make a great gift – even if it’s one you buy for yourself. We’ve seen a lot of questions about whether or not Destiny 2 would scale to meet the potential of new hardware. On this festive occasion, the answer is “Yes!”

On December 5, along with the launch of Curse of Osiris and Season Two, we’ll be deploying an update to Destiny 2 that will deliver stunning gameplay with high dynamic range (HDR) lighting to these new consoles.  You’ll also see adaptive 4K resolution on the PlayStation 4 Pro and 4K on the Xbox One X.

If you’re migrating to these new consoles, or already have, we’ll make it worth your investment.

Answer the Call

Starting on November 17, the first Clarion Call for Destiny 2 will be live all weekend long. This will be an opportunity for you to earn double XP for everything you do with a fellow clan member in your fireteam. If you aren’t in a clan, this would be a perfect time to join one. Your increased gains will run from 10 AM Pacific on November 17 to 10 AM Pacific on November 20. If you are dedicated to playing solo, there will be future Clarion Calls that won’t require you to play with a clan.

Social Cues

Since the first launch of Destiny 2, we’ve seen a lot of feedback about the social features you use to share your adventure with other players. Social Designers M.E Chung and Steve Dolan are here to shed some light on Guided Games, in-game chat, and that emote wheel we talked about a few weeks ago. 

How is Guided Games going?

M.E.: Well, one thing we’re really happy to see is that Guided Games has enabled a bunch of new players to play the Nightfall and/or Raid for the first time (since Destiny 1).  Our goal with Guided Games for end-game content is about helping players find tight-knit communities to join, but we see and are very aware of the current issues. For example, we know that the lack of reconnections causes all kinds of problems with unintentional oathbreakers, that the lack of audio feedback when a clan is found is causing players to miss the queue, that guides lack proper incentives, that we need a guided games option for Trials of the Nine, etc.

Steve: We have several of our superhero engineers working on really important things, like network stability across the game, but we hope to continue making progress on Guided Games as soon as possible. Here are some short-term fixes we’ll deliver with the release of Curse of Osiris on December 5: 

  • We’ve added an audio cue so that you know when you’ve found a guide.
  • Full clans can now guide.
  • Added reminders that if you reject a clan, you’re still at the front of the line, so you can only pick guides with a mission statement that looks appealing.
  • Guided games will support the new Nightfall and Raid content you’ll find in Curse of Osiris (and you’ll learn more about that next week on our first livestream).

Why aren’t there checkpoints in Guided Games?

M.E.: The original goal was to prevent checkpoint farming (where players would start a game with a pickup group and drop right when they reached the right checkpoints to take to their buddies), but not having checkpoints causes different issues that we’re not happy with either.  We’re still looking at this.

Steve: We also wanted to make sure every player had the same expectation of where you would be starting.  When you go into a guided game, you will always start from the beginning.  We considered breaking up the starting points by checkpoints, but our fear is that if we split up the matchmaking pools on a per-checkpoint basis, we would make queue times even longer. It’s always a balancing act when putting new players together to play endgame content. 

Why can’t players talk to their clans in the game chat?

M.E.: Oh, man, we want it in the game too! Getting clan chat into the game is one of our highest priorities, and we hope we can get it into a release as soon as possible. 

Steve: And yes, we’re interested in a Tower/zone chat too, but we have to prioritize it against all of other asks. 

Will we see improvements to chat functionality?

M.E.: We can do a waaaaayyyyyy better job in the game to encourage players to communicate, like making more obvious public/team channels and a good time to enter (i.e., NOT when the player gains control when boots are on the ground), or letting players know about chat setting defaults up front when you start the game, or letting you know when someone is trying to whisper you, etc. These are the kinds of things we have on our backlogs, but again, everything is prioritized against all other asks.

What about that emote wheel we just heard about?

M.E.: Yes! No one wants this more than me, and we’re trying our best to make it happen as soon as possible.

Steve: I’ve wanted this forever! Even without an emote wheel there has been amazing content put out by the machinima community. I can’t wait to see what y’all create once the wheel is out and it’s easier to chain your favorite moves together.

Thanks for your patience, for sending feedback, and being a passionate community!

Resetting the Reset

The DPS team is always working diligently behind the scenes. They are making sure you have the info you need to have the best Destiny 2 experience. Player Support Specialists are your tireless advocates behind the scenes – in the meetings, repeating what you talk about on our forum.

This is their report.

Curse of Osiris: Reset Changes

With the release of Curse of Osiris, Ritual Resets will no longer take place at 1 AM Pacific. Starting December 5, resets will occur at 1700 UTC.

Throughout Destiny 1’s lifespan, players would frequently encounter an issue where weekly resets would not always coincide with content releases. This would prevent impacted players from earning new rewards. Countermeasures were taken by disabling activity playlists, but we were unable to prevent every scenario. Additionally, we’re seeking to align the Milestone resets with event availability, such as Trials of the Nine or Iron Banner, to provide a uniform experience for players to follow each week.

The following is a short list of time zone conversions from 1700 UTC. If you do not see your local time below, we advise using an online time zone converter to prepare for the upcoming change.
  • 9 AM PST
  • 12 PM EST
  • 5 PM GMT
  • 9 PM MSK
  • 2 AM JST
  • 4 AM AEDT
  • 6 AM NZDT

Stay tuned to help.bungie.net for future Support updates regarding the Curse of Osiris and the start of Season 2, releasing on December 5, 2017.

PC Support:

We are actively investigating general issues and crashes impacting Destiny 2 that have been reported to the PC Support forum. This chatter is helpful and we invite more of it.
Framerate Stutters or Hitches: Hotfix 1.0.6.2 was deployed this week to address issues introduced in Hotfix 1.0.6.1. Some players are reporting continued framerate stutters or hitching. We advise the following troubleshooting steps:
  • Ensure you have installed the latest Windows updates
  • Ensure you have the latest graphics drivers available for your GPU
  • Attempt running Destiny 2 in true Fullscreen mode
  • Set clock speeds for hardware, including memory, to manufacturer-recommended defaults

General Gameplay Crashes: As we continue to investigate general crash reports during Destiny 2 gameplay, we advise the following troubleshooting steps:

  • Ensure you have the latest graphics drivers available for your GPU.
    • Note: AMD Vega and AMD R9 380 GPU’s have been reported frequently to the #Help forums.
  • Set clock speeds for hardware, including memory, to manufacturer-recommended defaults.
  • Some anti-virus programs may interfere with Destiny 2. Please consider temporarily disabling the program to see if this resolves your issues. If so, please report your findings to the #Help forum.
  • If you are receiving a “Run a scan and repair” error when crashing, yet seeing no improvements after doing so, attempt installing Destiny 2 to an alternate hard drive if available.
Additionally, we are investigating reports of issues encountered when attempting to visit the Third Spire destination during Trials events. Players may circumvent this issue by using in-game vsync settings or the framerate_cap setting in their cvars.xml file to limit framerate to under 100. Stay tuned to @BungieHelp for updates on our investigation.

Movie Madness

Seen any good movies lately? We have. And now we are going to share them with you. Every week we sift through all of the good submissions on the Creations page to pick out the great ones. If your movie gets chosen, we will send you a special emblem in Destiny 2. To enter, just send your movie to the Creations page. Here are this week’s favorites. 

Movie of the Week: Voice Effects

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Honorable Mention: Fragments of Time

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Honorable Mention: Drawing a Nightstalker

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Next week, we will start a series of streams to give you more info on Curse of Osiris, Season Two, and more. The first stream is next Wednesday at 11 AM Pacific. Join us live to learn about the new stories we’ll tell.

Are you excited yet? I am. We have some cool stuff coming up and we are looking forward to sharing more of it with you soon.

<3 Cozmo