Bungie Previews Destiny 2's Next Big Update

Following the release of the most recent hotfix update, Bungie has revealed the first details about Destiny 2’s next update. Patch 2.6.1 is expected to launch on October 29, which is shaping up to be a big day for the game between the launch of the Halloween-themed Festival of the Lost, the new dungeon, the new Momentum Control PvP mode, and the Xenophage Exotic quest. But in terms of the update launching on that day, Bungie has outlined some of the balance changes we can expect, and it’s not good news if you’re a fan of a particular Titan or Warlock Super ability.

The Super changes impact Titan’s Striker (the Code of the Juggernaut path) and Warlock’s Dawnblade (the Attunement of Flame path). In both cases, moves are being made to reduce the amount of Super energy you can regain by killing enemies with the Super, thereby extending its duration.

“For a while now, Trample and Everlasting Flames have been an outlier, especially in PvP,” Bungie explained. “We’ve previously done a pass to add diminishing returns to this but it’s proven to not be enough. In this update, we’ve tightened the curve a bit and split it out over PvE and PvP. This should allow Guardians to keep dunking on combatants for longer while being less oppressive against one another.”

Striker also gets a further nerf, increasing the cost of the Super’s light attack, which players use to get around more quickly, and the regeneration effect is no longer available for Super kills.

“We still want this to be used as a way to run people down or dodge and be shifty, but this change should make it costly enough as to be prohibitive as a form of long-distance travel,” Bungie said. “Finally, regeneration will no longer proc on melee kills while in Super. The combination was just too strong and overly forgiving of strategic or positional mistakes.”

Additionally, the Armor of Light timer provided by Titans’ Ward of Dawn now lines up with the life of the Ward, and a bug that allowed 1-2 Punch’s damage buff to apply to shoulder charges has been removed.

Phantasmal Cores, a new item in Shadowkeep, will no longer be capped to three in your inventory; with the update, you’ll be able to stack up to 999 of them. Forsaken’s Supers will finally display the correct icon in the HUD during PvP matches, and there have been some improvements to the inventory while in space flight. Specifically, a bug has been addressed that caused gear previews to take longer than they should, which should let you see gears and preview ornaments or shaders more quickly while in space flight.

Beyond what’s outlined in the preliminary patch notes, Bungie said it’s “aware of feedback about other abilities and gear” that it hasn’t outlined in this particular blog post. It called out One Eyed Mask in particular, saying to “expect a change in a future update,” though it didn’t share anything further.

Destiny 2 Update 2.6.1 Early Patch Notes

Striker – Code of the Juggernaut (Bottom Path)

• Trample:
  • Tuned the amount of Super energy returned per kill
    • Reduced amount returned possible per kill from 15% to 13% (before diminishing returns)
    • Reduced the low end of the diminishing returns from 5% to 3.25%
    • Changed the kills for the diminishing returns by splitting them out between players and combatants
      • Previously it was 15 kills. Now it is 14 combatant kills or 7 player kills (players count for 2X towards diminishing returns)
  • Cost of light attack in super increased by 50% from 2% to 3%
  • Regeneration on kill no longer procs on super kills

Dawnblade – Attunement of Flame (Bottom Path)

• Everlasting Flames:
  • Tuned the amount of Super energy returned per kill (handled differently than Striker as this attack in an AoE)
    • Increased the low end of the diminishing returns from 0.75% to 0.95%
    • Changed the kills for the diminishing returns by splitting them out between players and combatants
      • Previously it was 30 kills. Now it is 21 combatant kills or 7 player kills (players count for 3X towards diminishing returns)

QUALITY OF LIFE AND BUG FIXES:

Sentinel – Code of the Protector (Top Path)

• Ward of Dawn:
  • Armor of Light timer now correlates with the life of the Ward of Dawn
  • Particle FX move more rapidly towards the end of the Ward of Dawn’s life

Nightstalker – Way of the Wraith (Middle Path)

• Shattering Strike:
  • Fixed a bug in which Shattering Strike activation window was reduced to 3 seconds along with Truesight
    • Shattering strike last the proper 9 seconds once again

Shoulder Charge We’ve removed a bug that allowed players to shoot immediately before activating shoulder charge, which allowed players to apply the 1-2 Punch damage buff to shoulder charge. This bug was caused by a quality of life change made for Tempest Strike. Before Shadowkeep, if player’s had the sprint button configured as “hold to sprint”, then they would need to be holding the sprint button while sliding in order to activate Tempest Strike. With the release of Shadowkeep, we added a small window of time where players could activate Tempest Strike after letting go of the sprint button. This change had unexpected effects on other melee abilities, so we have reverted this change until we can find a better fix for Tempest Strike.

OTHER:

• Forsaken subclasses will display the correct super icon in the PvP HUD for the following Subclasses:
  • Thundercrash
  • Burning Maul
  • Blade Barrage
  • Spectral Blades
  • Nova Warp
  • Well of Radiance
  • Chaos Reach
• Fixed a bug where Warlocks who wagered Weak Motes in Reckoning were incorrectly being rewarded Titan gear
• Fixed a bug that increased loading times for gear preview while in space flight.
• Players should notice their character models update more quickly while changing gear, previewing ornaments, or previewing shaders during space flight
• Phantasmal Core stack cap raised from 3 to 999

Steam

• Blocking Communication with Players in Steam will now block/mute Players in Destiny 2
• Added Functionality for /addfriend and /removefriend commands
  • /addfriend [ PlayerName ]
  • /removefriend [ PlayerName ]
  • Note – Players must be in one of your Rosters (Fireteam, Friends, or Clan) in order to Add/Remove them as a Friend
• Added Functionality for /invite command
  • /invite [ PlayerName ]
    • Note – Players must be in one of your Rosters (Fireteam, Friends, or Clan) in order to Invite them by PlayerName
  • /invite [ SteamID ]
    • Note – You can Invite Players by SteamID, regardless of if they’re in your Roster or not
• Players can now /invite and /join another Player regardless of their Steam Online Status (‘Online’, ‘Invisible’ or ‘Offline’)
• /help description updated to reflect new changes to commands