Fans are now just a few days away from the long awaited Destiny 2 reveal event. Bungie has promised a sizable look at the upcoming Witch Queen expansion as well as information on the brand new anti-cheat system powered by BattlEye. However, the event day also represents the start of Season 15, which has remained tighly underwraps, leaving fans to simply speculate over the name and storyline it could be following.
While that side of the season remains a mystery, Bungie has been much more forthcoming with seasonal updates to the sandbox as well as other changes. Already, the studio has detailed a ton of big changes including a massive balancing effort on nearly every Destiny 2 subclass, including nerfs to popular builds like Top Tree Dawnblade, while also poroviding major buffs to many under used classes. This week, Bungie laid out plans on how they plan to balance weapons, including a number of exotics as well.
In the latest Destiny 2 blog post from Bungie, the developer highlights a few big changes coming to certain exotic weapons. For many in the community, it was assumed that the popular grenade launcher Anarchy, a weapon which is very good in nearly all situations, would be getting a major nerf this season. While Bungie appreciates how viable the weapon is, the studio doesn't want it to dominate like it has been so it has reduced the weapon's reserve mags from 26 to 16 and reduced the damage it does against bosses by 30%.
Other nerfs include the machine gun Xenophage, which has had its rate of fire lowered from 120 to 90RPM as well as getting less of a benefit from the Machine Gun PvE damage buff. Bastion recieved a few tweaks in advance of the shotgun nerf, having its damage reduced by 15%, increased spread angle by 10%, though it did get a damage buff of 25% in PvE.
Thankfully, the rest of the list features buffs for exotics like Merciless, Fighting Lion, Jotunn, and the Vex Mythoclast. While Bungie admitted to being very cautious with Vex Mythoclast when it launched with the Vault of Glass, the studio admitted that the data showed the weapon falling short of being balanced. As such, the PvE damage has been boosted by 40%, an increase to both range, rate of fire, and stability, while also reducing the Linear Fusion Rifle mode's charge time from 820 to 533. The catalyst has also been reworked to grant additional stability and damage after a kill and players will no longer lose the Overcharge stacks when the weapon is stowed outside of Linear Fusion Rifle Mode.
The exotic changes follow on the heels of a huge list of changes to weapons coming in Season 15. Nearly every weapon type is getting adjusted in some capacity including big buffs for fusion rifles to help make them more appealing for most activities. Weapons associated with the Primary slot now have unlimited ammo, removing the white ammo blocks from the game. This change has also led to a few weapon perks like Drop Mag and Compact Arrow Shaft almost worthless, so they've been reworked to offer bonuses to reloading and handling.
Here are the full list of exotic weapon changes coming in Season 15:
Exotics:
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Anarchy Exotic Grenade Launcher
- Reduced total reserve+magazine ammunition from 26 to 16.
- Reduced damage by 30% vs bosses (Champions are not bosses).
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Xenophage
- Reduced rate of fire from 120 to 90 RPM.
- Receives less of the Machine Gun PvE damage buff.
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Fighting Lion
- Fighting Lion reserve ammo increased from "a lot" to "infinite."
- Receives the same changes as other breech Grenade Launchers.
- Reduced base reload stat to 0 (breech Grenade Launchers with 0 reload stat reload very, very slowly).
- Now increases reload speed to its previous level on damaging multiple enemies with one grenade.
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Vex Mythoclast
- PVE damage bonus increased by ~40%.
- Range stat increased to be near-best in class for high impact Auto Rifles.
- Increased stability stat.
- Reworked catalyst to grant stability and damage after a kill.
- Increased rate of fire from 360 to 390.
- Reduced Linear Fusion Rifle mode charge time from 820 to 533 (same as standard Linear Fusion Rifles).
- No longer loses overcharge stacks on stow except when in Linear Fusion Rifle mode.
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Merciless
- Updated perk to account for fewer shots per burst (should build up charge rate at the same amount per burst as before).
- Reduced the damage penalty for increasing charge rate by 40%.
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Jotunn
- Reduced charge time from 0.82s to 0.78s (i.e. charges 0.04s faster).
- Slightly reduced damage per shot.
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Bastion
- Reduced damage by 15% (can now not quite kill a Guardian with one shot in the three-shot burst it fires).
- Increased spread angle by 10%.
- Increased PvE damage by 25% (so overall around a 10% increase in PvE).
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Sweet Business
- Now refills magazine on picking up Special/Heavy ammo instead of Primary.
Destiny 2: Beyond Light is now available PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: Bungie