Destiny 2's upcoming expansion Beyond Light will add plenty of content, but will also see changes implemented throughout the game's weapons.
In a new blog post, Bungie revealed a host of changes coming to Hand Cannons, Sniper Rifles, Auto Rifles and more.
Destiny 2 Beyond Light Will Make Huge Changes To Weapons and Gunplay
Hand Cannons
Aggressive frame hand cannons will get a boost to their rate-of-fire in Beyond Light, while Adaptive and Precision frame will have a larger magazine and less damage falloff.
Lightweight frame is being renamed to Adaptive, and guns with this frame will have a reduction to their rate of fire.
“Lightweight Hand Cannons represent the majority of Hand Cannon usage in the Crucible," Bungie explained, so they're looking to shake up that particular meta.
Sniper Rifles
Sniper rifles will now have aim assist of varying degrees, depending on your scope.
A lower zoom scope will have less aim assist, while a higher zoom scope will offer more.
Auto Rifles
Auto Rifles are getting a slight nerf to damage, with Adaptive frame variants dropping overall damage from 15.75 to 14.25.
This is because a recent buff made them a little too powerful.
Scout Rifles
Scout rifles will get a similar aim assist boost to Sniper rifles.
Rocket Launcher
Expect more ammo in your reserves (at last!).
Exotic Changes
You can check out the full list of updates to both weapon types and exotics below, but the big takeaway from the latter is that Mountaintop is being nerfed, as is Falling Guillotine.
Check out all the changes below.
Weapon Changes Coming In Beyond Light
Hand Cannons
Aggressive
- Increased RoF from 110 to 120.
- Broke out Aggressive Hand Cannons, allowing custom tuning of stats (e.g. damage falloff for 100 range in this subfamily now starts at 32m).
Adaptive and Precision
- Range stat now has more impact on minimum damage falloff range for both archetypes.
- Damage falloff for 100 range now starts at 25m, was 20m.
Precision Hand Cannon
- (180 RoF) magazine scaled up by 37 percent.
- Note: This also affects Exotics with that rate of fire.
Lightweight (folded in to Adaptive)
- Moved all Lightweight Hand Cannons (150 RoF) to the Adaptive subfamily (140 RoF).
- This includes Luna’s Howl and Not Forgotten.One Exotic Hand Cannon will retain 150 ROF.We aren’t going to leave it to speculation.It’s beautiful.It does solar damage.It makes enemies explode.It’s Sunshot.
Sniper Rifles
- Adjusted how aim assist (AA) is affected by Sniper Rifle zoom level. Lower zoom scopes have less AA, higher zoom scopes have more, scopes with around 50 zoom are unchanged.
- Lowest-zoom scopes have a large reduction in AA cone angle.
- Highest-zoom scopes have a small increase.
Auto Rifles
Adaptive
- Damage per bullet reduced from 15.75 to 14.25.
- Note: Prior to Season of the Worthy, damage per bullet was 13.75.
Scout Rifles
- Increased how much each point of the AA stat widens the AA cone.
- At maximum, the AA cone is now 15 percent wider.
Rocket Launchers
- Increased reserves by 1 or 2 rockets depending on Inventory stat.
General
Perks
Outlaw
- The reload speed increase felt insufficient with certain subfamilies and combinations of rolls (e.g. Aggressive Hand Cannons).
- Increased reload stat bonus from +50 to +70.
Merciless
- Increased inventory stat from 36 to 55 (this increases reserve ammo).
Mountaintop
- We’ve had a ton of feedback that Mountaintop feels a bit over the top in Crucible modes. This Pinnacle weapon has had ample time to shine, so we’re taking it down a notch.
Specific pain points:
- A one-shot body shot with infinite range.
- Quick and easy cleanup of wounded Guardians, even around corners.
- Deals high splash damage, rewarding players for inaccuracy.
- Perfect in-air accuracy allows airborne Guardians to rain down death, and there’s not much grounded Guardians can do to respond.
- Here are the changes intended to address those points:
- Reduced splash damage by 33 percent, increased impact damage such that total damage is 5 percent lower than before.
- Reduced projectile velocity multiplier from the Micro-Missile perk from 1.4 to 1.2. (i.e., now 20 percent faster than other breech Grenade Launchers instead of 40 percent).
- Reduced in-air accuracy. Now has significant projectile error while in-air (around 7 degrees without the Icarus Grip mod, substantially less with).
Falling Guillotine
- Reduced heavy attack damage by ~24 percent to bring in line with other Swords.
- Note: Falling Guillotine will continue to be slightly above average, just not to the extent that it is now.
MIDA Multi-Tool and MIDA Mini-Tool
MIDA Mini-Tool
- Moved the “Mida Synergy” trait to the intrinsic, similar to how the (Baroque) version works
- Added the following perks:
- Hip-Fire Grip
- Kill Clip
- NOTE: There is an issue with the masterwork on this weapon that prevents it from being upgraded. This will be fixed in a later update.
- NOTE: The Gunsmith will begin selling a version of this weapon on November 10 with no infusion cap.
Sturm and Drang
Drang
- Moved the “Together Forever” trait to the intrinsic, similar to how the (Baroque) version works
- Added the following perks:
- Accurized Rounds
- Moving Target
- NOTE: There is an issue with the masterwork on this weapon that prevents it from being upgraded. This will be fixed in a later update.
- NOTE: The Gunsmith will begin selling a version of this weapon on November 10 with no infusion cap.
Ruinous Effigy
- Transmutation Spheres
- Reduced the damage of the aerial melee attack by 25%
- Significantly reduced the damage of the drain effect on enemy combatants
Arbalest
- No longer strikes shields multiple times, but its efficacy against shielded targets has been increased.
Jade Rabbit
- Armor Piercing Rounds swapped to High Caliber Rounds.
- This fixes an issue that could prevent the exotic perk from triggering.
For more on Destiny 2, be sure to check out our rundown of all of the new exotic weapons we know about coming in Beyond Light here.
We've also got some hints at a character returning later this year.
Find out who it could be here.
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