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Welcome to one of many Developer Insight articles for Codename: Frontiers. Over the weeks and months to come, we will be covering a lot of different topics about changes coming to Destiny 2 next year with these deeper dives. Check back with our Paving the Way for New Frontiers article for more information on our plans and and continuingly updated list of these articles that we will continue to update as they are published.
Now let’s talk about Core Game: Rewards.
Core Game, Expansion, and Event activities will feature a reworked reward offering that provides a deeper reward chase across a wider range of activities.
TLDR
- Weapons and armor will be available in a deeper range of quality across a wider range of activities.
- Core Game activities will have dedicated reward pools for different categories of activities.
- Gear will be labelled “New Gear” during the Season it is introduced and is easier to recognize and buildcraft around.
The Problem
In past Destiny Seasons, only a narrow range of activities received updated rewards, leading to a narrow selection of activities worth playing. These reward pools tended to not be very deep either, with most chases bottoming out with weapon perk rolls (or crafting recipes), and armor not mattering much at all.
These problems have resulted in shallow, unsatisfying grinds in a tiny subset of the activities actually available to play, with their best rewards being a matter of luck rather than skill or mastery.
The Solution
Weapon and Armor Tiers
Legendary weapons and armor will be available in a deeper range of quality “tiers” that layer on properties like stat bonuses, enhanced perks, and other benefits. For weapons, this will be similar to how Adept weapons upgrade the baseline Legendary.
The baseline tier of Legendary weapons and armor will be equivalent to current day Legendaries, with higher tiers being generally equivalent to Adept weapons in terms of upgrade.
Early mockups that are subject to change.
These higher tiers of weapons and armor will be available from the full range of core game activities, as rewards for higher challenge tiers and mastery of those activities.
Reward Pools
Reward pools are complete sets of weapons and armor that are available as rewards from one or more activities. Some weapons are shared across multiple pools, but the majority of weapons and all armor are unique to a single pool.
A typical pool is a full armor set for each class, and enough weapons to provide multiple options for each weapon slot.
All of these rewards are available at all tiers, so each reward pool is deep and supports a range of challenge in the activity they are associated with.
The major core game reward pools will be updated in every Major Update, and will be:
- Core PVE: Rewards shared among more accessible PVE activities, like Strikes.
- Core PVP: Rewards shared among more accessible PVP activities, like Crucible playlists.
- Pinnacle PVE: Rewards shared among more intrinsically challenging PVE activities, like Dungeons.
- Pinnacle PVP: Rewards shared among more intrinsically challenging PVP activities, like Trials of Osiris.
Every expansion also contains two full reward pools:
- Expansion Story: Rewards shared among missions, exploration, or other activities in the Expansion content.
- Expansion Raid/Dungeon: Rewards for Expansion Raid or Dungeon activities.
In addition to the above pools, some activities like Events may have additions exclusive to that activity, such as individual weapons or armor sets.
New Gear
"New Gear” will be a blanket category for all of the weapons and armor newly introduced in the current Season, regardless of source.
New Gear will receive a special visual treatment to help players identify which weapons or Armor Sets are new, and which may therefore benefit from things like Artifact bonuses.
Some Artifact bonuses which previously applied to specific perks, such as weapon Origin Traits, will now be pointed towards the wider category of New Gear instead. This should provide more and clearer buildcraft options and make for some shorter tooltips in the Artifact.
New Gear may be required in specific, optional activities where players are looking for a level playing field. For example:
- A Crucible playlist option for players who want to play with and against the newly introduced gear.
- Seasonal Events centered on posting high scores in specific activities.
FAQ
Does New Gear mean old gear is being sunset?
No, not at all. Existing gear remains unchanged and ready for use in any activity except those set aside for experimenting with new gear. It can be infused to achieve the same Power as any newly introduced gear.
The only specific advantage to using New Gear will be some Artifact synergies, comparable to Origin Trait upgrades found on existing Artifacts.
Can I still obtain old gear?
Absolutely. Exclusive gear will remain available from older activities, such as Raids, Dungeons, or Destinations.
What’s happening with weapon crafting?
Weapon crafting is not going away and will continue to be a way to craft a specific roll of a weapon.
Our intent is for crafting going forward to provide a catch-up mechanism for rolls you weren't able to nab from the original sources. This may be because that source is no longer available or was gated by lockouts when it was. But ultimately, we want crafting to support the weapon chase, and not replace it. We’ll follow up with more details in a future article.