Destiny 2 Staff Designer Chris Proctor revealed some huge weapon meta changes coming Season 17 in the recent “This Week at Bungie.” Read further to learn more.
Air Superiority
Do you want to kill enemies effectively even though you’re up in the air? Well apparently, you can spec into it by improving a new weapon stat called “Airborne Effectiveness.” This new stat influences several aspects of airborne gunplay. For example, the accuracy cone penalty angle for primary weapons is at a lower penalty at zero stat and no penalty when you invest 60 to 100 into airborne effectiveness. Simply put, you’ll get fewer misses due to randomness while airborne, but there’s a heavy reliance on aiming if the said stat is low.
Airborne effectiveness will come from three sources: weapon, subclass, and armor. For weapons, this stat ranges from zero to 30 depending on the weapon archetype. Legendary hand cannons, for instance, have zero to 25.
You can read more about this new stat on the game’s official website.
Changes to Special Weapons
Special weapons like snipers and shotguns are receiving some adjustments come Season 17. First, their in-air accuracy is significantly reduced. According to Proctor, the developers believe that the prevalence of one-hit kill options while airborne is not good for PvP. So, what changes can you expect?
Special weapons are going to have a slightly larger airborne accuracy penalty than, say, primary weapons, though this is reduced to zero at 100 airborne effectiveness stat. Furthermore, their airborne aim assist cone penalty will be similar to other weapons (around 50% at zero stat) and although this penalty can be reduced, it cannot be entirely removed by investing in airborne effectiveness.
Anyway, shotguns are still overwhelmingly popular in PvP. This prompted the developers to tweak this weapon archetype again to increase special weapon diversity. They will have reduced damage falloff and aim assist/magnetism falloff next season.
While sniper rifles are generally quite effective no matter what Destiny 2 content you indulge in, they are fairly slow to use, especially when aiming down sights. Don’t worry, snipers will feel snappier as their stow, ready, and aim-down sight times are reduced by 10%.
New Prime Rewards
The weapon changes probably got you so excited to play Destiny 2, but they won’t come until Season 17. However, there’s no reason to be sad as the latest round of Prime Rewards is now up for grabs.
If you have a Prime Gaming account, be sure to link it to your Bungie account to get these exciting stuff:
- Tip of the Spear Exotic Sparrow
- The Tall Tale Exotic Ship
- Drop Pod Legendary Ghost Shell
- Taunt Dance Legendary Emote
Destiny 2 is available on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.
