Destiny 2 Reveals Huge Changes to Exotic Weapons in The Edge of Fate

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In its regular blog updates, Bungie unveils forthcoming modifications to Destiny 2 weapons, focusing on significant enhancements to underperforming or often-overlooked exotics. With The Edge of Fate’s release date drawing nearer, Bungie provides more details to enthusiasts, offering a deeper insight into the game via a recent developer live stream and providing additional information in its weekly Destiny 2 blog post.

Bungie is stepping up its demonstrations of what’s coming in The Edge of Fate, with a series of three live streams and regular blog posts detailing updates to the main gameplay. Lately, fans have been given a clearer view of Destiny 2’s new Dark Matter abilities, which not only offer new ways for players to navigate Kepler but also create fresh combat scenarios. This week, Bungie shared insights on how weapons will be developing when the expansion is released.

In its latest blog post, Bungie highlighted weapon adjustments in the Edge of Fate update, such as staged reloads for Machine Guns, less responsive projectile tracking on Glaives, and modifications to certain perks. Additionally, Bungie announced upcoming significant enhancements for some underutilized or underperforming exotics like The Navigator, Worldline Zero, Devil’s Ruin, and Dead Man’s Tale. For the peculiar Tommy’s Matchbook exotic auto rifle in Destiny 2, Bungie plans to reduce the damage players take and extend the duration that Ignition Trigger stays active even when not firing the weapon.

In the Edge of Fate update, Bungie is making significant changes to the Hierarchy of Needs combat bow from the Spire of the Watcher Dungeon. This exotic bow has been somewhat limiting in its usability, so the enhancements are meant to provide more versatility. From now on, any strike by the Hierarchy of Needs will accumulate Guidance Ring charges, up to a maximum of 3 to deploy the ring. The duration of the ring has been extended to 20 seconds, and it now rotates towards the player. Furthermore, any allies wielding bows can now benefit from the Guidance Ring as they all generate missiles when firing through it.

In addition to exciting updates, Bungie has also verified that certain weapons will acquire a unique capability to stun different types of enemies in Destiny 2. Weapons like Queenbreaker, Salvation’s Grip, and Dragon’s Breath now function against Unstoppable enemies, while Tractor Cannon, D.A.R.C.I., and Two-Tailed Fox can stun Overload champions. The weapon Conditional Finality works against either Overload or Unstoppable depending on the currently active element. For improved understanding, weapons displaying an anti-champion symbol in the inventory will no longer receive additional boosts from the Artifact or effects similar to radiance.

Destiny 2 Edge of Fate Exotic Weapon Changes

Vigilance Wing

To ensure fairness between traits like Alacrity and Last Stand from Vigilance Wing, we’ve adjusted the Last Stand trait so it can now be activated during single-player PvE missions.

  • Last Stand bonus is now active when running solo in PvE activities.

Hierarchy of Needs

The current implementation of the Hierarchy of Needs in the game seems overly restrictive, limiting the player’s actions excessively. To enhance the weapon’s versatility without compromising its magical essence, we decided to allow it to interact with other bows, either held by your allies or yourself. This change aims to provide a more flexible and engaging gaming experience.

  • Players now gain charges of Guidance Ring with any hit from Hierarchy of Needs, and now only need three charges to deploy the ring.
  • Hierarchy’s spawned Guidance Ring duration increased from 13s to 20s.
  • Hierarchy’s spawned Guidance Ring now rotates to face its owner.
  • Players are now limited to one Guidance Ring in the world per player. Spawning a second one will remove your previous ring.
  • All Bows now spawn missiles when fired through an allied player’s Guidance Ring.
    • Yes, all Bows.
  • Fixed an issue where Hierarchy’s seeker missiles would not play detonation visual effects when colliding with world geometry.

Dead Man’s Tale

Over time, Dead Man’s Tale has earned a certain status within the Crucible, yet it’s occasionally underperformed in Player versus Environment (PvE). To address this issue, we’ve implemented some changes aimed at minimizing its extended reload duration and increasing the incentive for precise headshots.

  • Each stack of cranial spike now grants:
    • +3.4% damage vs combatants (max 17% at 5 stacks)
    • +1 rounds reloaded

Duality

As a dedicated admirer, I must admit that the recent adjustments to Duality were commendable, yet fell slightly short of our expectations. To enhance its performance in single-target engagements, we’ve decided to loosen the trigger on its trait perk, enabling it to ramp up consistent damage more smoothly.

  • Added a secondary activator for On Black Wings, now gives the buff when landing most of your pellets on a target

The Navigator

The Navigator, though intriguing and exotic, has seemed somewhat limited due to its woven-mail weaving and knot-making abilities. To enhance its utility, we’ve boosted the effectiveness of its weapon when the user is employing it for its primary function while wearing woven mail.

  • When the user has Woven Mail:
    • Increased damage
      • 25% in PVE
      • 5% in PVP
    • Increased ammo generation stat

Wicked Implement

We’ve increased the speed at which Wicked Implement fires to match its intended gameplay style more closely. Additionally, due to the recent modifications to how Stasis interacts with characters, we’ve made Wicked Implement inherently anti-overload to align it with Stasis’s role within the game environment.

  • Now is Rapid Fire RPM.
  • Now takes one additional hit to start slowing and to freeze to account for the faster rate of fire.
  • Increased magazine size to 20,
  • Is now intrinsically anti-Overload.

Heartshadow

Using heavy swords can be challenging due to their rapid ammo consumption rate. This swift depletion makes it difficult to decide when and where to employ them effectively, particularly for a weapon like Heartshadow that thrives on strategic peeking in and out of invisibility to clear minor threats. With these modifications, we’ve emphasized more on the fantasy associated with such gameplay.

  • Increased ammo reserves.
  • Reduced cost of heavy attack to three (from four).
  • Added: “Defeats while Shot in the Dark is active make you invisible once more.”

Worldline Zero

As a dedicated gamer, I’ve always enjoyed wielding Worldline for its unique swordplay, but ever since it lost the skating feature and Eager Edge made its entrance, it seems to have taken a backseat in most players’ hands. To give it a fresh breath of life, we’re focusing on amplifying its Tesseract ability, making swift, agile teleports more prominent and distinct, so gamers can master the art of rapid positioning and gain an edge in combat.

  • Increased lunge distance of the heavy Tesseract attack by 3m.
  • Removed the ability to chain two blink attacks back to back.
  • Added a new effect: “Defeating a target with Tesseract allows you to Tesseract again for a short duration.”
    • These extra blink attacks cost less ammo and consumes less guard energy.

Devil’s Ruin

The weapon known as Devil’s Ruin has been perceived as repetitive for quite some time. We’ve revamped this Exotic to eliminate its automatic firing upon release, and we’ve also made the beam mode more enticing after it has been activated.

  • Removed fire on release behavior.
  • Beam is now behind special reload.
  • Kills with the weapon make firesprites and picking up a firesprite enables the special reload.
  • Beam now scorches on hit and ignites on kills.
  • Increased magazine size to 20.
  • Is now intrinsically anti-unstoppable.

Tommy’s Matchbook

Tommy’s Matchbook encounters problems with durability and user-friendliness. Our updates aim to enhance the gameplay, ensuring players can keep the Ignition Trigger active even during brief pauses in firing, and offering built-in methods for regenerating lost health without eliminating the building aspect entirely. We also aimed to motivate players to use hip-fire more frequently with this weapon and improve how self-damage is displayed both to the user and other players.

  • General
    • Added a burning screen effect while the player takes self-damage from Ignition Trigger. Other players who are taking self-damage from Ignition Trigger will now have a burning effect surrounding their model.
  • Ignition Trigger
    • The HUD buff now appears as a bar. While Ignition Trigger is active, the bar charges as you fire the weapon and drains when you don’t. So long as the bar has some charge, Ignition Trigger will remain active.
  • Heat Sink
    • Hip-fire self-damage decreased to 50% less damage than ADS self-damage, previously 33% less damage.
    • Catalyst
      • Removed improved health regen. Now final blows while Ignition Trigger is active grant Cure x1 to the user.
    • Scorch on hit is unchanged.

Winterbite

After the significant overhaul of melee damage mechanics, the constant effect on Winterbite was found to provide excess, unpaid-for damage, particularly when compared to Swords. Similar to Wicked Implement, Winterbite will now inherently counteract Overload to match the adjustments made to Stasis Shatter’s Champion stunning mechanism.

  • Reduced enhanced melee damage with ammo to +20% vs bosses, down from +50%
    • This is to account for this now being able to recieve melee damage bonuses from a variety of sources.
  • Is now intrinsically anti-Overload.

Anti-Champion Changes

These specific weapons retain their current balance, but now possess inherent abilities to counter Champions:

1. The first weapon is the Valorheart. This sword has always shown great prowess on the battlefield, and now it can withstand even the most formidable of Champions.

2. Next up is the Stormclaw Hammer. Known for its devastating blows, this hammer now comes equipped with a unique ability to neutralize Champions effectively.

3. Lastly, we have the Voidbringer. This powerful rifle has been modified to counteract Champions, making it an essential tool in any battle against them.

In essence, these weapons have been upgraded to include anti-Champion capabilities, allowing players to face their foes with greater confidence and effectiveness.

  • Anti-Unstoppable
    • Queensbreaker
    • Salvation’s Grip
    • Dragon’s Breath
  • Anti-Overload
    • Tractor Cannon
    • DARCI
    • Two-Tailed Fox
  • Conditional Finality can be anti-Overload or anti-Unstoppable depending on which element is active.

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2025-07-04 16:15