ICYMI: Bungie Finally Solves The Blue Engram Problem In Destiny 2

Yesterday Bungie released another groundbreaking TWAB where they announced a variety of changes coming to Destiny 2. Among the changes came the huge update regarding the problematic Blue Engrams.

Blue Engrams were previously put into the game to help bridge the gap in the progression system of acquiring gear. However, for the past few years Guardians have learned to grow sick of them as they have seemingly only existed to clutter Postmaster Inboxes and player inventories. Now starting next week, Blue Engrams will no longer drop when players are at soft cap, and instead glimmer will rain out of enemies. Finally, as it should have been all along.

This is going to be a much welcome change as I have personally lost countless Prisms and Shards to Blue Engrams as they have snuck into my Postmaster box.

Alongside the big blue news, Bungie also had a variety of updates regarding Red Border Weapons, stating they will now drop at an increased rate for all the weapons they drop for in raids and the Duality Dungeon.

The Dredgen title is also getting even easier to earn now as Bungie will no longer require players to win matches for the titles. Starting next season, Dredgen will go to a match completion rate instead.

Rumble will also be returning to Destiny 2 full time and find a permanent home on the Crucible Director. This is promising news for PVP in a time where not much positive can be said about the current state. Matchmaking is in a sore state for many players and while some have enjoyed the new way Bungie finds player's a match, many have become vocal on Reddit and Twitter about how Skill Based Match Making is ruining their experience. In this TWAB, Bungie did address player feedback and concerns around player matchmaking and PVP but Bungie believes they are on the right track according to their data.

Here are some other notable points from the TWAB:

SMG Changes

• General
• Increased damage and aim assist falloff start at 0 range by ~30%.
• Adaptive SMGs lag behind Lightweights in effectiveness, dealing more body shot damage, but much less critical hit damage despite sharing the same rate of fire. To narrow this gap, we have increased their critical hit multiplier, which makes them feel more rewarding in skilled hands and increases their lethality against certain resilience values.
• Increased critical hit multiplier from 1.44 to 1.5.
• We inadvertently skipped Forensic Nightmare when we adjusted the zoom of other SMGs, so we're correcting that oversight:
• Increased Forensic Nightmare's zoom from 13 to 14.

Pulse Rifles Changes

• General
• Reduced aim assist falloff start at 100 range by ~10%.
• BxR-55 Battler is by far the most effective Legendary Pulse Rifle, in large part due to being extremely strong up close with the Legacy Frame intrinsic and highly lethal at long range with best-in-subfamily zoom. We felt the fantasy of the gun fit better with the CQB, hip-fire, aggressive style of gameplay, so we have brought the zoom down to more closely match standard Lightweight Pulse Rifles, which will open some space for other options to work in.
• Reduced BxR-55 Battler zoom from 20 to 18.

Sidearm Changes

• General
• Reduced the Season 18 aim assist falloff distance buff from 30% to 20%.

Exotics

Dead Messenger

• Reduced wave splash damage against players by 35%.

Dead Man's Tale

• Removed the damage penalty for 5 stacks of Cranial Spike.
• Reduced hip-fire and airborne aim assist cone angles by 25% on MnK.
• Reduced hip-fire cone angle bonus scaling from 20% to 5%.
• Reduced hip-fire precision aim cone angle from 3 degrees to 0.8 degrees.
• Reduced hip-fire auto aim falloff scalar from 1.5 to 1.1.

Revoker

• Reversal of Fortune now triggers on two misses within 6 seconds only granting one shot back.

Citan's Ramparts

• Increased the cooldown of the Barricade ability while Citan's Ramparts are equipped by 70%. Increased the amount of damage players deal to a Citan's Barricade by 25%.

Abilities

Increased base cooldown time of the following class abilities by 20%:

• Barricade

Touch of Thunder – Storm Grenade:

• Secondary strike damage reduced from 40 to 30.

Shotguns

• Removed stability, incoming flinch, and Shotgun pellet spread penalties while sliding.
  

Raid Date

We are also lucky to get the future Raid Date far in advance for all of us that need to prepare our sick days. The Lightfall Raid will launch March 10, 2023, at 9 AM PST.

We are sure to get even more big changes to come soon as these are simply some of the highlights. If you want to read the full list of changes for yourself check out the TWAB here!

Oh and one last thing, quit pretending like Bungie deleted your Guardian they are on to you!

What do you think of the new Lightfall changes? Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter @Suttledge