A new Destiny expansion is always a momentous occasion, and the same holds for Lightfall. It releases on February 28th for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, and PC and includes the Season Pass for Season 20. Along with new content, missions and loot, various new features and changes are coming to the base game. Here are 14 things you should know before diving into the expansion.
Story
If you’ve been following the story (cue: “Destiny has a story?!” jokes from 2014), The Witness and the Black Fleet will arrive in the Solar System soon. The Guardians travel to Neptune, a place that didn’t suffer a Collapse. Instead, it’s thriving under the cybernetically augmented Cloud Striders. When The Witness and his new Disciple, Calus, target Neptune, the Vanguard teams with the Cloud Striders to halt their advance and protect the city of Neomuna.
Neomuna
Neomuna is the new destination players will traverse in Lightfall. There are extensive skyscrapers and neon lights, restaurants and arcades, and much more to explore. However, structures and outposts belonging to Calus’s troops also appear. The recent “Neomuna Environment” trailer also hinted at a new Vex domain which both the Cabal and Guardians target. It may be the location for a potential new Strike or simply a story mission.
Strand
Strand is the newest subclass players will wield as part of the Darkness. Warlocks become Broodweavers, launching missiles and creating minions; Hunters are Threadrunners, using a rope dart for sweeping attacks; and Titans become Berserkers, armed with two Strand claws to tear at enemies. All classes gain the ability to grapple with Strand, which opens up the traversal options available during fights and exploration. One combination involves grappling onto a Thundercrash Titan and riding them across the area onto some enemies.
Enemies
Unfortunately, the campaign has its share of reskinned enemies, at least going by trailers. Calus has the Shadow Legion, which appears to be the same Cabal units seen for years now, and the Vex are also a threat. Fortunately, there is a new Elite unit called a Tormentor, who wields a massive scythe. It can also pull Guardians with telekinesis and deal lots of damage.
New Weapons and Armor
As much praise as Destiny’s gameplay gets, the shooting and abilities are only half the story. The other half is the loot, and Bungie’s done a pretty good job in the past year of delivering unique Legendary weapons and Exotics. We’ve already seen hints of a new Auto Rifle, Heavy Grenade Launcher, Sniper Rifle, and Pulse Rifle in Lightfall, each with neon designs. There’s also the Quicksilver Storm Exotic, available for those who pre-order the Lightfall Deluxe Edition, which fires like an Auto Rifle and preps grenades after accumulating enough charge. Even more new Exotics and armor, including the 80s action hero-style sets from the trailers, can be expected.
Legendary Campaign
The Witch Queen received a fair amount of praise for its missions and story. However, the Legendary Campaign was a great new addition, allowing players to complete the story missions at a higher difficulty. This provided double rewards at select encounters, with high Power loot, upgrade materials, and a choice between two new Exotic gear pieces. The good news is that Lightfall will also have a Legendary Campaign, though it remains to be seen if there are any changes.
New Raid
Like previous expansions, Lightfall will have a raid, which goes live on March 10th at 9 AM PST. The only thing we know about it currently is that a “haunting presence” is detected in an unknown location. Of course, the Guardians must investigate and learn about this “threat,” as Bungie describes it. The World’s First race returns, which means Contest Mode should be active within the first 24 hours of the raid’s launch. Otherwise, expect new weapons, armor and maybe an Exotic tied to the experience.
Loadouts
Along with the new expansion, Bungie will release a massive new update benefitting all players. It adds Loadouts, with the ability to create a gear loadout with mods, weapons and armor, and then save it as a format to switch to. Each character in a player’s account can have up to ten loadouts, with different icons and colors as labels corresponding to activities like Crucible, Gambit, Raids, and so on. Three loadouts are available from the start, and you can unlock more by progressing through the new Guardian Ranks system.
Crafting Changes
Crafting is also undergoing major changes with more ways to earn Deepsight currencies. However, from Lightfall onwards, non-craftable weapons won’t have Deepsight versions, thus heavily reducing the number of Deepsight drops and Vault clutter. There’s still more to be revealed, but the next raid’s Adept weapons will have access to Enhanced perks, so there’s that.
Mod Changes
All standard mods have been unlocked for players to experiment with, eliminating any need to visit Ada-1 daily. The Season 20 update further streamlines mods by adding a mod customization screen where equipped armor and weapons are displayed. More importantly, mods will no longer have Energy types, and their overall cost is being reduced, providing more opportunities for customization.
The Combat Mod socket is also turning into an additional mod socket, which means that Charged With Light and Elemental Well mods will now become Armor Charge mods. Players will now gain stacks of Armor Charge based on the mod, which can go up to six. Effects can range from passive as long as you have Armor Charge stacks (though these will decrease by one every ten seconds) or consuming stacks for an immediate benefit depending on the requirement. Unfortunately, some mods like Warmind Cells are being deprecated, so enjoy them while they last.
Elemental Well Changes
Elemental Wells have helped provide ability regeneration, added weapon damage and more since their introduction, but they’re undergoing some changes. They’re now broken up into five different materials based on your subclass. Arc gets Ionic Traces, Void gets Void Breaches and so on. Based on the Fragment equipped to your subclass and the elemental damage type, you can generate these Wells by slaying enemies.
Artifact Mod Changes
The seasonal Artifact has been a means to increase Power level if they fell short on any gear while encouraging different play-styles and weapons. Unfortunately, this could make things restrictive, especially since their mods took up space in armor. From Lightfall onwards, Artifact mods are now perks that are unlocked and apply throughout the season.
Anti-Champion mods are rolled into this, so if you unlock the Anti-Barrier perk for Pulse Rifles in Season 20, it will apply to all weapons in that type. You can only have 12 seasonal perks active at a time, so some trade-offs are necessary, but it’s a marked improvement over the current system.
Anti-Champion Changes
Champions are still kind of a headache since there’s only one method – Anti-Champion mods – to deal with them. Thankfully, it’s expanding to include subclass damage as well. For example, instead of an Anti-Barrier mod, you can use Volatile Rounds, become Radiant or use Strand to take down a Barrier Champion. Overload Champions can be disrupted with Jolt, suppressing them with Void or slowing them with Stasis. Finally, Unstoppable Champions can be stopped by blinding, encasing and shattering them with Stasis, triggering a Solar ignition and using Strand.
Focusing Changes
In Season 20, players can focus Vanguard weapons and armor, which includes Nightfall weapons. You can even focus Adept Nightfall weapons, though this requires new Adept Nightfall Ciphers from Grandmaster Nightfalls (and not Adept Nightfalls, despite the naming). Various Legacy armor sets and weapons for Vanguard, Gambit, Crucible and Iron Banner will also be able to focus. New weapons are being added to the Crucible, Trials and Vanguard loot pools, though some (like Horror’s Least) are leaving when Season 19 is over. Get ’em now while you still can.
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