It has been a long time coming, but Bungie has today released the latest expansion for Destiny 2, known as The Witch Queen. The latest add-on for the long-running first-person shooter doesn’t just bring new story content for players to dig into, but a vast number of changes in a general sense have also now come to the game. Fortunately, Bungie has now released the full patch notes for this Witch Queen update to more specifically inform fans of what has been altered.
Fixed a rare issue preventing some players from launching the strike directly from the Europa map.
Fixed an issue where some players would be stuck behind a gate after they joined an in-progress run of the strike.
Fixed an issue where the dialog at the end of the campaign version of Scarlet Keep could be cut off by the end-of-activity timer.
Fixed an issue where players could sometimes be teleported to higher floors of the tower before the elevator reached them.
The launch node for this strike now appears on the Dreaming City map on the Director.
There are new copies of the Warden of Nothing Triumphs in the Legends Triumphs category. Players who previously earned these Triumphs will have that reflected in their Legacy Triumphs and Triumph score, but they may be earned again in this new spot for additional Triumph points.
Fixed a spot where players could hide from danger.
Fixed invisible geometry that hinders player traversal to the first secret chest.
Pinnacle reward sources moved to The Witch Queen raid. Vault of Glass rewards set to Powerful.
Ammo finder mods will still function.
Crates give both Heavy and Special ammo.
Invasions now trigger at 40 and 80 Mote thresholds.
The amount that gets added increases the more ticket wins you have. At the top end, each round won generates 21 Trials reputation. This should speed up Trials reputation gains by around 50 percent on average.
Stadia
PlayStation 4
PlayStation 5
Xbox One
Xbox Series X|S
These mods can be socketed into your helmet mod sockets and allow your weapons to generate Orbs of Power (functionality that has been deprecated from weapons).
These mods are automatically unlocked for all players, and work with all weapons of the appropriate damage type.
Once Masterworked, Legendary armor can swap between energy types for a cost of 10,000 Glimmer and an Upgrade Module.
Fully Masterworked Exotic armor can swap between energy types for a cost of 20,000 Glimmer and an Upgrade Module.
Dev Note: Protective Light was previously too dominant and felt too much like a must-take mod. By swapping the damage reduction values of Protective Light and Well of Tenacity, Protective Light should no longer feel like a mandatory part of every loadout, and players will need to choose between a smaller, but longer-lasting, amount of damage reduction on-demand when wounded (Protective Light) vs. a shorter-duration but stronger amount of damage reduction when picking up Void wells (Well of Tenacity).
If the required Super energy is not available, the benefit will not trigger.
Dev Note: With the introduction of Lucent Hive Ghosts and finishers being mechanically necessary to defeat them, the finisher mods have all been updated to behave differently. Now, regardless of which mods you have equipped or how much Super energy you have, you will always be able to perform finishers. If you don’t have the requisite energy, or you don’t need what the mod would grant, the benefit will not trigger, and you will not have Super energy deducted. For example, if you have the One-Two finisher equipped and you have a full melee and/or less than one-sixth of your Super energy, you will be able to perform the finisher, but you will neither gain melee energy nor be charged Super energy.
Exotic weapons from earlier than that will be updated in a later release.
The maximum you can pick up off a Special brick is one for a Shotgun, Fusion Rifle or Sniper Rifle, or equivalent for other weapons.
Scavenger adds to this as normal.
Scavenger adds to this as normal.
Precision: 0.95x
High Impact: 1.0x
Adaptive: 1.05x
Aggressive: 1.05x
Dire Promise: +4 range, +3 stability, -4 aim assist.
Waking Vigil: +6 range, +5 stability, -3 aim assist.
Jack Queen King 3: +3 range, +3 stability, -8 aim assist.
Spare Rations: +4 range, +4 stability, -9 aim assist.
Dev Note: Typically we don’t adjust stats on weapons at all post-ship, so we don’t intend to do this regularly.
Reduced stability bonus from +40 to +10.
Changed max recoil angle scale from 0.5 to 0.875.
Changed error angle scale from 0.9 to 0.975.
Void Overshield – You are armored with a protective barrier of Void Light. Reduces damage taken from combatants.
Void Invisibility – You vanish from sight, and do not appear on enemy radar. Performing offensive actions will end Invisibility.
Devour – Feast on the energy of your defeated foes. Kills restore you to full health, grant grenade energy, and extend Devour.
Void Weaken – The target takes increased damage, and has their movement speed slowed. Afflicted combatants have difficulty firing accurately.
Suppression – The target is taken out of any active abilities, and cannot activate any abilities or movement modes while Suppression persists. Afflicted combatants cannot fire their weapons.
Void Volatile – The target is afflicted with unstable Void energy, andenergy and will explode upon taking additional damage.
Split Shadowshot into two separate variants – Deadfall and Moebius Quiver.
Shadowshot: Deadfall
On impact, Deadfall Shadowshot now pulls nearby enemies into tether range before arming.
Duration of tether mark against players (the red X that is applied to tethered targets) reduced from 30s to 10s. Unchanged vs. PVE combatants.
Base direct impact damage decreased from 250 to 150.
Damage vs. combatants increased to compensate.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, but generally is significantly more damage than before.
Moved Deadfall Shadowshot to the tier 4 Super recharger tier (recharges more quickly than previous).
Shadowshot: Moebius Quiver
Each shot now fires a volley of three Void Arrows in a fan that seek to nearby enemies, Suppressing and Weakening them, and making them Volatile.
Two shots per Super; three with Orpheus Rig equipped.
Reduced base direct impact damage per arrow from 250 to 125 and reduced bonus damage vs. tethered targets from 5x to 1.2x.
Increased base damage scalars vs. PVE combatants to compensate, moving much of the tethered target bonus damage back into base impact damage in PVE.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, butcombatant but is generally within the same damage profile as the previous Moebius Quiver in terms of total damage.
All Shadowshot variants
Now suppresses the target more quickly and reliably on direct impact.
Slightly lowered the collision size of the Shadowshot projectile to reduce instances where it would get caught on doorframes in close quarters activation.
Player maximum momentum while casting Shadowshot reduced:
In-air speed reduced from 5.5m/s to 3m/s.
Ground speed reduced from 8.5m/s to 5.5m/s.
This should reduce the number of instances of players flying off ofoff cliffs, into boss stomp range, or beyond the edge of the known universe while firing their Shadowshot arrows.
Fixed an issue where Shadowshot arrows would immediately delete when impacting a Barrier Champion’s shield.
Now the default Nightstalker melee ability.
Now Weakens enemies on detonation.
Radar ping duration reduced to 5s after impact.
Deprecated as a standalone melee ability.
When the Trapper’s Ambush Aspect is equipped, your Snare Bomb will make nearby allies Invisible when it impacts a surface or enemy.
On impact, Deadfall Shadowshot now pulls nearby enemies into tether range before arming.
Duration of tether mark against players (the red X that is applied to tethered targets) reduced from 30s to 10s. Unchanged vs. PVE combatants.
Base direct impact damage decreased from 250 to 150.
Damage vs. combatants increased to compensate.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, but generally is significantly more damage than before.
Moved Deadfall Shadowshot to the tier 4 Super recharger tier (recharges more quickly than previous).
Each shot now fires a volley of three Void Arrows in a fan that seek to nearby enemies, Suppressing and Weakening them, and making them Volatile.
Two shots per Super; three with Orpheus Rig equipped.
Reduced base direct impact damage per arrow from 250 to 125 and reduced bonus damage vs. tethered targets from 5x to 1.2x.
Increased base damage scalars vs. PVE combatants to compensate, moving much of the tethered target bonus damage back into base impact damage in PVE.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, butcombatant but is generally within the same damage profile as the previous Moebius Quiver in terms of total damage.
Now suppresses the target more quickly and reliably on direct impact.
Slightly lowered the collision size of the Shadowshot projectile to reduce instances where it would get caught on doorframes in close quarters activation.
Player maximum momentum while casting Shadowshot reduced:
In-air speed reduced from 5.5m/s to 3m/s.
Ground speed reduced from 8.5m/s to 5.5m/s.
This should reduce the number of instances of players flying off ofoff cliffs, into boss stomp range, or beyond the edge of the known universe while firing their Shadowshot arrows.
Fixed an issue where Shadowshot arrows would immediately delete when impacting a Barrier Champion’s shield.
Damage vs. combatants increased to compensate.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, but generally is significantly more damage than before.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, but generally is significantly more damage than before.
Two shots per Super; three with Orpheus Rig equipped.
This increase varies by type and tier of combatant, butcombatant but is generally within the same damage profile as the previous Moebius Quiver in terms of total damage.
In-air speed reduced from 5.5m/s to 3m/s.
Ground speed reduced from 8.5m/s to 5.5m/s.
This should reduce the number of instances of players flying off ofoff cliffs, into boss stomp range, or beyond the edge of the known universe while firing their Shadowshot arrows.
This should reduce the number of instances of players flying off ofoff cliffs, into boss stomp range, or beyond the edge of the known universe while firing their Shadowshot arrows.
Now follows boss or Champion targets if they move out of the Squall area. If the boss or Champion dies, the Squall will attempt to find a new target and move toward them.
Now a standalone Super in recharge tier 5 (fastest recharge tier).
Weapons of Light outgoing damage bonus reduced from 35 percent to 25 percent.
Ward of Dawn can now take damage from Kinetic weapons.
Now casts much more quickly as a result of being decoupled from the Sentinel Shield activator.
Deprecated small shield block behavior.
Banner Shield is now the new base behavior for Sentinel Shield – large guard size, generates Orbs of Power on blocking damage, can be shot through by allies, and provides a weapon damage boost for allied players behind the caster while guarding.
Now grants a Void Overshield on kill.
Shield Toss – Throw your Sentinel Shield, which ricochets between nearby enemies. Each hit with Shield Toss grants a small amount of Void Overshield.
Banner Shield is now the new base behavior for Sentinel Shield – large guard size, generates Orbs of Power on blocking damage, can be shot through by allies, and provides a weapon damage boost for allied players behind the caster while guarding.
Damage vs. players reduced from 250hp/s to 75 hp/s.
Fixed an issue causing this projectile melee to behave as a physical melee.
Split Nova Bomb into two separate variants: Vortex and Cataclysm.
Nova Bomb: Vortex
On impact, now pulls nearby enemies into the lingering damage field.
Nova Bomb: Cataclysm
Increased travel speed by ~30 percent.
Added a short delay before Nova Bomb seekers spawn to reduce instances of them being caught in the detonation area and destroyed prematurely.
Decreased damage from the caster when shooting your own Nova Bomb.
Previously a scalar increased damage you dealt to your own Nova Bomb by 1000x; this has been reduced to 4x.
This is intended to reduce instances of accidentally destroying your Nova Bomb while in flight after firing it at a boss.
Pocket Singularity
Launch an unstable ball of Void energy that detonates when it nears an enemy, pushing targets away from the blast and making them Volatile.
Now makes the target Volatile on hit.
Now accessed via the Chaos Accelerant Aspect when Magnetic Grenade is equipped.
Nova Bomb: Vortex
On impact, now pulls nearby enemies into the lingering damage field.
Nova Bomb: Cataclysm
Increased travel speed by ~30 percent.
Added a short delay before Nova Bomb seekers spawn to reduce instances of them being caught in the detonation area and destroyed prematurely.
Decreased damage from the caster when shooting your own Nova Bomb.
Previously a scalar increased damage you dealt to your own Nova Bomb by 1000x; this has been reduced to 4x.
This is intended to reduce instances of accidentally destroying your Nova Bomb while in flight after firing it at a boss.
On impact, now pulls nearby enemies into the lingering damage field.
Increased travel speed by ~30 percent.
Added a short delay before Nova Bomb seekers spawn to reduce instances of them being caught in the detonation area and destroyed prematurely.
Decreased damage from the caster when shooting your own Nova Bomb.
Previously a scalar increased damage you dealt to your own Nova Bomb by 1000x; this has been reduced to 4x.
This is intended to reduce instances of accidentally destroying your Nova Bomb while in flight after firing it at a boss.
Previously a scalar increased damage you dealt to your own Nova Bomb by 1000x; this has been reduced to 4x.
This is intended to reduce instances of accidentally destroying your Nova Bomb while in flight after firing it at a boss.
Launch an unstable ball of Void energy that detonates when it nears an enemy, pushing targets away from the blast and making them Volatile.
Hunter:
Trapper’s Ambush
Vanishing Step
Stylish Executioner
Titan:
Controlled Demolition
Bastion
Offensive Bulwark
Warlock:
Chaos Accelerant
Feed the Void
Child of the Old Gods
Trapper’s Ambush
Vanishing Step
Stylish Executioner
Controlled Demolition
Bastion
Offensive Bulwark
Chaos Accelerant
Feed the Void
Child of the Old Gods
Echo of Expulsion
Echo of Provision
Echo of Exchange
Echo of Remnants
Echo of Reprisal
Echo of Undermining
Echo of Persistence
Echo of Leeching
Echo of Domineering
Echo of Dilation
[redacted]
[redacted]
[redacted]
[redacted]
Updated to use the new Void Invisibility buff.
Updated to use the new Void Overshield buff.
Now take 90 percent less damage from PVE combatants.
Floor: 1350 (up from 1100)
Soft Cap: 1500 (up from 1270)
Powerful Cap: 1550 (up from 1320)
Hard Cap: 1560 (up from 1330)
(The purchasable character boost has been updated accordingly and will increase your character’s Power to the new Soft Cap of 1500.)
Rahool in the Tower has risen to the challenge and can now decode Umbral engrams.
At Season start, players can focus Umbral engrams into Seasonal gear.
Focusing individual weapons and armor pieces will require two things: Having collected that gear piece before and owning the vendor upgrade for weapons or armor.
Hawkmoon
Dead Man’s Tale
Ager’s Scepter
Outbreak Perfected
Whisper of the Worm
The Fourth Horseman
Individual pieces are awarded between ranks 57 and 87.
Five in total. Each focused to a different armor piece (arms, legs, chest, class, and head).
All Umbral engrams are tier 2.
The Season Pass scrounger bonuses (bonuses which increased Seasonal weapon/armor drop chances in ritual activities) have been overhauled.
Two weapon scrounger bonuses instead of six.
The first bonus grants the player a small chance to receive earn the weapons from ritual activities. The second bonus gives an improved chance.
Total drop chance is unchanged from previous Seasons.
One armor scrounger bonus instead of three.
Like the weapon, the total drop chance for each armor piece is unchanged.
A number of rewards such as Glimmer and Legendary Shards have been consolidated to make room for high-stat armor.
A small amount of Upgrade Modules have been added.
The order some rewards are acquired has been tuned to accommodate the above changes.
To use windowed HDR, players must have the in-game HDR option enabled, and Windows 10 configured to have ‘Use HDR’ enabled for the specific display:
When playing Destiny in windowed HDR, the game will automatically swap between HDR and SDR if the window moves to a display without HDR support.
All players (SDR or HDR) that use the software OBS on Windows 10 (and up) with Window Capture: Ensure the ‘Capture Method’ is set to ‘Windows Graphics Capture’ or capturing will display a black screen. The BitBlt setting will continue to work for previous versions of Windows.
Under the hood, Destiny now uses DXGI flip model on Windows 10 (and up). More information can be found here.
Screenshots must be taken using the in-game screenshot feature.
HDR screenshots will be tone-mapped to SDR and saved as lossless PNG files.
Players in HDR will see an updated calibration UI screen to adjust their settings.
HDR calibration settings have been updated with friendlier functionality to accommodate the wide range of HDR display capabilities and viewing environments.
SDR and HDR calibration settings are no longer stored account-wide and old settings have been reset.
Display calibration settings are now stored per-platform: PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series S and X, PS4, PS5, and Stadia.
SDR brightness settings no longer affect the game when playing in HDR.
Display calibration settings are now stored per-platform: PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series S and X, PS4, PS5, and Stadia.
More details here.
He will offer a unique roll of both weapons each week.
Dismantle armor and weapons to earn Gunsmith reputation.
Banshee-44’s Daily Bounties now offer a small amount of Gunsmith reputation upon completion.
Gunsmith Materials, Mod Components, Weapon Telemetry, and Pure Matterglass Lens have been depreciated.
Ghost mods that generated Weapon Telemetries have been removed:
Arc Analyzer
Solar Analyzer
Void Analyzer
Omni-Telemetry
Banshee Special
New Gambit engrams can be spent on focused equipment from the Drifter, or be decrypted by Master Rahool.
Shaw will no longer offer repeatable bounties to new characters before they have finished A Guardian Rises, saving New Lights valuable Glimmer.
A new Exotic quest, The Queen Beckons, is available from Shaw Han for players who purchase The Witch Queen expansion.
Upon completion, the quest awards the Exotic Auto Rifle, Sweet Business.
The Blast from the Past Exotic quest has been moved to the Variks vendor on Europa.
From her overlook in the Tower Bazaar, Ikora will now teach all classes the Void abilities, Aspects, and Fragments they have yet to unlock on their character.
However, easily learning new Void abilities comes with a cost: each new ability learned requires large quantities of reprogrammable matter (Glimmer) and a nearby meditation device to expedite the process.
Returning characters with a Void subclass will have the majority of their abilities unlocked upon character login.
Grenades that were not accessible to a class prior to The Witch Queen launch will still need to be learned from Ikora.
For new characters, Ikora will offer quests to earn their Solar and Arc subclasses once they have reached her step in the A Spark of Hope questline.
Arc Analyzer
Solar Analyzer
Void Analyzer
Omni-Telemetry
Banshee Special
Upon completion, the quest awards the Exotic Auto Rifle, Sweet Business.
However, easily learning new Void abilities comes with a cost: each new ability learned requires large quantities of reprogrammable matter (Glimmer) and a nearby meditation device to expedite the process.
Grenades that were not accessible to a class prior to The Witch Queen launch will still need to be learned from Ikora.
All new characters will start with the reworked Void 3.0 subclass regardless of class.
Solar and Arc subclasses may still be unlocked for all classes via quests. These quests are available after finishing the A Guardian Rises questline and talking to Ikora Rey during the A Spark of Hope quest.
New characters will start with Void subclass abilities intended to be more friendly and appealing to new players. Additional abilities may be unlocked by talking to Ikora in the Tower.
Hunter:
Super Ability: Moebius Quiver
Class Ability: Marksman’s Dodge
Movement Ability: Triple Jump
Charged Melee: Snare Bomb
Void Grenade: Scatter Grenade
Titan:
Super Ability: Sentinel Shield
Class Ability: Towering Barricade
Movement Ability: Catapult Lift
Charged Melee: Shield Throw
Void Grenade: Magnetic Grenade
Warlock:
Super Ability: Nova Bomb: Vortex
Class Ability: Healing Rift
Movement Ability: Burst Glide
Charged Melee: Pocket Singularity
Void Grenade: Vortex Grenade
New Quest: Learning Light
During the Schism mission, players will acquire a new quest called Learning Light that teaches them more about their subclass abilities.
This quest is only available to new characters and existing characters that have not yet finished the Schism mission in the A Guardian Rises questline.
This quest is not required to complete the A Guardian Rises questline.
The second Sacrifice questline step requiring players to purchase a bounty from Shaw Han has been removed.
The Seek and Destroy questline step no longer requires completing a bounty to progress.
The Welcoming Committee questline step, where players meet Ikora for the first time, now has a new VO introduction performance for her character.
After completing the first step in the questline, Zavala will now ask players to play the first mission of The Witch Queen campaign instead of Beyond Light.
A precarious but usable path has been welded together to help New Lights climb from The Divide into the Exodus Garden 2A Lost Sector.
An issue has been resolved where players on the Guardian Rises mission would not see the Ketch fly-by performance in The Divide if another player on that same mission was already present.
Europa has been added to the destination XP-based unlock flow for New Light players.
Hunter:
Super Ability: Moebius Quiver
Class Ability: Marksman’s Dodge
Movement Ability: Triple Jump
Charged Melee: Snare Bomb
Void Grenade: Scatter Grenade
Titan:
Super Ability: Sentinel Shield
Class Ability: Towering Barricade
Movement Ability: Catapult Lift
Charged Melee: Shield Throw
Void Grenade: Magnetic Grenade
Warlock:
Super Ability: Nova Bomb: Vortex
Class Ability: Healing Rift
Movement Ability: Burst Glide
Charged Melee: Pocket Singularity
Void Grenade: Vortex Grenade
During the Schism mission, players will acquire a new quest called Learning Light that teaches them more about their subclass abilities.
This quest is only available to new characters and existing characters that have not yet finished the Schism mission in the A Guardian Rises questline.
This quest is not required to complete the A Guardian Rises questline.
Super Ability: Moebius Quiver
Class Ability: Marksman’s Dodge
Movement Ability: Triple Jump
Charged Melee: Snare Bomb
Void Grenade: Scatter Grenade
Super Ability: Sentinel Shield
Class Ability: Towering Barricade
Movement Ability: Catapult Lift
Charged Melee: Shield Throw
Void Grenade: Magnetic Grenade
Super Ability: Nova Bomb: Vortex
Class Ability: Healing Rift
Movement Ability: Burst Glide
Charged Melee: Pocket Singularity
Void Grenade: Vortex Grenade
Will be fully re-recorded in the next update.
