Bungie details Destiny 2’s Crucible, Gambit, and Strike changes coming with Beyond Light

Gambit finally gets a rework this November

In its weekly blog post, Bungie revealed some Destiny 2: Beyond Light details, mostly around the game’s three core activities: Crucible, Gambit, and Strikes. But the studio also revealed the game’s new yearly armor, as well as the first new “pursuit” weapon in a few seasons.

A few weeks ago, game director Luke Smith revealed a new approach: armor refreshes and pursuit weapons. Every year, Destiny 2 will get a new set of armor for each class. The armor pieces have three variants for Crucible, Gambit, and Strikes. So while the actual armor pieces are the same no matter where you get them, the look will vary slightly based on the activity from which you picked them up.

The newest blog post gives a visual preview (seen above) and details how players can pick these pieces up. They’ll come from weekly challenges, completing activities like Crucible matches, and by ranking up Shaxx or Zavala. Bungie will retire the old sets and add a new one each year during the fall expansion.

Beyond Light will also come with a pursuit weapon for the first time in a few seasons. Toned down versions of the beloved pinnacle weapons like Recluse and Mountaintop, pursuit weapons are powerful Legendaries that come with unique perk combinations. In Season 12 and Beyond Light, players will only get a single ritual weapon, rather than one based around each of the game’s core activities.

Season 12’s ritual weapon is Adored (a name based on the weapon’s image files), and it’s a sniper rifle based on the same model as Beloved, a sniper Bungie plans to sunset on Nov. 10. It’s currently unclear what Adored’s perks are.

Players will earn this new ritual weapon by visiting Banshee-44, the gunsmith. He’ll give players a choice, letting them earn Adored by playing a ton of Crucible, Gambit, or Strikes. But once players pick their poison, they can’t go back on it.

Once players earn Adored, they can go to The Drifter, Shaxx, and Zavala to get a secondary quest, letting players compete in the various activities to earn an Ornament skin based on the activity. Players will get a new ritual weapon and three activity-based Ornaments for it each season.

Bungie also detailed some major changes coming to its core activities.

For the Crucible, Bungie plans to pare down the number of playlists yet again. Every week, players can dive into Control, Elimination, Rumble, and Survival (standard and Freelance). There will also be a weekly rotating mode, either Clash, Mayhem, or Showdown. Also, players can continue to launch private matches. Iron Banner will continue to show up once a month, and Trials of Osiris will appear weekly.

Most notably, Trials of Osiris will see Adept weapons in Season 12. In the original Destiny, Adept weapons came with bonus perks, and they were only available for players who went Flawless. Players will have to reach the Lighthouse to get these new Adept weapons in Destiny 2 as well. Bungie will fully reveal Adept weapons at a later date.

Bungie is also paring down the Strike menu.

In Beyond Light, players won’t be able to select the standard Nightfall or Daily Heroic missions anymore. Instead, the game will offer two choices: the Vanguard Strike playlist or Nightfall: The Ordeal. The functionality of both features won’t change.

The most interesting addition to Strikes is the inclusion of Adept Strike weapons. Presumably, these will function similarly to the unique, powerful perk weapons from Trials of Osiris. Bungie said they’ll detail Adept Strike weapons closer to Season 13, which takes place after Beyond Light.

Finally, Bungie is completely reworking the Gambit mode, combining Gambit Prime and Gambit into a single offering.

The new Gambit looks to mostly echo Gambit Prime, the one-round version of the PvEvP mode Bungie added in Season of the Drifter. But players will no longer have access to the Gambit Prime’s armor perks, so the studio is toning the mode down a bit.

Gathering Motes will now be a larger part of each match, with the boss fight being much faster. The studio also increased the timer between invades, meaning players need to wait 20 seconds instead of just 10 to go over and kill enemy players. “It never feels good to get invaded back-to-back,” wrote a representative from the Gambit team.

The new version of Gambit will take less time than Gambit Prime, which is already significantly faster than the original Gambit. It looks like the Gambit menu will still allow players to play private Gambit matches with friends.

As we get closer to the new release date for Destiny 2: Beyond Light, which is Nov. 10, Bungie seems to be ramping up its communication. We’ll learn more about a variety of upcoming changes throughout this month and into October.