Yesterday Destiny 2 launched the somewhat mysterious and highly anticipated Season of the Haunted. With season 17 a lot of new things were added, changed or adapted, something that is hard to keep track of. One of the simplest is giving players access to solar 3.0, though there is also a new activity, dungeon, vender and so much more to explore. To make it easier, we wanted to make a brief guide detailing some of the bigger and easier to miss elements of this new season.
Update: This week at Bungie and additional play time confirmed a couple things that have since been corrected.
Your Guide to Destiny 2 Season 17
Seasonal Exotic Weapon – Trespasser
The somewhat popular exotic sidearm from Destiny 1, Trespasser, returns in Season 17. While the exotic perks are basically the same, it now sports Full Bore, Ricochet Rounds and Smooth Grip. Claiming it will give a quest via the Gunsmith for the catalyst, which after defeating a target and reloading, increases target acquisition and ADS speed. At paid season pass level 100, it gains an ornament that looks similar to this seasons weapons.
New Exotic Armor
This season each class was given a new piece of armor. While there is currently no confirmation on how to obtain them, they will most likely be awarded to solo Lost Sector completions like the previous new exotics. Like previous new exotic armor pieces, they can be obtained through solo Lost Sectors.
Titan – Second Chance
Titan’s new gauntlet gives a second shield charge that not only pierces, it also stuns Barrier Champions.
Hunter – Caliban’s Hand
This gauntlet gives Proximity Knife an explosion and ignites targets on a direct hit. It also increases melee regeneration until it explodes.
Warlock – Rain of Fire
This leg armor improves the effectiveness of arial Fusion Rifle and Linear Fusion Rifles, adds reload to Air Dodge and final blows grant radiant.
New Dungeon – Duality
As previously revealed, this season adds a new dungeon. Unfortunately, this is paid content and has its own purchase that can be seen on the Eververse store. Currently, Duality is set to release on May 27, but some information about loot and objectives were revealed.
New Exotic Weapon – Heartshadow
The exotic for dealing with Duality is an interesting sword called Heartshadow. The exotic perks are Exhumation, heavy attacks with full sword energy fire Void projectiles and turn you invisible, with the other being Shot in the Dark, which increases power by remaining invisible and debuffs enemies with the projectiles while this trait is active. There is also a catalyst, though the conditions to unlock are currently unlock, but datamined information reveals it makes you faster while invisible. It also features a season inspired ornament, though said ornament is Silver only this season.
Finally, thanks to the triumphs associated with this season, we know this will be a random drop from Duality and not guaranteed like Gjallarhorn.
Important Triumphs
While a random drop is going to discourage some players, especially if there is a lockout like the raids, there are five triumphs that increase the drop rate.
- Complete Duality without dying
- Complete Duality solo
- Complete Duality solo without dying
- Complete Duality on Master
- Steal Calus’ repressed memories
Each of these are their own task, so if you can’t win without dying you can still unlock solo, with the last one likely being some kind of optional collectible or possibly time-gated content.
Like most dungeons, finishing it gives an emblem, as does solo without dying. Those who finish on Master also unlock the exotic ship Mandate of Strength.
Solar 3.0
As previously revealed, this season revamps Solar and offers a variety of new ways to play. To make things simpler, you can find the changes in Bungie’s patch notes. Beyond that, like Void, speaking to Ikora will unlock additional grenades and aspects. Right now two aspects are not unlockable, Ember of Empyrean and Ember of Char, which might unlock from the dungeon or some other event this season. Ember of Empyrean, Ember of Char, Ember of Ashes and Ember of Wonder will unlock when the community hits 20 million Nightmare Containments completions.
New Activity – Derelict Leviathan
Right now players can explore a twisted version of the original raid area, Leviathan. The main activity there are public events, where players fight waves of enemies followed by a boss, that awards new gear.
There is also missions that explore the narrative throughout the season referred to as Sever missions. This is important to note as some quest and mission progress requires one over the other.
New Gear – Trials
If you missed the previous announcement, this season Trials is getting a Fusion Rifle, Sidearm, new armor and even an exotic ship/sparrow. These are some lovely pieces of gear, though expect the cosmetics to require flawless to unlock.
New Patterns
The following weapons can be crafted once the pattern is unlocked:
- Auto Rifle – Firefright
- Hand Cannon – Austringer
- Scout Rifle – Tears of Contrition
- Sidearm – Drang (Baroque)
- SMG – CALUS Mini-Tool
- Fusion Rifle – The Epicurean
- Glaves – Nezarec’s Wisper
- Shotgun – Without Remorse
- Sniper Rifle – Beloved
- Trace Rifle – Hollow Denial
- Machine Gun – Fixed Odds
- Rocket Launcher – Bump in the Night
New Catalyst – jötunn
Lucky players can now earn a jötunn catalyst by playing Strikes, Gambit or Crucible. Unlocking it gives faster charging when surrounded and applies Scorch, which spreads on kills.
Raid Changes
One of the more interesting things mentioned sometime back was revamping how raids work in this season.
Each Season, the newly released raid and dungeon will grant Pinnacle rewards for all encounters. As an example, in Season 17, Vow of the Disciple and the upcoming [REDACTED] dungeon. Outside of these, we’ll have a raid rotator and a dungeon rotator, each offering a Pinnacle reward once completed.
For those wondering about the weekly rotation, this particular inclusion will have a chance to feature all raids and dungeons not listed as the Seasonal rotation. Want to revisit the Vex in Garden of Salvation? Do it! Want to go toe-to-toe with Riven because you like to feel hungry for that wildly impressive (and stressful as all heck for players like me that are prone to panic) final encounter? Weird, but get on with yo’ brave and Light-driven self. Get that bread.
Rewards, what’s different there? For the weekly rotation, completing the final encounter in any of the chosen raids or dungeons will award a Pinnacle drop from a Weekly Challenge. For any raid or dungeon that offers a higher difficulty, such as Master Vault of Glass, that higher difficulty will also be available to select should players be itching for an additional challenge.
Oh, wait, you said you liked farming? We got you there too with the new rotator system. All lockouts on encounter rewards for Legendary gear are being removed, which means all Legendary drops in both raids and dungeons will be 100-percent farmable if you so choose. Throw on some lo-fi music, grab a cozy beverage, and farm to your heart’s content. Or don’t, the choice is yours (which is the point!).
This Week at Bungie
Guardian Games Emblem
Anyone who earned the top 10 percent emblem, be it through taunts and hard work or creative scorekeeping, should know there are currently no reports of anyone getting said emblem yet. Supposedly they will be awarded sometime later this week once scores are determined. This will be distributed next week.
Eververse
A few notable additions were added this season, along with a slight addition to Eververse Engrams.
First and foremost, there is a charity emote called Loyal Companion. Unfortunately, I can’t find information on which charity it’s going to, though Loyal Companion seems to be associated with a few adoption charities, which is a cute emote that is probably going to a good cause will have 100 percent of proceeds going to the Bungie Foundation.
Like previous seasons, a new Force Squad emote is available. If you haven’t followed the line, each emote matches one of the poses used in The Ginyu Force introduction. This season we have Jeice’s, with last season adding Burter’s pose, with the remaining pose being Ginyu himself. Expect the remaining two, Guildo and Recoome to follow in the next seasons.
Anyone not looking to purchase shaders for Bright Dust might be interested to learn some were added to the Eververse Engram line up. No word on the exact number but it is good to know there will be other ways to earn them.
Finally, while not currently implemented, this season will have new paid cosmetics as part of the upcoming event. What exactly they look like, pricing and other such information is not currently available, just keep this in mind when the event launches.
