Destiny 2 Season of Dawn Update and Patch Notes

Back when Season of Dawn was first announced, people were eagerly waiting what would be next for Destiny 2. The new patch for the first series of Season of Dawn updates to Destiny 2 drops today. Bungie also released the full patch notes for the update, paving the way for a pretty big shift in the meta-game. Bungie had already revealed some teases for what’s changing in Season Nine of Destiny 2. Season of Dawn of course replaces the previous one, Season of Undying, adding and removing content to prepare players for a brand new fight against historic and tough enemies. The Season of Undying content that is being removed will be replaced by new rewards and Exotics for players to quest after.

And speaking of Questing, there’s a whole new quest series to undertake in Season of Dawn, with even more rewards. But the new quest line is just the start. Along with the launch of Season of Dawn today, there’s some pretty major balance adjustments coming to all areas of Destiny 2. The Season 9 patch introduces fixes and improvements to combat, mostly by way of adjusting gear levels and ability effects. Titan, Hunter and Warlock abilities all got some looks in the patch today.

There’s also plenty of bug fixes in the patch too. The patch even adds new controller support options for Switch controllers, Steam controllers and more. Check out the full patch notes below. Season of Dawn is pretty massive, so take your time.

COMBAT SYSTEMS

Finishers

• Improved the finisher camera experience when using mouse and keyboard.

Finisher Multi-Equip

• In your inventory press R3(if using controller) or the Shift Key(if using mouse and keyboard) to mark a finisher as a “favorite”
• When triggered, a random finisher you’ve marked as a “favorite” plays
• If no finishers are marked as a “favorite”, which would be pretty crazy because we all know you have favorites, your default class finisher plays

ABILITIES

Titan

• Sunbreaker Code of the Fire-Forged (Top Path)
  • • Vulcan’s Rage
      • • Made Vulcan’s Rage much more angry
        • Increased detonation time minimum from 0 seconds to 0.5 seconds
        • Increased cluster spread
• Hammer of Sol
  • • Impact damage decreased from 70 to 5
    • Detonation damage increased from 205 to 270
    • NOTE: These changes also affect bottom-tree Sunbreaker
• Sunbreaker Code of the Devastator (Middle Path)
  • • Throwing Hammer
      • • Increased impact damage from 100 to 120
        • Increased hammer pickup radius from 2 meters to 3.5 meters
• Roaring Flames
  • • Increased damage bonus
      • • From 20% per stack to 30% per stack in PvE
        • From 10% per stack to 25% per stack in PvP
    • Increased duration from 15 seconds to 20 seconds
• Burning Maul
  • • Increased idle super duration from 21.2 seconds to 28.5 seconds
    • Light Attack
      • • Reduced super-energy cost from 5% to 3%
        • Tuned movement and player feedback
    • Heavy Attack
      • • Slightly reduced speed of heavy slam projectile
        • Slightly reduced tracking radius of heavy slam projectile
        • Increased height of projectile hitbox to more easily hit airborne opponents
        • Increased super energy cost from 6% to 8%
        • Slightly increased terminal explosion size
• Sunbreaker Code of the Siegebreaker (Bottom Path)
  • • Mortar Blast
      • • Increased explosion radius from 5 meters to 6 meters
    • Sol Invictus
      • • Burning targets you kill also make Sunspots
        • Burning targets killed now trigger the heal
        • Kills with the Sun Warrior buff active can now make Sunspots
          • • This is based on weighted enemy killed and a sunspot is created when the threshold of “1” is reached
            • Players/Bosses add 1
            • Majors add 0.5
            • Minors add 0.25
        • 1 second cooldown on creating Sunspots
    • Sun Warrior
      • • Increased ability recharge scalar by 35%
        • Touched up the FX and audio for allied Sunspots
• Striker Code of the Missile (Middle Path)
  • • Thundercrash
      • • Increased base damage from 2700 to 3200
        • Increased in flight damage from 100 to 200
        • Slightly increased the amount of time you have in the air after activation

Hunter

• Gunslinger Way of the Outlaw (Top Path)
  • • Explosive Knife
      • • Changed to Proximity Explosive Knife
        • Sticks to surfaces
        • Fuse time of 14 seconds
        • Adjusted impact damage to 14
        • Adjusted Detonation damage to 105
    • Six Shooter
      • • Adjusted damage falloff of this Golden Gun Super variant
        • Damage falloff starts at 30 meters when firing from hip and at 40 meters while in ADS
• Gunslinger Way of the Sharpshooter (Bottom Path)
  • • Knife Juggler
      • • Changed to Weighted Knife
        • Damage changed from 120 to 140
        • Precision modifier changed from 1.3 to 1.5
          • • Headshot is a one-hit kill in PvP
        • Updated throw animation to be longer to compensate for the one-shot capability
        • Knife projectile moves faster and with less drop than previously
        • Knife bounces once after impacting the environment
    • Practice Makes Perfect
      • • Super energy granted reduced by 16%
        • Increased the buff duration by 50%
        • Precision kills now grant 2 stacks
    • Crowd Pleaser
      • • Original perks (precision damage, precision hits with Golden Gun generate Orbs of Light) have been moved to “Line ‘Em Up”
        • New Perk: Knock ‘Em Down
          • • Precision kills increase weapon stability and ADS speed
            • Buff duration starts at 10 seconds and each kill or assist adds time, with a cap of 25 second
            • Time added is variable weighted on the enemy killed and whether it was a precision kill
            • While the buff timer is above 20 seconds your Golden Gun does 30% more damage (determined upon moment of cast and lasts the whole super)
            • This burns the buff
            • Does not stack with Celestial Nighthawk
    • Line ‘Em Up
      • • Now has a passive bonus to aim assist and range while aiming
        • Now has the precision damage and precision hits with Golden Gun generate Orbs of Light perks originally included with “Crowd Pleaser”
• Nightstalker Way of the Pathfinder (Bottom Path)
  • • Vanish in Smoke
      • • Added a short period (0.8 seconds) after the invisibility is applied where firing weapons or performing other actions will not break the invisibility
        • This should help prevent allies from accidentally breaking the invisibility the moment it is granted to them if unexpected.

Warlock

• Dawnblade Daybreak (All Paths)
  • • Reduced the speed of Burst Glide activations while in super
• Dawnblade Attunement of Sky (Top Path)
  • • Swift Strike
      • • Changed to Celestial Fire
        • Shoots three spiraling, homing projectiles
        • Approximately 35 damage per projectile
    • Winged Sun
      • • Also allows Celestial Fire activations
        • No longer gives grenade energy for aerial kills
        • Gives more melee energy for aerial kills
    • Heat Rises
      • • Perk redesigned with new gameplay
        • Consume grenade to gain Heat Rises buff
        • Dramatically reduces in air accuracy penalty
        • Changes movement mode
        • Reduce Glide upkeep cost by 99%,
        • Reduce Glide activation cost by 99%
        • Set Glide velocity and agility to a combination of Strafe and Burst glide
    • Icarus Dash
      • • Now has two dodges per 5 seconds
        • Dodge now has a slight upward velocity
        • Dodge in super is now one long dodge per second
• Dawnblade Attunement of Grace (Middle)
  • • Guiding Flame
      • • Doubled the range that the empower effect is applied from 12 meters to 24 meters
    • Divine Protection
      • • Increased radius that the healing grenade is applied to friendly targets from 1 meter to 3.5 meters
    • Benevolent Dawn
      • • Buff can now be refreshed if additional friendly targets are healed/empowered while you still have the buff
        • Removed cooldown (can continuously proc)
        • Reduced energy regeneration by 15%
        • This was needed as it is much more consistent, procs more often, and for longer
    • Well of Radiance
    • Standing in the well now grants 20% damage reduction against damage from other players
    • Sword object no longer takes precision damage
• Dawnblde Attunement of Flame (Bottom Path)
  • • Phoenix Dive
      • • Now heals a fixed amount over time
        • Healing is interruptible from incoming damage
        • While in super, returns super energy depending on how much you healed
        • Has diminishing returns the longer the super is active.
• Voidwalker Attunement of Fission (Middle Path)
  • • Handheld Supernova
    • Adjusted grenade charge time so that it lines up with the animations and effects. This is to make it feel more consistent to activate.

Stat Values

• Class ability cooldown is now governed by player stats.
  • Hunter Dodge cooldown is modified by their Mobility stat
  • Titan Barricade cooldown is modified by their Resilience stat
  • Warlock Rift cooldown is modified by their Recovery stats.
• Paragon Mods have been deprecated as a result.

 

WEAPON CHANGES

Exotics

• Divinity
  • • Divinity’s weaken effect no longer stacks with other weaken effects. The “cage” will still appear in these cases and act as a precision weak spot, but the weaken multipliers themselves will no longer stack.
• Xenophage
  • • Increased PvE damage by +50%
    • Increased PvP ammo from heavy ammo crates to 4/6 (previously 3/4) on shared/non shared crates, respectively
    • Fixed an issue where this weapon would gain overall ammo when swapping from another power weapon to this weapon
• Leviathan’s Breath
  • • Fixed an issue where this weapon would gain overall ammo when swapping from another power weapon to this weapon
• Cerberus+1
  • • Fixed an issue where repeatedly pulling the trigger would give you a faster fire rate while the “Focused Fire” Catalyst was enabled
• Eriana’s Vow
  • • Increasing the reserves for this weapon via armor perks no longer increases starting/respawn ammo in The Crucible
• Monte Carlo
  • • The “Monte Carlo Method” no longer has a 100% chance to trigger on Guardian kills and now matches the combatant chance

Archetype changes

• Linear Fusion Rifles
  • • Precision damage increased by +20%
    • This change does not affect Sleeper Simulant
    • Significantly increased target acquisition at close to medium ranges
• Sidearms
  • • Increased target acquisition across the board

Perk changes

• Master of Arms
  • • Removed the precision damage function
    • This weapon still provides a damage bonus, but non-precision damage is no longer disproportionately increased
• Magnificent Howl
  • • Fixed a bug that was causing the perk to apply to two bullets over the network instead of just one
• Sticky Grenades (Grenade Launchers)
  • • Fixed a bug that allowed players to stand on grenade launcher projectiles

Misc changes

• Fixed “Shield Piercing”/”Anti-Barrier” rounds not penetrating Scorn Lurker bucklers
• Chip damage behavior removed from “Shield Piercing”/”Anti-Barrier” rounds
• A selection of year 1 legendary weapons have had a face lift and have joined the engram reward pool to keep Edge Transit company
• Reduced Arc Logic’s muzzle blast size when aiming

ARMOR CHANGES

Exotics

• Wings of Sacred Dawn
  • • Now grants 15% damage resistance while in the hover state
• One-Eyed Mask
  • • No longer grants an overshield on killing your marked target
• Peregrine Greaves
  • • No longer disproportionately increases the damage of Hammer Strike
    • Damage is equalized to ~300% the damage of a normal shoulder charge against a single target

• Claws of Ahamkara
  • • Fixed an issue where both melee charges could be consumed on one melee hit

Armor Mods

• Removed stacking restrictions on many armor mods
  • • Similar mods can now be stacked for improved effect. However, stacking mods with similar effects provides diminishing returns, granting less relative benefit than two different mods would.
    • Reduced the efficacy of Ammo Scavenger mods to their pre-Shadowkeep levels to accommodate mod stacking
• Generalized Ammo Finder and Ammo Scavenger mods are unlocked for all players in the Head Armor Mod and Leg Armor Mod sockets, respectively
• Added Season of Dawn Armor Mod Sockets
  • • Vanguard, Crucible, Gambit, and Iron Banner armor sets will drop with this season’s armor mod socket, allowing them to use the new Dawn Armor Mods.
    • The Mercury destination armor set has also received the Dawn Armor Mod socket
• Fixed various stacking exploits with mods related to the Garden of Salvation

General

• Fixed an issue where orange bar enemies would display a sliver of health when they died.
• Fixed an issue where players would go into first person if they placed a raid banner while in their super. Going forward, if a player places a banner while in their super, their super will be canceled.
• Fixed an issue where Stormtrance Lightning attack would fail to fire if attack trigger was held while casting super, or after Blinking.
• Players can no longer push Vex Cyclops

REWARD SYSTEMS

Power and Progression

• Powerful and pinnacle reward caps have been increased
  • • Powerful Cap: 960, up from 950
    • Pinnacle Cap: 970, up from 960
• Rebalanced some sources of XP on Mercury to align with newer destinations
• Fixed an issue where some chests weren’t granting any XP
• Fixed an issue where Iron Banner bounties were rewarding more XP than other weekly bounties
• The XP required to level up the seasonal artifact has been slightly adjusted
  • • Some levels had a much higher increase in XP required from the previous level, and this increase has been distributed throughout all levels to smooth out this curve

Quests and Bounties

• Merged Strike/Crucible/Gambit objectives on the Gunsmith weekly bounty “Field Calibration” into a single objective that shares progress from all sources
• Removed Valor/Infamy and Vanguard Tokens from “Field Calibration” as there is no longer a requirement for any of these linked activities
• Added repeatable bounties to the Gunsmith
• Added new mode-specific daily Crucible bounties (one per day, selected from full-time playlists and active rotators)
• Reduced the completion requirements of several daily and repeatable Crucible bounties
• Removed grenade and melee bounties from the Crucible bounty repeatable pool
• Fixed a rare issue where the “??????” quest item from mission “A Mysterious Disturbance” could get stuck in inventory; it has been removed from affected players
• Lowered the daily bounty target for defeating Nightmares in K1 Lost Sectors to 3 (previously required 7)
• After the Vex Invasion ended on the Moon, the number of Vex kills required to cleanse the “Essence of Servitude” has been reduced from 100 to 30
• Removed weapon requirement and changed objective display to a float instead of a percentage on Eriana’s Vow Catalyst Pursuit
• Benedict and Werner will no longer display the Lumina Exotic quest chain steps (bounty/perk steps) if the player is already on, or has completed, the steps.

Lore

• Fixed an issue where pages from the “Letters from Eris” lore book couldn’t be unlocked
• Each of the eight Nightmare Hunts now unlocks one page upon completion

Season Pass

• The Season Pass now displays its active bonuses in a new Season Pass Bonuses section, visible on the main Season Pass window in the Director
• The Season 8 Nostalgic Engram has been retired, and in its place players can now obtain the new Season 9 Fond Memories Engram
• Fixed an issue that prevented Season Pass armor from displaying the correct stats and energy type when previewed
• (Korea Region Only) Fixed a bug that caused the Season Pass purchase item to be referenced as “Get Season Pass” on the purchase confirmation and completion screens

Exotic Engram

• The Exotic Engram and the Fated Engram have been collapsed into a single new Exotic Engram item
  • • When opened it will award a new Exotic if any remain to be collected; otherwise, it contains a random piece of Exotic armor
    • Note: contents are still class-specific

Eververse

• A new consumable is available in Eververse for 200 Bright Dust, the Concentrated Mattergem
  • • When used, this item causes bosses to have a chance to drop an Upgrade Module when defeated
    • The effect will last until an Upgrade Module is found
    • Note: Only one Concentrated Mattergem can be active at a time
• The Eververse store no longer permits purchasing an item that is already in your Collection
• Fixed a bug that prevented year one Vanguard shaders from being a potential drop in the Vanguard rank up reward
• Fixed an issue where the Riskrunner “Electric Violet” Ornament lost its pink glow
• Fixed an issue that caused The Last Word ornament Laconic to be purchasable when Forsaken was not owned

Ghosts

• Fixed a bug that prevented the Banshee’s Favorite ghost perk from dropping a higher volume of Weapon Telemetry
• Fixed an issue that caused Ghost particle effects to be hidden when a Ghost Projection was active
• The following Exotic Ghost Shells now have Ghost Projection sockets: Arc Shell, Solar Shell, and Void Shell
• Fixed an issue that prevented Black Armory forge activities from granting Glimmer upon completion

Collections and Triumphs

• Fixed a bug that permitted multiple copies of the same combat finisher from being acquired through the collection
• Fixed a bug that caused Universal Ornament items to display in an improper order from what is intended (head, arms, chest, legs, then class)
• Removed four erroneous collection entries for the below items that were not obtainable:
  • • Shade at the Gates (Season 3 Legendary Ship)
    • The Ruinous Flame (Season 3 Legendary Ship)
    • Shrinking Iris Shell (Season 3 Legendary Ghost)
    • Shining Shield Shell (Season 3 Legendary Ghost)
• Fixed an issue that prevented the Season of Opulence versions of the Optimacy armor from unlocking their corresponding collection entries
• The Black Armory Platinum Starling Ship in Collections > Equipment > Ships > Season 5 now correctly states that a player must complete the “Master Smith” Triumph.
• Fixed an issue with the Perfect Gambit triumph. Previously, the triumph was checking for player deaths instead of dropped motes. The triumph now correctly checks for dropped motes and will ignore players that die without motes.
• Fixed a bug where the Ennead emblem (for presenting gifts to all Cats in the Dreaming City) was no longer being awarded when claiming the Remember your Manners triumph.
  • • Players impacted by this issue will find that they can reacquire the Emblem from their Collections > Flair > Emblems > Open World
• Fixed an issue with the triumph ‘WANTED: The Rifleman’.  It will now be completed on either Rifleman kill or associated mission completion. Players that are missing this triumph will need to play the mission again to earn the triumph.

Glimmer

• The cost of slotting a Weapon Mod has been reduced from 5000 to 500 Glimmer
• Fixed an issue that caused EDZ patrols to drop a slightly higher amount of Glimmer than intended
• Fixed a bug that caused Mercury patrols to drop a slightly lower amount of Glimmer than intended
• Fixed a bug that prevented Mars free roam treasure chests from awarding Glimmer when opened
• Fixed a bug that prevented Mercury free roam treasure chests from awarding Glimmer when opened
• Fixed an issue that prevented raid encounters from rewarding Glimmer upon completion

Vendors

• Added additional Weekly and Repeatable bounties to Zavala, Drifter, Shaxx, and Banshee-44 to allow for Seasonal rotation
• Updated completion requirements for some daily Crucible bounties
• Repeatable bounties have been added to the Gunsmith
• Fixed an issue that caused Benedict 99-40’s Imperial Engram to display Armor 1.0 versions of its contents
• Fixed an issue where Ada-1 could grant duplicate weapon mods
• Fixed an issue where Eris Morn and the Drifter had vendor dialogue lines that would never fire

World Rewards

• Fixed an issue that frequently prevented the Duke MK.44 Hand Cannon from being a possible world drop
• Fixed an issue that frequently prevented No Turning Back, Terran Wind, and Death by Scorn from being possible world drops
• This prevented Vestian Dynasty from being erroneously displayed in Legendary Engram previews

Rewards UI/UX

• Fixed an issue where Gambit Prime and Revelry armor set icons weren’t collapsing properly on the Character screen

New Light

• Fixed an issue where New Light players were required to finish the Red War campaign to purchase Last Wish raid bounties
• Fixed an issue where several Triumphs/Ghosts previously earned through the Red War campaign could no longer be acquired
• Fixed an issue where ‘Adventurous’ triumph could not be completed on EDZ
• Fixed an issue where weapons in Homecoming mission would cause other gear to drop at lower power levels than expected
• Fixed an issue where some players could not complete the New Light ‘Introduction: Crucible’ quest

Player Identity Systems

• Fixed an issue where Hawthorne’s icon kept flashing for players who were doing the Refer-a-Friend quest after it ended
• The Armor 2.0 version of the Solstice 2019 armor will now correctly use the 2019 Drained and Renewed Ornaments and Eververse Glows.

Escalation Protocol

• Changes and updates to acquiring Escalation Protocol activity rewards
• Escalation Protocol Wave 7 chest no longer requires a key to open
• Chest can be opened upon every successful completion of Wave 7
• Each opening of the chest will award one piece of EP armor for your character class until you have the full set
• After full set is acquired, subsequent opening of the chest will award a random piece of armor
• Charged Decryption Keys and Key Fragments are being removed from the game.  These items will be removed from Player inventories
• Armory Keys to spawn Valkyrie Javelins are unchanged and will remain
• EP Weapons drops were not touched and are still cumulative stream Boss drops

Iron Banner Ornaments

• Removed the Season 3 Iron Banner ornament Rank requirements. They can now be freely applied to Season 7 Iron Banner armor

ACTIVITIES

Nightfall: The Ordeal

• Cabal invade The Ordeal –  three new strikes added to The Ordeal lineup, and removed three of the Season 8 strikes
• Added two new Cabal modifiers, and three new strike-specific modifiers
• Added Cabal modifiers to rotation
• Vehicles now give Nightfall score for both Nightfall and The Ordeal
• Fixed up the tooltip name for The Scarlet Keep on Legend difficulty

Strikes

• Fixed an issue where Savathun’s Song did not count toward Vanguard Weekly Hive Boss kill bounty
• The Vanguard Strikes weekly challenge description now correctly tells players to complete Vanguard Strikes while matching the weekly singe element
  • • The objective line will continue to still say “0/3 Bounties” until Destiny 2 Update 2.7.1

Raids and Dungeons

• Altars of Sorrow
  • • Fixed an issue where if the boss phase timed out while the boss was immune, 2 Nightmares would spawn at another Altar location before the Tier 5 waves started again
• Pit of Heresy
  • • Fixed an issue where the dungeon incorrectly showed a pinnacle reward challenge for players who have already completed the challenge on a different character of the same class
• Garden of Salvation
  • • Fixed an issue where players could survive Voltaic Overflow while guarding as a Sentinel Titan or Arcstrider Hunter
• Crown of Sorrow
  • • Fixed multiple issues where Gahlran’s Deception could continue to deceive Guardians even after being defeated. Make sense? No? We need to go deeper…
      • • Fixed an issue where Gahlran’s Deception could defeat a team of Guardians even after the encounter had been completed, which prevented flawless runs
        • Fixed issue where Gahlran’s Deception could respawn with full health after dying, specifically if killed at the last moment before teleportation
• Scourge of the Past
  • • Fixed the Best of the Best of the Best triumph so that it is hidden unless completed
    • Increased the drop rate of the Scourge of the Past raid exotic weapon ‘Anarchy’ from 5% to 10%.

Crucible

• Playlists
  • • Made Elimination a permanent Crucible playlist
• Momentum Control
  • • 150 Scout Rifles will only 1 shot targets under 5 resilience
• Map Rotation
  • • Added Rusted Lands to appropriate playlists
    • Added The Dead Cliffs, Legion’s Gulch, Retribution, and Solitude to appropriate playlists.
    • Removed Emperor’s Respite, Equinox, Firebase Echo, and Vostok from all Crucible playlists.
      • • These maps are still available for play in Private Matches
• Midtown
  • • Added invisible physics volumes to keep players from perching on walls
• Legion’s Gulch
  • • Added invisible physics volumes to keep players inside the intended playable space
• Dead Cliffs
  • • Adjusted spawn points and weighting, especially around the edges of the map
• Retribution
  • • Adjusted spawning to improve map flow
• Endless Vale
  • • Added invisible slip volume to keep players inside intended playable area
• Twilight Gap
  • • Added invisible physics volumes to keep players inside the intended playable area
• Widow’s Court
  • • Added invisible physics volumes to keep players inside the intended playable area

PC

Steam

• Added controller support through Steam input for:
• Steam Controller
• Switch Controller
• Steam Link and Remote Play will now work with supported controllers
• Text Chat lobbies will now try to recover when Steam Servers come back up