Including something called ‘Faction Rally’
One ofDestiny‘s strengths is its ability to highlight and modify certain activities so playing the same content for the umpteenth time isn’t quite as stale as one might expect.Destiny 2is looking no different in that regard, and Bungie has already laid out the plans for this first month of the faux-MMO loot-shooter’s life in the current edition ofThis Week at Bungie.
The current Nightfall Strike features the Prism modifier, rotating which element causes bonus damage over the course of the run. It also features a Time Warp modifier, Killing Time, which extends the mission timer for each enemy killed. Interestingly, it looks like every Nightfall will have a different condition to extend the timer. The next three weeks have modifiers called Rings, Anomalies, and Zero Hour. Your guess is as good as mine as to what those are. (I expect the first two have to do with seeking out special items in the environment and interacting with them. The last one sounds like it has Guardians doing something close to the end of the timer to extend it.)
Both the new raid (Leviathan) and the new version of Trials start up next week. Trials of the Nine is the endgame PvP mode that many loved to hate near the end ofDestiny 1‘s life, but it’s tweaked now. Instead of sticking to an Elimination game type, it looks like it will rotate, at least between Countdown (Destiny 2‘s “plant the bomb” mode) and Survival (its “your team has X number of lives” mode).
Exotic gear lovers need not worry; Xur will be back every Friday, right on schedule. Let’s not ignore the power weapon he ends up selling right away lest it end up being utterly indispensable like Gjallarhorn was during the first year of the last game.
The wildcard in the This Week at Bungie post is something totally new: Faction Rally. The graphic features the logos for the three factions in the Destiny universe, Dead Orbit, New Monarchy, and Future War Cult. Perhaps it will actually matter to which faction a Guardian is pledged now. My guess is it’ll be a bit like the clan rewards system, but for everybody pledged to a particular faction instead. Faction Rally hits on September 26.
