• • • There will be no new darkness subclass with The Witch Queen or through year 5.
      • • We made the call to refocus ourselves on Light subclasses this year. As you’ll see below this doesn’t just mean a port but also new and exciting stuff too.
    • There are no new Stasis aspects and Fragments arriving along Season of the Lost.
      • • Similar to above we wanted to focus on different initiatives instead of adding more to Stasis.
        • We feel like the subclass build variety is in a good spot and was likely to benefit from tuning changes more than new stuff.
        • To that end we prioritized the Season of the Lost balance patch and another patch you’ll hear about below debuting with 30th anniversary.

COMBAT REFORGED

Today you’re going to read a quick tease on a feature we’re calling Void 3.0 – a new interpretation of the Void subclasses and fantasies. In the coming weeks, you’ll hear about changes we’re making to how players regenerate ability energy and how those changes are going to affect PvE and PvP with our 30th Anniversary release. A few examples of changes in the pipe: A reduction to how many one shot kill abilities are available in the crucible and  shifting super energy regeneration so players are rewarded for participating in combat vs waiting for a timer. Later in Year 5, we hope to share more info on an initiative the team is discussing internally right now: making ammo generation a more deterministic and consistently paced experience across all activities. I hope what I’m describing here paints a clear picture: The game is evolving for the better.

Destiny 2 is a living game, and as we head into our fifth year, we’re looking at how we can evolve the sandbox you know and love to not only create exciting new experiences, but to better polish ones that haven’t had much love since our launch in 2017. We’ve learned a lot over the years with each iteration of the sandbox, and we’re hoping to apply those learnings through Year 5 and beyond. I hope you are all as excited about the future as I am!

BRAVE NEW WORLD

As you saw in our reveal event, we’re going to be doing serious revamps to the existing Light subclasses in Destiny 2. Our Void, Solar, and Arc subclasses and damage types have been with Destiny from the very beginning – in fact, some of the player fantasies and mechanics in Destiny 2 today are the same that debuted with Destiny 1 back in 2014. And while we’ve had refreshes in 2017 and 2018 with Destiny 2 and Forsaken, these subclasses have in some cases been left behind by the new power bar and build-crafting goals of the game. To help solve that problem, we’re going to take these subclasses back into the shop to retrofit, remix, and reinterpret the gameplay fantasies and mechanics by integrating them into the modern subclass experience.

In Destiny 2: Beyond Light we introduced a new subclass system we dubbed internally as Subclass 3.0. The goals of Subclass 3.0 were to create an experience that gave players more customization akin to Destiny 1, while also meaningfully evolving that experience. To us, Destiny is best when build-crafting, best-in-class action, and power fantasy all meet to create gameplay experiences you can’t get anywhere else.

STARING OUT INTO THE VOID

With Void 3.0, we’re taking the subclasses you know and love and remixing them. That means adding new abilities and mechanics, ditching some old ones where it makes sense to do so, and spreading out existing ones to create enticing new combinations. Our hope is to retain playstyles you know and love today and to create some exciting new ones you didn’t even know you wanted. We can’t wait to see what you all think about these changes and as always, we’re going to be looking for and responding to feedback. <3

With that all said and done, I am going bow out and let the team do the talking.

A NEW SHAPE

As Kevin detailed above, we’re in the process of updating Void, Solar, and Arc into the new Subclass 3.0 system used by Stasis, where you can pick and choose from a selection of Supers, grenades, melees, and Aspects and Fragments to craft cool and unique builds tailored around your playstyle. In The Witch Queen, you’ll experience the first phase of this metamorphosis as you wield the powers of the Void in your fight against Savathûn and her Lucent Brood.

It’s important to reiterate that this update will change things. Destiny 2 has evolved significantly in the three years since Forsaken, and we believe that the Light subclasses need a shakeup to keep pace. Much of the Void gameplay that you know and love will continue to exist, albeit in a different form. A few things won’t be returning. And there are some exciting new additions we think you’ll have a blast with.

To paint the picture of how we’re approaching the Void 3.0 rework, here are our main goals:

SAY THE (KEY) WORD

With the Void 3.0 update, we’re defining a set of core keywords that will be used by the various perks and abilities within each Void subclass, akin to the Slow, Freeze, and Shatter verbs used by Stasis. Each class will specialize in a few of these verbs, but it will be possible to dabble in the rest by coordinating with your fireteam or with certain combinations of Abilities and Fragments.

Additionally, these verbs will appear in other places outside of the subclass screen – weapon perks, Exotic armor, and mods from your Seasonal Artifact – and we intend to continue expanding that list as we move forward. We believe that these systemic interactions between your abilities and your gear are the core of the Destiny buildcrafting game.

Within Void, there are three negative status effects that you’ll be applying to enemies:

• • Suppression – The target is knocked out of any active abilities and can’t activate any abilities/movement modes as long as Suppression persists. Afflicted enemy AI combatants can’t shoot their weapons.
  • Weaken – The target takes increased damage and has their movement slowed. Enemy AI combatants fire their weapons with decreased accuracy.
  • Volatile – The target is afflicted with unstable Void energy and will explode upon taking additional damage or on death.

And three positive effects that you’ll be applying to yourself and allies:

• • Void Overshield – A protective barrier of Void Light which reduces damage taken from combatants.
  • Invisibility – You vanish from sight and do not appear on enemy radar.
  • Devour – You feast on the energy of your foes. Kills restore you to full health, grant grenade energy, and extend Devour.

These verbs should all be familiar to veteran players, but now exist in a new, broader systemic framework that will allow us to consistently spread their behaviors across the game, where previously they mostly existed in their own siloed-off subclasses.

OLD DOGS, NEW TRICKS

To close this section out, here’s a preview of some of the new and updated abilities that you’ll be able to play with once Void 3.0 drops.

Nightstalker Hunter

• • Shadowshot – Moebius Quiver – Super
    • • Fire two volleys of three Void Arrows in a cone which seek out enemies and spawn Void Anchors on impact. Shadowshot makes tethered enemies Volatile and deals increased damage to tethered targets.
      • One of the main usability pain points of the current iteration of Moebius Quiver is having to press the Super input a whole bunch of times to fire each arrow individually, which is cumbersome and takes a lot of time (and often results in the player drifting somewhere they didn’t intend to be – off the side of a cliff, as a totally hypothetical example). By firing multiple arrows at once, it should be a lot easier to blanket an area with traps in preparation for a fight or put burst damage on a boss.

• • Stylish Executioner – Aspect
    • • Defeating a Weakened, Suppressed, or Volatile target grants Invisibility and Truesight. After performing a Stylish Execution, your next melee attack while Invisible Weakens enemies.
      • A twist on middle-tree Nightstalker’s current Flawless Execution perk, this Aspect lets the Hunter specialize in defeating debuffed enemies to keep looping their Invisibility.

Sentinel Titan

• • Overwatch – Aspect
    • • Cast a Void-empowered Barricade to grant a Void Overshield to yourself and nearby allies. The empowered Barricade slowly regenerates the Void Overshield of allies bunkering behind it.
      • We want players to be able to lean into the Sentinel fantasy of being the front-line protector for your team, so Overwatch is a powerful tool for setting up prior to an encounter and providing a safe haven to fall back to when things get spicy.
  • Shield Toss – Projectile Melee
    • • Hurl your shield towards an enemy. The shield can ricochet off enemies and surfaces, granting you a small chunk of Void Overshield for each enemy hit.
      • We want to give Titans more options when it comes to projectile melees. Shield Toss is a great choice for aggressively pushing forward into groups of enemies, softening them up and giving you extra staying power.

Voidwalker Warlock

• • Pocket Singularity – Projectile Melee
    • • Launch a tracking, unstable ball of Void energy that detonates when it nears an enemy, pushing targets away from the blast and making them Volatile.
      • Designed as an anti-dive tool and a way to push enemies out of cover. With careful placement, it’s possible (and incredibly satisfying) to bop enemies up in the air and then pop their Volatile with a well-placed headshot before they hit the ground.
  • Child of the Old Gods – Aspect
    • • Cast your Rift to summon a sentient black hole which hovers at your side, waiting for a target. It will launch itself at enemies, then begin siphoning their energy and weakening them, refunding their life force back to you as either grenade and melee energy (if you are using Healing Rift) or health (if you are using Empowering Rift). Defeating enemies who are being siphoned by the Child will refund some Rift energy.
      • Child of the Old Gods is a strong debuff tool that gives Voidwalkers an additional way to lock down an area while sustaining themselves.

We hope that this preview sparks your curiosity and gets you thinking about cool new Void builds. Have you ever wanted to run Spectral Blades and Vanishing Step? Ward of Dawn and Controlled Demolition? Handheld Supernova and Devour? There are a lot of new possibilities… And as we get closer to The Witch Queen, we’ll be back in future TWABs to talk more about the Supers, Fragments, and grenades you’ll be mixing and matching.

We’re really excited about what we’re cooking up, and we can’t wait for you to get your hands on it. In the meantime, check out the ability balance update that we released with Season of the Lost in Destiny 2 Update 3.3.0. Thanks for your time and see you soon.

What do you think of these upcoming changes? Do you think that the Void subclass is still good after them? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: Bungie