Bungie is ‘shaking up the solar subclasses’ in a big way in Destiny 2

Coming next season

Every so often Bungie sees it fit to shake up the meta, and that’s just what they’re doing very soon with Destiny 2 in this post Shadowkeep world.

Taking to their weekly update blog, Bungie notes: “Next Season, we are shaking up the Solar subclasses. We are reworking several ability trees and the Destiny dev team has the details on what to expect when you praise the Sun next season.” In line with their previous subclass reworks, solar (fire/sun, basically) is being refreshed with both overhauls and quality of life updates for all three main classes: Hunter (Gunslinger), Titan (Sunbreaker) and Warlock (Dawnblade).

Bungie notes that although each update will provide quality of life changes and some new abilities, it isn’t a completely new subclass creation exercise in any case. In other words: it’s a rework. Gunslinger is probably the one in the most dire need of change, as the boring “save up your Golden Gun super for raid fights to dump damage” really got old years ago. Bungie is rectifying that by making the subclass less tied to the Celestial Nighthawk exotic helmet, with better stability and ADS speed buffs for landing precision blows.

Dawnblade is becoming more movement oriented, which fits the original fast power fantasy of the subclass. Bungie smartly wants to make it feel like a “flying angel” which should be useful all-around, but anticipates that speed reduction for burst glides are going to be controversial (it will be). Sunbreaker is being overhauled to be more viable in PVP: a contentious dichotomy that Destiny 2 players have been arguing for or against since the series’ inception (many players prefer to just play PVE). It’s probably the least excessive of all three alterations.

These changes will be happening next season. You can find the full changelog/tentative future patch notes below for all three subclasses.

This Week at Bungie [Bungie.net]

Gunslinger:

For 3-shot we increased the auto-aim distance and reliability when aiming down sights, as it fulfills the role of long range accuracy. For 6-shot, we shortened the damage falloff range to emphasize the short range gunfighter role with a lot of kill potential. While it can still perform at longer ranges, it may take an extra shot to get the job done. We’ve made other changes to Way of the Outlaw to help keep its potency like adding a new Explosive Prox Knife that can stick to surfaces and detonate when enemies pass nearby. 

All up – we want Way of the Sharpshooter to feel more active and rewarding for players who can fulfill the role of the sharpshooter by taking down enemies with accuracy and precision.

NEW Weighted Knife: High-damage knife throw with a long wind up. Travels at high speeds, bounces once, and does extra damage to the head. Precision shot final blows recharge the melee completely. One-hit precision final blow in PvP.

Practice Makes Perfect: (QoL):  Lasts longer but gives a bit less energy per second. Precision hits grant two stacks.

NEW Knock ’em Down: Precision final blows increase weapon stability and ADS speed. Timer starts at 10 seconds but any additional final blow/assists can increase it up to 25 seconds. Casting your Super with this buff above 20 seconds consumes the buff and grants extra damage. (Does not stack with Celestial Nighthawk).

Line ’em Up: (QoL): Old perks from Crowd Pleaser are now part of this perk. (Golden Gun can cause precision damage and precision shots generate orbs of light).

 

Sunbreaker:

The Roaring Flame perk has received a significant buff to its bonus damage, and the buff now lasts 25% longer, making it easier to build and retain stacks between encounters. The base damage of Throwing Hammer melee ability has increased—it’s now very lethal in PvP while you have Roaring Flames active. In addition, once you’ve thrown the hammer and it’s lying on the ground, you don’t have to get quite as close to it to pick it back up. Finally, we tuned the Super in a number of ways. 

For starters, Burning Maul now lasts longer, giving you more time to use it strategically instead of simply spamming the slam button. (Titans. All we want to do is smash, right?) We also increased the height of the heavy-slam explosion, so this Super should feel much more potent against airborne enemies. That’s the gist of it, but here are more details:

Throwing Hammer: Increased impact damage from 100 to 120 and increased hammer pick-up radius from 2m to 3.5m. Adjusted hammer throw animations to fit a more damaging attack.

Roaring Flames: Increased damage bonus from 10% per stack to 25% per stack in PvP, and increased duration from 15 seconds to 20 seconds.

Burning Maul: Increased duration from 21.2 seconds to 28.5 seconds

• Light Attack: Reduced light attack energy cost from 5% to 3%. Adjusted the animation so that it flows seamlessly into chained light attacks without stopping.
• Heavy Attack: Ground Slam attack now detonates when it detects enemies above it. Detonation radius was increased to make landing attacks more consistent. Increased energy cost from 6% to 8%.

Dawnblade:

Icarus Dashes while in Daybreak have increased speed and thrust to recapture the burst glide gameplay for those running the air superiority path. We hope that, while this change is different, you still feel as fast as before—but with maybe a bit more expression behind that speed. The rest of the changes are below:

NEW Celestial Fire (Melee): Send a spiral of three explosive Solar projectiles.

Heat Rises: (Rework) Consume your grenade to extend Glide time and dramatically reduce the in-air accuracy penalties for weapons.

Winged Sun (Rework): Fire weapons, use Celestial Fire, and throw grenade while gliding. Airborne final blows grant melee energy and extend the duration of Heat Rises.

Icarus Dash (Rework): Tap (Crouch) twice to dodge in midair. Dodging in Daybreak accelerates players farther and costs less Super energy while under the effects of Heat Rises.

Added note: Due to the nature of these reworks, Wings of Sacred Dawn received a buff where it gains 15% damage resistance while Tome of Dawn is active.