Bungie Ends Destiny 2 "Gunsetting," Plans To Research Loot Structure Changes

Bungie is doing away with a system that makes Destiny 2 loot obsolete after a certain amount of time, a controversial feature added with the Beyond Light expansion to keep players engaged in chasing new guns and armor.

The announcement came in a new blog post in which Bungie outlined a number of changes to its loot and Power grind. The "Infusion caps" feature (known in the player community as "gunsetting"), in which weapons and armor can only have their Power level raised to a certain number (and therefore eventually become too weak to handle later-game content). Bungie said the system "made our rewards feel like they have an expiration date and have frequently made playing our legacy content feel shallow."

Gunsetting isn't going away entirely--older weapons that have already become obsolete under the system, including player favorites like The Mountaintop and Luna's Howl, will remain capped. But all weapons players have that can be brought up to the game's current maximum Power level will retain that capability. In other words, if you've got a maxed out weapon right now, it'll never hit an Infusion cap, and you'll be able to continue raising its Power level through the release of Witch Queen and beyond. Essentially, any guns earned since the release of Beyond Light can be saved in your collection indefinitely.

Bungie also noted that it's going to change how Power levels increase with seasonal content. For the last two seasons, the overall Power cap for players--the maximum strength of their characters based on all their gear--has increased by 50 points per season. That gives you a reason to play through new content to power up your character, but Bungie also said that had the problem of making players' previous gains seem futile.

Starting with Season 14, Destiny 2's next content season, that system is changing. Power caps will rise only 10 levels, so players who boost their characters to max power in the current season will be near the top of the leveling climb when Season 14 starts on May 11.

It'll be interesting to see how these changes impact Destiny 2 going forward, especially since gunsetting has been a contentious issue in the player community. Bungie said it's still looking for ways to deal with some of the issues gunsetting was meant to address--namely, attempting to balance a huge amount of weapons in the game, while continually introducing new gear for players to chase and use. The developer said it plans to do research for the time being to find a solution to those problems, but we don't know what form future changes to Destiny 2's loot system might take.

In addition to laying out changes to its loot and Power systems, Bungie also announced a delay for its Witch Queen expansion, laid out timing for adding the Vault of Glass raid and transmogrification to the game, and explained some PvP changes to Stasis and the Trials of Osiris.