As part of its most recent weekly blog post, Destiny 2 developer Bungie announced some upcoming Exotic weapon changes. Specifically, the studio will be nerfing several popular Exotic weapons in next month’s Season of Opulence. Unsurprisingly, fans aren’t exactly thrilled about Bungie’s decision to effectively gut Destiny 2’s more desirable Exotics.
Destiny 2 Season of Opulence Exotic Weapon Nerfs
The specific Destiny 2 weapons receiving nerfs include Whisper of the Worm, Ace of Spades, Lord of Wolves, and Sleeper Simulant. Whisper of the Worm is getting the biggest nerf by far since it’s losing its ability to generate infinite ammo. All four weapons are taking performance hits in some aspect as outlined below (text courtesy of Bungie):
Whisper of the Worm
- White Nail pulls ammo from reserves rather than creating it
- Reserve ammunition increased to 18 (without ammo reserve perks)
Ace of Spades
- Memento Mori now ends if the weapon is stowed
- The PvP damage bonus of Memento Mori was slightly reduced to prevent two-tapping Guardians while Vengeance (One-Eyed Mask) was active
- Specifically, you need four resilience to survive this
- Memento Mori is active for six shots again (up from five)
Lord of Wolves
- PvE damage reduced by 20%
- Release the Wolves perk has been reworked:
- No longer triggers automatically on kill
- This effect is now triggered by holding reload, similar to “The Fundamentals” on Hard Light and Borealis
- PvE damage and range bonuses on this effect has been removed and replaced with a universal damage bonus instead
Sleeper Simulant
- Reduced ricochet/bounce damage on boss combatants
- Modified precision behavior—total damage is unchanged, but non-precision shots are significantly more forgiving
Fan Reactions
A casual perusal of the official Destiny 2 subreddit shows just how upset fans are by these upcoming changes. A long-running joke within the Destiny community involves Bungie’s propensity to over-correct. For example, if one weapon class could use a buff, Bungie will just nerf every other class instead. The announced Exotic changes appear to fall right into that line of thinking.
To be fair to Bungie, the proposed Exotic changes make sense on paper. Thanks to its ammo-generating capabilities, Destiny 2’s Whisper of the Worm is virtually a mandatory weapon for most raid encounters. Bungie explains that this inadvertently punishes players who use other sniper rifles as a result. Still, the anger fans are expressing is just as valid since this is far from Bungie’s first screw-up.
As of this writing, Bungie hasn’t responded directly to fan concerns, but there’s a good chance it might. It’s unfortunate to see all the goodwill Bungie built up with Destiny 2’s recently added Outbreak Perfected quest undone so quickly.