Today's surprise Destiny 2 update squashed one of the game's oldest pain points: restricted buildcrafting. As of today, all of the game's essential mods are automatically unlocked for all players rather than being tied to a soul-crushing piecemeal lottery system which kept many Guardians, especially newcomers, from using the best and most enjoyable builds in the game. But the specter of the Bungie-brand monkey's paw looms ominously over the good news, and many players are rightly worried that nerfs are a-comin'.
awesome_news_but_those_4_words_scare_the_hell_out from r/destiny2
This is partly down to Bungie's habit of significantly rebalancing things whenever it makes systemic changes, not to mention the lopsided state of the three main groups of combat mods. Elemental Wells have been eating everyone's lunch for several seasons now. Charged With Light mods have nabbed some scraps here and there, but the once-premium Warmind Cell mods are living off crumbs. Frankly, we're probably overdue for a mod balance patch of some kind, especially with how ridiculous our base subclasses are now. That said, I think I'm with most players in hoping that more mods are brought up to the level of Elemental Wells rather than the player base's new favorite toy being hammered down.
Much of this mod anxiety was also caused by how Bungie worded its announcement. "With big changes coming to buildcrafting in Lightfall, we want to give everyone a chance to enjoy all mods in their current state," it said in a tweet, setting off the alarms of buildcrafters everywhere.
We've known for some time that Destiny 2 Lightfall will introduce a proper in-game loadout system, and this will inevitably affect how players use mods to some degree. If that's all Bungie's talking about, great; we'll just use the same mods in a new way come February. Maybe we'll just get more mods! Maybe a whole new family of mods that works extra well with the Strand subclasses! Right, guys?
I hope we're all wrong about this and it really is one of the occasions where Bungie gives with both hands. Still, I can't shake the feeling that some of the, uh, "mods in their current state" will be in a different, weaker, and/or more expensive (that is, energy-hungry) state post-Lightfall. As long as buildcrafting is less finicky and at least equally exciting, I won't complain, but I'm still walking off the bruises from the last swing of the nerf bat and don't know if I can endure any more right now.
Destiny 2 players don't need any more stress on the back of the "worst Iron Banner ever."
