Destiny devs Bungie have announced the details of updates included in the latest ‘March Update’ patch for Destiny 2. Plagued with diminishing player numbers and continued disappointment at the state of PVP in Destiny’s second outing, Bungie is making some sweeping changes in the hopes of retaining its player base and maybe tempting some of those old players back.

This update consists of a variety of changes to the Destiny 2 sandbox and Crucible, while also bringing with it unique Nightfall rewards. Players will now be able to enjoy a weekly rotating Crucible playlist, which contains 6v6 Iron Banner, Mayhem and Rumble. Sandbox changes include faster super recharge, weapon buffs and balances, faster movement, increased power ammo drops, and more! Check out the accompanying trailer for some of the highlights.

Here are all the update changes due to take place:

Strikes
Nightfall strike unique rewards
Possible rewards include Legendary weapons and Exotic accessories
Drop rates increase in likelihood based on score thresholds
Strike repetition reduction
Players will no longer see the same strikes back-to-back in strike playlists
Challenge Card
Increased the Power handicap maximum from 40 to 45
Fixed an issue where “Tree of Probabilities” wouldn’t end immediately after Valus Thuun’s death if he was killed very quickly
Fixed an issue where players could respawn below the boss fight of “A Garden World”
Fixed an issue where vehicles were not rewarding points when destroyed
Fixed an issue where Orbs granted points in public areas

Other
Exotic repetition reduction
Protections were put in place that prevents back-to-back duplicate Exotics from Exotic Engrams
Fixed an issue where some emblems were not displaying what statistic they track
Prometheus Lens correctly appears in the Exotic weapon collection for players who acquired the item from Xûr without owning Curse of Osiris
Reduced interaction time for patrol beacons and activity totems from 3 seconds to 1 second
Fixed an issue where applying or previewing a shader on an item would return players to the top page of the shader inventory

Sandbox

Weapons
Pulse Rifles
Increased PvE damage for all Pulse Rifles by 16%
Increased rate of fire for adaptive and high impact Pulse Rifles
Adaptive: from 360 rpm to 390 rpm (+8.3%)
High Impact: from 320 rpm to 340 rpm (+6.3%)
Increased base damage for adaptive, high impact, and rapid-fire Pulse Rifles
Adaptive: from 14.5 to 16 (+10.3%)
High Impact: from 16 to 18 (+12.5%)
Rapid-Fire: from 12 to 12.5 (+4.2%)
An increased precision multiplier for lightweight Pulse Rifles from 1.5x to 1.6x (+6.7%)
A decreased precision multiplier for adaptive Pulse Rifles from 1.55 to 1.475 (-5.8%)
Design Note: This keeps precision damage close to where it is now when you factor in the base damage and rate of fire buffs above. This puts most of the buff into body shots, but in the end, this still increases precision damage overall.

Scout Rifles
Increased PvE damage for all Scout Rifles by 15%
Increased base damage for high impact Scout Rifles from 37 to 40 (+8.1%)

Hand Cannons
Increased PvE damage for all Hand Cannons by 15%
Precision Hand Cannons deal 0.15x more precision damage, increasing from 1.5x to 1.6x (+6.6%)
Increased hip fire accuracy when using controllers on console and PC by 33%
Increased ADS accuracy when using controllers on console and PC by 25%

Sidearms
Increased PvE damage for all Sidearms by 15%
Increased hip fire accuracy; reduced cone by 20%
Increased ADS accuracy; reduced cone by 12%
Increased inventory (allowing more reserve ammo to be stored)
Increased range falloff start by +1m
Increased ADS movement speed

Submachine Guns
Increased PvE damage for all Submachine Guns by 10%
Set optics to 1.3x
Increased inventory (allowing more reserve ammo to be stored)

Linear Fusion Rifles
Increased PvE damage for all Linear Fusion Rifles by 50%
Increased aim assist
Decreased flinch multiplier

Shotguns
Increased PvE damage for all Shotguns by 35%
Increased inventory (allowing more reserve ammo to be stored)
Increased aim assist on SUROS precision Shotguns

Sniper Rifles
Increased PvE damage:
By 20% for yellow bar enemies
By 40% for red bar enemies
Increased precision damage, which now scales with the weapon’s rate of fire
Changed from 2.5x for everything to 3.0x at the lowest rate of fire up to 3.5x at the highest rate of fire
Increased aim assist
Increased inventory (allowing more reserve ammo to be stored)

Grenade Launchers
Increased blast radius
Drum-Fed Grenade Launchers: +0.5m
One-Shot Grenade Launchers: +1.0m

MIDA Mini-Tool
Decreased the MIDA Mini-Tool’s optics to match other Submachine Guns
Prevented the stacking of Lightweight and the MIDA Mini-Tool’s Lightweight perks
Adjusted player movement speed to match the MIDA Multi-Tool
Auto Rifles
Decreased range by 10 for all precision Auto Rifles
Decreased aim assist for all precision Auto Rifles

Perks
Scaled up PvE damage for the following perks:
High Impact Reserves
From 1.12x to 1.30x (+16%)
Kill Clip
From 1.33x to 1.53x (+15%)
Rampage
From 1.33x at 3 stacks to 1.65x while at 3 stacks
Also increased duration from 3 seconds to 3.5 seconds

Dragonfly
Buffed damage
From 50 to 65 (+30%)
+30% additional damage against combatants
Updated FX

Explosive Rounds
Decreased PvE Explosive Rounds damage multiplier by 15%
Increased PvE damage for the base weapons to compensate for this decrease

Grave Robber
Reloads 50% of the magazine instead of 30%

Timed Payload
Splits damage 55/45, explosive/direct instead of the previous split which was more direct damage

Abilities
Increased Super regeneration rates from 6:40 minutes to 5:00 minutes
The output of every increment of the Mobility stat, from 2 – 10, has been increased allowing for a significant boost in player speed
Vanishing Step (invisibility upon dodging) and Vanish in Smoke (Smoke Bomb invisibility)
Dodging remains unchanged and still breaks both aim assist and projectile tracking for the duration of the actual dodge
The invisibility granted by Vanishing Step no longer breaks aim assist or projectile tracking in PvP (unchanged in PvE)
Increased the duration of invisibility granted by Vanishing Step by 1 second
Increased the duration of Smoke Bomb invisibility by 1 second
Increased the movement speed of “melee Supers” (Fist of Havoc, Sentinel Shield, and Arc Staff)
While these Supers are active, sprint speed is automatically set to the fastest possible sprint speed (no additional perks needed)
Characters automatically sprint when you request forward movement
Increased movement acceleration to reach max speed almost instantly

Titan
Increased the distance the player travels with an untargeted airborne shoulder charge attack (Shield Bash, Seismic Strike, and Hammer Strike) back to 4.5 m
Lift
Strafe Lift
An increased top speed of Strafe Lift
Catapult Lift
Increased the initial horizontal acceleration gained from activating Catapult Lift
Increased the amount of time Catapult Lift can be active to allow for more control

Hunter
Arc Staff
Increased the speed of the Arc Staff dodge animation
Increased the speed of all Arc Staff attack animations
For Arc Staff Super cast animation and all Arc Staff melee attacks, reduced the amount of time you’re locked in animations before you can move or attack
Increased the AoE range of all Arc Staff attacks

Warlock
Glide
Overall
Increased the initial extension of vertical speed gained from activating Glide to allow for quick, on-demand bursts of speed
Strafe Glide
Increased the top speed of Strafe Glide
Greatly increased the horizontal acceleration of Strafe Glide to allow for more in-air manoeuvrability
Increased Strafe Glide’s max height to match the other vertical movements
Burst Glide
Greatly increased the top speed of Burst Glide (higher than Strafe Glide’s top speed)
Balanced Glide
Recalibrated Balanced Glide to gain some of the added speed of Burst Glide and some of the added horizontal acceleration of Strafe Glide.
Design Note: Our intent is for Balanced Glide to have some of the properties of both Burst and Strafe Glide without being as potent as either version.

Dawnblade
Decreased the cost of throwing sword projectiles with the Daybreak Super, allowing for one additional throw
Increased the Super duration extension gained from the Everlasting Flames perk (~+20%)
The buff granted by the Swift Strike melee ability now removes all in-air accuracy penalties while active
Decreased the Icarus Dash cooldown from 10 seconds to 6 seconds
Increased the grenade and melee energy that Heat Rises gives you per kill from 10% to 16%

Fixed an issue where players could throw infinite numbers of Nova Bombs in Mayhem

Mods
Mods that affect ability regen rates (i.e., for grenades, melee, and class abilities) now have increased output (16.667% per mod). They still cap at 3 mods (50% regen rate).

Crucible
Weekly Featured Playlist (Rumble, Mayhem, Iron Banner)
Each week we will rotate among Rumble, Mayhem, and Iron Banner playlists in the Crucible

Crucible repetition reduction
Enabled repeat map protection for Quickplay, Competitive, and Iron Banner playlists

Quitter penalties
Incomplete matches in Competitive Crucible playlists will now result in a warning or temporary (30 minutes) suspension from Competitive and Osiris Competitive playlists

Added invisible physics and kill volumes to keep players inside the intended playable area on a number of maps.

Iron Banner
Now features 6v6
Time limit is 12 minutes
Score limit is 125 points
Respawn time is 7 seconds
All Control Zones start off neutral
Additional Guardians (max of 3) in a zone increases capture speed
Emperor’s Respite has been removed from the Iron Banner Control playlist
Power ammo
Recurring side crate respawn times reduced from 90 seconds to 45 seconds
Initial side crate respawn times reduced from 90 seconds to 30 seconds

Crucible gameplay/ammo improvements
Quickplay (Clash, Control, Supremacy) match length has been extended to 10 minutes, with score limits adjusted accordingly

All modes
Increased assist and kill credit time from 2 seconds to 2.5 seconds
Increased Super energy granted to players for both kills and assists
Players who are defeated while carrying Power ammo will lose all of their Power ammo and drop 50% of it on the ground as a brick
This brick is visible to all players, and anyone can pick it up
The brick expires after 30 seconds
The brick requires a full .25-second interaction instead of a passive walkover
This interaction can be interrupted if the player takes damage

Quickplay
All modes
Match length has been extended to 10 minutes, with score limits adjusted accordingly
Respawn time for all Quickplay game modes has gone down from 5 seconds to 2 seconds
Recurring side crate respawn times reduced from 90 seconds to 60 seconds
Neutral crates for Clash/Supremacy are unchanged
The player Super display has been removed from the HUD
Players can still access this information in the death screen and while in Nav Mode (when their Ghost is out)
The player Super display remains unchanged in Competitive

Control
Reduced initial side crate Power ammo respawn times from 90 seconds to 30 seconds
Changed the amounts of Super energy players get for capturing zones
Players on the capturing team get slightly less than before
Players participating in the capture itself get 2x that amount

Clash/Supremacy
Initial side crate Power ammo respawn times reduced from 90 seconds to 60 seconds

Competitive (Includes Trials of the Nine)
All modes
Tracker is now turned off
Design Note: This is to enable more flanking and expression of individual power.

Survival
Reduced recurring neutral crate respawn times from 75 seconds to 45 seconds
Reduced respawn time to 7 seconds

Countdown
Reduced recurring side crate respawn times from 60 seconds to 45 seconds
Lowered revive lockout time from 20 seconds to 7 seconds
Players no longer lose revive tokens on death

Crucible Power Ammo Crates
Rockets
Now: 1 rocket
Was: 2 rockets

Drum-Fed Grenade Launchers
Stays at 4 grenades

Single-Shot Grenade Launchers
Now: 6 grenades (may be capped by weapon inventory size)
Was: 4 grenades

Sniper Rifles
Now: 6 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 6

Shotguns
Now: 5 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 4

Slug Shotguns
Now: 6 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 4

Fusion Rifles
Now: 5 bursts
Was: (variable) 4–5 shots based on mag size

Wardcliff Coil
Stays at 1 volley

Swords
Now: 6 swings
Was: 30% of total Energy, capped at 9 swings

Linear Fusion Rifles
Now: 4 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 6

The Prospector
Now: 8 grenades
Was: 4 grenades

Legend of Acrius
Now: 4 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 4

Tractor Cannon
Now: 6 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 4

The Colony
Stays at 4 shots

D.A.R.C.I.
Now: 8 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 6

Borealis
Now: 8 shots
Was: (variable) 2 mags, capped at 6