Kicking off 2021's Gamescom event, Destiny 2's The Witch Queen Showcase delivered several big surprises for long-time fans of the ongoing live-service shooter. Fans couldn't help but get excited about the reveal of Savathûn the Witch Queen and the introduction to the now-live Season of the Lost.
However, the bigger takeaways weren't narrative but rather based on gameplay mechanics. The game is introducing a new weapon type and finally adding a weapon crafting system, which should help manage the pile and piles of guns players have sitting in their vaults. All in all, fans have plenty of reasons to be excited about the upcoming expansion and the final season in Beyond Light.
Traditionally in Destiny 2, new weapons are earned as rewards for completing content or overcoming specific challenges. Sometimes it comes at random in an Engram, and other times there's a long series of quests leading up to only one reward. Stretching back the original Destiny, it's always been some form of loot drops. Now in The Witch Queen expansion, players will be able to create some weapons by hand. Luckily this doesn't mean players will take up workbenches instead of powerful firearms.
Weapon Crafting will "give ultimate control over the guns," allowing players the most control to date over the rolls they get on weapons. Bungie has been laying the groundwork for a system like this, with many of Beyond Light's seasons featuring different ways to tweak the odds in a player's favor of receiving a specific stat set on a weapon. Crafting will be a gradual, combat-focused process. The more a player uses a crafted weapon, the more powerful they'll become. At the start of The Witch Queen, all Throne World, Seasonal and Raid weapons will be available to craft, with older weapons on the way.
The Glaive was the first weapon revealed to be using the new weapon crafting in Destiny 2. Players won't be able to find them in chests at the end of a Strike; they'll have to be built. But once players have a Glaive weapon in their hands, they'll find their combat options open up substantially. Glaives are melee/firearm hybrids that allow Guardians to get in close to deliver punishing stabs, slashes and blows before turning and unleashing an energy blast the next approaching foe.
Glaives will only come as Energy weapons for now, but unlike other melee weapons, they are used in first-person like all guns. The little action shown around the new archetype leaves the impression that they're a powerful force to be reckoned with. For example, The Witch Queen's gameplay trailer showed Glaive-wielding Guardians quickly eliminating multiple powerful new Hive Guardian enemies with a few stabs and a blast.
Bungie's announcements surrounding The Witch Queen have stirred players' excitement. Everyone expected to hear about some new story beats, a new featured location for the upcoming expansion and maybe some new weapons, but a weapon crafting system and a new weapon type have caught many pleasantly by surprise. Players can jump into Destiny 2's Season of the Lost now, which acts as a prelude to The Witch Queen expansion launching Feb. 22, 2022.
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