"This Week at Bungie" Hope everyone is enjoying Crimson Days...but this is what you have been waiting for! We here at Bungie have been listening and working hard these past few months. We gave you a few small PVP events to keep you busy but the biggest content release since TTK we purposefully kept a secret until now. As you realize, we took the game world down for maintenance last week. But we also did it in preparation for our updates to the game world to introduce the new content: 1.) Level 40 Patrols: We kept it with fireteams of 3 for simplicity sake. But made patrol missions much more involved at level 40. When u pick up a patrol at level 40, one of your faction commanders will give you a mission like before. But if you are aligned with that faction, you will now receive double Vanguard and Faction experience. New "Quest Chain" patrols will have new icons. Each planet will have planet-specific "Quest Chain" patrols with end boss encounters. The bosses being old strike bosses from the previous strikes. Omnigul/Sepiks on Earth, Phogoth on the Moon, Archon Priest on Venus, and Valus on Mars. As for rewards, we will also add planetary materials upon patrol completion. 2.) Vanguard/Crucible/Factions We will be reimplementing the old Nightfall experience bonus but will reduce it to 15%. You will also get back your beloved blue fiery halo to tell others that you have the NF bonus active. Ranking up will also provide you with a commendation to be used for Reforging. 3.) Reforging 2.0 We learned our mistakes with 1.0 and realized customization was a huge part of many games. But we are going to make it more difficult. Using the previous commendation system, each reforge will cost a commendation plus weapon/armor materials. You will be able to reforge both armor and weapons to really customize your look. Only 260 light or above will be "reforge-able" 4.) Etheric Light Will function to "upgrade" old 170 or less light level gear to base 260 light gear. As a result, elemental primaries will still have their elements removed for balancing. Poor Skolas should be getting some visitors in prison soon! 5.) Monthly Vendor Reset After all calculations, we figured out you would be able to buy about 20% of the vendor items before each monthly reset. We are reducing the cost of each item by about 25% so you have the chance to buy about 25% of all the vendor items. If you want the math: Roughly 1800 marks (conservative) can be obtained per month total. Total vendor armor/weapon/ghost costs about 9240 marks. Speaker inventory not included. 6.) Bounties Will give double the experience and will be more favored when ranking up armor specifically. 7.) Glimmer Yellow bar "major" enemies will drop 25 glimmer again, regardless if you have the consumable active or ghost equipped. Having a consumable or ghost (not additive) will net 50% increase (37 glimmer). 8.) Gunsmith Gunsmith packages will be moved to the "missions" slots until redeemed. Armor materials will be sold by any of the Vanguard vendors, same rate as buying weapon parts from the Gunsmith. 9.) Loot changes: More loot is on the way. Period. Increased legendary drop rates across the board. Reduced rate at which blue engrams drop in raid environments only 10.) New Exotics via Questlines Yours to discover when routinely playing. Pipeline: A.) Old Raids As of now, we are still working to implement "Challenge Mode" to VOG and Crota, but the Etheric Light and Reforging changes should keep you busy. B.) Elemental Primaries We are entertaining the possibility of having a "Crux of Crota" like drop from each end-of-raid boss that will give you a choice of 1 of 3 quest lines involving one of the elements (Atheon-Arc / Crota-fire / Oryx-void). Upon completion, you will be rewarded with an infusable element that you may add to any primary weapon. There you have it. Time to make that Fire Fatebringer! Have fun and enjoy the loot! #IfDreamsCameTrue