Big Changes Coming to Destiny 2 Abilities in Season 19

In today’s This Week at Bungie post, the Destiny 2 developer outlined changes coming to the game’s abilities in season 19. Given the dominance of abilities over gunplay after this year’s 3.0 subclass updates and Bungie’s desire to bring things more in line with a 60/40 gunplay/ability split, this makes a lot of sense. However, it’s not all nerfs. Many subclasses and abilities will be receiving substantial buffs, including my beloved Shadebinder Warlock. Here are the changes from the TWAB.

Solar — Destiny 2 Abilities Changes

General Changes

• Restoration  
  • Restoration x1 base healing rate reduced from 25 to 20 health per second (40 health per second in PvE activities, down from 50).  
  • Restoration x2 base healing rate reduced from 40 to 32.5 health per second (65 health per second in PvE activities, down from 80). 
  • No longer stacks with Healing Rift’s healing. The stronger heal-over-time value is prioritized and will stop the weaker heal-over-time from taking effect.  
• Ember of Torches  
  • Radiant base duration reduced from 10 seconds to 8 seconds. 
  • Now applies a -10 Discipline penalty while equipped.  
• Ember of Solace 
  • Now provides a bonus 50% to Radiant duration, rather than a flat 5 seconds. 
    • Note: this is consistent with its behavior with Restoration. 

Gunslinger Changes

• Knock ‘Em Down 
  • Golden Gun   
    • Now provides 15% bonus damage resistance to Deadshot Golden Gun and no longer provides bonus duration. 
    • No longer provides 15% bonus damage resistance to Marksman Golden Gun. 
  •  Blade Barrage 
    • Blade Barrage bonus projectiles reduced from 5 to 3 per group. It now releases a total of 20 knives , down from 24.

Dawnblade Changes

• Celestial Fire 
  • Increased close-range melee damage from 90 to 100. Players using Celestial Fire and the auto-melee option are no longer disadvantaged in close-range melee fights.  

Void — Destiny 2 Abilities Changes

General Changes

• Void Overshield  
  • Fixed an issue where the overshield was only providing 25% PvE-only damage resistance to the overshield, rather than the intended 50%.  

Voidwalker Changes

• Nova Bomb: Vortex  
  • Increased initial projectile speed by 21%.  
  • Increased radius of the inward pull on impact by ~17%.  
  • Increased strength of the inward pull on impact by ~20%. 

Sentinel Changes

• Shield Bash  
  • Improved reliability of applying suppression. 

Nightstalker Changes

• Shadowshot: Deadfall  
  • Increased Tether anchor lifetime when triggered from 8 seconds to 12 seconds.
• Shadowshot: Moebius Quiver  
  • Reduced Tether anchor lifetime when triggered from 8 seconds to 6 seconds. 

Arc — Destiny 2 Abilities Changes

Striker Changes

• Touch of Thunder Storm Grenade  
  • Decreased Touch of Thunder’s Storm Grenade base roaming duration from 5 seconds to 4 seconds.  
• Decreased the bonus lifetime granted by Spark of Magnitude to the enhanced Storm Grenade from 2 seconds to 1.5 seconds. 
• Updated friend-or-foe visual language. 
  • Previously, the friend-or-foe ring surrounding a Touch of Thunder Storm Grenade’s lightning strikes blinked on and off between strikes, and there was no indication within the cloud itself of whether it was friend or foe. Now, the ring persists through the life of the storm, and enemy storms have an additional VFX layer in the cloud itself to help differentiate them from those created by allies.   
• Ballistic Slam  
  • Increased Ballistic Slam damage against PvE combatants by 16%.  

Arcstrider Changes

• Tempest Strike  
  • Increased Tempest Strike damage against PvE combatants by 30%. 

Stormcaller Changes

• Arc Soul  
  • Increased base damage vs. PvE combatants from 35 to 60.  
• Ball Lightning  
  • Increased travel range from 27.5 meters to 35 meters.  
• Chain Lightning  
  • Increased damage against PvE combatants by 50%. 
• Chaos Reach  
  • Reduced base cooldown time from 9:16 to 7:35. 

Stasis — Destiny 2 Abilities Changes

General Changes

• Stasis Slow 
  • Increased movement speed penalty while Slowed by 10%.
•  Coldsnap Grenade  
  • Coldsnap’s seeker can now adjust its trajectory for 0.5 seconds after creation, rather than immediately finding a target and traveling toward their last known position.  
• Duskfield Grenade  
  • Increased Slow stack application rate on players by 13%. 
• Whisper of Rending  
  • Now provides bonus damage to Stasis Crystals and frozen targets for all Primary ammo weapons, rather than just Kinetic Primary ammo weapons.

Behemoth Changes

• Cryoclasm  
  • Fragment slots increased from 1 to 2. 

Revenant Changes

• Winter’s Shroud
  • Fragment slots increased from 1 to 2.  

Shadebinder Changes

• Glacial Harvest  
  • Reduced cooldown on Stasis Shard creation (per six shards) from 15 seconds to 10 seconds.