New Rewards, Checkmate Weapons Adjustments, And Gunsmith Engrams Coming To Destiny 2

This week in Destiny 2 covers new rewards, an update on Checkmate weapons, and Gunsmith Engrams.

Players of the shooter can look forward to new rewards in both the Nightfall and Trials activities. In Nightfall, a new Precision Bow called "Pre Astyanax IV" is up for grabs, featuring Solar damage from the Cassoid foundry. Additionally, Trials returns with a new Grenade Launcher called "Cataphract GL3," an Adaptive Heavy Grenade Launcher from the Strand foundry.

Bungie also addressed weapon balance within the game mode Checkmate. The goal is to allow mid-range Primary weapons to shine while preventing extreme time-to-kill outliers from dominating the meta. This update includes adjustments to various weapon archetypes, such as increasing damage penalties on some weapons and reducing them on others. Notably, Hand Cannons are getting a reduction in damage, affecting their effective range and performance against high-resilience targets.

Additionally, a new feature called "Gunsmith Focusing" is introduced, offering players a way to chase their desired rolls of older foundry weapons. Banshee-44 will provide focusing options for weapons released from Season 16 up to Season 19. These weapons, which are at least four seasons old, will no longer be obtainable from Legendary Engram world drops...but can be acquired through Gunsmith Engrams and focusing.

The rotation of available foundries for Gunsmith focusing will change every day too, allowing each foundry to have a spotlight for two days in a row. These costs for Gunsmith focusing are in parity with focusing ritual weapons, requiring 3 Gunsmith Engrams and 5,000 Glimmer. To make it easier for players to obtain Gunsmith Engrams, additional methods of acquisition are being introduced — including ranking up Gunsmith Reputation, completing Lost Sectors at different difficulties, and finding free-roam chests.