Bungie may well be ramping up its efforts concerning the long-rumored Power Level removal fromDestiny 2, as per some recent gameplay discoveries. The notion thatDestinymay forego its core levelling component in lieu of a more traditional scaling difficulty selector has been floating about for a while now, and the new activity featured in Season of the Deep seemingly adds to the claims' veracity.The firstleaks suggestingDestiny 2might remove Power Levelsharken back to 2022, though the sources then suggested that Bungie had been toying with the idea for a while at that point already. Instead of leveraging the players' Power Level, the game would feature a seasonal Artifact Level, the leaker claimed, allowing Bungie to consolidate the game’s content and keep everyone on the same difficulty curve.RELATED:Destiny 2 Community Highlights Growing Problems in Bungie’s Handling of the GameThese leaks are now far more likely to be true, it would seem, asDestiny 2now includes Season of the Deep’s Deep Dive activity, which features a fixed difficulty curve. Twitter user MossyMax discovered that changing the character’s Power Level also changes the numbers that pop up when an enemy is damaged, but the actual amount of damage dealt remains the same across the board. It is interesting to note, of course, that having a fixed Power Level in Deep Dives didn’t substantially alterDestiny’s combat loop, with the activity being praised for its solid difficulty and progression.
Even more curious perhaps is the fact that Bungie hasn’t been hiding this information at all. MossyMax highlighted the fact that the actualdescription ofDestiny 2’s Deep Divesplainly states that players' Power Levels are fixed while engaging in the activity. As this hasn’t been widely discussed by the community, however, it seems that Bungie has managed to stealthily introduce one of the biggest changes toDestiny’s difficulty scaling yet, albeit with a limited scope for the time being.
It’s worth noting that the fixed Power Level in Deep Dives hasn’t been released in a vacuum.Destiny 2’s Season of the Deep Pinnacle Levelalso stayed the same, which meant that players who grinded to the highest attainable Power Level in the previous season didn’t need to do so once again. Putting all these Power Level changes together suggests that big changes are ahead and that the old leaks may well have been correct.
Though it’s not without its issues,Destiny 2’s Season of the Deep improved build craftingby a measurable margin, introducing a wealth of important new gear, mods, and gameplay options for players to fiddle around with. It’s a good sign of things to come, but it’s not yet certain whether some of the featured changes are here to stay or if Bungie may go back to the drawing board once the season wraps up.
Destiny 2is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
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