Fans are getting used to massive overhauls to power, loot, gameplay, activities and really all corners of Destiny 2 with the launch of its new Edge of Fate expansion, taking the game into an entirely new, expressly slimmed-down era.
One of the biggest system changes is that all new Destiny 2 loot (and zero old loot) now operates on a Tier system. Tier 1 to Tier 5. Tier one weapons are normal, un-enhancable legendaries. As you move up you get enhancement and more perks and then flashy colors and bonuses at Tier 5. For armor, it’s higher and higher stat totals, with some extra perks at the top. The goal, obviously, is Tier 5 as the ultimate pursuit.
But this entire system is very strange right now, heavily linked to power and Guardian Rank in a way that it hasn’t been previously. I just talked about how I think this is bad, but to really understand what’s going on here, and what you can or cannot farm and how, is needed.
Credit to Gigz here, who compiled this all in one place that I think is useful for discussion. It’s a wide, wide range of what exactly is going on, and I would be surprised if any one player understood all of it. I’ve been attempting to since launch, and some of it is still going over my head. I will correct any of this if need be, as lord knows there may still be some things that are mission. So:
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- Doing Portal activities at 200+ power will give you Tier 2
- Doing Portal activities at 300+ power and Guardian Rank 7 will give you Tier 3
- Doing Portal activities at 400+ power and Guardian Rank 9 will give you Tier 4
- There is a “pity” drop at 20 Portal completions that will be one Tier higher than your normal. After 400 power, this is the only way you can level up.
- A weekly story mission, which can be done at 100+ power, will give you a Tier 4 item. Doing it at 350+ power will give you a Tier 5 item
- Beating Contest Mode raid at launch was giving players Tier 1 items. Playing the raid now at 300+ power gives you Tier 1-2. Playing the raid with incredibly challenging modifiers gives you a chance at a Tier 4
- Playing Trials of Osiris at anything under 400 power will not give you Tier 5s, even from a flawless chest, which now has a one per week lockout.
- Finally, hitting 450 power, the absolute cap, will get you Tier 5 items all over the place. Rank high in almost any PvP or PvE activity and you can get anywhere from 1-5 Tier 5s at a time with bonus drops. They rain from the heavens.
The headlines here are: The most difficult activities in the game like raids and Trials are not guaranteed to give you high Tier loot and in fact, they’ll often give you outright bad loot.
Conversely, Tier loot is almost 100% determined by milestones of 200, 300, 400 and 450 power, and usually their associated ranks which will require any number of random feats.
If you do get a rare wild drop that’s a better Tier, you almost certainly just hit a timer after burning through almost two dozen activities.
The system is confusing, ill-explained and illogical. Substantive changes are needed, but through all of this, we’ve really only heard that Bungie realized that maybe the Contest Raid Tier 1 thing was bad. Hopefully we hear a lot more soon about coming changes to how all this works.
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