Those who frequent my blog here are probably aware by now that I'm a big fan of Destiny, Bungie's MMO looter-shooter. I've written a number of shorts set in the Destiny universe (recently collected under the House of Dregs and Wahei Transcripts tags) and also wrote a Gamr Drivl piece suggesting a way to make a Battle Royale game mode work.
In November 2020, Destiny 2 brought us its latest expansion, Beyond Light, which also saw some major changes in the world. Several destinations in the setting were removed, and a lot of loot (weapons and armor) was "sunset," meaning they could no longer be upgraded to remain viable equipment to use in current content. When this was announced, it prompted a lot of complaints. (Bungie has since walked this back, and will be further working to maintain balance and shift the "meta" of loadouts to keep things fresh.) The removal of so much content-- explained as a necessity to keep the game a manageable size for ease of patching-- also meant that some lore in the game was rendered unobtainable.
Additionally, one of the biggest complaints with Beyond Light was that the loot pool was suddenly far too small. With so many weapons and armors sunset, the newer weapons weren't enough to satisfy players. Bungie later rectified this slightly by adding several more recent sets back into the game, but it still left a bad taste in players' mouths.
What I propose in this Gamr Drivl is a means to make the missing lore books obtainable (though not for triumph score or seals) and make lore more accessible for the average player. And likewise a way to make it possible for players to "farm" for rolls they want on their weapons.
THE LORE PROBLEM
Destiny has had an issue with making its lore accessible since its inception. Admittedly, with 'vanilla' Destiny 1, this was down to disagreements about the story plans, as Bungie focused more on gameplay mechanics and world building than on developing a story. This has been something they've refined and gotten better about with each successive release and season, but so much of the lore in the game was not actually available in the game. Instead, it was unlocked as "grimoire cards" which could be accessed through Bungie's website. Now all those cards are inaccessible, as they were removed with Destiny 2, and can only be found on third-party websites such as Ishtar Collective. The grimoire lore included the "Book of Sorrows," which was added in The Taken King expansion, is still hailed as some of the best lore in the franchise.
With Destiny 2, the "lore" available in-game was limited to scannable objects, prompting a brief commentary by Ghost. This was widely seen as a step backwards, as there was no way to track how many scannables there were, or if you had already scanned one. With Forsaken, lore was added back in with tabs on some weapons and armor, but it also brought the introduction of lore books, a tab on the new Triumphs page. Some lore books were unlocked by completing campaign activities, others by finding glowing items in-world. And still others depended on completing activities at certain locations during specific weeks. All of this gave completionists and lore-interested players something to chase, and awarded the "Chronicler" seal for completing all of the lore books from Forsaken.
The lore books provide backstory on characters and factions, developing out characters that we'd only heard referenced previously, adding little touches to the world they'd built over the years. It also shows what some characters are up to and show their reactions to events transpiring in the game. For example, with Beyond Light, new armor sets were introduced for some of the core game modes (strikes, Crucible, Gambit), and these show how characters like Zavala and Shaxx are reacting to the arrival of the Black Fleet to the system and Guardians wielding the Darkness-derived power of Stasis.
The problem is, however, that the majority of players don't pay attention to the lore. They don't read the lore tabs, they don't read the lore books, some don't even pay attention to cutscenes. And now with Beyond Light including a new starting-player experience, as well as being available via services like Game Pass, there are now new players dropping in who don't have any knowledge of who some of the characters are, including the late Cayde-6, who was killed at the start of Forsaken. Names and events are references, of which some players don't recognize the significance.
How then, to make the lore more accessible to players?
Welcome to the Archives
As it happens, I think Bungie has started down the right path. With the past few seasons, when a character (not a player, but the separate characters a player has) logs in for the first time that season, they're treated to a brief, fully-rendered cutscene narrated by one of the characters, giving a little intro to current events. And with Beyond Light, we started getting animatics-- animated storyboards, essentially-- to fill in things, from Commander Zavala talking about the recent losses with the Black Fleet's arrival, to Variks explaining the fall of the Eliksni homeworld and Eramis' rise to power. Animatics require less work than a fully-rendered cutscene, and written properly, the narration for them doesn't need anything more than a single voice actor.
What I propose is the introduction of a new location in the Tower, perhaps located next to Zavala's office, called The Archives. Going in, one would find a sort of library, or at least a balcony overlooking one, with a new vendor nearby, the Archivist. Ideally, this would be a way to re-use the character of Tyra Karn, a cryptarch introduced in Destiny: Rise of Iron, and later used as the cryptarch at the Farm in Destiny 2's Red War campaign. However, with the conclusion of the Red War, she hasn't seen much use since, and now with Beyond Light removing the Farm from the game, Tyra is no longer in the game at all. That said, the Archivist could also be a new character if Tyra's voice actress is unavailable.
In the Archives, there would be several objects one could interact with, each related to a major event from Destiny's backstory, such as the Collapse-- explaining some of what happened, or at least what's understood about, when the Darkness first arrived in the solar system. These cutscenes would be animatics, then narrated by the Archivist (or other characters as necessary/appropriate). Animatics or cutscenes related to the character would be accessible as well, explained as the Archivist beginning to compile a record of the Guardian's own legendary deeds.
Warframe, sometimes seen as a competitor to Destiny 2 as a looter-shooter, is frequently hailed for the depth of its lore and the sheer scope of everything they have in their free-to-play game. Some lore is available in-game as a kind of museum-like series of dioramas, presented via the Leverian, complete with narration. If Warframe can put something like this in their game, I fail to see why Bungie couldn't do the same. This could be how the Archives' lore would be shown.
Once a week, players would be able to purchase a bounty/quest from the Archivist to allow them to unlock chapters in a lore book from the sunset content. I specify those lore books because unlocking them won't affect the triumph score and their seal is unobtainable, so there is literally no reason not to make them obtainable at this point. The objectives necessary to complete the quest could vary, but should require some grind to make up for the lore's associated activities/quests/locations no longer being available. Only lore books from no longer available content would be available from the Archivist bounties.
As for rewards, the Archivist could provide some cosmetics, such as Ghost shells, Sparrows, ships, or an emote of some kind. An emblem would be one of the main things to acquire, with variants on it being unlocked the more lore books have been completed. I would also propose moving the two new kiosks in the Tower-- the Exotic Archive and Quest Archive, through which exotic weapons could be purchased and old campaigns could be accessed-- to the Archives as well, while making the supposed Monument to Lost Lights into an actual statue of some kind in the Tower, rather than a little computer terminal next to the Vaults.
THE LOOT PROBLEM
Bungie has responded to player complaints about the lack of loot in Beyond Light by re-adding a bunch of weapons and armor to the loot pool. Nevertheless, this removed a lot of weapons and armor, as any weapons or armor from the sunset activities (several raids, the Menagerie, Gambit Prime, the Reckoning, Black Armory, etc.) were now unobtainable.
One way to address the issue would involve bringing back the Black Armory content, which was introduced during Forsaken's "Season of the Forge." Black Armory dealt with tracking down the lost forges of the titular armory, enabling its curator, Ada-1, to construct weapons and armor for the Guardian. Ada-1 and the Black Armory content was put into the Destiny Content Vault when Beyond Light dropped. Story-wise, it was explained that Ada-1 was working alongside the Vanguard on something called "Project Stronghold," to produce more weapons and armor with the arrival of the Pyramids.
Bungie has announced that Ada-1 will return in a future season, and that she will be tied into the "transmog" system, which will allow players to convert armors into universal ornaments, so they can wear the armor with the stats they like, but have it appear like the armor they want to be seen wearing.
Also, Bungie has brought back the Umbral Decoder and Prismatic Recaster from "Season of Arrivals." During that season, players could earn Umbral Engrams from random drops, which could then be "focused" at the Recaster, allowing players to narrow down the loot pool for the engram, so it might be one of two weapons, or from a specific armor pool, and then focus it further by specifying the stat on the armor which has the highest rank. Starting with "Season of the Chosen," the Decoder and Recaster are available again, refined further and allowing players earn specific focuses for the Recaster. Get enough kills with a specific weapon type, and now you can farm that kind of weapon from the Recaster.
The issue that arose in Season of the Chosen was that focusing an Umbral Engram to Tier 3 required a great deal of "hammer charges" (from a quest item tied to the Battlegrounds activity from that season), and even then, there have been complaints that it's not worth spending the resources (and charges) on a Tier 3 focus.
But I can think of other ways to incorporate Ada-1 into addressing the loot issue.
The City Foundries Present: The Return of Armsday
When reintroducing Ada-1 and the Black Armory into the game, more emphasis should be put on the other foundries in the Last City. These foundries don't get a lot of emphasis in the game, they're mostly there as background fare, a logo and a motto there as flavor text.
Similar to the Archivist idea above, I propose restoring Ada-1's Black Armory storehouse to the Tower Annex, but expanding on it to an extent. It's explained she's working with the other foundries of the City to improve on their work and make it easier for Guardians to customize the weapons they use. In-game, this doesn't mean the Guardian can re-roll the weapon they already have, but they can make it more likely that a weapon from a particular foundry will drop with a perk they want.
I'm no expert on how one would calculate the odds of a weapon dropping with a specified perk, but through Ada-1, players could select certain options, not dissimilar from the Chalice of Opulence from the "Season of Opulence." The Chalice required players to slot in up to three runes, the first of which would determine what players would get by completing the Menagerie activity (i.e., a hand cannon, or a class item, or a rocket launcher, etc.), the second would narrow the focus onto the specific type of that loot, and the third would determine which stat would get the masterwork bonus.
Something similar for the Foundries would apply, wherein players could slot specific options in to try to farm a specific weapon type, then with specific perks, but it would be noted that the perks are not always guaranteed, merely given a chance of dropping. A third slot would determine the masterwork stat. Once the options are selected, the player receives something-- I want to suggest making it a Foundry Engram in addition to having it on the quest tab.
As part of all this, a mechanic from Destiny 1 would return, with Armsday. In Destiny 1, the Tower's gunsmith Banshee-44 would offer an option to purchase a legendary weapon for a price, which would arrive on Armsday (the next Wednesday). No explanation was given in-universe for the removal, but here it could be explained that the Foundries had collectively agreed to work together, with the interest in driving up business by sponsoring Armsday.
To make things more interesting, and to encourage players to visit the Foundries every week, each week could feature a different foundry as the primary sponsor. On that week, only weapons and loot from that foundry is obtainable. So on one week, SUROS is featured, the next Veist, then Hakke, etc. In theory, you could also make ornaments for that foundry's exotics obtainable through a prolonged quest, to give players a chance to earn the ornaments, if they don't want to just spend premium currency at Eververse. (Or, make new ornaments available solely through the Foundries, in addition to the Eververse ornaments.)
You might wonder what makes this different from the Prismatic Recaster and Umbral Decoder, and the answer for that is that the intent for the Recaster/Decoder is to provide loot primarily from the current season. Players can opt to focus their engram to have a weapon or armor piece from "destinations" (i.e. the world pool), but there's no way to try to get a specific weapon out of that pool. Having the Foundries involved would get around that.
Ideally, this could all be introduced as part of a season focusing on Ada-1 and the Foundries. The antagonist(s) could be remnants of both House Salvation and the Kell's Scourge. We can already infer that remnants of the Kell's Scourge have joined House Salvation, since the Brigs-- the giant walking tanks that House Salvation deploys all over Europa-- are scaled-down versions of Insurrection Prime, the Kell's Scourge final boss from the Scourge of the Past raid. Perhaps some ex-Scourge machinist is close to reverse-engineering the Black Armory Forges, maybe even making a Dark-infused version of the Obsidian Drive. Combined with the Deep Stone Crypt being cracked open, maybe the Scourge machinist is intending to (or already has) turn themselves into another Fallen Exo, this time with the same technology that Ada-1 has incorporated into herself.
CONCLUSION
The lore of Destiny 2 has developed a great deal since the early days, and the fact that it isn't being appreciated by a lot of the wider community is tragic. Introducing the Archives concept would help address this by giving players a reason to pay attention to it. I-- as anyone who has read my various writings about Destiny can tell-- love the lore and want more people to enjoy it.
By bringing the Foundries to exist alongside Ada-1, and incorporating some manner of perk- or stat-targeting system a la the Chalice of Opulence or the Prismatic Recaster, it would help with the "loot problem" that players keep coming back to.
Obviously, with the third season of Beyond Light being less than a month away (at the time of this post), it's too late to bring the Foundries idea in alongside Ada-1 and the transmog system that's coming with Season 14. But that's not to say that it can't be brought in later. Ditto for the Archives. I love this game, in spite of all of its flaws, and want it to be the best it can be.
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