Significant Destiny 2 weapon changes coming for Season 20, highlights heavy weapons, nerfing Linear Fusion Rifles, and more

On February 28, Destiny 2 players will dive into the highly anticipated Lightfall expansion, which will be the first day of Season 20. Fans can look forward to exploring Neptune for the first time and unlocking a brand new Guardian power, Strand. Ahead of the upcoming release, developer Bungie has outlined some significant weapon changes coming to the game. The recent update highlights heavy weapons, with a serious nerf to Linear Fusion Rifles and multiple perk changes.

Bungie shared these details in an extensive blog post, outlining their plans for weapon tuning when Lightfall arrives. This follows yesterday’s reveal of the many Lightfall exotic gear featured in the expansion.

The ever-popular Linear Fusion Rifle will receive a significant nerf when Lightfall arrives, reducing the damage they can do against Champions, minibosses, bosses, and vehicles by 15%. Linear Fusion Rifles are some of the more popular weapons to use against bosses, capable of cutting through larger enemies and making short work of them. Machine guns will get a boost for PvP, Heavy Grenade Launchers will damage bosses more, and Shotguns’ reticle aim will change in proportion to the spread angle.

Bungie also went to town on many of the exotic weapons in Destiny 2, adding more subclass 3.0 verbs that they’ve released for the past year. For example, the Queenbreaker, an exotic Linear Fusion Rifle, felt underwhelming to the team, so it now adds a chain attack to nearby enemies and blinds foes. This is one of the many changes coming to Lightfall. Other exotic weapon changes include The Leviathan’s Breath, Ruinous Effigy, One Thousand Voices, Two-Tailed Fox, Prometheus Lens, and others.

Related: Destiny 2 shows off the devastating freezing ability of upcoming Lightfall exotic glaive Winterbite

There will also be a handful of reworked perks that already exist in Destiny 2 that will work alongside Strand. Osmosis, for example, will now work with Strand, so players to modify any weapon they’re using to become a Strand element weapon.

These changes will take effect when Lightfall officially arrives in Destiny 2 on February 28.