Destiny 2's Recluse, Other Best Guns Are Getting Nerfed In Shadowkeep

Bungie's latest blog post gave a final look at changes and alterations coming with the release of Destiny 2's Shadowkeep expansion, and it contained a whole lot of information. Easily missed, however, was the fact that a bunch of Destiny 2 guns are getting their power nerfed a bit--although not directly. Bungie is changing the effectiveness of certain weapon perks that can stack up to increase damage. Chief among the weapons affected is The Recluse, a pinnacle submachine gun that has become one of the most useful, and most used, guns in the game.

In its This Week at Bungie post ahead of Shadowkeep, the studio detailed how damage-dealing will change in Shadowkeep. As director Luke Smith previously noted in his Director's Cut blog posts, weapon damage in the second year of Destiny 2 has become something of a runaway train. It's possible to stack perks and buffs together to get massive damage boosts in ways Bungie didn't expect, and some guns have become more or less essential for various activities--putting people who don't have them at a disadvantage.

"Legendary weapons have become too powerful overall," Bungie wrote. "In many cases, they even outclass Exotic Primary weapons, so we’re walking them all back a bit. All the way back in original Destiny, we had a perk named Crowd Control, which was Rampage’s predecessor. Crowd Control capped out at a bonus of +15% extra damage. At this point in Destiny 2, Rampage caps out at about +67%. That’s a 447% increase from the original iteration. Legendary damage perks have become so powerful, they simply invalidate non-damage related perks."

Perks Getting Reduced Effectiveness in Shadowkeep

• Rampage
• Kill Clip
• Swashbuckler
• Multikill Clip
• Desperado
• Surrounded
• Master of Arms
• Onslaught

Several of those perks appear on a variety of guns, but three of them are specific to a few of the top guns in the game. The "Master of Arms" perk is exclusive to The Recluse, giving you a big damage boost on the submachine gun for any kill you make with any weapon. That has made it one of the best guns in the game up to now. Also on the list are Desperado, a unique perk on the Redrix's Broadsword pinnacle pulse rifle, and Onslaught, the perk specific to the Breakneck pinnacle auto rifle.

The TWAB post also includes a few details about how it's changing the perks, although there's not much information. Bungie writes that all the perks being changed will "use the same damage multipliers for PvE that they did in PvP." The Rampage change doesn't affect The Huckleberry, an Exotic submachine gun; Onslaught and Desperado will now change bullet impact values in PvE activities; and Surrounded no longer multiples precision damage over base damage, since that was making it more effective on some weapon types than others.

Bungie also detailed how it's doing away with pinnacle weapons altogether, changing them instead to easier-to-obtain but way-less-overpowered "ritual weapons" in Shadowkeep. So this change sounds like it's right in line with Bungie's thinking on those guns--but it's still a bummer that the mega-powerful Recluse is getting taken down a peg. Still, we know Bungie wants to keep lots of different weapon sets viable in Destiny 2, and when one gun becomes dominant, nerfs are never far behind.