For many Destiny 2 players, the party is over. Bungie has launched a server-side fix that will prevent AFK Forge Farming and ostensibly kills the Umbral Engram power level exploit that players discovered last week.
The new fix makes it so that players have to requeue a Destiny 2 forge any time that one is completed. It doesn’t matter if the Forge activity is a failure or a success, there is at least one button press required to start a new Forge run.
As a result, the AFK Forge Farm that Destiny 2 players were using to power level is gone. Players will simply have to earn Umbral Engrams the old fashioned way.
Although this does remove one of the fastest ways to power level, it does not impact the bug with Umbral Engrams that helps players level faster than they should. Normally, focused Umbral Engrams are only supposed to offer an increase in power for a limited time (depending on a player’s Prismatic Recaster upgrades), but Armor-Focused Umbral Engrams do not abide by those rules. Players can continuously decode the Armor-Focused Umbral Engrams and see a 4-power level increase on the Engram's base power.
Any who used the AFK Forge Farming method will not be punished by Bungie with any sort of suspension or ban. Many purists had hoped that Bungie might enact some form of punishment, but the studio has long held the stance that its mistakes are a player’s gain. Cheating in Destiny 2, however, can be met with a swift ban.
What’s most surprising about the AFK Forge Farm situation is that Bungie hadn't implemented this change sooner. Players have been using this process to achieve a number of different goals, from farming materials to activity “completions,” and Bungie only addressed the end goal and not the source of the farm. Now, any future situations that could benefit from AFK Forge Farming will not work.
So while the whole process might be slower, there is still a way for Destiny 2 players to increase their power level and work towards the new 1050 cap. However, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Bungie fix the bug with Umbral Engrams sooner rather than later. The studio is clearly aware of the exploits in its game; it’s only a matter of time before they get addressed.
It’s also worth mentioning that while AFK Forge Farming is dead across Destiny 2 as a whole, PC players might come up with their own way to skirt this change. Using Macros or some other programs, it’s possible that the process could live on.
Destiny 2 is available now for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
