Destiny 2 has been steadily expanding the roster of powers and abilities players have at their disposal for years. The most recent expansion, Lightfall, introduced the Strand subclass, complete with its own new set of capabilities. And now that the subclass has had some time out in the wild, Bungie has noted some alterations coming to Strand starting with Season 22.
Throughout Destiny and the first few expansions of Destiny 2, Guardians were exclusively wielders of the Light. Those powers manifested themself in the form of three subclasses: Solar, Void, and Arc. That all changed with the release of the Beyond Light expansion, revolving around players learning to harness the first Darkness-based subclass, Stasis. While the icy grip of Stasis can be useful, a lengthy grind and some lackluster abilities didn't help win over unanimous fandom. Since Strand was released alongside Lightfall, it saw more widespread adoption thanks to its powerful, flashy powers and straightforward acquisition path. However, Bungie couldn't help but notice that since Strand has swung onto the scene, it does what Stasis is supposed to, but better.
Why Is Strand Changing?
While Strand functions well in a few different roles, it seems the subclass initially overshadowed its other Darkness-based counterpart.
According to Bungie, Strand's Suspend effect trivialized a lot of PvE content, acting as a one-size-fits-all solution to nearly any non-boss opponent. Further, the developer pointed out that Stasis and its Freeze effect should exist as the cornerstone of enemy control.
Suspend can be easily activated in a number of ways for any Guardian class utilizing Strand, and the lengthy stun renders recipients immobile and open to fire. This creates frequent opportunities for players to lock foes down in one place for extended lengths of time without the fear of any significant repercussions. Naturally, Destiny 2 players found ways to maximize this effect with build options and took it as far as possible, sometimes finding ways to keep enemies suspended practically indefinitely.
How Is Strand Changing?
Starting with Season 22, Strand's identity will see a reformation to rely less on long Suspend times and lean more into Threadling and Tangle generation. Threadlings, of course, are little self-destructing summons that seeks out enemies, and Tangles are tossable orbs of woven Strand energy that can add beneficial effects or explode on foes.
Suspend Changes
- Suspend effect duration decreased from an 8-second duration to 3 seconds for Champions (this can be extended to 4 seconds with the Thread of Continuity Fragment).
- Suspend effect duration decreased from an 8-second duration to 5 seconds on non-Champion enemies (this can be extended to 7 seconds with the Thread of Continuity Fragment).
- While bosses cannot be Suspended, they do receive a debuff that eventually deals damage. This damage has increased by 67%.
- The Thread of Mind Fragment's class ability energy gain decreased from all enemy sources. From 15% to 10% for Minors, 25% to 15% for Majors, and 50% to 25% for Bosses, Champions, and minibosses.
- Thread of Generation originally gave grenade energy whenever Guardians damaged enemies in any way. That gain is being scaled back by about 20% in PvE and retooled to reward precision weaponry over automatic bullet hoses.
General Strand Changes
- Threadlings deal 30% increased damage to PvE enemies.
- The cooldown for creating a Tangle was reduced to 12 seconds from 15 seconds.
- The Sever debuff, which initially made enemies deal 30% decreased damage, now reduces damage by 40%.
- Grapple melees will always take priority during a Grapple to avoid conflict with ranged-powered melee abilities.
- The Thread of Propagation Fragment gains +10 Strength, but Thread of Continuity loses it.
- The Thread of Wisdom Fragment now generates an Orb of Power whenever Guardians defeat any Suspended foe -- losing the previous requirement of precision killing a Suspended target.
- The Thread of Isolation Fragment's activation requirements has decreased by about 30%. It causes a burst of the Sever debuff after multiple precision hits.
- The Thread of Rebirth Fragment initially offered a chance at summoning a single Threading with each Strand weapon kill. It now conjures additional Threadlings based on the type of enemy defeated: 1 for Minors, 2 for Elites or players, and 3 for Bosses, Champions, or Minibosses.
Hunter Strand Changes
- Resistance to all forms of damage whilst the Silkstrike Super is active has increased to 45% from 40%.
- The Silkstrike Super became a bit more nimble in the air, with alterations to both the speed of light attacks and the acrobatics of heavy attacks.
- The Threaded Specter Aspect now keeps the Strand decoy on the field for 12 seconds, up from 10 seconds. The decoy has more PvE health, more consistently catches enemy attention, and now gives a brief period after setup before drawing enemy awareness. The lure also no longer draws friendly players' reticles toward it like a foe.
Warlock Strand Changes
- The Wanderer Aspect initially let Warlocks toss Tangles that stick to enemies and then erupt with the Suspend debuff, also creating Tangles on Threadling kills. The Aspect now works if players shoot the Tangle, and the explosion radius has increased to 7 meters from 6 meters. The Wanderer's thrown detonation damage has been brought in line with regular Tangle detonations.
Titan Strand Changes
- While not specific to Strand Titans, Towering Barricade's cooldown went up to 70 seconds from 48 seconds. All Barricade health decreased to 500 from 600, but additional PvE resistances have been applied.
Destiny 2 is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S
