Episode Heresy is very close now, releasing next Tuesday. We have some exotic armor buffs coming into the game which are going to mix up the build crafting. Today I want to go through all the exotic armor buffs, so you know what to use in Destiny 2 Episode Heresy.

Without further delay, lets dive into the exotic armor buffs.

Hunter

Sealed Ahamkara Grasps

Sealed Ahamkara Grasps have struggled on Hunter due to the large array of alternate reload options that Hunters already had access to. We’ve reworked its behavior to have a bit more Exotic flair in terms of playstyle.

Reworked with a weapon-swapping focus to differentiate it from other Hunter reload Exotics. Perk description now reads as follows:

Powered melee and finisher final blows grant Nightmare Fuel, increasing handling and airborne effectiveness. While active, freshly drawn weapons deal additional damage and grant Nightmare Fuel on final blows. Gaining Nightmare Fuel reloads all holstered weapons.

Gwisin Vest

With the recent roaming Super changes, we decided to give this Exotic a bit of tuning to let it shine in its role, as well as giving some utility outside of the Super.

Now progresses its Super returns on Super hits as well as kills before becoming invisible.
Improved the maximum possible Super energy gains per return while also increasing the amount of progress needed for maximum gains.
Now also emits a cloud of weakening smoke when you exit invisibility while nearby an enemy.
Works both in neutral and while in Super.

Renewal Grasps

Now that Frost Armor has settled in the sandbox, we feel that Renewal Grasps can safely be more generous in granting it.

Doubled the rate of Frost Armor gain while in the enhanced Duskfield grenade.

Foetracer

While Foetracer offers an excellent way to increase one’s damage, we’ve found that the benefit is too brief when compared to other alternatives.

Increased the bonus weapon damage duration from 10 seconds to 15 seconds.

Radiant Dance Machines

Radiant Dance Machines has been reworked to allow the multiple dodge charges that it grants to count as real dodges for the purposes of perks and aspects. The trigger mechanism for granting extra dodges requires more effort to compensate for that, but the overall change is a large increase in strength and utility. We have also added some flat benefits to Primary weapons that are a real gamechanger for players who prioritize gun feel and performance when mobile.

Improves airborne effectiveness and hip fire mobility, range, and accuracy for Primary ammo weapons.
Multi-kills with Primary ammo weapons refund dodge energy. When dodge energy is full, multi-kills grant extra charges. Powerful combatants and Guardians count as more than one kill.

Relativism – Spirit of Galanor

With the ability to regenerate a roamer more quickly than ever, it was quite easy to end up chaining roaming Supers back-to-back and effectively never need to rely on your weapons during activities. So, to combat this, we are reducing this capability a little on the armor side specifically for Silkstrike and Golden Gun.

Reduced the maximum amount of energy refunded for Silkstrike and Golden Gun to 30% (down from 50%).

Relativism – Spirit of the Foetracer

Spirit of the Foetracer has inherited the changes made to Foetracer.

Titan

Citan’s Ramparts

Citan’s Ramparts was last adjusted to account for its problematic dominance in PVP, but that came at the cost of its value across the game. In the current sandbox, we’ve found that many of its downsides can be removed safely in PVE, even with the small buff that gives it in PVP, without introducing those toxic play patterns.

Removed several downsides applied by Assault Barricade to bring it in line with base Towering Barricade behavior. Cumulatively, these changes result in a Towering barricade you can shoot through with no other downsides while Citan’s is equipped (in PVE – see below).
Increased barricade health from 400 to 500.
No longer increases Barricade cooldown.
No longer decreases Barricade duration.
Further increased damage dealt to Citan’s barricades by Guardians from 125% to 160%.
This results in near-identical effective Barricade health in PVP (~2.5% less after these changes).
Eternal Warrior

We want Eternal Warrior to be an appealing option in both PvP and PvE for players interested in building into Fists of Havoc. We’re giving it increased Super duration on final blow – a nostalgic effect for longtime players that is thematically aligned with the Exotic.

Final blows with Fists of Havoc now grant extended Super duration.

Ursa Furiosa

Our recent changes to Ursa Furiosa to integrate it with the Unbreakable aspect have yet to encourage significant use. So, we want to lean further into supporting Unbreakable by changing the energy returned by blocking with Unbreakable to be grenade energy.

Blocking damage with Unbreakable now returns grenade energy instead of Super energy.
Grenade energy is returned at the end of Unbreakable and is scaled based on the amount of damage you blocked with it.

Khepri’s Horn

Khepri’s Horn is getting a glow-up: It will still causes your Barricade to emit waves of damaging Solar energy, but with this update they have been significantly enhanced.

Now sends out three waves of flame instead of just one.
These waves no longer return towards the Barricade – they only travel outwards once.
Tracking on the waves has been enhanced.
Combatants damaged by these waves are enveloped in a Sunspot. Players are enveloped if they are defeated.
Now requires a Solar Super to be equipped to create the flame waves from the Barricade.

An Insurmountable Skullfort

As difficulty goes up, Skullfort can feel overly punishing when you fail to land the final blow it’s perk demands. To alleviate this issue, we are extending its effect to grant partial refunds from any melee attack to help rebuild that crucial momentum.

Now grants energy to Arc melee abilities when hitting targets with any melee attack. Amount granted varies based on the melee used.
From most to least energy granted: Powered melees, non-Glaive unpowered melees while Knockout is active, and unpowered melees (including Glaives).

Stoicism – Spirit of the Bear

Spirit of the Bear has inherited the changes made to Ursa Furiosa.

Stoicism – Spirit of the Horn

Spirit of the Horn has inherited the changes made to Khepri’s Horn. On Thruster, Sprit of the Horn will now emit four waves in an X-pattern.

Warlock

Stormdancer’s Brace

Much like Spirit of Galanor, we wanted to tune back how much returned energy was given for roaming Supers via Exotics. To compensate, we wanted to give Stormdancer’s Brace a little love in the potency granted to Stormtrance while you are in Super.

Doubled the damage benefit per stack of Ascending amplitude (up to 20% per stack, from 10%).
Now also reduces the cost of Ionic Blink during Super by 50%.
Reduced the maximum amount of energy refunded to 30% (down from 50%).

Geomag Stabilizers

Part of the charm of Geomag Stabilizers was lost when sprinting to get Super was removed due to PvP issues. With the introduction of Bolt Charge to the Arc kit, there was an opportunity to bring this experience back without breaking PvP.

Added a new perk: “Sprinting while near max Bolt Charge will top it off.”
Starts at six stacks of Bolt Charge.
Reenabled VFX where boots spark while sprinting near max Bolt Charge.
Increased Super energy gained from ionic traces to 7% from 2%.
Secant Filaments (and Spirit of the Filaments)

Ever since anti-Champion capabilities were expanded to work with elemental verbs inherently, Secant Filaments have felt like an Exotic lost to the flow of time. Giving it a satisfying loop felt like a nice way to give the perk some love for both the base Exotic and its Spirit counterpart.

Now gives class ability energy per kill while Devour is active.

Speaker’s Sight

Speaker’s Sight paired with Ember of Benevolence allowed Warlocks to earn a massive amount of ability energy via the Healing Turret even if they and their fireteam were all at full health. Speaker’s Sight’s impact should be rooted in the actual healing of injured Guardians, so we are making a change to how the Healing Turret selects its targets.

Healing Turret no longer targets allies at full health.
Allies need some damage done to their shields to be eligible targets.
Verity’s Brow (and Spirit of Verity)

The Death Throes buff is quite potent, but it is easy to let it run out and lose all your grenade benefit. We have updated this Exotic to bring it in line with how the similar Titan Exotic Wormgod Caress works: Stacks of Death Throes are now represented by a meter that decays backwards through each tier rather than falling off entirely when the duration elapses.

Now uses a meter to track Death Throes
New durations per tier:
x1: 8 seconds
x2: 7 seconds
x3: 6 seconds
x4: 5 seconds
x5: 4 seconds

When one tier’s duration elapses, the buff will downgrade to the next lower tier rather than expiring entirely.

Bonus grenade recharge per tier:
x1: 0.5% per second
x2: 1% per second
x3: 1.5% per second
x4: 2% per second
x5: 2.5% per second

Let me know what you think about the exotic armor changes coming.