• • Freelance node added. 
    
    • • The modes we have added Freelance nodes to (Iron Banner, Glory, and Trials of Osiris) all feel like they end up with more balanced matches more often, even as they increase and split the number of matchmaking pools. 
      • Bungie is investigating ways to remove the need for Freelance nodes that split the population, and hope to have something for you later this year. 
      • In the meantime, the ability to queue for Gambit Freelance should be very useful. 
  • Rotating seasonal selection of curated encounters starting in Season 16. 
    • • In Classic Gambit/Prime, you got a randomly selected encounter from a list of three for each enemy race, on each map. In Beyond Light, due to production issues, Bungie was only able to bring one of the three variations forward into the new activity. Those issues have been fixed, and we are now bringing the missing variations forward. 
      • Playing with the single variation for race/map for a year led to an interesting observation: it’s FUN to know that ‘Hive on Pacifica’ means “Oh, god, those Shriekers” and to learn the spawns and master them over time. 
      • So, no more Shriekers on Pacifica for now, but they will be back later in the year! 
  • Respawn points added to all Fronts (sections of maps where enemies could cycle in or out). 
    • • It can be frustrating to always have to run all the way from the backfield after spawning before you are able to help teammates, fight the invader, collect dropped Motes, etc. 
      • It can also be very frustrating as an invader to always spawn at the same location on the same map multiple times in a row, or to have the invader camp the entrance to avoid confrontation. 
      • More respawn points spread throughout Fronts should help you get back into the action faster, and provide for less predictable spawn points during Invasions. 
  • Players always drop half the Motes they were carrying when they are defeated. 
    • • These can be picked up by anyone, including invaders! Invaders can also drop more Motes now! 
      • This makes recovering from a ruthless invader (or bad luck fighting enemies) a little easier. 
  • Players can be revived by other players two seconds earlier, and auto-respawn is delayed two seconds. 
    
    • • This change should also reduce the frustrating moments of teammates being forced to respawn as you’re halfway through the revive interact. 
      • When your teammate dies and you run to grab their dropped Motes, stop for a second and revive them, will ya? 
  • All shields have increasing resistance to non-matching damage types. 
  • “Rules of Gambit” node added to the launch screen, and numerous Gambit-specific hints have been added to the load screen.  
    • • Gambit can be a bit opaque to newcomers — this should give them a leg up. 

 

Blockers, Draining, and the Bank

 

 

While Bungie didn’t do any drastic adjustments here, they have a few tweaks that they think will increase interesting decisions both when sending and battling Blockers, and hopefully remove the feeling of helplessness as you pour ammo into three Knights as all of your Motes drain away. 

 

• • 10 Mote Phalanx Blocker has its health boosted a bit. 
  • 15 Mote Knight Blocker gains a Stasis attack. 
  • Mote drain from multiple Blockers continues even if the opposing team is in Primeval phase. 
  • Mote drain is paused if a player is near the bank and engaging Blockers. 

 

Ammo Economy 

 

 

Bungie’s goal for these changes are to make a more predictable and equal baseline of Special and Heavy ammo among all players. They will be watching both feedback and analytics around ammo gain and usage rates, and they will continue to make tweaks if these aren’t enough to make fair matches. 

 

• • When completing a Front,  a chest containing a small amount of Special and Heavy ammo spawns in the middle of the Front and can be looted once by each player. 
    • • It times out 20 seconds after the initial interact, so you still can’t dilly-dally. 
  • Killing a high-value target spawns one normal Heavy brick for each player. 
    • • During the Primeval phase, ammo chests spawn in one of the Fronts every 60 seconds. 
      • This replaces the regular Front ammo chests – but you still need to find the time to go grab it! 
  • Limited Special and Heavy ammo bricks to only spawn from enemies if you have finder mods equipped. 
    • • Other ammo Exotics and perks, like Aeon Cult still work. 

 

The Primeval Fight

 

 

The Primeval fight is the ultimate challenge of Gambit. It should feel like an epic boss fight and be long enough for the opposing team to get off some invades to counter strong DPS. It should have more to do than simply burning the boss as quickly as possible (and turn in place to kill Envoys every once in a while). Its mechanics shouldn’t be complex but should require about as much tactical play as a high-end strike boss.  

 

• • Primeval health and Slayer stack bonus retuned. 
    • • Burning the boss after three rounds of Envoys should be just as easy as it is now, but burning him after just one or two rounds should be significantly more work. 
  • Envoys now spawn with friends out in the Fronts, rather than in the bank area. 
    • • They have reduced health, and are no longer affected by Slayer stacks, and have varied elemental shields. 
      • Killing the Envoys to get Slayer stacks will require movement, dealing with the Envoy’s protectors, and dealing with their elemental shield. 
  • Envoys put an invulnerability shield on Primeval. 
    • • You must kill them both to remove it and damage the Primeval, forcing your team to go out and invade. 
  • Envoys respawn at 30% of the Primeval damage done. 
    • • This increases by 10% every Envoy respawn, and Envoys stop spawning after the fifth spawn. 
  • The Primeval Servitor boss is removed, since its custom shielding mechanics conflicted with the new mechanics. 
    • • The Malfeasance quest starts on the first Primeval kill. 

 

With the tuning changes above, the Motes phase is significantly quicker, and the Primeval phase longer. You should expect matches to be just about as long as they are now, but Bungie will be watching to make sure they aren’t too short or too long. 

 

Invasions

 

 

As Bungie said above, a good invader should be able to turn the tide of a match, but a good invader should be no more important than any other equally-skilled team member. They don’t want a single good invader to completely dominate match outcome — and they certainly can right now. However, they still want a good invader to be able to delay a strong PvE team from finishing off the Primeval. 

 

• • Level advantage is “now” disabled for Invader PvP. 
  • One of the Mote phase invasions has been removed. 
    • • Invasions now trigger at 40 and 80 Mote thresholds. 
      • Primeval phase invasions are unchanged. 
  • Invasions can no longer be saved up. 
    • • Use it or lose it, pal. 
  • Invader no longer can see how many Motes enemy players are carrying, and player nameplates fade out when the Invader is aiming down their sights. 
    • • You can still see players through walls, just not while you are engaging your rocket tracking, or using your sniper zoom. 
  • Bungie found a bug with how the Primeval heal effect was being applied, which depending on the sequence and timing of kills, would heal the Primeval for somewhere between 5 and 35%. 
    • • We fixed it, and now invader kills heal the Primeval for exactly 27% every time. 
      •  

 

Rewards

 

 

Gambit is the second of the core rituals (after Trials of Osiris) to get comprehensive engram focusing options. 

 

• • Focusing 
    • • You can focus the Gambit engram into either ‘Gambit Armor’ or ‘Gambit Weapons’ for 10,000 Glimmer and 50 Legendary Shards. 
      • Gambit Weapons includes: Crowd Pleaser, Bottom Dollar, Trinary System, Borrowed Time, and Servant Leader. 
      • Brand new Gambit weapons are drop-only for a single Season, and are then available for focusing. 
      • Bugnie plans to expand Drifter’s focusing options further during upcoming Seasons. 
  • Other Drifter Changes 
    • • Bygones/Trust/Bad Omens have been removed from the vendor. 
  • End Match Drops 
    • • There is a Gambit memento for weapon crafting that can drop after any match. 
      • Older Gambit shaders now have a small chance of dropping at the end of each match. 
  • Primeval Servitor cosmetic drops can now drop at the end of any match. 
    • • The Furtive Shell ghost can now drop at the end of any match.