Year Two: Everything we know about the future of Destiny

Bungie is taking everything from Year One in Destiny and turning it on its head. They have big changes planned to hit Destiny when The Taken King releases next month and no one is safe.

First off, there's a minimum level requirement for you to be able to access the new content, but your level might not even be the same when The Taken King releases! You might be thinking to yourself 'What does this mean, Tatiana? You're not even making sense!' Well, let me explain (and the three little men on the right side of each image explain)…

Minimum Level Requirement

In order for you to begin exploring and experiencing The Taken King's content, you'll need to make sure you're leveled up enough. The minimum level for the expansion has been set at 25, leaving you 15 levels short of the new level cap.

If you're new to Destiny or are looking to use a new Guardian to experience the expansion, fear not. When you purchase The Taken King you automatically receive an item that will bring you to the minimum level.

[More on that here]

Leveling in The Taken King

"Your Light Level is being brought in and grandfathered in as your character level. Any character from Year One, when you first log in to 2.0, will be grandfathered in and basically be boosted to your level that you always have been all through the last year."

Bungie will will be looking at all of your gear, across all of your Guardians and use a 'behind-the-scenes algorithm' to determine what your Guardian's appropriate level is.

That means that Light Level will no longer limit your overall level. The feature won't be altogether removed though, Light Level will still exist as a feature that informs you of whether or not you're geared enough to be doing a Quest in the first place.

[More information here]

Items, Gear, Gear, and more Gear

First up, the Speaker no long has emblems. You can find all emblems along with shaders, ships and more have been moved on to different "terminal locations" in the tower called "Collections." These collections will keep track of every emblem, shader or ship you have acquired, as well as the one's you have yet to acquire. You can use Collections as a sort of "to-do" list.

Upgrading

“I can keep walking these weapons and armor up, and keeping them current,” said Senior Designer Tyson Green. “We’re really trying to deliver on people being able to find things that they’re excited about, and keep them, and customize their character.”

Bungie is bringing a new Infuse mechanic with The Taken King. The "Infuse Perk" will be available on all legendary and Exotic weapons and armor in Destiny from here on out, existing weapons like Vault of Glass or Crota’s End gear cannot be infused.

This mechanic will take other items as "fuel" for Infusement, you can find more on that here.

Quest Rewards and Legendary Guarantees

In the Hall of Guardians, you'll find a fellow named Shaxx that hands out Quests and Bounties. Starting as early as level 5, Shaxx will give you PVP quests that will give you various rewards. On top of this, he will also doll out will be weekly bounties, if all five of his weekly bounties are complete before they switch during the reset a final bounty will appear. The final bounty will reward you with Nightfall-tier rewards, as well as Legendary and Exotic items.

There are also Prestige packages, Faction-specific items and more — information on that can be found here.

Blueprints

If you have ever experience the loss of accidently Sharding an Exotic, rest assured that it is a pain you will never experience again. Every time you find an Exotic a blueprint of it will be added to your collection to "get back what you lost."

These Exotic blueprints will be account wide and will even include some Year One items if they see an upgrade in Year Two,

[More on that here]

Cooldown Trackers, Class Item Stats and Skills

Earlier we touched on the change to the Light system, well, on top of that the expansion will also bring a statistical breakdown of your character’s stats. Starting in the Taken King and moving on to every future Destiny expansion, Discipline, Strength and Intellect from your gear will unlock tiered cooldown reductions.

Class items will play a key role in this system, it's intended to change how the strength of your Guardian is defined, you can find more on that here.

Vanguard and Crucible Marks are out, Legendary Marks are in

On September 15th, you'll notice two things missing from your Guardian, Vanguard and Crucible Marks. These Marks have been taken away from you and converted into Commendations (they can be found at your local in-game postmaster). In their place we will have Legendary Marks as a form of currency, these Marks will be available account wide and will not be capped with weekly limits.

[More information on that here]

Vault Space, Vault Space, Vault Space!

The place where you store your items just got bigger! The Vault has doubled in size, will have pages relating to items: General, Weapons, Armor, etc. Specifics in size per item group here and more here.

Destiny: The Taken King is set to release on September 15th, 2015.