Destiny 2 Season 18 is coming soon and with the story for Season of the Haunted reaching a major milestone this week, it makes sense to start looking ahead at what’s coming next.
In week 7 the seasonal story concluded, with Calus ‘joining’ The Witness and Eris Morn warning they were too late, with this being “the beginning of the end”.
So where does the story go now? We’ll no doubt get a few more teasers in the weeks to come, but for now, here’s everything we know so far about Destiny 2 Season 18.
Latest News
[accordion]
| Title | Content |
|
August 23 - Today's the day!
|
Good news – the Destiny showcase is today. Bad news – At 1600 UTC Destiny 2 will undergo maintenance for the brand new season and Update 6.2.0. Destiny 2 maintenance is expected to conclude at 1800 UTC. |
|
August 21 - HUGE Season 18 Leaks - Spoilers for those who open
|
|
|
August 19 - Arc 3.0 + New Artifact Mods
|
There are only 4 days to go until the start of Season 18 and the Destiny 2 Showcase as well. But in the meantime players have now been given a new TWAB with a look at the Season 18 mods, Arc 3.0, and some additional save the dates for Season 18. |
|
August 16 - One Week To Go + New Message From Calus
|
There’s one small quest left as we approach the end of Destiny 2 Season 17, but here we are, with a small epilogue cutscene involving Calus who has somehow projected himself into the HELM. His message is simple, join him and the witness or prepare to perish. You can have a watch of the cutscene just below courtesy of Esoterickk. |
|
July 22 - Destiny 2 Showcase Confirmed For August 23
|
Bungie has announced that it will host a Destiny 2 Showcase event on August 23, 2022. Which is the same day Season 18 starts. “Witness what’s next,” the company teased in a tweet you can see below. Last year Bungie held a showcase in August to reveal the Witch Queen Expansion, and we can likely expect the company to do the same this year, potentially giving fans their first proper look at what to expect from the 2023 expansion, Destiny 2: Lightfall. Take a look at the Short Teaser below, titled No Escape. |
[/accordion]
When Does Destiny 2 Season 18 Start?
Every season in Destiny 2 will traditionally run for three months, with new weekly challenges released each week to keep players entertained alongside a seasonal storyline.
Year 5 of the game started with the release of Destiny 2: The Witch Queen which also kickstarted Season 16 ‘Season of the Risen’.
The current season is Season 17, known as ‘Season of the Haunted’ and it is planned to end on August 23, 2022. Barring any delays to the schedule from Bungie, this is when Destiny 2 Season 18 will begin.
Traditionally on the day of release, the game will be brought offline for several hours of maintenance. Bungie normally announced this a few days in advance to give players fair warning.
Following the conclusion of maintenance, the new Destiny 2 patch will be released across all platforms and regions. At this point, players will normally be able to log back into Destiny 2. Although with so many players attempting to log back in, it’s typical for players to run into a ‘Destiny 2 Is Temporarily At Capacity‘ error message.
| Destiny 2 Year 5 | |||||
| Year | Season Number & Name | Start Date | End Date | Duration |
Power/Pinnacle Power
|
|
Destiny 2: The Witch Queen
|
Season 16: Season of the Risen | February 22, 2022 | May 24, 2022 | 91 days | 1550/1560 |
| Season 17: Season of the Haunted | May 24, 2022 | August 23, 2022 | 91 days | 1560/1570 | |
| Season 18: Season of [REDACTED] | August 23, 2022 | N/A | N/A | N/A | |
|
Season 19: Season of [REDACTED]
|
N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | |
Season 18 Story
That is unclear, but it will no doubt lead on from the events which unfolded at the end of Season 17. You can remind yourself of that final cutscene from Week 7 in the video below.
Season 18 Leaks
August 21 - Looks like a whole load of info has now dropped.
Season 18: Season of the Plunder.
– Raid: Kings Fall
– Story: Ketchcrash, No Quarter
– Activities: Expedition, Hideouts pic.twitter.com/i0WAwrWald— josh hunt (@joshhunt) August 20, 2022
Original Story – There’s not a whole heap of info to go on, with the only significant leak so far coming from @DestinyTwoLeaks on Twitter.
We have to say a pirate-themed season certainly sounds fun, not least after the (fantastic) but heavy storytelling that came with Season of the Haunted.
New Raid
UPDATE - August 23 - Bungie has now confirmed that Destiny 2: Season of Plunder will add King's Fall as the new raid, which goes live on August 26, 2022. Not sure what King's Fall is? Here's a quick recap: "From within the furthest reaches of the Hive Dreadnaught, Oryx draws on the power of Darkness. Infiltrate the lair of the Taken King and seize the weapons and armor within."
August 21 Update - As per the leaks shared above, it now looks as though it will be Kings Fall which returns.
Season 18 introduced the new Duality dungeon, which was nice, but players will likely be craving something a bit meatier as we approach our third season of Year 5. Well good news, Bungie has confirmed that the game will add a new Raid to the game.
So far the team hasn’t said anything about the new raid, but there’s been a lot of talk about Bungie potentially adding one of two possible raids from Destiny 1.
Many believe we will see King’s Fall or Wrath of the Machine added to the game, with @DestinyTwoLeaks on Twitter suggesting it could be the former that gets added. Sorry SIVA fans.
A Bungie TWAB blog post in July confirmed that the new raid will go live at 10 AM Pacific on August 26. In addition, Bungie noted the following caveats:
- The raid will launch with Contest Mode enabled for 24 hours.
- You will need to be at 1560 Power to be at the cap for all of the encounters.
- Clearing the raid with Contest Mode active is the first step to access the new Challenge Mode in the Director and the special Triumph for completing all of the challenge Triumphs for each encounter.
- Completing the secret Triumph, a curated list of challenges in this newly unlocked Challenge Mode, will be how a fireteam crosses the World First finish line and claims their prize.
- To enforce the Triumph requirements in the Challenge Mode, your team will wipe if you fail the success conditions during any encounter.
New Crucible Map
In Season of the Haunted Bungie added one new crucible map called ‘Disjunction’ (see below) which was set on Savathun’s Throne World.
However, the map was only available to play during Iron Banner: Rift matches.
Thankfully, with Season 18 Bungie will be adding the map to the standard Crucible map pool, so you should be able to play this spooky new map far more in the future.
ARC 3.0 Subclass
UPDATE - Bungie has now revealed everything you need to know about Arc 3.0 and you can read the full breakdown by following this link right here. Here's a little tease for you: "The new abilities buff is all about making you feel mighty. Movement speed, weapon readiness—it all matters, but we want players to feel powerful by showing off their skills, and that’s where the amplified buff will come into play."
With the launch of Destiny 2: The Witch Queen the team at Bungie set about overhauling the games existing classes so they were more aligned with Stasis.
In Season 16 players got Void 3.0 and in Season 17 this was followed up with Solar 3.0 and that means we only have Arc 3.0 set to arrive in Season 18.
Earlier this year Sandbox Lead Kevin Yanes had suggested (in a now-deleted tweet) that Arc 3.0 could take some cues from the Synaptic Spear used in Season of the Risen (S16).
We would imagine it won’t be long before we learn a bit more about Arc 3.0 and its new aspects and fragments.
Destiny 2 Season 18 Weapons
Bungie hasn’t confirmed what weapons are being added to various activities in Season 18, however, we do know what weapons are being removed, which you’ll find listed below.
- Iron Banner – Peacebond Sidearm, Archon’s Thunder Machine Gun
- Nightfall – PLUG ONE.1 Fusion Rifle, The Hothead Rocket Launcher
- Trials of Osiris – Eye of Sol Sniper Rifle, The Summoner Auto Rifle
In addition, Bungie has confirmed a few things the team is looking at addressing in the future (either in a Season 18 mid-Season patch or Season 19):
- Reducing Shotgun spread randomness.
- Reducing Bow-swapping effectiveness.
- Increasing Trace Rifle ease of use.
- Introducing the full-auto setting.
- Reducing the ability of Snipers to shoot through flinch in PvP.
- Examining some small, targeted balance changes to certain PvP outliers.
- Pulse Rifles with out of band effectiveness.
- High Impact Scout Rifle ease of use.
- Precision Fusion Rifle ease of use.
- Allowing Glaive interactions with some Exotic armors that buff melees.
- Fixing Glaive hit detection.
- Reworking some enhanced perks.
- Folding Spec mods into the base perks.
Destiny 2 Season 18 price
Destiny 2 is free to play, but Season 18 will cost roughly £10/$12 for players to get access to the various seasonal content.
If you already own the Destiny 2: Witch Queen Deluxe Edition, you will already have access to Destiny 2 Season 18 and Destiny 2 Season 19.
Everything you need before Bungie eventually releases the next big expansion, Destiny 2: Lightfall.
That’s everything you need to know about Destiny 2 Season 18, but stay tuned for more news, updates, leaks, and more as we approach the next big update to the game.
