Destiny: The April Update

*Image is the property of Bungie: I lay no claim to it*


Yesterday afternoon, Destiny players were able to get the newest batch of content with what Bungie called "The April Update."  Since I'm still waiting on my copy of Dark Souls 3 to arrive (I bought the collector's edition, and it has to be shipped from another store...long story) I dove right in to tackle the new challenges they made for us veteran Guardians.  I'm going to assume that, if you're reading this, you've read the patch notes provided by Bungie and are somewhat familiar with the game...if not, you may want to check out the details on Bungie's website!

After waiting for the update to download and install, as well as for everyone in our group to get ready, we decided to tackle the story missions first.  I was under the impression that there were going to be 3 story missions, but I was mistaken; there were 3 quests for us to tackle, and they weren't all new missions/levels.  All in all, there is 1 new story mission and 1 new strike.  Our Fireteam took about 1-2 hours to finish these up alongside 2 of the quests.  We got a bunch of new loot, so it was worth our efforts (especially the new sword...it drops at light level 320!)

So, now that we finished the story missions, the quests, and the strike & Nightfall, we moved on to the content we were most anticipating; the new Prison of Elders and Challenge of the Elders!  Both promise greater rewards and fantastic loot, and we are all eager to hit the new light level cap of 335, so we went in, guns blazing.

The new Prison of Elders was, mostly, a breeze.  We tore through 5 rounds of enemies and 1 boss battle, with a few "diffuse/destroy the mines" tasks thrown in.  Our Fireteam is comprised of a 319 Warlock, a 310 Hunter, and a 315 Titan (ME!), so it should come to no surprise that we decimated the first challenge which has a light level recommendation of 260 (if I recall correctly...it was under 300 regardless.)  We then moved on to the Challenge of the Elders, which has a light level recommendation of 320.  Our Hunter was getting nervous, but our faith wouldn't be wavered; we came to conquer!

*Image is the property of Bungie: I lay no claim to it*


We, the Scruffy Ninjas (our Destiny Clan, which is what our Fireteam was comprised of) were cautious when we first entered the new arena.  As it turns out, we were too cautious, since we were able to breeze right through the new arena despite us being under the 320 recommendation.  The modifiers this week, which gave extra damage to primary weapons, may have had a hand it this, but I believe our group is just that well put together.  Our group was able to hit over 30000 points 3 times in a row; something that we didn't feel too pressured into obtaining, especially when we did this a third time around.  We filled up our score cards and finished off our night with running the Court of Oryx over and over to obtain more loot/drops to further boost our light levels.

So, after all of that, I feel pretty good about the new content.  The Prison of Elders update has been long awaited, in my opinion, and I'm sure I'll be eager to fight new foes with different modifiers each week (and earn some sweet loot as well...looking forward to the new Lord of Wolves!)  The new weapons, armor, and shaders are nifty as well, but I'll most likely stick with my Iron Banner gear for now.

I think what I'm happiest with is that Bungie assured their fans that they haven't forgotten Destiny players, and that there will be more content coming down the pipe (squashing my fears from an earlier blog post.)  Lets just hope Bungie follows through and continues to make content that is both rewarding and challenging!