4 New Crucible Maps (3 on Xbox One)
Rise of Iron will introduce either 3 or 4 new Crucible maps, depending on your platform. Here’s what Game Informer shared:
The Last Exit takes us back to the Ishtar Sink, where we’ll battle through a crumbling subway station and an outdoor plaza that drops off into the ocean below.The map will feature train tubes, maintenance tunnels, and an abundance of outdoor cover as well.
Floating Gardens is Bungie’s nod to the environmental crowd, a Vex shrine (also on Venus) where worn out units go to recycle themselves. We’ll bear witness to a actual waterfall of Vex milk as we battle over a bridge that dominates the interior of the shrine.
Skyline will have us traveling back to Mars, to some kind of receiving area for Clovis Bray with a view of the Buried City. Other notable features include an elevated rail car at one end of the map and a gigantic hologram of Mars and the Traveler in the center.
If you’re on Xbox One, go ahead and keep on scrolling – this next one’s not for you. Playstation 4 players, read on:
Icarus is no longer just a great perk for hand cannons, its now also a solar collection site on Mercury turned mock battlefield of the Crucible. The arena is a raised structure at the center of a vast array, and evidently its circular shape will funnel Guardians inevitably toward conflict in the center.
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Iron Banner Updates
Iron Banner will, as you might expect given the expansion’s theme, be getting an update here. In addition to changing locations (to Felwinter Peak, of course), it’s also getting a major overhaul to the ranking system. The current system favors playing on the weekends to take advantage of Tempering and / or grinding long hours during the week. Beginning in Rise of Iron, Tempering will go away and the total Reputation needed to reach Rank 5 will be considerably reduced. Don’t worry though – we get to keep the rep bonus for ranking up on our second and third characters!
In addition, fashion divas (and aren’t we all?) will be overjoyed to hear that we no longer need to wear Iron Banner gear to gain reputation bonuses, so you can compete while also looking your best without penalty. Finally, Iron Banner bounties are being reworked again, with plans being to eliminate some of the common sticking points (the need to get first in a match being one specifically mentioned), and the bounties will also reward Iron Banner equipment or weapons immediately when turned in.
Ultimately these changes are aimed at making Iron Banner more accessible to all Guardians, but we hope they don’t lose the focus on power and victory that has always been at its heart.
One final note: The First Iron Banner in Rise of Iron is expected to use the 6v6 Supremacy game mode, outlined below.
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Supremacy
A new game mode! And no, so far as we’re aware, Matt Damon has not been hired to do voice-over work.
The game is Supremacy, and it’s a new take on mixing slaying with objectives. In this mode, you no longer score points directly from getting kills: instead, slain enemies drop a new, Engram-like object known as a “Crest”, which you or someone on your team must collect in order to score the kill. You can deny points to your enemies by collecting friendly Crests before they can, putting a high emphasis on team play, coordination, and not trading kills pointlessly. The dynamic promises to be an interesting one, and Bungie is giving us three variations on the mode:
- Supremacy 6v6, which works just as described above.
- Inferno Supremacy, a 6v6 mode with no motion detectors that combines the pure shooting gameplay with careful Crest collection.
- Free-for-all Supremacy, which works like a Rumble version of the game and requires you to collect Crests on your own, even if it means stealing the Crest from someone else’s kill.*
All modes will feature extremely fast respawn times to keep players in the action. There is not expected to be a 3v3 version of this mode right now, likely because revives don’t sound like they would fit the motif.
*It’s unclear at this time if the Free-for-all version of this game scores points for all Crests collected, or only Crests from your own kills. If the latter, the advantage to collecting Crests is point denial (as in 6v6) and could lead to some very long matches.
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Thorn is back!
As covered in our initial summary article, Bungie has confirmed that Thorn will be turning to the game at the new Rise of Iron light levels, meaning it will be viable in all game modes once again.
This high rate of fire hand cannon applies a damage-over-time effect to the Guardians it hits, as well as a green tinge to players screens, and once dominated the Crucible during Year 1. Even today, it remains a popular weapon for competitive players, so be prepared to see a lot of it as people work through their Exotic quests.
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Rampant Speculation…
That’s all we know for now, Guardians, but stay tuned for additional Crucible updates in the near future. Game Informer and Bungie have both promised a major reveal regarding the Crucible scheduled for August 16th. While no details have yet been released, Bungie has “expressed enthusiasm for the way the new feature can continue to evolve player expectations for Crucible play” and design lead Lars Bakken added that this announcement will herald the “introduction of a long-awaited feature our community has been clamoring for.”
Could this be the arrival of the long-hoped-for custom games / private lobbies that so many Guardians have asked for? Or is it something else, like Ranked playlists or even Map Voting?