While Destiny 2 loves to style itself as an MMO, it's been missing one crucial component all these years—my favourite part of the genre, in fact—and that's armour set bonuses. Sure, armour stats have occasionally mattered over the years, but the actual armour you were wearing was just a means to an end. Well, The Edge of Fate update is about to change that, at least a little bit.
Yearly expansions may be long gone now, but Destiny 2 The Edge of Fate still brings many of the same updates and additions, including exotics like New Land Beyond, three new weapon types, a fresh destination to explore, and a new story campaign. Providing the system is maintained and expanded going forward though, I think armour set bonuses and Armour 3.0 might just be the most exciting change. Below you'll find all the set bonuses we know of so far, including some from our hands-on preview of the expansion. I'll update this guide once we have discovered all of them.
Destiny 2 armour set bonuses and how to get them
These are the six new armour set bonuses confirmed for The Edge of Fate so far:
Armour Set | Source | Two-Piece Bonus | Four-Piece Bonus |
|---|---|---|---|
Aion Renewal | Kepler activities | Force Converter: After a final blow with any rocket or grenade launcher, sprint for a short time to gain Speed Booster. | Reactive Booster: Once per activation of Force Converter, sprinting while at critical health, being suspended, or being slowed by a Stasis effect will immediately grant Speed Booster for a short duration. |
Bushido | Pinnacle Ops in the Portal (this includes activities like dungeons, exotic missions, and full-length Onslaught) | Iaido: Final blows with freshly drawn or reloaded weapons heal you. | Unfaltering Focus: Bow, shotgun, or sword final blows temporarily reduce incoming damage. Damaging targets with these weapons extends the effect. |
Techsec | Fireteam Ops in the Portal (this includes activities like Strikes, Onslaught, and The Coil) | Wrecker: You deal significantly increased kinetic damage to combatant shields, overshields, vehicles, and constructs. (Constructs include barricades, turrets, Stasis crystals, and other objects created in the field.) | Concussive Rounds: Defeating powerful combatants or breaking a combatant's shield with kinetic damage releases a disorienting kinetic shockwave. |
Twofold Crown | Trials of Osiris | Crook and Flail: Picking up an ammo brick heals you. | Gift of Sight: Final blows with primary ammo weapons grant you briefly increased radar resolution. |
Last Discipline | Crucible | Currently unknown | Currently unknown |
Raid armour set (name unknown) | The Desert Perpetual raid | Currently unknown | Currently unknown |
Generally, you'll get armour with set bonuses by completing the different types of activities available in the Portal, from new Kepler activities to PvP. Each playlist has a uniquely designed armour set, as always, but also a corresponding set bonus, so you'll need to play them all if you're a habitual collector like myself. Keep grinding, and you'll eventually get all the pieces you need.
Bear in mind, though, that Edge of Fate overhauls the loot system, adding new gear tiers to weapons and armour. It's likely best to hold off on grinding for these armour sets too hard, too early, as you'll want to get them again at a higher tier.
In terms of buildcrafting, set bonuses provide a sprinkling of additional power, vs. the tidal wave buff that exotics represent. However, since each set has a two-piece and four-piece bonus, you can either make the most of a single set or even combine two two-piece bonuses from different sets. Either way, you'll need the right pieces so you can chuck your chosen exotic armour piece on top.