Destiny 2 Season of the Drifter: New Exotics, The Revelry, and everything you need to know

Destiny 2 Season of the Drifter will keep the seasonal updates coming as Destiny 2 continues to march through its second year. Among other things, the latest season has some highly requested balance changes and quality of life updates, new activities and events, and a higher Power ceiling to keep you hungry for loot. So, we've put together a roundup of everything included in the season. 

Before that, here's a quick reminder: where Destiny 2 Joker's Wild is a paid DLC, Destiny 2 Season of the Drifter is a free seasonal update which overlaps with Joker's Wild. In other words, you have to pay for Joker's Wild, but everyone gets the Season of the Drifter. 

Destiny 2 Thorn | Destiny 2 Drifter Allegiance quest | Destiny 2 Vanguard Allegiance quest | How to get Gambit Prime armor | Destiny 2 Gambit tips 

The Season of the Drifter Power cap will be 700 

Each stage of Destiny 2's annual pass ups the Power level cap by 50, meaning the Season of the Drifter will push it to a clean 700 and the newly named Season of Opulence will bump it to 750. This will also raise the soft power cap, so hitting the upper 600s should be much easier going forward, especially if you own the annual pass and have access to Power Surge bounties. 

Gambit is getting private matches  

Everyone will get access to regular Gambit private matches on March 5, though it seems the new maps will only be available through normal matchmaking and not private matches, at least initially. 

Another Exotic quest is coming 

On top of Thorn's Exotic quest and the Vanguard Allegiance quest, all players will get access to an as-yet-unnamed Exotic quest sometime this season - around April, if the roadmap is accurate. 

We've also got four new normal Exotics to chase 

Apart from Thorn and the above mystery Exotic, the Season of the Drifter also added four new Exotics to the general loot pool. You can receive these from any activity that can dish out Exotics, so cross your fingers and get grinding. You can learn more about these Exotics here, but here's a quick rundown:

  •  Arbalest: a kinetic linear fusion rifle designed to bust elemental shields 
  •  Getaway Artist: Warlock gauntlets that give you a souped-up Arc Soul 
  •  Stronghold: Titan gauntlets that can turn swords into powerful defensive tools 
  •  Liar's Handshake: Hunter gauntlets that give you a special melee counterattack  

New Crucible, Vanguard, and Gambit pinnacle weapons are coming 

A new season means new seasonal weapons, and the pinnacle Crucible, Vanguard, and Gambit guns are getting a refresh. In the Season of the Drifter, you'll be chasing:  

  •  Crucible pinnacle gun: The Recluse, a submachine gun with a unique perk that increases its damage whenever you get kills with any weapon 
  •  Vanguard pinnacle gun: Oxygen SR3, a scout rifle with an amped-up version of Dragonfly which deals more damage based on the number of precision hits you land before the detonation  
  •  Gambit pinnacle gun: 21% Delirium, a heavy machine gun whose unique perk increases its damage every time you get a kill until you swap weapons or reload  

New events are coming in May 

The tail end of the Season of the Drifter will be supported by three events, and two of them are totally new: The Revelry, which sounds a lot like The Dawning, and Arc Week, which we know next to nothing about but will presumably buff the damage or cooldown of arc weapons and abilities. Oh, and Iron Banner will close out the month.  

Xur will sell Forsaken Exotics in the Season of the Drifter 

If you're still missing some of the many cool Exotics from Destiny 2: Forsaken, Xur's got good news for you: he's adding Forsaken Exotics to his inventory on March 5. His selection will still be random, and Fated Engrams won't award Forsaken Exotics, but even having a chance at something new is better than another season of outdated Exotics.  

Armor will feature random stat rolls in the Season of the Drifter 

If you've ever felt like your fashion choices are limited by the base stats on your armor, Bungie's got good news for you: starting in the Season of the Drifter, armor will feature random stat rolls, meaning armor which was previously specced for resilience will have the option to roll with recovery or agility. This is a nice quality of life change which should make more armor more relevant. You can learn more about this change and about a billion others in this rundown of the big seasonal patch. 

Austin Wood

Austin freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree, and he's been with 12DOVE since 2019. They've yet to realize that his position as a senior writer is just a cover up for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a focus on news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.