Destiny 2’s Iron Banner adding Rift, brand-new PvP map in season 17

Bungie has not been afraid to rethink, remix, and overhaul portions of Destiny 2 over the past five years, and one aspect of the game that’s getting a substantial refresh is Iron Banner — the fun, more casual side of Crucible PvP. For season 17 of Destiny 2, Bungie is changing how Iron Banner plays, both in terms of how rewards are doled out and the core game mode it’s built around.

One of the bigger changes: Bungie is disabling power levels in Iron Banner in order to, well, level the playing field. (Power level will still be active in Trials of Osiris, Bungie notes.)

Iron Banner players will also get a new place to play, in the form of a brand-new map called Disjunction — the first brand-new map for Destiny 2 PvP in about two years — set “in the swampy Pyramid area of Savathûn’s Throne World, so expect lots of many-butted horses, transparent brown glass, and art deco designs,” Bungie says.

Season 17 of Destiny 2 will see the return of Rift, Destiny’s rugby-with-guns PvP mode, to replace Control in Iron Banner. And Bungie says it plans to switch out the Iron Banner game mode every season, noting, “Sometimes it might be a brand new or returning mode, sometimes it might be an interesting twist on an existing mode.”

Iron Banner is also getting new daily challenges, dropping Iron Banner tokens, and getting a new reward track, among other changes. To acclimate players both new and old to Iron Banner, Saladin will offer players a new, mandatory quest to explain the PvP mode’s new features.

“You only have to run through it once per account, but with this reset we wanted everyone to get the same introduction, even Iron Banner veterans will need to do this,” Bungie said. “In fact, you’ll need to start this quest to even access the Iron Banner node.”

Season 17 of Destiny 2 will go live May 24. More details on upcoming changes to Destiny 2’s Iron Banner mode and its new Disjunction map are available in Bungie’s weekly blog.