The Iron Banner is a brand new event that Bungie is launching on Oct 7th and will last until Oct 14th. Much the same as the Queens Bounty that is just coming to an end, the Iron Banner event will offer special bounties, items, and rewards. Unlike the Queens Bounty though, that was based primarily on the idea of PVE (although it had PVP elements to keep everyone involved), the Iron Banner is all about PVP combat in the Crucible.

Bungie has already hinted that the Iron Banner will be returning every so often, so do not expect it to be a one hit wonder for hard core PVP players.

What is different about PVP in the Iron Banner?

Fighting in the new Iron Banner Crucible format will be very different than fighting in regular Crucible matches, for one very important reason: Gear Matters!

Unlike regular Crucible matches where everyone is normalized, you are not in the Iron Banner.  Sure, in the normal Crucible your base damage is normalized and upgrades still count, but here, it all counts.  This means that since everything counts, Light points also count, and therefore to compete you will need to be at least level 28, but to really stand a chance you will need to be 30.

Iron Banner Bounties

You will  be able to pickup several different bounties each day to complete in the Iron Banner.  There are 10 bounties to choose from and ALL of them need to be completed in the Iron Banner.

There are some that almost anyone will be able to complete, such as Hard Forged, which requires you to earn 10,000 experience in the Iron Banner.  However there are also some that will be the exclusive realm of hard core PVP players such as Rise Above, which requires you to complete an Iron Banner match with the  highest score, which not everyone will be able to do.

Each of these bounties will each you either 50 or 100 points of reputation with the Iron Banner.

Iron Banner Reputation

There will be three different ranks that you can earn with the Iron Banner faction.  Each rank will reward you in different ways.

  • Rank 1 – Unlocks Iron Banner Emblem and Shader.  Each of these will provided a stacking 10% boost to Iron Banner reputation gains.
  • Rank 2 – Unlocks Iron Banner class items.  These provide an addition stacking 10% boost to Iron Banner reputation gains.
  • Rank 3 – Unlocks Iron Banner armour items and addition emblems and shaders.

Iron Banner Class and Vanity Items

There will be 11 different class and vanity items added with the Iron Banner content.  There will be a class item for each of the three classes, two different shaders, two different emblems, and a brand new ship.

For players that like having visual options for their characters, these items will help provide even more options to chose from.

The first shader is available at rank 1 reputation which makes it fairly easy to get.  Even if you are not a fan of PVP, you should be able to get to rank 1 and get this new cool shader for your character.

Iron Banner Armour Items

Once you reach rank 3 with the Iron Banner, you will be able to purchase complete sets of Legendary gear for each of the three different classes.  These items all have a focus on PVP stats.

Iron Banner Weapons

Probably the item that has hard core PVP players the most excited are the nine new Legendary weapons that are all made for PVP.  They all appear to focus on hitting hard, but requiring a lot of effort to hit correctly through a lack of stability.

These weapons will become status symbols for PVP players as they will be awarded for doing well in the Iron Banner version of the Crucible.  This means that most players will not be able to get a hold of any of them.

An interesting observation that several players have already made is that there are nine weapons, all with proper names such as Perun’s Fire and Felwinter’s Lie.  Is there a potential connection to “The Nine”?

 


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Last Updated: Mar 13, 2016

About The Author

Byron has been playing and writing about World of Warcraft for the past ten years. He also plays pretty much ever other Blizzard game, currently focusing on Heroes of the Storm and Hearthstone, while still finding time to jump into Diablo III with his son.

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