Felwinter's lie could have been a great opportunity to create a brand new exotic whisper type mission.
Set in the Plaguelands.
Make it near archons forge, to progressively go down and down, to the core room, where the iron lords died.
And make the axe relic available in the mission and play that EPIC iron lords music, at the final boss. Felwinter's siva-fied corpse will appear, and he will be wielding the perfected... the original... SHOTGUN.
and BAM. You could have saved this season bungie. Always take in what the players have to say.
IF the game's capacity is the issue, then re-use assets. Or even remove seraph towers to free up the space.