Destiny 2 PvP Loadout Preparation Guide

Destiny 2's PvP gameplay will be massively different from Destiny 1. We break it all down for you so you can start getting used to the new Crucible changes. The new PvP changes will be relatively easy for new players to pick up and learn but will be hard for veteran players to master. Through our first few beta tests, we ended up getting carried by our more veteran team mates but as we continued to play and gain more experience, it was a lot easier finding ways we could contribute to the team's victory in accordance to our own strengths and weaknesses when it came down to personal game play styles. And yes, the new changes are a real shocker.

First off, you're going to want to get familiar with your weapon loadouts. In Destiny 2, Guardians get to have 2 "primary" weapons (one kinetic and one elemental) and a Power weapon. Kinetic weapons deal neutral damage or normal damage while elemental weapons deal either Solar, Arc, or Void damage and then you have your Power weapons that can have either elemental or kinetic damage depending on the weapon being used.

In Destiny 1, we had a more simplistic weapon loadout that consisted of a Primary, a Special and a Heavy weapon.

Sidearms and SMGs (basically 100/2 Auto Rifles with less damage) are now considered primary weapons, so in your first two slots you now have the choice of Auto Rifles, SMGs, Pulse Rifles, Scout Rifles, Hand Cannons, and sidearms. In the last slot you have rocket launchers, swords, grenade launchers, snipers, shotguns, and fusion rifles. The category for LMGs seem to have been totally removed from the game.

Ideally, you'd want your loadout to look like this for PvP:

• Primary/ Kinetic Weapon: Hand Cannon, Pulse Rifle, Scout Rifle, or Auto Rifle
• Special/ Elemental Weapon : Sidearm
• Heavy/ Power Weapon: Rocket launcher or sword

Grenade Launchers and Horseshoes are great too (in fact too great) but we feel they might get nerfed upon release.

Alternatively, you could place something else in you Secondary Slot instead of a Sidearm and completely ignore your Power Weapon but you'd be robbing yourself of the feeling of having 2 "primary" weapons. Which is something you don't want happening due to the lack of ammo in PvP.

Players will now want to start paying attention to their ability cooldowns. Grenades and Melee attacks in Destiny 2 take longer to come off cooldown. This will greatly influence how and when to use your abilities which is why it is highly recommended to stay between tiers 3 and 4 on all cooldowns and as much as possible try not to hit tier 5. Remember that this is simply for the sake of getting used to the cooldown times and gameplay mechanics of the new Crucible. Not everyone is going to be willing to give up their tier-11 or 12 builds.

Sunsinger

• Solar or Firebolt until Super, then Fusions (all three come back, but keep in mind fusions can no longer one-hit kill, so relying on them all the time will be detrimental to your game)
• Balance Glide or Focused Control (remember you can no longer Warlock surf in D2, so using Focused Burst to increase your movement speed isn't going to help you)
• Radiant Skin (Dawnblade does get some damage reduction while active, so use Radiant Skin here, but stay away from Fireborn at all costs)
• Brimstone (trying to mimic Igniting Touch, which is anew perk that causes the enemies to explode)
• Radiant Will (increases the duration of Radiance)
• Angel of Light (allows you to hover in the air by aiming your weapon, and will be our version of D2's Risen Angel)
• Special Recommendations: Because we absolutely cannot ever make the Sunsinger Super function like Dawnblade, we're going to try to do the next best thing. We'll use Brimstone and Angel of Light to give us the feel of the melee and in-air combat, and then we'll pretend like Radiance with Fusion grenades is our flaming sword. If you use Heart of the Praxic Fire or Starfire Protocol to decrease grenade cooldowns in Radiance or give you two fusion grenades, respectively, and then you use Radiant Will, you should be able to throw around the same number of fusion grenades during your super as the Dawnblade can throw swords. It won't be quite the same feeling, but as direct hits with both will kill and enemy, and they both have a fair amount of tracking, it's going to be the best we can do.

Striker

• Your choice of grenade (they're all coming back, but remember that Lightning grenades now take time to arm after they hit a surface)
• Increased Height or Catapult (as previously mentioned, no skating!)
• Aftermath (goes one-for-one with the D2 version)
  Amplify (unfortunately we don't have anything like this or D2, but since all it does is reduce your super cooldown, maybe just shave off some Intellect from your build)
• Aftershocks or Transfusion (we have versions of both in the new Striker skill trees, but Aftershocks is the one that goes with the other perks we are choosing as part of a package deal. However, if you don't want to use it and instead want Transfusion I won't tell anybody)
• Shoulder Charge (Shoulder Charge makes a comback in D2, so it's definitely what you want to go with here)

Gunslinger

• Your choice of grenade (they all come back)
• Your choice of jump (they all come back)
• Gunfighter (going to combine this one with Gunslinger's Trance to make a poor-man's D2 Gunslinger's Trance)
• Knife Juggler (Knife Juggler comes back in the second tree option)
• Gunslinger's Trance (combine this with Gunfighter to try to mimic the D2 version, which gives you decreased Golden Gun cooldown with precision kills, as opposed to increased stability)
• Chain of Woe (Chain of Woe also comes back, but now speeds up your allies' reloads too)