Complete Destiny 2 weapons guide: when you should use kinetic, energy, and power boomsticks, how to infuse, and more

Destiny 2 is being a bit coy about its new weapon system, but we’ve sorted it all out to our own satisfaction and are perfectly willing to share.

Destiny 2 does away with D1’s primary, secondary and heavy weapon slots in favour of, uh, three weapon slots with different names.

But let’s not be glib: the fact is Destiny 2’s kinetic, energy and power slots are very different from the old system, and not extremely well-explained; after all, mystery – even in game systems – is half the fun of Destiny.

Let’s start with the basics before we move on to a discussion of each of Destiny 2’s weapon categories. First of all, you can carry multiple weapons of each type, but only have one equipped in each slot at a time. if you wish to change your equipped weapon in any slot, you’ll need to open the menu and switch it out manually.

Second, you can quick switch between your kinetic, energy and power weapons. On consoles, tap Triangle/Y to cycle to and between your kinetic and energy weapons, and hold Triangle/Y to switch in your power weapon. In the PC version of Destiny 2, using a keyboard and mouse, 1 brings up your kinetic weapon, 2 brings up your energy weapon, and 3 is your power shortcut.

Finally, each weapon type has its own ammo pool and pickups in Destiny 2. On default colour settings, kinetic ammo is white, energy ammo is green and lovely, lovely power ammo is purple. Got all that? Good, Now let’s explain what each of them are for.

This page is part of our newborn, baby Destiny 2 guide, and is subject to change and updates as we explore the release build alongside all of you eager Guardians.

Kinetic weapons

Your kinetic weapon is an all-purpose boomstick used for ploughing through grunts. Kinetic weapons can be scout rifles, pulse rifles, auto rifles, hand cannons, side arms and submachine guns.

Kinetic ammo is common, and if we seem ammo aynthesis consumables return in Destiny 2, we expect it to be cheap.

Although Exotic and Legendary kinetic weapons may have special perks and traits, in general, they behave just like standard guns in any video game: shoot, do damage.

But that’s not to say that kinetic weapons are the weakest of Destiny 2’s categories – oh no. According to creative director Luke Smith, of the three weapon categories, kinetic weapons do the most damage with critical hits, as when you whack a fellow Guardian in the head in PvP, or smack a boss or enemy minion’s weak point.

If the weak point your aiming at has an elemental affinity though – ah! Let’s move on.

Energy weapons

Energy weapons can also be scout rifles, pulse rifles, auto rifles, hand cannons, side arms and submachine guns – the exact same pool as kinetic weapons. What distinguishes energy weapons from their kinetic fellows is elemental affinities: every energy weapon deals solar, arc or void damage.

Energy ammo is less common than kinetic ammo, but still fairly prolific, and we don’t expect it to be expensive.

While energy weapons don’t deal as much critical damage as kinetic weapons, their real value is dealing increased damage to shields. Any shielded enemy you see should immediately inspire you to switch weapons and pop pop pop – you’ll find the shield discharges much more quickly.

Additionally, if the energy weapon you’re using and the enemy’s shield have the same elemental affinity – by default that’s red for solar, blue for arc, and purple for void – you’ll get some tasty bonuses when the shield drops. The shielded enemy will be stunned and take double damage from the shield break, and there will be an area of effect explosion that damages nearby foes. Once the shield is down, you can keep blasting away with your energy weapon, or switch back to your kinetic weapon to attack a weak spot for extra damage.

As for PvP, where you won’t see shielded enemies, energy weapons deal extra damage to Guardian with their supers active – so that’s what you’ll want to use against all those nasty glowing Gunslingers and Sentinels. You don’t have to match elements to trigger this damage bonus, which is nice.

By the way, you can change the elemental affinity of most energy weapons using the mod slot. The only exception is Exotic energy weapons, which have a set elemental affinity.

Power weapons

Between energy weapons to drop shields and kinetic weapons to target weak points, you’re probably wondering what power weapons are for.

The executive summary is: power weapons are game changers in Destiny 2. Power weapons can be grenade launchers, rocket launchers, shotguns, sniper rifles, fusion rifles and swords – all weapons capable of dealing tremendous damage at different ranges and with varying precision. Your choice depends on the situation and preferred playstyle. Power weapons also have an elemental affinity, by the way.

In PvP, power weapons are intended to be one hit kills – although of course you do have to actually hit your target and preferably not catch yourself in the blast when using grenade and rocket launchers. In PvE, power weapons should do significant damage to bosses, and especially to general enemies.

Power ammo is rare. In PvE, it will drop rarely, but Majors (enemies with names or yellow health bars) will always drop power ammo. In PvP, you’ll have to collect it from ammo boxes that spawn periodically during the match. Only one player will receive power ammo from each spawn, so expect fierce competition.

Miscellaneous weapon info

There are a few other things you might want to be aware of when considering your arsenal in Destiny 2. Some of this information may be altered by the Destiny 2 Day 1 patch, but we’ll update as soon as possible if that’s the case.

• For brand new Guardians, you may like to know that there are five tiers of gear: Common (white), Uncommon (green), Rare (blue), Legendary (purple) and Exotic (gold). Your chances of more rare drops and rewards increases as you level up and access more advanced activities and better RNG rates, although Exotic drops are always special. You can only equip one Exotic weapon at a time – not one in each weapon slot.

• Weapons can be level-gated, meaning you can’t use them til you reach a specific experience milestone. Higher level weapons have a greater attack attribute than lower level ones. Beyond the level cap, the attack attribute continues to increase, and weapon drops will generally be equal to or slightly higher than your best possible Power (gear score) level, regardless of what you actually have equipped.

• Weapons can be modded. As mentioned above, you can change the element of energy weapons, and you’re also able to apply cosmetic skins. These mods are consumables, so you may want to save them for endgame.

• Weapon traits are set, not randomly generated. You don’t have to keep checking to see whether the new version of your existing gun is better; unmodded, whichever has the higher attack value is the best option of a pair of duplicate weapons.

• Legendary weapons can be infused to raise their attack attribute. You’ll need to sacrifice a weapon of the same category with the target attack attribute, as well as a number of Legendary Marks. Legendary Marks are primarily obtained by dismantling Legendary and Exotic weapons. Infusion means you can sack of duplicate weapons or those you don’t enjoy using to bring your favourite Legendaries and Exotics up to your current Power level, retaining any applied mods you’d lose if you just swapped to higher-level duplicate. Note that Legendary Marks are also your primary currency for us with Xur, Emissary of the Nine.

• Exotic weapons can also be infused, but you’ll need Experimental Parts – which are primarily obtained by dismantling Exotics, we think.

Is there anything else you want to know about weapons in Destiny 2? Just let us know and we’ll do our best to answer.

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