The current story in Destiny 2: Witch Queen brings many new Guardians. But that’s not all the first-person shooter has to offer. Our ultimate beginner’s guide makes it easier for you to get started and tells you what to pay attention to at the start and where you should begin to start optimally.
Destiny 2 offers a quick and, above all, free entry into the game with New Light. Through the successful Witch Queen expansion, which marks the beginning of the end of an 8-year-old and epic story, new players have also become aware of the first-person shooter.
But we know it can seem very confusing when seeing the various content. Especially new players can be overwhelmed by this and wonder:
- Where should I actually start?
- What should I skip?
- What should one focus on?
What is Destiny 2 about?
In Destiny 2, you are a so-called “Guardian of Humanity.” Your Ghost, a flying companion created by the “Traveler,” has found and resurrected you, and you have no memories of your past.
The Traveler is an extraterrestrial being that travels through the universe. It empowers its “Lightbearers” with great power so that they can fight against the threats in its name. Thus, the 3 classes of Hunters, Warlocks, and Titans are born. Each class is already strong on its own, but together, they are unbeatable when combined with their abilities.
The story in Destiny 2 is as extensive as it is captivating. The more your Guardian learns, the more interesting background information becomes available about the story of the Destiny universe. Even though Destiny 2 is a first-person shooter, the game tells a gripping story that is worth paying attention to:
3 classes and 4 focuses define your Guardian
At the beginning of the game, you can choose a class and a race. This allows you to create up to 3 Guardians, enabling you to effectively play all three classes. While the class defines your playstyle, the choice of race has absolutely no significance – neither in the story nor for the gameplay.
Choose your class based on your playstyle:
- The Titan is the classic front-line fighter.
Disciplined and proud, he defines himself in the game with aggressive attacks and unwavering defense. When nothing else helps, he resolves matters with raw strength. - The Warlock is a floating space wizard.
He transforms the mysteries of the universe into weapons to sustain himself and crush enemies. With their abilities, Warlocks often blanket areas of the battlefield with damage over time, creating zones that enemies should avoid. They can also take on the task of regenerating themselves and their teammates. - The Hunter is an agile rogue.
Lightning fast on their feet and even quicker on the draw, Hunters carve their own path as gunslingers and make their own laws. They are the precision instruments in the game and masters of movement.
You can switch between 4 focus abilities at any time: In combat, Guardians can focus their powers. Each class has access to four focuses, if available, that provide them with a unique set of abilities. This way, you can use destructive Supers to protect your allies and eliminate enemies.
Solo or in a team? The combination of all three classes is particularly strong in a team in Destiny 2. Some activities can also be played solo, but this requires a bit of practice depending on the activity.
Additionally, there are activities that require a team, such as raids. Some mechanics require additional players to participate (3 or up to 6 player teams). However, there are also ambitious solo fighters in raids who prove that everything is achievable.
What should I play first after the introductory mission?
Your first mission takes you to the Cosmodrome. Bungie has revamped the entry and explains many details of the game with a type of tutorial. You will receive voice lines and tooltips that explain the menu and gameplay mechanics step by step.
Once you have completed everything in the Cosmodrome and acclimated, you will fight through the ruins to a ship and then fly to the Tower of the Last City on Earth.
What is the Tower and the H.E.L.M.? The Tower is the social hub in Destiny 2. Here you will always find the most important NPCs who offer you quests and bounties for various rewards. This way, you gain access to new missions, more activities, and can also make purchases on the side.
The second social hub is the “Hub for Emergency and Logistical Maneuvers,” short: H.E.L.M. From there, seasonal activities in Destiny 2 are coordinated, and specific NPCs that are important for the story are placed.
There are also NPC planet vendors, such as Shaw Han in the Cosmodrome or Eris Morn on the Moon, that you should visit as well, offering suitable planetary bounties.
If you complete bounties for the NPCs, you will receive XP, various materials, and rewards to help you progress in the game.
Why am I doing this? Your goal is to become stronger. Find powerful weapons and armor with good stats to optimally expand your abilities and equip your Guardian with gear combinations that define you and match your personal style. You gather more power by continuously increasing your power level. This ultimately leads you to the best missions and quests in Destiny 2. The game excels especially when you face the greatest enemies in a team or solo.
Increase your power level for the endgame
Your power level determines when you are ready to dive into the endgame or tackle more challenging challenges. As a beginner, you should first earn items to increase your power level before fully jumping in and playing the hardest activities.
There are various caps from blue and legendary (purple) engrams that raise your power level.
- The base power level in Witch Queen was 1,350, which every player automatically receives without having to do anything.
- The soft cap was 1,500, and it’s very easy to reach that by playing normal activities, such as public events or opening chests that can grant you a power upgrade.
- After that, you need to pay attention to what a particular activity rewards you. To reach the power cap of the respective DLC, you should only participate in activities that guarantee you “powerful gear.”
- To break the hard cap of 1,560, only activities that guarantee “pinnacle loot” will assist you further.
Pro tip: If you want to quickly reach power level 1,520, all you need to do is complete the legendary campaign. Bungie has provided a good reason to play the harder variant of the Witch Queen campaign. Additionally, you will be rewarded with one of the new exotic armor pieces from Witch Queen.
The artifact offers a seasonal power level boost
Every player in Destiny 2 also has a seasonal artifact. Through the artifact, you can additionally increase your power level throughout the season, even beyond the maximum value of 1,560. It is especially helpful for quickly making up a few power levels by collecting XP. This allows for quick progress in activities like pinnacle strikes or grandmaster missions for exotic weapons.
What you should know about the artifact boost: The artifact is not a real power level but merely a kind of quick boost. When a new season starts and the artifact changes, you lose this power boost. Therefore, it is important to level your actual power level to the maximum of 1,560. This can then be carried into the new season.
What the artifact is and how it works, you can find out here:
Better gear and how to earn it
In Destiny 2, you receive your loot from engrams. The armor has different rarity or quality levels. With increasing rarity, the total stats that an armor piece offers also increase. Additionally, some activities can drop improved armor, such as the “Artful Armor” from the dungeon “Sog der Habsucht”.
- Blue engrams (rare) offer you average gear and drop almost in all activities up to level 1,500.
- Purple engrams (legendary) are the main component of your gear.
- Yellow engrams (exotic) are the rarest items in the game and also come with unique powerful bonuses. However, you can only equip one weapon and one armor exotic at a time.
Once you’ve exceeded the soft cap of 1,500 power, you’ll have a higher chance of pulling legendary engrams from activities or receiving legendary shards.
If you’re unsure what armor stats are the maximum and, above all, which ones you should keep and which ones you don’t need, we recommend this article:
The Armor 2.0 system
Armor in Destiny 2 has various stats that vary with each drop. The armor has an overall value and an individual distribution. What you prefer fundamentally depends on you. Some players prefer builds with high discipline. Others focus on their supers and thus on a lot of intellect. As a so-called masterpiece, the armor receives an additional boost.
In addition, you can equip various mods and perks into the armor to further improve the armor stats and create custom builds that fit you and your playstyle.
- Each armor piece has an energy level and a burn (Solar, Void, Arc, Stasis)
- The armor stats can be improved from 0 to 100. However, you gain no advantage past 100 on the respective stat.
- The better a stat, the better the cooldown time of the respective abilities. You can see exactly how long it is when you hover over the stats.
- When you reach certain ranks, the respective cooldown time is further reduced.
- Level 10 is a masterpiece armor that grants extra bonuses to all armor stats.
- The higher you level your armor, the more mods you can slot into it.
These armor stats exist:
- Energy stat: The stat and burn of an armor piece determine which mods you can use.
- Mobility: The basic movement speed. (Does not include sprinting)
- Resilience: Affects shield durability.
- Discipline: Do you like grenades? Then boost this stat, as it shortens their cooldown time.
- Intellect: The higher this stat, the faster your super recharges.
- Strength: It determines how quickly you can recharge your melee attack.
How to find powerful or pinnacle gear
If you’re looking for the right rewards, a glance at the map is enough. Yellow dots mark the sources of powerful or pinnacle gear. This way, you can complete these activities every week and level up further.
What beginners should know about combat in Destiny 2
In normal missions, it typically does not matter what weapon a player uses. Basically, you can play whatever you want there.
However, there are also situations where you need specific weapon types or where a weapon requires a certain burn (Solar (orange), Arc (blue), or Void (purple)), otherwise, you’ll just be messing around with your enemy.
Your Guardian always carries three weapon slots with them:
- Kinetic weapons (infinite ammo) have no damage element and are strong against enemies without shields.
- Energy weapons (green ammo) are strong against shields of the same element.
- Power weapons (purple ammo) are the strongest weapons in the game and are also strong against shields of the same element.
So if you have an enemy in front of you with a blue overshield, you should shoot them with Arc energy weapons that cause Arc damage.
Where do you get ammo?
You get new ammo from fallen enemies. The ammo packs are also color-coded accordingly. In missions, there are also white circles where a banner can be placed. You can recharge ammo and abilities there.
In the open world, you can recharge at one of the orange flags that appear before the start of a public event.
Enemies in Destiny 2 have different difficulty levels
Everywhere in Destiny 2, you can encounter enemies. To know what types of foes you are dealing with on your respective adventure, we list how the enemy categories differ:
- Enemies with a red health bar are the easiest.
- Enemies with a red health bar and an overshield are a bit tougher.
- Enemies with an orange health bar are called majors. They have more health and are harder to defeat.
Then there are mini-bosses and bosses with yellow health bars. These opponents are particularly tough, have a large health pool, and require a lot of firepower to defeat.
How to identify good weapons?
Weapons in Destiny 2 are excellent killing machines with often individual appearances. Every Guardian will eventually find a weapon they love. When you find a new weapon, feel free to try it out for a while. Even without prior knowledge, you’ll quickly figure out which weapons you prefer.
Weapons also have stats that determine the damage and effectiveness. The attack value of a weapon contributes to the power level of the Guardian wielding it. A weapon with a higher attack value will generally outperform a weapon with a lower attack value.
- Impact / Explosive radius: This value determines the weapon’s impact power per shot. Automatic rifles and submachine guns have lower values, while powerhouses like sniper rifles and hand cannons are stronger. For rocket and grenade launchers, the explosive radius describes the area covered by each explosion.
- Range / Velocity: This value indicates how quickly a weapon’s damage decreases with increasing distance. The bigger the bar, the better it is from afar. For explosive weapons, the respective value is the velocity, indicating how fast a projectile moves.
- Stability: This value describes the intensity of a weapon’s recoil. The higher the stability, the less a weapon bounces around when firing.
- Handling: This indicates how heavy a weapon is and how well it handles. The better the handling, the faster you can switch to or away from a weapon, and the smoother it is when targeting or in the air.
- Reload speed: A poor value here is not the end of the world, but under pressure you need to compensate for it by taking cover or switching to another weapon that still has ammo in the magazine.
- Rate of fire: A general indication of how much sustained damage a weapon can deal considering the pace at which it can shoot and its reload speed.
- Magazine: The number of rounds a weapon can hold when fully loaded.
Eventually, you will find a weapon with a higher attack value that handles similarly to your favorite weapon. Additionally, there are activities from which weapons with solid values can drop, such as from currently active raids or nightfall strikes.
How to craft your own weapons
In addition to the weapons you find everywhere, since the release of Witch Queen, you can also craft your own weapons. There is a relic site on Mars, allowing every player to form their personal god roll, even if they do not own the DLC “The Witch Queen”.
- Weapon crafting allows you to customize weapons.
- It offers improved perks for weapons that have bonus advantages.
- Exotics, such as the submachine gun “Osteo Striga,” can also be shaped.
- The longer you play with a weapon, the better it becomes.
The practical aspect of weapon crafting: You get exactly what you want. The most personalized weapons, thanks to improved perks and characteristics, can become monsters in battles against enemies and other Guardians. You should keep in mind that you can also adapt certain weapons to your needs if you wish.
Our weapon crafting guide explains everything you need to know:
How to find exotic weapons and armor
The best gear in the game is exotics. Destiny 2 features a variety of exotic weapons and armor that provide ultimate advantages through their intrinsic perks. You can equip only one exotic weapon and one exotic armor piece at a time.
- Some exotics simply drop in the open world (yellow engram).
- You can obtain exotic weapons and engrams by leveling the season pass.
- Other exotics can be purchased at the Tower from the “Monument to Lost Lights.”
- Xur, a secret merchant, offers exotics for purchase every weekend.
- There are special missions, such as “Vox Obscura,” where you receive an exotic plus a catalyst.
- Armor exotics can be earned in the legendary lost sectors. The availability of the sectors and the type of armor piece received rotates daily.
- Rank increases with NPCs, like Vanguard, Gambit and Crucible also grant exotic engrams.
- Players can also obtain exotics through other means, such as Twitch Prime Gaming.
- Some exotic weapons can only be received from raids, which is the endgame.
Note: There are exotics that can only be obtained if you own the corresponding expansion. For example, the exotic weapons “The Parasite” and “Dead Messenger” are only available if you have purchased the latest expansion “The Witch Queen.”
These exotic armors have come into the game with Witch Queen:
5 tips and tricks for Destiny 2 beginners
Finally, here are a few tips to keep in mind while playing. Besides weapons and armor, you also have materials and various items in your inventory. Additionally, there are some things that new players often overlook.
1) Always diligently collect materials
To ensure you are well-equipped in Destiny 2, you need various materials. If you want to “level up” armor or improve or craft weapons, it costs you something. You need to earn these materials, and it’s practical to have all materials in sufficient quantities.
- Glimmer can be obtained from all activities, chests, and even kills.
- You can find collectible planetary materials on planets, which you need for various purchases.
- Upgrade modules are required for infusing armor.
- Legendary shards come from dismantling gear or from activities.
- Enhancement cores can be obtained through Banshee’s weapon calibrations.
- You can also trade materials. This can be done at the Tower with Master Rahool.
Your Ghost helps you gather and loot: To find such materials quickly, you can also install mods in your Ghost. They will indicate where the material or loot crates are in the game via a symbol. You just need to walk over and collect the item. There are also other very practical mods in the Ghost that can be used.
2) You have your own vault
You don’t have to carry everything around with you. At the Tower and the H.E.L.M., you can access your vault and store items there. You have 500 slots available and can also store various materials there.
However, accessing your vault is not possible when you’re out on planets. Here, we recommend third-party apps like the Destiny 2 Item Manager (also known as D.I.M.). This app is supported by Bungie and allows you to move items via drag-and-drop to your respective character.
3) Make it heroic and play sectors – You’ll benefit more
While you’re on planets, you can also participate in so-called public events. They promise quick XP, materials, and legendary gear. However, many do not know: Triggering a public event heroically yields even better loot.
MeinMMO tells you how to heroically complete all public events:
The same goes for patrols. So if you see a VIP patrol on a planet, activate it. These mini-missions are extremely short but guarantee better loot.
4) Stop by the merchants every day
While some mods can drop in activities, others can only be purchased from merchants. Since the mods provide many advantages, it’s important for beginners to have them. So make sure to stop by Ada-1 and Banshee-44 in the Tower, as they sell mods and their inventory rotates daily.
5) Don’t take all quests at once
Good to know: You don’t have to take all the quests you can get at once. Especially when you are new to the game, it’s better to focus first on the campaign. Here, you are guided through the game automatically and will receive side quests as you progress that you can complete afterward.
Afterward, you should only accept and complete the bounties you wish to play that day. For example, grab the Gambit bounties from the Drifter if you are doing three Gambit matches or the Vanguard bounties from Zavala if you are running a nightfall with 100,000 points to get pinnacle loot.
These two tasks should be prioritized daily:
- Weapon calibrations with Banshee-44 to earn enhancement cores
- Check with the season NPC whether you can buy another weapon with Deep Sight
With this information, you and your Guardian are well-prepared to explore the world of Destiny 2. Gradually, you will also gather enough materials to improve all weapons and armor and perhaps even craft a personal weapon to dive into the endgame with.
On MeinMMO, you will receive daily articles and tips about Destiny 2 that reveal how to further enhance your gameplay. For example, why you might want to avoid Gambit right now: A weapon is terrorizing the Gambit mode in Destiny 2 – “Why doesn’t Bungie disable it?”
