Destiny 2 Lightfall New Player Guide

Eyes up, Guardian. A new system awaits.

Guardians, the Lightfall expansion for Destiny 2 is officially here. The next chapter in Bungie’s massive 10-year space shooter brings system changes, a new subclass, more weapons and armor, and the penultimate chapter in Destiny’s overall saga. This is most likely one of the most anticipated expansions for the game.

However, you may be reading this as a brand-new player, or you may still be considering whether or not to purchase Destiny at all. If you have already bought the game, then welcome! If not, we hope this guide helps give you the information you need to understand the basic mechanics of this space shooter. While there are so many details to dive into that may be too large for this piece, we shall guide you the building blocks needed to get a head start on everything.

The Story So Far…

Let’s start with a very quick summary of what Destiny is. In this game, there exists the Light and the Darkness, forces that defy physics and have been at odds since before recorded time. On the Light side, a giant orb in space known as the Traveler visits civilizations and uplifts them with technology and power. On the other side, the Darkness trails behind and forces the Traveler to abandon any species it helps. Within the last year, players learned that the main avatar of the Darkness’ will is a being known as the Witness, a leader with a fleet of space-faring pyramid-shaped ships at its disposal.

Centuries before our characters’ time, the Traveler visited humanity in our solar system. Humans lived in harmony with abundant wealth and bountiful technological advancements. Yet, just like in many other instances, the Witness arrived with its forces to attack the Traveler. This time, the Traveler stayed and fended off the Darkness, creating small orb-like beings known as Ghosts. These Ghosts resurrect deceased beings into fighters filled with Light known as Guardians. For almost 10 years now, our Guardian has been fighting forces of the Darkness in many forms, and now with Lightfall, our Guardians are heading to Neptune to discover a secret that could help or hinder us forever.

So, with close to 10 years of content, 7 of those being in Destiny 2, you may be wondering what expansions you need to own in order to participate in one of the most popular MMO shooters in gaming. While some of the expansions have plenty of story campaigns to play, and a couple even offer certain weapons and gear, the good news is that you can just buy Lightfall and be good for the foreseeable future. Bungie has announced that a Destiny 2 Legacy Edition will be released containing all past expansions that have not been sunset into a content vault. Therefore, if you decide to play through some of the older stories, you will have the ability for one flat cost. However, none of that will be needed for the journey you can start right now.

Who Are You: The Character Creator

So, what class do you pick? Destiny has three classes to choose from and allows those classes to create a variety of playstyles and methodologies. The beauty of the classes is that though each might have a little more focus in one area, all are capable of being both offensive and defensive, allowing for versatility. Titans are bulwark soldiers, being able to charge in and dish out strong physical damage. Hunters are the “rogue” class, being able to dodge in and out of danger. Warlocks weave offensive and support magic to their needs. Our recommendation is to choose whichever of the three classes seems to fit the best and give yourselves time to acclimate to it. Destiny gives players three character slots, allowing us to put one of every class into play if we’d like. In fact, many players do this exact thing. You have freedom!!

During character creation, you will notice that you can choose one of three races as well. This will be more of a personal decision, as your choice has nothing but an aesthetic impact on your character. Humans are… well, just that. Humans. The Awoken, the blue-skinned humanoid figures, were once human beings that became infused with the paracausal energies of Light and Dark to become something immortal and new. Finally, the robotic Exo are cybernetic bodies containing the consciousness of a human. Each class has its own dense lore and story and can be explored in plenty of sources.

The Subclasses: What Powers You Use

Now, there are a lot of systems at play in Destiny. One of the most important of those is the use of subclasses. Subclasses are just as important a tool as your armor and weapons. Currently, there are four subclasses, with Lightfall bringing us a fifth. Each of these features certain equipable nodes that give buffs and skills with it. Putting these simply, Solar is fire, Void is purple and spatial, Arc is lightning, Stasis is Darkness made into ice, and Strand is the green weave of the metaphysical.

Just like with your class choice, whichever subclass you decide on is going to be a combination of personal choice and experience. These subclasses become essential to creating powerful builds, as the variation and diversity of what each one does can make all the difference. Furthermore, these subclasses can function differently depending on which class you play. For example, a Void Titan is very defensive, being able to cast shielding bubbles around their allies. However, a Void Hunter can utilize their subclass to dodge in and out of invisibility and to cast debuffing abilities onto enemies. Finally, a Void Warlock shows more offensive capability with strong grenades and a super Nova Bomb attack. This example alone offers insight into how unique and diverse players can be on the battlefield.

Where Do I Start?

You’ve picked your character, and now it’s time to go save the galaxy, except now you’re completely lost on where to start! The good news is that Bungie has two systems in place to aid in starting your journey. All new players will immediately have their first quest begin, known as “New Light.” In “New Light”, players are introduced to the basics of combat, navigation, and playlist activities. There will be small quest steps to complete involving participation in the three-player strikes, the PvP arena known as Gambit and even learning how to use each subclass. There is even a unique story mission to complete as a brand new Guardian.

Once you finish your “New Light” work, the newest system introduced in this expansion kicks in. Every player is on a ranking track known as the Guardian Rank. All players are ranked 1-11 based on certain tasks they’ve completed on their account. For context, veteran players started off the Lightfall campaign at rank 6, and Bungie has stated that all experienced Guardians going forward will begin at rank 6 for each season. To achieve a higher rank, players must accomplish certain tasks such as collecting a certain amount of the game’s main currency, Glimmer, or completing three patrols on a certain planet. The tasks do become more robust as the ranks get higher, and we are pretty confident that anyone who reaches rank 11 before the end of this season definitely knows what they are doing. 

The Building Blocks of Builds

Our final section of this guide involves the concept of character stats and mods. All characters have six stats that affect how certain aspects and character abilities work, and all of Destiny's armor will drop with randomized distributions in those six areas. Mobility affects character movement and speed, Resilience affects damage resistance (aka how long it takes your character to lose all their health), Recovery affects how fast your character gains health back, Discipline works with grenade recharge speed, Intellect pertains to the speed at which your character gains their Super ability, and Strength affects how fast the powered up version of your character’s melee ability replenishes. Each of these stats is ranked on a tier system, with tier 1 offering the lowest enhancement and tier 10 offering the highest. Many players who create builds for their characters strive to get at least 2 of these stats to 100, or the tier 10 level. Some can even achieve having 3 or 4 stats at 100, and this comes from having good rolls on armor and certain mods equipped.

The mod system in Destiny is what offers some of the greatest strengths in builds. Bungie has consolidated many of the mods together for easier building, but there are still so many to choose from. These mods go on all five of your armor pieces, and there is plenty of mixing and matching to do. Every mod has an energy “cost”, meaning that out of the 10 available points every armor piece has, each mod will cost a certain number of those points. Rather than go into detail on mod options, we are going to recommend, for your beginning character, just to focus on putting stat-enhancing mods on your armor. Players have two options for every stat: one mod that will add 5 points to the stat and one that will add 10. For now, we recommend just putting on stat mods to get your overall stats higher. This will aid in your survivability as well as damage output, and later on, you can learn how the other mods work via experience and research.

Phew! That was a lengthy guide. We hope that this can set you on your path to greatness and enjoyment. Destiny is such a robust game with a wealth of content to experience, whether you are solo or with a group. Destiny 2 is crossplay, so the number of players you can squad up with is enormous.

So, go out there and get that loot, Guardian!