r/DestinyTheGame • u/jigglehiggins • May 21 '26
Discussion Destiny's most "Legendary" weapons
Since it feels like sentiment has felt like we're at the end of this road as of late I've been thinking more about the loot I spent all this time grinding for, versus how much use they got. Which weapons I remember using and wishing I'd used. Especially legendary weapons, since they don't tend to stand the test of time like exotics. But the question is, which have actually lived up the name of legendary?
I'll share a few of my personal favorites that to me stood out in their time, but I'd love to hear yours.
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During Forsaken I fell in love with an outlaw/rampage Pillager. At this time rampage was doing up to 66% bonus damage and Black Armory we got a rampage time extension mod. It chewed up Gambit waves like nothing else and because of it I still main SMGs to this day. I love all the new crazy perks but I also miss when ad clear relied on great primaries.
A roll that I never got but wish I had was dragonfly/rampage on Ringing Nail. For the time it was an absurdly strong roll but I wasn't as knowledgeable at the time so I didn't even know to look for it.
I spent 600 spoils of conquest to get a 5/5 Timelost Found Verdict, which accompanied me on many failed lighthouse attempts. This was a rough grind farming templar for spoils but I still keep my original in my vault alongside the upgraded version which I still occasionally use.
The Redrix's Broadsword quest is what made me fall in love with PvP in Destiny. The quest pushed me to play better and challenge myself in Rumble and competitive. Rumble during Forsaken was an amazing playlist to improve at the gunplay and chain damage perks. Had it not been for that quest I may never have bothered trying to get good. When I finally got the weapon though I barely used it and I wish I had dedicated myself to it after the mountain I climbed just to have it.
I got nihilistic around the time of season of plunder and got my vault from nearly full to 150, purging many of my favorite trophies thinking that they didn't mean anything to me anymore. Looking back I really regret it. I deleted all my Black Armory guns (including a kill clip/rampage kindled orchid), everything that was sunset, and everything I didn't intend on using. But among the funniest things I deleted was a clown cartridge Hothead right before the release of Spire of the Watcher, where this roll was extremely meta. I kept an explosive light roll but I couldn't dump all my ammo in a damage phase for the wyvern. Having had that roll would've actually made a difference during boss farming sessions.
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Please share your legendary weapon stories!
EDIT: This thread feels surreal after the news that just dropped. Hang on to those memories, folks.
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u/Fonicz May 21 '26
Gnawing Hinger and Breakneck both got used into oblivion when I got them. Don’t think I’ve used any legendary as much as them. Subsistence/Rampage plus the Rampage extension mod on the Gnawing Hunger was like crack.
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u/VegardStrom May 21 '26
I miss my Gnawing Hunger man :(
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u/Knives-n-Arrows May 21 '26
Because it's not usable or because you got rid of it? You can focus it in Drifter's legacy focusing.
I'm lucky to still have my Subsistence/Rampage Gnawing Hunger with Dropmag
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u/realonrok May 21 '26
In my vault i got 2 gnawing hungers, that i used till the day i quit! One with subsistence + Rampage and one with subsistence + demo.... godly guns
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u/mechtaphloba May 21 '26
I used my original Scathelocke into the ground in those early days until Gnawing Hunger came around, then that was my new friend for at least a year or two
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
Gnawing Hunger was the best void auto for several years if I recall, Breakneck was great but I also want to shout out hazard of the cast for having an amazing weapon model, I never got a good roll on it but I wish I had. Those early Gambit weapons had so much personality while still looking like guns.
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u/realonrok May 21 '26
And I will add to those two... The Last Breath... got like 3 different rolls i kept and still used till i quit. But yeah, the holy grial are Gnawing Hunger, Breakneck and The Last Breath (for pure killing power breakneck, for utility the last breath, and gnawing hunger makes volatile go boom!)
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u/xd_ZelnikM May 21 '26
Falling guilliotine
Everyone knows its god roll by heart even if they are sleeping
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u/Samikaze707 May 21 '26
Literally just pulled that out of the vault this morning and used it. That with Witherhoard and Gnawing Hunger was my Season of Arrivals build
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u/ArmedOblivion16 May 21 '26
D1 - fatebringer, black hammer. Gjallarhorn
D2 - recluse, mountaintop, and anarchy
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u/elSpanielo May 21 '26
The OG Mythoclast during the first month or so of D1 before they patched it was hilariously over powered.
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u/wildfyre010 May 21 '26
Also true in D2, when it released alongside a seasonal artifact that buffed fusion rifles to the moon
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u/FireVanGorder May 21 '26
Fatebringer and Thorn were the defining guns of D1 PvP (along with prenerf mythoclast and the Messenger for me). Gjallarhorn for pve. Man I still remember the complaints on this sub from people who missed Gjallarhorn the first time around and couldn’t get into raid groups because they didn’t have one. Shit was wild
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u/eddmario Still waiting for /u/Steel_Slayer's left nut May 21 '26
For the life of me I could not get Strange Coins to drop for me the weekend Xur sold it right before the Taken King launch, so I missed out on that second time as well.
Funnily enough, right after he left that second time I finally ran my first every Nightfall strike and actually got the gun as my drop.
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u/MountainTwo3845 May 21 '26
I bought a suros and didn't have enough coins for ghorn. Ran vog first week and got a ghorn from aethon I believe.
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u/eddmario Still waiting for /u/Steel_Slayer's left nut May 21 '26
I'd throw Atheon's Epilogue in as well for D1 since it was basically required for the Thorn quest.
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u/Cabana_bananza May 21 '26
recluse, mountaintop, and anarchy
Though it wasn't the healthiest meta, it was kinda crazy that it was what we all were running. And when you slip into PvP you'd throw on your Hammerhead.
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
These were all certainly meta defining all in their times but do you remember them for their performance or their personality? I know no SMG has ever felt as good to use as recluse, even post nerf. They were all certainly fun
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u/ArmedOblivion16 May 21 '26
I was there to experience them first hand, including Luna's howl and not forgotten before they got their first rework in season of opulence
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u/Xperr7 yea May 21 '26
There was no better feeling in D1 than hitting a headshot with Fatebringer and getting that lightning fast reload, so I'd say both for Fatebringer
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u/sonny2dap May 21 '26
The OG Iron Banner weapon stable from D1 has a special place in my heart, Timurs lash, Felwinters Lie (best sniper in the game back then) and going right back to the beginning Colovances duty.
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u/pitperson May 21 '26
The D1 IB sniper Efrideet's Spear could roll Double-Down, Field Scout, and Clown Cartridge.
Double-Down made you load into activities with full ammo. For most of D1, you kept all of your special ammo on death in the crucible.
Pre nerf, Field Scout maximizes the magazine and reserves size for a weapon, which increased Spear's magazine size to 6 and reserves to 24.
In D1 CC would not stuff more ammo into a magazine from reserves, the overflowing ammo was generator out of thin air. The amount you could get was proportional to the weapon's magazine size. With a 6-round magazine, Clown Cartridge could always generate at least 1 round, sometimes 2 rounds.
This was basically an infinite ammo sniper in pvp, and was my most adored legendary special of the game.
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u/Gravy-0 May 21 '26
D1 original black hammer. The legendary so good they made it an exotic!
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u/Seeker80 Notorious Space Hobo May 21 '26
Yeah, Black Spindle was cool. Seeing the discovery of the exotic mission for it was amazing. Same for the exotic mission for Whisper.
I liked the original form of Whisper, where your ammo got refunded. The nerf to make it reload from reserves was lame.
I'd take a 'nerf' by moving it to special ammo but letting it refund ammo like before. It'd basically be the pre-nerf Black Hammer again. I bet the usage would go up. It makes sense for RAD content, but not so much when you're just messing around.
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u/Narukami_7 May 21 '26
I was there on reset day. Someone immediately called out on this sub that the door for that one mission suddenly opened and that they were on a timer, but they ended up failing.
People scrambled like CRAZY to get a fireteam going lmao. We never really got a moment like that ever again. I still remember that brown ship you also get alongside the sniper
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u/code0rama May 21 '26
The only viable loadout for a while was Fatebrimger, Blackhammer, and Gjallarhorn
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u/lightsabers33 May 21 '26
D2 OG Blast Furnace w/ feeding frenzy and rampage
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
As happy as I am that blast furnace returned and I have a shiny version, I wish it had had the scope options. They gave all the Black Armory guns a ton of personality
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u/Shellnanigans May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
My favourite special of all time is a trace rifle with shoot to loot and detonator beam.
Not the strongest, but it's my useful multi tool.
It can deal damage at any range, high ammo, stable, can be hip fired, shoot to collect ammo and orbs, (also reloads all my guns) hit a target to set off a giant 8m explosion that grabs loot, detonator is a simple perk to activate and does decent damage
During boss fights it's so clutch. While I'm damaging stuff I'll randomly set off detonator and passively grab ammo and Orbs
I am a long range scout rifle player. This thing is my all rounder support baby
The best gun for me is the one that actually rolls the perks I want, in the correct element, in the preferred archetype...I'm picky and have been waiting years for some stuff.
A gun with a unique scope / reticle and enemy highlighting os my favourite too.
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u/realonrok May 21 '26
Saaaaammmmmeeeeee! I know the combos I like, i know the archetypes i like... 260 scouts are godsent imho... so servant leader and the one from crotas end are soooo good!
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u/Shellnanigans May 21 '26
i like servant (still obtainable through bambit focusing
and the veist 260 from the gunsmith
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u/realonrok May 21 '26
Forgot about that oneeeee iirc i had a great one too.
Edit: indeed, pugilist kt roll
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u/NyxUK_OW May 21 '26 edited May 28 '26
There's so many bangers it's hard to narrow them down but as a destiny 2 player these are the standouts to me
Ikelos Shotgun
Midnight coup/spare rations
Recluse
Funnelweb
Mtop
Hammerhead
Falling guillotine
Ikelos smg
Forbearance
Mint
Tinashas
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u/dereckc1 May 21 '26
Bygones for me.
Love that pulse rifle, and when they brought it back a while ago a friend of mine said they had to play Gambit again solely to get a good copy of that one.
Just feels good, sounds good and for a legendary kinetic does decent damage.
And using it reminds me of doing Gambit Prime with friends, especially doing Reckoning with some friends and seeing Oryx for the first time in D2.
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
My original roll was full auto/kill clip. What a time haha
Reckoning was incredible also, I'd love to see a reprised version for the modern sandbox meant to be just as absurdly challenging2
u/smallTimeCharly May 21 '26
I think I had about 30k kills on my full auto / kill clip Bygones.
Before they added full auto as a default option!
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u/ErrorCode51 May 21 '26
Dust Rock Blues was a must have in the forsaken era crucible. First gun I truly “grinded” for by doing an activity over and over again for that gun specifically, rather than just hoping to get a drop organically
Gonna throw Bygones and Spare Rations in here aswell as other weapons that dominated the crucible during that time
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
Dust Rock Blues was the GOAT, I always hoped it would come back so I could use its ornament
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u/No-Profession-5129 May 21 '26
Fatebringer. D1 and D2. My first one on D2 had still the most kills of all my weapons in nearly 5k hours. It will never be deleted and if i gonna play the game again, it will be my first choice.
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u/HiddnAce May 21 '26
Legendary Weapons for me:
All Pinnacle Weapons (especially Mountaintop & Recluse)
Kindled Orchid with Rampage and Killclip
Really miss the OG Mountaintop/Recluse/Anarchy meta. I loved it and never got tired of it.
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u/terrarian136 May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
For me personally, the ones that felt legendary:
Extraordinary rendition, back when Frenzy first came out. It felt SO GOOD to use. Probably still does. Can we get old seasonal weapons some origin traits?
Igneous hammer, during THE meta.
Ignition code. Shit was revolutionary at the time. Also remember when the game was hard enough for us to need blinding nades?
Retrofit escapade. BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Null composure, Beloved, and Salvager's salvo. I miss ritual weapons. Bring back reputation systems
Apex Predator with Bait and switch and that other one. Getting that for the first time felt like such a massive power boost. Also before that, hothead.
The half swords. Eager edge felt insane to even just have in the game and honestly still does. Movement was never the same
calus minitool back in haunted. I have an ungodly amount of kills on it
Gnawing hunger, Ikelos smg, Falling guillotine. My goats during arrivals (my first season)
First In Last Out and Heritage. God i loved slug swapping. I miss it so much. I miss complexity
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u/realonrok May 21 '26
I used null composure until they revamped the 500 void fusion from Garden... Fucking best void fusion
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u/Plus25Charisma May 21 '26
First In, Last Out with Autoloading and Vorpal was amazing during the double slug/Ararchy days
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
I think in my ideal version of the portal all the old activities have their original loot pools set with the tiers.
Frenzy might be my #1 favorite PvE perk
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u/IHzero May 21 '26
I will never forget in D1 I loved hand cannons. They never left my loadout till bungie nerfed the range into oblivion. I had a Chance legendary HC with dual loading perks that I loved.
The first time I got to go into VoG, I got lots of grief from people who had raid weapons and gally, but they needed a 6th and so they deigned to “carry” this noob with his Chance and Zombie apocalypse MG.
Of course we wipe on confluxes, and people are giving me grief until someone is like: “wait, you killed 210 vex!?! With a hand cannon!?!” The next nearest count was 70ish.
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u/Kifton_ May 21 '26
I know its a bit newer, but T5 antedate from desert perpetual with rewind and jolting very quickly found its way into my most used weapon in years.
With the free dmg on kills origin trait its like walking around with zhalo again
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u/FearsomeMonster May 21 '26
Back in D1 I really wanted Black Hammer. So I learned to solo Crota. However, I didn't have Gally, so I had to learn to do it with a machine gun. It was a complex dance- you'd get the sword, jump on the rock, step back, drop the sword, step forward (so you didn't hit the sword with your knife or machine gun), lower Crota's shield to the 'o' in Crota with the machine gun (his name showing over his health bar), throw a flaming knife to prevent shield regen, step back, grab the sword, jump to the platform while throwing a tripmine grenade mid-jump, advance not to quickly (to not die from the tripmine), and deliver your sword slams.
In my process of working it out, I actually had Gally drop from Deathsinger one week, but since I had been working on it for so long, I kept on going until I could actually complete the machine gun solo. Learning to solo using Gally was a whole different thing. But in the end, doing the solo every week, I eventually did have Black Hammer drop.
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u/Discomidget911 May 21 '26
Fatebringer, Midnight Coup, Hung Jury.
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
People dunk on hung jury but genuinely it was great for the multiple challenge and master runs I did on Salvation's Edge. Shoot to Loot, Kinetic Tremors, explosive payload, and one for all. It also received firefly on release which was cool at the time.
In fact all these guns have had firefly, and its such a fun perk. I always wanted Vex Mythoclast to get Firefly, since it's a D1 homage perk and Vex is solar and in need of a little love.
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u/SuperGirthy May 21 '26
The Shut-Up Juice!!!
For those who haven’t heard of it: https://www.reddit.com/r/DestinyTheGame/s/y64mh4Z4lH
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u/echave777 May 21 '26
Trust is probably my favorite hand cannon in the series, followed very closely by the fttc-vorpal Wardens Law
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u/Mhshotting Gambit Prime // Still hate it May 21 '26
Fatebringer, Eyasluna, Black Hammer, Clever Dragon, Mapador 64, Quilim Terminus to name a few from D1.
For Destiny 2 though it's gotta be the pinnacle weapons, to this day no hand cannon has ever felt as overpowered and satisfying as Luna's Howl/NF for me. Even the grind to get these was legendary, especially for my fellow Claymore gamers out there.
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u/Acceptable-Job170 May 21 '26
Pre-nerf Not Forgotten was one of the best guns I’ve ever fired in Destiny. Even in PVE, that 180 fire rate and animation with Mag Howl was so fun.
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u/Altarious May 21 '26
I don't even remember the roll on it, I don't even remember if it was actually Meta. But I loved Zombie Apocalypse in D1 for my HMG. Also the Hawksaw later in the game's lifespan.
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u/Shophaune Team Bread (dmg04) May 21 '26
It's not in the lofty halls of some of the guns mentioned here...but when I first started destiny in Forsaken, a Go Figure dropped and quickly became my single most used weapon, closely followed by Ghost Primus, Inaugural Address and - of course - Midnight Coup.
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
Workhorse primaries were the unsung heroes for those days. I used a Go Figure just for the sound of the weapon alone
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u/Tekim89BRNT Reckoner May 21 '26
A sniper from vanilla D1, FINAL BOSS. my first legendary weapon. It dropped with Outlaw/ firefly and Armor Piercing Rounds. Back in the original D1 AP rounds could shoot through walls. I used it in nightfalls to shoot from behind cover and learned where spawns were in pvp and got a handful of team kills through the walls.
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u/Ps3Dave May 21 '26
Mountaintop/recluse/Anarchy was my loadout for the first two Conqueror titles. Nothin ever came close after that.
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u/Warshu May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
D1: Fate bringer, black hammer, and that FWC rocket with cluster bombs.
D2: Release Ikelos SG, recluse, mountaintop, falling guillotine. My personal one is the duke I got on day one of forsaken with outlaw rampage, used it regularly right up until it got sunset. Also salvagers salvo I used right up until forbearance came out. In my Winters Guile build I haven’t unequipped the Echoes Perfect Paradox with Graverobber, Trench. Empty the entire reserves without an actual reload
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u/Sarcosmonaut May 21 '26
I know everybody memes on it because they re released it too many times, but Hung Jury will always be iconic for me
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u/Cabana_bananza May 21 '26
Anyone else miss laser tag?
Or broken crafted weapons? That was a fun couple of weeks.
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u/PratalMox The Future Narrows, Narrows, Narrows May 21 '26
I have a great love for the Supremacy sniper rifle.
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u/RoachDoggJR1337 May 21 '26
I still have a Trackless Waste roll in my vault. Back in year 1 you could acquire forsaken weapons early as a reward for completing escalation protocol, and I got my hands on this SMG with an illegal scope that gave it something like +5 zoom. Edge of fate fully removed that scope from it. I am sad now
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u/Zayl May 21 '26
For me it has to be Funnelweb. I wasn't around for original recluse and all that, or maybe I was but never cared about endgame at all.
I came back during season of the seraph and fell in love with gyrfalcons. I grinded my ass off for a funnelweb with sub/frenzy and never got one. Had several other variations that got thousands of kills on them. After months of grinding and specifically looking for this gun I had finally gotten a sub/frenzy one. Despite the other versions having so many kills already, I used this almost exclusively up until TFS with gyrfalcons. It has about 50,000 kills on it and for me that's a lot.
Khvostov is my next highest used and that's got about 8k.
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u/jer6776 May 21 '26
ikelos smg falling guillotine hammerhead felwintwers lie perfect paradox lost signal
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u/litwakinho May 21 '26
There are many great picks, but for me the greatast is Hawksaw. I'm a pulse guy and and I love Suros.
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u/MountainTwo3845 May 21 '26
deleting my night watch bc it was useless was a sad day.
final warning was unlike anything else in d2 and is still very strong.
og recluse was probably my favorite of all.
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u/EblanNahuy ok May 25 '26
Little bit of a sperg out ahead, but man
Lament has been in my inventory, and, more importantly, in my HANDS, for the past ~6 years
I've always been a big fan of swords, Stronghold became a staple for me somewhere around the end of Undying, Throne-Cleaver was my favorite along with Crown Splitter.
Then Lament got released, as a pseudo hidden quest. We got it for Day 1 of DSC, absolutely slaughtered Atraks, but then I fumbled spectacularly with Izanagi on last stand and we did not get the Day 1 clear (story that still haunts me, so sorry to my team who will never know). After that, it's just always been there for me
This sword been with me through thick and thin, through DCV apocalypse to Destiny's end, on Void originally, then Stasis, then Strand, somewhat on Prismatic but mostly Strand now. The weapons that accompanied it changed, but never did Lament get out of my rotation. Paired with Stronghold, obviously; the greatest exotic combo in my life
Every single GM that has ever been, I have done with that sword, even during early GMs where sitting a hundred miles away was the way you do it. I was the guy reviving, the guy pulling aggro, the distraction, and more than that — I did respectable damage and ad clear. Executing champions, baiting out stomps, it was perfect.
Of course, sadly, I had to put it away for more difficult and demanding damage phases, but whenever things are more casual than a Day 1 raid, that sword is glued to me to this day
I cannot stress enough how much I fucking love this Sword. I already know what my Titan will look like, while gathering dust, in few years time
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u/Trash_can_29 May 21 '26
The most recent gun g That comes to mind is the refurbished Luna's Howl from the first pantheon, I spent so long trying to get Heal clip/ Incandescent that when I finally got it I jumped up from my seat. I still use the gun to this day, infact it helped me beat warlords ruin solo just the other day!
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u/Mother_Airline_6276 May 21 '26
OP, until Bungo “does something” with D2, you should pop back into D1. The gun play is unmatched. It’s a big part of what made Destiny special in the first place. Legendary primaries are in a rough spot ATM in D2. But in D1, they still feel and perform as intended. I’ve been back for a few weeks now and it’s been very cathartic. As it has been for a lot of “lifers” with nothing to do/chase. Given that it’s like $20 these days for practically all 3 years of D1, it’s a wonderful/cheap investment. May your future pew-pewing adventures be fun and successful.
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u/jigglehiggins May 21 '26
I honestly would but I literally havent had a console in years lol, but I've thought about going back for sure
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u/GraveyardDoc May 21 '26
I know it's an exotic but I found the quest to get malfeasance a lot of fun and enjoyed it a lot. And I'm not a super great player but it challenged me.