Destiny 2 Episode Heresy Exotic takes Trace Rifles back to their roots

The new Exotic weapons coming in Destiny 2 Episode Heresy have been revealed, and one of them is an incredibly exciting Trace Rifle that uses primary ammo.

Lodestar is an Arc Exotic that will be the first Trace Rifle to use primary ammo since the weapon type was moved to the Special category in Forsaken over six years ago.

As revealed on the Heresy Act 1 developer stream, Lodestar will have these two Exotic perks:

• Starlight Beam: This weapon fires a low-intensity Arc beam with enhanced stability and accuracy.
• Arc Alignment: Dealing Arc damage from any source aligns the battery’s coils. When alignment is complete, reload to disengage the safety and enable hip-fired Starlight Beam to apply Jolt to any targets damaged for a short time. Aim down sights to slow the rate at which the battery drains.

In practice, this means it will initially fire in short bursts but become full-auto like other Trace Rifles if you activate Arc Alignment. In this activated state, Lodestar also Jolts combatants, dealing massive damage and debuffing them.

As for its catalyst, we don’t know its name yet, but its effect creates a Blinding explosion whenever you defeat an Arc-debuffed enemy. This has natural synergy with both Arc builds and the weapon’s other Exotic perks, making it a great fit.

Lodestar is introducing some serious power creep

As exciting as this new Exotic sounds, there have been concerns in the community about power creep, with Lodestar potentially replacing multiple Arc weapons at the same time.

The most notable of these is Symmetry, an Arc Scout Rifle that builds up a charge that can be activated to deal more damage. That’s essentially the same premise as Lodestar, but the new Trace Rifle also debuffs enemies, hits harder, and works better as an add-clear weapon thanks to its catalyst.

It’s a similar story with Centrifuse, which is another charge-up weapon that can blind targets. What’s particularly unfortunate about this Auto Rifle is that it was only released in Season of the Deep, meaning it has fallen into irrelevance in less than two years. It is getting buffed in Heresy, but only with a slightly larger magazine, which is unlikely to make a big difference.

Even before Lodestar’s arrival, these weapons weren’t seeing much use. Their real problem is that they are mediocre options when compared to the best PvE weapons. Rather than nerfing Lodestar, Bungie may need to consider buffing or even reworking Symmetry and Centrifuse instead.