Destiny 2’s nerfed workhorse Exotic is now mandatory in every endgame activity
Destiny 2’s most powerful support Exotic has received a gigantic indirect buff in Episode Heresy, making it a must-have for DPS despite receiving numerous nerfs.
Obtained from Shadowkeep’s Garden of Salvation Raid, Divinity has historically been a top-tier meta pick for Raids and Dungeons due to its ability to generate an easy-to-hit weak spot on bosses.
Over the years, Bungie has attempted to reduce the Trace Rifle’s prevalence with nerfs, the last coming with The Final Shape, where the weak point “cage” it generates required more ammo to generate.
Since then, the Exotic has fallen by the wayside somewhat, with other methods of boosting DPS being favored. However, that all changed in Episode Heresy thanks to the return of seasonal perk Particle Reconstruction.
Divinity & Particle Reconstruction interaction
For those unfamiliar with how Particle Reconstruction works, it grants the following benefits:
Particle Reconstruction: Dealing sustained damage with Fusion Rifles or Linear Fusion Rifles partially refills the magazine from reserves and grants them bonus damage for a short duration against that target.
While the damage boost Divinity itself gains from this perk is essentially negligible, testing of interactions on Vault of Glass’ reluctant DPS dummy, The Templar, has yielded some interesting results.
A Reddit thread documenting how Divinity’s cage and Particle Deconstruction synergize discovered that the two not only stack as expected, but that the former’s 15% buff applies twice for a 30% damage increase.
The math gets substantially more complicated from there due to several variables, but the thread’s author concluded, after repeated trials, that “If using Divinity and Particle Reconstruction together, hitting the cage specifically will apply a total of ~68% bonus damage over base LFRs. I believe this is because, somehow, PR and Divinity interacting causes the 15% debuff to apply twice on the cage.”
Taking all of the above into account, Linear Fusions are, without competition, the de facto best heavy weapons for DPS in Heresy and likely will be until the episode ends, barring any changes deployed by Bungie.
If you’re wondering which Linear Fusion Rifle is best to use, look no further than Queenbreaker, which received a massive buff in Heresy. For Legendary alternatives, if you farmed Mistral Lift during 2024’s The Dawning, you’re all set.