What Are The Best Classes To Play in Destiny 2?

A Gunslinger, Voidwalker, and Striker activate their Supers.

In Destiny 2, you can bend Light and Darkness to your will in the ultimate power fantasy. Whether you’re a New Light, freshly resurrected in the Cosmodrome, or a grizzled veteran using too many revive tokens, you’re going to need the right build to get the job done. Here are the 5 best subclasses you can feel confident taking into raids, dungeons, Nightfalls, and more:

1. Dawnblade (Warlock)

A Dawnblade Warlock conjurs a sword of Solar Light in the Daybreak Super.

The Dawnblade wields the power of Solar Light to empower and protect its allies and scorch its foes into little more than piles of ash. While metas come and go, the Dawnblade stands eternal. Its signature super, the Well of Radiance, was introduced way back in the Forsaken expansion and has been one of the most desired supers on fireteams in nearly every single activity type since.

What Dawnblade Excels In:

• Buffing and Healing the Fireteam – With support techniques like Healing and Empowering Rifts, Healing Grenades, and the infamous Well of Radiance itself, Dawnblades can take pride in not only keeping the entire team alive, but in simultaneously increasing team damage as well.
• Slaying Out – Nearly all of Destiny 2’s endgame content is littered with enemies standing between you and your loot. The Dawnblade is an absolute specialist at using its Solar magic to spread Scorch to huge crowds of enemies and Igniting them in wild and outrageous explosions.
• Being the Last Guardian Standing – Any Destiny 2 veteran can tell you – sometimes things go wrong. Horribly wrong. Sooner or later, you’ll find yourself all alone, surrounded by dead teammates and staring down a horde of angry Hive. A timely and well-placed Well of Radiance can not only keep you alive, but turn these situations around for the entire fireteam, preventing wipes and earning you all that sweet, sweet loot.

Pick Dawnblade if:

• You enjoy support roles – While most subclasses in Destiny 2 can handle themselves in a fight, Dawnblade finds its niche in keeping the team alive and well. When your teammates show big DPS numbers, everyone knows they have you to thank for it.
• You like ridiculous amounts of explosions – And I mean, who doesn’t? Few classes will bring the boom quite as spectacularly as the Dawnblade, especially when paired with the Sunbracers Exotic armor for infinite, yes infinite, grenades.  
• You want to be the “go-to guy” in your clan – Your friends and clan know they can count on you. No one is going to be disappointed to learn you’re bringing a Well of Radiance to a raid, I promise.

2. Nightstalker (Hunter)

A Nightstalker Hunter prepares its Shadowshot Super to capture unsuspecting Taken Thralls.

Masters of Void Light, Nightstalkers use their massive bag of tricks to turn the tide of battle for their fireteam. Like Well of Radiance Warlocks, Nightstalkers often take on a pivotal support role for their fireteam and, also like Well of Radiance Warlocks, they have stood the test of time, remaining an integral part of the meta since Destiny 2’s launch.

What Nighstalker Excels In:

• Massively Increasing Team Damage – The Shadow Shot Super, commonly called “Tether,” is one of the largest debuffs a guardian can put on enemy bosses in all of Destiny 2. Tether Hunters are absolutely critical for fireteams looking to one-phase difficult bosses.
• Crowd Control – Nightstalkers are equipped with various means to disorient enemies. Tools like the Snare Bomb, Trapper’s Ambush Aspect, and Shadow Shot are excellent means of slowing down Majors and Ultras who might be a little too beefy to outright kill before they become problematic.
• Surviving – One word - invisibility. When things start to get a bit too hairy, Nightstalkers can quickly go invisible with their Vanishing Step. Most enemies in the game will completely lose track of the Hunter, giving them precious seconds of peace to regain their footing on the battlefield

Pick Nightstalker If:

• You like melting enemies – The weaken debuffs Nightstalkers provide are second to none and will greatly reduce your time to kill most bosses and mini-bosses in Destiny 2.
• You like speed-running content – Invisibility allows Nighstalkers to quickly bypass most minor enemies in activities, greatly reducing the time to complete them. For the hardcore grinders out there, every second counts.
• You like feeling unstoppable – By combining Nightstalker with the Gyralcon’s Hauberk Exotic chest piece, you can easily create a build that exploits the Volatile and Devour effects to create infinite explosions and infinite healing. Add this to your pocket invisibility, and really, what’s going to stop you?

3. Berserker (Titan)

A Berserker Titan wields twin blades of Strand Darkness in its Bladefury Super.

The Berserker subclass is one of the newest in Destiny 2, having just been added in Lightfall. It has cut and clawed its way to the top of the meta in short order thanks to the recently added “Banner of War” Aspect. Even in the most difficult content, the Berserker is an unstoppable front-line tank.

What Berserker Excels In:

• Close-Quarters Combat – New to Season of the Witch, the Banner of War Aspect makes the Berserker an indestructible goliath on the front lines. Not only buffing melee and sword damage, the Berserker also keeps its allies safe with healing and damage-reducing Woven Mail.
• Crowd Control – In addition to their area-clearing super, Berserkers can also make excellent use of Shackle grenades to immobilize groups of enemies, including any type of champion. Hive boomer Knight causing problems for your squad? A quick little toss can turn the tide of an entire encounter.
• Sword Fighting – In a game with rocket launchers, sniper rifles, and space magic, swords can sometimes find themselves the odd-man out. The Berserker’s Banner of War changes all that with a nice little loop where the Banner buffs sword damage and sword kills power the Banner.

Pick Berserker If:

• You enjoy playing tanks ­– Tanks have long been part of the “holy trinity” of team roles in MMORPGs. Focusing on ideas like crowd control and damage reduction, Berserkers can fulfill that classic fantasy and be an integral part of their fireteam.
• You like being immortal – All Titan subclasses love having a high Resilience stat, ideally 100. While this naturally brings with it significant damage resistance, Berserkers in particular go beyond that by generating Woven Mail for themselves and their allies, granting the highest level of damage reduction in the game.
• You identify with the “Leroy Jenkins!” meme – Whether with the Grapple grenade or the Bladefury super itself, Berserkers are awesome at charging in head-first into absurd amounts of danger and not only surviving, but carving a safe space for their allies to set up shop.

4. Arcstrider (Hunter)

An Arcstrider launches its staff of Arc Light in the powerful Gathering Storm Super.

Arcstrider is a versatile class that plays differently based on what exotic and build you pair it with. Unlike some “jack of all trades” types which tend to be the master of none, the Arcstrider can do just about anything very well, whether its spamming grenades, dealing incredible melee damage, or nuking bosses.

What Arcstrider Excels In:

• Spamming Grenades – Whether its Arcbolt grenades with the Lucky Raspberry Exotic or Skip Grenades with the Shinobu’s Vow Exotic, Arcstriders can absolutely spam grenades to give exceptional area control on the battlefield.
• Close Quarters Combat – Mix the Lethal Current and Flow State Aspects with Gambler’s Dodge for an easy, infinite loop of increasing melee damage, Jolting, and healing. You can even add in the Assassin’s Cowl Exotic for the added safety of invisibility on each melee kill.
• Massive Boss Damage – When Arc received the subclass 3.0 treatment in Season of Plunder, Arcstriders were gifted a phenomenal new super, Gathering Storm. Combined with the Star-Eater Scales Exotic, Gathering Storm has arguably the highest damage output of any ability in the game, making it a top-notch choice for raid and dungeon bosses.

Pick Arcstrider If:

• You like being in the thick of things: With their infinite loop of melees, Jolts, heals, and even invisibility combined with a handful of fragments that provide further benefits when at low health, the Arcstrider thrives where the action is fastest and most chaotic.
• You enjoy fun combos and interactions: With so much command of Arc 3.0 keywords, the interactions with various weapons and exotics give nearly endless build possibilities.
• You like seeing huge numbers on the DPS screen: If your brain gets all happy when the biggest number on the DPS screen is next to your name, then Arcstrider’s Gathering Storm and Star-Eater Scales combo is for you. You’ll be the envy of your group, even on the sweatiest of teams.

5. Shadebinder (Warlock)

Wielding the power of Stasis, a Shadebinder casts Shatter during its Winter's Wrath Super.

One of the most beginner-friendly classes in the game, the Shadebinder is a powerhouse capable of locking down and controlling entire battlefields. Using the power of Stasis Darkness magic, Shadebinders sometimes take things a bit slower than other classes, manipulating the tempo of battle to their liking.

What Shadebinder Excels In:

• Neutralizing important targets – Sometimes a frustratingly placed Champion can cause major problems for your fireteam. Not for a Shadebinder. By holding down their grenade button, a Shadebinder can toss out a Bleak Watcher turret who will freeze the problematic enemy while the Warlock and his teammates remain safe in cover.
• Slowing down the chaos – Some encounters feature wave after wave of swarming enemies, and things can quickly spiral out of control. Using the Bleak Watcher aspect combined with Osmiomancy Exotic gloves, the Shadebinder can deploy not one, but two freezing turrets at a time, silencing entire battlefields and turning the hordes into easy picking.
• Breaking enemy lines – In certain activities, like Grandmaster Nightfalls, Guardians are tasked with breaking into heavily fortified strongholds. Deploying a Bleak Watcher and following it up with a Winter’s Wrath super can break through even the toughest defenses, allowing your teammates to follow you in and wipe up the remnants.

Pick Shadebinder If:

• You like to take things slow – Run and gun chaos is fun, but it’s not for everybody. Shadebinder presents a different approach, allowing Guardians to slow the pace of play to a speed where they can easily control everything like a master tactician.
• You enjoy solo content – Some of the most difficult challenges in the game are those undertaken without a fireteam. Shadebinder is almost like cheating since it can freely use Bleak Watcher turrets as makeshift teammates, enabling approaches that would otherwise be impossible alone.
• You have difficulty aiming – Space magic aside, Destiny 2 is, at its core, a first-person shooter. That means aiming is an important part of it. Sometimes this is easier said than done given how mobile a lot of enemies can be. Once again, the Bleak Watcher turret can be exploited to freeze enemies in place, allowing even the worst marksmen plenty of time to line up their shots.

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