Just before Christmas, the Community Manager for Destiny, David "DeeJ" Dague, shared on the game's blog that gamers around the world had spent a collective 872 million hours playing the massively-multiplayer open world shooter. There's no doubt that the influx of new gamers over the holiday pushed that well over a billion hours.
With that much time spent killing endless enemies and taking down Atheon and Crota, we wonder what weapons players are using to do so much damage. The folks at Bungie were kind enough to compile that information and in a recent blog post, Bungie revealed the most popular Primary, Special and Heavy weapons used by Guardians level 20 and above for the last two weeks. For the most part, the results are as expected.
The two most popular Primary weapons were the Vision of Confluence scout rifle (which is the favored weapon of yours truly) and SUROS Regime exotic auto rifle. Seeing SUROS at the top of the list was expected, considering it's a weapon of choice for the Crucible – Destiny's PVP arena – due to its high fire rate from the hip and slower, more powerful ranged shooting feature. Additionally, Xur has sold SUROS a couple times during his visits to the Tower, making it one of the most owned exotic weapons in the game.
For Special weapons, Guardians have been using Murmur fusion rifle and Ice Breaker no-ammo-required sniper rifle. Again, not a huge revelation since the Murmur is given to any players who finish all the Rise of Crota quests from Eris Morn, an in-game vendor who arrived with The Dark Below DLC. And considering many Destiny players tout the Ice Breaker as the best weapon in the game, it easily rounds out the top two Special weapons.
Probably the most interesting stat from the lot is the top two Heavy weapons are both Rare, rather than Legendary or Exotic. This is likely due to the fact that most players focus their attention on obtaining Legendary and Exotic Primary and Special weapons for use in raids and the Crucible. Of the 30 weapons Bungie shared – 10 in each category – there were 7 Exotic, 13 Legendary and 11 Rare weapons. To see how the weapons stacked up, check out the below infographic from Bungie.
Considering that the above stats were pulled only for players level 20 and higher, it's no surprise that basic or uncommon weapons were absent in the lists. However, when Bungie looked at the 10 most popular Primary weapons of all players across all levels, four of the ten were basic or uncommon weapons, with Legendary weapon Vision of Confluence leading the pack. Here's the full list:
- Vision of Confluence
- Khvostov 7G-02
- Cydonia-AR3
- The Stranger’s Rifle
- Marshal-A
- Suros Regime
- Marshal-A1
- Atheon’s Epilogue
- Shingen-E
- Galahad-E
For those interested in the most popular weapons in the Crucible PvP multiplayer modes, 6 of the 10 are auto rifles. Due to all guns being almost completely balanced in Crucible matches – except for during Iron Banner events and mode types – auto rifles offer Guardians the best opportunity for wiping out the competition because of their high fire rate and ease of use. Keep that in mind the next time you head into a Crucible match - lock and load your best auto rifle and get to work. Check out the top 10 Crucible Primary weapons below:
- SUROS Regime
- Vex Mythoclast
- Thorn
- Atheon’s epilogue
- Shingen-E
- Cydonia-AR3
- The Last Word
- Galahad-E
- Up For Anything
- The Stranger’s Rifle
Did your weapons of choice show up on the list? How do you think the list will change over the next couple months? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Destiny is available on PS3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.
Source: Bungie