EVERY Hunter Exotic, Ranked & Explained - Destiny 2

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37:44 Young Ahamkara's Spine doesn't say it, but it also:
Makes you immune to your own tripmine explosions.
Gives you innate fastball.
Gives your tripmines massive damage resistance.
Increases your tripmine damage by 20 (140 -> 160).
Removes damage falloff on the explosion.
That's alongside the stated perks of a bigger blast radius, longer duration, and (quite a lot of) tripmine charge on _all_ ability _damage_ (not kills).

Wormhusk was one of the first exotics I got, I used to just run it in every activity. Using other exotics was weird for a while because for the first 300 hours of D2 I associated dodging with healing instantly

Stomp-EE5 on a Hunter is like the Venom symbiote on a host: Powerful, yet nearly impossible to take off

My favorite thing to do with Bakris is to actually use it at the start of a round in Trials to cover ground more quickly. I've caught so many teams off guard by being at an angle just a few seconds before they were expecting me to. It works especially well against seasoned players because they get used to engaging enemies at a certain time each round. Forcing them into that engagement just a second or two early can really throw off their groove.

When solar burn and brawler modifiers pop up, I HIGHLY recommend using ophidia spathe with middle tree golden gun. You can literally throw knives the entire time (as long as you get a kill every once in a while). It does great damage and is a super fun combo.

Appreciate the Oathkeepers take. Hunters that know, know. It's so good for those moments when you need to hold a lane. Lets you ignore the drawtime of the bow essentially by predrawing in cover before peeking. The fact you always trip Monarque poison is such a big plus. And it is subclass agnostic so it works with whatever I'm feeling at the moment. Also in respect to PvE, I know some people use it with Ticuu so they can guarantee the causality arrow stacks build up.
Great vid Fallout!

I always liked using the Sealed Ahamkaras with Monte Carlo and Knife Trick. My Fireteam gets annoyed that I don't use a more "useful" exotic, but having effectively a bottomless mag and unlimited throwing knives seems pretty good to me. You only need to throw a knife every few seconds, which doesn't stop your damage output like dodging would, and the Markov Chain perk allows for extra damage. Might not be the most effective loadout, but I play for fun.

I like this series because as a hunter main, I get locked into only using 4-5 exotics and seeing this video makes me want to use exotics that I haven’t thought of in a while.

I love ophidia spathe for PvP with top tree gunslinger. Being able to throw two of the explosive knives in similar spots makes for some amazingly easy kills. And I’ve noticed that the dodge also instantly refills BOTH melee charges, regardless of how much melee energy you have, which can lead to some pretty crazy plays where you can just get out 4 explosive knives back to back. In pve it’s fantastic with middle tree gunslinger for low-mid tier content. I can basically use the triple throwing knifes as a primary weapon, and they do a lot of damage as well!

Celestial Nighthawk is S-Tier unless you’re playing with randoms running stasis who throw walls right in front of your shot

I've personally noticed a lot of people don't realise that the extra damage from Mask Of Bakris against slowed and frozen combatants doesn't only apply to Arc weapons.
It applies to every source of damage from your Hunter.
This means any weapon, any ability. They all get their damage to slowed and frozen targets buffed after you dodge.
This is very effective for the Stasis Super, Silence and Squall which constantly slows enemies so your super constantly has more damage, just for dodging.
It also makes Duskfield grenades very good too.

I feel like they should combine foetracer and knucklehead radar into one exotic and just make the 2 looks ornaments. If you combine those it would be awesome but still wouldn't be op.

Celestial is fun in PVP in game modes like control because if there’s people bunched up and you headshot one of them, they explode and cause some serious damage while getting some of your super back.

I always thought Sixth Coyote was a solid exotic, but I fell in love with it on Revenant. Double slow dodge, double slow shurikens, it’s a really fun exotic to make builds around and is always useful.

I rocked Oathkeepers for years with the monarch and the Stag and it has always made me sad when armor reviews put them in D tier. I seriously appreciate you review of them! I feel like this covers there strength.

Dragon's Shadow buff to handling is to set Handling to 100 to all weapons. This effectively adds QuickDraw, Snapshot, and a Dexterity mod to every weapon at once, even on weapons that couldn't get those perks.

I've been really enjoying young ahamkara's spine on top tree. If you can get good at timing it right before an engagement enemies come into the area looking for you, not the grenade. Then, usually, they will strafe into it or try to run away and get caught by it. It might not be the easiest hunter exotic to play with but it's one of the more fun ones.

I am happy you recognized the power of graviton forfeit. My current high level end game PVE build is 100 mobility with 100 strength which allows me to remain cloaked PERMANENTLY as long as there is an enemy around to refresh my melee from dodge on. It is so much fun to just perma camo around the map and be fireteam revive medic

I find that throwing on Rat King along with Graviton Forfiet is an amazing loadout and is infact incredibly fun and I think that if you can, then you should try it.

I don’t see it talked about much, but Oath Keepers and Wish Ender can be a fun combo as well. Basically perma true sight as long as you hold the draw on the bow. It does have a little shorter range than True Sight but it’s pretty good and useful in 3v3 if you are talking with your team. Not as strong of a bow as LeM but much more effective than Kepri‘s IMO.

Arc staff in gambit is amazing, especially with raiden flux. Fries an entire wave in one super if you’re behind on motes, or obliterates non-meatball primevils and the envoys

The event you're thinking of for Shinobu's Vow was The Revelry. It was an event during Season of the Drifter in which the Reveler's Tonic gave you a massive cooldown buff to either grenade, charged melee, or class ability.

Assassins Cowl and stasis hunter melee is a great combo. I use it pretty often as a safety for being the last guardian alive in a nightfall. Gives me some time to breath in the middle of all the shooting. Paired with mods that keep melee up almost 24/7 its really good in casual pve.

I used to enjoy using the Oathkeeper gauntlets with Leviathan's Breath in Gambit. It was quite a bit of fun to invade with those two exotics.

Man I really love that you’ve been putting out these videos. Coming back to playing destiny after 2 years, these are really helpful in getting back into the game, and it’s a great bonus that it’s coming from someone who’s Been one of my favorite streaming/UAclips personalities in destiny.

Really appreciated man. Not many creators will spend THIS much time going over EVERY exotic in the game. Thank you

Again, excellent guide. Both positives and negatives well explained, with context added for clarity. Highly appreciated.
The hunter class always felt flimsy and was looking for ways to improve my hunter game.
Cheers!

Assassin's cowl paired with stasis melee shuriken and gambler's dodge is amazing. With this season's perk of thermoclastic blooming you can basically always have your super up as well. Between finishers and rank and file enemies I have so much more survival in GMs than I do running Omni (and definitely not as aeons). Paired with overshield from stasis crystals it can be hard to die when used effectively. Once I got that exotic, I hate having to use anything else in PVE.

One thing people might not know about Raiju’s Harness is if you pop your super and immediately get killed, you retain at least half of your super energy when you respawn
Or that’s just a common trait, I actually don’t know… 😂

Bakris has been one of my main exotics to use in both PvP and PvE simply off the principle that its really fun to use. It's definetly not the best PvE exotic but I agree that it's effectiveness ranges widely between users

Just a quick note to Dragons Shadow: It secretly adds a +50 mobility to your stats, so in order to have 100 mobility, you just need to make it to 50 mobility and you basically have 100, even though it doesnt show it. imo thats a highly overlooked fact about DS, because it adds more room to focus on skilling on for example recovery or intellect. Thats also why its so easy to hold on the effect, because it roughly lasts about 10 seconds, and with 100 mobility you get your dodge back ever 11 seconds.
Just wanted to add it because its a important fact to it and because I see many players using it skilling to 100 mobility

You're a life saver Fallout. Let it be known the work you put into these videos does not go unappreciated.

I like the ophidia spathe, on mid tree you can spam knives indefinitely, handy for PvE and while blade barraqge is certainly lacking it can at least roomclear as long as you don't wedge your face behind a ceiling protrusion/doorframe after hitting the cast button.
on the other trees it's less spamable but every single melee regen instantly providing 2 charges is not to be underestimated, especially with the mods that provides bonuses on melee hit/kill.

One thing to add about the worm husk, and it’s just ideas for builds in PvP/ what I like to use sometimes. Use it with middle tree goldy with the lemon arch bow. The burn from the bow counts to the dodge recharge rate perk, which lets you rock really low mobility, but it’s still like having 100 mobility, giving you more flexibility to spec into other traits. Combine that with utility kick starts or even bomber and you can spam dodge/Grenades better than just 100 mobility. Better stats in other places, heal quickly bc after you dodge you can basically dodge again, like almost radiant dance machine spam but with healing, etc etc. only down side is the ult is dog S*** only used to show down other ults.
Side note too, Shin gauntlets are insanely strong with double bomber. I prefer the middle tree arc, just to reflect, but the double grenade spam is nice. Again i like to use the lemon arch bow, so i can take someone, than throw one of these after the person ducks behind cover and you just see the go fly across the map with the grenade chasing them down, I feel bad but it gives you an evil chuckle.
Also lastly to add. The trick sleeves with a harmony bow build, or lonesome with kill clip 2 taps to the head dealing 101 damage, watch TDT vid on it. They are slept on but are only good once you get super confident about you low health, and know when you can trait with such low health bc of the raw damage you can output bc of the sleeves. Also to help with the low health, wear the mod that takes away your CWL stacks in exchange for a damage resistance, that with a mid or high spec into resilience will basically let you tank an extra shot or two while keeping the trick sleeves proc’d. So you can trade sometimes even better at low health than if you were at full health going into an engagement.
Just extra food for thought.
P.S. I’m all about dueling, as I main bow builds, So that’s where my mind is with the exotics.

Raiden flux is fun to use for both PvE and PvP especially if I am using the twirly, and those brief moments of a prolonged arc staff is satisfying!

57:09 Sealed Ahamkara grasps are my favorite exotic of all time. With solor 3.0 and the ability to have almost unlimited proximity knifes is so beneficial to this exotic. I dont use exotics often but the minute I got my resilience god roll for this exotic it hasn't left my active inventory

Foetracers should just come with the inherent weapon mod “rank and file” or a version of it. Allowing us to do more damage to red bar enemies (for PvE I’d let it stack with weapon mods)

Foetracer is really hit or miss in pvp. I personally love it with SMG- Lorenz and middle tree void. Also I always use it for certain boss like in Prophecy

They definitely need to make more armor pieces that have champion mods such an invaluable resource

As a new player the Ophidia Spathe was the first exotic I got, Xur just happened to have it. It’s definitely not end game viable but my goodness is it badass for the Hunter phantasy in pve. The explosive blades still one shot most Elites. So two, dodging and getting another charge has made it easy to clear most encounters in seconds. Going to enjoy it while it lasts

As a Hunter main, there are many of these exotics that I've yet to try. Thanks for putting them all in context. Great content. Keep up the great work.

Assasin’s Cowl pairs wonderfully in PvE with Stasis because you can set up a build where you have a melee almost al the time, so youre spamming melees and getting invis and healed endlessly

I just started Destiny 2 last week as a hunter, and I feel like I couldn't have been luckier getting the sixth coyote as my first exotic. Glad to know it's good

Very much an edge case, but on bosses you can get close to the Sealed Ahamkaras can work really well with stuff like the Legend of Acrius or the Fourth Horseman. Keep an eye on them for if the next seasonal weapon meta is shotguns

Foetracer gets no love and it's always been one of my favorites 🥺 still is, i use it quite often. I think it's one of those that really depends on your playstyle and how cognizant your teammates are. If you're running together and paying attention to each other, I find it to be very useful. I agree with the commenter who suggested that they combined Foetracer with Knucklehead. Wouldnt be OP but would definitely be significantly more useful than what it is now lol.

I use the sealed ahamkara grasps on my main pve build I think they are slept on with the stasis melee you get 2 reloads then dodge is a third reload you can do some massive dps especially with trench barrel. Or with Monte Carlo they are insanely synergistic you have to get the cool down timed right but once you these things are 👍

I adore Young Ahamkara’s Spine in 6s (Athrys is my 3s choice). Catch out people hiding in cover who took any sort of chip, place it as a trap to catch out retreating or aggressive players, use it as an opening strike into a group…
I wiped an entire team in the opening of a 6s match once, all with one tripmine and one top tree explosive knife. If you place your tripmines well, you’ll also get all sorts of kills you never intended as your team accidentally forces your enemies into your mines. It isn’t a wasted ability if they get a kill 20 seconds after placement thanks to that longer trap timer. Seriously. *So many “future sight” kills.*

Thank you for all the time and effort you put into your videos

One thing I’m noticing from Lucky Pants. I would want to see a change for Actium war rig which would act like the lucky pants, where it turns Machine guns into DPS machines, or sort of like rampage on steroids. And then warlocks could get something like particle deconstruction for Linear and Trace fusion rifles.

Bakris took a hit in PvE when anarchy was nerfed. first in last out + anarchy with bakris was really good for taniks, especially if you were using silence and squall to proc focusing lens for your teammates.

About lucky pants and particle deceleration, I’ve been using both for a while with crimson, cartesian, and threaded needle. Crimson and lucky pants are absolutely stellar for anything less than a boss or champion since I have the fusion and the linear. I get near constant health, reloads on precision kills, and each round of the burst fire gets another level in the damage boost. So landing 3 bursts gets you x9 in no time at all and you’re free to blast away at x10 for a good while.

Sealed Ahamkara grasps are pretty fun with sleeper, 2 linear reserves and stasis - using marksmans dodge you can get all 16 rounds off without reloading. Works well with anything that has a total reserve size of 4 to 5 mags

Sir Fallout, I _really_ appreciate these videos. Really looking forward to the Titan one. I value the situational use of the various pieces. Learn some new tricks.

one very important thing you didn't mention about Raiju: if you get killed in your super, you retain super energy the same way as if you had turned it off early.

i feel like celestial nighthawk coulda been foetracer in a combination, could make a side perk called hawks eyes so you get the foetracer’s perk while your super is charged. would def make it a 10/10 for things other than just a boss, and makes it usable for something other than only your super

THE BEST Hunter Exotic LIST EVER! Your Explanations and advice are very Appreciated! Thank You!

I was playing comp earlier with young ahamkaras spine and fought some revenants that played around shatterdive. I threw a single grenade and for the next 30 seconds they could not shatterdive. Absolutely incredible exotic.

I actually used Sealed Ahamkara with stasis in GMs last season. Worked really really well.

Aeons with Sect of Vigor and running Vigilance Wing results in some interesting synergy.
Probably the only real use case out there with them, but still niche and really only works on Titan and Warlock

Sealed Ahamkara’s got HARD killed when they nerfed the reloading smokes, because the nerf specifically added an invisible timer to the effect that is WAY too long. You can sort of still mix it with a ranged melee and marksman’s dodge to get some quicker back-to-back mag-dumps, but there are WAY better options for that now. I’m sad because it’s my favorite-looking set of gloves :(

Actually I enjoy using sealed ahamkara's grasps. It can result in more weapon uptime than something like 6th coyote with the reload dodge if you're using revenant hunter. The shurikens come out really quickly, at range, and have very little end lag if you animation cancel.. Also it starts off with 2 charges Baseline. You could fire 4 volleys back to back without a traditional reload. I mean is it cracked? Not particularly. But it can be a lot of fun.

With Assassin’s Cowl, you actually get a longer invis time when you perform finishers, I believe. Though obviously that’s only applicable to pve

Omnioculus is really nice even on top tree. Getting 2 smokes to abuse radar manipulation with false pings is extremely effective

cowl should be run with a very specific playstyle and shines in extremely hard solo content, it is always run with a 12punch sg and tractor or lament depending on the enemy type. you can stunlock most champs and bosses with the punches and kill them
before they retaliate. also it is bound to the punch arc hunter class and the build do not require any stat requirements. it is highly thought after in asian communities along with stronghold titans. a low skill floor, but extremely powerful when mastered.

For SAG (Sealed Ahamkara Grasps) if you tag an enemy with the triple knife attack with Blade Barrage, you get constant reload from the burn effect. Though it’s been a while since I’ve done this, could be patched by now.

One thing about the St0mp-EE5 in PvE that makes me use them just about constantly is the fact that I am a revenant main in most PvE content outside of raid bosses and GMs, and for revenant, there isnt really many exotics to choose from. Bakris is the only one that targets it specifically, but for PvE I havent found it to be super useful. The only other exotics are the non-class specific ones. So its really just between St0mp-EE5 and Aeon Swift. and for casual PvE content like strikes, Astral, Shattered realm, etc., I wear the St0mp-EE5 just because the movement buff is very nice to have. Just like you said for PvE, it's very much a "set it and forget it" exotic. Just my 2 cents, plus I just like extra movement as a hunter. Kinda like wearing Lion Rampant all the time as a Titan

Hunter main here, Sealed Ahamkara Grasps are nice for insta-reloading during a dps phase like against Atheon. Basically be a Revenant and throw a shuriken as soon as you run out of 1k shots in the mag. Don't have to dodge to reload, don't need to use reload mods, don't need to rely on others to equip the right exotics to buff your reload speed etc. It has increased my dps by a ton in those phases, especially after factoring in focusing lens. It is also really handy once you get used to relying on throwing a stasis melee out for a quick reload of literally any weapon. I guess the main reason I like the exotic is that it negates the reload speed being a stat that you need to worry about in low or high-end pve. I wouldn't use it if I wasn't a Revenant. Pvp... I don't use it there.

The secret META for Ahamkara Grasps is here. This makes glaives insane! Never reload and never lose your shield, also great with shotguns, dmt and reservoir burst fusions. So fun with Arc 3.0

Void 3.0 with graviton forfeit is very good now, and in strikes if you get a faster melee modifier you get insta-shadowdives every time you jump

Love the Assassin’s Cowl for infinite shuriken invisibility and clutch hp regen. Also clutch invis for ressing teammates. Stacks very nicely with Rime

Sealed Ahamkara Grasps would be sick with middle try solar and Dead Mans Tale in PVE. one shorting most red bars, two tapping most weak yellow bars. Idk, playing with fire is really cool, and adding a weapon reload on top would be sick

The Revelry was the event that gave us faster ability recharge in pvp and pve (briefly).

Been a D2 player since the start and never really used Fr0st-EE5 but I love them with the stasis subclass. Orpheus Rig may not be good in normal PVP but it's bloody fun in mayhem :D

Tthere is a new build going around with Oathkeeper, le monarque and a quickdraw hand canon. Most people know where I'm going with this but you basically get that tick shot and swap to a hand canon for a few body shots at least and its a pretty quick clean up. I've been using it in comp and a bit in trials and its really nice

i would love to see a remake on this considering a lot of what he based things on such as with the hunter dodge which got massively nerfed. no more breaking aim assist, no more short cooldown, ect.

I've actually been using Lucky Pants since the season started. I'm using Null Composure/Vorpal Cartesian and/or Vorpal Threaded Needle for single-target. I actually use the Lucky Pants buff a lot to clear out big packs of adds with Crimson. I've run it both as Stasis (Thermoclastic + Elemental Shards, etc, etc) or as Top-tree Nightstalker with 2x Well of Utility, Reaping Wellmaker, and Bountiful Wells). It has been my favorite build in a long time. I've been preferring Marksman's Dodge with it, even though I'm normally always on Gambler's for PvE.
The build just *shreds* in Gambit, too. And the safety you get from Crimson healing while murdering everything? I've done some really stupid things this season in Gambit that SHOULD get me killed and they just don't with this loadout.
Did I mention it rains ammo bricks when Crimson is 1-shotting enemies thanks to Lucky Pants?

With Mask of Bakris. A way to sorta counter the dodge recharge delay would be the Stasis Class Item mods, Utility Kickstart. Once the delay timer is over, you get at least 40% energy back if you have two Kickstarts on. Pretty cheap mod, only costs ONE energy. Lots of spare energy slots left over, good for stat increases.

On Foetracer: if I recall correctly, “low health” enemy is 15-20% of health or less remaining. The player’s health bar is split about 50/50 between health and shields despite that not being visually apparent. So you getting absolutely nothing until the last shot isn’t entirely surprising.

I’m also an athrys main, and really if you think it looks cool I’d highly recommend just putting it on. You’ll miss a lot of knives, but after long enough you’ll be knowledgeable of where to throw the knives and when they will be able to bounce to kill people behind cover, leaving your friends in private matches going “wHAT?”
As for pve, the draw for me is less the stagger capabilities, but more for the fact that the knife will do about as much damage as a golden gun shot. It’s good damage and it’s really easy to activate.

I'm happy assassins cowl is getting more recognition. IMO its one of the best exotics in the game. I love it so much

I use the nighthawk in pve and pvp because like you said, I love how it looks and the excessive damage is hilarious

With Graviton, mid tree invis is 10 seconds for every precision kill which with some of the current scouts/pulses is REALLY strong you can spend half a game invis if you're getting lots of headshots.

I wish Stompees didn’t have such a bad stigma tied to them, I’ve used them and bottom tree Arc since year 1 (I basically only play PVE) because I absolutely love speedy builds/characters. Also, great video!

I use the Cowl with an Ager's Scepter Stasis build. It gives me the survivability I need so that I can focus on melee and super recharge on my stasis class.
It falls off at end game pve but for everything else it's insanely good.

Celestial Nightkawk gives a 1.5x damage increase on crit vs the total of all 3 shots doing crits

Don't sleep on YAS in PVE, it pairs with splash damage and Solar Mods, both Wells and Warmind Cells (which even after nerf can be very useful). With BB it's trading bust damage for continual damage. Very viable mid to close range usage, and in lower difficulties it's just fun times.

I really like sealed ahamkara with stasis knives for dps phases. It’s nice with the linears to get 2 free reloads and it’s a fast animation compared to smoke

1:31:12 - I would like to add (as someone who runs this 24/7 on Hunter) that using the double utility mod with 9-10 mobility, you will in fact get your dodge back around the 8 second mark and have about 2 seconds of Wraithmetal perk left over.

I went up against a hunter invader in Gambit using the oathkeepers and a leviathan's breath bow. One of the most humiliating, humbling, raging encounter ever! If you peeked, you were dead!

I have a PvE build using middle tree solar and Ophidia. With melee well maker, bountiful wells, and well of healing, my knifes are my primary weapons and I'm providing an insane amount of ability energy for my teammates.

Young Ahamkaras spine with the top tree explosive mine knife feels amazing. I can’t tell you how many double kills I’ve gotten with it, or how many Roaming supers I’ve killed with it

concept: top path arcstaff bombadier and potentially riskrunner. bombadier enhances your roll melee spam combo in terms of damage and blind gives a bunch of safety
if it self damages then it'll also activate risk runner on command very easily and riskrunner will negate a lot of the self harm downsides due to the arc resistance buff as well

Rad Fallout, thanks for making this guide, going to try out some builds with the Dragon's Shadow for fun in PVE. For the last couple weeks I've been using Shinobu's Vow with the newest well mods. Its not anything game breakingly amazing but its been fun to use and a nice break from Lucky Pants.

The graviton bottom tree void works wonder when you pair it with the mod when your charged w light you get half your melee upon using it paired with its faster regen and you get it back before you even lose invisibility also paired with some grenade regen buff mods and your getting both back within 15 secs of use definitely if used with a correct build

Sealed Ahamkaras Grasps are good for boss dps. Use revenant and you can empty your mag then throw ur shurkien to auto reload and reproc focusing lens.

Regarding the sealed ahamkara grasps, they're actually pretty good with a shotgun that has one-two punch or trench barrel

I love this format. It’s almost podcast-like. I dig it man. Thanks for putting this together fellow nerd 🤓

Ahamkara Grasps: They pair well with top tree arcstrider. Punch the enemy, dodge, punch again. Paired with a shotgun it's a fantastic combo so long as you can get the ammo to maintain it.

For graviton forfeit, I personally prefer using inviz nade with gamblers dodge. Go inviz, dodge near enemies, get your inviz back. Plus, you can give inviz to your buddies if their pinned in a corner during a gm nightfall or something or even make your entire team inviz for Gorgon Maze. Graviton Forfeit is easily one of, if not my favorite hunter exotic for those reasons