For some, combat in Destiny can be a bit precarious. It’s not like shooters of ‘ol, where enemies stood still and held their guns out and pointed vaguely in your direction. Now enemies actively work to fight back, dodging if you keep your scope on them too long, and actively using abilities to deter you from fighting.

1. For instance, you could be attacking a Knight who will, depending on the weapon equipped and the difficulty, summon a shield to block your heavy fire or roll out of the way of your attack. Similar to Halo and earlier Bungie AI, every unit will try to avoid damage where possible.

Sort of like the old World of Warcraft days where you could simply place an AoE attack on the ground and the enemies stand in it, enemies in Destiny move. They will not stand in any of your abilities. If you put something down and something is caught in it, they will immediately begin moving out.

This is the first core thing to learn in the game, because a lot of grenades have a area-of-effect damage area that pulses or radiates damage, and if you place it where the edge is near the enemy you’re trying to kill, then they’ll take 2 steps to the left and walk out of it, which won’t do you much of any good.

However, it can do you good if you need some heat off of you, because most enemies will not shoot while moving. They’ll put their guns down to sprint out of danger, unless it’s something where they slowly need to move to aim or in the instances of special units like Wizards which move around the battlefield and launch seeking projectiles at you.

So the basic idea is you want to hit as close as you can with any attack. If you’re facing a lot of enemies at once, throwing a grenade or using a super can buy you some time as the enemies find new cover to hide in to get yourself somewhere safe.

2. You’ll learn quickly in Destiny that cover is your friend, but at the same time, managing it is to critical to your success. You’re going to want to move in and out of it to block damage, but you’re also going to need to stand still enough to get some well timed shots in, unless you’re the spray and run kind of person.

3. Firing from the hip is never smart, because most enemies just don’t care. They take so much damage that you can fire from the hip all day, but it’s not going to phase them. Always try to aim as much as possible, unless it’s an auto rifle or a shotgun.

4. Reload as often as you can, because you don’t want that Wizard’s shields to be down or that Captain’s shields and be stuck in a situation where they’re almost dead but you have to reload and they’re quickly retreating to cover to regen.

5. In PvP especially, there are 360 degrees around you at most times enemies can come, so keep your eyes peeled.

6. Avoid groups of enemies as much as possible before you thin them out. If it’s something like Thralls, then you’ll want to shoot at them as they rush you. If it’s something like Acolytes, then you’ll want to just wear them down as much as possible before you actually start combat. Throw grenades, shoot blindly, whatever it takes. Because if you expose yourself and let them all fire at you, even behind cover might not be safe.

7. Drop ships have turrets that can be destroyed, but you should only bother in multiplayer. In the same light, avoid killing the beefy units like Captains and Knights and Wizards until last, because as you thin out the smaller enemies, they become a lot easier to just continuously blast into.

8. Use your mini-map to your advantage. It has a semi-radar on it that tracks where enemies are, which if you’re going in blind, can give you a somewhat of an idea of where to point your gun at the start.

9. Save all of your heavy ammo and grenades for big units or large difficult clusters of enemies. No point in wasting everything on a single Thrall.

10. Finally, aim for the weak point. Some enemies like Minotaurs don’t have weak points, for the rest it’s either their head or the glowing weak red spot.

That’s my top ten beginner combat tips for Destiny! Get out there and have some fun.


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Last Updated: Mar 13, 2016

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Get in the bush with David "Xerin" Piner as he leverages his spectacular insanity to ask the serious questions such as is Master Yi and Illidan the same person? What's for dinner? What are ways to elevate your gaming experience? David's column, Respawn, is updated near daily with some of the coolest things you'll read online, while David tackles ways to improve the game experience across the board with various hype guides to cool games.

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