Destiny Crucible Auto Rifles Guide
Destiny Crucible Auto Rifles Guide by RevolverOctopus
As the high impact exotic auto rifle, the Suros Regime is the weapon of choice in PvE for putting a lot of lead downrange without compromising damage/impact output, not to mention the stats associated with it make it even more desirable.
However, I want to make the case to you guys that the Suros is actually not the most useful and handy auto rifle for the crucible and in fact would more often than not be detrimental to your PVP success as it uses up that one precious exotic slot.
Before we begin I just want to throw a caveat out there:
This guide is only going to discuss the legendary high impact auto rifles that you can buy at the tower with crucible/vanguard marks. I am well aware that if you receive an auto rifle drop it will roll different stats from what is available in the tower, so some of you who received Shadow Price from a drop may have wildly different attributes and even stat changing attributes from what I will discuss.
So lets begin by examining some two of the basics that I believe are most important. In no particular order:
Impact: Simply put, impact his how much damage each individual shot does. Thus, the higher the impact the more the damage. The hardest thing to conceptualize is how this then relates to the attack score. That 248/300 that you see at the top of your weapon stats. FOR THE CRUCIBLE, YOU DO NOT NEED TO WORRY ABOUT ATTACK Let me repeat that, for PVP in Destiny differences in attack are negligible and unless you’re playing Iron Banner (and even then…it won’t matter that much) you do not need to worry about the attack value of your gun. This is because attack is normalized across weapon and level types in the crucible. This why a blue Shingen-E can sit your level 28 ass down on the ground.
What Impact does however, is it regulates how much of that normalized damage per shot each of your bullets does. This is why low Rate of Fire (RoF) guns like handcannons have MASSIVE impact scores. It is a way of compensating for their horrendously low RoF. Less shots, but more damage per shot. Let’s consider a low impact high RoF auto rifle like Doctor Nope this is the equivalent of death by a thousand cuts. Due to the low impact rating each bullet is going to be dealing small amounts of damage, however the maxed out RoF means that you are effectively putting a wall of lead downrange.
Stability: How easy the weapon is to handle as you shoot it. The higher the rating, the more predictable or muted the recoil will be. So as opposed to the gun firing wildly up and to the left or side to side when you hold down the trigger, it will stay focused within a small area of what/who you are currently aiming at. This isn’t something that is widely considered with auto rifles, since they are obviously intended for mid-range encounters as opposed to a sniper for long range, and a fusion/shotgun for CQC.
I will be discussing Shadow Price, Grim Citizen III, Vanquisher VIII, and the Suros Regime. There is no particular order to these weapons, aside from the Suros Regime as last since I’m trying to raise the point that the Suros is actually the least useful and versatile weapon in the crucible. All of these (minus the Suros) are always available for sale at the tower, and near as I can tell their stats don’t vary.
Auto Rifles
The first thing you’ll notice among these AR’s is that the Impact stat across all of these AR’s is exactly the same. Barring any weird variations in stats from drops, if you buy each of these weapons from the tower, they will not vary their impact rating at all. This means again the damage per bullet IN THE CRUCIBLE is exactly the same for all of these weapons. The variations then are found in the everything else that we talked about, namely the stability rating and the specific abilities/attribute boosts that each weapon gives you.
Sold by the Vanguard Quartermaster this weapon isn’t particularly efficient for the Crucible in my opinion. It doesn’t have the highest magazine size of all of the weapons we’re discussing and the Life Support perk (“Recovering from near death grants additional ammo and briefly increases reload speed”) doesn’t really grant enough benefits to merit equipping this weapon.
Of note however, is Hammer Forged which increases the effective range of the weapon (at what distance your bullets will still produce maximum amounts of damage) and Persistence which improves the accuracy of your gun as it is fired. This might be great legendary weapon for PvE but as far as PVP is concerned you might actually be better off with a Shingen and invest in getting a legendary secondary.
This is a great weapon for the crucible and one of my personal favorites overall. The default magazine size (26) is the largest out of all the AR’s we’re discussing and its attributes are great. Of special note is the increased reload speed when the mag is empty. Someone in the comments can correct me if I’m wrong but this ability stacks with other increased AR reload perks from gauntlets or Subclass attributes.
Where this weapon lacks is stability. At 39 stability all of the other guns boast a significantly higher stability rating which limits this weapon severely for long range encounters. To be fair this weapon does share the Persistence attribute with the Shadow Price but in the frenetic nature of the Crucible I have found this to be of very limited use.
This is my personal favorite and the gun I use the most in the crucible, though it has several deficiencies. First of all the magazine size is the smallest out of all of these ARs at a sometimes paltry 22. and the Glass Half Full attribute (“The bottom half of each magazine causes additional damage”) is of limited value. Where this weapon really shines is with the Perfect Balance attribute (“This weapon has extremely low recoil”) Which effectively maxes out the stability rating on the Vanquisher. This means that you can accurately and effectively deal damage at long and mid range without compromising the high RoF that is available to you with an AR.
The global favorite and Exotic AR Suros Regime is not a bad gun, and this guide isn’t meant to say that one gun is definitively and objectively better than another. However what I’m trying to show is that there are other alternatives to the Suros in PVP and that moreover you can become more deadly in PVP if you unequip the Suros.
Like all of the previous guns the Suros has the exact same impact rating, however the default stability rating is the highest out of all the ARs at 82. This can be completely maxed out to 100 if you take the small penalty to impact and range and equip “Smart Drift Control”. Where this weapon truly shines is with the Suros Regime perk which has a chance of returning health to you when dealing damage with the bottom half of a magazine, something that can be incredibly beneficial in a tight spot.
However this weapon lacks in certain areas. The focused fire perk, while dealing additional damage, severely limits the ADS (Aiming down the sights) effectiveness of the gun. Considering that the Vanquisher VII does not take a hit to RoF when ADS and enjoys high stability without having to compromise on either impact or range one can start to see that the Suros isn’t the end all be all for AR’s. This is further compounded when you can consider the use of other more varied exotics (Plan C, Invective, Icebreaker) which open up if you use a legendary auto instead of the Suros.
Moreover, in the frenetic and high speed engagement nature of the Crucible a penalty to RoF becomes increasingly more detrimental to any 1v1 engagements which are decided almost from the beginning.
Please comment on any mistakes/issues/ideas as I learn as much from you guys as I hope you learned from me.
Good hunting Guardians!
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