Best Hunter Solar Builds For Destiny 2 PvE and PvP (Season 23)
Let's break down the best Solar Hunter builds for both Destiny 2 PVE and PVP.
Page Updated December 28, 2023, 21:44 | First Published November 29, 2023, 17:02
The dust has settled a bit following the release of Lightfall, Destiny 2's latest expansion. Now that it's been out for some time, we can finally take a look at the revamped mod system and put together what we consider to be top-tier Meta builds.
What makes a build good? It all depends on what you want to do. If you're a PVE fanatic, you might find more value in builds that are better for burst damage and survivability. PVP players might need faster recovery and snappier movement options. Things that don't necessarily hit hard, but certainly hit fast. Let's get down to brass tacks and take a look at the best PVE and PVP builds for Solar Hunters in Destiny 2.
Table of Contents
Best Solar Hunter PVE Build: Radiant Gambler
While this Solar Hunter build might not be quite up to snuff for your Grandmaster Nightfalls, it is certainly good enough for a Master Lost Sector or two. This build is a ton of fun and thanks to our Exotic Gloves, Young Ahamkara's Spine, you'll get some serious ability spam going if you get the rotation down. Remember to keep dodging, keep using your melee, and throw Tripmines until you're trippin' yourself.
Required Gear
- Exotic Armor: Young Ahamkara's Spine (Gauntlets)
The Young Ahamkara's Spine is a pair of gloves that grant you a supercharged Tripmine grenade that lasts longer and has an increased blast radius. As an added bonus, doing ability damage will grant you additional Tripmine energy, giving you more Tripmines faster. Win, win!
Class Setup
- Super: Blade Barrage
- Grenade: Tripmine Grenades
- Class Ability: Gambler's Dodge
- Melee: Knife Trick
- Jump: Triple Jump
The Super is really up to you, but Blade Barrage fits the fantasy this build is going for really well. The add-clear potential is silly and makes for a fun time in mid-tier content.
Aspects
- Knock 'Em Down: Your Super is enhanced regardless of which one you use! Blade Barrage for this build, for example, gains additional projectiles. It also grants you instant Melee energy when getting powered Melee kills while Radiant.
- On Your Mark: We're going to go with On Your Mark for our second Aspect here just because of the extra Fragment Slot. This is an extremely passive Aspect and while the heightened reload speed is nice, Gunpowder Gamble is a lot more fun IMO.
Fragments
- Ember of Singeing makes your class ability recharge faster when you scorch targets
- Ember of Ashes makes you apply more scorch stacks to targets
- Ember of Searing creates a Firesprite and grants Melee energy when defeating scorched targets
- Ember of Mercy grants restoration when reviving an ally and when picking up a Firesprite
- Ember of Torches makes you Radiant when you land powered melee attacks
Armor Mods
Outside of Stat Mods, you'll want to min/max for ability uptime to further lean into the Grenade, Melee, and Class Ability spam that this build is all about.
- Head Mods: I recommend Ashes to Assets, Solar Siphon, and Heavy Ammo Finder for more orbs, more super energy, and heavy ammo
- Arm Mods: I recommend Grenade Kickstart and Bolstering Detonation for more grenade energy and class energy
- Chest Mods: I recommend Emergency Reinforcement and/or whatever damage reduction mods of your choosing. Emergency Reinforcement is crazy strong right now and a requirement for high-end content
- Leg Mods: I recommend Solar Weapon Surge, Recuperation, and Orbs of Restoration. These will grant you additional Solar weapon damage as well as additional health and ability recharge.
- Cloak Mods: I recommend Time Dilation, Bomber, and Outreach for longer Armor Charge duration and increased cooldowns on grenades and melee charges.
Weapons
- Kinetic Slot: Witherhoard (recommended) While not required, Witherhoard is a kinetic slot grenade launcher that deals DOT (damage over time). It is a great way to apply constant DPS to enemies, keep your grenade uptime going consistently, and is just a fun weapon to use.
- Energy Slot: The choice here is yours, but I do recommend my personal favorite, Calus Mini Tool with Incandescent. If you don't have a Calus Mini Tool, you can run any solar weapon you like here, but since we're leaning into Scorch, I recommend having a weapon with Incandescent.
- Heavy Slot: Again, this is completely up to you. Right now, Grenade Launchers and Rockets have become favorable, but Linear Fusion Rifles are still a great option. Regardless of what it is, I recommend a Solar Heavy weapon to lean into the synergy of the build.
Stat Distribution
For these, you'll want to focus on as much Resilience and Recovery as possible for survivability. Next would be a minimum of 60 Mobility for your Dodge recharge, but anything higher is obviously better. The rest of the stats are entirely up to you, but Discipline as a sort of mild focus is always a good idea.
Conclusion
This Solar Hunter build is an explosive addition to any Guardian's lineup. While it might not be as toxic as the Solar Warlock builds that have been bouncing around for a while, it's still worth checking out and running in some Legend or Master Lost Sectors!
Best Solar Hunter PVP Build: Flame of Shaxx
Welcome to your PVP build, Solar Hunters! This build is going to look extremely familiar if you just worked on building out the Solar Hunter PVE build above because it's virtually the exact same thing! The only thing we're going to change is our melee, but Young Ahamkara's Spine is still our go-to for shutting down lanes with Tripmines and so too will be our Melee ability. Let's take a look!
Required Gear
- Exotic Armor: Young Ahamkara's Spine (Gauntlets)
The Young Ahamkara's Spine is a pair of gloves that grant you a supercharged Tripmine grenade that lasts longer and has an increased blast radius. As an added bonus, doing ability damage will grant you additional Tripmine energy, giving you more Tripmines faster. Win, win!
Class Setup
- Super: Blade Barrage
- Grenade: Tripmine Grenades
- Class Ability: Gambler's Dodge
- Melee: Knife Trick
- Jump: Triple Jump
The Super is really up to you, but Blade Barrage fits the fantasy this build is going for really well. This Super can shut down a team in just about any mode out there, so make sure you put it to good use!
Aspects
- Knock 'Em Down: Your Super is enhanced regardless of which one you use! Blade Barrage for this build, for example, gains additional projectiles. It also grants you instant Melee energy when getting powered Melee kills while Radiant.
- On Your Mark: We're going to go with On Your Mark for our second Aspect here just because of the extra Fragment Slot. This is an extremely passive Aspect and while the heightened reload speed is nice, Gunpowder Gamble is harder to proc in PVP, especially Trials.
Fragments
- Ember of Singeing makes your class ability recharge faster when you scorch targets
- Ember of Ashes makes you apply more scorch stacks to targets
- Ember of Searing creates a Firesprite and grants Melee energy when defeating scorched targets
- Ember of Mercy grants restoration when reviving an ally and when picking up a Firesprite
- Ember of Torches makes you Radiant when you land powered melee attacks
Armor Mods
Outside of Stat Mods, you'll want to min/max for weapon steadiness and handling. These are all pretty straightforward and grant bonus weapon stats and ability recovery.
- Head Mods: I recommend Kinetic OR Energy Targeting (and a siphon mod for fun!)
- Arm Mods: I recommend Reloaders of your choice.
- Chest Mods: I recommend Unflinching mods of your choice.
- Leg Mods: I recommend Innervation and Invigoration x2 for grenade and melee regeneration.
- Cloak Mods: I recommend Distribution, Bomber, and Outreach for more ability energy.
Weapons
- Kinetic Slot: I recommend something with some range like the No Time To Explain, Dead Man's Tale, or a similarly ranged Primary of your choice. Pulse Rifles continue to absolutely dominate in PVP and DMT is just fun to use. You can try to swap for a Hand Cannon too if you're finding yourself in close range, as you should be in this build!
- Energy Slot: All Shotgun, all the time. I use a Mindbender's Ambition that I love. Auto-Loading Holster is going to make you very happy when you're sprinting and swinging over Special Ammo and you have to switch to a CQB weapon in a pinch.
- Heavy Slot: This is completely up to you. Personally, Rockets are always a go-to in PVP due to their wide blast radius, making it tough to miss an opponent, but I have been a bit partial to Heavy Machine Guns recently, too!
Stat Distribution
For these, you'll want to focus on high Resilience, Mobility, and Recovery for both survivability and class ability recharge time. Next would be Discipline for faster Grapple charges.
Conclusion
This build in PVP is pretty fun, but there are definitely more fun builds with Void or Strand out there for Hunters right now. Having a little bit of Ability-spam in endgame PVP is pretty fun, though! Give it a shot in Trials or Iron Banner!
These are the best Solar Hunter builds for PVE and PVP in Destiny 2. Make sure you save them in your new Loadout slots before you start moving on to your next build!
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Written by Austin Ford
Austin is a freelance writer, theatre nerd, and lapsed stand-up comedian. His love for writing and dissection of video games brought him to the games journalism space where he’s written for outlets like The Outerhaven and XboxEra. When not working on Destiny 2 YouTube videos or streaming on Twitch, he helps to build out our Destiny 2 coverage with his deep knowledge of the game and its systems. With multiple Day One Raid completions, Austin likes to think of himself as an expert not only in Destiny but Bungie’s entire catalog of games. When not actively obsessing over The Traveler, Austin is also a fan of indie titles and JRPGs. If you ask him what his favorite game of all time is, he’d say Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy and will not rest until a sequel or Reboot is in his hands.
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