Destiny 2 is known for two things, cool space magic and great gunplay. This Strand Hunter build guide is going to heavily utilize the former, so let’s dive into this Destiny 2: Strand Hunter tangle spam build guide.
Exotic Armor – Foetracer
At its core, this build revolves around dealing damage with Strand abilities and finishing off opponents with a Strand weapon to spawn Tangles. To maximize this setup, we’re going to be using the Foetracer Exotic helmet. Its perk, Relentless Tracker, is the bread and butter behind consistent extra damage and spawning those precious spinning Tangle buddies. Here’s what the perk does:
- Damaging a powerful combatant or Guardian with an ability grants you a temporary bonus to weapon damage matching your subclass. Defeating that opponent with a weapon matching your subclass’s damage type creates an elemental pickup.
Now, because we’re using Strand, that means a Tangle is spawned instead of an elemental pickup. Additionally, and the reason this build works in PvE and PvP, is because Foetracer’s damage buff is a 4x weapon surge. Which means in PvE you get a 25% damage buff for 11 seconds, and in PvP you get a 6% damage buff for 6 seconds. Granted, that’s only if you get the kill using a Strand weapon on the thing or person hit with your ability damage.
Exotic Weapon – Quicksilver Storm
Speaking of which, the Strand weapon you will be using with this build, and the one that works in PvE and PvP is none other than the Quicksilver Storm Exotic auto rifle. However, you will need the catalyst to make this Exotic a Strand weapon. If you don’t already have it, then it can be obtained from the Any Data Port in a Storm quest at the holoprojector that is next to the postmaster in Neomuna.
Why try to obtain Quicksilver Storm’s Catalyst? It’s because the rifle’s range is decent, and its stability is maxed out alongside having low recoil and very high aim assist. Better yet, is the gun’s intrinsic trait that fires small homing rockets that usually never miss as you land shots. Landing these rockets generates grenades that create Tangles on kills. So, between your Strand abilities, FoeTracer, and Quicksilver Storm, you’re going to be making Tangles hand over fist.
Legendary Weapons
When it comes to pairing the Quicksilver Storm to other Legendary weapons, my recommendation is your favorite shotgun. While I use a max range Gunnora’s Axe Arc shotgun, if you have a Strand shotgun or even a Strand fusion rifle those would work just as well. A powerful close-range weapon nicely compliments the already decent range of the Quicksilver.
As for a Heavy Legendary weapon, my recommendation is the Semiotician, a Strand rocket launcher. That said, you can’t really go wrong with whatever decently rolled Heavy weapon you already own. So, choose what you like and are already familiar with, bonus points if it does Strand damage so that it synergizes with your Foetracer helm.
Aspects, Fragments, and Abilities
The Whirling Maelstrom Aspect is a must and is what turns your Tangle into a deadly green tornado. With that, I like to run the Threaded Specter Aspect because it leaves behind a decoy that not only makes enemies shoot at it but explodes too and spawns to threadlings in the process. It works amazingly well in PvE and only slightly less so in PvP. If you don’t like that for whatever reason, you could run Ensnaring slam instead.
Regarding Strand’s Fragments, I like to run Thread of Isolation, Thread of Generation, Thread of Rebirth, and Thread of Evolution. All of these Fragments combined increase your threadling damage and range, grenade generation when dealing damage, severing a target from repeated precision hits, and Strand final blows possibly making another Tangle—ideal!
In my opinion, the best choice of grenade is the Threadling grenade. One of your Fragment’s buffs all of them, and they can help you deal damage to multiple targets which makes your Foetracer helm’s Exotic perk all the more useful. Its two-minute base cooldown isn’t too long either.
So Many Mod Choices
When it comes to armor mods, I find it best to stack your character’s class stat. So, in this case, stack Mobility to 100, followed by Resilience and then Strength or Discipline depending on if you like dealing melee ability damage more often than grenades. Either way, Foetracer will make it count toward generating another Tangle.
On the helmet, I like to run the Harmonic Siphon and whatever else Siphon I need to make sure every rapid series of kills with every weapon makes an Orb of Power. For the arms, I run the Firepower, Momentum Transfer, and Impact Induction. Those arm mods give Orbs of Power on grenade kills, grenade energy on melee damage, and vice-versa.
For the chest armor, I recommend Concussive Dampener for a reduction of Area of Effect damage. Followed by two copies of Unflinching Harmonic Aim, doing so reduces flinch while using your Strand weapon(s) of choice. On the boots I highly recommend either one or two copies of the Absolution mod, giving you cooldown reduction on all abilities when you pick up an Orb of Power. Lastly, rolling Recuperation or Better Already guarantees you will be healing one way or another whenever you collect an Orb of Power.
Now, on the cloak you will want the Reaper mod that spawns an Orb of Power whenever you kill something after using your class ability. Follow that up with Bomber that reduces your grenade cooldown when dodging or use Outreach if you want to reduce your melee cooldown. Lastly, you will want to use Powerful Attraction, a really neat mod that collects all the Orbs of Power around you whenever you dodge to make your Strand decoy. Which has saved me more than once because absorbing two or more Orbs at once essentially fully heals you.
Ultimately, this build is one of my favorites for its AoE in the Crucible and Master Nightfalls. You make lots of Orbs, keep cooldowns relatively short, heal, and have a near unlimited uptime on the highest stack of weapon surge as you toss Tangle after Tangle of unraveling destruction.
