Dragon’s Breath is a weapon that had humble beginnings in Destiny 1 before being revamped and now returning this year to Destiny 2 with further sweeping changes. So, here’s why Season 23’s Dragon’s Breath Heavy Exotic will be Amazing for Scorch Builds.
Destiny 1 was neat because rocket launchers didn’t always have only one rocket in the chamber. Sometimes, you would find a rocket launcher that could shoot two rockets at a time. Enter Dragon’s Breath and its chamber that could hold three rockets. But that’s not all because Dragon’s Breath’s munitions would leave behind a solar flare that acts much like Destiny 2’s Solar Grenade.
But that wasn’t good enough for Bungie because, in the 2nd year of Destiny 1, Dragon’s Breath inched closer to its Destiny 2 iteration. At the time, its new perk lets you hold down the trigger to delay the rocket’s detonation, which would then drop a napalm canister that left a large pool of fire, causing damage over time. Meanwhile, Dragon’s Breath new Exotic perk, coming very soon to Destiny 2, has taken that concept from Destiny 1 and ran with it.
The ‘Burn the World’ Exotic Intrinsic gives this revamped Dragon’s Breath a fuel counter that passively loads while you wait to fire it and maxes out at five stacks. The next rocket you fire will then use all the stacks you saved up and inject itself into an enemy you hit, causing Scorch damage. From there, the rocket periodically ejects fuel into pools around the hit enemy that does Scorch damage to anything standing in them. Additionally, the more fuel used, the longer it spreads fuel before the fire-spreading explosion.
Meanwhile, its other Exotic Intrinsic ‘High Octane’ instantly refills the Dragon’s Breath with two fuels when an ignition happens nearby. Furthermore, upon being fully refilled, the imposing rocket launcher reloads itself! Then you have the Exotic Catalyst ‘Pyromancer’ that replenishes Dragon’s Breath’s fuel faster. Even better is that if you kill enemies with this weapon once, you’ll have the catalyst spawn Firesprites on top of everything else.
I think it is easy to see how this magnificent beast would suit nearly anyone’s Solar build on any class and Solar-based Exotic armor. For example, with Dragon’s Breath, Solar Fragments like Ember of Searing that gives Firesprites upon scorched enemy kills would drop like candy. Meanwhile, Ember of Mercy would make these constant Firesprites grant restoration, and Ember of Char would make your ignitions spread even more scorch—forgive me for this—but that’s hot.
There are just so many Solar Fragments I don’t typically use that I would want to use with Dragon’s Breath. Ember of Singeing would recharge your class ability faster with each rocket landed. While Ember of Blistering would return grenade energy when the eventual Solar ignitions clear the screen for you. Meanwhile, Ember of Eruption would spread death and scorch from your ignitions even further, on top of Ember of Wonder generating Orbs of Power from your rocket’s ignition’s final blows.
With so many other ways for a Guardian to enact scorch and ignitions upon Destiny 2’s enemy populace, Dragon’s Breath literally only adds to the majestic fire of your favorite Solar build.
