5 new perk ideas for forgotten Destiny 2 Catalysts that could make their Exotics top tier

At the present time, there are a significant amount of Exotics in Destiny 2 that have yet to receive an Exotic Catalyst. Exotics Catalysts can not only give significant stat bonuses to the weapon but can also drastically change how the perks function. This can boost an Exotic weapon’s overall power from mid-tier to top-tier so it’s a shame that so many Exotics are left in a state that doesn’t reach their overall potential.

In a recent article, gaming journalist Paul Tassi talked about the 27 Exotic Catalysts that still need to be released in Destiny 2 and ordered these Catalysts most important to least important, with some level of variability.

I tend to agree with most of Tassi’s list, so I thought it would be a fun idea to go through the top of the list and discuss what would be some nice buffs to the Exotics that these unreleased Catalysts could bring. However, the biggest buff these Catalysts will bring is the simple fact that these weapons will be able to be masterworked and generate orbs on multi-kills. In a meta where Supers and Charged with Light mods are so powerful, it is a huge handicap to not use a masterworked weapon, which is why a lot of these weapons aren’t used a ton in high difficulty content.

Thorn

A fine line must be tread with Thorn as it is already a fairly powerful weapon in bost PvE and PvP. Any kind of stat boosts will likely cause it to become way too oppressive in PvP while something like increasing the extra damage from Soul Devourer could make it too powerful in PvE.

At the moment, collecting a Remnant returns four rounds to the magazine and gives five seconds to the Soul Devourer timer. The Catalyst could be as simple as adding a few more extra rounds to the magazine or having the Soul Devourer timer max out at 15 seconds instead of 10.

Another option is giving a small boost to Thorn’s damage when collecting multiple Remnants within a short window. With Soul Devourer at its base level being as strong as it is, this could be a bit busted.

Le Monarque

Le Monarque is another one that needs to be taken carefully. This weapon sees some fringe use in PvP and with damage over time effects being extremely frustrating to play against if they are overturned this is a tough one to buff. While increasing the time the poison lasts would most likely be fine for PvE, it would be extremely oppressive in PvP.

Thinking outside the box, maybe something like rapid precision hits (4-5 in a row) increasing the damage of the poison effect, or maybe rapid kills with the poison increasing the damage of the arrows themselves. These effects would be less likely to activate in PvP and wouldn’t break PvE.

As a safer bet, something as simple as a slight boost to the range of the poison spread could be worthwhile.

Bastion

In Season 14, Bastion is receiving a buff that will allow it to inherently stagger Unstoppable Champions which is an almost Catalyst worthy buff. Bastion does receive a decent amount of playtime in PvP on console so buffing any stats like Range, Stability, or Charge Time with the Catalyst will make it too strong.

The small magazine size of Bastion and its low Handling could be boosted a decent amount without breaking the weapon but something that could be interesting is the Catalyst granting the perk ‘Disruption Break’. This perk increases Kinetic damage when breaking a shield with the weapon but since Bastion is Kinetic there is no need to swap to another weapon.

Disruption Break gives a 50% damage boost which would be a bit ludicrous on Bastion since you don’t actually have to swap weapons. Bastion could receive its own version of the perk with its own name that reads something like: “Breaking a shield with this weapon increases its damage for a short time”, with the damage buff only being around 20-30% instead of 50%.

Since Bastion is an Exotic and next Season is having its chip damage taken away and replaced with the ability to stagger Unstoppable Champions (which is useless in non-endgame content), I don’t feel like this is too overpowered.

Wish-Ender

Wishender is honestly a tough egg to crack when it comes to making a Catalyst that interacts with its current perks. As it stands, Wish-Ender highlights enemies behind walls only when the bow is fully drawn but I wonder if making it so that the highlighting begins once the drawing of the bow begins. This will give almost an extra second to adjust aim to try to catch enemies as soon as they round the corner.

The problem with this is that it doesn't address the reason as to why Bows are rarely used in Crucible but not every Catalyst needs to be some huge buff. Maybe this change along with some extra Handling to make Wish-Ender not feel so sluggish, plus the obvious orb generation, will be enough to make it usable.

Wish-Ender’s ‘Broadhead’ perk causes its arrows to damage the target on both the entry and exit of the arrow, plus the arrows are able to penetrate multiple targets. Maybe it's possible for some kind of stacking damage buff as multiple targets are killed with a single arrow to work?

Devil’s Ruin

Sidearms in the right hands, like TrueVanguard’s, can be absolute monsters in PvP so like the other weapons on this list there aren't many stats that can be buffed with the Catalyst without making them too overpowered, except maybe Reload Speed. This increase in Reload Speed could work quite well for the extra perk I have in mind for the Catalyst.

This perk would increase the damage of the laser when chaining rapid kills with the semi-auto mode. Since the Pyrogenesis perk refreshes the magazine from reserves when using the laser, the idea behind the perk would be to chain kills down to 1 round left in the magazine and to then use the laser for big damage.

What are some Catalysts you are looking forward to being released? Have any ideas about some good changes to the weapons these Catalysts might bring? Leave a comment below or as a reply on Twitter with your thoughts on the above ideas, or to give your own ideas for Catalyst perks.