Destiny 2 has seen a radical rework of its ability cooldown system since the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. Abilities now have unique cooldowns, Super energy received an overhaul, and many abilities had their cooldowns tweaked.

Related: Destiny 2: A Complete Guide To Armor 2.0

If you haven't played Destiny 2 recently, this can be a shock to come back to. And for veteran players, figuring out exact ability cooldowns can be a pain. This guide covers how ability cooldowns work in Destiny 2, explains what Super tiers and active Super generation methods are, and we cover every single ability cooldown in the game. Use the table of contents above to jump to any section that interests you.

Updated August 23rd, 2022, by Charles Burgar: Arc 3.0 brought new melee abilities, rebalanced a few Arc grenades, and it even gave Hunters a new Super. To help you theorycraft your ultimate Arc built this season, we've updated this guide to include all Arc 3.0 grenade, melee, class ability, and Super cooldowns. We've also updated our ability tier brackets to include these new abilities.

What Are Variable Ability Cooldowns?

Destiny 2's abilities each have a unique cooldown that Bungie refers to as the variable ability cooldown system. In essence, Bungie can tweak the cooldowns of each ability in Destiny 2 without impacting the cooldown of similar abilities, something that was impossible before the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack was released.

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Each grenade, melee ability, class ability, and Super has a unique cooldown. For example, Duskfield Grenades recharge in 1:04 minutes while Glacier Grenades take 2:32 minutes to charge. Both grenades have different cooldowns despite being a part of the same subclass. While abilities have differing cooldowns, most abilities tend to fall under certain cooldown bands that Bungie refers to as tiers.

Ability And Super Tiers Explained

You might have heard some community members or developers refer to some abilities as a "T3" or "T4" ability, but what does that mean? Simply put, tiers refer to a selection of abilities that all share the same base cooldown and active Super regeneration scalars (explained in the next section). The higher the ability tier, the shorter the cooldown.

For example, the shortest base Super cooldown is 6:57. This cooldown is shared between the Warlock's Well of Radiance Super (Solar) and the Titan's Ward of Dawn Super (Void). T5 refers to abilities with the fastest cooldowns in the game, so Well of Radiance and Ward of Dawn are both considered T5 Supers. If Bungie decided to nerf their base cooldowns, they'd move them to T4 or T3, sharing the same base cooldown as any Supers in that tier. This system also impacts how much Super energy you get while in combat, but we'll cover that in the next section; it's very complicated.

This terminology is only used outside of the game in This Week at Bungie posts, patch notes, or community-made videos, so don't worry about base cooldown tiers if you're a newcomer or returning to the game. Just know that not all abilities have the same cooldown rate.

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Passive And Active Super Regeneration

If you're a returning Destiny 2 player, Super energy received an overhaul in the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. Supers have passive and active regeneration sources, regardless of build. Let's break that down:

• Passive Regeneration: A Super's base cooldown rate.
  • Modified by the Intellect stat.
• Active Regeneration: Killing enemies, dealing damage, and taking damage charges your Super faster.
  • Modified by weapon perks, armor mods, and how much damage is being dealt/taken.

Every Super in Destiny 2 will passively charge over a lengthy period. This passive rate can be accelerated by increasing the Intellect stat through certain armor pieces, mods, and subclass Fragments. Active regeneration is much more involved. In essence, the more active you are in combat, the faster you'll get your Super. Killing enemies and actively taking damage will charge your Super much faster, regardless of your Intellect stat or general build.

Active Super Regeneration Explained

All sources of damage from your Guardian will grant a small chunk of Super energy. The amount of energy gained depends on a few factors:

1. The damage inflicted
2. The weapon type used to inflict said damage (Primary, Special, Heavy)
3. The rate at which you damage the target
4. The enemy damaged
5. Your Super's cooldown tier (not your Intellect)

Dealing Damage

The most important factor is your weapon type, both for PvE and PvP. Primary weapons give the most Super energy per damage dealt, with Specials and Heavies granting around half as much. For example, dealing 41,200 damage with an Auto Rifle will give about 4% of your Super, assuming you're using a T5 Super (we'll come back to how tiers affect energy returns in a second). If you used a Special or Heavy weapon and dealt the same amount of damage, you'd get about 2% Super energy instead. Overkill damage does not grant additional Super energy.

Super energy scalars are different in PvP, but the concept is the same. As shown in Castle Content's YouTube video analyzing this topic, dealing 265 Primary damage against an enemy Guardian will grant 2.3% of your Super, the same as killing a Guardian. You'd have to deal 440 damage with a Special weapon to get the same amount as your Primary. In PvP, Specials give about 40% less Super energy than Primaries, Heavy weapons presumably giving even less. This is regardless of your Super's cooldown tier.

With that said, it's important to note that Special and Heavy weapons have far better DPS than Primaries. PvE players can main a Machine Gun or Fusion Rifle and receive the same Super returns per second, potentially more, as if they used a Primary. The conversion rate of damage to Super might be less efficient on Specials and Heavies, yet that's counteracted by their far better DPS values in PvE. For PvP, this scalar highly rewards players for using their Primary in duels, granting far less energy if you slay out with your Special.

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Taking Damage

Fortunately, the correlation between Super energy and damage received is much simpler. The magnitude of damage you receive determines how much Super energy you get. The harder the hit is, the more energy you'll get. Small hits, such as a Thrall's melee attack, give a sliver of Super energy (0.25% or so). Harder-hitting attacks scale to around 0.5% or 1% of your Super.

In the Crucible, you also gain Super energy for taking damage—albeit at a reduced rate. You gain energy equal to 67% of the damage you took from enemy Guardians. For example, if you took 600 damage with a T1 Super, you'd gain Super energy equal to dealing 400 Primary damage yourself (about 2.3%).

With that said, overshields completely disable this mechanic. If you have any overshields active—even a sliver from Whisper of Rime—you won't gain any Super energy from taking damage. Should your overshield break from enemy fire, you'll need to wait for your shields to fully recharge before this mechanic works again. Having your overshield dissipate without taking excess damage will re-enable Super gains from damage received. This behavior is present in all activities, not just PvP.

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Super Cooldown Tiers

If things weren't complicated enough, your Super's cooldown tier also impacts how much energy you receive from dealing and receiving damage. The higher your Super's cooldown tier is, the more energy you'll receive from dealing and taking damage. Bonus energy received from higher tier Supers is also affected by the Special and Heavy energy scalars we talked about earlier, but here's a rough rundown of the bonus energy you can expect from each tier. Values for this table are based on Castle Content's findings.

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Other Ways Of Gaining Super Energy

Dealing and taking damage aren't your only two ways of earning Super energy. There are a few more Super energy sources that are worth mentioning:

• Killing enemies
• Picking up Orbs of Power
• Using certain weapon perks (notably Thresh)

Defeating enemies in Destiny 2—both in PvE and PvP—will grant a chunk of Super energy. PvE values seem to remain consistent from Shadowkeep, although PvP values have been adjusted with the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. The table below showcases rough approximations of how much energy you'll receive from kills and assists.

Beyond kills, you can also earn more Super energy from Orbs of Power, certain weapon perks, and armor mods. Credit to Light.gg for many of the values listed below:

*CwL is short for "Charged with Light."

Amor mods can be stacked twice to increase their energy returns. Stacking the same armor mod three times via Artifice Armor will not grant additional energy.

• Ashes to Assets x2: 12.5% more effective.
• Hands-On x2: ~25% more effective.
• Dynamo x2: 60% more effective.

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All Grenade Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (Tier 3 Discipline)

Grenade Tiers

For mobile users and general readability, we're going to clump most grenade cooldowns into tiers, similar to how Supers work. Some grenades fall outside these cooldowns, which are listed in a separate table. Tiers referenced in the Discipline cooldowns table refer to these grenades.

Discipline Cooldowns

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All Melee Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Strength)

Melee Ability Tiers

To make this article and the Strength cooldowns table easier to read, we're going to clump most melee abilities into tiers. Melee abilities with unique cooldowns are listed in a separate table. The Strength cooldowns table refers to these abilities with each tier column:

Strength Cooldowns

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All Class Ability Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Mobility, Resilience, Recovery)

Class Ability Cooldowns

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All Super Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Intellect)

Intellect Cooldowns

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Next: Destiny 2: The Witch Queen Complete Guide And Walkthrough