Thermal Erosion god roll & best perks

Thermal Erosion — Destiny 2 Machine Gun
Legendary · Machine Gun
Where it drops: Random Perks: This item cannot be reacquired from Collections.

“"Europa has relit the fire in my soul; one that even its freezing winds cannot chill." —Clovis Bray”

Full perk pool, stats & source for Thermal Erosion →

Built from 880 curated wishlist rolls for this Machine Gun. Perks marked essential appear in every roll of a recommendation; alternatives are the other perks curators call worth keeping.

Recommended rolls

Community wishlist roll

448 wishlist rolls

Constructed by @Adamsdown_Boy (PvE PvE-Minor PvE-SingleAdd PvE-God M+KB Controller): First-choice PvE roll for clearing individual Minor adds or tougher enemies in activities rated Normal difficulty. Thermal Erosion is a rapid fire LMG, which are rated C-Tier for endgame PvE by @TheAegisRelic Endgame Analysis Spreadsheet​, who says "good damage profile but mediocre total damage and worst recoil of any LMG frame". The frame intrinsic offers built in Anti-Overload, better total ammo reserves and a ×0.8 reload animation scalar when the magazine is empty as per the Destiny Data Compendium. The recoil direction is right and loose so you should improve recoil control or look to boost Stability wit your barrel perk to help hit crits, or Handling if you can land your shots. In the magazine perk slot, any of the combat effect mags, or perks that improve Reload Speed or mag size are fine. For tackling tougher adds, in the first trait perk column Triple Tap generates one ammo from thin air for hitting three crits within 3s of each other, effectively adding ~50% to your total ammo if you can keep hitting crits. There's also Rewind Rounds refills 70% of hits landed from reserves when the magazine empties, or Demolitionist provides an instant magazine refill on grenade use and chunk grenade ability energy on kills. Finally, Light Touch boosts Handling and Reload Speed, and provides an ADS scalar while you're Amplified or Radiant or Devour is active. For damage, One For All boosts damage by ×1.35 for a non-refreshable 11s after hitting three separate targets within 3s of each, or Meganeura builds up to ×3 stacks on crit hits for a refreshable 4s for Solar AoE explosive damage in a 7.5m radius on a crit kill - the explosion is treated as weapon damage so inherits damage boosts and also procs subclass fragments. Aegis ranks the Winterized Gear origin trait as F-Tier - it provides ×3 stacks after 12s out of combat - so if you're playing you'll probably never proc it - each stack decays after 5s in combat providing a gradually reducing boost to Stability, Handling and Reload Speed. If you're interested, thermal erosion is the melting and weakening of ice-rich permafrost caused by moving water or temperature changes, and connects to the planetary environment of Europa, the elemental nature of the weapon, and the broader narrative themes of the Beyond Light expansion. Recommended MW: Handling, with your preferred choice of mod to boost weapon stats, ammo generation, or elemental pickups for builds.|tags:PvE PvE-Minor PvE-SingleAdd PvE-God M+KB Controller

Strong alternatives

Arrowhead Brake High-Caliber Rounds Triple Tap One for All Meganeura Rewind Rounds Demolitionist Light Touch Armor-Piercing Rounds Ricochet Rounds Appended Mag Alloy Magazine Flared Magwell Light Mag Chambered Compensator Extended Barrel Fluted Barrel Corkscrew Rifling Polygonal Rifling Smallbore Hammer-Forged Rifling

Community wishlist roll

160 wishlist rolls

Constructed by @Adamsdown_Boy (PvE PvE-Boss PvE-SustainedDamage PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller): First-choice PvE roll for sustained DPS against a single yellow-bar target activities rated Normal difficulty, particularly with Solar Warlock builds. Thermal Erosion is a rapid fire LMG, which are rated C-Tier for endgame PvE by @TheAegisRelic Endgame Analysis Spreadsheet​, who says "good damage profile but mediocre total damage and worst recoil of any LMG frame". The frame intrinsic offers built in Anti-Overload, better total ammo reserves and a ×0.8 reload animation scalar when the magazine is empty as per the Destiny Data Compendium. The recoil direction is right and loose so you should improve recoil control or look to boost Stability wit your barrel perk to help hit crits, or Handling if you can land your shots. In the magazine perk slot, any of the combat effect mags, or perks that improve Reload Speed or mag size are fine. For sustained boss damage, in the first trait perk column Triple Tap generates one ammo from thin air for hitting three crits within 3s of each other, effectively adding ~50% to your total ammo if you can keep hitting crits. There's also Rewind Rounds refills 70% of hits landed from reserves when the magazine empties, or Demolitionist provides an instant magazine refill on grenade use and chunk grenade ability energy on kills. Finally, Light Touch boosts Handling and Reload Speed, and provides an ADS scalar while you're Amplified or Radiant or Devour is active. In the second column for damage, Burning Ambition works better to build Solar ignitions on tougher targets if you have a solar ability like a Eunoia Helion to apply scorch initially, otherwise it'll take 27 hits within 2s of each other to apply +20 scorch stacks with +20 added on each additional hit to build towards an ignition. All of the scorch stacks are increased by ×1.5 with Ember of Ashes, and Dawn Chorus provides ×3 Scorch damage. Aegis ranks the Winterized Gear origin trait as F-Tier - it provides ×3 stacks after 12s out of combat - so if you're playing you'll probably never proc it - each stack decays after 5s in combat providing a gradually reducing boost to Stability, Handling and Reload Speed. If you're interested, thermal erosion is the melting and weakening of ice-rich permafrost caused by moving water or temperature changes, and connects to the planetary environment of Europa, the elemental nature of the weapon, and the broader narrative themes of the Beyond Light expansion. Recommended MW: Handling, with your preferred choice of mod to boost weapon stats, ammo generation, or elemental pickups for builds.|tags:PvE PvE-Boss PvE-SustainedDamage PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller

Essential perks

Burning Ambition

Strong alternatives

Arrowhead Brake Extended Mag Triple Tap Rewind Rounds Demolitionist Light Touch Appended Mag Alloy Magazine Flared Magwell Light Mag Chambered Compensator Extended Barrel Fluted Barrel Corkscrew Rifling Polygonal Rifling Smallbore Hammer-Forged Rifling

Community wishlist roll

160 wishlist rolls

Constructed by @Adamsdown_Boy (PvE PvE-Boss PvE-SustainedDamage PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller): First-choice PvE roll for sustained DPS against a single yellow-bar target activities rated Normal difficulty, particularly with Solar Warlock builds. Thermal Erosion is a rapid fire LMG, which are rated C-Tier for endgame PvE by @TheAegisRelic Endgame Analysis Spreadsheet​, who says "good damage profile but mediocre total damage and worst recoil of any LMG frame". The frame intrinsic offers built in Anti-Overload, better total ammo reserves and a ×0.8 reload animation scalar when the magazine is empty as per the Destiny Data Compendium. The recoil direction is right and loose so you should improve recoil control or look to boost Stability wit your barrel perk to help hit crits, or Handling if you can land your shots. In the magazine perk slot, any of the combat effect mags, or perks that improve Reload Speed or mag size are fine. For sustained boss damage, in the first trait perk column Triple Tap generates one ammo from thin air for hitting three crits within 3s of each other, effectively adding ~50% to your total ammo if you can keep hitting crits. There's also Rewind Rounds refills 70% of hits landed from reserves when the magazine empties, or Demolitionist provides an instant magazine refill on grenade use and chunk grenade ability energy on kills. Finally, Light Touch boosts Handling and Reload Speed, and provides an ADS scalar while you're Amplified or Radiant or Devour is active. In the second column for damage, Bait and Switch boosts damage by ×1.3 for 11s for doing damage with your other two weapons. Aegis ranks the Winterized Gear origin trait as F-Tier - it provides ×3 stacks after 12s out of combat - so if you're playing you'll probably never proc it - each stack decays after 5s in combat providing a gradually reducing boost to Stability, Handling and Reload Speed. If you're interested, thermal erosion is the melting and weakening of ice-rich permafrost caused by moving water or temperature changes, and connects to the planetary environment of Europa, the elemental nature of the weapon, and the broader narrative themes of the Beyond Light expansion. Recommended MW: Handling, with your preferred choice of mod to boost weapon stats, ammo generation, or elemental pickups for builds.|tags:PvE PvE-Boss PvE-SustainedDamage PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller

Essential perks

Bait and Switch

Strong alternatives

Arrowhead Brake Extended Mag Triple Tap Rewind Rounds Demolitionist Light Touch Appended Mag Alloy Magazine Flared Magwell Light Mag Chambered Compensator Extended Barrel Fluted Barrel Corkscrew Rifling Polygonal Rifling Smallbore Hammer-Forged Rifling

Community wishlist roll

56 wishlist rolls

Constructed by @Adamsdown_Boy (PvE PvE-Utility PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller): First-choice PvE utility roll for solar Warlocks running Eunoia or Dawn Chorus in activities rated Normal, Hard or Very Hard difficulty. Thermal Erosion is a rapid fire LMG, which are rated C-Tier for endgame PvE by @TheAegisRelic Endgame Analysis Spreadsheet​, who says "good damage profile but mediocre total damage and worst recoil of any LMG frame". The frame intrinsic offers built in Anti-Overload, better total ammo reserves and a ×0.8 reload animation scalar when the magazine is empty as per the Destiny Data Compendium. The recoil direction is right and loose so you should improve recoil control or look to boost Stability wit your barrel perk to help hit crits, or Handling if you can land your shots. In the magazine perk slot, any of the combat effect mags, or perks that improve Reload Speed or mag size are fine. For weapon-based application and progression of scorch into ignitions, you can roll both solar damage perk traits - Incandescent spreads +30 Solar Scorch stacks within 4m on a red bar Minor add kill (+45 stacks within 8m for orange and yellow bars), with scorch damage counting as weapon damage so can inherit damage boosts, and also proc subclass fragments, while Burning Ambition works better to build Solar ignitions on tougher targets if you have a solar ability like a Eunoia Helion to apply scorch initially, otherwise it'll take 27 hits within 2s of each other to apply +20 scorch stacks with +20 added on each additional hit to build towards an ignition. All of the scorch stacks are increased by ×1.5 with Ember of Ashes, and Dawn Chorus provides ×3 Scorch damage. Aegis ranks the Winterized Gear origin trait as F-Tier - it provides ×3 stacks after 12s out of combat - so if you're playing you'll probably never proc it - each stack decays after 5s in combat providing a gradually reducing boost to Stability, Handling and Reload Speed. If you're interested, thermal erosion is the melting and weakening of ice-rich permafrost caused by moving water or temperature changes, and connects to the planetary environment of Europa, the elemental nature of the weapon, and the broader narrative themes of the Beyond Light expansion. Recommended MW: Handling, with your preferred choice of mod to boost weapon stats, ammo generation, or elemental pickups for builds.|tags:PvE PvE-Utility PvE-EndGame PvE-God M+KB Controller

Essential perks

Burning Ambition Incandescent

Strong alternatives

Arrowhead Brake High-Caliber Rounds Armor-Piercing Rounds Ricochet Rounds Appended Mag Alloy Magazine Flared Magwell Light Mag Chambered Compensator Extended Barrel Fluted Barrel Corkscrew Rifling Polygonal Rifling Smallbore Hammer-Forged Rifling

Community wishlist roll

56 wishlist rolls

Constructed by @Adamsdown_Boy (PvE PvE-Minor PvE-SingleAdd PvE-God M+KB Controller): First-choice PvE roll for clearing individual Minor adds or tougher enemies in activities rated Normal difficulty, particularly with grenade builds. Thermal Erosion is a rapid fire LMG, which are rated C-Tier for endgame PvE by @TheAegisRelic Endgame Analysis Spreadsheet​, who says "good damage profile but mediocre total damage and worst recoil of any LMG frame". The frame intrinsic offers built in Anti-Overload, better total ammo reserves and a ×0.8 reload animation scalar when the magazine is empty as per the Destiny Data Compendium. The recoil direction is right and loose so you should improve recoil control or look to boost Stability wit your barrel perk to help hit crits, or Handling if you can land your shots. In the magazine perk slot, any of the combat effect mags, or perks that improve Reload Speed or mag size are fine. For tackling tougher adds, in the first trait perk column Demolitionist generates chunk grenade ability energy on kills and an instant magazine refill on grenade use. You can use your grenades to help proc Desperate Measures which provides up to ×3 stacks for max ×1.3 damage for a refreshable 7.5s for a weapon and then two ability kills. Aegis ranks the Winterized Gear origin trait as F-Tier - it provides ×3 stacks after 12s out of combat - so if you're playing you'll probably never proc it - each stack decays after 5s in combat providing a gradually reducing boost to Stability, Handling and Reload Speed. If you're interested, thermal erosion is the melting and weakening of ice-rich permafrost caused by moving water or temperature changes, and connects to the planetary environment of Europa, the elemental nature of the weapon, and the broader narrative themes of the Beyond Light expansion. Recommended MW: Handling, with your preferred choice of mod to boost weapon stats, ammo generation, or elemental pickups for builds.|tags:PvE PvE-Minor PvE-SingleAdd PvE-God M+KB Controller

Essential perks

Desperate Measures Demolitionist

Strong alternatives

Arrowhead Brake High-Caliber Rounds Armor-Piercing Rounds Ricochet Rounds Appended Mag Alloy Magazine Flared Magwell Light Mag Chambered Compensator Extended Barrel Fluted Barrel Corkscrew Rifling Polygonal Rifling Smallbore Hammer-Forged Rifling

What these Thermal Erosion perks do

High-Caliber Rounds

Hits inflict increased Flinch on Enemies. PVE: Tier 1-2 Minors can be repeatedly staggered. Higher Tier Combatants stagger quicker. PVP: Flinch against Players varies based on damage and Weapon Archetype. Flinch increase ranges between 5-10%.

Burning Ambition

Direct Hits against Scorched Enemies apply additional Scorch on a 0.5 second cooldown: • Primary Weapons apply 10 [4] additional Scorch per Direct Hit (15 [9?] with Ember of Ashes) • Special and Power Weapons apply 20 additional Scorch (30 with Ember of Ashes) Scoring multiple Direct Hits within 3? seconds of each causes the next Direct Hit to Scorch the target. Hit counter persists through stow. Number of Direct Hits required by weapon type: • Bows: 2 • Swords: 3 • Other Weapons: 55% of the base magazine size Scorch applied by Burning Ambition to Unscorched targets counts as Weapon Damage. Ember of Ashes increases the amount of Scorch applied by 50%.

Incandescent

Weapon Kills trigger a Solar explosion that applies 30 Scorch Stacks (40 with Ember of Ashes) and deals up to 30 damage to enemies within 4 meters of the target. Killing Elite or higher tier Combatants and Players increases the radius to 8 meters and applies 10 more Scorch Stacks. Scorch damage can be increased through Weapon Damage Buffs.

Armor-Piercing Rounds

Grants 5% increased damage against Elemental and Barrier Champion Shields. Allows bullets to overpenetrate enemies once.

Alloy Magazine

Linearly grants a Reload Duration Multiplier as your magazine drops from 50% capacity to empty. Reload Duration Multiplier scales from 0.9x at 50% capacity to 0.8x with an empty magazine.

Desperate Measures

Weapon Kills grant 'Desperate Measures x1' (DMx1), increasing damage by 10% for 7 seconds. Grenade or Melee Kills grant 20% increased damage for 7 seconds (DMx2). Scoring another Grenade or Melee Kill with DMx2 active increases this to 30% (DMx3). Can be activated while stowed. Weapon, Grenade, and Melee Kills refresh the buff duration.

Demolitionist

Weapon Kills grant 10% Grenade Ability Energy. Kills with Sniper Rifles, Shotguns, Glaives, and Fusion Rifles grant 20%. Using your Grenade Ability refills the Magazine with a 3 second cooldown. Ability energy gained may be significantly decreased based on your selected ability's Chunk Energy Scalar. Learn more about this mechanic in our explainer blog post on the Clarity website.

Triple Tap

Scoring 3 Precision Hits within 2 seconds of each refills 1 Ammo into the Magazine from thin air. Cannot load the Magazine beyond its base capacity. Precision Hit counter persists through stow.

One for All

Scoring Weapon Hits against 3 Separate Enemies within 3 seconds of each grants 35% increased damage for 10 seconds. Does not require Direct Hits. Buff duration cannot be refreshed.

Meganeura

Precision Hits grant one stack of Meganeura for 3.5 seconds. Maximum of 3 stacks. Precision Kills cause targets to explode, dealing 123.89 [95.3] | 173.6 [?] | 207.57 [?] weapon-matching elemental damage in a 7.5-meter radius at 1|2|3| stacks. Explosion has up to 50% damage falloff at the furthest point.

Rewind Rounds

Upon emptying the Magazine: Refills 60% of the number of Hits landed (rounded up) into the Magazine from reserves. Hits are counted from either your last reload or the last time the perk was triggered. Does not require Direct Hits. Requires firing 28.75% of the Magazine Capacity for the refill to activate. Cannot load the Magazine beyond its base capacity. Hits after triggering a refill do not count while the Rewind Rounds buff is active (1? second). Adaptive Burst Linear Fusion Rifle behavior: • Each individual bolt in the burst counts as a Hit • Refill amount is uniquely 14% of the number of Hits rounded up (numbers are subject to change once we get more data points)

Light Touch

While Amplified, Radiant, or Devour is active: • ? Handling • ? Reload Speed • ?% decreased Reload Animation Duration • ?% decreased ADS Animation Duration

Bait and Switch

Dealing damage with a weapon starts a 7 second timer. Dealing additional weapon damage resets the timer to 7 seconds. Dealing damage with all 3 of your weapons without letting the timer run out grants you 'Bait and Switch' for 10 seconds, granting 30% increased damage. Timer is disabled while Bait and Switch is active, requiring a full activation sequence once the buff expires.

Recommendations aggregated from curated community wishlists; credit to the curators linked above.

Thermal Erosion in Destiny 2

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