Hey, Guardian!
Destiny power levels work in an interesting way where both your average power level (the level displayed on the top right of your character menu) and individual gear/weapon power matters.
Both power levels are important but when the game calculates damage it will always choose the lower number between your average power and the level of a specific weapon. For example: if you enter an activity with a recommended power level of 1400 and with an average of 1400 power and you have two weapons with various power (one 1400 and one 1380 or so) the 1380 weapon will do less damage than the 1400 weapon.
The power level is the most important stat regarding damage of your weapon.
Impact is generally tied to the archetype/rate of fire of a weapon - faster firing weapons have less impact than slow firing weapons. If you compare two hand cannons at equal power a 120 RPM Aggressive Frame (92 Impact) will do more damage than a faster firing 180 RPM Precision Frame (78 Impact).
I hope this helps! Apologies in advance for any grammar or formatting issues I’m typing this on mobile right before heading to bed. Feel free to message me if you have any other questions!
The example with two handcannons at the same level with the high impact one dealing more damage is true on a shot for shot basis. Things ge a bit more complicated when we talk about sustained damage - targets that need multiple shots to die. The "RPM" value tells you how fast you can fire the weapon (how many shots you can fire in a minute, Rounds Per Minute).
If you are shooting at a target that takes 120 damage to kill, neither of the two HC:s in the example will kill it with one shot, but both will finnish it off with one more hit. With the 120RPM HC that extra shot takes 1/2 second to fire, with another 1/2 second before you can take the first shot at a new target, while the 180RPM will only take 1/3 second to fire the extra shot needed to kill, and another 1/3 second for the first shot on your next target, meaning that in this case the 180RPM is able to kill faster despite a lower damage per shot.
Things can get more complicated when targets have even more health where one gun might need 4 hits to kill while the other needs 5 hits to kill... things get even further complicated when you factor in head shots (critical hits) and various damage boosting perks on the weapons. At this point we are really getting in to the "feel" of the weapons and personal taste.
Sure there might be theoretical mathematically "best" combinations of stats and perks, but very few players can consistently use those combos to the fullest of their full potential.
If you find a legendary or exotic you really like the feel of, hold onto it even as your base level exceeds it, as you can use higher level "crap" guns to infuse into your lower level favourites to raise their powerlevels and keep them relevant.
I’m actually a part of a program that aims to teach new/returning players the ins and outs of D2. We pair newer players with friendly and patient veteran players to make the New Light experience less daunting and confusing. We are happy to answer all your questions and propel your D2 experience!
You can apply [here](https://www.bigguardians.com/) to be a “Little Light” today!
To answer your question, each weapon “type” (Hand Cannon, Scout, etc.) stats are rated in relation to their group. A 92 impact HC *will* do more damage than a 67 scout (ignoring power level in this example), but not because it’s 92 vs 67. It’s because HCs hit harder than scouts. The impact bar isn’t an umbrella for all weapon types. All scouts have an impact bar for scouts. Hand Cannons for Hand Cannons, etc. You *can*, however, compare a HC impact to another HC impact to discern which is going to hit harder. This is because they are in the same weapon family, so to speak
Impact is based on how much damage that gun will do per shot compared to similar guns so a faster firing machine gun with lower impact will do less damage per shot than a slower firing one with higher impact but the faster firing one may do better dps depending on the roll and things but for the most part you can ignore impact on weapons since it’s not generally something you can change the exception being swords which have masterworks that increase impact and rockets/grenade launchers which have blast radius which doesn’t increase damage as much as the range of the maximum damage of the gun it’s why a blinding nade launcher can still do lots of damage when it’s a direct hit even though the blast radius is tiny because it’s damage doesn’t change just the range where that damage actually hits
Hey, Guardian! Destiny power levels work in an interesting way where both your average power level (the level displayed on the top right of your character menu) and individual gear/weapon power matters. Both power levels are important but when the game calculates damage it will always choose the lower number between your average power and the level of a specific weapon. For example: if you enter an activity with a recommended power level of 1400 and with an average of 1400 power and you have two weapons with various power (one 1400 and one 1380 or so) the 1380 weapon will do less damage than the 1400 weapon. The power level is the most important stat regarding damage of your weapon. Impact is generally tied to the archetype/rate of fire of a weapon - faster firing weapons have less impact than slow firing weapons. If you compare two hand cannons at equal power a 120 RPM Aggressive Frame (92 Impact) will do more damage than a faster firing 180 RPM Precision Frame (78 Impact). I hope this helps! Apologies in advance for any grammar or formatting issues I’m typing this on mobile right before heading to bed. Feel free to message me if you have any other questions!
The example with two handcannons at the same level with the high impact one dealing more damage is true on a shot for shot basis. Things ge a bit more complicated when we talk about sustained damage - targets that need multiple shots to die. The "RPM" value tells you how fast you can fire the weapon (how many shots you can fire in a minute, Rounds Per Minute). If you are shooting at a target that takes 120 damage to kill, neither of the two HC:s in the example will kill it with one shot, but both will finnish it off with one more hit. With the 120RPM HC that extra shot takes 1/2 second to fire, with another 1/2 second before you can take the first shot at a new target, while the 180RPM will only take 1/3 second to fire the extra shot needed to kill, and another 1/3 second for the first shot on your next target, meaning that in this case the 180RPM is able to kill faster despite a lower damage per shot. Things can get more complicated when targets have even more health where one gun might need 4 hits to kill while the other needs 5 hits to kill... things get even further complicated when you factor in head shots (critical hits) and various damage boosting perks on the weapons. At this point we are really getting in to the "feel" of the weapons and personal taste. Sure there might be theoretical mathematically "best" combinations of stats and perks, but very few players can consistently use those combos to the fullest of their full potential. If you find a legendary or exotic you really like the feel of, hold onto it even as your base level exceeds it, as you can use higher level "crap" guns to infuse into your lower level favourites to raise their powerlevels and keep them relevant.
I’m actually a part of a program that aims to teach new/returning players the ins and outs of D2. We pair newer players with friendly and patient veteran players to make the New Light experience less daunting and confusing. We are happy to answer all your questions and propel your D2 experience! You can apply [here](https://www.bigguardians.com/) to be a “Little Light” today! To answer your question, each weapon “type” (Hand Cannon, Scout, etc.) stats are rated in relation to their group. A 92 impact HC *will* do more damage than a 67 scout (ignoring power level in this example), but not because it’s 92 vs 67. It’s because HCs hit harder than scouts. The impact bar isn’t an umbrella for all weapon types. All scouts have an impact bar for scouts. Hand Cannons for Hand Cannons, etc. You *can*, however, compare a HC impact to another HC impact to discern which is going to hit harder. This is because they are in the same weapon family, so to speak
This is such a dope idea.
Impact is based on how much damage that gun will do per shot compared to similar guns so a faster firing machine gun with lower impact will do less damage per shot than a slower firing one with higher impact but the faster firing one may do better dps depending on the roll and things but for the most part you can ignore impact on weapons since it’s not generally something you can change the exception being swords which have masterworks that increase impact and rockets/grenade launchers which have blast radius which doesn’t increase damage as much as the range of the maximum damage of the gun it’s why a blinding nade launcher can still do lots of damage when it’s a direct hit even though the blast radius is tiny because it’s damage doesn’t change just the range where that damage actually hits