As of April 16, the beloved grenade launcher The Mountaintop has returned to Destiny 2 as part of Into the Light's BRAVE Arsenal of weapons. While it's part of the wider Into the Light loot pool and can be earned by spending Trophies of Bravery at Lord Shaxx's cache in the Hall of Champions and in chests as part of the Onslaught activity, the vendor Arcite 99-40 also has a quest called Climbing The Mountaintop that can earn you a Limited Edition Variant that comes masterworked — and the opportunity to attune to the weapon so that it drops more often.
The quest requires that you use Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers, which might be confusing since Destiny 2 also has Grenade Launchers in the heavy weapon slot. So what counts as a Breech-Loaded Grenade Launcher, and what's the best way to complete Climbing The Mountaintop?
Climbing The Mountaintop Quest
In the Hall of Champions, the robot Arcite 99-40 offers quests related to each of the BRAVE Arsenal weapons. Climbing The Mountaintop was released on April 16. Like all of these quests, you have the option of completing it in two different ways:
- Rapidly defeat combatants using Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers anywhere in the system. Bonus progress for rapid final blows in Onslaught.
- Defeat Guardians using Grenade Launchers.
Despite the language for the second option, it does appear that you need to use Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers to defeat Guardians and not heavy Grenade Launchers. Crucible PvP is the best place to do that, but technically, you can also do it in Gambit during invasions. If you can reliably get kills in the Crucible and conserve your special ammo, that seems like the fastest route. But since you're likely playing a lot of Onslaught anyway, that's also a valid option.
Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers Basics
A great place to start when distinguishing Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers from regular Grenade Launchers is the weapon slot. If it's in your primary or special weapon slot, it's Breech-Loaded and takes special ammo. If it's in your heavy weapon slot, then it's just a Grenade Launcher. All of the Breech-Loaded options are always either Lightweight Frame or Wave Frame.
If you're unsure what you might have in your Vault and aren't aware, Destiny Item Manager (DIM) is an excellent resource that allows you to view and interact with all of your Destiny 2 inventory. Fire it up, log in using your Bungie account, and you can search for "Grenade Launcher." Anything that appears in the primary or special weapon slot will count.
How to Get a Breech-Loaded Grenade Launcher
If you for some reason don't have any Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers handy at all, then you have a few options. In the purple Legendary Legacy Gear section of the Exotic Archive kiosk, you can claim a Salvager's Salvo for 75,000 Glimmer, 2 Enhancement Prisms, and 1 Ascendant Shard. It's a solid choice but also quite expensive.
Commander Zavala has Empty Vessel in Focused Decoding for 3 Vanguard Engrams and 5,000 Glimmer. He also has the Nightfall weapon Wild Style for 5 Vanguard Engrams and 25,000 Glimmer. If you want to get one of these and need the engrams, you'll have to grind some Strikes and/or Nightfalls.
If you're sitting on some Defiant Engrams from Season of Defiance, you can get Prodigal Return at the War Table in the HELM for 4 Defiant Engrams and 3,000 Glimmer.
Also, be sure to check out Banshee-44 at the Tower and/or Xur. Banshee's stock rotates daily and Xur has new weapons each week, so depending on when you're looking for one, they may have one available.
Best Breech-Loaded Grenade Launchers to Use
There are several great options to consider here. There are four Exotics that count here:
- Witherhoard
- Dead Messenger
- Ex Diris
- Fighting Lion
Witherhoard is the only Exotic that's viable, but it's excellent in both Onslaught and Crucible, applying Blight that damages affected enemies over time like a poison, making it downright overpowered wherever you're fighting.
and Salvager's Salvo is perhaps the best non-Exotic option. The Chain Reaction perk causes elemental explosions with each kill, which can go a long way to getting rapid eliminations. And Ambitious Assassin complements that nicely, overflowing the magazine based on rapid kills.
Prodigal Return from Season of Defiance is another great choice here (we mentioned how to get it above), but much like Harsh Language, it's build-focused. Yet it's craftable, so if you've gotten to that point, it can be your best option that's not Salvager's Salvo. Voltshot on an Arc build is the roll to go for
Banshee-44 occasionally sells Harsh Language, but you might get one to drop as a random rank-up with the Gunsmith. It's highly regarded as another S-Tier option, but only if you can get a good roll. Even at that, the best rolls rely on Void subclass synergy to really pop off.
If you've spent a lot of time playing Xur's Dares of Eternity, you probably have at least one Pardon Our Dust, a very common drop that was eventually made craftable.
