Destiny 2 Hawkmoon: How to get the exotic hand cannon

Stuck trying to find the Destiny 2 Hawkmoon feather locations? Long-time players will recognise this exotic hand cannon from Destiny 1, and it has returned to the game as part of the Beyond Light expansion. If you want to get your hands on this gun to see how it measures up to the original, you'll need to go through a few steps first—starting with the Destiny 2 As the Crow Flies quest. 

If you're up for more of a challenge however and want to unlock an additional perk on the Hawkmoon exotic, as well as its Exotic Catalyst, you'll need to complete the Bird of Prey and Harbinger quest steps. These only become available after you've unlocked the Hawkmoon, and the mission is lengthy and tough. The enemies you'll be dealing with are sitting at around 1270-1280 power and have several negative modifiers. If you're still keen, check out this Destiny 2 Harbinger quest guide for more details.

So, read on to discover how to unlock the Hawkmoon exotic, starting with the As The Crow Flies quest and the Destiny 2 Hawkmoon feather locations.

As the Crow Flies Destiny 2: Hawkmoon quest guide

To begin, simply head to the Tangled Shore and have a chat with the Spider. From there you'll need to track down five glowing yellow 'paracausal' feathers. The locations are listed below.

Destiny 2 feather locations

Feather 1: Outside Spider's lair

The first feather is super easy to find. Make your way out of the Spider's lair and it's sat on top of a box near the exit. (Just past the barriers you have to jump when you're heading inside normally.) Grab it and head back to talk to the big man. 

Feather 2: Hallowed Grove Lost Sector

Next it's time for a trip to the EDZ. You're looking for the Hallowed Grove lost sector, which can be found by heading straight forwards from The Sludge spawn point. The feather is in the building that overlooks the entrance to the Lost Sector. Climb up and it's yours.

Feather 3: Near Shaw Han

Another easy one. Head for the Cosmodrome and The Steppes spawn point (which is the one with Shaw Han, the unlovable new vendor with the Fortnite-looking face). The feather can be found on top of the crumbled pillar immediately in front of you and slightly to the right.

Feather 4: The Dreaming City

Our next destination is the Dreaming City. Make your way to the entrance of the Blind Well. You don't need to go very far inside. The feather is located on a ledge to the left, just past where the Taken and Scorn tend to fight outside. Avoid them, swipe the feather, and book it out of there.

Feather 5: Moon catacombs

This is the only one that's somewhat annoying to find because it's in the catacombs on the Moon. The area you're looking for is the Shrine of Oryx, which is the same room used for the Fanatic Nightmare Hunt boss fight. Land at the spawn point where Eris Morn hangs out, swing a left toward Archer's Line, and then use this video to get to the Shrine. Once there, the feather is tucked away to the side of the little central vestibule. 

Complete the Destiny 2 Cry from Beyond mission

Having returned to the Crow, you'll now embark on a little mission in the EDZ, at the end of which you'll retrieve part of the re-made weapon, which [spoiler] has been hewn from the same material as The Traveler. The mission takes place in the spooky forest from the OG Destiny 2 campaign, and so unsurprisingly involves wasting a bunch of Taken. There is a small jumping element, but it's nothing too taxing. Don't worry about bringing friends to help, as the whole thing really is simple enough. 

With that done, it's grind time as you have to chalk off some activity-based objectives. Starting with: 

Generate 50 orbs

You can do this however you wish, but I would recommend running three masterworked weapons and a subclass which has a super designed to clear lots of enemies. Simply head toward your favourite lost sector (I recommend The Orrery on Nessus) and go ham. I slapped on the Trinity Ghoul bow, with exotic catalyst, and it only took two runs.

Once you're done, it'll be time for another trip to Crow who'll rap with you about his dreams again. Time for another trip to the EDZ. This time: Trostland.

Commune with the Traveler

Look, I don't want to call it a date, but once we hit the EDZ The Crow takes us on a magical mystery tour of the dilapidated dam he's been calling home since his resurrection. Along the way you'll need to collect another five feathers, but they're incredibly easy to spot—in fact they're actually marked on your HUD in the same manner that planetary resources are.

There are also some more Taken to fend off, but again no great drama. The final feather is found by the boss, who has a shield which needs to be brought down using orbs dropped by defeated trash mobs. Just pick up the orbs and throw them at the boss. We're almost done now, so head back to the Crow for debriefing. 

Defeat Champions or Guardians in Crucible/Gambit 

It's dealer's choice for how you want to grind the final step out. You can either go into Gambit or Crucible and kill other players or kill Champions in PvE. According to the mathletes on Reddit, Crucible is 0.5% per kill, whereas Gambit will grant 2.5% (because kills are less frequent). If you prefer the Champion route, each one counts for 3%, so you can just go into legendary lost sectors and farm them if you prefer. Or run Nightfalls and Empire Hunts.

Complete the Destiny 2 The Crow and The Hawk mission

Time for one final trip to the EDZ. Once again we begin by The Sludge spawn point, with the mission starting around the Hallowed Grove lost sector. Be warned you'll need to do some more challenging jumping this time, whilst tracking down more of those pesky feathers. Knock it out, kill a bunch of Taken at the end, and Hawkmoon is finally yours to keep.

Destiny 2 Hawkmoon: What is it?

Hawkmoon is a kinetic 140RPM exotic hand cannon, which is returning from Destiny 1. As with all exotics brought back from the original game, Bungie has given it a substantial rework. It's signature perk is now called Paracausal Shot, and reads: "Final blows and precision hits with Hawkmoon grant stacks of Paracausal Charge. The final round in the magazine deals bonus damage based on the number of stacks. Stowing Hawkmoon on the final round removes this bonus." 

So essentially you build up towards one mega-bullet and then let rip. Interestingly, Hawkmoon is also the first ever Destiny 2 exotic which has some amount of randomness to its perks. The final perk and grip will both change randomly (according to a specific pool of possibilities) on subsequent times the gun drops for you. You can see the full spread of perks over at light.gg.

For the curious, back in Destiny 1, Hawkmoon was all about randomness. It excelled in PvP thanks to two perks: Luck in the Chamber and Holding Aces. These added a total of three special bullets (one from Luck in the Chamber and two from Holding Aces) to the magazine that could do substantially more damage.

This transformed what was typically a four-shot hand cannon into a two-shot hand cannon in PvP, giving Hawkmoon users a razor sharp edge over their opponents—provided luck was on their side. As promised, Bungie has retained an element of randomness with the weapon, but no longer applies RNG to the bullets, which some players had complained about, as was very much their wont.

Let us know in the comments what you make of the reworked version once you've got it.

Can everyone get Hawkmoon in Destiny 2: Beyond Light?

The quest to get Hawkmoon in Destiny 2 has just dropped, so the gun appeared as part of Season of the Hunt as expected. This means you will need to own the Season Pass for season 12 to participate in the exotic quest. 

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