If you’ve spent even a few hours grinding missions in The First Descendant, you know how fast your inventory can fill up with random common, uncommon, and even rare weapons you’ll never actually use. Nothing is more frustrating than hitting a full inventory mid-raid right as a legendary weapon drops, forcing you to make a rushed call about what to delete to make space. That’s why learning how to dismantle weapon in The First Descendant is one of the first core skills you should master, even before you start experimenting with high-tier builds. I’ve put over 120 hours into the game across three different account profiles, and I made every possible mistake early on—from selling weapons that held rare upgrade materials to accidentally dismantling my favorite rolled shotgun. This guide is based on all those missteps, so you don’t have to repeat them.
How to Dismantle Weapon in The First Descendant: Core Step-by-Step Process
The actual dismantle process is pretty straightforward, but there are a few small details the game doesn’t explain clearly to new players. Follow these steps every time to avoid mistakes. First, open your inventory either from the main hub menu or the pause screen during a mission. Navigate to the weapons tab, which will show every gun you currently own sorted by rarity, type, or power level, depending on your filter settings.
If you’re dismantling a single weapon, just hover over the gun you want to get rid of, select the dismantle option from the pop-up menu, and hold the confirm prompt for two seconds. If you want to clear out multiple weapons at once, toggle the bulk select option in the top right corner of the screen.
Always lock your go-to legendary and unique weapons first before doing any bulk dismantle. The game will not let you dismantle locked weapons, which is the easiest way to avoid accidentally deleting a weapon you’ve spent weeks upgrading. Note that you can’t dismantle weapons you currently have equipped on any of your characters. If you want to get rid of an equipped gun, you’ll have to unequip it first, either by swapping it out for another weapon or moving it to your general inventory.
You can also dismantle weapons directly from the post-mission loot screen, which saves you time if you know you don’t want to keep any of the drops you just earned. Just hover over the weapon in the loot list and select dismantle instead of adding it to your inventory.
Key Benefits of Dismantling Unused Weapons
A lot of new players default to selling unused weapons for extra gold, but dismantling is almost always the better choice, even if you’re short on in-game currency. The perks of dismantling go far beyond just clearing space, and they make the small amount of time spent sorting your loot well worth it.
- Earn weapon upgrade materials like enhancement cores, mod shards, and element-specific fragments that you can only get from dismantling or endgame raid rewards. You’ll need thousands of these materials to level up your legendary weapons to max power, so stockpiling them early will save you dozens of hours of grinding later.
- Free up valuable inventory space so you don’t have to leave rare loot behind during long open-world or raid runs. Your base inventory only holds 100 weapons by default, and upgrading it costs premium currency, so dismantling is the cheapest way to keep space free.
- Get unique crafting components for building exclusive event weapons and endgame meta loadouts that can’t be earned through regular mission rewards. For example, the recent frost event shotgun required 50 dismantled rare shotgun components to craft, which I would have never had if I’d sold all my extra shotguns for gold.
- Earn small amounts of gold if you dismantle common-tier weapons, which adds up fast when you’re clearing out 20+ unused guns at a time. You’ll get almost the same amount of gold from dismantling common weapons as you would from selling them, plus the extra materials, so there’s almost no downside.
I used to sell all my unused weapons for gold during my first 20 hours of play, and I didn’t realize how much I was missing until I tried to upgrade my first legendary rifle and was 300 enhancement cores short. It took me three full days of grinding to make up the difference, which I could have avoided if I’d been dismantling all along.
Common Mistakes to Avoid When Dismantling Weapons
Even experienced players make mistakes when clearing out their inventory, especially if they’re rushing to make space for a new drop. These are the most common errors to watch out for, and they’re all easy to avoid with a little extra attention.
First, never dismantle a new weapon before you register it in your collection. The game has a collection system that gives you permanent account-wide stat boosts for every unique weapon variant you register, even if you don’t plan to use it. Register every new weapon in your collection before dismantling it to unlock those passive boosts without any extra work.
Second, don’t dismantle weapons that have unique, removable mods. A lot of rare and epic weapons come with exclusive mod rolls that you can extract and apply to your main weapons. For example, I once found a common shotgun with a 35% damage boost against shielded enemies, which I extracted and put on my legendary shotgun for endgame raid runs. Always check the mod list on a weapon before you dismantle it to see if there’s anything worth keeping.
Third, don’t forget to check your active daily and weekly challenges before clearing out your inventory. A lot of challenges require you to equip a certain number of specific weapon types or rarities, and if you’ve dismantled all of your rare rifles for example, you’ll have to grind missions to find new ones just to complete the challenge. Locked weapons can't be dismantled by accident, so get in the habit of locking any weapon you plan to keep, even if it’s a low-rarity one with a good mod roll. It only takes one click to lock a weapon, and it will save you from the frustration of losing a great build piece because you were rushing through a bulk dismantle.
Advanced Dismantling Tips for Endgame Players
Once you hit max level and start grinding endgame raids and open-world world bosses, your inventory will fill up even faster than it did during the early game. These tips will help you sort through your loot faster and make smarter dismantle decisions, so you can spend less time managing your inventory and more time playing.
You can set custom filters to exclude weapons with specific mod rolls or stat bonuses when doing bulk dismantles. For example, if you only want to keep weapons that have a 20% or higher damage boost against boss enemies, you can set that filter, and all weapons that meet that requirement will be excluded from bulk select. This cuts down your sorting time by 70% compared to going through every weapon manually.
Save 2-3 copies of every unique weapon type for different character builds. If you have multiple characters built for different elements, you’ll probably want a separate weapon for each build, so don’t dismantle all duplicates unless you’re 100% sure you won’t need them. You can also trade extra duplicate unique weapons with your squadmates if they need a specific gun for their build.
Dismantle extra weapons right after you finish a mission, instead of waiting until your inventory is full. It only takes 30 seconds to sort through your new loot after a 10-minute mission, and you won’t get stuck having to make rushed decisions when you find a legendary drop mid-mission and have no space left. If you’re running low on specific crafting materials, you can filter your inventory to show only weapons that drop that material when dismantled. For example, if you need more cryo fragments to upgrade your frost build, you can filter your inventory to show only cryo element weapons, and dismantle the ones you don’t need to get exactly the materials you’re looking for.
At the end of the day, knowing how to dismantle weapon in The First Descendant is one of those basic gameplay skills that makes your entire run way smoother, no matter if you’re a new player just finishing the prologue or a veteran grinding endgame raids. You don’t have to overthink it, just follow the steps we covered, lock your favorite weapons first, and register every new gun in your collection before you get rid of it. You’ll never run out of upgrade materials or inventory space again, and you’ll be able to focus on what matters most: taking down big bosses and testing out new builds with your friends. If you have your own little dismantling hack, drop it in the comments below, I’m always looking for ways to speed up my post-mission loot sorting.