This is all a matter of suggestion from my own experience. First and foremost do your story missions. While leveling to 20 is not necessary to increase difficulty of a mission. The XP per kill looks to be about the same and the end reward does not justify the time and difficulty. If you are 1 level below the recommended level you should be okay. Strikes are great for loot and XP, and should be done anywhere at -1 level until the next strike is unlocked during the course of the story. Gear is pretty varied while leveling to 20. White is going to be your friend for a while. If you get a green or blue check the upgrade perks on that armor. Greens get 1 perk to your weapon/skill. Blues get a perk to your weapon and then a defense bonus and then another weapon/skill perk. For greens if you are, for example, using a hand cannon and the perk on that piece of armor is increased reload speed for scout rifles, don't buy the perk. You're wasting your money and there is no damage increase just for buying a perk. On a blue however you may want to take the first perk regardless so that you can get the next perk which will be a defense increase. Bounties are your friend. Do them now so that you can gain reputation with the Vanguard. You will need Vanguard rank 2 to buy purple gear and Vanguard rank 3 to buy purple weapons at level 20. Bounties restock daily and will change daily as well. As the story progresses, the total bounties available will increase. So head over to the bounty master and get some bounties. Patrols are not necessary, but can be a great learning experience. You can gain reputation for the Vanguards and learn the layout of the planets. Public events will occur here which will grant ascendent materials once a day, if you achieve a gold rating (successfully completing the event). You have to go back to the tower and get the reward from the postmaster. Ascendent materials are for upgrading purple and yellow gear at level 20. Start saving now because they're hard to come by later on. On each planet there will be a specific material you can gather, i.e. Spinmetal on earth. If you see one grab it. You're going to want to start saving these for when you upgrade purple and yellow gear at level 20. Treasure chests are also located randomly throughout the planets. These will have at the very least one material item from that planet. At the most iv'e seen chests drop 8 materials 2 pieces of equipment and a glimmer enhancer item. Elemental damage is not to be taken lightly. Void is purple, Fire is orange, and Arc is blue. Your secondary and heavy weapons will eventually have one of these modifiers on it. When you shoot an enemy with a shield you will see the shield around the enemy. What ever color it is, use that element to kill the shield and it will go down a lot faster. For example; a captain usually has a blue shield, therefore use a weapon with arc damage to take out the shield. Subclasses also have elemental modifiers. The Warlock has void and fire subclasses. Hunters have arc and fire. Titans have arc and void. You will not be able to select the second subclass for any character until you have gotten at least one character on your account to level 15. When you can change your subclass, you will start that subclass with no perks. For example; if you start the game as a warlock you start as the void subclass. As you increase levels you will unlock perks in the void subclass. At level 15 you can switch to the fire subclass. The fire subclass will have no perks unlocked. Your void subclass will retain all of the perks you have already unlocked and you can switch back at any time to progress it further. On a side note for the future. If you want to raid once you are level 26, you must have a working mic. The raid is designed to make players communicate. So if you don't have one, save your money in RL and get one, if you want to raid. At this time a mic not required for anything else in the game or this clan