I'd echo what a couple of others have said. Level up legendaries and exotics that you like until they need energy then decide which you like best. Level your armour until you're 29 then save shards for your raid/iron banner gear. Unless you're very lucky you'll save plenty of shards before you ever get a full set of lvl 30 armour. I'm still a chest piece short and I had 98 shards before I levelled my alt to 28. I still have 78! As weapons take energy not shards you can spend them as you see fit without effecting your level. While the raid weapons are great for oracles they're not the be all and end all. I only have the sniper and never use it in VoG. I suspect that when moving on to hard mode they would help more. I've never bothered soloing the nightfall as there always seems to be someone around. However decent weapons of the burn type are a must I imagine. I always seem to be short of arc weapons.

Hi, choice is always good to have. I don't have hard light but it looks like a pretty good gun... the volatile light perk sounds pretty good. Always worth leveling up guns at least to the point before you have to start spending ascendant energy on them. I kept going with my legendary gear till i hit 29 (with an exotic helm) only run the raid once but i got loads of shards from it and only chatterwhite and the raid shotgun, i'm sure by the time i actually get some raid gear i'll have plenty of shards to level it up. I started soloing the nightfall when i was 29 done the previous 3 solo but this weeks was pretty nasty - down to the amount of enemies dealing arc damage i think. I was glad to have some help in the end cos i died just b4 sepkis died and if i'd have been on my own that would have been pretty upsetting lol.

you can get raid level gear from iron banner if you're into it. solo nightfalls, if you were patient and have the right weapons this weeks one is possible, as long as you are doing damage you can solo. its hard though, you revived me about 50 times last night, granted i would have been more cautious if soloing but still. solo'ing the weekly should be doable, nightfall is much easier with friends. have you done a raid yet?

I'd level your gear till you hit 29 and then save shards fir raid gear. I'd level the gun maybe dont finish it if you don't like it but the good thing about Destiny's gun's is it's all personal preference with a few exceptions mostly raid primary weapons with arc solar ect