Alongside the launch of Destiny’s new Age of Triumph, developer Bungie has refreshed all of its old raids, bringing them up to light level, tweaking the rewards, and improving some of the mechanics. And for those raids that didn’t have challenge modes, Bungie has also added those to both Crota’s End and Vault of Glass.
For week one of Age of Triumph in Destiny, both of the Crota’s End challenges are active, one for the Deathsinger fight and one for the final showdown with Crota. Read on for details on how to complete the Crota challenge and unlock new armor and elemental primary weapons.
How to Complete the Crota Challenge
As some had predicted, the Crota challenge in the Crota’s End raid revolves around the sword mechanic. Like the Warpriest challenge in King’s Fall, Bungie has added a restriction whereby a player can only hold the sword once during the entire fight. If at any point the same player picks up the sword, a prompt will appear on the screen letting the team know they have failed the challenge - a nice touch for Age of Triumph.
Under normal circumstances, this new wrinkle wouldn’t be significant, but it does force players to switch up their strategies. For starters, many Crota’s End raid teams used to run a single sword bearer, usually a Bladedancer Hunter. Now they will need to rotate in a couple sword bearers to complete the fight, as Crota requires more than one round of swings at light level 390.
The challenge also means that those Bladedancer Hunters that do use the sword will not be able to use the Escape Artist perk to maximize their time hitting Crota. In the old days, a Hunter would get their first set of swings in, drop the sword, melee Crota to turn invisible, and then start hitting him again when he kneels for the second time. Now, when that player drops the sword, he/she cannot pick it back up again and complete the challenge.
Strategies for Beating Crota
While not a complete game changer, the Crota challenge certainly will force some Destiny players out of their comfort zones. Some may have never even wielded the sword, and are unsure of positioning and strategy. As well, there will be some sword bearers that are not Hunters, and they too will have a few important things to consider.
With the revamped version of Crota's End, the raid now has two new tricks. One is that every time Crota kneels, an Oversoul spawns. That means once the non-swordbearing players have downed Crota, they will need to focus fire on the giant Oversoul in the background. Assuming the team downs Crota twice per sword, they will need to shoot two Oversouls per cycle.
In a less difficult twist, Crota's End adds the Chalice of Light to the raid, so the team can replenish its health. That's a useful addition since Bungie has tweaked how Health Regen perks work.
For the swordbearer's safety, the biggest consideration is going to be the Hive Knights (nicknamed Boomers) in the towers on the right and left – depending on which side the swordbearer attacks from. The team will either need to snipe them down to keep them from shooting the swordbearer, or another trick is to use a Titan’s bubble to draw their fire away. These Boomers are major run killers, but keep in mind that taking them out spawns a Hive Wizard, so if you can keep them distracted instead of killing them, that's the better option.
We also recommend standing on the back awning for downing Crota and using Gjallarhorn rockets indiscriminately. Luckily, Rise of Iron made sure every player unlocked a Gjallarhorn, so the team should have no problem making Crota kneel.
The introduction of the Crota challenge also means that the days of players completing the raid solo are gone, at least if they want to complete everything. Back in Year 1, soloing Crota was the ultimate challenge, and it was fun to keep track of the different ways players could circumvent the “rules” of the raid. But just as fans were watching so too was Bungie, and it appears the devs have crafted the Crota challenge with those players in mind.