Forum:Unnamed Raid

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Overview

"One heck of a party to attend."

This raid takes place somewhere in space and is accessed in the Tower. The objective is to board a pyramid and discover why it invited you to board it. In the end, It ends up being destroyed. There are a total of eleven encounters, making it the longest raid in the game, but some of the encounters are very short and can take as little as five minutes to complete.

The encounters are as follows: Board (short), The Coliseum, The Sol Progeny, Infernal Abyss (short), Primius Phase 1, Primius Phase 2, Marathon (short), Malevolence, Galrath, Tzak, and Escape (short).

This raid is in no way associated with the Unnamed Dungeon by the same author.

Gameplay

Board the pyramid

At the start of the raid, players will be shown a cutscene of theirs ships flying to and boarding the pyramid. Upon landing, a Fallen Captain appears and gestures at a hallway to the left and then begins walking down the hallway. Players are then shown to begin following the captain.

When the gameplay begins, players will receive an objective: Board the pyramid. Players can then run off to the hallway to the left. They will be able to see and catch up to the captain, but not be able to go past him. Sometime during the walk down the hall, players will pass combatants standing to the sides of the hall, two Minotaurs, two captains, two Centurions, and then two Knights. Despite being nightmares, they are all red-health enemies. Upon reaching this point, the captain will being to speed up and then close a door, preventing the players from progressing. The combatants will then attack the players. Killing them reopens the door revealing the captain, and he resumes walking.

Sometime later, players will pass combatants standing to the sides of the hall, two minotaurs, two captains, two centurions, and then two knights. These are also nightmares, but they are all elite enemies now. Upon reaching this point, the captain will being to speed up and then close a door, preventing the players from progressing. The combatants will then attack the players. Killing them reopens the door revealing the captain, and he resumes walking.

At the end of the hall is a closed door. The captain will turn around and draw his weapons. A knight, centurion, and a minotaur will also appear. These are all nightmares and are major enemies as well. Killing them opens the door to the coliseum.

This is by far the easiest encounter in the raid, or in any raid for that matter.

On heroic mode, every enemy is a major.

The Coliseum

Upon completion of the previous encounter, the doors behind you will shut. Players will receive a new objective: Complete the trials. This objective stays until the final encounter. Players will enter a massive stadium, with surrounding stands filled with combatants; hive, nightmare, and taken they are. When the doors close, the encounter begins, but nothing initially happens. Two messages will appear. The first one, “The crowd is placing bets,” does nothing until the end of a wave. Then, the message “The crowd demands some flair” will appear. To please the crowd, all players must activate any of their emotes. If someone does not activate an emote after 15 seconds, the message “The crowd grows disappointed” will appear, and everyone who did not taunt will be struck dead by combatants with snipers in the crowd.

From this point in the raid forward, players are in a blackout zone, so players are not able to respawn 30 seconds after death, and must be revived to respawn. If the team is wiped, everyone is returned to orbit. Light-based abilities only charge upon defeating enemies, but do more damage than normal. Stasis abilities recharge automatically, but do less damage than normal.

After the crowd has been pleased, doors on the sides of the coliseum will open and enemies will enter the arena. Ads will also leap out from the stands, causing quite a bit of commotion. There are three waves to this encounter. To complete a wave, 100 enemies must be defeated to draw out a major. To kill the major, one must stand in the Empowering Plate in the center, wait to become empowered, and then shoot the major. Once the major is dead, clear out the remaining ads to complete the wave.

The first wave uses red-health enemies, the second wave uses both red and yellow health enemies, and the third only uses elites. The ads are spread out fairly evenly, and will not attack you if they don’t see you— they will attack the thing that is closest to them instead, regardless of species. Enemies will continue to spawn after the major has been drawn out, but will cease to spawn when the major dies.

Randomly during the encounter, the crowd will demand flair, and players must use their emotes or they die. At the end of each wave the person with the most kills will get rewarded with a random weapon of any rarity and from any year (exotics here are very rare). The crowd will then place more bets, except at the end of the last wave. At the end of each wave, the crowd will demand more flair and players must taunt or die. Once the players have taunted their last, the encounter is complete.

On heroic mode, 150 enemies must be defeated per wave, and red-health enemies will be replaced by all elites.

The Sol Progeny

Upon completion of the previous encounter, three reddish-black ethereal orbs will form in the stands. The crowd will grow louder, and after a few moments, nightmare versions of the Sol Progeny fought in the original Destiny campaign will appear from the orbs.

When they appear, they will have impenetrable over-shields, and will walk around the stands shooting at you as a few more ads enter the arena. To bring down their shields, one must destroy a random major that climbs out from the stands. Killing it will result in it dropping one of three orbs, an Eschaton orb, a Primeval orb, or an Imminent orb. Once picked up, take it to the center of the arena and stand on the Empowering Plate. After a few seconds, you will receive the Empowered buff, and you can throw it at the corresponding mind in the stands. Its shield will instantly drop, and after being shot 15 times, it will teleport down to the center. After 30 seconds of being in the center, it will turn blackish reddish and become immune to all damage, and then summon two major nightmares. Killing the majors will have the mind teleport back up to the stands with its shied back up. All three bosses can be in the center at once.

Once a boss reaches half health, it will introduce its wipe mechanic. If not already in the stands, it will teleport back up. For 60 seconds, it will raise its arm, stand still, and charge up its attack. To make it stop, simply repeat the process to get it down from the stands. If not, it will bring down its arm and six massive bolts will fall from the sky onto each player, killing them. Players must be very careful about how evenly they spread the damage to each boss. If all three are charging their wipe simultaneously, you’re in trouble.

When a boss is defeated, instead of dying, it will kneel in the center and not attack. One of two messages will then appear. If the message “The crowd demands a spare” appears, players must leave the boss alone and after a few seconds, it will teleport back up to the stands with its shield up. If the message “The crowd demands an execution” appears, the fire team must nominate an executioner to approach the boss and use their finisher to end it. If these instructions are not followed, the bosses will not die and the player who disappointed the crowd will be killed. The messages that appear are random. A boss may be spared 0, 1, 2, or 3 times.

If a boss is spared, bring its shield down again and it will instantly teleport to the center and kneel. Repeat this process until all three minds are dead. Once they are dead, the message “The crowd goes wild” will appear and all players will receive a random legendary item. Upon receiving the item, the encounter is complete.

On heroic mode, champions will appear during this encounter. Only champions drop orbs. Barrier for Imminent, Overload for Primeval, Unstoppable for Eschaton.

Infernal Abyss

Upon completion of the previous encounter, the door on the far side of the coliseum will open. Once all players are through, the fire team will enter an area known as the Infernal Abyss. It is a jumping puzzle that includes moving and time weaving platforms sprawled out in all directions, as well as taken mines littering the correct path, so be careful. There are also many snipers on some platforms and along the walls. The distance between platforms becomes greater and the platform size will decrease as you progress further through this encounter.

Dying in this area displays the message “The void below absorbs the kill” and causes what once was complete darkness below to catch fire. The player who died can be revived with no trouble, but if there is a total of six deaths, the fire will grow in size with each death and eventually consume the fireteam, causing a wipe.

Players will know they have reached the end because there will be a single platform at the end that extends out from the wall. In the wall is an open door, and next to it are two lit braziers. The fire below (if there is one) will also die down and disappear upon reaching this point. When all of this has been done, the encounter is complete.

On heroic mode, the numbers of ads is increased and they can respawn. Taken mines are on almost every platform.

Primius, The Rotten Mind Phase 1

Upon completion of the previous encounter, players will enter the door to the next area, still called Infernal Abyss. Players will be shown a cutscene here. Players will be standing on one side of a chasm, and on the other side, which is highly elevated, Primius, a massive Taken Hydra, will appear.

There is no major complex mechanic to kill Primius for these encounters, which may feel like a nerf, but do not be swayed. The sheer number ads that will spawn is enough to overpower a team of 5 in a minute, and Primius has incredibly high resistance and does a ton of damage. The taken cyclopses that are summoned also have the special ability to shoot five different elemental grenades (kinetic, solar, arc, void, stasis) to go along with their standard attack, which is commonly a one shot. In addition to this, dying will cause a pool of taken energy to start filling below, similar the the Infernal Abyss. When 15 deaths occur, the pool will reach the lower part of the arena. When 30 occur, it will reach the upper level, causing a wipe. When added up, this boss fight has three wipe mechanics.

For the first phase of this encounter, Primius teleports you to a multitude of different simulations and summons many different enemies. For each simulation, players have two minutes to eliminate all of the enemies. If that time passes, the team will be inflicted with the “Simulation Meltdown” debuff and will be wiped five seconds later, even if the last enemy is defeated within those five seconds. There are a total of 6 simulations, and in between each one, you can to a little bit of damage to Primius, but not enough to make any difference. Dying while inside a simulation does not effect the pool outside of it.

Simulation 1 is located in The Summoning Pits and summons Hive. Simulation 2 is located in Cerberus Vae III and summons Cabal. Simulation 3 is located at Winter's Run and summons Fallen. Simulation 4 is located in The Nexus and summons Vex. Simulation 5 is located in The Hollowed Lair and summons Scorn. Simulation 6 is located in Cyclone 141G and summons Splicer Fallen.

On heroic mode, The simulations will summon the strike bosses associated with their location (Phogoth, the Untamed, Valus Ta'aurc, Aksor, Archon Priest, Sekrion, Nexus Mind, Fikrul, the Fanatic, Kovik, Splicer Priest). No mechanic is needed to defeat them. Kovik's Monster will not spawn. Dying in a simulation does cause the pool to rise.

Primius, The Rotten Mind Phase 2

Upon Completion of the previous encounter, Primius will summon 2 taken cyclops majors. These cyclopses have shields and power Primius’s shield while all three of them are shooting at you. Primius also summons many enemies down where you are, and you should take them out before doing anything else. Once all enemies are defeated, attack the cyclopses. To take down the cyclops shields, stand on two nearby synch plates and shoot at them. Once Primius’s shield is down, you can do a bit of damage to him. After 30 seconds, he brings his shield back up and spawn more ads. He also has the strange ability to attack with darkness bolts and poison clouds, much like a hive wizard. Keep in mind, He is on the other side of the chasm so long ranged weapons are crucial. Precision hits may be hard to land, as his crit point is small and he is always moving slightly. He will continue to summon enemies and bring his shield back up until a forth of his health is depleted.

Now Primius will begin to summon unusual taken enemies, Such as taken Splicers, Scorn, and eventually, even guardians. The Cyclopses will still be there powering his shield, while he attacks you with Aeon Maul and hobgoblin grenades this time. Many taken scorn will begin to spawn, possessing unique abilities that are very annoying and deadly if not dealt with. The same goes for Taken Splicers.

When he spawns taken guardians, he will only summon three of them, but they will appear as powerful champions, a Barrier Taken Hunter, an Overload Taken Warlock, and an Unstoppable Taken Titan. They behave the same as sweats in the crucible, welding seasonal meta weapons. It is crucial to eliminate these enemies as quickly as possible, as they can eventually use their stasis supers with grim accuracy, which one shot if they hit.

Once half of Primius’s health is depleted, the message “Primius lures you across the chasm” appears. Vex time weaving platforms will appear, and you are now able to cross. Standard taken enemies will now spawn on both sides, and Cyclopses will generate his shield. It is recommended to split into two teams of three, one crosses the chasm, the other stays back. This is so the team that stayed can easily eliminate the cyclopes and any other major threat the other team may be facing. The team on Primius’s side is there primarily for damage.

In addition to summoning standard taken enemies, Primius will switch to using only one shot attacks. The most commonly used one is summoning Walls of Deletion, which spawn at the back of the area and move slowly toward the front. You cannot shoot through these walls, making it hard to target things for the team that stayed. For his second attack he picks the person that has done the most damage to him in the past 15 seconds and grants them the debuff “Marked for Annihilation” for 15 seconds. Once these 15 seconds are up, they die. This attack cannot be avoided. For his third attack, he will give everyone the “Reality Collapse” debuff and the message “Primius attempts to erase the fireteam” will appear. To avoid this, players must destroy the Totem of Annihilation that appears before 15 seconds pass.

Once one forth of his health is left, Primius will attack you with every attack he possesses (minus the simulations). Unusual taken enemies will be spawned rather than standard ones (no guardians.)

Once Primius is defeated, he will unleash a massive Hydra Death Blast that will one shot anyone who is too close. If everyone dies when this happens, you have to start the encounter over again, so be careful.

On heroic mode, Taken guardians will spawn (not as champions) during the last part of phase 2.

Marathon

Upon completion of the previous encounter, a door on the far side of the chasm will open and players can progress. On the other side of the door is the location known as The Thoroughfare. Once all players enter this location, tons ads will appear out of nowhere and run toward the fire team. Players will have no choice but to book it.

While running, players will encounter no small amount of obstacles and ramps. Stopping at any point in time will not bode well. Snipers also litter the corridor, and it is not recommended to stop and kill them. If the massive horde of enemies catches up to a player, the player will be killed almost instantly.

Three times during the run, players will encounter a massive barrier blocking their path. To bring down the barrier, players must destroy an elite barrier shrieker, elite barrier nightmare servitor, or elite barrier taken Minotaur. (These are not champions, they are called barrier because they protect the barrier.) Players will have a very small time frame to do so, but since the horde moves slower than you, if you have outran them enough, the timeframe can be extended slightly.

Somewhere along the wall is a small room with a loot chest with a piece of raid armor and an exotic from a previous year. Players must quickly enter and exit this room if they wish to remain alive, and staying inside the room will not work because enemies will enter it.

On heroic mode, the number of ads that get in the way is increased.

Malevolence

Upon completion of the previous encounter, players will enter a very dark area called Malevolence. This encounter is basically ad clearing on steroids. Hive will spawn as red-health enemies and make up the majority of ads, but some taken and nightmares will appear as elites and majors.

Players will be affected by the Weight of Darkness debuff upon entering the room. It stacks up to ten times. To start the encounter, one player must pick up a glowing orb called an Unstable Light Charge in the center. Once the orb has been picked up, ads will flood the room. Holding the orb and standing near the person carrying the orb removes the Weight of Darkness, but beware, the orb doesn’t last forever. Orbs have a countdown of 30 seconds and when they reach zero, they explode. Players can throw them early to create a powerful area-of-effect detonation. Once the orb has been destroyed, every major will drop another. Only three orbs will be present at a time.

To complete the encounter, players should split into three teams of two and locate three synch plates. One player carries the orb while the other defends them. Enemies will continue to come at you until all three plates have been captured. Once all plates are captured, ads will stop spawning and players must defeat every last one of them before the room is illuminated, revealing the door to the next encounter. Beware, enemies can arrive and recapture a synch plate, so it is advised to stay near one at all times. Synch plates will also emit a light that takes away the Weight of Darkness debuff when captured.

After one synch plate has been captured, an entity will spawn in the middle by the name of Galrath, the Malevolent. He is a massive hive Darkblade ultra, and cannot be killed. Galrath will go to the most recently captured synch plate and torture those who are defending it. He behaves much like Alak-Hul, slowly trudging along and occasionally dash attacking. He also has the ability to teleport short distances. If a synch plate was captured but then all captured synch plates are lost, Galrath will de-spawn. When all three plates are captured, they cannot be taken back, and Galrath will de-spawn.

On heroic mode, every other major drop and orb.

Galrath, The Malevolent

Upon completion of the previous encounter, players will enter the door that leads to the next area, still called Malevolence. When all players are in the room, players must draw out Galrath by scanning a massive ethereal blackish red energy spike in the center, much like a nightmare. When it is scanned, players must stand next to it for sixty seconds while defending against hordes of thrall and cursed thrall. Letting an enemy inside the circle stops the timer, and if the enemies inside outnumbers the players, the timer is slowly set back. Once the this has been complete, instead of transforming to reveal an enemy, the orb will explode, dealing damage to those who are too close.

Galrath will come into the room using the door that was left open from the last encounter. Once he enters, the message “Galrath's presence darkens the room” will appear and the room will darken. Lamps are scattered that pop on and off to provide light. The damage phase can begin as soon as Galrath enters the room. Players must use extreme caution fighting him, because every attack he possesses is a one shot. Hive enemies will continue to spawn throughout this encounter.

There are two mechanics to this boss fight. Every ten seconds, Galrath will cloak himself in nightmare energy for one second, becoming immune to all attacks when he does so. Whenever a fourth of his health is depleted, he will summon a nightmare orb in the center and cloak himself with nightmare energy. He will then begin to sprint towards the nearest player and attack them with his blade. He will continue to do this until the orb in the middle has been destroyed by standing next to it. If this orb is not destroyed in 100 seconds, it will blow up the entire room, wiping the team.

Galrath’s attacks consist of a melee attack with his blade, and occasionally shooting a massive blast at players. He can also shoot the blast at a random ad, which will transform it into a nightmare.

When Galrath has been defeated, the ceiling will start to crumble and players have 30 seconds to exit the room or they die. If the whole team dies when this happens, the encounter must be restarted.

On heroic mode, Galrath gains an attack that tethers you and consumes half of your current super energy. The Weight of Darkness debuff will also exist, but the lamps that pop on and off get rid of the debuff.

Tzak, The Proud

Upon completion of the previous encounter, players will bolt through the exit door to reach the next room called The Pinnacle. The room is seemingly empty, and has corridor with stairs going forward. Enter to continue.

When you enter the massive chamber that the stairs led to, A cutscene will be shown. A large figure sitting on an even larger throne at the far end of the room will stand up. That is Tzak. Darkness energy radiates heavily from his body. He will summon a glowing orb and then throw it into a smallish red circle hanging above the players. He will then pump his fist, and the cutscene will end shortly thereafter.

Tzak will stay in the back of the room here. If a player tries to approach him, he will kill them with his melee. He will also have a shield up. He will wander around in the back, firing strange blasts of pure darkness that do some decent damage. Lots of hive enemies will swarm the room as well. In order to draw out Tzak, six things must be done. A major Empowerer must be killed, stolen light must be deposited, three sacrifices must be prevented, one of three synch plates must be captured, a Swordbearer’s relic must be destroyed, and all remaining ads must be cleared.

It should be known that the Empowerer is a very tough wizard, as it can survive two shots from Sleeper Simulant, and does not flinch. It can also shoot other enemies to make them cursed, meaning players will likely encounter cursed thralls, acolytes, knights, ogres, and wizards. After the Empowerer is dead, an altar will appear (much like on the moon), five sky eater wizards will appear, a synch plate will activate, and a Swordbearer will appear. Sky eater wizards drop stolen light, and the swordbearer drops the relic. When a stolen light is deposited, it summons five orbs of power. If three sacrifices take place, the team will be wiped. To destroy the relic, use it until it is gone.

Once all of that has been said and done, Tzak will teleport to the center, summon five nightmare knights, and a large rectangle with a barrier in the center will appear. This is basically volleyball. The goal of this part of the encounter is to score 3 times before your opponents do. If the other team wins, your team will be wiped. If you win, the other team will drop their shields and become hostile. Tzak will serve the ball he summoned, and to volley the ball, players simply touch it before it hits the ground. Players should also be aware that they can go under the net, but doing so will burn you when stepping on the ground, and you will die fast. If the ball lands on your side and is not returned, it will detonate, killing anyone who is too close. It is advised to immediately revive them. When hitting the ball, there is a pattern of how many hits it will take to get it back over the net. The pattern goes 1, 3, 2, 3, 1, 2. When this ends, Tzak will miss the ball and his shield will drop after his third miss.

This begins one of three damage phases. Tzak will use his standard attack, but he will also sometimes summon a ball and throw it at a player. Players can catch the ball, but if not, it will explode, killing them. Catching a ball allows a player to throw it back, but they must be accurate; the ball will not gravitate towards Tzak. Tzak will generally stay on the right side of the room, unless he teleports, which happens occasionally. He will try to teleport directly on a player that is standing still, which will instantly kill said player. If a player gets to close, he will melee. He also occasionally uses a tether attack, in which he tethers one person and drains their health until either he is shot until he flinches, or all of the players ability energy has been drained. If all ability energy has been drained, the player will die and Tzak will regain health. If three people have been successfully drained during one damage phase, Tzak will use the light he drained in a massive attack that will wipe the team. Tzak will also summon six nightmare minotaurs during the damage phase. Eliminating them is necessary to continue.

After a third of his health has been depleted, he will retreat to the back with his shield up. The previous process with the six tasks to do will be repeated. The only difference is that all enemies are now nightmares of all races excluding hive and splicers, and a different synch plate will activate. The Empowerer, the sky eaters, and the Swordbearer are all non-nightmare hive.

Once those tasks have been done again, the volleyball game will start up again. The only differences are that the pattern is reversed, and the enemies are nightmare centurions.

The same damage phase will happen again after that, but Tzak will this time try to stay on the left side of the room.

The third and final time that the tasks require completion will also be the hardest time, due to the fact that all enemies are Taken, including the Empowerer, sky eaters, and Swordbearer. The last synch plate that has not been captured will activate this time.

The volleyball game will commence once more after this, but the order is completely scrambled (though it still has two 1s, 2s, and 3s) and nightmare captains appear this time.

After Tzak's shield has been dropped, he will teleport to the back and try to stay there until he has a small portion of health left. The minotaurs he summon will also be taken. Once his health is low enough, he will then run away from players in any given direction every 15 seconds. Once he has enough health left to be killed by any given super (minus Ward and Well), he will travel to the middle and stay there. End him there. Once he has been killed, you have a five second time frame to approach and taunt him, which will reward you with an additional piece of raid armor.

On heroic mode, all tasks must be completes in the order listed or it will cause a wipe. (Empowerer, stolen light, sacrifices, synch plate, relic, ad clearing.) Taken Scorn and Splicers will appear when the other taken enemies do.

Escape the Pyramid

Upon completion of the previous encounter, a cutscene will be shown. Tzak, who is seemingly dead, will groan and stand up. He will point and laugh, turn around, summon a ball, and chuck it at his throne. It will blow up, triggering the self destruct of the pyramid. Players will be shown starting to run, and Tzak will face the fire, smiling, with his arms spread wide.

A new objective will be received here: Run. The only thing that needs to be done here is to book it. However, this may be a little difficult because the fire moves fast, and players need to run all the way back to where they first started the raid. Fortunately, there are no ads to be dealt with. It takes roughly three minutes for players to run all the way back to the start, and three and a half minutes for the fire to get to the same point.

Once the platform where player ships are has been reached, a cutscene will be shown of players boarding their ships and taking off. The view will zoom out to look at the Pyramid. Player ships will be shown flying away from the pyramid and it will explode behind them. Upon this moment, players will have completed the raid and be rewarded with a piece of raid armor, a raid weapon, and the raid exotic.

On heroic mode, there are ads, whether they be sniping you or getting in the way.

Wavering Neutrality

"I serve no one but myself."

Wavering Neutrality is the raids exotic weapon. It is a kinetic submachine gun. It has 35 rounds and a maximum 440 reserves. Compared to other exotic submachine guns, its impact is slightly low, but what it lacks in impact is made up for in its range and stability.

Its exotic perk, Leave None Alive, causes enemies to explode when they die. If an enemy was precision killed, the explosion is slightly bigger and more powerful. Its other perks are Ricochet Rounds, Smallbore, Extended Barrel, and a changeable set of perks unique to the weapon. They are called Light Mercenary and Dark Mercenary. Light Mercenary fires rounds that are more lethal against servants of the darkness. Dark mercenary fires rounds that are more lethal against enemies of the darkness. Guardians with using light subclasses are affected by Dark Mercenary, and guardians using Darkness subclasses are affected by Light Mercenary.

The weapons Catalyst is acquired from completion of the grandmaster difficulty of the raid. It requires players to defeat 200 enemies using Light Mercenary, and 200 more using Dark Mercenary. When completed, the weapon weakens enemies that are hit by explosions caused by the weapon.

Lore

"I serve no one but myself."

The Hunter's cloaked floated dramatically behind him as he approached the Titan. "I could not thank you more for assisting me with those blasted Hive," The Titan said.

"It was no trouble," the hunter replied, kicking a Knights head out of his way. "So you gonna pay me or what?"

"Pay you for what?" The Titan said. "I don't remember purchasing anything or making any deals with you."

The hunter's patience began to grow thin. "Pay me for saving your skin," He said.

The Titan shrugged. "Look, as appreciative as I am for giving me a hand back there, I don't-"

The Titan was cut off mid sentence by the Hunter's trusty submachine gun.

The Titan was quickly resurrected by his ghost. "Aw, c'mon man. Why'd you do that?"

"I want my payday," the Hunter replied.

"Fine," said the Titan, and he gestured to his ghost. Moments later a crate full of glimmer dropped in front of the Hunter.

The Hunter smiled, picked up the crate, and began to leave. "Just hope our paths don't cross again," he said. "And if they do, do as I say, or I'll make sure your ghost won't resurrect you next time."

Grandmaster

There is a grandmaster difficulty. In this difficulty, heroic modifiers will be in place, incoming damage is increased, shields cannot be broken without the proper matchups, enemies will not flinch (Tzak is an exception during his tether), enemies will have higher health, and there will be no red health enemies (exploders are an exception). There will also be additional exclusive challenges. If the raid is completed on this difficulty, players will be rewarded the full set of raid armor, two raid weapons, two ascendant shards, five enhancement prisms, ten enhancement cores, Wavering Neutrality with its catalyst, and an additional random exotic armor piece a previous year.

Additional Lore

Primius

Primius was once an incredibly powerful axis mind that was taken by Oryx when he arrived in the Sol System. Primius oversaw the transformation of the moon Ganymede. His presence on that moon was unknown to almost all, and the only hints of it were revealed when astrologists from earth had observed Ganymede had been transformed. He planned to use Ganymede in a similar way the Cabal used the Almighty, and began to form the moon into a super weapon. His plan was ceased when he was taken.

During the SIVA crisis, Primius was able to get his hands on a few small garrisons of splicer fallen, though he did not initially take them because he wanted to study them a bit first. Sometime afterward, he managed to open a time portal and abduct an army of splicers and held them in custody. He did this a few times until he was satisfied with how many se had, and took them all. He also learned how to create his own splicer fallen through simulations, but did not know what to do with them.

Sometime after the reef’s prison break, Primius learned of the existence of scorn, and took large numbers of them as well. He mostly experimented with his taken during this time, and also learned how to take the summoned entities in his simulations. By learning how to do this, he managed to create and take thousands of hive, cabal, vex, fallen, scorn, and splicers.

During the events on Europa, A small fire team of guardians somehow entered Primius’s ascendant plane. He took all three of them to defend his realm. Since they were now under the influence of darkness, their former light-based abilities transformed into darkness-based abilities.

Sometime after he was taken, Primius learned how to use some hive magic and how to utilize Totems of Annihilation. It is unknown how or when he learned these things.

Tzak

Tzak is of a race that is unknown to all but himself and his peers. Even the hive do not know exactly what he is, though they speculate his race is made up of devoted servants of the Darkness, or entities that were created by the Darkness itself, which would elevate them as gods above the Worms. According to Tzak himself, there are 13 other entities like him, though he does not use their names. He refers to them as “the Isolated,” “the Fearful,” “the Anguished,” “the Despaired,” “the Brutal,” “the Failed,” “the Greedy,” “the Insane,” “the Jealous,” “the Obscure,” “the Raged,” “the Servant,” and “the Vain.” All of these titles are those of essences dropped by nightmares. This is most likely not a coincidence. Tzak and his peers also seem to live on the Pyramids. Tzak did list a few names in his writings, but never associated them with their titles. (Morzum and Durzic were the names mentioned)

Tzak seems to have an obsession with sports and is very proud of his skills. This either influenced his name, or his name influenced his personality. According to himself, the others of his kind have personalities similar to their names, so the later is probably the more likely case. For some reason, Tzak also tends to be very sarcastic and tries to be funny.

According to Tzak, there are 20 “Main Pyramids.” These are the largest of the pyramids. Fourteen of them are occupied by those of his race, and the other six are occupied by other unknown enemies. One was blown up by “something too bright for us to see.” One is said to be a Cabal mercenary, another is a large Taken figure, and the rest are powerful ascendant Hive. The pyramids that entered the Sol System during Shadowkeep were supposedly smaller pyramids, though the Luna pyramid is said to be medium sized.

With the destruction of Tzak’s pyramid, there are only 18 “Main Pyramids” left.

Galrath

Galrath is a hive darkblade. There is little record of his existence even in hive archives. The majority of records that concern him are his own writings, though the the Vex somehow have minimal knowledge of him. This may be because he apparently fought in the ancient war against the Vex. According to his own writing, he was present on the moon during the Great Disaster, and the reason that there is no record of him being there is because all enemies who saw him were also slain by him. This is the case for a few other events that involved the hive.

Galrath gained the title “The Malevolent” shortly after Oryx was assassinated. He salvaged the Tablet of Ruin that was placed inside Golgoroth and somehow incorporated it into his helmet. It allowed him to gain strange abilities using the Darkness, but he did not gain the ability to take like he intended. He himself basically became a “Living Nightmare,” and discovered he had the power to turn those around him into nightmares as well.

Sometime during the events of Curse of Osiris, Galrath sought out to meet the most physical form of the Darkness there was, and entered the Pyramid on Luna. It told him of the coming of the fleet, and that he was invited to be a champion on one of the main pyramids. On Tzak’s pyramid, Galrath formed a cult that revolved around himself.