Raid Challenges for Crota’s End, the newest reprised Raid in Destiny 2, has just launched with this week’s reset. Just like all previous Raids, Crota’s End’s four encounters have been updated with distinct, curated challenges which require Guardians to complete the encounters under special conditions or restrictions. If you and your team can come out the other side with the challenge requirements intact, you’ll be awarded a triumph that contributes towards the Swordbearer title, an Essence of Oversoul and some sweet additional loot from each of the Raid’s various encounters.
The first Raid Challenge for Crota’s End is Preservation of Energy and it takes place in the cold, dark depths of the Abyss encounter. Ordinarily, this encounter features your fireteam running aimlessly through the shadows as you try and ferry a Chalice of pure Light into Crota’s Throne World. With the challenge active, the difficulty increases dramatically as you’ll be on a much harsher time limit and require more tact and care when passing around the Chalice of Light.
Here’s how to complete the Preservation of Energy Raid Challenge for the Abyss encounter in Destiny 2’s Crota’s End Raid.
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What Are Raid Challenges in Destiny 2?
Before we dive into the Conservation of Energy strategy and guide, let’s first go over what Raid Challenges are and what you’ll earn by completing them. Raid Challenges are special restrictions or requirements added to already existing Raid encounters that Guardians can undertake for additional loot and rewards. The requirements of each challenge change from encounter to encounter.
Crota’s End has 4 distinct encounters, each of which drops unique loot and has a different weekly Raid Challenge attached to it: those encounters are the Abyss, the Bridge, Ir Yut and Crota himself. Raid Challenges rotate weekly, beginning with the challenge for the first encounter (which, in the case of Crota’s End, is the Abyss) and then rotating to the next one at weekly reset.
The main prize of Raid Challenges is that they drop additional Raid loot upon completion. If you complete a Raid Challenge on Normal difficulty, you’ll get an additional chest which drops an additional piece of loot from that encounter’s loot table. If, instead, you complete a Raid Challenge on Master mode, the extra chest will award you one of the Adept versions of the Raid weapons: these variants of the Raid weapons are special, able to slot exclusive Adept mods and have their perks turned into Enhanced variants at the Enclave.
So, now that you know what Raid Challenges are and what you seek to gain by completing them, how do you complete the Conservation of Energy challenge for Crota’s End in Destiny 2?
Crota’s End Raid Challenges
Crota’s End Raid Challenge: Conservation of Energy
Conservation of Energy is the first Raid Challenge available for Crota’s End, taking place in the Abyss encounter. This encounter is your fireteam’s first real taste of the chaos that the Chalice of Light mechanic can bring, as you need to transport it from one end of the Abyss to the other. During this time, you’ll be switching Chalice holders to gain the Enlightened buff, lighting Hive Lanterns to make traversal easier and Preserving the Chalice to activate any inactive Lanterns. Honestly, this encounter can be the most challenging in Crota’s End simply because of how hectic things quickly get.
Well, if you were hoping for a simple, calming Raid Challenge for the Abyss, you aren’t in luck. To complete the Conservation of Energy Raid Challenge in Destiny 2, you can only light a Hive Lantern using the Enlightened buff once per Chalice of Light Preservation.
Every so often during the Abyss encounter, you’ll notice that the next Lantern is completely turned off: it won’t be glowing a dim green like usual and, instead, it’ll just have a few faint white lights on. This means that the Lantern is inactive and, to turn it on and progress the encounter, you need to Preserve the Chalice in a Preservation point at the Lantern before the inactive one. This will activate the previous inactive Lantern, thus allowing you to proceed onwards.
Into the Abyss
In a normal run of this encounter, any player with the Enlightened buff can light any Hive Lantern at any time: this resets the encounter’s wipe mechanic timer and takes away Weight of Darkness stacks while players are stood around the lit Lantern, allowing easier mobility. For the challenge, though, your entire team is restricted to only lighting a single lantern each time you need to Preserve the Chalice. Essentially, once you’ve Preserved the Chalice, only one player can use up their Enlightened buff on a Lantern before you reach the next Preserve point.
This challenge isn’t too hard on a mechanical level – in fact, it’s much simpler than the original mechanics of the Abyss – but it adds a ton of pressure based on pace and time. Because you can only light one Lantern, you have, at maximum, 2 minutes to get the Chalice from one Preservation point to another. This means that your entire team needs to constantly be moving and always ready to take the Chalice. If you have some players who don’t know how the Chalice works or are extremely hesitant to take it, you’ll certainly run into much more difficulty.
The Chalice of Light
How to Complete Conservation of Energy in D2
Before you begin, make sure everyone knows how the Chalice works and ensure that most players are willing to take the Chalice when needed. The more people are willing to carry the Chalice, the more likely you are to succeed because you’ll be relying on fewer people. Additionally, it wouldn’t be a terrible idea to have a rough order of who’s taking the Chalice: due to the chaos of this encounter, that order will likely get disrupted, but it can still help less confident teams.
Begin the encounter as normal by picking up the Chalice and then Preserving it in the first available. Once you’re second Chalice holder has retrieved the Chalice from the Preserve point, your entire team needs to move as far forward as they can. In general, Preservation points are generally 5-7 Lanterns apart which, if you’re going at a consistent pace, should take two or three Chalice holders to reach it. As such, we recommend using your Enlightened buff to light every third Lantern: this will give your team a good opportunity to safely switch Chalices or get rid of Weight of Darkness stacks.
Another thing you need to be aware of is to not overdo the amount of Enlightened buffs you have. Usually, having as many Enlightened buffs as possible is good because you can use them to constantly reset the timer, even if you make a mistake. In this challenge, though, having more Enlightened buffs means fewer people can take the Chalice: you’ll only need about 4 or 5 Enlightenments for the entire encounter, anymore will simply limit who can take it. As such, after you know one person has Enlightened, get into the routine of switching the buff early before it fully fills: this will ensure that you don’t get into the situation where there are 4 people with Enlightened and one person on Drained cooldown, dooming your run.
Aside from that, you just need to keep that strict one Lantern per Preservation rule in mind at all times. Stay close together to ensure that you can switch the Chalice when needed but also make sure to keep up the pace and not dilly-dally. If you can manage that, you should reach the final Preservation point and be able to begin building the Bridge which, in most circumstances, will be an automatic encounter success for your team.
The Depths of the Pit
Conservation of Energy Step-by-Step Strategy
If you wanted a more simple step-by-step guide to this Raid Challenge in D2:
- Start the encounter as normal and Preserve the Chalice in the first available spot.
- Once the next person picks up the Chalice, have your entire team move as a group until you reach the third lantern. At this point, you should switch Chalice holders and light the nearest Hive Lantern.
- After the Lantern explodes, keep going through the dark until you find the next Preservation point for the Chalice of Light.
- Rinse and repeat this same routine of Preserving the Chalice, picking it up, moving until you need to switch, lighting the nearest lantern and then moving to the next Preservation point.
- Keep going until you reach the final sequence where you need to build the bridge, where you can safely Preserve the Chalice.
- From here, just defend the bridge into Crota’s domain as it builds and then escape to close the encounter.
Beginning of the End
Additional Raid Challenge Loot
On Normal mode difficulty, completing a Raid challenge will award you a second chest filled with additional gear from that encounter’s loot table. This additional drop will also be a Pinnacle for anybody still chasing maximum Light Level. From the Abyss encounter, you have the chance to obtain:
- Fang of Ir Yut Strand Scout Rifle
- Abyss Defiant Solar Auto Rifle
- Song of Ir Yut Arc Machine Gun
- Legendary Chest Piece (Willbreaker’s Resolve, Relentless Harness, Deathsinger’s Mantle)
- Legendary Legs (Willbreaker’s Greaves, Tireless Striders, Deathsinger’s Herald)
- Legendary Class Item (Mark of the Pit, Shroud of Flies, Bone Circlet)
Manage to complete the Raid Challenge on Master mode and the extra chest will award a different type of reward. Instead of a piece of random additional loot, you’ll get one of the six Crota’s End Raid weapons as an Adept variant. Adept Raid weapons can slot the exclusive Adept mods, which include the likes of Adept Big Ones and several powerful stat-boosting mods like Adept Stability or Adept Range. Adept weapons also gain additional weapon stats upon being Masterworked, and you can turn their perks into Enhanced versions at the Enclave on Mars.
The way that unlocking Adept weapons works in Crota’s End is that the Adpet you receive upon completing the challenge is completely random, meaning that you can earn any of the weapons at any time. Once you’ve received one, you won’t get it again until you get the five you’re missing: for example, if you get Adept Abyss Defiant as your first Adept weapon, you won’t get it again until you have all five other guns.
Crota’s Arsenal
That was how to complete the Preservation of Energy Raid Challenge for the Crota’s End Raid in Destiny 2. Next week, the challenge will rotate to the Precarious Balance challenge for the Oversoul Throne Bridge encounter.
