He helped me and Disciple go through and get the new black hammer. Weirdly, the strategy that worked the best for us was to just spam him with rockets from the get go.

I tried to pay it forward with Midnight and Cougron but we couldn't do it. I didn't have enough heavy ammo synths anyway.

But also, he explained the mechanics of a few encounters in the raid to half a team of newbies patiently, and we had great success completing it today. Very nice! Eeeeeeeverything worked out in a relatively stress free Destiny day.

Kind of a pointless post, so I don't expect replies. Just putting it out there.

Kind of a pointless post, so I don't expect replies. Just putting it out there.

well now I have to reply.

Munky and I helped Sammy get hers last night. It took us about 3 runs. I found that just using primaries on him, special on the blights/shielded adds. I also switched to Rockets to get rid of adds and shielded knights/centurions.

Congrats though! Black Hammer 2.0 is awesome

I haven't even pulled the trigger on my Spindle yet, but I have used my 310 version to infuse a (hopefully) unpatchable 307 Spindle and used the vault copies to make lots of 300 special weapons :)

-Disciple

We just couldn't make it happen. Sorry I got a little irritated at the end. I haven't had much sleep lately and I was not expecting to try for that long. I'm really hurting today from staying up and having to get up early. I definitely don't find this challenge fun.

I definitely don't find this challenge fun.

I'm with you. I tried multiple times with 2 different LFG groups early in the day, then took a long break and made a few attempts with Kermit, but ultimately gave up. It's a very frustrating challenge, and I really hate that they are nerfing the drop. I feel like something that difficult should reward a 310 exotic weapon. You can only get it once, so I don't see why they would feel they need to nerf it. You can get 310 weapons from the raid and I would say nothing in the raid is as challenging.

Last week I tried this with a Fireteam that I think is very good... We were unable to get it done, we primarily focused on the boss, trying to burn him quickly. We killed him once or twice, but couldn't finish adds. Only tried for about 2 hours before running out of time.

Yesterday I jumped on with a less solid Fireteam overall, and one of the guys had a different strategy to use.

Basically assign one person right, one person left, and one back. Each prioritizes the black spawn spheres, and then adds, and once the adds are cleared, you do as much damage as you can on the boss. I found this strategy EASY. Psions can be tough, as can yellow bar taken, but with each person in their own area, the boss' blind bubble is way less annoying, also it is pretty easy to manage adds if you focus them from the start. This took us one try, and we basically 2 manned it as one person kept dying. The black spawn spheres will come back, so you want to always prioritize those... I think after the first 3, only 2 spawn each time. I also think they spawn with the Boss health (or it could be the timer).

EDIT: Also use supers on add's when things get hairy... We had a stormcaller, sunbreaker, and nightstalker. Seemed to really help when one of us popped a super on adds.

I'm honored, guys - thanks for the call-out but it was most definitely a team effort. The Spindle is worthy of the challenge; give it a try in the next raid (especially during Warpriest, Golgoroth, and the Daughters of Oryx).

Basically assign one person right, one person left, and one back. Each prioritizes the black spawn spheres, and then adds, and once the adds are cleared, you do as much damage as you can on the boss. I found this strategy EASY. Psions can be tough, as can yellow bar taken, but with each person in their own area, the boss' blind bubble is way less annoying, also it is pretty easy to manage adds if you focus them from the start. This took us one try, and we basically 2 manned it as one person kept dying. The black spawn spheres will come back, so you want to always prioritize those... I think after the first 3, only 2 spawn each time. I also think they spawn with the Boss health (or it could be the timer).

EDIT: Also use supers on add's when things get hairy... We had a stormcaller, sunbreaker, and nightstalker. Seemed to really help when one of us popped a super on adds.

This is almost exactly what we did last night. Only slight difference is we all rotated around a bit, returning to the entranceway for cover as needed. I posted a video in a thread above.

Let's follow Dooskey's strategy below next time.

P.S. Thanks for the help with the daily this morning.

Tried this kind of strategy with andivian and failed miserably. Next time we'll give it a better effort.

Thanks for hosting the game last night Kermit and for letting me tag along. I was hoping to get more damage out of the Golden Gun with Celestial helm on the boss but he is a true bullet sponge. And how about that perfectly timed no-look bubble from the Vandal when I sent a rocket to him?

Last week I tried this with a Fireteam that I think is very good... We were unable to get it done, we primarily focused on the boss, trying to burn him quickly. We killed him once or twice, but couldn't finish adds. Only tried for about 2 hours before running out of time.

Yesterday I jumped on with a less solid Fireteam overall, and one of the guys had a different strategy to use.

Basically assign one person right, one person left, and one back. Each prioritizes the black spawn spheres, and then adds, and once the adds are cleared, you do as much damage as you can on the boss. I found this strategy EASY. Psions can be tough, as can yellow bar taken, but with each person in their own area, the boss' blind bubble is way less annoying, also it is pretty easy to manage adds if you focus them from the start. This took us one try, and we basically 2 manned it as one person kept dying. The black spawn spheres will come back, so you want to always prioritize those... I think after the first 3, only 2 spawn each time. I also think they spawn with the Boss health (or it could be the timer).

EDIT: Also use supers on add's when things get hairy... We had a stormcaller, sunbreaker, and nightstalker. Seemed to really help when one of us popped a super on adds.

Our biggest problem was getting to the final room with more than 4 or 5 minutes on the clock. Any suggestions for quicker clearing of previous areas? (I didn't feel like we were being incompetent, and we KNEW we needed to get down there with 7+ mins on the clock - we just couldn't execute, and I can't help feeling like we were going about it wrong, somehow.)

Our biggest problem was getting to the final room with more than 4 or 5 minutes on the clock. Any suggestions for quicker clearing of previous areas? (I didn't feel like we were being incompetent, and we KNEW we needed to get down there with 7+ mins on the clock - we just couldn't execute, and I can't help feeling like we were going about it wrong, somehow.)

Make Blights your first priority targets in every room. Generous use of supers to clean out the little guys. Weapons with "Crowd Control" are nice too but the ammo expenditure (or even the time taken to pop a synth to top 'em up) gets problematic.

-- Steve's group usually made it to the final room with about 6 minutes this way.

Our biggest problem was getting to the final room with more than 4 or 5 minutes on the clock. Any suggestions for quicker clearing of previous areas? (I didn't feel like we were being incompetent, and we KNEW we needed to get down there with 7+ mins on the clock - we just couldn't execute, and I can't help feeling like we were going about it wrong, somehow.)

Make Blights your first priority targets in every room. Generous use of supers to clean out the little guys. Weapons with "Crowd Control" are nice too but the ammo expenditure (or even the time taken to pop a synth to top 'em up) gets problematic.

-- Steve's group usually made it to the final room with about 6 minutes this way.

Be aggressive in the Walker room. Make the jump up to the ledges to take out the sniping Vandals. You can lose a lot of time waiting on their bubbles, which they can repop pretty quickly.

It was very tough. A different super might do more damage in a crowded room. Just a thought for next time. Thanks for playing.

Our biggest problem was getting to the final room with more than 4 or 5 minutes on the clock. Any suggestions for quicker clearing of previous areas? (I didn't feel like we were being incompetent, and we KNEW we needed to get down there with 7+ mins on the clock - we just couldn't execute, and I can't help feeling like we were going about it wrong, somehow.)

Vortech, Ehud and I were consistently making it to the final room with about 5 minutes left. As fast as we pushed, we just get their any quicker. 5 minutes turned out to be enough time, but just barely. We finished with 17 seconds to spare. I posted a video in another thread, if you want to see it (we used pretty much the same technique as doooskey.

Be aggressive in the Walker room. Make the jump up to the ledges to take out the sniping Vandals. You can lose a lot of time waiting on their bubbles, which they can repop pretty quickly.

Yup, and taking out the Taken Witches in that room quickly (as they spawn Thralls) pays off too.

-- Steve does have to practice jumps in that room a bit more. Er.

It was very tough. A different super might do more damage in a crowded room. Just a thought for next time. Thanks for playing.

I think this is a big part of success in this mission. It seems supers that excel at crowd control make a huge difference. As tough as the boss himself is, it's actually all the adds that take up most of your time and do most of the damage. We used a Nightstalker/Stormcall/Sunbreaker combo to steamroll as many adds as possible in as little time as possible, then hit the boss with rockets/swords/whatever we had. He drops fairly quickly when you're able to concentrate sustained fire on him for more than a split second at a time.

Our biggest problem was getting to the final room with more than 4 or 5 minutes on the clock. Any suggestions for quicker clearing of previous areas? (I didn't feel like we were being incompetent, and we KNEW we needed to get down there with 7+ mins on the clock - we just couldn't execute, and I can't help feeling like we were going about it wrong, somehow.)

We got to the boss room with about 6:30 on the clock and ended with :40 to spare. The room that is the hardest is the one with the 3 wizards that spawn (Where the spider tank drops in the strike). If you have the Raid fusion rifle (void, extra damage to taken) or Telesto's (void, secondary explosion tons of damage), they really help with the wizards. This room seems to be the one that hurt us the most timewise. We prioritize the wizards/spawn balls in order of how close they are. First thing we did was take out the spawn ball that is near the front, then 1-2 guys focus the wizard at the end of the left tunnel (Again raid/telesto fusion rifles are great here, as 2-3 shadow thralls can be taken out with one volley), then clear the spawn ball in the back left, after that we all 3 focus the middle wizard (who the first guy is whittling down, along with taking out the back spawn ball). Then the 3rd wizard always seems to end up in the right tunnel... We all 3 kill her. Then we had two guys hop up to clear both sets of snipers. If you had high light void snipers... Those might work better on the wizards. We just didn't have them.

In the final room, make sure you come in with full rockets (we used rockets on the boss and spawn balls, but I think I would primarily use them on the boss in the short "no adds" windows). Use a synth if you need to. Also, like Cruel said, you can rotate back the the front cover area when needed. I think the rockets can make the fight shorter, which is why I mention them. They do quick, high damage for those little windows.

The fight is still hectic, but you will have moments of control, and a few moments of no adds where you can rocket the crap out of the boss.

I think if you did this clean with lots of boss damage, it could be done with 5 minutes. That would be tough, but doable.

In the final room, make sure you come in with full rockets (we used rockets on the boss and spawn balls, but I think I would primarily use them on the boss in the short "no adds" windows).

This is also a great suggestion. I used my Year 2 Truth in this encounter, and I think it made a big difference. The boss moves just enough to dodge a lot of non-tracking rockets, and the adds come back quickly enough that Machine guns just don't do enough damage quickly enough. But unloading 6 truth rockets in about 15 seconds put a real dent in his health.

You can clear it with 7 minutes left if you go HAMF.

Be aggressive on everyone. If you have a bubble, shove it in the doorway immediately upon entering. Get a void bow hunter to tether the wizards before they get too far apart. Blast them with void snipers from a distance, or telesto up close. Take care of the blights. They and the wizards share priority number one. Absolutely feel free to blow your supers in this room. Ideally, you'll get them back by the end due to the sheer amount of death you'll be dealing.

Swords do magic on the vandals up top, but sniping them works as well. Get the guy on the left first.

Thanks for the tips. The first run through I used my Nightstalker for the bow super and the second time through I switched to Gunslinger. It was nice taking out the Wizard with one shot in the previous room but yes, lack of area spread from a super does make itself known in the final room.