Destiny 2’s Black Armour expansion is the first bit of content we get as part of Forsaken’s expansion pass, and there’s quite a bit to unpack here. A crucial part of the new questlines involves you finding new forges, and then getting to them—in this guide, we deal with how to clear the Volundr Forge (we’ve already talked about getting to it in a previous guide), and how to get to the Gofannon Forge.

CLEARING VOLUNDR FORGE

Clearing the Volundr Forge the first time you get to it can be difficult. The easiest way to sidestep this difficulty is to have a fire team of a full three players, with each of them at a Light Level of 600-630 (the higher the better, naturally). After this, just follow these steps:

• Focus on the blueberries, taking them out to get the batteries
• Two people should focus on taking out the enemies, while one focuses on charging the forge with the batteries
• Use your regular ammo against the enemies, saving the Heavy Ammo for the boss
• Once the third wave is complete, move to near the ledge you used to get to the Forge, and take out the drones. At this point, the boss shows up, and you know what to do here

Furthermore, you can check out the video below to know some of the best strategies to complete this Forge.

GOFANNON FORGE

• To start this quest, get the Stolen Black Armory Gear. You can get this by killing Dreg and Captains
• Speak with Ada
• Collect 35 Tainted Gear
• Complete the quest “Needle in a Tangled Shore”
• Complete the quest “Scourge of the Armoury”
• Complete the quest “Sivik’s Delivery Note”
• Go to Artifact’s Edge on Nesus, and enter the broken ship. Follow the corridor to its end to emerge in Gofannon Forge.

Furthermore, you can check out the video below to know some of the best strategies to complete this Forge.

Destiny 2’s Black Armory content is now slowly rolling out, and if you need help finding your way around it, we’re here with this guide to show you what to do, and help find your way.

LEVELING

Black Armory raises the Power Level to 650. If you own the Annual Pass, but are under 550, you will see an increase in Prime Engrams, which will help you boost your Power Level up to 600+ with greater ease than you would be able to otherwise. Another leveling tip we will share is to grind the Blind Well in the Dreaming City—it’s a tough activity, but the payout is worth it.

HOW TO GET POWERFUL DROPS

Given the high Power level requirement demanded by Black Armory, you’re gonna want to be on the lookout for gear that boosts your powerful level. Doing certain activities, thankfully, is more rewarding than others in this regard. The following activities usually give you drops that are more powerful and will help you get to higher Power levels quickly.

• Gambit usually gives you drops for gear at +3/4 Power level in weekly bounties, or +2 when you rank up.
• Last Wish activities usually give yield gear at +2/3 Power level.
• Dreaming City also drops gear at +2/3 Power level most of the times, but can drop higher Power level gear as well. Exotics gained from Ascendant challenge bounties are at +6 power level, while gear gained from Dreaming City weekly activities is at +5 power level.
• Exotic drops in general can boost your Power level by anywhere between +3 to +7.
• Weekly and daily Crucible gear drops at +2/3 Power level.
• Flashpoint gear drops at +2/3 Power level.
• Nightfall gear drops at +2/3 Power level.
• Pre-Black Armory Exotic quests award gear at +3 Power level.

Thanks, Reddit user James_Sells.

Destiny 2’s Black Armory has begun a soft rollout, meaning we are beginning to see new content that is associated with it begin to be added to the game. This guide quickly deals with some of this new content.

FORGE SABOTEUR LOCATIONS

These are a new enemy type that have begun to show up in the game recently. They only show up in a few places, and can drop the new Season of the Forge weapons upon being defeated. This is where you may find them.

• Hallows: Nessus
• The Gulch: European Dead Zone
• Outskirts: European Dead Zone
• Artifact’s Edge: Nessus

GETTING THE WEAPON CORE

You need to get the Weapon Core to be able to make the Basic Machine Gun Frame. To get this core, you need two Black Armory crates. The video below shows you exactly where to find these crates. Once you do, your can move on to getting the Basic Machine Gun Frame (a quest that ends with the Forge being lit, and giving you the Mysterious Box Exotic item).

Black Armor is now available for Destiny 2’s Season Pass owners, and brings with it a host of new activities, items, and quests. In this guide, we look at some of them.

MYSTERIOUS BOX

The Mysterious Box is an Exotic item that is tied to an unknown quest. But getting it is relatively easy:

• Complete enough quests that you have access to the Forge at Smidur’s Cavern
• Head over to the Sunken Islands, and begin tracking the activity Black Armory Machine Gun Frame
• When you arrive at Smidur’s Cavern and the Forge, jump down on to the platform below, and walk into the cave
• In the back of the cave there is a cache, where you can get the Mysterious Box

ACTIVATING FORGE IGNITION

1. From the Spider in the Tangled Shore collect the Black Armory Badge
2. Enter the Black Armor area through The Tower
3. Get the Basic Machine Gun Frame from Ada-1
4. Farm Compound Ether
5. Get Weapon Core from the EDZ
6. Now, score 50 Power Weapon kills against Hive
7. And then score 15 Power Weapon multikills
8. Using Power Weapons defeat 25 Powerful Enemies
9. Collect 20 Radiant Seeds
10. Get the Radiant Machine Gun Frame from Ada-1
11. This unlocks the Forge Ignition Event (and you can now get the Mysterious box!)

Clans go back to the original Destiny, but they were far more limited then. They have been formalized in Destiny 2, to allow for groups of players to get comfortable with one another, and keep playing. Clans are also a great way for you to be able to find a squad for a Raid or a Nightfall Strike, in case you have mostly played the game solo.

Okay, so let’s walk you through some stuff:

• Once you are a part of a Clan, go talk to Hawthorne, and equip your Clan banner
• Once you have your Clan Banner, you start earning more collective perks and bonuses as your clan grows in power:
  • Level 2 – Gain additional Glimmer from engrams.
  • Level 3 – Public events rewards are increased.
  • Level 4 – Eliminating Cabal results into better awards
  • Level 5 – Get reputation tokens when completing activities.
  • Level 6 – Receive engram when completing playlist activities along with a clan member
• Clan Members will earn up to a weekly maximum of Clan XP every week. You can get Clan XP in the following ways, while part of a clan:
  • Crucible games will net you 500XP
  • Patrol activities will bet you 250XP
  • If you finish a story mission you will get 500XP
  • Adventure will net you 500XP

Joining a Clan

Okay, all that is well and good, but… how do you join a clan to begin with? As it turns out, there are a few methods, but, in true Destiny fashion, they are every bit as obtuse and obfuscated as you might imagine.

• First, let’s start with the (what I think is) the only way to join a clan in game- if you are playing with someone who is in a clan, you can pull up their menu, and select Join Clan. Depending on what the Clan’s membership is (Open, Review, By Invite Only), you will join right away, pending a review by the admin, or not at all
• The easiest way to join clans is via the smartphone app- select a player, and ‘Join Clan’, or alternatively, accept an invite you have received to join one
• You can join by directly going to a clan’s webpage on Bungie’s website, as long as you know the URL- to ask for a clan member to share the URL, ask them to go to ‘My Clan’ on the Bungie site.

Yeah, like I said, this is needlessly complex- but stick with it! Clans make Destiny 2 far more fun than it would be otherwise.

Guided Games

Guided Games is a new feature introduced instead of traditional matchmaking for a clan to guide players through end game content (such as raids)- an excellent way for you to be able to engage in content you might not have been able to otherwise, if you don’t have enough friends playing it.

The Seeker is the clan member who will initiate the search for the guided. There are some requirements here:

• The seeker needs to meet the level requirements of the activity they want to guide the guided through
• The seeker needs a Guided Game Ticket, which is a consumable item
• The guided needs to meet the minimum power level of the necessary activity as well

Guided Game Tickets can be received from the Postmaster at the farm. Note that there will be a ‘score’ (similar to your Reputation on Xbox Live) that will keep track of your behavior and etiquette- how likely you are to play nice and help out, that sort of thing. This is called the Oathkeeper Score. So- don’t engage in Guided Games unless you are willing to commit to sticking around for the game session- things like rage quitting have penalties associated with them.

Engrams are basically loot drops- you get these decrypted, and you earn gear and rewards. This guide is a quick runthrough of what each Engram type is, and the best way to farm Bright Engrams- the currency needed to obtain things like the Sparrow Vehicle in the game.

Bright Engrams – These need to be decrypted by Tess Everis. These can be purchased by using Silver. This engram consists of many rewards such as ghosts, ornaments, shaders, mods, ships, emotes and other stuff.

White Engrams – Available duing beginning of the game but near the end game, White Engram drops are mostly consumables. Gear you get from these Engrams only has slot for one additional perk.

Green Engrams– These are the most common Engram types, and they get you a piece of armor at Green or higher rarity. They give you two slots for perks in addition to their intrinsic perk.

Yellow Engrams – You can mode these using ornaments.  Exotic Gear is hugely powerful, extremely specialized, has four perk slots, plus extremely powerful intrinsic perks built in.

Blue Engrams – These are also automatically decrypted (tough sometimes you may find ones that need to be decrypted, which have a small chance of giving you a Legendary or Exotic); these offer three additional slots for perks.

Purple Engrams – These will lead to Legendary gear, which have three perk slots, and extremely high power.

FARMING FOR BRIGHT ENGRAMS

• You get Silver each time you level up past the XP level cap of Level 20- this Silver can be exchanged for Bright Engrams
• You can purchase Bright Engrams via microtransactions
• Just… play through the game, and you should get at least some of them

In Destiny, a lot of your gears and abilities are tied to your character’s overall ‘XP Level’. Additionally, the best game content- the endgame content- is only available for players who have hit the level cap of 20. Then, on the other end, we have your Power Level, which determines your overall effectiveness in combat.

It is clear that you should work on raising both these values and hitting the level cap as soon as you can- the question is, how, exactly, do you do that?

That’s where we come in.

Raising Your XP Level

Raising your XP level may seem daunting – it looks like it takes forever to level up, and with a cap of 20, you might expect that you are expected to spend a long time hitting it- but it really is not that hard to raise it (in just a few hours of play, I was already at Level 10). Your XP level increases for kills and events you participate in- so the best way to raise it is to just play the game, and to focus on the campaign (since it has a lot of XP gains). While playing the campaign missions, if you encounter an event, go participate in it! That will give you some good XP too (and also some good high level loot).

Raising Your Power Level

Power Level is a composite average of the defense and attack ratings of all the equipment you have on- in simpler terms, it is dependent entirely on what gear you equip, and is a quick summation of how effective that gear is. Power Level gates end game content like Nightfall Strikes and Raids, and has a soft cap of 260, with a hard cap of 300.

Really, there’s not much I can suggest here- this is dependent on your gear, so my advice is to equip the best gear possible? On the whole, remember that the higher level your gear is, the better your Power Level will be- so focus on that, and you should be able to hit the soft cap of 260 reasonably soon, at least.

Hunters may be the hardest class to play, if only because they are easy to take down, but they can be truly fulfilling if you master them. Hunters move quick, have a fancy triple jump, and can therefore dodge incoming attacks and projectiles far better than the other two classes. the trade-off, as implied before, is lower health.

If you prefer melee play (which really, you shouldn’t be playing as a Hunter if you do, but okay), select the Arcstrider subclass for the Gambler’s Dodge, which allows for better melee play. For ranged combat, select Gunslinger, so you get Marksman’s Dodge.

Hunters have three sub-classes:

• Arcstrider
• Gunslinger
• Nightstalker

ARCSTRIDER

• Allows for High Jump, Strafe Jump, and Triple Jump
• Specializations: Way of the Warrior (a balanced build for melee and movement) and Way of the Wind (emphasis on movement)
• Super: Arc Staff (create and defeat enemies with a staff made of pure energy)
• Grenade Type: Arc (with Skip, Flux, and Arcbolt variants)

GUNSLINGER

• Specializations: Way of the Outlaw (increase the length of your team’s kill streaks and on the amount of enemies killed with the Golden Gun) and Way of the Sharpshooter (increase  the duration of your Golden Gun and increase its damage)
• Super: Golden Gun (summon a flashing pistol to disintegrate enemies)
• Grenade Type: Solar Grenade (with Swarm, Incendiary, and Tripmine variants)
• Allows for High Jump, Strafe Jump, and Triple Jump

NIGHTSTALKER

• Allows for High Jump, Strafe Jump, and Triple Jump
• Specializations: Way of the Trapper (To track and mark enemies) and Way of the Pathfinder (To take enemies out)
• Super: Shadowshot (Ensnare enemies with conjured Void achors)
• Grenade Type: Void (Voidwall, Vortex, and Spike variants)

Warlocks are great for players who just want a good all round character- they have great offensive and support capability, they have some pretty good movement range, good health and shields, and they can lend themselves to almost any style of play.

Both your abilities for subclassses- Voidwalker’s Nova Bomb and Dawnblade’s Daybreak- are hugely offensive, and especially useful for when you are battling mobs, or high end enemies. Additionally, you also get Area of Effect abilities- Empowering Rift that raises attack for you, and every other team member who stands within it, and Healing Rift, which heals everyone who stands within it.

That’s not all, either- you also get multiple jump options. You can get gliding, air dash, air strafing, as well as the ability to be a marksman while in the air. For this, the best option is to try the different kinds of jumps out for yourself and see which one works for you the best.

Warlocks have three sub-classes:

• Dawnblade
• Voidwalker
• Stormcaller

DAWNBLADE

• Allows for Controlled Glide, Balanced Glide, and Focused Burst
• Super: Daybreak (create a sword of fire and take out enemies, Azor Ahai style)
• Grenade Type: Solar (with Solar, Firebolt, and Fusion variants)
• Specializations: Attunement of the Flame (take enemies out with harder hitting attacks) and Attunement of the Sky (emphasis on movement)

STORMCALLER

• Allows for Controlled Glide, Balanced Glide, and Focused Burst
• Specializations: Attunement of Ions (make your energy attacks more powerful) and Attunement of Elements (makes your support abilities more powerful)
• Super: Stormtrance (basically, this is force lightning)
• Grenade Type: Arc (with Pulse, Arcbolt, and Storm variants)

VOIDWALKER

• Allows for Controlled Glide, Balanced Glide, and Focused Burst
• Specializations: Attunement of Chaos (makes the Nova Bomb slower but more hard hitting) and Attunement of Hunger (makes the Nova Bob faster but less powerful)
• Super: Nova Bomb (throw a devastating energy bomb at enemies and destroy everything caught in its wake)
• Grenade Type: Void (with Vortex, Scatter, and Axion Bolt variants)

Titans are arguably the best class for newcomers- they can take a beating, they have a lot of health, and their abilities are tailored to get them through sticky situations. The trade off here is that what you get early on is what you get, period- and that, of course, they don’t lend themselves as well to mobility.

When playing as a Titan, you can either play as a Stroker, which gets you the hugely offensive Fists of Havoc ability, or you can play as a Sentinel, which gives you the Sentinel’s Shield, which blocks all incoming shots for your team. I would recommend the Sentinel, if only to have a more balanced build.

Titans have three sub-classes:

• Striker
• Sentinel
• Sunbreaker

SUNBREAKER

• Grenade Type: Solar (with Incendiary, Thermite, and Fusion variants)
• Allows for High Lift, Strafe Lift, and Catapult Lift
• Specializations: Fire-Forged (emphasis on your Super’s offensive capabilities) and Code of the Aggressor (emphasis on area of effect abilities)
• Super: Hammer of Sol (Conjure fire hammers to throw at your enemies)

STRIKER

• Allows for High Lift, Strafe Lift, and Catapult Lift
• Specializations: Code of the Juggernaut (emphasis on melee attacks) and Code of the Earthshaker (get the Shoulder Charge)
• Super: Fist of Havoc (slam the ground for a devastating attack)
• Grenade Type: Solar (with Solar, Firebolt, and Fusion variants)

SENTINEL

• Super: Sentinel Shield (negate all incoming damage)
• Allows for High Lift, Strafe Lift, and Catapult Lift
• Specializations: Code of the Protector (melee attacks get Support abilities) and Code of the Aggressor (emphasis on offense)
• Grenade Type: Void (with Magentic, Voidwall, and Supressor variants)