Last night I spent some time participating in the newest Escalation Protocol event happening in the Sorrow’s Harbor area of the moon. In theory as soon as you port to the area you will be matched up with a group of players also participating in the event. Now last night we had a full group and it went pretty smoothly. This morning I tried a round with less than a full group and we still managed to complete all of the rounds to earn the final chest. In theory this should be a much easier thing to get started than Escalation Protocol. It tells me they maybe took some lessons away from how that event worked and figured out a way to juice the results a bit by allowing us to drop down directly in an area where we are going to see events happening.
At any given point there will be a platform or platforms activated so you can participate simply by hanging out in the near vicinity. The goal is to take out a number of majors that will be spawning and heading towards your platform. Similar to Escalation protocol there is a phase where you have to mix things up a bit where a number of Hive Wizards spawn with shields. In order to break these shields you will need to take out the Hive Knights that spawn in at the same time and use their swords to disrupt the shield similar to the Warsat event in the Archers Line area of the Moon. Each time you successfully defeat all of the Majors within the time limit the Altar event moves to the next Tier, and after Tier V a boss will spawn at the gate to the Shadowkeep.
Similar to Escalation protocol you are chasing a number of weapon drops that apparently change on a daily basis. Yesterday the Rocket Launcher was dropping, and today there will in theory be a completely different drop. Unlike Escalation Protocol these weapons seem to drop each time you get through the final boss. I got a couple of different rolls and managed to pull what I think is the curated Masterwork roll as well. All in all this looks to be a pretty solid rocket launcher thanks to the Cluster Bombs. It doesn’t beat my Bad Omens with both Cluster Bomb and Tracking Module… but it still is a pretty solid option for the Crucible.
I also ran a few rounds of Nightmare Hunts which got me the shotgun essence and it seemingly turned into a pretty solid roll. As much as I like punching things… the One-Two Punch perk seems to be pretty useful. The Magazine holds 8 rounds which is also super nice, placing it as probably my new favorite kinetic slot shotgun. Having threat detector on a shotgun also is super nice for the added reload speed, making this the sort of shotgun that you can bounce around a mob and fire after loading a single round over and over until it is dead. I am still pleasantly surprised at just how damned good the game feels right now, and how much there is to keep doing even though I have been capped in light for weeks.
I did just like you and ran this yesterday as well as this morning. Both times, it went very smoothly. Got some decent gear, so I’m happy. And TONS of candy which helped with those triumphs. Also great for pounding out some bounties thanks to the near-endless stream of baddies to shoot in the crotch.