A Dummy's guide to: The Thorn

Hello fellow guardians, Welcome to a dummy’s guide to the Thorne. This guide will help you trough the steps you need to take to make to obtain the Thorne for yourself. I am aware this might not be the first guide you are using to accomplish your goals, but I still hope it helps you out. These are the steps you will need to take for achieving your goal: 1 Get the bounty. 2 Complete the summoning pits strike. 3 Kill hive. 4 Get void kills in PvP 5 Infuse your gun with light 6 Break bond from Xyor the Unwed. 7 Get your price *Skip to the step you need to complete or read all of my gibberish, your choice. Step 1: Getting the bounty, To get this whole journey started you will need to get the exotic weapon bounty for the Thorn. It is named: A light in the dark. You will receive this bounty from the bounty bot (xander-99-40). Be wary of choosing your bounty, because you get the choice between any of these 3, - A light in the dark (Thorn) - Toland's Legacy (Bad juju) - A Dubious Task (Invective) - A Voice in the Wilderness (Super good advice) - Shattered Memory Fragment (Pocket infinity) You will obtain the Vanguard Mentor Missive, randomly for turning in bounties, and you will need this to chose trigger a set of bounty’s. Step 2: Complete the summoning pits strike on any difficulty. Now you have the bounty you will need to work for your reward. The first part is easy just defeat the summoning pits strike; this can be achieved alone, with friends or in the strike playlists. If you are really having trouble completing this strike, consider getting better gear and a better team or look into the tactics for killing Xyor the Unwed (step 6). Step 3: Kill the hive on the moon Okay you have defeated Phogoth big deal, now you will have to kill some hive, any hive, on the moon. You will need to rack up 500 points doing it, here are the values; - white enemy = 2 points - yellow (Major) = 20 points - Yellow ( Ultra) = 50 points An easy way to rack up points is to play the sword of Crota mission; it took me only 4 times to fill up the points bar. Use heroic for more major enemies to spawn. Step 4: Kill guardians in multiplayer with void damage. So you just killed an unholy amount of hive, well done, you’re halfway now. Your gun is hungry, for fresh guardian souls, so go ahead and feed it. This is the part where some of you got stuck, and where some of you blazed through. Yes its that time again, PvP time! Okay first things first. You are going to need a void weapon in order to complete this bounty part. If you don’t have one, get one! Or two! Get comfy with those guns because you will need to kill a lot with them. Try to get a void weapon for every slot, and change your subclass to void damage. (Too bad hunters). Now here is the math part; for every kill done by Void damage you get 5 points. If you die -2 points. So doing the math right you will need at least 1 kill every 2 deaths. So keep you KD over 0.3 and you should be fine. If you are not able to do this or want to speed up the process take a look at some PvP survival tactics. Here are a few: - Communicate with your team to get the most out of it. - Try to flank or blind the enemy, a gun pointed at you is a dangerous gun. - Don’t waste a super. - Play dirty, be shielded. - Stay in the back of an attack group. Step 5: Infuse your weapon with light. All right you did the PvP part, now go to the speaker and put some bling in that gun. You will need to have a mote of light for this part of the bounty; you can get a mote of light from levelling, as reward, or from engrams. Step 6: Break bonds with Xyor the Unwed. So here we are, at the last part of the bounty. This is the part most people get stuck, and give up. YOU WON’T, because you are going to get your hands on that awesome gun! Do you remember the part about killing Phogoth? Good times right? Well that’s over now. You are going to do this strike on mythic lvl 26 difficulty and might NOT KILL Phogoth!!! You will have to face ‘it ‘ again and stare it down for like 4 waves of enemy’s until XYOR the unwed appears ( say hi from me to him)(( with bullets)). For this strike its recommend that you have at least: - 1 arc damage weapon - 1 solar damage weapon - A level of 26 - A buddy, or two - Some ammo synthesis - Persistence and time If you have made your preparations you are now ready to go and try to face off with Xyor. The whole mission is just like the original strike, only on lvl 26 and with mythic on. When you enter the Gatehouse area you will get your first taste of the stronger enemies. Eliminate them and remember this area, you can use this area to fall back if you need to in the next part. However if you die the enemies you killed will respawn and you will have to deal with them again if you want to make use of this area. The next part is the hardest in my opinion. You will have to wait for your ghost to open up the door, and meanwhile you will have to kill 4 waves of enemies. The hardest of these enemies are the knights with their shield and the unforgiving final wave of wizards. Use your arc weapons on the knights to take of their shield, and don’t let them regenerate it. The wizards are the same story only with solar damage, you will have to decide if it’s safe to follow them when they flee, with their shield down. Try not to take on the whole mass of enemies and use your cover wisely. Also have a fallback location, in case you are overrun or need to take a moment of rest. After the door has opened you won’t have a to hard time getting to Phogoth. When you stand in front of the room leading to Phogoth, you might want to use some ammo synthesis, because you will have an intense battle raging on when you enter the room. After you release Phogoth a few waves of enemies will appear. When the third drop ship arrives, Xyor will appear with a few enemies, as the drop ship unloads. Kill him and this part of the bounty is complete. Following are a few strategies to help you remain alive; - Doorway strategy : This strategy makes use of a flaw commonly found in destiny; enemies won’t follow you into other areas. Basically you will remain in the doorway leading to Phogoth and kill off the enemies there, until the Anti-camp spawns, these are spawning whenever the schrieker appears. When the anti camp triggers you will fall back until you will be in a different area. After a short wait you will be able to take a few shots again. Repeat this until you killed Xyor. Its not adviced that you use this strategy combined with others, since the anti camp spawns in the phogoth area, making it harder for people inside. - Rock steady strategy: This strategy is just a way of using cover. In the far left of the area where Phogoth is are a few rocks, there is also a rock wall which has a pocket in it, you can use this pocket to guard yourself from incoming fire. Every time you want to shoot you are vulnerable to incoming fire, so don’t stick your head out for to long. Try to kill hive wielding boomers and wizards first because their splash damage sometimes finds a way trough your cover. When things get hairy try slipping under the platform next to you, be aware that you can also slide in the abyss attempting this. - Platform hopper strategy: This is a strategy for players who thrive when they are mobile, you use the upper platforms to shield yourself from Phogoth’s beam and use the beams running to the ceiling to protect yourself. Sometimes the enemy will spawn on your platform, in that case kill them quickly or find cover. - Vulture strategy: You strafe around Phogoth, making use of the walls to block his beam. Enemies will appear around you and you will have to be aware of your surroundings. The area where the small enemies( adds) will spawn depends on your location near Phogoth, if you are on his right when he breaks free, the enemies will spawn on the right. If you are on the left, they will spawn on the left. If you are on his back or in front of him the enemies will spawn from both sides, this also happens when you let him break free without triggering it yourself. All described strategies can be done with multiple players, some are not even advised to do without. Eventually you will have to pick a strategy that fits your play style, but remember that when you play co-op your enemies get stronger but you can divide the attention between the players. Step 7: Getting your gun! Okay, you have done it you have nearly completed the bounty; all you have to do now is to get to the speaker, and get your gun. I hope this guide helped you on your journey to your goal. Any reactions to this guide will determine if there will appear others. Suggestions are welcome. - DutchDummy • special thanks: • Abstract_Lfx • Darkchildoflight • Jammychedder98 • A_small_raptor • Destiny official strategy guide • Bungie • Activision