Destiny: Crota's End - How to defeat Crota, use the Chalice of Light and survive Oversoul

You made it to the final Crota fight after taking down Ir Yut the Deathsinger and dealing with the Liturgy of Ruin.

The bad news is that Crota's the biggest jerk in the whole Raid and you will need to be all-powerful and extremely well-coordinated to take him down. Pop some heavy ammo synthesis and get ready for a big fight.

Note if you're playing the 390 version of the Raid and it's part of the Weekly Featured Raids playlist, you'll have the chance to complete the Crota Challenge for bonus rewards.

How to defeat Crota

Similar to Atheon in the Vault of Glass, Crota is a boss with a lot of tricks up his intergalactic sleeve. Initially you need to summon him, which you do by crowding around the crystal in Ir Yut's chamber. Out on the far side of the arena, visible through the window, you will see pieces of scenery flying together to form spikes, after which Crota will appear in their midst. Closer to home, the forcefields that once enclosed Ir Yut will form up again around you, while Knights and Acolytes will materialise in the rooms beyond them, waiting to attack.

Using the Chalice of Light

The fight will unfold like this. Once the forcefields drop, you need to take out the enemies inside these rooms. After that, one player needs to head down to the ground floor and claim an item called the Chalice of Light from the central altar. Holding the Chalice of Light is the only way to recover health during the Crota fight, so you need to pass it around. Holding it bestows the buff that allows you to recover health, so you don't need to hold it for any length of time. Then you need to take out a Swordbearer who appears on the ground floor and take his sword, which is the only thing that can damage Crota. The player with the sword then needs to wait while the rest of the team takes down Crota's shield using conventional weapons, at which point Crota drops to his knee and the sword player needs to land a few blows and back away again.

Various tough enemies spawn at different stages of this fight too. Knights with super-powerful Boomer weapons appear on the elevated platforms in the left and right corners of the arena, which were safe zones in the Ir Yut fight but now rain death upon you - particularly the sword player if they aren't destroyed. They need to be killed on sight. Occasionally a third Knight also appears there, jumps down and assaults your fireteam. And because the sword disappears after a short period, you also need to wait for additional Swordbearers. Every two Swordbearers, a pair of Ogres spawn and need to be killed.

How to survive Oversoul

It's also very important to remain alive if you can, because although revives are active, death of anyone in the group causes Crota to summon his Oversoul, a giant wall of energy that appears in the sky and will wipe your whole team after a pause. When the Oversoul arrives, concentrate all of your firepower on the sky and you'll hopefully destroy it before you all wipe.

The biggest complicating factor, though, is simply timing. It's difficult to judge the exact window for the player with the sword to approach Crota, because it's hard to guarantee exactly when the shield will go down. The window of opportunity to land blows before Crota recovers is quite small. If you misjudge it and arrive too early or exit too late, Crota will smash the sword-carrying player. Crota also moves around the arena, pausing in spots near to the doorways on the middle platform, forcing your team to move around.

Tips and tricks for the Crota boss fight

There are a few things you can do to help get the rhythm of this fight down, though:

- Initially you can attack the Swordbearer and Crota from upstairs at either of the entrances to the indoor space. As long as the Boomer Knights are dealt with and you stay on the opposite side to Crota, you're pretty safe here and can use the stairs - Defender bubbles are also useful - to attack the Swordbearer.

- Once the Ogres arrive, fall back to the ground floor area where you first entered the arena. From inside the door, you can tackle Swordbearer and Ogres more simply, and the sheer walls on either side of the entrance protect you from Boomer Knights. When the Ogres are down, go back upstairs, but watch out for enemies who have occupied the Ir Yut chambers.

- For the first attack on Crota, use primary weapons and keep the damage flying, because Crota's shield respawns very quickly when gunfire stops. It's a good idea to start with primaries rather than busting out heavy ammo in the first instance, because if things go wrong subsequently then you haven't wasted the rarer stuff, and it will be clearer whether or not this attempt is going well.

- The player with the sword can take advantage of a few spots to get close to Crota and wait for the shield to go down. When Crota is in the position he spawns in, there are little ledges in the rock walls that flank his podium, halfway between the ground and the platform that rings the arena. These ledges make good hidey spots, providing the rest of the team is staying on top of the Boomer Knights.

- As with fights in the Vault of Glass, should you take too long then Crota will reach Enrage state. Once enraged, Crota spams his Oversoul whether someone dies or not. The timing for Enrage seems to be linked to the number of Swordbearers. If you haven't dealt with Crota after five of these swords, he gets impatient and it's Enrage time.

That should be all you need to know. As with the best parts of all Destiny Raid encounters, life or death depends on a mixture of efficient communication, accuracy and timing. Put all these elements together and you should be able to vanquish Crota, leaving you to dance merrily around his arena checking out all your hot new loot.

You can find the rest of our Crota's End guide from the first page of this article. You can also read the rest of our Destiny guide, or when ready to play year two content, our Destiny: The Taken King guide.