Shadowkeep wasn’t a very popular DLC for PVE in Destiny 2, so Garden of Salvation wasn’t exactly a fan favorite among raids. Its well-known tether mechanic can be very annoying for fire teams that don’t work well together.
But now that Garden of Salvation is part of Destiny 2’s weekly raid rotation, new and experienced players will likely return to this raid to get their weekly rewards. When you do this raid again, there are a few helpful things to remember that will make it easier and faster to finish.
Agree on a tethering order
Players must stand in line to connect from point A to point B. The rope is easy to break and only works within a certain range. This makes it hard for players to form a rope when moving around and changing positions quickly.
Teams that are having trouble with this mechanic can make things easier by agreeing on the order of ropes from the start. This means that when a rope needs to be made, each player will stand in order according to their number. Even if not all six players are needed, some who stand in the rope need to recollect their order, accelerating the process.
Be ready for a lot of ad-clear
Each fight in Garden of Salvation has a lot of ad-clearing, which is a standard part of any raid. Still, it’s rare to see a raid where clearing ads is so important in almost every part of the raid. This means that players need to get ready in the right way. The Witherhoard grenade launcher is one of the best tools for this.
There will also be times when players will have to ad-clear a lot of Vex enemies on their own, so ego and heavy ad-clear builds are important, at least until the final boss fight, since Garden of Salvation doesn’t have a powerful damage check until the final boss fight.
Use swords for jumping puzzles.
Two annoying jumping puzzles in Garden of Salvation are made even harder because players can shoot flowers to make temporary platforms to stand on. This means that getting between these two areas could take a long time and cause some deaths.
If players aren’t sure about their parkour skills, they can wear a sword with the perk “Eager Edge” to help them easily get through these areas. You might also want to change the type of jump in these areas. Since these jumping puzzles are horizontal, players who can jump farther will have an easier time. Icarus Dash can also save the day for Warlocks in this spot.
Watch out for the Overload Champions
Yes, there are champions in the raid, but they only show up in the first fight when players enter the garden. Even though the raid isn’t hard, and players could kill these champions with enough damage, it’s best to have at least one player who can stun Overloads.
This is because overwhelmed minotaurs tend to teleport a lot, making it hard to deal burst damage. Also, they can waste a lot of time if they start to heal while taking damage. Players can buy time with these champions without using Stasis or blinding grenades without putting on a champion mod.
The Mote Banking Phase Is Versatile
During the final boss, players have to teleport to two sides of the map, collect two types of Voltaic motes and put them on the confluxes. This process is very open to change. Players don’t have to wait until one conflux is full. Instead, they can send two people to the left side, and two more go to the right as soon as they return.
You can even send just one person if you need more people to build platforms on the main stadium, and things get too crazy. The most important thing to think about is whether or not the player forwarded in can quickly clear the area of ads and get back in time to deal with the shielded Vex that reaches the confluxes.
Double-tether to the boss for maximum damage
Most players might want to play it safe and choose a simple damage phase in which they only tether one conflux to the supervisor and then deal damage. Still, an organized fire team can do even more damage if they rapidly tether the 2nd conflux to the boss.
This will need planning and great callouts, but if the first tip is followed and the fire team agrees on a tethering order, it will be easy for almost any fire team. With a second rope, the DPS phase lasts longer, so players can do more damage to the boss.
The Best Damage: Precise and Linear Fusions
This might change as the meta changes, but since the start of the Witch Queen era, the easiest way to kill the final boss in Garden of Salvation is to use precision damage on his critical spot, which is his midsection.
For this purpose, snipers and linear fusion rifles work great. Therefore, anyone with a Stormchaser, Cataclysmic, or Izanagi’s Burgen should utilize these weapons. Of course, using the right buffs and debuffs is also important. Use Radiant to do the most damage and Weaken on the boss to remove his buffs and get him ready for damage.
