Beating the Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst challenge will get you and your fireteam some extra loot for conquering Rhulk in the Vow of the Disciple Raid. Slaying Rhulk generally requires coordination, careful movement and reliable damage output from all players, so an additional challenge on top of all that might seem like a serious complication, but the Looping Catalyst Raid challenge is actually very simple. If you and your Raid team are ready to get the Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst challenge done, we’ve got everything you need to know right here.
Raid challenges rotate each week, and there’s one for all four of the main Vow of the Disciple encounters. Check out our guides for the others if you need them help:
- Destiny 2 Swift Destruction challenge - Acquisition
- Destiny 2 Base Information challenge - Caretaker
- Destiny 2 Defenses Down challenge - Exhibition
Here's how to access and complete the Destiny 2 Preservation mission and puzzle.
The Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst challenge requires your team to never lose the Leeching Force buff during the first phase of the Rhulk boss fight – that’s the part where you must deposit buffs into the symbol totems to push Rhulk and his bubble back and you might have to do it up to three times depending on how much damage you deal to Rhulk.
Leeching Force can be lost if all players with the buff die, the buff’s timer expires, or all players convert their Leeching Force into Emanating Force by standing in Rhulk’s beam attack. To keep things simple and minimize the risk of failing the Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst challenge, we recommend you deposit one Emanating Force buff at a time.
This might sound a little complicated, but it’s surprisingly easy because you just have to complete this first phase of the Rhulk boss fight in the normal way, ensuring there are no mistakes. If Leeching Force is entirely lost during this phase, you’ll see the ‘Challenged failed’ message appear in the text feed and Rhulk will spawn another big crystal above himself. Your team will need to wipe to reset the Looping Catalyst challenge and start the Rhulk fight again.
How to complete the Destiny 2 Vow of the Disciple Rhulk challenge
These are the broad strokes of how to complete the Looping Catalyst challenge while fighting Rhulk:
- Destroy crystals to get the Leeching Force buff
- Read symbols that appear to find a matching pair
- Use Rhulk's quad-laser to convert Leeching Force into Emanating Force
- Deposit Emanating Force at the totem with the symbol identified in 2
- Repeat six times until Rhulk’s bubble is pushed all the way back
Obviously, there's more to it than that, so let's take a look at the finer details below.
Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst Raid challenge guide
Here’s how your team can run the first phase of the Rhulk boss fight with no mistakes, which will also complete the Destiny 2 Looping Catalyst challenge.
- To start things off, Player 1 stands on the central plate and destroys the big crystal above Rhulk to get the Leeching Force buff.
- Player 1 remains on the plate to summon two smaller crystals on either side of Rhulk. Players 2 and 3 must destroy a crystal each to both get Leeching Force and remove it from Player 1, who can now step off the central plate.
- All players must now focus on killing the two Glyphkeepers that will appear on the left and right sides of the arena. Players 5 and 6 should only focus on clearing enemies for the rest of this phase to protect their teammates.
- Once the Glyphkeepers are dead, the players need to read the two sets of symbols that appear above the nearby pillars and determine which symbol is the same across both sets – you’ll need to remember it for the rest of this phase!
- Player 2 needs to follow where Rhulk teleports and jump inside his quad-laser beam attack to convert their Leeching Force buff into Emanating Force. All other players must avoid this attack, especially the other player with Leeching Force.
- Player 4 must now read the symbols on the six totems around the arena and tell Player 2 which one has the common symbol from earlier on it. Player 2 then needs to run up to the correct totem and deposit their Emanating Force buff.
- Meanwhile, Player 3, who has Leeching Force, must now stand on the central plate to summon two more small crystals which need to be destroyed by Player 2 after they’ve deposited their Emanating Force and Player 1. This will give Leeching Force back to Players 1 and 2, and Player 3 can step off the central plate.
- Go back to step 5 and repeat these steps – bear in mind that Players 1 and 3 will switch their roles for each Emanating Force that gets deposited – until you’ve deposited six Emanating Force buffs in total and Rhulk’s bubble has been pushed all the way back, allowing you to begin phase two of the Vow of the Disciple boss fight.
- Bonus optional step: After your team deposits the fourth Emanating Force buff, Players 2 and 3 can both get Emanating Force from Rhulk’s laser while Player 4 looks for the two totems with the correct symbol. The Emanating Force players can then deposit the fifth and sixth buffs simultaneously to save time. This will not fail the Looping Catalyst challenge as the next phase of the Rhulk fight will start as soon as six Emanating Forces have been deposited.
Remember, this is just one of three phases that repeat until Rhulk dies or becomes Enraged and insta-kills the team, so you’ll need to follow these steps several times to defeat Rhulk and complete the challenge. Thankfully, you can do the next phase and the damage phase for the Rhulk fight normally, and then you’ll be back at step 1 once Rhulk has become immune after the damage phase. Defeat Rhulk and complete the Looping Catalyst challenge to get a Triumph and extra Vow of the Disciple Raid loot for your efforts.
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