How to prepare for Destiny 2: The Final Shape

Destiny 2’s next expansion is within sight, arriving on June 4. The Final Shape is poised to bring the first saga of the franchise to a close, sending players into The Traveler to confront The Witness. The fight ahead is sure to be demanding, but there are some preparations Guardians can take to ensure they have everything they need to take on The Witness and its new Dread forces.

Throughout any given expansion in Destiny 2, new content comes to the game through limited-time events or via the game’s seasons. While Bungie currently makes all seasonal content available through the life of an expansion, seasonal and any lingering limited-time content leaves the game as a new expansion begins. As such, several worthwhile rewards and the activities they’re tied to will retire when The Final Shape releases.

Players have three weeks to hunt down anything they want to take into The Final Shape, and that’s not limited just to the seasonal weapons that’ll become harder to obtain. Destiny’s next expansion is set to change much, from the economy to how Power works. Here’s everything players can do to prepare for The Final Shape.

Benefit from Account-Wide Power

Bungie announced changes to how Power would work in The Final Shape via an April 25, 2024, This Week in Destiny communication. While the news of Fireteam Power, bringing the group up to right around the highest-leveled player’s Power, was cause for celebration, the more significant news arguably was Account-Wide Power.

Account-Wide Power enables players to earn gear at a Power level relevant to their highest-Power character, regardless of which character they play. For example, if a player has a Warlock all 1810 gear, a brand-new Titan would have get drops in the 1800s and Pinnacle rewards at that same 1810. So, what does this mean? Players should make one of each Class, of course.

It would be a massive understatement to say that each of the three Classes plays differently. Though every Class has the same elemental Subclasses available, each vastly differs from the others. Take Strand, for example. As a Warlock, you can create swarms of Threadlings to harass foes. As a Titan, you’re an unkillable melee powerhouse with blades for arms. As a Hunter, you’re a battlefield manipulator with grappling, decoys, and even spinning tops of death. In The Final Shape, players won’t have to stick with one Class just because they haven’t leveled up another.

Farm Exotic armor from Lost Sectors

For years, players have gone to Lost Sectors to farm Exotic armor. Running the daily Lost Sector on Legend or Master difficulty solo rewarded previously unobtained Exotics, with the targeted equipment slot (legs, helmet, arms, etc.) also rotating daily. That’s going away when The Final Shape arrives in favor of Exotic armor acquisition through The Tower’s Cryptarch, Master Rahool.

Bungie outlined the change on May 2, 2024, in a This Week in Destiny communication, noting that Legend and Master solo Lost Sectors would still reward Exotic Engrams but not rolls on specific Exotics. While this change is to support a more seamless path to all Exotic armor, it does mean the process now costs in-game currency (Exotic Ciphers or Ascendant Shards) instead of just effort. In addition, with Rahool’s rework, the newest cross-Class focusing tier won’t be available until after players have maxed out their reputation.

If players haven’t already earned every Exotic armor piece for their favorite Class, or if you’ve taken the above advice and want to earn some free Exotics for a newly made character, it’s worth running Legend or Master solo Lost Sectors. Of course, players need to be able to complete the activity at these higher difficulties, but if possible, the rewards are only limited by how much time you’re willing to invest in farming.

Unlock Season 20-23 crafted weapons

While the weapons from Seasons 20-23 won’t go away when The Final Shape launches, the activities that reward them will be culled from the game. Every craftable weapon from the Lightfall seasons isn’t a top pick, but some excellent weapons have emerged over the expansion. Plus, as Bungie showed by sunrising weapons players never thought they’d see again, you should never wholly count a weapon out.

Craftable weapons are attractive because players can custom-tune their rolls at will. And with the way Destiny 2 is constantly changing, always buffing and nerfing Perks, there’s the chance something once passed over will become meta. As such, players can make the case for wanting every crafting option available. Even without living in a world of speculation, some weapons are standouts right now. Some recommended priorities would be:

• Season 20’s Regnant Void grenade launcher
• Season 20’s Raconteur Stasis bow
• Season 21’s Rapacious Appetite Stasis submachine gun
• Season 22’s The Eremite Solar fusion rifle
• Season 22’s Kept Confidence Strand hand cannon
• Season 22’s Semiotician Strand rocket launcher
• Season 23’s Scatter Signal Strand fusion rifle
• Season 23’s Appetence Stasis trace rifle
• Season 23’s Subjunctive Arc submachine gun
• Season 23’s Doomed Petitioner Void linear fusion rifle

As a bonus, not only did Bungie make all Lightfall seasonal content available for free until The Final Shape, but players can also get one free random Deepsight blueprint per Season per day by completing an associated seasonal activity.

Complete Riven’s Wishes

As part of the conclusion to Season 23, Bungie introduced Riven’s Wishes, a series of quests centered around the Dreaming City that rewarded cosmetic holiday Mementos, craftable Raid weapon blueprints, and other goodies. Each of the six Riven’s Wishes quests can be completed relatively quickly, and the reward options make them more than worth the time to complete. Best of all, Riven’s Wishes are available to all players for free, and some may even lead you toward other rewards, like those free daily Deepsight weapons.

Earn Exotic weapons from Lightfall Exotic missions

Like seasonal activities, Exotic missions often depart when a new expansion is released. This will be true for Lightfall Exotic missions like Whetstone, Starcrossed, and NODE.OVRD.AVALON. Each rewards an Exotic weapon, with Whetstone offering Wicked Implement, Starcrossed providing Wish-Keeper, and NODE.OVRD.AVALON rewarding Vexcalibur.

As all Lightfall seasonal content is accessible to players until its removal, any Guardians who didn’t snag these Exotics should prioritize it before the release of The Final Shape. While Bungie will likely make these Exotic weapons available through other means, the only options would be for in-game currency at The Tower’s Monument to Lost Light or via the weekly rotating Exotic mission. If players can claim these weapons on their own terms, they should.

Stack Engrams for Master Rahool’s reputation change

If players want to access new Exotics and focusing options as they release in The Final Shape, they’ll have to work on building reputation with Master Rahool. Reputation is earned by decoding Engrams with the Cryptarch, with higher tiers of focusing rewarding more rep. Of course, Bungie expected players to try to maximize their reputation as soon as the new expansion was released, so the studio noted how fast one could feasibly reset Rahool’s reputation track.

In the May 2, 2024, This Week in Destiny post, Bungie noted, “So, if you want to be ready for the Witness’s forces as soon as possible, make sure to stock up on Exotic engrams and Ascendant Shards before June 4, as with a little more than a full stock of Exotic engrams you’ll be able to start focusing new armor.” I’ll echo Bungie’s statement and recommend that, if possible, players hold a complete trove of Exotic Engrams for The Final Shape‘s launch to hasten the Cryptarch’s reputation grind.

Unlock all Subclass Aspects and Fragments

While the new Prismatic Subclass will seemingly provide some Aspects and Fragments in its own right, every other Subclass sells its Aspects, Fragments, and abilities for in-game currency. It’s not clear if already-obtained additional Aspects and Fragments that work with Prismatic will also be included or if they’ll have their own acquisition path. Regardless, it can’t hurt to strengthen your other Light and Darkness Subclasses.

Aspects, Fragments, and abilities for the Light subclasses can be purchased from Ikora Rey in The Tower, with the Exo Stranger handling Stasis on Europa and Neomuna’s Pouka Pond selling Strand. Everything aside from Strand can be purchased for Glimmer, with Strand Meditations (earned by using Strand or through various Neomuna activities) being the currency at the Pouka Pond.

Buying the Subclass elements isn’t a problem for most players; it’s unlocking the Subclass itself. Though all Light Subclasses are available for free to all players, Stasis and Strand are behind the Beyond Light and Lightfall campaigns specifically. Thankfully, Bungie opened free access to Shadowkeep, Beyond Light, and The Witch Queen, with PlayStation Players also getting Lightfall through PlayStation Plus. So, at minimum, Stasis is available to all players through Beyond Light, and Strand is free for PlayStation players.

Nab Exotic weapons from unowned expansions

This goes hand-in-hand with the above recommendation to unlock Stasis if players haven’t had the opportunity before. While the Shadowkeep, Beyond Light, and The Witch Queen campaigns stay free after The Final Shape launches, other content like Dungeons and Raids will become part of a separate pack sold instead of the expansion. Currently, however, these expansions are in complete open access, meaning players can engage with all the content associated with that expansion.

This presents an opportunity for players who don’t already own these expansions to earn some of their best rewards before the content becomes paid again. Bungie even helped PlayStation put together a blog post telling players how to make the most of this free access, recommending that players hunt down powerful Exotic weapons like Divinity and Xenophage.

Farm shiny Brave weapons

For any spot in a player’s armory that an Exotic or crafted weapon hasn’t filled, the Brave weapons likely have you covered. These are a collection of some of the most beloved weapons from across the Destiny franchise, all recently reintroduced as part of the Into the Light content update. While these weapons and the accompanying Onslaught horde mode will stick around after Into the Light releases, the shiny variants of these weapons will not.

After players complete an associated quest for each Brave weapon, there’s a slim chance a shiny variant will drop instead of the regular version. There’s no mechanical difference between shiny and non-shiny Brave weapons other than the fact that they come with double Perk options. But if players want to hunt their ideal rolls on these shiny variants, it’ll only be possible until The Final Shape releases.

Spend Legendary Shards

Bungie announced last September that Legendary Shards would no longer be an in-game currency when The Final Shape launches. Since then, the number of things players can spend Legendary Shards on has dwindled, but the number of Shards players earn from dismantling items and other sources has mostly stayed the same. As such, spending all of your Legendary Shards before they’re gone may be easier said than done, especially if you’re a longtime player.

The most straightforward transaction to make is 10 Legendary Shards for 10,000 Glimmer at The Tower’s Cryptarch, Master Rahool, but that will only get you so far. The Glimmer cap is 500,000, and if you play even moderately, you’ll still find yourself sitting on a potential mountain of Legendary Shards even after you’ve topped off your Glimmer. Guardians can spend some of that Gimmer on Ascendant Shards using 10 Enhancement Prisms and 50,000 Glimmer per and buying more Enhancement Prisms as needed. From there, Legendary Shards come back int the picture by replenishing the Glimmer needed to make these transactions. That said, you’ll need an excess of Enhancement Cores to make this worthwhile.

Alternatively, players can head to the Moon and over to Eris Morn’s Lectern of Enchantment. There, players can convert 10 Legendary Shards into a Phantasmal Fragment. These will still be in-game after The Final Shape and can be exchanged for Glimmer as Legendary Shards have been with Master Rahool.