Season of the Lost

Arbalest is the NEW KING of PVE content (How to get Arbalest Catalyst & Builds) in Destiny 2

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Arbalest has been upgraded in the recent Sandbox Update that coincided with the 30th Anniversary patch. Arbalest is now an absolute beast and one of the best weapons for Nightfall content in Season of the Lost. Today I’m going to check out Arbalest, why it’s top-tier, plus put together a Nightfall Build for Season of the Lost, so you’ll be able to run through those GMs with ease.

Arbalest wasn’t being used much until recently, and you can tell it’s now top-tier because I’ve started seeing LFG posts saying “Must have Arbalest”… which is high praise indeed and reminiscent of the old Gjallarhorn days.

Let’s remind ourselves about Arbalest. It’s an Exotic Kinetic Linear Fusion Rifle.

Compounding Force – Fires slugs that cause massive damage to elemental shields of enemy combatants.

Disruption Break – Breaking an enemy’s shield with this weapon makes them more vulnerable to Kinetic damage for a brief period.

Here’s a couple of reasons why it’s recently become in demand.

Bungie Changes

  • Linear Fusion Rifle – Increased PvE damage by 10%.
  • Arbalest – Now has intrinsic anti-barrier.

The fact this one now has intrinsic anti-barrier means you’ll be ripping off the shields of enemies in Grandmaster Nightfalls or other high-end PVE content in no time at all. Anti-Barrier Champions are no longer going to be a problem. This is better than Eriana’s Vow as it only takes a single shot, where at EV took up to 3.

We also have Disruption Break, where if you break an enemy’s shield with Arbalest, follow-up shots are going to cause more damage. Given Arbalest is a kinetic weapon itself, that means if you tear off the shield on an Anti-barrier champion, then your follow-up shots are going to cause even more damage, meaning the Champions aren’t going to be living very long at all.

Plus we have that 10% flat damage increase in PVE content to all linear fusion rifles. This is before taking into account Particle Deconstruction, which is perhaps the best mod in the game right now and the reason why you see so many fusion and linear fusion rifles all over the place.

This is made even better by the catalyst, which I’ll get into now.

How to get the Arbalest Catalyst

You can get the catalyst from doing playlist activities like Strikes, Crucible, and Gambit. Unfortunately, it’s don to RNG whether this drops for you, but it does drop in playlists, so keep grinding those out and it’ll drop for you eventually. Once you have the catalyst level it up in the best way you see fit, whether that’s the Shuro Chi checkpoint in the Last Wish Raid, or somewhere else, just level it up by getting kills with it as quickly as you can, as you are going to want to get the bonus perk.

What the Arbalest Catalyst does

As well as the regular Orb generation, you’ll get extra handling and an increase to the magazine size, PLUS you also get Genesis. This means when you break a shield, the magazine is going to be filled from reserves. Given these benefits, you’ll want to be getting the catalyst ASAP.

Arbalest Nightfall Build

This is what I have been using for GMs since the 30th Anniversary Sandbox patch and it’s been working pretty well for me. This is mainly about the weapon combinations, and I’ve put together a

Subclass & Exotic Armour

Here’s a few suggestions, and you can pick and choose depending on which class you like to play as.

Titan – Top Tree Sentinel & Helm of Saint 14

Top tree void gives you a bubble which could come in handy in end game PVE content, whether its for you or cover for your fireteam. Helm of Saint 14 helps with that, and blind any enemies who enter the bubble, plus gives allies an overshield.

Hunter – Bottom Tree Nightstalker & Omnioculus

This has been my go to pick for Hunters this season, with the double invis grenades provided by Omnioculus. Plus you get the multiple arrows from your super which can gives you that big DPS.

Warlock – Middle Tree Dawnblade & Phoenix Protocol

Phoenix Protocol and middle tree Dawnblade are pretty much unmatched when it comes to utility in the game, and when you’re running through GMs or high end PVE content, you always need a well.

Weapons

Kinetic – Arbalest

Not much more needs to be said about this one. If you don’t have it, then you can get it from Xur at the weekends when he arrives on EDZ, Nessus or the Tower dishing out Exotic loot.

Energy – Wolftone Draw

Wolftone draw is a bow from Season of the Lost. It deals arc damage and if you can get a roll with explosive head, then it’s like a mini-Trinity Ghoul. Get this one from Astral Alignment chests or Umbral Engrams.

Power – Threaded Needle

A good Threaded Needle with Vorpal Weapon is nearly unmatched in the legendary heavy slot at the moment, mainly due to particle deconstruction this season.

Mods

  • Protective Light – When your sheilds are broken you get increased damage resistance.
  • Elemental Charge – Get charged with light by picking up elemental wells
  • Elemental Ordnance – Create Elemental Wells with grenade kills
  • Font of Wisdom – Grants a temporary significant increase to super regeneration speed.
  • Particle Deconstruction – Bonus damage to fusions and Linear fusions
  • Overload Bow & Unstoppable Fusion – For Champions

Let me know what you think about the buff to Arbalest, and share your PVE builds in the comments.

That’s it for this look at Arbalest in Destiny 2. For more Destiny 2 content like this check out This Week In Video Games on YouTube and subscribe today.