How to complete The Core Four (Taniks) challenge in Destiny 2’s Deep Stone Crypt raid

As you approach Taniks, The Abomination for the final encounter of the Deep Stone Crypt raid in Destiny 2, there’s no doubt there’s only one thing on your mind: the guaranteed Deepsight weapon in the final chest. Despite Deep Stone Crypt’s age, releasing with Beyond Light, Bungie is breathing new life into it in season 19 with craftable weapons, new perks and an origin trait for its suite of Legendary loot.

The weekly Deepsight gun of your choice, which is purchased with Spoils of Conquest from that final chest, will be the main appeal for many players tackling this raid in 2022. However, you can guarantee even more loot and some additional shots at Deepsight weapons by completing the rotational challenges in each encounter.

In the final boss fight against Taniks, that challenge is The Core Four. Compared to the previous three challenges available, The Core Four is seen as Deep Stone Crypt’s easiest, making it a stress-free way of doubling your loot once Taniks falls. The increase in rewards is because completion of a raid challenge not only nets you a Triumph toward the Descendant title, but also a second loot chest after the encounter ends.

How to complete The Core Four challenge in Destiny 2

The Core Four challenge in Deep Stone Crypt has a simple requirement: deposit all four of Taniks’ nukes simultaneously, rather than disarming them in two sets of two. A lot of teams run the encounter this way by default, as it reduces the amount of roles to perform and gives you a longer damage phase.

To do this, you will need to quickly destroy all four of Taniks’ vulnerable cores while he is priming them. Each generator destroyed is another nuclear core dropped to the floor, where a player can pick it up and rotate it toward one of the six containers in the arena for disarming. Traditionally, a player with the Scanner role would inform you of the two containers that are active, but when four nukes are being moved, the Scanner role isn’t needed.

This is because the four containers that players need to move the nukes toward will always be the four containers furthest away from where Taniks currently is. Each time he is priming them, he will move toward one of the three sections of the arena—blue, red or spawn—making it easy to gauge which four containers you need to move the nukes to. If Taniks is priming them at spawn, your four carriers will move the nukes to the blue and red sections, for example.

With four players in charge of nuke delivery, the remaining two players on the fireteam take up the responsibilities of Operator and Suppressor. Both of these roles are even more crucial than usual to success now.

The Operator needs to be quick about destroying the bubbles that Taniks locks players in, as the lack of an additional player to relay each core means that the Radiation debuff has a good chance of killing every carrier. Similarly, Suppressor needs to be in position to hit Taniks with the third and final Suppressing shot the moment that the second bubble has been destroyed by the Operator.

Speed is absolutely key here, as any delay on the four cores reaching the containers and being dunked could prove fatal. Assigning the players in your raid team with the highest mobility as your nuke delivery squad can give you a bit more breathing room, avoiding more scenarios where Radiation kills a player before they reach the container.

To save on hectic communication once the four cores have been picked up, splitting the four players into two duos before the start of the encounter can also help. Assign one of these pairs to always go to the two containers that will be to Taniks’ left, while the other pair always goes to Taniks’ right. In the prior example of Taniks charging the nukes at spawn, the first pair will head toward the containers in the blue section to his left and the second pair will make a run for the red area to his right.

Successfully dunk all four cores and Taniks will immediately teleport to the middle of the arena to prepare for the damage phase. This damage phase lasts longer than a traditional one, making The Core Four challenge also grant an easier encounter for teams that struggle to do boss damage.

Repeat the cycle of depositing four cores in each disarmament phase until Taniks is dead and you will handily complete The Core Four challenge and net yourself the bonus loot at the end of the encounter.