Grandmaster Nightfalls are back in Destiny 2 for Season of Plunder, and will be available until Season 19 starts on Dec. 6. If you’re eager to jump in with a Fireteam, you’re going to need to know what Champions and shields you’ll be facing, and which Nightfall is available in a given week. Basically, you need a calendar — which is where we come in.
In this Destiny 2 guide, we’ll walk you through which Grandmaster Nightfalls are available this season, how to get into them, when each will be available, and what they can drop.
What are Grandmaster Nightfalls?
Grandmaster Nightfalls are a handful of hyper-difficult Strikes that you and your Fireteam can jump into each season. In Season of the Plunder, there are six Grandmaster Nightfalls:
- The Glassway
- The Lightblade
- Fallen S.A.B.E.R.
- The Disgraced
- Exodus Crash
- The Devil’s Lair
These Nightfalls require careful crafting of builds and are packed to the gills with Champions. Thankfully, they offer some of the most potent rewards in the game, including Adept weapons and rare crafting materials like Ascendant Shards.
The active Grandmaster Nightfall will rotate each week, and offer a specific Nightfall reward on completion. Some weeks, Bungie will offer double rewards for completing Grandmasters.
The catchup node
To complete the Conqueror Seal — and then to gild it in following seasons — you’ll need to complete all six Grandmaster Nightfall strikes before the season ends. However, you don’t need to login each week in order to accomplish this.
In the Vanguard Operations menu, you can select a special catchup node at the start of each season, which will allow you to select a seasonal Nightfall of your choosing, regardless of the week. However, once you’ve completed a Nightfall, you won’t be able to use the catchup node to access it again. This is to prevent players from only grinding the easiest Strike in the bunch.
The catchup node does allow you to knock out all of the Grandmaster Nightfalls in a single week, if that’s what your Fireteam would prefer to do.
Power requirements
In Season of Plunder, Grandmaster Nightfalls are 1620, which is 40 levels above the gear cap. In order to even enter a GM Nightfall, you and your entire Fireteam will need to be at 1595 Power — at least. The best way to accomplish this is to get your gear level to 1580 (the current Power level cap for this season) and then increase your Artifact Power to +15.
Grandmaster Nightfall calendar
This season is stacked with difficult and moderate level Grandmaster Nightfalls, with Devil’s Lair and Disgraced being the only relatively easy weeks. Glassway and Lightblade — two of the three Strikes that will appear on multiple weeks this season — are the toughest in the game, with Lightblade being especially difficult for most Fireteams.
Thankfully, the calendar above — created by Destiny streamer Ekuegan, and edited by T1Appalled — will help you prepare. This calendar tells you not only which GM Nightfall is available for the week, but which Champions and shield types you’ll encounter. You can also see which special weapon is up for grabs.
As far as burns go — these cause you to deal and take additional elemental damage from a specific element — this season is all about using Arc abilities. All of the Grandmasters, except for Devil’s Lair, use an Arc burn in Season of Plunder. (Devil’s Lair uses Void.) There are no Solar burn Strikes this season.
Note: At the time of publication, the calendar above has proven itself accurate, and we expect it will remain that way throughout the season. However, we’ll be checking in each week to ensure the calendar remains accurate, and will update this guide if we discover any errors.
New Adept weapons this season
Season of the Plunder sees the return of two Strike-specific weapons: The Militia’ Birthright (a grenade launcher originally from Lake of Shadows) and Mindbender’s Ambition (a shotgun originally from The Hallowed Lair).
Both of these weapons can now drop as Adept when completing Grandmaster Nightfall strikes. Adept variations of weapons are identical to their normal versions aside from one difference: They can equip Adept mods. These mods typically grant bonus stats, like range, and can be very powerful. They’re also able to wield mods like Adept Big Ones, which causes the weapon to deal increased damage to bosses and powerful enemies.
Below we’ve listed all their potential perk combinations so you can plot out the roll of your dreams.
The Militia’s Birthright
The Militia’s Birthright is a 90 RPM, single-shot Lightweight Frame grenade launcher. It deals Arc damage and uses Special ammo.
Perk row 1 options
Perk row 2 options
Origin traits
Mindbender’s Ambition
Mindbender's Ambition is a 55 RPM Aggressive Frame shotgun. It deals Solar damage and uses Special ammo.
Perk row 1 options
- Pugilist
- Lead From Gold
- Auto-Loading Holster
- Slideways
- Snapshot Sights
- Threat Detector
Perk row 2 options
- Swashbuckler
- One-Two Punch
- Incandescent
- Steady Hands
- Fragile Focus
- Well-Rounded
Origin traits
- Stunning Recovery
- Vanguard’s Vindication