Nightfall

See also: Strikes

Nightfall, also known as Nightfall: The Ordeal, is the pinnacle weekly Vanguard PvE activity in Destiny 2: a Strike run at greatly increased difficulty with additional modifiers and Champions. A different Strike (or seasonal Battleground) is featured as the Nightfall each week, and Guardians can run it at several difficulty tiers for progressively greater rewards.

Difficulty Tiers

Nightfall is offered at multiple difficulty tiers, each adding more modifiers and tougher enemies:

• Hero — the entry tier, with matchmaking available.
• Legend — more modifiers and tougher Champions; no matchmaking.
• Master — additional modifiers and an increased Champion count.
• Grandmaster — the hardest tier, featuring Limited Revives, the Extinguish modifier, and a heavy Power disadvantage for the player. It becomes available only later in a season.

Higher tiers cap the player's effective Power further below the enemies, so they demand strong builds and team coordination.

Weekly Rotation

A pool of Strikes and Battlegrounds rotates as the featured Nightfall, with a different one active each week of a season.

Rewards

• A featured Nightfall weapon, which changes with the weekly Strike.
• Adept versions of Nightfall weapons, which drop from Grandmaster difficulty.
• Upgrade materials such as Enhancement Cores, Enhancement Prisms, and Ascendant Shards, awarded more generously at higher tiers.
• Exotic gear and other high-tier loot.

Completing a Nightfall also earns a score; defeating every Champion and finishing efficiently raises the score toward a Platinum ranking, which increases the rewards granted.

History

Nightfall began in the original Destiny as the hardest difficulty setting of a weekly Strike. It was rebuilt as Nightfall: The Ordeal in the Shadowkeep expansion, introducing the tiered difficulty and Champion system; the "The Ordeal" suffix was later dropped, leaving the activity known simply as Nightfall.