Destiny 2 Iron Banner Guide For Beginners

Contents

In a recent TWID — the last one this year — Bungie announced the return of Iron Banner. This fan-favorite activity is set to make its final appearance in Episode: Revenant on January 14, 2025, giving you plenty of time to gear up, grab a Destiny 2 boost, and dive into the action for some amazing loot.

If you’re new to Destiny 2 or returning after a break, now’s the perfect moment to get the hang of Iron Banner! In this guide, we’ll cover all the basics and walk you through everything there’s to know, from rules to rewards.

Iron Banner (IB) is a special two-week-long Crucible event that takes place twice per episode. During this time, Trials of Osiris are not held.

Each week, the event features one of several objective-based game modes in rotation:

– Control: Two teams of six compete to get hold of zones and defeat opponents to earn points. A special mechanic, The Hunt, activates when one team claims all three zones, giving them a higher score for kills.

– Fortress: A variation of Control where you earn points by holding zones. Twice per match, a high-value Cabal zone shows up to offer bonus points for control.

– Eruption: A 6v6 Clash-style mode with energy boosts tied to kill streaks.

– Rift: A modified version of the CTF mode, where players must pick up a Spark and carry it to the enemy base to score points.

– Tribute: A Supremacy-style mode where you gather crests from fallen opponents and deposit them for points.

The main goal of Iron Banner is to play matches and earn points that build your reputation with Lord Saladin. Saladin oversees ranks and rewards, which include exclusive weapons, armor, and a unique title.

One of the most important features of Iron Banner is the disabled Power Level advantages. This means your gear score doesn’t impact your performance — only your skill matters, so you can jump in with any gear setup and compete on equal footing with other players.

Event challenges come in two sets of objectives that roll out daily throughout the week:

1. Match Completion Challenges: Finish IB matches. Once you hit the required number, you’ll get rank bonus multipliers (more on ranks and boosts later).

2. Subclass Challenges: Equip one of the seasonal subclasses to earn points and snag Pinnacle gear rewards.

You can grind daily for rewards or save all your challenges for one marathon session before the reset to grab all boosts and Pinnacles at once. Rank multipliers earned in the first week will carry over into the second week. Plus, Pinnacle rewards are available for all three characters, meaning you can collect up to 8 Pinnacle engrams per Guardian.

If it’s your first time playing Iron Banner, you’ll have to finish the Forging Iron quest, waiting for you at Lord Saladin’s at the Tower. The quest line is pretty simple yet important as it introduces you to the basics of the event. Here’s what you’ll need to do:

– Play one IB match.

– Get done with a daily challenge.

– Earn 300 Rank points in the event.

– Get an IB Engram from Saladin (it’s better to save this engram for later — it’s very valuable!).

– Complete matches with at least one piece of Iron Banner armor on your Guardian.

To speed things up, equip as much Iron Banner gear as you have and use the subclass specified in the daily challenge for extra points.

Once the quest is done, you’ll be able to access Iron Banner through the Crucible node on the Director.

If you’re brand-new to Destiny 2, you’ll need to unlock the Tower first by completing the A Guardian Rises quest. Then head to Lord Shaxx to pick up the Light Reforged quest. After finishing that, Lord Saladin and his IB quest will be available to you.

Ranking System

Following a big revamp in Season of the Haunted, Iron Banner now uses a reputation system similar to other activities in the game.

Every match you complete adds to your reputation with Lord Saladin. These rep points help you climb the rank ladder and unlock rewards with each rank-up. Once you max out, you can reset your rank for extra rewards, including Masterwork materials.

Here’s the rank breakdown:

– Guardian (I–III)

– Brave (I–III)

– Heroic (I–III)

– Fabled (I–III)

– Mythic (I–III)

– Legend

To earn more points and speed up rank progression, you can stack rank XP multipliers. Here’s how you can do it:

– Activity Streak: Play IB matches back-to-back, win or lose. A max streak of 5 matches grants a +20% reputation bonus.

– Daily Challenge: Completing 3, 7, 12, and 18 matches earns extra points.

– Iron Banner Gear: Equip IB weapons, armor (transmogs count, too), or an emblem. Using all 5 pieces gives the highest multiplier.

All bonuses stack, so if you’re serious about farming ranks, make use of every available boost.

You can check your current rank and any active boosts in the Iron Banner node on the Director menu.

Rewards

Each new season or episode brings a fresh emblem, shader, class-specific armor, and of course, new weapons for players to earn in Iron Banner. New items, along with some loot from previous seasons, are available as post-match drops, rank-up rewards, or through Engram Focusing at Lord Saladin’s.

For Episode: Revenant, Saladin offers a unique reward track packed with awesome loot:

– Iron Banner Engrams

– Prime & Exotic Engrams

– Ascendant Shards

– Tinasha’s Mastery sidearm

– Archon’s Thunder machine gun

– Crimil’s Dagger hand cannon

– Claws of the Wolf pulse rifle

– Canis Lupus emblem

– Cruel Patina shader

You can target specific loot by focusing your engrams via the Focused Decoding node. It costs 20,000 Glimmer and one Iron Engram per focus, with Iron Intent armor set, Multimach CCX SMG, Riiswalker shotgun, and other cool items available for you to get.

Also, Saladin’s Legacy Gear shop allows you to purchase rewards from past Iron Banner seasons for 3 IB Engrams and 10,000-25,000 Glimmer depending on the type of items. The legacy roster includes Frontier’s Cry hand cannon, Swarm of the Raven grenade launcher, Iron Remembrance armor set, and much more.

Pinnacle gear pieces, which we mentioned earlier, come as daily challenge rewards. On top of that, winning matches guarantees random weapon drops and gives you a good chance of receiving an IB Engram.

Finally, each episode offers a series of Triumphs that you can complete to unlock the prestigious Iron Lord title for your Guardian.

Final Word

Iron Banner may not be the most balanced activity in the game, but it’s certainly less intense and demanding than Trials of Osiris and still offers great rewards, especially weapons, which will be useful both in PvP and beyond. So, if you’re looking to spice up your winter Destiny 2 sessions and have a blast with friends, Iron Banner will be waiting for you in the new year!