Destiny guide: Venus The Nexus Strike guide
Destiny: Venus The Nexus Strike walkthrough
Destiny players come together in a spirit of jolly co-operation in Strike missions – or they should, anyway. Here’s our guide to beating one of Venus's two co-op challenges, The Nexus.
Destiny's Strikes are often elaborate affairs but The Nexus is a pretty straightforward run. It takes place in N/Gen Branch, an area off the Ishtar Commons that you have no reason to visit during the main storyline.
There's a Gold Chest and two Dead Ghosts on offer in this Strike. The chest and first Ghost are accessible if you visit this area on Patrol, but the second Ghost is not. I'll make a note of the best times to grab these, but you should check out our Venus Gold Chest locations guide and Venus Dead Ghosts location guide for more details.
Most of the enemies in this Strike are Vex, interspersed with Fallen, so don't bother with Solar weapons on normal difficulty. I find machine guns more use against the Vex swarms than any other secondary weapon.
You begin on one side of the Ishtar Commons, but the usual Vex versus Fallen battle has quietened down somewhat; you only need to push through a token force to gain the entrance to N/Gen branch.
As soon as you enter N/Gen Branch, though, the Fallen attack in force - maybe more numerously than you have ever seen before. Your goal here is to defeat three major Servitors while fighting off huge numbers of Dregs, Vandals and Shanks, and later a few Captains.
If you are high enough level you can brazen this out, but for everyone else, some tactics are required. The Fallen will spawn on all sides, approaching from every direction, so you can't just hammer away at the Servitors. If one Guardian - perhaps a sniper - tags the Servitor, keeping its attention and whittling its health away, the other two can keep down the Fallen numbers. The two Guardians on minion duty should generate plenty of orbs of light between the two of them, which will help in quickly dispatching the tougher foes.
After this battle, stop and collect Gold Chest #5; it's in the building immediately to the right as you enter this area, where the first Servitor spawns. Look for it in one of the cubicles.
You'll now be heading up the stairs to the second level. The door that you go through is host to Dead Ghost #13; facing in, it's just to the left, behind the waist-high entrance console, at ground level.
The room beyond is crawling with Fallen, but you'll make short work of them if you get in before they have time to react properly. Once they're down, climb the stairs and head through the corridor.
This path is linear and there's nothing to see so just keep on keeping on. You should only stop when you battle some Vex in a room with a glass cylinder in the centre. The radar suggests you go down the stairs, but I suggest you go into the nearby sideroom and pick up Dead Ghost #14 from the sink.
You'll fight a few more Vex down the stairs and then it's time to face the boss - I told you this was straightforward. When you're ready, drop down the deep pit; if you double jump right at the bottom you won't take damage.
The boss is an ultra Hydra. Sexion, the Nexus Mind, isn't much tougher than the Hydra you face in the story mission, but his waves of ever-spawning minions are a real pain. Crowd control is the name of the game here, as the slow-moving but implacable, endless Vex rapidly become a headache.
Because Sexion fires from either side of his body and floats ominously around the room, it's very easy to get hit by an attack when you thought you were in cover. The key here is for one or more Guardian to always actively have his attention, so the others won't be caught by surprise.
One tactic that has worked well for me is for all three Guardians to form up quite close to each other behind cover on one side of the room. The best spot, in my opinion, is a place with a couple of floor to ceiling columns. Two guardians take turns drawing Sexion's attention and taking shots at his glowing yellow eyeball - that's his weak spot. When Sexion's shield covers him, they focus on taking out minions, while continuing to play cat and mouse to keep Sexion's attention and stop him wandering away to attack the third Guardian.
The third Guardian has the most important role - keeping down the swarms. Titans are great here, but good snipers of any class can take down Vex very quickly by hitting their glowing weak spots - the stomach, not the head. As well as smashing crowds, the third Guardian has to alert the others when things get out of control; taking an occasional break from damaging Sexion to put down minions is a very good idea.
Towards the end of the battle you may want to switch things up; have one Guardian focus on Sexion and two work on crowd control, because it will get seriously hectic. Chaining together your Supers will be a massive help, so I hope at this stage you've got that sorted. Good luck, Guardian.
Be sure to check the rest of our Destiny guide for more tips and info.