Battleborn Taken King Guide
The Warpriest
Note there is a challenge variant to this, but I recommend you read this first.
It's like a big, creepy, somewhat dirty, concert hall. You have plenty of time before the main event starts, so have fun bouncing around the place. Explore the staircases & balcony, and find different routes to get up to the raised platform on the left.
While exploring, you might want to pay attention to those three obelisks in front of you. They're kind of important.
OK, now on the count of three jump into that big black sphere on the main stage to get a surprise. Ready? 1....2....3....surprise!
Hey, I figured you're dying enough on this raid that just once I'd like it to be because of me.
Now we've had our fun, I'm sure you noticed three plates on the ground while you were bouncing around. If you didn't, they are located on the right platform, the middle, and way up there on the left platform. At this point, the concept of divide and conquer shouldn't be new to you, unless you got someone to give you a checkpoint here and avoided the rest of the guide. Wimp.
What's going to happen varies slightly depending if you're in the middle or the sides, but you kick it off by having one person on each plate (if people are jealous that they don't get to be on a plate, two on each plate works as well). The Warpriest will make a grand entrance and immediately begin firing at you. I suggest you take cover at this point. In case you're thinking of returning fire, let me assure you that he is immune to your little weapons (your 320 Black Spindle included). So don't bother.
At this point, the doors on the left high, left low, right high, right low and middle low will open (note the bottom level has all three doors, for triple the fun), and adds will be swarming out. Here's the breakdown for Round 1 waves on the sides.
- Knight
- Wizard and Acolytes
- Knight
- Adept and Acolytes
- Yellow Bar Knight
The center is the same except replace round 2 & 4 with cursed & regular Thralls. The side doors only produce normal Thralls.
You'll get a warning before the Yellow Bar Knight appears in the form of the Warpriest screaming in rage because for all his invincibility he can't seem to kill Guardians that stand behind cover. The thought of actually moving more than a couple feet to each side never seems to occur to him. I'm guessing he's out of shape, judging from the movement patterns of all the bosses, regular exercise is not a requirement of employment by Oryx.
To be fair, his dental plan is outstanding.
Let's take a second and talk about taking cover to kill the adds. The left hand side has it pretty easy, they're elevated above the bad guys, have some chest high walls, and a big obelisk they can use to shield them from the Warpriest while blasting baddies. Frankly anyone who dies on the left hand side needs to learn the basics of "when health bar turns red, move" or has not paid attention to the Knights coming out.
The right hand side however is in a world of pain, they are below the stage so the baddies can be harder to see, and not a lot of places to take cover where the Warpriest can't blast them. Dying on the right is completely normal. Everyone does it. There are basically 3 places where it's safe to stand and still be able to shoot adds.
- The back left side by the top of the stairs from the center.
- Halfway up the right side stairs.
- At the top of the right side stairs.
I highly suggest you and your partner stand in different places. First of all, you have a limited field of view so you'll need multiple vantage points. And second, you just ran a relay race so unless you used super strength Guardian deoderant, no one wants to stand next to you.
At first it seems the center has the worst of it, they have 3 doors to deal with, and somewhat limited cover. However they have one big advantage due to the fact the Warpriest's stage has an overhang. The two people in the center should get right next to the wall on either side, start thanking Bungie that friendly fire is turned off, and start the mother of all crossfires. When done correctly, you never have to worry about the Thralls coming behind you because your partner will take care of them. As you will take care of the Thralls coming from behind your partner, unless your partner owes you money, in which case they're on their own.
When all the Yellow Bar Knights are down, you'll see a message that the glyph sequence has started. Of course everyone will immediately think to look at the obelisks and wait for some sort of sign of what to do next. While waiting you'll see the Initiate Rejected message and you'll all die.
The Warpriest is a dick, the sign is on the back of the obelisks.
Have one person (usually one of the center people unless they are both mute, or their mics don't work) run to the wall and look at the backs of the obelisks. One of them will have their symbol glowing. Call out which side it's on. Remember, you're facing backwards now so left is right, right is left, and center is...center. One person from the group on that side needs to step on the plate. The next obelisk will light up, so do it again. At that point the 3rd obelisk should light up but I hope that you are smart enough to use the process of elimination to figure out which plate hasn't been stepped on.
Once the 3rd person has stepped on the plate, something magical will happen and a red aura will appear around them. Anyone inside this aura can now hurt the Warpriest. And I strongly suggest that you do (helped by a Weapons Bubble and Shadowshot), because time is limited. Except the person holding the aura, they have another job. Staying alive.
The person with the bubble will notice a message Aura of the Initiate x 5 along with a countdown timer. They have until that timer reaches 0 to kill an Acolyte. Once they do, the timer resets and the multiplier goes down by 1. If they don't, they die. The thing is, they shouldn't just go killing Acolytes as fast as possible, because once the multiplier is gone, so is the red bubble and your ability to hurt the Warpriest. So it's a balancing act, let the timer run down as far as possible before killing an Acolyte. For new people, I recommend shooting at 2 or 3. Don't take chances, use a Heavy Machine Gun and mow that prick down.
Once the Aura has disappeared, the Warpriest will call upon the power of the obelisks and the big glowy ball will make the room really bright. As much as the room could use some mood lighting, this light will kill you. Good news is you're safe as long as you keep an obelisk between you and the blight. Bad news is after its done, the Warpriest will take away any obelisk you've been hiding behind.
Did I mention the Warpriest is a dick?
So with your amazing powers of counting, you have realized you have 3 obelisks, so at the end of the 4th round you'll have nothing to hide behind. I highly recommend you kill the Warpriest before that happens. Once the obelisk starts fading away it's safe to move back to your original positions to start round 2. But first let's take some questions from our audience.
Q: What weapon should I shoot the Warpriest with?
A: Any weapon you want as long as it's a Sniper Rifle.
Q: I had the Aura, but the Acolytes hid and I died.
A: That does happen sometimes, you get the batch of smarter Acolytes that will actually take cover. If you don't have one in your sights around 3 seconds, leave your group and sprint to find one. Your team won't be able to do damage, but you'll be alive. And that's what's important. Screw those guys.
Q: I'm helping my Aura holder by killing every Acolyte in sight, but they keep dying. Are they that bad at this?
A: No, they suffer from idiot partner syndrome. There is only one cure, you must go to orbit and have someone replace you. Then the Aura holder will be cured. It's a noble sacrifice you're making, I salute you.
Q: WTF is bombing the crap out of us while we're hurting the Warpriest?!
A: That is either an Adept or an enraged Acolyte that someone didn't take care of. As a ghost pivot your camera to see where the shot is coming from then when you resurrect, beat the crap out of the people on that side.
Q: I have the Aura, but the Warpriest/Acolytes keep killing me as I'm keeping the Aura steady. How can I live?
A: On the right hand side, you want to crouch down behind that chest high wall to your right. The Aura should still give good coverage, and you can pop out every couple of seconds to mow down and Acolyte. In the center, crouch down behind the chest high wall in front of you.
Q: What about the left hand side?
A: We won't kill the Warpriest from the left. I'll get to that.
Q: After the round ends, I'm trying to get back up to the left platform, but I'm getting slammed by shots from the Warpriest as I try to navigate the jumps.
A: Take the right hand side staircase and jump from the balcony over to the left platform, you're under cover the whole time. Plus stairs are great cardio!
OK, time for Round 2! The waves of adds in the center follows the same sequence, but on the sides it's slightly different.
- Knight
- Adepts and Acolytes
- Knight
- Two Wizards and Acolytes
- Yellow Bar Knight
Pretty straightforward, rinse and repeat to damage Warpriest. If your light is pretty high, you can actually kill the Warpriest in 2 rounds.
Q: WAIT!!! I'm in the center and just got hit in the back by a Knight! I thought you said only Thralls come out the side doors?!
A: Only Thralls come out through the side doors, the Knights sometimes drop down from the left and right. Especially when your teammates don't get back on their sides fast enough. You people on the sides should be on the lookout for that and call out to the center when that happens. Unless you think it's really funny. Then just laugh at them.
At Round 3, things change quite a bit. The order is.
- Lots of Taken
- Lots of Taken
- Lots of Taken
- Yellow Bar Taken Knight
The Taken don't need doors, so they will warp in on the right and left sides of the main stage and on the center plate. The Warpriest (dick) at this point has noticed the center has had it kinda easy to makes sure some of those Taken are Acolytes who will immediately deploy Eyes.
Note that the Yellow Bar Knight will now warp in on the plate. For people on the left hand side, this means he'll be behind you, so keep an eye out.
Kill em all, damage the Warpriest, and Round 4 is a repeat of Round 3.
There will not be a Round 5.
Now that we've gone through all the rounds, you've probably noticed you need some coordination since:
- Everyone needs to convene on the Aura.
- It will have to be a different place since the obelisks get taken away.
- The Warpriest gains a power each time he takes away an obelisk.
I highly recommend instead of damaging the Warpriest from the last plate stood on, you start on the right hand side. The power he gains from that obelisk is the least deadly. After that, meet in the center from there on out. After he takes away the center obelisk, you can hide behind the left one without going up on the left platform by going on that small ledge underneath the left platform.
Guardians who are not standing on plates, should get to the meeting area for that round as soon as the glyph sequence starts, that way you're ready to pop your weapons bubble or slam the Warpriest as soon as the Aura arrives.
Q: Help! The Warpriest keeps killing us while we're trying to kill him. No fair!
A: The Warpriest hits pretty hard, but he'll stagger when hit with multiple head shots. The biggest issue that usually happens is that people wait for the Shadowshot or Weapons Bubble to go up before hitting him. As soon as you get the Aura, hit him in the head. The damage will come, just get him loopy quick.
OK, now that you've proven the Warpriest's guess that you were worthy by killing him, it's time to go through the portal and enter the maze. However first you might want to read up on the Warpriest Challenge Mode that will come around every couple of weeks.