If you’ve completed Forsaken’s campaign, and found a cool Awoken statue, you’ve probably found your way into The Dreaming City. The lost Awoken City is beautiful and mysterious, but should you have the misfortune of getting lost, you’ll find its filled to the brim with evil and violence.
Central to this evil and violence is an arena of destruction known as ‘The Blind Well.’ Approach it with a ‘Charge of Light’ item, and you’ll unleash a hellish plague upon this dreamlike place. It doesn’t appear to be an endgame activity; while Prime Engrams can drop, the highest Power mode (Tier 3) is set to 560 Power Mode.
But, odds are, you aren’t 560. And, after completing the campaign -where you’re probably exiting at 500 PL- you face the steep grind to 600. It’s a battle for Prime Engrams and Powerful Engrams, dropping from Daily/Weekly bounties and activities. This high level gear won’t drop in the wild, so if you’ve cleared those activities and are still aching for a way to climb upward, you’ll want to make a visit to The Blind Well.
I don’t have exact stats for what the Prime Engram RNG is, but I received two after playing eight times. (6x Tier 1 and 2x Tier 2). There doesn’t appear to be any activity exclusive loot. That said, there does appears to be a fourth, non-numbered Tier available via Petra Venj. Given it’s non-numbered, and describes “uncontrolled Light,” this could be the endgame version. It’s a safe bet that if this is the case, further loot and PL drops would be available.
How to Play
Select the Blind Well in the Director and beam your way down to The Dreaming City, specifically the Divalian Shore. Run straight through the tower ahead, and keep following the waypoints until you find your way into The Blind Well.
This is less of an instruction, and more of personal advice you can take however you please. If there are fewer than three other people already there, don’t bother starting. Unless you’re a much higher PL (520+), you risk wasting your Charges of Light. Wait there until you get more players, or until the group as a whole seems down to play. On PC, this is as easy as just using text chat. If you’re on console, I’d err on the side of caution, at least until more players are higher PL.
Once it starts, you’ll see a bubble spawn around the pit in the center the room. Make your way there, jump in and defend. You’ll fight off waves of Scorn until your HUD indicates that you’ve charged the well to 100% Light. Once this is done, you’ll make your way to various locations around the arena fulfilling this exact task.
There’s a few complications to this. While in the bubble, you’ll have a buff called ‘Mark of the Sky,’ and enemies outside the bubble can’t damage you. Outside the bubble, you’re vulnerable to damage, and after roughly 30 seconds, you’ll begin taking damage from the air itself. It’s not a lot of damage, but just enough to remind you to head back to the objective.
Periodically, glowing enemies called ‘Anathemas’ will spawn on the field and rush the bubble. Upon killing them, you’ll see a blueish orb drop. Run through the bubble to gain a buff, which you’ll need in a bit. Shielded Majors known as ‘Servants of the Plague’ will begin rushing the bubble.
With the Anathema’s buff, you’ll be able to damage the Servant’s shield. Without the buff, you won’t be able to do damage until the shield is down. While it’s not hard to get this done in the first two Tiers, you’ll want to get this down, because a harder iteration of this mechanic will resurface later.
After clearing a number of locations, and charging them to 100% Light, you’ll face a boss. An Ultra will enter the field, with a shield just like the Servants of the Plague. Anathemas will spawn around the edges of the room. Kill them, grab the buff and melt the boss’s shield.
A lot of players will blow their supers on the shield. For the most part, this is inadvisable because the damage can’t multiply with interactions, and you’ll want to throw those out once the shield is down and you can safely burn the healthbar down. The only exception is Golden Gun. Since it deals DPS without burn, you’re not missing out on any benefits. Otherwise, stick to grenade launchers and rockets.
Once the shield is down, you know what to do. Blow your supers, deal burn and melt it. A solid team of four or more can make easy work of them. Once you’re at Tier 3, this gets harder, because you’ll have three of these bosses. Be attentive, kill Anathemas, and make sure everyone is focused on killing the same boss.
In a bad run, players will essentially trickle damage onto the boss’ shields because they don’t kill all the Anathemas and don’t agree on which boss to engage. The boss’s shields will take way too long to pop and the remaining time won’t be enough to effectively deal DPS.
In a good run, you’ll focus on a boss, melt the shield quickly, drop your supers and watch the boss vaporize. By the time you engage the second boss and kill the Anathemas, you’ll have your super back, meaning you’ll have supers available to burn each of the three bosses down. Pair that with Sleeper or Whisper, and you’ll have them down in no time.
Like many Destiny activities, the best strategy is awareness. Be aware of the Anathemas, be conscientious of your teammates, and know how to time your super economy.
At the end of the day, you want those Prime engrams. Grind this out and you’ll reap some hefty rewards that’ll let you get Raid ready ASAP. So, once you’ve cleared your bounties and are hungering for new rewards, get yourself to the Blind Well. It’s great for your power and it’s just stupidly fun.