Destiny: The Taken King Court of Oryx Guide

The Court of Oryx is a new game mode added to Destiny: The Taken King. It takes place while on patrol in the Dreadnaught. This game mode is an arena that summon random bosses and has 3 different tiers to choose from. You need certain runes to summon them, and sometimes you need to charge them.

I’ll explain each boss in the Court of Oryx, how to get the runes, and how to charge them. Check out my Destiny: The Taken King Beginner Tips and Tricks for more help with the game. 

This guide will go over everything about the Court of Oryx in Destiny including:

• Court of Oryx Info – How the Court of Oryx works, which runes you need, how to get the runes, and how to charge them.
• Tier 1 Bosses – Each boss in Tier 1 and how to beat them.
• Tier 2 Fights – How Tier 2 fights work.
• Tier 3 Bosses – How to beat each Tier 3 boss.

Court of Oryx Info

You can reach Court of Oryx by heading through the right hallway, Hall of Souls, as you enter patrol. It is the open coliseum-like area that has statues before entering.

There are 3 tiers to Court of Oryx and you need rune to summon bosses for each one. The statues on the left, as you are facing the court, summon the bosses.

• Tier 1 – The closest statue to the court. You need reciprocal runes to summon Tier 1. The recommended light level is 190.
• You can get these from quests and chests. You can also buy them from Eris when you get rank 5 with Crota’s Bane.
• Tier 2 – The middle statue. You need stolen runes to summon Tier 2. The recommended light level is 240.
• You can get these from random drops while doing Tier 1 Court of Oryx, or buy them from Eris at rank 5.
• Tier 3 – The farthest statue. You need antiquated runes to summon Tier 3. The recommended light level is 300.
• You can get them from random drops while doing Tier 2 Court of Oryx, package from ranking up Crota’s Bane, certain quests, and randomly from chests in the King’s Fall raid.

Up to 9 people can help when someone summons a boss in Court of Oryx, but only the person who summons gets guaranteed loot. If you are trying to get Calcified Fragments from Tier 2 and Tier 3, you have to use the runes.

Tier 1 Bosses

Vorlog

This is a knight that cycles through different elemental shields. He always starts with Arc, then Solar, then Void. He is pretty easy, so you can usually kill him before he cycles to his last, and sometimes 2nd, shield.

Hives enemies spawn during this fight, but you can ignore them and kill Vorlog quickly.

Lokkar

This is a standard wizard, meaning it has a solar shield, but it teleports. You’ll have to chase him around the map after damaging, but it is a straightforward fight otherwise.

Alzok Däl, Gornuk Däl, and Zyrok Däl

This fight involves 3 wizards. To win this fight, you have to kill all three of them within a certain time after killing one of them. If they don’t all die soon after each other, they respawn.

One method is to get each wizard’s health low, then finish them all off. 

Another way is to use supers and heavy weapons as soon as they spawn since they are next to each other, and kill them all quickly.

They all have solar shields, so using solar weapons and supers makes it quick and easy.

Brachus Horu’usk

This is a Taken Centurion that has a shield that makes him immune to damage. You must kill all the other enemies to take his shield down so you can damage him.

After a short time, his shield comes back and more enemies spawn. Just keep killing enemies and damaging him afterwards until he dies.

Cra’adug and Mengoor

These are two knights, one is Hive and one is Taken. The Hive knight has a sword and the Taken knight has a boomer gun. They each have shields to make them immune to damage.

To take down the shields, you must get both of them close to each other. As long as they stay within range, the shields stay down. When one dies, the other will lose their shield.

Krughor

This is an Ogre with another damage immune shield. To take this shield down, you have to cause curse thrall explosions near him. Normal and cursed thrall spawn during the fight, so just lead the boss downstairs and wait for cursed thralls to spawn.

Like most of the fights, his shield comes back, so when it does, just kill another cursed thrall near him.

Tier 2 Fights

Tier 2 does not add any new bosses. The fights combine 2 of the Tier one fights at the same time. The enemies are also higher level so each one is harder.

Some of the combinations are more challenging than others, so it is best to focus on one boss at a time.

Tier 3 Bosses

There are 2 bosses in Tier 3, but there is at least one more that is not out yet. They change each week, so once you do one, you’ll need to wait for the weekly reset before another one is available.

Tier 3 fights have more mechanics than the normal fights and are similar to a mini-raid boss. 

Kagoor

This is a wizard with a damage immune shield. There are also 2 normal ogres and 1 main ogre in this fight. To take Kagoor’s shield down, you must kill the main ogre.

It takes too long to kill these ogres normally so there is another mechanic to watch for in this fight. Enemies call Malificient Eyes spawn throughout the fight. When you kill one, you get a buff called Ogre’s Fury that allows you to do extra damage to the ogres. The buff stacks up to 3 times.

When you kill the main ogre you only have 30 seconds to kill the boss, so save your supers and heavy weapons for this window.

Thalnok

This is a big knight called the Fanatic of Crota. It is almost identical to the Crota fight at the end of the Crota’s End raid with one change, wizards.

There are many enemies that spawn, including a swordbearer and 2 wizards. Kill the wizards first because they continually restore the Thalnok’s shield.

When you kill the swordbearer, he drops a sword that lasts for a short time. Only the sword can damage the boss, but everyone else must damage Thalnok until his shield is gone and he kneels. This is the only time that the person with the sword can damage the boss.

You can get in around 3 heavy attacks if you are close when he kneels. Move away as he gets up so he doesn’t kill you. If your team is fast enough, you can make him kneel at least twice and damage him before the shield goes away.

When the sword is gone, the wizards and swordbearer spawn again. Repeat the same process until you kill the boss. The damage you do with the sword is based off the user’s light level, so have your highest person take the sword.

Balwur

The 3rd Tier 3 boss is a wizard that spawns special acolytes. The floor is poison except for the safe zones. 

• One safe zone spawns beneath the portal platform. This one never goes away.
• Other safe zones appear where you kill the acolytes. 
• When the acolytes respawn, the safe zones go away. Go back to the initial safe zone.
• You can only damage the acolytes and the boss while in a safe zone.

This one is not too difficult. You can kill the boss as long as you are in a safe zone, so just keep killing acolytes, then damage the boss until you kill it.

That’s it for my Destiny: The Taken King Court of Oryx guide. Let me know if you have any questions about any of the bosses, or Court of Oryx in general.