Iron Banner Guide for Season of the Seraph

Iron Banner is back this week, and we have a load of new loot including weapons and armour, plus a brand new PVP game mode to enjoy. Today I am going to cover the complete guide for Iron Banner including how to get started, what Iron Banner Fortress is, how to earn Iron Banner loot, how to locate the Iron Banner Challenges, plus check out the god roll weapons you should be chasing this season, plus a quick look at the Iron Banner title.

Before we get into it today let me know in the comments what you think about the new game mode in Iron Banner, plus what do you think of the weapons and armour?

Without further delay, let’s dive into things.

How to get started

Lord Saladin is back in the Tower, which means it’s Iron Banner week. You can find Lord Saladin front and centre in the Tower when you land in the Courtyard. Iron Banner is free for all players, and if you haven’t played Iron Banner before then there is a quick introduction quest to get through, but you only have to do this once per account. When Iron Banner is on, you can access it via the cruicble section in the Director, and Iron Banner replaces the Control Node for the entire week, plus Trials of Osiris is canceled when Iron Banner is around.

To get the most out of Iron Banner play Iron Banner matches to get XP, this XP will level you at with Lord Saladin, get Iron Banner engrams through leveling up or as random drops at the end of matches, then either decrypt your engrams as per normal, or trade-in your Iron Banner engrams with Lord Saladin. Iron Banner is objective focused PVP, with a rotating game mode each season. Play matches level up, and Iron Banner-themed weapons, armor, plus the Iron Lord Title.

Iron Banner Fortress

Fortress is the latest Iron Banner PVP game mode to be introduced, and it’s brand new in Season of the Seraph. This is similar to Control, where you have three capture points; A, B and C. The objective is to earn as many points as possible. Capturing and holding zones is key to earning points. You can see a grey timer on each point counting down at regular time intervals. If you capture one zone then you get two points, if you have two zones then you get 4 points, if you hold all 3 zones then it’s a power play, plus you’ll get six points. Fortress focuses on zone control rather than killing opponents. If you want to win the match, then focus on the zones rather than killing opposing guardians. Killing opponents is going to help you capture zones, but nothing else, so focus on the zones.

Twice per match Caital will send in Cabal drop pods. Watch out because if they land on you they will kill you. At the drop pod location, normally in the middle of the map, this is going to spawn a high-value zone alongside cabal turrets. Your objective now switches from capturing A, B and C to capturing the central zone, and removing the turrets, because they will kill you fast. The high-value zone will award more points for capturing and holding it. This is the perfect way to gather loads of points in a short burst, so if you are behind and need to catch up, or if you are in the lead and want to squash your opponents, watch out for that high-value zone.

The team with the most points at the end of the time wins, or the first team to get to 130 points.

How to earn Iron Banner loot

Iron Banner has a range of loot on offer including weapons, armor and the Iron Lord Title. Lord Saladin is our Iron Banner vendor, and you can find him in the Tower near the courtyard landing zone. By playing Iron Banner you can rank up with Lord Saladin, and each time you rank up you’ll earn Iron Banner Engrams and powerful upgrades. Play Iron banner to earn XP, and get as many Iron Banner engrams as possible. Iron Banner engrams can be decrypted at Master Rahool in the Tower for Iron Banner loot, or you can focus your Iron Banner Engrams with Lord Saladin himself, but be aware this can be a costly business regarding legendary shards.

Iron Banner Challenges

Challenges are available for Iron Banner and you can find these by hovering over the Iron Banner node in the Director. For example, this week it’s complete Iron Banner matches with a void or stasis subclass. Complete Iron Banner challenges and you’ll earn powerful upgrades to help you level up. Completing iron Banner Challenges also give you XP boosts. On the first day of Iron Banner you’ll only see one challenge, then more challenges get released each day at reset time, each challenge offers you a pinnacle reward that will help you level up. You can see which XP boosters are active when you select the Iron Banner game mode, it’s on the left hand side.

Weapons God Roll Guide

Here’s the best rolls to look out for related to Iron Banner weapons this season.

Dark Decider (Auto Rifle)

Dark Decider is a Legendary Energy Auto Rifle with a Rapid-Fire Frame meaning deeper ammo reserves. Slightly faster reload when magazine is empty. Looking at the stats we have Impact 18, Range 25, Stability 49, Handling 39, Reload Speed 46, Airborne Effectiveness 10, Rounds Per Minute 720, and Magazine 50.

For PVE Arrowhead Brake, Appended Mag, Subsistence, and Voltshot would be good.

Arrowhead Brake – Greatly controls recoil, Increases handling speed
Appended Mag – Increases magazine size
Subsistence – Defeating targets partially reloads the magazine from reserves.
Voltshot – Reloading this weapon after defeating a target overcharges this weapon for a short period of time, causing it to jolt on its next hit.

For PVP Arrowhead Brake, Accurized Rounds, Dynamic Sway Reduction and Rangefinder would be good.

Arrowhead Brake – Greatly controls recoil, Increases handling speed
Accurized Rounds – Increases range
Dynamic Sway Reduction – Improves accuracy and stability while continuously holding down the trigger.
Rangefinder – Aiming this weapon increases its effective range and zoom magnification.

Gunnora’s Axe (Shotgun)

Gunnora’s Axe is a Legendary Energy Shotgun with a Pinpoint Slug Frame meaning it fires a single-slug round. This weapon’s recoil pattern is more predictably vertical. Looking at the stats we have Impact 70, Range 67, Stability 49, Handling 65, Reload Speed 48, Airborne Effectiveness 2, Rounds Per Minute 65, and Magazine 6.

For PVE Fluted Barrel, Appended Mag, Auto-Loading Holster and Vorpal Weapon would be good.

Fluted Barrel – Greatly increases handling speed, Slightly increases stability
Appended Mag – Increases magazine size
Auto-Loading Holster – The holstered weapon is automatically reloaded after a short period of time.
Vorpal Weapon – strong against bosses, vericles and guardians in their super

For PVP Hammer-Forged Rifling, Accurized Rounds, Threat Detector and Snapshot Sights would be good.

Hammer-Forged Rifling – Increases range
Accurized Rounds – Increases range
Threat Detector – Increased reload, stability, and handling when enemies are in close proximity.
Snapshot Sights – Faster time to aim down sights

You can also get Roar of the Bear (Rockets), The Wizened Rebuke (Fusion), Allied Demand (Sidearm), The Hero’s Burden (SMG), Frontier’s Cry (hand cannon) and Razor’s Edge (Sword). These are now older weapons, but if you want to go into more detail on these then I have guides on the channel.

Armor Guide

With the new season comes a new armor set inside the Iron Banner. However, the upcoming armor pieces might be familiar to some from Bungie’s previous title. As shown in the image above, the company will bring back the Iron Banner armor set from the Taken King era in the first game.

The armor set gained a lot of popularity in the community back in the day, primarily due to Hunter’s Wolf cloak and Titan’s Mohawk helmet. All of this will be farmable for the duration of the Iron Banner’s runtime in Destiny 2 Season 19 week 5.

We also have a chain-mail shader which we can get from ranking up with Lord Saladin. This is a very cool shader and gives us that chain mail look on our armour. Definitely worth the grind in Iron Banner to look like this and it goes great with the armor sets.

Iron Lord Title

Finally we have the Iron Lord Title, which you can find on the second page of the titles and seals. This is going to be a grind, including resetting your Iron Banner rank twice with Lord Saladin, however, it’s one of the best titles to get in the game, and allows you to show off your dedication to Iron Banner.

Let me know in the comments what you think of Iron Banner.

That’s it for this Iron Banner Guide in Destiny 2. For more Destiny 2 content like this check out more on This Week In Video Games youtube channel and subscribe today.