Destiny 2: Season of the Lost leveling guide — Reaching the 1330 PL cap

There used to be a time when the grind to reach the power level (PL) cap in Destiny 2 was a mind-numbing task. Thankfully, the previous season changed things up a bit. Now, we’ll only see incremental increases (unless it’s a major expansion). Here’s our Destiny 2: Season of the Lost leveling guide to help you with the pinnacle rewards as you attempt to reach the 1330 PL cap.

Note: For more information, check out our Destiny 2: Season of the Lost guides and features hub.

Destiny 2: Season of the Lost leveling guide – Reaching the 1330 power level cap via pinnacle rewards

Leveling thresholds and terms for Destiny 2: Season of the Lost

• Soft cap – 1270 PL.
• Powerful cap – 1320 PL.
• Pinnacle cap – 1330 PL.
• On-level – Your actual power level minus the bonuses granted by the seasonal artifact.

Note: During the previous season, the pinnacle cap was at 1320 PL. Now in Destiny 2: Season of the Lost, 1330 is the magic number that you need to hit. That means if you reached the cap last season, then your only recourse is to focus on pinnacle rewards until you hit 1330 PL.

Pinnacle reward sources

Below, you’ll see the current sources of pinnacle rewards in Destiny 2: Season of the Lost. Please remember that 3x playlist completions and Hawthorne’s XP challenges only give +1 PL drops. The rest give +2 PL items:

• 3x Vanguard strikes completed; must match weekly elemental burn
• 3x Gambit matches completed
• 3x Crucible Valor playlist matches completed
• Hawthorne Clan XP (100% progress) – The tooltip still says that you’ll get a tier 2 powerful drop, but this is actually a +1 PL pinnacle reward.
• Nightfall: Ordeal with 100,000 score
• Complete 1x Master Empire Hunt
• Complete the weekly Exo Challenge
• Prophecy dungeon: Kell Echo final boss
• Harbinger/Hawkmoon mission
• The Presage/Dead Man’s Tale mission
• Vault of Glass raid and challenges – There are five encounters here (i.e., Conflux, Oracles, Templar, Gatekeeper, and Atheon) that drop pinnacle rewards. The raid chests you obtain while exploring only have on-level stuff.
• 4x Iron Banner bounties – The Iron Banner isn’t live yet, but we can expect the same mechanics to apply as with prior seasons.
• NEW: Trials of Osiris – The revamped Trials of Osiris, which goes live on September 10, will have additional pinnacle sources:
  • Win seven matches on a given weekend.
  • Win 50 rounds.
  • A pinnacle Adept weapon can be earned each week the first time you go Flawless to reach the Lighthouse.
• NEW: Defeat 4x champions in the Shattered Realm – You’ll need to do a couple of runs to finish your tallies.

Powerful reward sources

Those within the 1270 to 1320 PL threshold will need to earn powerful drops to boost their characters. Then, once you reach 1320 PL, you’ll need the pinnacle rewards mentioned above. Here are the sources of powerful drops:

• 8x Vanguard bounties
• 8x Crucible bounties
• 8x Gunsmith bounties
• 8x Gambit bounties
• 8x Variks bounties
• Nightfall: Ordeal runs (100% progress)
• Prime Engrams
• Exotic world drops
• Ritual weapons that you’ve yet to obtain
• Crucible Valor rank-ups
• Crucible Valor reset
• 7x Glory playlist wins
• Crucible Glory rank-ups
• Gambit Infamy rank-ups
• Exo Stranger’s challenge – Defeat 100 enemies with or affected by Stasis.
• 2x Empire Hunts weekly challenge
• Crow’s Challenge – 5x Wrathborn Hunts completed (not worth it due to how long this process would take).
• Prophecy dungeon – Just the first two encounters.
• Deep Stone Crypt raid
• 3x/6x/9x Battleground completions
• 3x Override activity completions
• NEW: 8x Wayfinder’s Compass HELM bounties
• NEW: 3x Astral Alignment troves/extra chests opened
• NEW: The revamped Trials of Osiris will have powerful Trials engrams every three rank-ups until your first reset this season.

Remember, Destiny 2: Season of the Lost is one of the longest in the franchise’s history (ending on February 22, 2022, when The Witch Queen expansion releases). That means we’ll see events that could present more opportunities to earn rewards. Moreover, the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack includes a pirate-themed dungeon, and there’s a chance that the drops there will boost power levels, too.

Destiny 2: Season of the Lost is available via Steam. For more information, check out our guides and features hub.