With each Solstice of Heroes in Destiny 2, Guardians ventured into the European Aerial Zone for combat trials against enemies of humanity. Along the way, they collected Solstice Packages filled with loot and Key Fragments to open them.
Players will see some quality of life improvements in across the activity in 2021, and there’s never been a better time to jump into the EAZ for some casual destruction.
This guide will lay out how play in the EAZ works, how to get the most out of the activity, and what to do (or not do) with the Solstice Packages you get from it.
Destiny 2: How the EAZ Works
You can access the European Aerial Zone in two ways.
First, check the Director tab for the Tower. At the top, you’ll see a big blue button that launches matchmaking. You can also head to the hologram to the right of the large statue and head in that way.
Once you’re in the EAZ, you’ll have five minutes to hunt and kill as many mini-boss enemies as you can. You’ll see a large star symbol over each mini-boss, appearing almost immediately after they spawn. After you kill one, a new one will appear somewhere on the other end of the map in about five or ten seconds.
After five minutes, all remaining mini-bosses will vanish, and the big boss monster will appear. There’s no time limit for this section. So long as you’re doing some damage, your fireteam will complete the encounter.
The final step is the chest hunt. With the boss dead, the first chest will appear in the center courtyard. Once opened, a ten-second countdown begins, and a number of additional chests will spawn equal to the number of mini-bosses you killed.
The location of these new chests will remain on your HUD in a departure from previous Solstice events. You’ll have two minutes to collect all of them, which is more than enough time unless your team managed like twenty or more kills.
How to Farm the EAZ for Solstice Packages
Ideally, you head into the EAZ with a fireteam of friends, but you can still make the most out of matchmaking with randoms with these few tricks.
- Split up — Don’t have all three people going after a single boss. If you see one of your teammates going to a boss at the other end of the map, make your way to the other.
- Use burst-damage supers — Nova Bomb, Thundercrash, Blade Barrage — to take out bosses whenever you can.
- Stay on the rooftops — You’ll be more mobile and better able to reach the harder-to-find mini-bosses.
- Use the teleporters at either side of the map — they’re the tall tower-looking devices on small floating islands at the far edges of the map, farthest from the spawn point. The top right and left corners, in other words.
- Keep a sword handy — Almost all the bosses are ground-based, so Crown-Splitter, Lament, or Falling Guillotine are good options.
The Best Way to Farm Solstice Packages
Getting your hands on a bunch of Solstice Packages ultimately comes down to playing a lot of EAZ, as getting them out of EAZ chests is random. If you can manage ten or more mini-boss kills per run, you’ll have around sixty chances per hour of getting a chest.
In my experience, you’ll get three to five packages per ten chests with good RNG, so by the above math, that’s about fifteen to thirty packages per hour if the game likes you. The remaining loot will all be Key Fragments that allow you to open packages for random blue and purple gear.
Be mindful of how many packages you have, as you’ll need thirty total to unlock the Legendary Solstice armor on all three characters. Once you get to the Magnificent or Tier 3 armor set, you’ll be able to earn randomly-rolled Legendary Solstice armor, so be sure to stock up when you have the chance.
Check out our other Destiny 2 guides on GameSkinny.
