It is an incredible day to be an Arbalest fan. Not only has Bungie increased PVE damage for Linear Fusion Rifles in Destiny 2 by 10 percent, but it’s also given the weapon intrinsic anti-barrier to give you another option for taking down Champions. We knew about both of these going into today’s update. What we weren’t aware of, however, was Bungie stealthily sneaking in the weapon’s catalyst. Here’s how to get the catalyst, including information on how to level it up and what it does for Arbalest.

How to Get the Arbalest Catalyst

You can obtain the Arbalest catalyst by completing playlist activities. That means strikes (Nightfall or otherwise) and Gambit or Crucible matches. It basically comes down to sheer luck, sadly. Keep in mind, you need to actually own the weapon itself to cause the catalyst to drop.

How to Level up the Arbalest Catalyst

You can level up the Arbalest catalyst by eliminating 500 foes. There doesn’t appear to be any kind of bonus for certain game modes or from the season pass catalyst progress buffs. You can just use the gun a whole bunch or grind it out quickly.

There are a lot of places you can complete this catalyst, but the best by far is the Shadow Thrall hallway in The Shattered Throne dungeon. Available about halfway into the dungeon, this location spawns an endless amount of Shadow Thrall that can easily be dispatched. Because of the new primary infinite ammo addition, you can literally just stand in one place as lines of enemies run at you.

If you are unable to reach this location, then activities like the Blind Well and Altars of Sorrow are terrific alternatives. The latter absolutely throws weak Hive enemies at you, making it easy to complete this catalyst. You can also go to the Kingship Dock Lost Sector in The Tangled Shore and keep repeating it. This is an extremely short Lost Sector that’s packed with enemies you can swiftly go through in less than a couple of minutes.

What Does the Arbalest Catalyst Do?

Aside from the usual Orb generating effect — which is, to be fair, a huge deal — the Arbalest catalyst gives you extra handling and increases the magazine size. Oh, and it also tacks on the Genesis perk for extra measure. So now not only will it pierce through shields, dealing some damage straight through to the enemy’s health, but when you do break a shield with Arbalest, the magazine will be filled from reserves.

Keep in mind that the gun has Disruption Break, which makes foes more vulnerable to Kinetic damage for a brief period after destroying an enemy’s shields. Now you get two bonuses instead of just one! With all of these changes and upgrades, it’s safe to say that Arbalest will now be a super reliable weapon in high-level Nightfalls.

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