The Leviathan Race event “Claim Your Throne”, hosted by DTR Champions (@DTRChampions) and DestinyTracker (@destinytrack) occured on Saturday October 14th. Over 450+ people sat down to watch the event on twitch.tv/destinytrack where eight teams vied for glory and chalices courtesy of Gravesham Trophies (@GraveshamTrophy). The winners, Rogue Nine, were consistent the entire way through posting times of 25m 27s, 24m 12s , and 23m 34s beating out current world record holders Euro. Needless to say, for a casual raider like myself, these times were very impressive. As we look towards tomorrow's Prestige mode, I decided to sit down with Rogue Nine talking the event, raiding in general, and other interesting topics.

JBeck: Hello everyone it is great to meet you. Feel free to introduce yourself to the community. Make yourselves known.

Worthers91: I'm Worthers91, leader of [Rogue Nine] and I used Primary Me, LilTedford, Wheelzz25, Jokerz Wild 2 and JamesWerk in the raid to carry me. It was very effective.

Jokerz Wild 2: I am Jokerz wild 2 I used Striker Titan and Sunbreaker Titan.

Wheelzzz25: I'm Wheelzz25, I used a Titan and switched between Sunbreaker and Striker

Primary Me: I'm Primary Me, also referred to as Mikey during the tournament. I used Voidwalker Warlock throughout the raid until Calus and then switched to Stormcaller. On a side note, pineapple on pizza is the only way to live your life. If you don't believe me, just let it happen. Morgan Freeman even loves Pineapple on pizza.

Jameswerk: JamesWerk and I was on a Warlock, both Voidwalker and Stormcaller

Worthers91: For completeness, LilTedford was running a Voidwalker and Stormcaller Scumlock. I ran a Sunbreaker and Striker Titan.

JBeck: Out of curiosity how did you all end up being in a clan together?

Worthers91: Technically speaking, we're not ALL in a clan. JamesWerk is here for decorative purposes and is the proud owner of The WerkShop, the clan for his partnered stream(twitch.tv/jameswerk). As for the rest of us, most are fairly recent editions. [Rogue Nine] was originally founded on Socom II: US Navy Seals on the PS2 on January 2nd, 2005. If memory serves, only myself and loonyjj are still active from the original membership. loonyjacko and loonyNikolai are also longstanding members worthy of mention .

The team on Saturday came about through myself and MzLiv running raids in The WerkShop back on Destiny 1. She introduced me to Primary Me and well, it was clear the boy BAKES! He hadn't done much speedrunning before that but was keen to learn. I'd previously, ironically, been running with Wami, GShark and what became the Euros (2nd Place in the event). Me and Mikey ran with them and got faster and faster.

Mikey then introduced LilTedford, Jokerz and Wheelzz to the group. It was [Rogue Nine]'s biggest expansion in a long time, but proved to be one of the best. By the time Destiny 2 launched, we were a tight knit group ready to bake whatever Bungie threw at us despite the turbulence caused by some members' misguided view that its ok to have fruit on a pizza where more meat could be.

JBeck: I wanted to ask about was the Bake saying you guys say. Where did it come from?

Worthers91: We'd rather not have to expose the big bake chicken too much... but I guess we can let him say his piece - Mikey (Primary Me)?

Primary Me: I don't believe that I can actually pinpoint the moment when it became a thing. The term "bake" when referring to gaming has been around for quite some time as far as I can remember. We normally convene together by simply asking each other, "Bake?". If I had to guess where the Bake Chicken came from would be me getting a bit impatient waiting on everyone to answer and just screaming it out.

JBeck: I know when I ran the raid it felt pretty challenging the first time through and still is a fun thing to do. You guys have seemed to make it a science with your speed and efficiency. Tell us a little bit about how your group prepared for the event.

Primary Me: There was quite a bit of testing going on throughout the preparation, as well as just the volume of raids that we have done. We had some help from one of our clan members, D4DDY P0PS, who found out that the combination of Mida Multi-Tool and Mida Mini-Tool was the fastest for our transitions through the underbelly.

Collectively, the number of raid clears for the people we ran with on Saturday is 480. I believe that speaks a lot about the dedication to learning the raid inside and out. Many hours have been spent mapping and timing out the best routes in the underbelly of the Leviathan as well.

More recently, we had started to cut down our times with other clan mates and friends, AAJRHB79, IAmTheFlash16, JohnnySRT, and USendintheWolf due to time zone differences. We were only able to get together fully for our qualifying run on Wednesday and practices Thursday and Friday.

JBeck: 480 clears? That is a lot more than what most people have come close to doing in that short of a time. How do you guys keep things fresh and make the runs still entertaining for you? I know speed running in itself can be fun but others may not.

Jameswerk: Every raid can be a unique experience, each fireteam is composed of different fireteam members, different classes and subclasses making each a novel experience. Bungie also made this raid very unique by swapping up the order of the encounters each week, having a vast underbelly to explore between rooms, and different paths each week, maybe even each run depending on the needs of each Fireteam. Then we all participate in raid helps, and Guided Games, where we train new raiders how to complete the raids and how each section works, which is a rewarding experience for us even if it's repeated activity. When it comes to speed runs, the strats constantly evolve, so we are learning, practicing and running it differently as the strats get faster each run.

JBeck: That brings me to my question of optimization. Which order has been found to be the fastest "route" ?

Worthers91: Firstly, we do not acknowledge the term "Route" in connection with speed running. Keepo. As to the fastest rotation, we were initially of the opinion that Week 1 was the fastest. That said, we believed last week would be faster than this week but with the ever evolving strats we have already been proved wrong. It may never be definitively answered, for example new weapons and gear with increases in light level could change everything.

JBeck: Of course. Things change and you have to adapt. That is how these things work from my experience in the community. For those interested in doing similar things to you and your group, what would you recommend as a starting point besides the obvious youtube/read.

Worthers91: I think we covered this briefly in the post-match interview yesterday. The starting point is to know the raid. I did that both by playing and by watching my favourite streamers. I'm sure there is a long list of good options but my picks are JamesWerk and gsxrclyde. They cover the full spectrum from virgin runs, right up to pushing impressive one plate kills and speed runs. When you have the knowledge, you need to find like minded people to run with and progress. Along with the streamers' communities, places like Confluence Gaming offer you access to huge numbers of gamers to enjoy content and develop with. They even offer an "emergency help" service called the Pilgrim Guard and you can find details at http://confluencegaming.io/.

If you hit solid sub-40 minute runs, from there you have to start getting sweaty. Looking what others are doing on YouTube and Twitch is a must or you risk getting left behind. We've made no secret of having watched content from the Euros and carolinagamer99 in the buildup to the DTR event. Looking forward, we're hoping to bring back our Stacked Saturday events on Twitch which are focussed on breaking down and teaching the speed run strategies to people outside the recognised speed running clans. Stopping by could help you get started and we relish new competition, having been the "new competition" to the established teams like Route and Redeem prior to actually winning an event ourselves.

JBeck: For each phase, what do you find the best set-up in terms of characters is? (4 hunters/2 titans for example)

Liltedford: Royal Pools fastest setup ideally is three voidwalkers and three sunbreakers all with charged supers, once you have everyone go to middle throw a nova bomb at each set of censers and then have the three sunbreakers throw hammers at the censers each picking a different group

Wheelzz25: Dogs fastest setup is 6 striker titans with double pulse nades because pulse nades are op

Liltedford: Gauntlet is almost entirely time gated so you have to minimize two things, time spent clearing enemies and time spent running the gauntlet, the easiest way was using empowering rifts on warlocks and double pulse grenades on titans, and then when we ran me and @Primary Me ran blink warlocks through the gauntlet which are the fastest characters bar none, it just takes a lot of practice to get down

Worthers91: The fastest setup for Calus would be a Titan, a Warlock and 4 hunters. Then you have a reload barrier, a rift and 4 nighthawks.

Liltedford: Also with dogs rockets with cluster bombs are a must, with a 24x stack it won’t even take six rockets to kill a dog

Wheelzz25: But with 6 striker titans and double pulse nades you only need a 12 stack and 5 rockets

Liltedford: One thing we can’t emphasize enough though is that for speed runs learning the underbelly is an absolute must.

JBeck: What has been the biggest challenge in doing these runs ?

Worthers91: Honestly the biggest challenge was deciding on a set 6, making sure people were available and then setting aside time to practice. Particularly as one of us causes a bit of a time zone issue

Liltedford: Another challenge was just maximizing consistency while making sure we get every time save available which almost always adds more risk. And then when it comes to assigning roles part of it goes with who’s most comfortable with each class and then maximizing each other’s strengths, for instance who’s fastest, who’s best at soloing an area and so on

Worthers91: The distance from the door is also important. Send the fastest classes the furthest. Some sort of science.

Liltedford: Also something we didn’t mention is that while different class combos are fastest for different encounters obviously in a true speed run you can’t switch characters so a huge part is finding the overall best class setup that gives us the highest time saves.

JBeck: How would you rank this raid with the others and why?

Worthers91: We're pretty split on the ranking aspect. Its definitely below WotM and VOG, but some of the group like the variety and mechanical aspects. What we all agree on is we'd like more bosses to bake in the DLCs.

JBeck: What do you think makes this raid special outside of being the first D2 Raid?

Worthers91: I don't really see it as a special raid. VOG was special because it was first. All speed runners love WotM. This one posed new challenges but isn't going to be a classic for us.

Jameswerk: I think the order of the rooms changing each week and the underbelly makes it unique, but we will learn a lot more about what makes it unique come Wednesday when Prestige drops.

JBeck: Did you find it refreshing to have something PvE focused compared to the PvP events that have occured in the Past. I think this is the first time I saw a Raid Race but I am curious if you guys think this is something that should become a norm.

Jokerz wild 2: If we are being totally honest, at the moment PvP is world away from PvE when it comes to events. Both require teamwork and strategies but they are different skills. Despite that, PvE seems to have been left behind and as a PvE gamer I'm disappointed by that. There are many teams who might be put off from entering events when they look at the top teams and their times, but they really shouldn't be! You only have to look at us. We don't have a speed running history or any records. The Euros had a much quicker time than us before the event. Despite that, we came through to win which is proof anyone has a chance in a single run bracket event. Even if you don't win, training together for events and competing as a team is a great experience and a way to show the world what your clan is capable of.

As for future events, whilst we've seen raid races before they've been small in size and few in number. We would LOVE more events in the future. They should never be "the norm", but should be special events at regular intervals. If DTR put another event on, we'll definitely be there and hope that a lot of new teams will come and try to take our crown away (but not too soon).

Jbeck: Well thank you all for your time! Do you all have any final words to the community?

Jameswerk: I am so grateful to DTR Champions for putting on such a great PvE event. I think it will be the first of many Destiny 2 PvE events going forward and I hope that in the future there will be additional components included, like a charity or different divisions, maybe even handicapping, that will encourage everyone in the Destiny PvE and PvP communities to both participate and watch.

Liltedford: Firstly I’d like to thank Destiny Tracker for hosting this amazing event I had so much fun both with the lead up and the actual event itself. Also thanks to these great group of guys here in Rogue Nine coming together to make something great. Raiding is such a unique experience in gaming. There really isn’t anything else quite like it in today’s market. Getting together with a group of five other friends or random people and all working together to defeat a common enemy or finish a task set forth for them is one of the most satisfying experiences I’ve had in gaming. The whole reason that I got interested in Destiny was that it brought this fantastic co-op pve activity into an FPS. One of the things I enjoy most about raiding is spending time learning the raids, each encounter and boss, and bringing down to its barebones so that I am able to help and teach others how to complete this activity. Then once you find a solid group that can consistently raid, and consistently raid well, you can take it to a whole new level and start challenging yourselves with limitations or going for fastest times. As you can see we obviously focused more on the speed running and I couldn’t have had a more fun time doing it.

Wheelzz25: I would like thank my clan and teammates for letting me be a part of this team for the event. I joined Rogue Nine at the beginning of Destiny 2 being very new to the speed running concept since I came from a more PvP focused mindset back in vanilla Destiny but I'm glad I got involved with doing raids quick with these guys. I also would like to thank DestinyTracker and all the sponsors for putting on such a great event and I'm looking forward to future raid race events!

Jokerz wild 2: First I want to thank DTR and all sponsors for putting on an amazing event. Second my Clan mates who have all agreed to have me be a part of this amazing speedrun team. Destiny and Destiny 2 has been more than just a game for me. It has allowed me to form friendships I would never have imagined. Gaming in general is one of few mediums where race,age, color, or creed become irrelevant. Friendships are forged through a person's character and skill level. Not only an excellent way to relieve stress it brings a level of accomplishment that only other members of the community understand. I consider myself a hardcore raider looking for every pattern of enemies and the loadout to destroy enemies as i face them. Each raid experience presents a different challenge from taking on a new role to teach a new Guardian. I would encourage all gamers looking to find a team and once found surround yourself with like minded and better gamers.

Worthers91: Since everyone else has, I'd feel bad if I didn't thank DTR for putting on the event. I'd also like to say thanks to the sponsors, particularly Gravesham Trophies as I'm looking forward to my new on stream Scotch glass. For the teams who came to compete, G F'ing Gs! It was a great tournament and you should all be proud to have been part of it. For the teams that didn't, we hope to see you all next time for an even bigger event. Everyone who supported and kept it so positive in chat, you created a great atmosphere. Above all, I have to thank my team. It was an honour and a pleasure baking the raid and getting a win with you guys!

Jbeck: Good luck with your continued raids guys and we will see you all tomorrow as Destiny 2’s Leviathan Raid adds Prestige Mode!