How to complete Specimen ID:NES004 in Destiny 2

The reward may not be what you're looking for.

A guardian clad in Echoes armor takes on two Vex Hydras in Breach Executable in Destiny 2.
Image via Bungie

Destiny 2‘s Echoes Act Two brought more developments for the seasonal story, more activities, and more specimen quests, starting with Specimen ID:NES004.

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This Specimen quest, like others, hands you a set of objectives around Nessus. In this case, Specimen ID:NES004 is connected with the seasonal activities. This comes in handy with the addition of the new Battlegrounds and two new, coveted weapons. Here are the objectives for Specimen ID:NES004 in Destiny 2 and how to complete them.

All Specimen ID:NES004 objectives and how to complete them

One of the bosses in Destiny 2's Echoes Battlegrounds activities.
This Vex will be in your crosshairs depending on what activities you run. Image via Bungie
  • Open Echo Chests from seasonal activities
    • Breach Executable gave us 44 percent progress, while Battlegrounds: Delve gave us 23 percent.
  • Focus Echo Engrams at the H.E.L.M.
  • Extract data and defeat powerful combatants in seasonal activities
  • Return to Failsafe

Open Echo Chests and focus Echo Engrams

This part is somewhat straightforward: Complete seasonal activities for Episode Echoes. When I was completely these, a regular-difficulty Breach Executable counted for 44 percent of the objective, while a Battlegrounds: Delve just after pushed that number to 66 percent and another Breach Executable did the trick. Once you’re past the threshold, you’ll need to focus Echo Engrams into your gear of choice.

If you don’t want to consume your weekly Deepsight, you can focus on the random Echo Engrams that grant you weapons and armor. They counted this objective for us and even got us another roll of Aberrant Action while still letting us save the Deepsight for later.

How to extract data and defeat powerful combatants for Specimen ID:NES004

The wording on this objective is slightly confusing. It tells you to secure extracted data in the Breach Executable activity and defeat powerful combatants in Battlegrounds. However, we cleared both objectives in a single run of Battlegrounds: Conduit, sparing us from having to dive into another Breach Executable. Progress for defeating powerful combatants is easy to track mid-activity, but the “extract data” objective completed at the end of the run. We didn’t try to run Breach Executable before Battlegrounds.

After you’ve completed the necessary steps, Failsafe will ask you to return to the H.E.L.M. Speaking to her will complete the quest and grant you the Mirror-Encrypted Hydra Tail specimen, which doubles your reputation bonuses from seasonal armor and bolsters the reputation gained by using a seasonal class item.

Author
Image of Pedro Peres
Pedro Peres
Pedro is Dot Esports' Lead Destiny Writer. He's been a freelance writer since 2019, and legend has it you can summon him by pinging an R-301, uttering the word "Persona," or inviting him to run a raid in Destiny 2 (though he probably has worse RNG luck than the D2 team combined). Find his ramblings on his Twitter @ggpedroperes (whenever that becomes available again).