How to Score Points
Before getting into the action, everyone has to pick up an Elders’ Sigil, a scorecard of sorts. Much like the scorecard for Trails of Osiris, you can find it in the Reef. Visit Varicks, and the Elders’ Sigil will be right near the top of his offered items. When you first pick it up, the scorecard will list 0/30,000 High Score and 0/90,000 Cumulative Score.
And that’s what makes Challenge of the Elders just a bit different from any of the other endgame tasks Destiny has featured. In order to get loot, it’s not just about surviving or killing everything. It’s instead about surviving, killing everything, and scoring well.
Everything you do in Challenge of Elders will give you points. Assists give the fewest, then normal kills, then higher amounts of points for melee kills, grenade kills, and super kills. Even dropping orbs gives you points. Each week, a different modifier will give a specific boost to a certain type of kill. While it remains to be seen what the future modifiers will be, the first week grants a point bonus for precision kills, offering substantially more points for each one you can pull off. Additionally, the number of points given for each action increases with each of the three rooms you enter.
Be careful, though. Wiping and even taking too long on any of the three bosses will result in points being taken away. If that happens, a notification will come up in the lower left hand corner of the screen explaining that Varicks is becoming impatient and your score will decrease if you take any longer.