How To Complete the Sundial Encounter in Destiny 2

Consisting of five encounters the Sundial is a Menagerie Lite. 

It is very easy for newcomers to the Sundial to bumble and fumble their way through the encounter.   I was one of the fumbling bumblers the first time, but I was fortunate to have four players with Undying titles driving the train into the station.  Thank you to my anonymous and temporary friends. 

Ascent

The first encounter isn't much of a warm-up for what is to come as there are no real downsides.  Kill everything and activate the Sundial. 

Bombardment

In my opinion, this is by far the easiest of the Sundial encounters. A mini-boss with shields will spawn in the middle of the map.   It will be immune until you can drop those shields.   To do so, kill the mobs around the outside of the map that are glowing (and pretty obviously more powerful than the other mobs).   They will drop relics (orbs) that you pick up and throw at the shields of the bad guy in the middle of the map.    Throw enough orbs and the shields come down.   When the shields are down take out the mini-boss.   The more mini-bosses that you kill the more points that you get.    Every time you kill a mini-boss the encounter gets harder.   Good times. 

Datamine

There will be circles on the ground that you must activate.   As you stand on the circles you will be attacked by waves of enemies.  Do your thing.   Occasionally a Psion Commander will spawn.  The only way to kill the Psion Commander is to melee him.  Saint-14 would be proud.   Until you kill him your progress is halted.  

After you protect the first circle two more will spawn at the same time.   The strategy that seems to work best at the moment is to put all six guardians on one plate... fully activate it and then do the other one.   Any time I was in a group that split it ended in deaths, deaths and more deaths.  

Gatecrash

One end of this painful map will have Vex Minotaurs that drop orbs.   You must take those orbs and drop them into place at the far side of the map.   Unfortunately, you lose your mobility; no double jump, etc.  Once enough orbs have been delivered a mini-boss will spawn.  Kill it.  Lather, Rinse, Repeat.    This seemed to be by far the toughest of the encounters as many players simply couldn't get the orbs back to deliver them.   The map and the lack of mobility are an unfortunate combination.  

Niruul, The Hollow Voice

As of December 11th this is the only final boss that will spawn. 

Niruul is immune to damage until you punch out a few of her Psion Commanders.   She will occasionally surround you with a bubble.  Burst it by attacking it as quickly as possible.  You will notice a lighter circle in the bubble.  Shoot that to escape. Then break out your teammates if they need help.   Like any other boss with shields, you need to burn her down when she is unshielded.   That's it.  Once you defeat Nirrul you will transmat back to the Sundial.   You must collect your reward from the terminal.  It won't be auto-dropped in your inventory.  

Strategies will surely change as we learn how to better complete this encounter, but for now, this seems the best course of action.