Warlocks have become one of the biggest powerhouses of Destiny 2 The Final Shape with the release of Prismatic. Here are the best Warlock builds you should be running in Destiny 2 for all kinds of content in Bungie’s looter shooter.
Warlocks have always been powerful in Destiny. Since the days of self-resurrection to Well of Radiance until very recently, Warlock is one class that never fell out of the meta. Bungie has tried multiple times to nerf Warlocks, but their survivability and versatility make them impossible to overlook.
With that said, when The Final Shape launched, Well of Radiance was nerfed which led to panic among the playerbase. However, that was short-lived since Song of Flame emerged as a new powerhouse Super and Warlocks have become stronger than ever.
Once you add Prismatic to the mix, you can be confident that no raid LFG will kick you for running a Warlock. If you want to play Warlock in The Final Shape and need an overview of the most meta builds, you’ve come to the right place.
Best Destiny 2 Warlock Prismatic Build: Mantle of Battle Harmony
Warlocks currently have one of the strongest Prismatic classes in the game. When equipped with Vortex Grenades, this subclass can deal with adds efficiently enough. However, add Stasis to the mix, and Warlocks now have the strongest add clear in the game.
The benefits do not end here as the new Song of Flame Super ability grants infinite Solar ability spam, which comes in handy against both bosses and smaller enemies. Finally, Warlocks have become extremely self-sufficient, as they can heal, deal damage, and provide buffs to the entire team.
This is further enhanced by the Mantle of Battle Harmony Exotic, which recharges your Super energy upon defeating enemies with a weapon of the matching element. Once you use this Exotic along with the Song of Flame Euper and add Prismatic to it, your Warlock will become unstoppable.
Destiny 2 Warlock Prismatic Build: Abilities, Aspects & Fragments
Abilities
- Super: Song of Flame
- Class Ability: Phoenix Dive
- Jump: Burst Glide
- Melee: Penumbral Blast
- Grenade: Vortex Grenade
Aspects
- Feed the Void: Defeating any target with ability grants Devour. Your Devour is significantly improved as it grants more healing and Grenade energy.
- Bleak Watcher: Holding your Grenade and throwing it spawns a Stasis Turret that crystals at enemies.
Fragments
- Facet of Sacrifice: Your Arc, Solar, or Void buff ability final blows grant Darkness Transcendence Energy.
- Facet of Balance: Rapidly defeating targets with Light damage recharges your melee. Rapidly defeating targets with Darkness damage recharges your Grenade.
- Facet of Courage: Your Light abilities (Arc, Solar, and Void) deal increased damage to enemies afflicted with Darkness debuffs.
- Facet of Protection: Gain resistance to incoming damage when surrounded by enemies, which is further amplified when transcendent.
- Facet of Dominance: Void Grenades can weaken targets, while Arc Grenades can Jolt targets.
Prismatic Warlock Weapons and Exotic
- Kinetic:. The Kinetic slot is flexible depending on what you prefer. Some of the best choices here include The Call Sidearm or The Supremacy Sniper Rifle. The Call is part of the Rocket Assisted Frame class that is immense in taking down both tankier and fragile enemies alike. As for The Supremacy, when equipped with Kinetic Tremors, it’s a powerhouse against all kinds of bosses and Champions.
- Energy: In the Energy slot, you need to use the Sunshot Hand Cannon. This weapon synergizes well with Solar abilities and is one of the best add-clear weapons in the game.
- Heavy: The best weapon to run in the Heavy slot is Apex Predator with Bait and Switch. This Rocket launcher boasts some of the highest DPS in the current sandbox, with the Heavy weapons being incredible for end-game content, especially when Solar Surges are active.
Prismatic Warlock Armor Mods
Helmet
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Harmonic Siphon (1)
- Heavy Ammo Finder (3)
- Heavy Ammo Scout (1)
Gauntlets
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Harmonic Loader (2)
- Font of Vigor (3)
- Fastball (1)
Chest
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Concussive Dampner (3)
- 2x Harmonic Resistance (2)
Legs
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3)
- Solar Weapon Surge x2 (6)
- Harmonic Scavanger (1)
Class Item
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Time Dilation (3)
- Outreach (1)
- Powerful Attraction (2)
Prismatic Warlock Stat Priority
- Resilience > Recovery > Discipline > Mobility > Intellect > Strength
The primary stat you should consider when playing Prismatic Warlock is Resilience. This stat is exceptionally important to survive against enemies in high-end content. Making sure that your build has 100 Resilience should be prioritized before any other stat is considered.
After Resilience, Recovery is great as it makes your health regenerate faster. Lower Recovery means slow health regen which can be dangerous, and even result in an unnecessary team wipe. Finally, getting your Discipline up is also essential as your Grenade is one of the most important tools in your kit. As such, you cannot afford a slow-recharging Grenade, especially in end-game content.
Destiny 2 Prismatic Warlock Build: How to use Mantle of Battle Harmony
There is a fairly simple rotation here, and once you’ve got it going, it will chew through enemies largely without your input. To maximize the impact of this strategy, you’ll want to follow this gameplay loop:
- Use your Grenade ability to deal damage. Alternatively, consume your Grenade to summon a Stasis Turret
- Pop your melee to freeze targets whenever possible
- Activate Transcendence once available and start spamming your Grenades
- Once Song of Flame is available, use it to deal damage to bosses
- Make sure to defeat as many adds as possible to recharge your Super quickly
This Warlock build is all about control as your Stasis Turret and Vortex Grenades easily deal with smaller enemies. If things look rough, activate your Song of Flame Super which deals a lot of damage to enemies, while also providing damage resistance and faster ability regeneration for your team.
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Best Destiny 2 Warlock Solar Build: Speaker’s Sight
While the Prismatic class is all about control, one of the biggest areas where Warlocks shine in The Final Shape is support and utility. Warlocks are the best healers in the game, and the Speaker’s Sight Exotic makes them even stronger.
Once combined with the Song of Flame Super, you get access to both healing as well as damage. You might be wondering why no Well of Radiance. The problem is that Well of Radiance has been heavily nerfed in The FInal Shape, and is now outclassed by the new Warlock Super.
The Speaker’s Sight Exotic combined with Song of Flame is more than enough to support your team. This has been tried and tested in not just normal content, but also in the Legend campaign, and even Salvation’s Edge’s Contest mode, easily the most challenging content of The Final Shape so far.
It won’t help you tank The Witness’ death beams in the final encounter of the raid, but it will keep you alive in other tight situations where that additional sustain can help your Fireteam clutch a tricky encounter.
Destiny 2 Warlock Solar build: Abilities, Aspects & Fragments
Abilities
- Super: Song of Flame
- Class Ability: Phoenix Dive
- Jump: Burst Glide
- Melee: Incinerator Snap
- Grenade: Healing Grenade
Aspects
- Touch of Flame: Your Healing, Solar, Firebolt, and Fusion Grenades have enhanced functionality.
- Solar Grenade: Increases linger duration. Periodically emits blobs of lava around its perimeter.
- Healing Grenade: Improves the strength of cure and restoration effects applied.
- Firebolt Grenade: Increases target search radius and maximum target count.
- Fusion Grenade: Explodes twice.
- Hellion: Activating your class ability summons a Solar Mortar damages targets from a distance and scorches them accordingly.
Fragments
- Ember of Searing: Defeating scorched targets will recharge melee energy and spawn a Firesprite.
- Ember of Benevolence: Your Grenade and ability regeneration is enhanced upon restoration, cure, or radiant.
- Ember of Singeing: Your class ability recharges faster when you scorch targets.
- Ember of Empyrean: Solar weapon or ability final blows extend the duration for restoration and radiant effects applied to you (-10 Resilience).
Solar Warlock Weapons and Exotic
- Kinetic: This slot is best for Special weapons. Some great examples include the Scatter Signal Fusion Rifle, The Supremacy Sniper Rifle, and The Call sidearm, with each excelling in different situations.
- Energy: Technically speaking, just about any strong Solar Primary weapon can work here. However, the best ones to use are Luna’s Howl, Zhouli’s Bane, or Sunshot as they synergize the best with Solar subclass in the current meta. Following their buff, meta Solar Pulse Rifles like Abhortative and BxR-55 Battler are excellent options too.
- Heavy: For the Heavy slot, you’ll want a powerful Rocket Launcher. The best one in this case is Dragon’s Breath, assuming your Exotic slot is free. Otherwise, you can run Apex Predator, which opens up the Exotic option for the energy slot.
Solar Warlock Armor Mods
Helmet
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3)
- Harmonic Siphon (1)
- Heavy Ammo Finder (3)
- Dynamo (3)
Gauntlets
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Impact Induction (2)
- Harmonic Loader (1)
- Focusing Strike (2)
Chest
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- 2x Solar Resistance (4)
- 1x Arc Resistance (2)
Legs
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Better Already (1)
- Recuperation (1)
- Innervation (1)
Class Item
- +10 Stat Mod of choice (3-4)
- Bomber (1)
- Powerful Attraction (2)
- Bulwark Finisher (1)
Solar Warlock Stat Priority
Resilience > Discipline > Recovery > Mobility > Intellect > Strength
Unsurprisingly, Resilience and Discipline are both incredibly important to this build. Resilience is important, as while we should be recovering constantly, it’s still a good idea to make yourself as tanky as possible. As for Discipline, it ensures that your Healing Grenade is back off cooldown as fast as possible, which provides an emergency heal when in a tough spot.
The other stat worth focusing on is Recovery, which is nice to have in case we lose our loop of Restoration and need a reprieve. It also shortens the cooldown of Healing Rift, though that ability isn’t a huge focus of this build.
Destiny 2 Solar Warlock build: How to use Speaker’s Sight
This particular Warlock build is focused on its support capabilities. Here is how you can use it in almost all forms of engagement:
- Drop your healing turret in a position where it can heal all your allies
- Use your Phoenix Dive to summon the Hellion Solar Mortar to deal with adds
- Use your Sunshot or Solar Primary weapon of choice as often as possible, triggering Sun Blast or Incandescent to clear adds
- Your Healing Grenade should recharge pretty quickly so drop it whenever you are in a pinch
- Save your Super for boss engagements, where it will provide valuable damage and utility for your team
One of the biggest advantages of this build is that it is so easy to use. Any new player can get access to build early as the Speaker’s Sight Exotic can be claimed as a reward for finishing The Final Shape’s campaign in Legend difficulty. The only point to note here is that do not waste your healing turret. Use it when the enemy density is high, rather than throwing it out without thinking.
For more on Destiny 2 The Final Shape, check out our Titan and Hunter builds. If you want to learn about Destiny 2 in general, check out our guides for the best PvE weapons, Exotic mission rotator, and Xur rework.
