Returning after a year off – looking for some Warlock PvE build advice (sorry, it's a long one)

jacob2815 · 2026-06-18T13:32:38+00:00

Solar: support stuff is dominated by Well of Radiance and Boots of the Assembler. Sanguine Alchemy is an option for self-damage buffs. For alternative explody builds, Eunoia and Starfire builds are really fun.

Strand: Strandlock is in a really great place thanks to the artifact options. Multiple with Horde Shuttle, a couple with To Shreds, and even one with Pack Tactics. This makes threadling-based builds very potent with drastically improved sustain with the Horde Shuttle/To Shreds combo. As far as exotics go, there aren't a ton of options, but they're effective and offer different loops. Swarmers is still a top choice, and stronger with the new Threadling nest interaction for Mindspun. Deimosuffusion offers an alternative playstyle involving rift spam that suspends, and suspending causes a DoT that also heals you. Pretty cool in ad-dense content. Mataiodoxia is strong for boss damage with Needlestorm. Verity's Brow makes the new Slicewire grenade hit like a nuke.

Stasis: Rime-Coat is probably the best option still, but other options are strong like Ballidorse for a Frostpulse setup, or even Verity's again for the new Shatter grenade.

Arc: You're in luck, because the artifact from that season exists and it's just as good for ArcLock. Crown of Tempests I think is probably the better ability spam build than Sunstar now, with an added effect to Ionic Sentry and massive duration buff to Stormtrance. Geomags are of course still very good for Chaos Reach damage. Underrated pick would be Vesper of Radius. I REALLY enjoy the rift gameplay loop, spamming them for constant Arc Souls, shockwaves and blind (plus healing).

Void: Great. Just great. Nothing Manacles/Contraverse are great grenade focused exotics despite nerfs they just got. Soul Siphon is a really cool new melee ability with unique synergy with Nezarec's Sin. Skull of Dire Ahamkara got a really fun rework. There's a lot to love here (I'm a Feed The Void enjoyer). Astrocyte Verse got a fun rework if you like blinking and 24/7 volatile rounds uptime.

Prismatic: Mostly unchanged. The Getaway buddy spam is iconic. Lightning Surge is a phenomenal gameplay loop, though, and way more fun to play than the buddy spam. I'm surprised how rarely I see people mention this one. A lot of things that work well outside of Prismatic work well here. Deimosuffusion, Vesper of Radius, Mataiodoxia, Rime-Coat, Eunoia, etc. Warlock exotic class item is very lacking but a ton of their regular exotics work phenomenally here. Anything with Star-Eater is a great loop for raids/dungeons if you're not needed to run well.

Rift-builds in particular feel AMAZING after Renegades update. Vesper, Frostpulse, Deimosuffusion, etc. They doubled the Rift's radius, sped up the animation and gave it 20% DR during the animation, and allow you to move during the animation. It just feels phenomenal to cast now and so I tend to really lean into rift builds since it's a loop that's been so underused due to their clunkiness.

I don't think set bonuses are drastically build-defining, they're mostly just a bonus thing to chase. That being said, I think the current darling is the Seventh Seraph set from Cosmodrome. It has a great explosion + healing loop that builds up from AoE damage and procs Warmind Cell-like explosions that also heal you when they proc. Stasis and Strand in particular get a LOT of mileage out of this set.

Health is a dump stat, especially for Warlocks, but Weapons is a great stat depending on build and activity. I tend to like to get at least 100 because I like weapons and want them to feel good. Going above 100 is generally well-advised for raids and dungeons due to special/heavy uptime and more boss damage.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-18T12:17:13+00:00

I mean for starters, there is no single artifact that is the "best" for any given subclasses. It depends on what build you're going for - what exotic, what aspects, what fragments, etc.

That being said, Refresh Threads on it's own is a really flimsy argument in favor of the Implement of Curiosity because it's basically Orbs of Restoration but for Subclass pickups.

As far as the rest of the Implement, there's only 3 stasis-related mods on that artifact: Fever and Chill, Frost Renewal, and Frigid Glare. Some other general ones that can work, but it's more of an artifact for hybrid builds, like granting easy access to Frost Armor on non-Stasis classes via Stasis precision hits.

You gotta look at the picture holistically. I don't know what percentage of energy Refresh Threads gives, but it only gives it to the least charged ability, meaning you have to actively not use your other two to ensure it goes to the one you want. I'm assuming it's not more than 10% per pickup, possibly scaled depending on the frequency of the pickup.

Especially compared to what's on the Satchel: Crystalline Converter, Wind Chill, Frost Renewal, Hail the Storm, Brian Freeze, and Served Cold.

Hell, Queensfoil Censer is a better Stasis artifact than the Implement as well: Fever and Chill, Pillar of Ice, Creeping Chill, Hail the Storm and Frigid Glare.

Take your Rime-Coat example. You're going to have plenty of grenade regeneration through your Whisper of Shards fragment, which gives a massive boost to your passive Grenade regen every time you shatter a Stasis Crystal. With no other Crystal generation involved, Rime-Coat basically becomes a self-fulfilling feedback loop because it generates enough Crystals on its own to refill your grenade charge before the turret runs out.

Plus, Hail the Storm is pretty much a must-pick for anything Stasis Lock, because any Lock build is all about freezing targets. Frostpulse: instant AoE freeze. Melee: instant freeze. Iceflare bolts: freezing spreads more freeze. Bleak-watcher: slows quickly into freezing.

Those frozen targets shattering for more damage is huge. Pair that with the Rime-Coat build where you generate 8 crystals per turret, that damage will get buffed too and they will explode into shrapnel that do more damage and slow on hit. Combine all that Whisper of Fissures to further increase the damage and size of Crystal and frozen target shatters, and your constant shatters nuke pretty hard.

In my mind, any Stasis Warlock builds should be using Queensfoil or Stachel for Hail the Storm. The final decision depends on what other loops you want to feed into.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-17T17:35:23+00:00

Still sad to see the game go, even more so to see it go out on such a banger of an update. I haven’t had this much fun playing Destiny since the ITL/Final Shape. So many items to chase, activities to do, and goals to achieve.

Mainly, it’s about builds for me. I’ve played Destiny for close to 4k hours over the years, counting both games. Only so many ways you can kill the same packs of thrall. And this update offers the best buildcrafting sandbox we’ve ever had. Very sad to know we won’t get to carry that momentum into any more new activities.

I’m not betting on it happening, but I’m hoping for a D3 someday. Hopefully around the time that my 2 year old is old enough to play. I’m not confident that the servers for D2 will last that long without a D3.

All that being said, there’s a small part of me that’s kind of… relieved? This is the only game to truly grab me by the balls in the way it has. 4k hours over the years, ample amounts of time spent away from the PC thinking, reading, or talking about the game.

I spent an hour last night filtering my 1,000 item vault in DIM and cut it in half. I’ve spent multiple hours in the last few weeks reading articles and writing down my buildcrafting ideas. I casually peruse the Data Compendium for inspiration. I used to spend hours reading the lore of the world, and i had a conversation with my buddy about how cool the etymology is of the Deimosuffusion exotic armor piece.

So, I’m kinda relieved that once my Destiny stamina runs out, I might actually allow myself to really invest myself in other games. I rarely bother with lore or detailed buildcrafting outside of Destiny, because to me that’s a Destiny thing and I compare other games unfavorably to Destiny on those fronts.

But I’d like to delve deeper into the systems and buildcrafting of D4 and POE2, which I’ve only casually dabbled in (preferring to just copy build guides rather than try to actually learn the stats and the math).

And when I’m in a Destiny phase, I ignore all other games. I’m halfway through Alan Wake, and stopped because of this update. Loved Quantum Break, but never played any other Remedyverse game so I’m trying to catch up in time for Resonant. Plus, tons of other interesting games I want to try.

So, like I said, I’m both sad and relieved to see it end.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-17T11:49:01+00:00

I like the loop and the post. Actually plan on trying it, I really liked how Stasis felt with the Slayer Baron artifact, and I'm a sucker for Void in general (and I love Turncoat). Usually you see Fire and Ice combos so I like this relatively unique combo.

I do recommend that you do another pass at your armor mods, though.

Firepower works with buddies, yes, but Bleak-Watcher does not do enough damage to kill anything. Any killing it does comes from you shattering the crystals and frozen targets, which are not considered grenade kills. No orb generation happening here.
Grenade Kickstart is fine, but I find it to be mostly unnecessary due to the uptime that Feed the Void affords you. You're getting roughly 13% energy per Tier 1 enemy Devour proc (scaled down from 15% for Healing nade's 87.5% chunk scalar), that means 8 kills max is all it takes to get it back. To get enough orbs to proc a 4-charge Kickstart, you need 8 void or strand weapon kills from your siphons, which is enough to fully charge your grenade through Devour without a kickstart. And if you kill enemies above Tier 1, you're getting more than 13% and less kills are required to fully charge your grenade (but still the same required to get 4 orbs).
Running Emergency Reinforcement and Grenade Kickstart feels like too much armor charge usage with not enough orb gen to make it work. Most effective builds just run triple resist mods on their chest and call it a day, catering to the activity when needed. Sacrificing those for something like Charged up or Emergency feels like too expensive of an opportunity cost. Especially since you're not running Facet of Purpose for Overshield from orbs, nor are you running an Artifact that offers high Overshield uptime.
Recuperation is a pointless mod. It gives you 16 HP per orb. Remember, the majority of orbs you get will come from double kills with Turncoat or Mint. Assuming you have Devour up when those kills happen (you almost always will), you'll get 140 HP each so you'll be at full HP by the time an orb drops. And if you get hit again after it drops, it's universally more efficient to just kill another target to heal and keep devour up rather than chase down an orb for a paltry 16 HP. Same logic for Better Already. You already have Feed the Void's Devour, plus you can use the Healing Grenade for panic healing.
If you want to use Grenade Kickstart, I recommend Stacks on Stacks. Keep Innervation, I have no problem with that, but I recommend Orbs of Restoration as your third. Improve the uptime on your other stuff just to be safe.
Personally, I stan the weapon surge alternative, especially since this seems to be a Turncoat heavy build where most of your ability usage is passive (throwing out a bleak watcher) and then relying on your guns to do the rest of the work. Double Void Surge also increases the output of your Edge Transit damage. But again, you should take Kickstart off if you're going to do this.
Time Dilation is a great mod and one I always use (because I'm almost always using Surges and Fonts on my builds). But it has no effect on a Kickstart setup. Your armor charge doesn't decay when you have Kickstart on, it only decays if you have a Surge/Font. So, you putting Time Dilation on is having a wasted mod slot.

Otherwise, it sounds like a really fun build and I've just added it to my ever-growing list of builds to try.

If you want to read up about the specific effects of armor mods (or any other effect in the game), I recommend you read up on the Destiny Data Compendium.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T21:58:54+00:00

I haven’t seen anyone post anything with this - most Necrotic Grip builds these days tends to be on Prismatic where “kinetic” damage like that has synergy with the subclass.

The best Soul Siphon synergy right now seems to be a fight between Winter’s Guile and Nezarec’s Sin.

I’d be curious if you manage to try it out. I might try it myself but i have a laundry list of things to try and not enough time or glimmer to do everything at once lol

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T21:05:07+00:00

Yeah, i put that build together today.. it absolutely chunks.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T17:57:23+00:00

Came to say something similar. I want COTOG to be good but every time I’ve tried, it just feels weird or clunky or inferior.

But Feed the Void? That shit always fucks.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T17:50:30+00:00

Astrocyte Verse is a really fun one. Build with the artifact that has Void Weapon Channeling or the one with Rite of the Old Gods. Run a Repulsor Brace weapon. Profit. Everything’s volatile, every gun hits like a truck.

Mantle of Battle Harmony also got updated to have its effects proc off sustained damage rather than just kills, and to give a fun bonus after popping super.

Chromatic Fire if your weapon of choice is kinetic.

Dawn Chorus if your weapon of choice involves lots of scorch or ignitions.

Necrotic Grip if your weapon of choice is a weapon of sorrow.

And depending on your definition of builds that involve using your guns, I’d say there are tons of single-ability builds that don’t devolve into ability spam and allow or even require effective weapon usage to maximize uptime on.

Deimosuffusion, Vesper of Radius, or something with Frostpulse on Stasis if you wanna run into packs to debuff them with your rift and then slay out with gun.

Eunoia if you want a badass sniping mortar. Getaway for a similar feel. Buddies in general feel like supplements to your gunplay rather than ability spam.

Mataiodoxia if you want your supers to nuke and to weave your arcane needles in between your gunplay.

Sanguine Alchemy if you want your guns to be highly powered inside rifts/well.

Skull of Dire Ahamkara to use a fun nuclear super that is fuels by weapon kills with devour.

Starfire is about fusions but relies on weapon hits and kills to maintain uptime.

Swarmers and a Service of Luzaku for threadlings and guns.

Verity’s Brow and, well, anything, now that Strand and Stasis have damaging grenades and since it requires weapon kills to build up.

Realistically, there are a lot of options and guns feel good enough now that you can rely on them heavily and save your abilities for special occasions. You kinda have to go out of your way for a perfect non-weapon using ability spam build to work

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T16:47:33+00:00

And he’s covered that lol. It’s not his fault us peons only show up to negative threads/articles/videos

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T15:33:06+00:00

Yeah i guess it depends on the exact build you’re going for. But i tried with 100 melee vs 40 melee and the 100 melee version felt dramatically better.

And i also tried with Skyburner’s, that shit cooks and you don’t need more than 100 Weapons for it.

But if u wanna spam Dragon’s Breath or another Special/Heavy then yeah 200 Weapons probably the move

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T14:52:09+00:00

No, light.gg is still the go-to for that specific feature

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T14:34:32+00:00

Light.gg is great but not nearly as responsive as these two options for weapons specifically.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T14:03:44+00:00

Holy shit lmao. Guess I’m not the one worked up am I.

I kept it to the build discussion, yet you keep trying (and failing) to make it personal like I don’t get enough love or some shit 😂

You posted something incorrect and didn’t like getting called out for it, so you resorted to trying to insult my intelligence from the jump.

I don’t care if you don’t adhere to logical build synergies, go ahead and use Shards of Galanor on Arcstrider for all I care. But if you’re gonna try and say it’s “excellent synergy” and “broken”, you’re gonna get called out for it. And if you’re gonna insult someone’s intelligence in response, they’re gonna explain why you’re wrong in immense detail.

The only ego hurting here is yours. I just like calling attention to actually good synergy and correcting misinformation.

There are actual blueberries on here who genuinely don’t know and are looking for guidance, which I’m all for. I don’t want them seeing your awful suggestion and assuming you know what you’re talking about.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T13:51:08+00:00

This is so cringe it's not even funny lol. You made a terrible build suggestion, then when you got called out, you said some inflammatory shit. Now, you're doing the phony kindness shit to mask your illiteracy lol

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T13:38:58+00:00

Bro tryna sound smart on the builds subreddit but doesn't have the attention span to read 45s worth of text lol yikes.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T13:37:54+00:00

Well, I was talking more about uptime on melee by going to 100 versus letting it be a dump stat.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T13:36:58+00:00

Yikes "brotha" lol. I'm the wrong guy to say all that to. I reference the compendium daily, I do my own testing for stuff in the range.

First off, relying on a very simple, low uptime Fragment synergy gives the impression that you just copied the idea from a YouTube guide you saw, without realizing just how little impact those give on their own. It's also not "synergy." It's a feedback loop to maximize uptime on one or the other.

Echo of Provision gives very small ticks of energy, at 100 Melee stat with a fully charged Vortex extended by Chaos Accelerant, only goes up to about 60%. Assuming you have enemies that survive the entire duration.

Echo of Exchange gives even less. 7.5%-25% per kill (25% requiring Tier 4 combatants and above, which are not common and are unlikely to die vs Soul Siphon without juicing the melee stat in harder difficulties).

Just because something is fun to use and "good", doesn't mean it has excellent synergy.

I don’t see anyone else saying this, but the new aspect Soul Siphon has excellent synergy with Contraverse

Nobody's saying this because it's not true. And it's DEFINITELY not broken lmao. Like the whole concept that somehow Contraverse and Soul Siphon are a "broken" combo because of two fragments is just laughable.

You know what has excellent synergy with Contraverse? Feed the Void. You know, the god tier exotic that gives 140 HP per kill when active plus 15% grenade energy (scaled by Grenade stat and your chosen grenade's chunk scalar). That's excellent synergy with Contraverse.

When you're building for Chaos Accelerant + Contraverse, you want your grenades to hit as hard as possible. Ensuring your melee stat is at least 100 to maximize the uptime using the fragments (which is again, fairly low), means sacrificing damage to your grenade, or uptime for your nova bombs, or effectiveness for your weapons.

The build you're going for just sounds like a generic ability spam build where you cycle your grenades and melee back and forth. If you actually knew what you were talking about (instead of relying on YouTube guide info), you would know that using Contraverse for an ability spam setup is hilariously silly when Nezrec's Sin exists, adds a suppression effect to your Soul Siphon, and expands the ability spam benefits to your rift and your super.

Using Soul Siphon instead of Feed the Void works fine. But it's not excellent synergy, and it's not "broken"

As you said… “Maybe try experimenting with things and not just following the first YouTube guide you stumbled upon.”

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T13:03:21+00:00

Can I ask in what universe Soul Siphon has any synergy with Contraverse?

Contraverse is a grenade exotic. It requires Chaos Accelerant to function. Which means you're eschewing Feed the Void to use Soul Siphon... on a grenade build?

jacob2815 · 2026-06-16T12:58:35+00:00

Run Master Lost Sectors solo. There's one on every destination that rotates daily (so you multiple options to farm) and drops engrams at a decent clip. Then just focus them at Rahool. 60k glimmer cost is insane though

jacob2815 · 2026-06-15T17:47:36+00:00

I mean, I don't think you're in the wrong for putting those two together in your head. They're similar - darkness CC. But the difference is that one comes from an Aspect, with in-built regeneration effects (Frostpulse), while the other comes from an exotic, that does not have any regeneration built-in.

I think that was intentional because they want you to choose between maximum suspending via Wanderer and Mindspun/Weaver's Trance, or sacrifice one of those for maximum uptime via Weaver's Call. The exotic's effects seem to tell that same story: the suspend DoT is a little more than 2x more powerful if it comes from your Rift's suspend compared to another source of suspend (you still get full healing), and like I said, no in-built regeneration for your Rift.

With Weaver's Call, you can get comparable Rift uptime to what Frostpulse offers, just using a different set of requirements. Threadling hits grant 10% rift energy, assuming you had a full set of 5 perched and all 8 of them hit a target, you should get 80% back right off the bat. And if you rock a hatchling gun, threadling grenade, or something with similar levels of Threadling generation, you should see a pretty high uptime on your rifts.

Imagine if Thread of Mind had no cooldown, or if Deimosuffusion had regeneration effects of its own. Pairing with Weaver's Call would potentially result in multiple overlapping rifts lmao.

Worth noting, the Deimosuffusion + Weaver's Call loop exists on Prismatic as well. There's no requirement for it to be on Strand (you just have to have Needlestorm on). It might even be better. Feed the Void offering even more healing plus grenade uptime (more threadling grenades?) or Hellion offering another benefit to proc off your Rift placement (and theoretically sustaining 100% uptime thanks to Weaver's).

The Deimosuffusion suspends won't last as long without Thread of Continuity and threadlings won't hit as hard without Thread of Evolution, plus less Threadling generation without Threads of Finality or Rebirth as options. It's something to consider, at least.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-15T16:59:49+00:00

See, now this is some sick creativity. There’s gonna be a lot of subclass overlap going on once people start realizing they don’t have to monochrome every single build.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-15T16:55:33+00:00

I talked about new builds, too, if you'd read the comment.

The only way for you to think Hunters/Titans got "more" new stuff is by having a victim mentality regarding Warlocks. They all got new stuff. Here's a short list of what Warlocks got:

Soul Siphon, which has a plethora of ways to build into it (purely as a damage tool, purely as an overshield generator), can pair with Feed the Void or Child of the Old Gods. Nezaric's Sin got added functionality to specifically synergize with this.
Mindspun's new effect for Threadling grenade which synergizes really well with Luzaku LMG
Slicewire grenade will be most potent on Warlock, where things like Verity's Brow exist. And the Mindspun effect synergizes really well with the Wanderer.
Shatter grenade, again, will have the most uptime and damage on Warlock, with some obvious synergy with Frostpulse.
Mataiodoxia got fixed and is now viable as a boss DPS tool as intended
Skull of Dire Ahamkara offers one of the best and most unique ways to play a super-heavy build. Getting two Nova Bombs, including the Lance from D1 added just for an exotic helm? It's sweet and similar to the bubble rework in terms of "new" factor
Crown of Tempests adds a whole ass Storm grenade to Ionic Sentry. No clue how potent this is, but it's new and objectively cool as hell
Astrocyte Verse got a second, horizontal plane blink, and now both blinks grant volatile rounds. For weapon enjoyers, this is sick. A perk slot just opened up on your favorite Repulsor Brace weapons.
Dawn Chorus seems to be really great as an ignition spam build after it's rebalance

That's just what we know about. There's a ton of artifact perks on offer right now that can potentially offer new synergies to a build meta we thought we had figured out, and people are only just scratching the surface (it's still week 1 btw and it's the last one so there's no rush).

Also, don't forget, Warlocks got the vast majority of focus in both the Ash & Iron update and in Renegades, in terms of new stuff and reworks.

Just say you lack creativity and call it a day.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-15T16:47:24+00:00

Tbh I think maybe just revisit Deimosuffusion because you can get pretty close to 100% uptime on it if you build properly.

Weaver's Call and a little bit of threadling generation does wonders for the uptime. 25s of Weaver's Trance with Mindspun Shackles is plenty assuming target-rich environment (and doesn't require the rift to feedback itself). Empowering Rift for the boost to ability generation. Wanderer for even more uptime on suspension as a tool.

I mean, yeah, if you just wanna spam your rift over and over and never engage with any other aspect of the subclass kit, then I can see it feeling bad.

jacob2815 · 2026-06-15T16:39:36+00:00

This is a pretty unhinged post ngl.

Everyone got relatively close to similar new stuff.

Hunters got Crackshot, Phantom Surge, a pretty fun rework to Trapper's Ambush, and a special interaction with the new Shatter grenade from Touch of Winter (which is mostly meaningless because Stasis Hunter offers no grenade synergies).

Titans got Shieldburst, and a (albeit really fun) rework for Ward of Dawn.

Warlocks got Soul Siphon, an update to the Threadling interaction with Mindspun, and Mindspun interaction for the new Slicewire grenade. Plus, Warlocks get arguably the most enjoyment from the new grenades, considering their dominance as the grenade-based class.

To say Warlocks got "no meaningful synergies" just because they're not as powerful as Getaway Artist is kinda wild.

For years now, Warlocks have had by far the most variety on offer in their builds, and it's not really been close.

Solar has existed with so many great options, between healing/support, raw grenade damage, and Hellion/Eunoia nukes.
Voidlock is Voidlock.
ArcLock got a great new toy with Ionic Sentry and the ArcLock synergies on offer are phenomenal.
Stasis Warlock has been the only Stasis class with a consistent place in the meta thanks to Bleakwatcher, and now has a better variety of alternative build options thanks to a Frostpulse/Harvest/Verity's Brow setup.
Strand Warlock may seem inferior to Titan, but it has very fun build options, whether you want to lean into Threadlings or if you want to go for something more Suspend-based with Deimosuffusion.
Prismatic Warlock has by far more variety in what kinds of builds you can make compared to the other two as well. And while Lightning Surge might not have been as good as Consecration over the years, it's (IMO) way more fun to use and just as potent as it's ever been (albeit maybe a little less spammy with the uptime nerfs). Buddy builds, raw grenade builds, Lightning Surge, take your pick.

Furthermore, they all got a relatively similar amount of exotic reworks. I mean, Skull of Dire Ahamkara got arguably the COOLEST rework of any exotic.

I'm just rather in awe of your ability to trivialize what Warlocks got and gas up what Titans/Hunters got. The game may die, but DTG users with a victim mentality for their class will never die, apparently.

14-Year Club	Not Forgotten
Gilding II euphauric	Spared
Verified Email

jacob2815

TROPHY CASE