Welcome to the Sunbracers Solar Warlock Build Guide! The Exotic gloves, Sunbracers, are an incredibly effective tool for clearing droves of enemies. With a snap of your fingers, you're able to set the world on fire, offering both strong area denial with your Solar Grenades and invaluable survivability with Song of Flame.
After dominating the Warlock meta last year, Sunbracers received a substantial nerf at the beginning of The Final Shape. However, this Sunbracers Solar build remains a powerful choice for Warlocks thanks to its strong ability uptime and exceptional survivability, keeping it relevant in endgame content.
After getting a powered melee kill, rain down on your opponents with Solar Grenades. Each tick of Solar damage done with grenades extends the duration of Heat Rises while ability kills extend Restoration and Radiant buffs. Finally, Ember of Searing generates a significant amount of Firesprites and Orbs of Power to top off your grenade energy.
WARNING: The Song of Flame Solar Super requires The Final Shape DLC to unlock.
- Easy to learn.
- Very high ability uptime.
- Strong damage and ad clear.
- Locked into Solar grenade.
- Harder to secure melee kills in more difficult content.
Gameplay Loop
- Start your rotation by consuming your Solar Grenade to gain Heat Rises and use Phoenix Dive to get 2 stacks of Restoration.
- Get a kill with Incinerator Snap to activate the exotic perk on Sunbracers.
- Start throwing Solar Grenades at your targets. Stay airborne for every kill to get a chunk of melee energy and extend the remaining duration of the Heat Rises buff. These kills extend the duration of your Restoration stacks.
- Grenade kills also build energy for Song of Flame, largely thanks to Ashes to Assets.
- Activate Song of Flame to defeat elite enemies and gain 90% damage resistance. This Super grants Radiant, increasing your weapon damage by 25% and allowing your weapons to pierce Barrier Champions. For the duration of the Super, your Solar and Kinetic weapons gain the ability to Scorch enemies.
Ability Breakdown
Super
- Song of Flame
- This Super makes you Radiant, grants 90% damage resistance, and enables your Solar and Kinetic weapons to Scorch targets. Casting Song of Flame replaces your grenade and melee with supercharged Solar versions of these abilities. Use it to clear ads, damage the boss, or just stay alive!
Abilities
- Phoenix Dive - Jump in the air and activate your class ability to dive to the ground and apply Cure x2 to yourself and allies. Dive during Heat Rises to grant Restoration x2. This is the main source of survivability in this build. It also applies 60 stacks of Scorch.
- Burst Glide - Your choice of jump ability is up to you, but the example setup uses Burst Glide.
- Incinerator Snap - Send out 5 Solar sparks dealing damage and applying Scorch stacks. Melee kills activate the exotic perk on Sunbracers.
- Solar Grenade - This grenade is the only one that interacts with your Exotic armor and is mandatory for this build.
Aspects
- Touch of Flame - Enhances your Solar Grenade by increasing its duration and causing lava to erupt from the point of impact, greatly improving both the damage and area control. This makes it even more effective for clearing groups of enemies or controlling zones in endgame content. Impact damage from these blobs stacks whereas the base Solar Grenade does not.
- Heat Rises - Consuming your grenade releases a burst of healing and initiates gliding. During Heat Rises, you can throw grenades, use your melee, and fire weapons. Kills while airborne extend Heat Rises and generate melee energy. Activate Phoenix Dive while Heat Rises is active to apply Restoration x2, further boosting your survivability.
Fragments
- Ember of Empyrean - Solar weapon and ability final blows extend the duration of active Radiant and Restoration buffs.
- Ember of Searing - When Scorched targets are defeated, melee ability energy is returned and a Firesprite is dropped. Picking up Firesprites recharges grenade energy.
- Ember of Singeing - Regenerate your Phoenix Dive faster.
- Ember of Ashes - Increases Scorch stacks applied by 50%. This fragment ensures your Incinerator Snap can kill an enemy to activate Sunbracers' Exotic perk.
Gearing
Required Gear and Weapons
Sunbracers - Increases the duration of your Solar Grenades. Solar melee kills grant unlimited Solar Grenade energy for a brief time. Built-in Fastball.
How to acquire:
- Purchase from Xur if available.
- Decrypting or focusing Exotic engrams at Rahool.
- Farm the expert Lost Sector on Arms armor days.
- Complete the Vex Strike Force Public Event on Neomuna.
- This exotic armor piece is not locked behind the purchase of any DLC.
Stat Priorities
- Resilience > Recovery > Strength.
- Resilience is the most crucial stat to focus on. Aim for 100 Resilience to maximize your damage resistance and shield capacity, ensuring better survivability in challenging encounters.
- Recovery governs the cooldown of the Warlock's class ability and decreases the time it takes to regenerate your health and shields.
- Strength is crucial for this build, as it reduces your melee cooldown, allowing you to activate the gameplay loop of Sunbracers more frequently by securing melee kills.
Learn more about the Stats available to you in Destiny 2 with our dedicated guide.
Armor Mods
| Item | Slot | Mandatory Mods | Supporting Mods |
|---|---|---|---|
| Deep Explorer Hood | Helmet | Harmonic Siphon Ashes to Assets | Heavy Ammo Finder |
| Sunbracers | Gloves | Firepower Firepower | Momentum Transfer |
| Deep Explorer Vestments | Chest | Harmonic Resistance Harmonic Reserves Charged Up | |
| Deep Explorer Boots | Legs | Solar Weapon Surge Invigoration | Recuperation |
| Deep Explorer Bond | Class Item | Powerful Attraction Outreach | Reaper |
- Optional Mods:
- On your Chest, replace Harmonic Resistance with the appropriate resistance for the activity.
- On your Class Item, replace Reaper for Time Dilation. This extends your Armor Charge timer at the cost of Orb generation.
Armor Mods are unlocked by progressing your Guardian Rank. Check out the Guardian Ranks Guide for more information.
Artifact Perks
- Overload Hand Cannon - A reliable method to stun Overload Champions.
- Elemental Siphon - Rapid final blows with your Solar weapons create a Firesprite when you have a Solar Super ability equipped.
- Radiant Orbs - Gain Radiant when picking up an Orb of Power while you have a Solar Super ability equipped.
- Shieldcrush - Gain a 25% recharge rate and 25% damage buff to your Solar Grenade while you are Radiant.
- Press The Advantage - Increase weapon stability, handling, and reload speed when you break an enemy's shield.
- Solar Fulmination - Increased damage and radius of your Ignitions.
Recommend Weapons
Kinetic Weapon: Riptide - A rapid fire frame Fusion Rifle capable of stunning both Overload and Unstoppable Champions when rolled with Chill Clip.
Energy Weapon: Sunshot offers unmatched ad clear potential and excellent synergy with the Solar subclass. This Hand Cannon fires explosive rounds, and enemies killed by it explode, scorching nearby targets and creating a powerful chain reaction. Sunshot excels in clearing groups of enemies quickly, making it an ideal choice for this Sunbracers Solar Warlock Build.
Power Weapon: Apex Predator - This Rocket Launcher is the go-to choice for boss DPS, with enhanced Reconstruction and Explosive Light. Being Solar, it benefits from all Harmonic mods on this build. Collect Orbs of Power to activate Explosive Light and maximize boss damage! WARNING: Apex Predator requires access to the Forsaken DLC pack to unlock from the Last Wish Raid.
Variants
Ability Swaps
- Swap out Song of Flame for Well of Radiance, a base game Super that still provides team support and survivability.
- Swap out Ember of Singeing for Ember of Torches.
- This fragment makes you and your allies Radiant when you do damage with Incinerator Snap. This is helpful before you unlock Radiant Orbs in the Seasonal Artifact.
Gear Swaps
- Equip the recommended Armor Mods you see on the right if you haven't masterworked your armor yet. These only require 4-5 energy and help with the gameplay loop of this Sunbracers Solar Warlock Build.
- Swap Apex Predator for Marsilion-C, a Legendary world drop Solar weapon. Look for the perks Envious Assassin and Cascade Point.
- Now that you have a Legendary Heavy weapon, swap your Kinetic weapon for an Exotic.
- Monte Carlo is the perfect pairing for this Solar Warlock build because dealing damage with it reduces your melee cooldown and grants a chance to fully charge your melee ability with each kill!
- Unlock this season's Artifact PerkTargeting Autoloader for even more damage.
Ability Swaps
- Swap Ember of Singeing with Ember of Eruption.
- This adjustment trades some class ability recharge for a more offensive playstyle, providing larger Ignitions, allowing you to deal more explosive damage to groups of enemies.
- Swap Incinerator Snap for Celestial Fire if you need more melee range. In some endgame activities, it may not be safe to get too close to enemies. Celestial Fire can help you reach them from a safe distance.
Gear Swaps
- This Sunbracers Solar Warlock build does well in raids and dungeon bosses. Use Apex Predator with enhanced Reconstruction. For the second perk, use Bait and Switch in longer encounters and Explosive Light for burst DPS. Marsilion-C with Envious Assassin and Cascade Point is another great option for boss damage.
- Swap Sunshot for Aberrant Action, a high-damage Rocket Sidearm that excels at quickly dealing with tougher enemies. Crafted with Heal Clip, it boosts survivability by healing you after reloads. Equip this season's Artifact perk, Solar Fulmination, to increase the size and damage of your Ignitions for even more explosive power.
- Khvostov 7G-0X is the perfect Kinetic weapon to pair with this season's Artifact perk Targeting Autoloader. This combination grants up to 20% increased weapon damage on kills and returns up to 40% of your magazine, keeping you in the fight longer and dealing consistent damage with minimal downtime.
Summary
The Sunbracers Solar Warlock Build focuses on devastating area control and sustained ability uptime, making it a top choice for clearing large groups of enemies. Sunbracers Exotic gloves grant unlimited Solar Grenades after a powered melee kill, allowing you to rain fiery destruction upon your foes. Generate Firesprites and Orbs of Power from kills, replenishing your ability energy to keep the loop going. The synergy between Sunbracers, Heat Rises, and Phoenix Dive ensures that you maintain Restoration and melee energy, allowing for continuous grenade usage and healing.
Excel in endgame content thanks to Song of Flame, which offers a powerful Radiant buff and 90% damage resistance. This Sunbracers Solar Warlock build is more than capable of dealing with almost any solo or fireteam based setting in PVE.
Credits
Written by: AbbyHour
Reviewed by: Tenkiei, Xtra37