Destiny 2 Warlock BuildThe ULTIMATE Briarbinds Void Warlock!

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We're taking a look at a Void Warlock build that’s about to get a big power boost.

Bungie is rolling out a sandbox update soon. When that update goes live, all Warlock “buddy” abilities—like Ionic Traces, Arc Souls, Hellion Turrets, Stasis Turrets, and Child of the Old Gods—will scale their damage based on your grenade stat.

Buddies created from your class ability will still recharge based on your class ability stat, but their actual damage will work the same way grenades do. If you hit 200 grenade stat, these buddies gain about 65% more damage. This will also improve how they interact with armor mods and Void/Strand/Arc fragments.

Because of this change, a lot of Warlock builds are about to get stronger—but one of the biggest winners is a Void setup using the Briarbinds exotic gauntlets.

Child of the Old Gods + Briarbinds

This build works only on the Void subclass because it uses the Child of the Old Gods aspect. When you drop your class ability (Healing vs Empowering Rift), it spawns a Void Soul. When you damage an enemy, the Soul locks onto that target, then links to nearby enemies. It deals steady damage over time and applies a 15% weaken debuff for about 9 seconds.

On its own, the Void Soul doesn’t deal heavy damage—about 42 base damage every 0.7 seconds. But with a 200 grenade stat, that climbs to around 70 base damage per tick, and that’s hitting multiple enemies.

The Soul has 150 HP, and enemies can destroy it, but Briarbinds makes it tougher and lets you do more with it:

What Briarbinds Adds

Exotic Perk: One With the Void

Increases the soul’s link duration by 55%, letting it stay active for about 15 seconds.

You can recall and redeploy the Void Soul, which refreshes its timer.

You can manage up to two Souls at once, allowing you to weaken and damage more targets.

Each enemy killed while linked makes the Soul stronger:

Starts with a 16% damage increase

Can scale up to 100% extra damage after 5 kills

Can reach around 110 base damage per tick when combined with your grenade stat

It also gains damage resistance as it kills enemies:

Starts at 8% DR

Can go up to 50% DR after several kills

Whenever linked enemies die, you get class ability energy back:

10% per minor enemy

Up to 50% from majors/champions

If you have 100+ class ability stat, those returns shoot up by 190%. So instead of 10%, you’d get about 19% per kill.

Rift Choice

Both Rift types work, but Empowering Rift fits this build best:

Healing Rift

Heals 40 HP per tick, reapplying every 1.5 sec

Gives small grenade and melee energy boosts

Empowering Rift (Recommended)

Heals 25 HP when you deal any kind of damage (every 1.5 sec)

Grants a 20% weapon damage buff

Boosts ability energy gain

Doesn’t block Overshield effects like Healing Rift does

Combining the 20% Empowering buff with the 15% weaken debuff from your Void Soul gives you great damage uptime.

Aspects and Grenades

Instead of using Feed the Void to trigger Devour, we're using:

Aspect: Chaos Accelerant

Makes your grenade type stronger

Works well with Scatter Grenades (cluster burst + tracking) or Vortex Grenades (sustained AoE damage)

Fragments

Echo of Starvation

Activates Devour when you pick up Void Breaches or Orbs of Power

Echo of Harvest

Creates Void Breaches and Orbs when you kill weakened targets

Has a 10s cooldown, but you have backup generation methods

Echo of Persistence

Extends Devour, Invisibility, and Void Overshields by 50%

Devour lasts 15 seconds instead of 10

For your final fragment:

If using Vortex Grenades → Echo of Remnants (makes them last longer)

Otherwise → Echo of Instability (your grenade final blows give Volatile Rounds)

Volatile Rounds let Void weapons break Barrier shields and cause explosions for add-clear.

Use Void weapons with Repulsor Brace to generate Overshields:

Overshields give 70% damage resistance

With Persistence, they last 15 seconds

Avoid Healing Rift since you can't gain an Overshield while standing in it—another reason Empowering Rift is better.

Weapon Support

Weapon traits that work well:

Demolitionist, Strategic, Chain Reaction, Dragonfly

Repulsor Brace for Overshields

Good Void exotics:

Graviton Lance

Le Monarque

Third Iteration

Leviathan’s Breath (amazing with Argent Quiver for +25% bow damage)

Tractor Cannon (30% weaken that your Void Soul can refresh)

Artifact Mods

This season doesn’t have a ton for this setup, but a few standouts include:

Elemental Overdrive – +10% Void weapon damage after you grab a Breach

Shoulder to Shoulder – Damage resistance when dealing sustained DPS near teammates

Threadling Proliferation / Pact Tactics if you're using a Strand kinetic weapon

Use a Strand kinetic weapon to trigger Strand mods and free up Void weapon space for damage perks.

Armor Stat Focus

To benefit the most, aim for these stat goals:

Grenade stat: as close to 200 as possible

Class ability stat: at least 100

Armor sets to chase:

Specialist + Grenadier armor for grenade/class stat focus

Smoke Jumper set:

2 pieces: Damage resistance when picking up Orbs

4 pieces: Heal after finishing strong enemies

You can mix 2 Smoke Jumper + 2 Bushido for extra survivability:

Bushido gives 35 HP when you kill with a freshly drawn weapon

Final Thoughts

Once the sandbox update hits, this build becomes way stronger. The Briarbinds will take your Void Souls to a completely different level, especially with grenade scaling, multiple deploys, and Devour uptime.

If you haven’t tried Briarbinds yet, now is the perfect time to start using them—they’re about to become top-tier for endgame content.