Swarmers and Strand work together very well for Warlocks, and this is one of the best builds we have for PVE content this season. This build focuses on creating Threadlings, allowing us to easier clear out ads with our army of mini strand minions. Today I’m going to go through the Swarmers Strand Warlock build, I’ll walk through the subclass setup including aspects and fragments, the exotic armor, weapon recommendations and mods, so you can unleash a mini-strand army on your enemies in Destiny 2.

This Swarmers build is an essential build this season, which helps you dish out big damage plus it’s a whole load of fun to play. With this build we’re going to produce a near infinite stream of Threadlings. Swarmers are the only essential item for the build, plus unlocking all the latest strand aspects and fragments. The weapons are mix and match, so you can tailor this to the activity you enjoy – this could be straight forward Vanguard Ops, or more endgame Nightfalls, Dungeons and Raids.

Without further delay, let’s check out the build setup, then we’ll have a look at some gameplay.

Strand subclass setup

Super – Needlestorm, a wave of Strand-woven hardened spikes that stick into enemies or objects and detonate. On detonation, they turn into Threadlings.
Class – Healing Rift
Melee – Arcane Needle
Grenade – Threadling Grenade

Aspects

Weaver’s Call – Casting your class ability spawns three Threadlings.
The Wanderer – Threadlings create Tangles, and Tangles suspend enemies when destroyed.

Fragments

Thread of Rebirth – Every kill has a chance to spawn a Threadling.
Thread of Evolution – Threadlings deal more damage and travel further.
Thread of Generation – Regenerates grenade energy when dealing damage.
Thread of Warding – Provides Woven Mail when you collect an Orb of Power (Woven Mail is a Strand overshield protecting against non-precision damage).

Armor – Swarmers

Swarmers are Exotic Warlock Legs with the exotic perk Swarmers

Swarmers – Destroying a Tangle spawns a Threadling. Your Threadlings unravel targets that they damage.

You can get these from Legend and Master Lost sectors on leg day, otherwise get them from Vex Incursion, the random public event on Neomuna that rewards exotic armor. Personally, I much prefer the Vex Insursion as it’s quicker and easier.

Weapons

For the weapons you want to look for weapons with the Hatchling perk, as this is going to help with the creation of Threadlings.

Rufus’s Fury

Rufus’s Fury is a Legendary Kinetic Auto Rifle with a rapid-Fire Frame meaning deeper ammo reserves, plus it deals Strand damage. Slightly faster reload when magazine is empty.

This one comes with the Origin Trait Harmonic Resonance. Equipping multiple weapons from this set grants this weapon increased reload speed and handling. It also deals increased damage versus Tormentors, Lucent Hive, and Guardians using their Supers.

To get this one you are going to need to go into the Root of Nightmares Raid in Destiny 2 Lightfall. It can drop from the 3rd and final encounter, and once you get hold of it you can get it from the secret chests in the raid too.

Tesselation

Tesselation is an exotic fusion rifle

Undecidable – This weapon adapts its damage type to match your equipped subclass. Final blows grant grenade energy.
Irreducible – Consume your grenade to load a large projectile that generates an elemental explosion on impact.

The Undecidable perk is what makes this one very unique. Given the weapon can match the element of the subclass, this means you can run a full stasis or strand build for the very first time, with this being in the energy slot. This is still going to be great for the Light subclass elements, but what makes this very interesting is on strand and stasis builds. Irreducible is also very good because you gain the ability to load in that large projectile and get the elemental damage explosion on impact.

You can get this by preordering The Final Shape DLC.

Circular Logic

Circular Logic is a Legendary Power Machine Gun with an Adaptive Frame meaning it has a well-rounded grip, reliable and sturdy. This one comes with the origin trait Nanotech Tracer Rockets, where landing multiple hits turns your next shot into a homing micro-missle. YOu can get this one from activities on Neomuna.

Mods

Head

Strand Siphon – Rapid Strand weapon final blows create an Orb of Power.

Arms

Firepower – Your grenade final blows create orbs of power.
Bolstering Detonation – Grants class ability energy when you cause damage with a grenade.

Chest

Font of Endurance – You gain a bonus to resilience while you have any Armor Charge. Your Armor Charge now decays over time.
Emergency reinforcement – When your shields become broken, you gain temporary damage reduction.

Legs

Innervation – Reduces grenade cooldown each time you pick up an Orb of Power.
Recuperation – Replenishes health every time you pick up an Orb of Power.

Class item

Powerful Attraction – Automatically collects nearby Orb of Power when you activate your class ability
Bomber – Reduces grenade cooldown when using your class ability.

Gameplay Loop

The basics of the build are create as many threadlings as you possibly can. Your grenades create Threadlings, as does your rift. If you have Hatchling weapons, then they also create threadlings. Through the Threadlings you’ll create tangles and exploding the tangles creates more threadlings, giving you a nice loop. As your Threadlings kill your enemies, they’ll leave behind Orbs, which give you Woven Mail, helping you stay alive for longer.

This is all about creating Hatchlings and we’re going to use a combination of our Strand subclass, weapons and exotic armor. Swarmers are the centre piece of the build and really the only must-have item. Weapons with Hatcling are good, but also weapons with Demonlitionist are also very good because we can create Threadlings with our grenades as well as weapons and class ability.

There are essential weapons for the build. Tessellation is very good because you can make out your Strand build by having an energy weapon capable of outputting Strand damage, meaning you can have all 3 weapons dealing strand damage, and when this is combined with fragments, you’ll be able to create more Threadlings. Thread of Evolution helps make the threadlings you create veen more powerful. Getting kills is key to the build, so you want to focus on red bar enemies and clear them out.

The Wanderer Aspect is very good here because of the ability to suspend enemies, which is going to help you control the battlefield. As well as suspend, you’ll be creating more Tangles, which you can either pick up and throw, or you can shoot them to make them explode. Tangles that explode now creates a delayed suspending detonation.

Bolstering Detonation helps get your rifts back nice and quickly, giving you another outlet for creating Hatchlings. Other mods are focusing on creating orbs with strand kills. Thread of Warding comes in useful here, given you’ll be picking up orbs, which give you Woven Mail, essetially an overshield to help you stay alive for longer.

Let me know in the comments what you think of the build.