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The best Destiny 2 Prismatic builds

Master the powers of Light and Darkness with the best Destiny 2 Prismatic builds for Hunter, Warlock, and Titan in The Final Shape.

Best Prismatic builds in Destiny 2

What are the best Destiny 2 Prismatic builds? With the release of The Final Shape, we’re able to combine Light and Darkness to wield the powerful Prismatic subclass, and with that comes new build crafting and interesting, fun combinations of all of the subclasses we’ve wielded before now.

If you’re not up to date with Destiny 2, check out our Prismatic subclass guide which explains everything you need to know, including the new Aspects and Fragments you can get your hands on. We’ve also got all of the new The Final Shape Exotics that you can get your hands on in the DLC. If you need an overview of everything the Destiny 2 classes have to offer, we’ve got that too.

Destiny 2 Prismatic builds: A Prismatic Hunter build in the setup screen, with the character posing on the right.

Best Destiny 2 Prismatic Hunter build

  • Exotic – Liar’s Handshake
  • Super – Silkstrike (Strand)
  • Melee – Combination Blow (Arc)
  • Grenade – Duskfield Grenade (Stasis)
  • Class Ability – Gambler’s Dodge
  • Aspects – Winter’s Shroud (Stasis), Stylish Executioner (Void)
  • Fragments – Facet of Purpose, Facet of Ruin, Facet of Protection, Facet of Dawn, Facet of Courage
  • Armor mods – Dynamo, Hands-On, Heavy Handed, Absolution, Innervation, Reaper, Bomber, Powerful Attraction, Surges
  • Main stats – Resilience, Discipline, Mobility

The best Prismatic Hunter build utilizes the brand-new super, Storm’s Edge, to increase mobility and give you multiple chances at taking down hordes of enemies. The Combination Blow melee will temporarily increase your melee damage and stacks up to three times upon defeating enemies for a 309% damage increase, making it the highest damaging melee in the game. Yes, even above any punchy Titan you’ve encountered in PvP. In addition, Combination Blow immediately grants Restoration, meaning you can stab away and begin to be healed. Landing a final blow with Combination Blow also fully refills your class ability. Combine that with the class ability of Gambler’s Dodge, which fully refills your melee charge. The two work in tandem to create an infinite damaging loop.

While this is a great build for Arc, the unique ability of Prismatic to combine features from other subclasses takes it to the next level. For example, you can throw a Stasis’ Duskfield Grenade in the mix for more crowd control and debuffs or use Strand’s Grapple for lightning-fast mobility.

With the Winter’s Shroud Aspect equipped, dodging will slow nearby targets and increase your class ability regeneration rate at the same time, as well as granting you damage resistance. Adding Stylish Executioner to the build, which grants invisibility when defeating enemies affected by any debuff, will make you almost invincible. While invisible, your melee attacks deal an additional 150% extra damage and weaken targets. That’s not all though, as Liar’s Handshake makes it so Arc melee abilities or being hit by melee attacks grant you a deadly counterpunch that heals you. You can see where we’re going with this. Thanks to Winter’s Shroud quickly applying a debuff to nearby enemies, it’s very easy to trigger Stylish Executioner on demand for massive melee damage with Combination Blow and Liar’s Handshake before using Gambler’s Dodge to repeat the process.

When it comes to fragments, there are a handful of standout choices. Facet of Dawn is an obvious one, making you Radiant on powered melee hits and nearby allies radiant with powered melee final blows. This will increase your weapon damage and also make them anti-barrier, adding some great utility to the build.

To up the damage even further, we have Facet of Courage and Facet of Ruin. Facet of Courage will deal bonus Light damage to Darkness-debuffed enemies, which will largely be frozen or slowed enemies in this build. Keep in mind that this bonus damage stacks with the existing damage boosts too. On the other hand, Facet of Ruin increases the size and damage of shattering crystals and enemies.

Given this is a melee build, you’ll also require some strong defense and survivability to avoid untimely death, though the frequent invisibility inherent in this build does go a long way. Facet of Protection grants damage resistance while surrounded, which should really be all of the time during combat since you’ll be brawling it out with Combination Blow. For the final slot, the Facet of Purpose fragment is a great choice. This will grant defensive buffs dependent on the Super you’re using when you pick up an Orb of Power. Though Silence and Squall is arguably the better Super for this playstyle due to its ‘fire and forget’ nature, using Silkstrike gives you access to the Woven Mail buff, which is the strongest of the bunch in PvE.

For Armor mods, we’ll want to use Dynamo for reduced Super cooldown combined with Hands-On for bonus Super energy on melee final blows. Add three copies of Heavy Handed to your gauntlets to create Orbs of Power on melee final blows. Combine these with damage resistance mods on the chest armor. On your boots, add a scavenger mod that matches the element of your heavy weapon, slot in Absolution to restore grenade, melee, and class ability energy every time you pick up an Orb of Power, and Innervation for additional grenade energy when you pick up an Orb of Power. Finally, on your class item slot in Reaper to generate more Orbs of Power when you’ve used your class ability, Bomber for bonus grenade energy when dodging, and Powerful Attraction to automatically collect nearby orbs when dodging. Happy punching, Hunter.

Destiny 2 Prismatic builds: A Prismatic Warlock build in the setup screen, with the character posing on the right.

Best Destiny 2 Prismatic Warlock build

  • Exotic – Getaway Artist
  • Super – Song of Flame (Solar)
  • Melee – Arcane Needle (Strand)
  • Grenade – Storm Grenade (Arc)
  • Class Ability – Phoenix Dive (Solar) / Healing Rift
  • Aspects – Bleak Watcher (Stasis), Feed the Void (Void)
  • Fragments – Facet of Balance, Facet of Dawn, Facet of Solitude, Facet of Purpose, Facet of Grace/Sacrifice/Devotion
  • Armor mods – Heavy Handed, Bomber, Innervation, Invigoration, Absolution, Font of Vigor, Font of Focus, Outreach, Reaper, Surges
  • Main stats – Resilience, Discipline, Recovery

Ever wanted to be a summoner in Destiny? Then this Warlock Prismatic build is the one for you. Nicknamed the ‘buddy build,’ this setup is all about creating turrets to do the work for you. In low-difficulty content, it will effectively do all the work for you. In harder content, your summons will still deal massive damage, though you’ll need to be more active.

Using Getaway Artist in the best Warlock Prismatic build accompanied by Storm grenades will create both Arc Souls and a Bleak Watcher turret for slowing, freezing, and damaging enemies automatically. All you have to do is hold the grenade button to consume it and you’re good to go. The Storm grenade will unlock after the second mission of The Final Shape’s campaign, so you don’t need to grind for this synergy.

While you can use Hellion for a third – Solar – turret, it’s hard to beat Feed the Void. This Void Aspect will trigger the Devour effect upon any ability kill. When active, this will improve your grenade energy and will restore health upon final blows. Plus, since it can be extended by defeating foes, it’s remarkably easy to maintain such a powerful buff.

You’ll want to use the Arcane Needle melee to get the Unravel debuff and to help build the Darkness meter to get Transcendence back quickly. Plus, since you can throw these multiple times, it’s also easier to activate Devour as you will need to consume your grenade to spawn a turret. On that note, you will have to choose Storm Grenade to use Getaway Artist, though you’ll often be consuming it rather than throwing it.

Then comes the fragments, which go a long way in rounding out this already strong build. Since your abilities are rather fire-and-forget, you’ll have plenty of time to use Transcendence without having to worry about reactivating your turrets. This makes Facet of Grace, Sacrifice, or Devotion great picks depending on your weapon choices. With Khvostov still being a popular weapon, Grace is particularly strong here.

The Facet of Balance will refill our ability meters quickly, with Light damage granting melee energy and Darkness damage granting grenade energy instead. Remember, this can also be triggered from your weapons, so pair it with your favorite Light or Darkness weapon.

Balance pairs nicely with Facet of Dawn, especially if you’re using a Light-damage weapon. Dawn makes it so powered melee hits make you radiant, increasing the damage of your weapons and granting them anti-barrier rounds. It’s easy to activate and offers a tasty buff.

Next, Facet of Solitude, which severs targets after rapid precision hits, is perfect for harder content. By reducing the damage enemies take, it’s a lot easier to survive while in the thick of it in raids and grandmaster content. Severed targets also spawn a Tangle too.

Last up, you’ll want Facet of Purpose. This fragment will grant you a buff based on your equipped Super whenever you pick up an Orb of Power. Since we’re using the powerful, Solar, Song of a Flame Super, it will grant restoration, keeping your health and shields topped up.

As for mods, it’s about what you’d expect. Focus on creating Orbs with weapon siphon mods matching your equipped weapons and Heavy Handed, which you can then use to get Armor Charge. Mods like Font of Vigor and Font of Focus help keep your abilities available with a sustainable energy regeneration loop. Absolution is also a great mod for this, reducing all ability cooldowns whenever you pick up an Orb of Power. Time Dilation and Powerful Attraction will make this Orb spawning and collecting loop much more straightforward too.

Destiny 2 Prismatic builds: A Prismatic Titan build in the setup screen, with the character posing on the right.

Best Destiny 2 Prismatic Titan build

  • Exotic – Hazardous Propulsion/Synthocepts/Pyrogale Gauntlets
  • Super – Twilight Arsenal (Void)
  • Melee – Frenzied Blade (Strand)
  • Grenade – Shackle Grenade (Strand)
  • Class Ability – Thruster (Arc)
  • Aspects – Consecration (Solar), Knockout (Arc)
  • Fragments – Facet of Grace, Facet of Balance, Facet of Dawn, Facet of Hope, Facet of Purpose
  • Armor mods – Heavy Handed, weapon siphon mods, Outreach, Font of Vigor, Invigoration, Recuperation, Time Dilation
  • Main stats – Resilience, Strength, Discipline

Sadly, there’s not that much variety in Prismatic Titan builds. It’s either a Consecration melee build or a Thunderclap melee build, and the former is generally more potent and easier to use in endgame content.

The core of this build comes from the Consecration and Knockout Aspects. With Consecration, you can activate a powerful Solar melee slam by activating your powered melee while sliding, and again when in the air. This deals a truckload of damage, though you will need to be reasonably close to your enemy, which is dangerous. Thankfully, Knockout can take the edge off by healing you after defeating enemies with melee attacks, which also applies to Consecration’s attack. You will also gain increased melee damage and lunge range, and become amplified, though that’s not as important here.

However, using Consecration consumes your melee charge, making the main selling point of this build more complicated. This is where the Frenzied Blade melee ability comes in, simply because you can hold three charges. You don’t want to actually activate this ability though, as spending the charges on Consecration is more worthwhile.

What makes this build really shine though is Transcendence as this rapidly increases your ability regeneration rate and immediately restocks your melee charges. So, you can spam Consecration back-to-back for incredibly high damage in a short window. It can be a little clunky though, so be careful.

With Transcendence playing a key role in your overall damage, even more so than other Prismatic builds, it’s important to charge it as fast as possible. Facet of Balance is a great choice, granting bonus melee charge upon dealing Light damage (which even includes Consecration itself) and additional grenade energy on dealing Darkness damage. With a Light melee and Darkness grenade, it’s a handy boost to fill both Transcendence bars.

Likewise, Facet of Grace is a strong pick considering how strong Khvostov is. This will grant additional Transcendence energy when defeating targets with Kinetic weapons. If you’re not using a Kinetic weapon, then Facet of Sacrifice and Facet of Devotion are also good alternatives.

Next, Facet of Dawn will make it so you’re effectively always radiant during combat due to Consecration spam. Radiant increases the damage of your weapons, which you’ll need when you’re waiting for your abilities or Transcendence to recharge.

This ties into Facet of Hope, which increases your class ability regeneration when you have an elemental buff. Again, this will be nearly all the time during combat due to being radiant. Though your class ability doesn’t do much on its own, various mods and the Hazardous Propulsion Exotic chest armor can be triggered using your class ability. That’s why Thruster is the best choice here: it’s quick to use and fast to recharge.

Finally, we’ve got Facet of Purpose, a staple of all Prismatic builds. This will give you a defensive buff based on your equipped Super each time you pick up an Orb of Power. You’ve got two options here. The Twilight Arsenal is a strong burst Super but it grants Overshield, arguably the weakest of the buffs offered by Facet of Purpose. On the other hand, the Strand Bladefury Super grants the incredible Woven Mail buff but the Super is lengthy and breaks the flow of Consecration. It’s up to you, though we generally prefer Twilight Arsenal.

As for Exotics, you’ve also got a lot of options. Synthoceps are undoubtedly the best for raw damage output, massively increasing the damage of Consecration since more often than not you’ll be surrounded by enemies. Pyrogale Gauntlets are another fun choice, greeting a flaming cyclone after each Consecration slam. However, without using the Burning Maul Super, it’s not taking full advantage of this Exotic. Plus, neither of these Exotics gives you any alternatives to risky close-range melee spam.

This is where the new Hazardous Propulsion Exotic chest armor comes into play. Loading tracking rockets upon precision hits and final blows that are fired when activating your class ability, Hazardous Propulsion gives you a great ranged option. It’s surprising just how much damage this Exotic deals when fully charged, especially since it’s quick to unleash the volley using Thruster. Plus, you’ll also gain a buff to rocket damage after firing the volley, which applies to the powerful new rocket sidearms.

Unsurprisingly, you will want to focus on armor mods that increase your melee ability regeneration and defensive capabilities. Use weapon siphon mods and Heavy Handed to spawn Orbs of Power, and then Font of Vigor, Invigoration, and Recuperation to reap the rewards. Mods like Time Dilation, Stacks on Stacks, and Charged Up are also helpful here.

If you’re looking for more Destiny 2 builds, we’ve also got the best Hunter buildbest Warlock build, and best Titan build for the other subclasses in individual guides that will be updated for each episode in Destiny 2.