Introduction

Welcome to our Life Drain Warlock build guide! In this build, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know to utilize the Life Drain Warlock build in Dark and Darker. This includes Skills, Perks, Stat Priority and more!

This Warlock build focuses on using a combination of meta Skills and Spells to deal massive damage, control areas and most importantly – sustain yourself! This build can work in both Solo game-play and Team-based maps.

Skills

Blow of Corruption and Spell Memory are the recommended skills required to run the Life Drain Warlock build. Spell Memory allows the player to access the main spell of this build, Life Drain. Additionally, Spell Memory can fill out the Warlock kit with some additional damage & utility. Life Drain and Summon Hydra is the focal point of the build.

Recommended Life Drain Warlock Build Guide Spells

For this particular Warlock build, the recommended spells are the following:

• Life Drain
• Curse of Pain
• Summon Hydra
• Bolt of Darkness
• Flame Walker

Life Drain and Summon Hydra are currently the two most important spells of the build. Bolt of Darkness is your typical quick damage projectile, while Curse of Pain and Flame Walker assist with DoT damage and mob clearing.

Perks

For this Warlock build, we recommend the following perks:

• Immortal Lament
• Dark Enhancement
• Torture Mastery
• Malice

Torture Mastery serves as both a common choice but also for the sustain provided. Malice also provides a 10% Will boost. Finally, Dark Enhancement increases Dark Magic spell damage by 10%. Immortal Lament provides a last ditch attempt at keeping yourself alive.

Stat Priority

• +All Attributes
• Will
• Magical Healing
• Any other Magical Damage modifier

Within the stat priority, it should be a no-brainer that +All Attributes is a great all-rounder stat to obtain. Will is a must, increasing your damage output through raw magical DoT damage. As can be expected, any other Magical Damage modifier after the rest is useful too! Magical Healing provides increased sustain to your Curses through the Torture Mastery Perk.

Weapons

Weapons for the Life Drain Warlock build is a fairly straightforward situation and not too important overall. The main choice for the build that we recommend, however, is a combination of Spellbook & Long Sword. Although, you can simply use Falchion & Crystal Ball to avoid weapon swapping. Gear-less however, we recommend buying a White rarity Magic Staff and Oracle Robe to make the build playable.

Armor

For the Life Drain Warlock build, we recommend using a decent combination of cloth and leather where appropriate to get the best protection-to-movement speed ratio. This can be the following:

• Leather Cap or Occultist Hood
• Oracle Robe
• Lightfoot Boots or Rugged Boots
• Rawhide Gloves
• Loose Trouser

The above loadout provides the best possible resistances without compromising your movement speed. Try to build your loadout with the above in mind to yield the most optimal results. Finally, do not forget to find the associated stat priorities required for the build!

How to Play the Life Drain Warlock Build

The playstyle surrounding the Life Drain Warlock is fairly similar to a standard Warlock setup. However, this build provides the option of zone control of Summon Hydra and a new combo with Hydra too – Hydra + Life Drain.

The main goal of the build when fighting players is to hit the following priority:

• Open with Curse of Pain if you’re in range
• Poke down your opponent with Bolt of Darkness
• Summon Hydra to either block your opponent’s exit or your opponent’s path to you
• Pop Blow of Corruption and hit with your Long Sword in melee range
• If you have to retreat, cast Flame Walker and pull back

Between this priority, you have a potent combo at your disposal for your sustain. First, cast Summon Hydra at any location near you. Then, cast Life Drain on your Hydra. Doing this Combo allows you to gain a lot of your missing Health back for free, a much-needed combo currently, as a result of Torture Mastery making all your spells cost more. Once you have this playstyle loop down of fighting, finding time between rooms to cast the Hydra + Life Drain combo, then fight again – you’re set!

Multiclassing Options

Multiclassing is a very experimental feature in Dark and Darker. As a result, there is going to be a ton of possibilities and build tweaks. As we and the many players of the game push further into the wipe to test Multiclassing, we’ll update this build with our recommendations! To see more on Multiclassing and what it means for the future of Dark and Darker – check out the 2024 Roadmap.

Flamewalker Warlock Build Guide Conclusion

That concludes our Life Drain Warlock build guide, providing a fun, meta-worthy approach to Warlock. This build can be played with next to no set-up cost-wise. However, the damage dealt and sustained can be pretty gear-dependent. For a fresh build, make sure to buy a White Rarity Magic Staff and Oracle Robe to enable the build. For more builds and guides, check out our Dark and Darker section. Finally, if you’re interested in further class guides or builds, check out our Bard and Warlock guides.