Spirit Breaker's way to competitive.

Currently SB is a really weak hero since of 6.79. I was thinking a lot for him into competitive scene, and I thought of some good changes. Changes are marked with green color.

BAT Reverted from 1.9 to 1.7.

Charge of Darkness

Ability Type: Targeting Type: Damage Type:

Active Unit Magic

Spirit Breaker fixes his sight on an enemy unit and starts charging through all objects. All enemy units passed through and the targeted unit will be hit by a Greater Bash. If the targeted unit dies, Spirit Breaker will change his target to the nearest enemy unit to that location.

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750 MS on every level is to make ganks easier, and enforcing people to take points in Empowering Haste and Greater Bash. This also makes him hard to be stopped with huge MS on early levels. Why, you will see below.

Greater Bash

Ability Type: Targeting Type: Damage Type:

Passive Enemy units/Self Magic

Gives a chance to stun and knockback an enemy unit on an attack, as well as gaining bonus movement speed after a bash occurs. Deals a percentage of movement speed as damage. Greater Bash will always activate if you have not attacked, or have been attacked, in the last several seconds.

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• Greater Bash is governed by pseudo-random distribution.
• The bonus damage is only applied on the 100% proc.
• While on cooldown, Spirit Breaker can still passively perform bashes.
• The guaranteed bash is only used up when the attack actually lands. Missed attacks don't put it on cooldown.
• Greater Bash does not go on cooldown if Spirit Breaker is attacked during Charge of Darkness or the performance of Nether Strike.
• When Greater Bash is off cooldown, the icon's lamp shines, while on cooldown the lamp is off.

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This change allows SB for a successful gank. One of the most important thing about this change is that makes MoM a fail item on SB because of the 100% chance proc on every 10 seconds. Meaning that, "pro" pubs/comp players will no longer purchase MoM to try to hit a bash. This makes SB a great mid and off-lane hero. This way SB has a guaranteed free gank with other 2 heroes on low levels.

Nether Strike

Ability Type: Targeting Type: Damage Type:

Active Unit Magic

Spirit Breaker slips into the nether realm, reappearing next to his hapless victim. Upon reappearing, a Greater Bash of the current level occurs and deals bonus damage. Upgradable by Aghanim's Scepter.

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• Aghanim's Scepter Causes the Greater Bash to hit an area around the initial target, decreases cooldown, increases cast range, decreases mana and makes Spirit Breaker 1 seconds Spell Immune.
• Aghanim's Scepter Nether Strike uses 1 sec spell immune delay instead of 1.2 Cast Time (cannot be interrupted as a result).
• color=#00ff00][Aghanim's Scepter Nether Strike deals the full damage of Greater Bash regardless of whether Spirit Breaker has min or max move speed.[/color]

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Since "pro" pubs/comp players don't buy ASU on SB, because they find it "useless". This ensures SB's purchase for ASU, especially in the pro scene. If your asking why is better, then I will answer. It decrease the CD to 20 seconds, reduces the mana from 125/150/175 to 125, 450 AoE is to make it a better team fight ultimate, unlike 250 currently which is really low, deals the full damage of Greater Bash and the best part is that makes him spell immune and cannot be interrupted except for spells that pierce spell immunity. 1 second is really worth it, even if someone finds it stupid.

This will make SB terrifying in comp because of his reliable single target stun. This makes SB a nightmare to heroes who can split push especially NP and Tinker, carries are not safe to farm unless they have 2 supports next to them or the whole team. Still SB is vulnerable to a lot of heroes, especially heroes like Viper, Razor, Slark, Wraith King, Ursa, Terrorblade, etc. So instead of ganking them solo, it would be best with the team.

This way SB's item build is changed drastically from the 2009 build to the new fresh 2014/15, because this is not the SB with free spell immunity, +100 damage that can wipe out 3 heroes solo.

The item build would be: or + + .

I don't think Spirit Breaker is weak - he can gank the whole map in early game without much efort - all you need is some followup from your mid/carry to get the kill, he is very tanky so he can dive towers freely. And he already punishes splitpush enough.

And these changes would just make him stuipidly OP, leave this hero as he is now, he's fine.

Honestly...sounds infamously overpowered. Free Abyssal Blade at level 2? Ult can no longer be interrupted with aghs? 450 AOE stun?

I mean the pre-6.79 SB was considered OP and was a top pick in competitive simply because he used to have 1.7 BAT and an un-interruptable ult. You can't just undo these changes completely (even if only for Aghs) AND give a free Abyssal Blade bash AND give him a Ravage in teamfights and expect it to be balanced.

I agree that he's pretty weak right now but I think you overdid it :)

Main problem of the hero IMO is his bad scaling. He's really scary in the early game but I don't see what he does past 25 minutes. He's no longer a carry, he's weak in teamfights, and his nuke damage is pretty limited so he's very weak against tanky heroes. Sure he can charge that Furion but the Furion will probably just solo kill him (happened to me a lot of times). So either you go for the carry route by going back for the 1.7 BAT and a buff to charge...or you go for the utility route with a better aghs. But you can't do both. Honestly I think the 1v1/carry route is the most logical, the hero is meant to be weak in teamfights.

By the way for the Aghs I like the AOE increase (still 450 is too much IMO but 350-375 is fine) however I really don't like the magic immune delay, makes it too reliable.

He's been picked some times in competitive, and ixmike88 from Team FIRE used to play him a lot in the offlane. I think he's a very situational offlaner or #4 roaming support (as I like playing him): he's pretty good at permabashing magic immune carries or annoying elusive Heroes, plus he has the highest starting STR of all Heroes if I'm not wrong. I don't like SB himself that much, but he's not as underpowered as others, not at all.

Just because he can gank the whole map, doesn't make him OP. Besides these changes are for him to be viable in comp and approach a new build for him.



Abyssal Blade, no. The shorter stun is override by the longer one. So it means that stun never stacked and Spirit Breaker is not a perma basher. Bash (stun) used to stack, but it got prevented. Nether Strike is a bluff. 450 AoE is nothing, even if you bought a BKB, only the stun will got through. None of Bara's spells do damage through BKB. I'm not saying the hero should be better in team fights, but rather have a better ulty team fight. He will always remain a solo killer.



He's on the weak side. I know that pros picked him, but not as a mid hero, only as an off-lane. Trust me, giving him the 1.7 BAT and the Greater Bash treatment that I suggest in 1 patch, you'll see him rising.

Okay, so charge a guy, that's 2.4 seconds of guaranteed stun.
Don't attack for that time, just sit there and wait.
After 2.4 seconds, hit him. Guaranteed Greater Bash, so 1.6 seconds of stun.
Then Nether Strike the guy. That's 1.6 second of stun.

So essentially you have a guaranteed 2.4 + 1.6 + 1.6 second = 5.6 seconds of 100% reliable stun while your team is pounding him into oblivion.
And I'm not even counting the RNG bashes.



He's a roaming support...since he doesn't really have carry potential anymore he doesn't make sense as a mid. Besides he has no lane control so the enemy mid will freefarm and outlane him.
And he's not even that level dependent, that's actually the main strength of the hero : he can gank at level 2. That's a support not a mid hero, he should be roaming for kills not farming a lane.

And of course you'll see him rising if you give him that treatment, he's like 100 times stronger than the pre-6.79 SB :)

You don't really have to wait for that 5.6 seconds to happen. It can never happen. If you do wait to stack those seconds, you'll get eventually ****ed up by other heroes. His Greater Bash is not RNG with this change.

First I look at the Charge of Darkness buff, I love it, currently the level 1 charge is too slow to be a global presence.
Then, I take a look at Greater Bash, wow, I mean, you can see 100% critical strike with cooldown, 100% maim with cooldown, 100% cleave with cooldown, 100% evasion with cooldown, but you will never find an 100% reliable stun with cooldown, why? Because it is too OP.

OK, OK, let's just treat it as a melee range active with 1.6 seconds stun and (250+40%ms) damage, with 10 seconds cooldown. Like a Storm Hammer except it is single-target active and doesn't cost any mana. Sounds alright? Yea of course wasn't too OP at all. But take a look at other skill and Spirit Breaker's role. First you have a 2.4 global range stun which will reveal the target at all time before you hit him, then you have an unstoppable 1.6 seconds stun. Sum up all together it is 5.6 seconds stun, more than ES (4.75 sec stun), not to mention Nether Strike has a 450 AoE stun (450 is quite huge).

You wan to encourage people to build Aghanim's Scepter, yes it will work because Ravage with 20 seconds cooldown is OP. You also discourage people to build Mask of Madness because you already have 100% bash, sorry but I will build Mask of Madness in more games, because the stun already offset the extra damage taken, so it is reasonable to keep attacking while the target is being bashed.

I agree that Spirit Breaker is about average-weak but you gave him too much buffs.