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Gauntlets of StrengthGauntlets of Strength
Tango
Urn of Shadows
Boots of Speed
Bracer
Drum of Endurance
Power Treads
Armlet of Mordiggian
Maelstrom
Shadow Blade
Aghanim's Scepter
Black King Bar
Blade Mail
Heaven's Halberd
Silver Edge
Assault Cuirass
Heart of Tarrasque
Monkey King Bar
Daedalus
Mjollnir
Mask of Madness
Dust of Appearance
Bottle
Sentry Ward
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2 | 8 | 9 | 10 |  |
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4 | 12 | 13 | 14 |  |
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1 | 3 | 5 | 7 |  |
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6 | 11 | 16 |  |
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15 | 17 | 18 |
Hi guys, it's just me again, in another attempt to write a guide. I know that my first guide sucks beyond repair, so I'm really trying my best for this one, as Spirit Breaker is one of my favorite hero.
The reasons why he is so amazing is not only he is a space-cow, but a talking space-cow. Jokes aside, he is a great tanks and physical burst damage-er, and has a really strong early-mid game presence, which doesn't quite fall off late game.
Either you are here because you want to test out that new Immortal item, a newbie learns to play an interesting hero, a try-hard who wants to compare builds, a pro who wants a little laugh, welcome to my Spirit Breaker Guide!
So... Let's move on to his Statistics and Skills
Also as a side note English is not my primary language so please do feedback about my grammar. It's better be a grammar nazi than being a dude who don't know to spell.
What makes his early so strong is his starting hit points and armor. He has 701 HP and 5.31 armor fresh out of the hero pool. This means he is much, much more tanky in the early game than most heroes. This allow him to takes lots of punishments early game and get away with it.
Let's look at his offense, he starts out with 60-70 damage, which is pretty high (if not very high), let him last hits and denies pretty easy, and possibly winning early clashes. That said, his AS early is pretty ****py, due to his BAT of 1.9 and mediocre starting AGI.
His manapool is limited at 182 mana, but luckily his spell are quite cheap, as his only active is 100 mana only, and due to the nature and cooldown of Charge of Darkness, he (or you) won't be spamming it often enough to run around manaless.
Spirit Breaker has quite an unique kit. He has only 2 actives, one of which is his ultimate, but both makes him already so fearful in term of ganking and bursting down foes.
But actually, the most important aspect of Spirit Breaker is one of his passive, Greater Bash, which is his main source of hand damage and also improves his actives. That said, this is the skill that you should build Spirit Breaker around, and let's look into it first.
Greater Bash
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 damage based on movement speed.
Chance to Trigger on Attack: 17%
Damage: 10/20/30/40% of movement speed
Knockback Duration: 0.5
Stun Duration: 1/1.2/1.4/1.6
Increased Movement Speed: 15%
Increased Movement Speed Duration: 3
His bread and butter skill. Early game, this is one unreliable way of getting last hits, but a good tool to harass. Because of your natural tankiness, you can easily walk up to enemy melee hero, smash his face with your flail then back off. Your basic attacks are already hurtful, but once this bad boy procs, it's the sign that you or your teammate get a kill. It deals only 30 bonus damage at first level if it procs, but it stuns for a good duration on every level. Which means a window for you and your lane mate to follow up and finish the miserable foe. Be careful though, this is only true for fragile foes, and if it procs before you have a reliable stun ( Charge of Darkness), don't go in unless your partner has a good stun too.
Charge of Darkness
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.
Charge Speed: 600/650/700/750
Stuns on Contact: 1.2/1.6/2/2.4
Range: Global
Cooldown: 12s (upon contact or upon stopping)
Another great tool in Spirit Breaker's kit. It ensures a bash proc, meaning another Stun, it provides somewhat of an escape (charge into a foe of another lane), and almost a free TP. But truly, the best aspect of this is you have global presence for all game, meaning enemy everywhere always have the fear of you popping out of nowhere, then pops them. Early game this is great for ganking another lane, and late game it's for catching up to teamfight or team push. Remember though, even it's great to get into team fight (one sure stun, and chance of stunning another enemies), it's not an initiation tool, because you hardly can stun a whole organized team, and will likely be resulted in your death afterward, which limits your potential of locking down the most dangerous foe of their team. Do not be afraid to chase a near foes, since the CD is pretty low anyway.
Use this as a follow up initiation tool, unless you use the initiation build and acquired said items.
Empowering Haste Empowering Haste
The Spirit Breaker's presence increases the movement speed of nearby allied units.
Increased Allied Movement Speed: 6%/10%/14%/18%
Movement Speed Aura Radius: 900
Aspiring heroes gain speed and power from simply observing the Spirit Breaker's dominance on the battle field.
He can activate it to gain MS for a while then halves it.
The second skill of Spirit Breaker. Nothing much impressive compare to his other skills. Still, it annoys the hell out of chasers, terrifies the chased, and improves Greater Bash a little. Use your active when you ult, it helps. The MS loss isn't that punishing afterwards.
Nether Strike
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.
Damage: 150/250/350
Range: 700 (850)
His ultimate, TADAA, and well, that's what you wanna scream when you suddenly appear in front of them when they are trying to run for their life. This skill is now updated so that Spirit Breaker always has vision over his target, meaning they won't escape from your fury. What again makes this skill so fearful is the greater bash it causes, along with the bonus damage, makes the health gap with your enemy even longer. This is best used to follow up Charge of Darkness, as its cast time is 1.2 seconds and [greater bash]] stun is 1.6 seconds. Of course, the 0.4 seconds gap will be you hovering your mouse over that target, so theoretically your Nether Strike cannot be stopped by your target. And guess what Spirit Breaker excels at? Punishing and picking of lone enemies.
So, after you got to know Spirit Breaker, let's discuss his pros and cons
+PROS
- Extremely scary ganker due to high health and burst damage, also guaranteed disable.
- High mobilty, with high MS and global presence
- Good follow-up initiator
- Can be a possible carry and scales into late game
- Item efficient, but not item dependent
- Heavily hurted by enemy warding
+CONS
- Melee
- Somewhat of a mana problem
- Bad BAT
- Doesn't scale into late game as good as other hard carry
- Almost can't recover from a bad start
- Not a good primary initiator unless built specifically to do so
Once we know his pros and cons, we should know when to pick or when not to pick him.
WHEN TO PICK
- Squishies! (on both team, but preferably enemy's team)
Why? Because you can act as a tank for yours and eat up theirs
- You have good gank partner(s)
Why? Because you are a ganker.
- You doesn't already have 3 melee on your team
Why? Because melee is a disadvantage for people who normally wouldn't get 
Skull Basher or 
Battle Fury
- You feelin' lucky
Why? Greater Bash depends on luck. A LOT.
WHEN NOT TO PICK
- Your team has a lot of farmer
Why? Farmer are from countryside and their internet connection sometimes is bad. Jokes aside, Spirit Breaker isn't item dependent, yes, but he needs some item to start kicking butt. And he can't stay in a lane with a partner that needs farm more than him
- They have lots of ranged disable
Why? They see you coming, you dead. Or worse, stuck on a cliff.
- They have lots of strong-stand-alone heroes such as 
Pudge, 
Razor or 
Juggernaut
Why? Pretty self-explanatory, less target for Charge of Darkness.
- They are even more tanky than you!
Why? You can't outlast them, you lose.
Well I think that's pretty much it. Was about to list ranged foes here, but closing gap for Spirit Breaker is somewhat easy.
So, you picked Spirit Breaker anyway eh? Let's talk about his laning phase. He can go to almost any lane, so I will explain the benefits and disadvantages of all lane for you to choose
- Safe Lane (Radiant Bot, Dire Top): Everyone loves to be on this lane, good farming spot, harder to get ganked. But don't pick this lane if your team has a harder carry that needs to farm.
- Hard Lane (Radiant Top, Dire Bot): As the name suggests, hard lane means hard life. With your natural tankiness and an escape mechanism, it can be easier for you than to other heroes. You can either solo to get better EXP, or have a lane partner to set up early kill
- Middle Lane: You have good rune control due to empowering haste and Charge of Darkness, why not? You can get to level 6 quicker also means you can gank earlier. Just don't go if they have heavy harasser such as 
Huskar or 
Viper.
Spawning
2x Gauntlets of Strength
1x Tango
EXPLANATIONS: Gauntlets allow you to quickly build into urn of the shadows , which is your core early game item. Tango is staple, helps you with your health and harassment.
The reason why I don't list how to spend the last 200 gold is because sometime in pub game your teammates can be complete ******* and refuse to buy the courier, you will because you benefit so much from it, since after you have Urn of Shadows, you rarely go back to the base.
Otherwise it's only two or three last hits away from sobi mask. It's also possible to pick up 
Iron Branches, but since Spirit Breaker already got such amazing gtreat start, I think it's quite unecessary. Get those if you plan on getting 
Magic Wand
Early Game
Urn of Shadows: somewhat a compulsory on Spirit Breaker. It gives you basically everything you need, bonus strength and mana regen, as well as a wonderful active. It recovers you from injury after ganks, finish of foes, and get a friendly commendation if used right. And with your amazing global presence, getting those charges is fairly easy. Remember to tell your team you gonna buy this bad boy, otherwise some might pick it up and often a team only needs one Urn of Shadows, as only the closest Urn to the death location gets a charge.
Ok... Urn is a very special item, and I have the need to tell you how to use it. Urn begins with 0 charge, and got a charge every time an enemy's hero dies near you (which is very often thanks to your global presence). At 0 charge it actually gains 2 charge instead of one, and I'd tell you how to takes advantage of this. Let's say... you have 0 charge, and see a gank-able enemy, ping that hero and kill him/her. Then you got two charges. Easy, eh? Nope, you probably lost lots of health after that. Just turn away, use your Urn of Shadows and regains 400 health. O...kay, you have one charge left, and depends on the situation here is what we do with that last charge:
- You see a team mate that being chased down or in danger of being chased down, charge of darknes the would-be chaser, stun him with surprise, heal your team mate and take that bully down together
- You see a lone enemy that has no nearby help (really, make sure you read the red part, pun not intended), Charge of Darkness him/her, Urn of Shadows him, takes him down with brute force. The 150 damage seems small, but it deals in HP removal, which effectively makes it equal to 200 magic damage nukes. The health loss will quickly scares the enemy and out of instinct they will runaway. Chase him down with empowering haste and gets two charges back.
- You spot an enemy but his/her team mates' location is unknown: don't risk it, save your charge till one of the two situations pop up. This is also how you use your charges two
In case your ganks involves two enemy and you got three charges, don't lie and admit you have help, heal that help and save that one last charge.
Boots of Speed: Staple. But for Spirit Breaker, MS means damage. So this is even more of a compulsory. With this and an early level of empowering haste, chasing would be a fairly easy job.
Bracer: gives you a little bit of everything, as well as a build up into Drum of Endurance, a core item of Spirit Breaker.
Mid Game
MUST GET
Drum of Endurance: A wonderful item of choice for Spirit Breaker. As stated above, MS means damage to Spirit Breaker, and it provides much needed AS for Greater Bash proc. It also gives a fair amount of stats, useful on all situations. This is another compulsory on Spirit Breaker, and even possible to build it before Power Treads.
Power Treads You might as well want to finish your Boots of Speed, because this gives slightly more MS, as well as some nice AS to helps bash proc. The extra strengths help too.
Phase Boots is another options, as it can gives you massive speed boosts. But since the extra damage slightly matters, and after a few Greater Bash, Spirit Breaker's MS almost 522 anyway, Power Treads is the boots of choice.
Offensive Item
Maelstrom OR Armlet of Mordiggian OR Shadow Blade
We face kinda a tough choice here. Their price are pretty close, with Maelstrom being the most expensive and armlet of mordigginan the cheapest, all gives some damage as well as attack speed, but let us see about their abilities:
Maelstrom: provides 24 damage and 25 Attack Speed consistently, as well as a chance to proc a Chain Lightning which deals 120 damage to enemies around.
Armlet of Mordiggian: provides 7 HP regen, 5 armor, 15 Attack Speed and 9 damage. Though there is some defensive quality, the offensive capability may seems underwhelming at first, but its strength (literally) lies within its active, which immediately provides 31 damage, 10 attack speed and 25 strength over 0.7 secs, which effectively makes it gives total 65 damage to Spirit Breaker because he is a strength hero, 25 AS (basically makes it the same as Maelstrom) and the invaluable 475 HP. The only downside is that it drains 40 HP per second (with its own regen and from bonus Strength makes you lose about 32.25 HP/s). This is somewhat remedied by Urn of Shadows.
Shadow Blade: provides 22 damage and 30 Attack Speed consistently, as well as a small RELIABLE burst on your first attack after Charge. This item is now, in fact, very legit core Item due to the introduction of Silver Edge.
So... When to buy which?
Maelstrom is a good item if you are snowballing out of control, and the HP gap between you and your enemies is huge (with yours higher, of course), as it provides even more burst damage to your low HP foes. This is extremely important as you can finish a foe in few hits. It also provides enough attack speed to scare the hell out of your enemies. It also gives somewhat of a farming capability, and can leads you so far ahead of your enemies. It also can be upgraded into Mjollnir
Armlet of Mordiggian is a good item if you are not that far ahead of your enemies, or falling behind and you needs some extra HP and DPS to outlast them. With the bonus it provides, it allows you to soak up nukes, have reliable DPS and of course, while turned off, some recovery.
Shadow Blade is an incredible snowballing item. Not only it struck fear into your opponents heart, forcing they to buy Dust of Appearance and Sentry Ward with their already scarce gold, only to find that you are not going to use it to escape. Trust me, Charge of Darkness is a much more reliable escape with 12s CD. The burst damage it provides synergy incredibly with Spirit Breaker's bursty nature, and the MS boosts also helps your Ultimate. However, it's price is the greatest obstacle, as 2800 Gold can delay your tankiness by a lot. It does have easier build up than Maelstrom at first though.
So, after you get one of those three, it's best that you have a defensive item now.
Defensive
Black King Bar: this item is awesome, it gives you magic immunity for 10 seconds longest, and makes your Charge of Darkness unstoppable. It gives you a lot of survivablity in team fight, allows you to do your job (which is locking down a foe or kill it). It provides some damage as well. The only drawback of this is it pulls nukes away from you and into your team mates. As a tank, it's actually a bad thing, but get this if you fear disable so much.
Use when charging or in middle of team fight when someone throw a stun.
Heaven's Halberd: Somewhat of a similar veins to Black King Bar, but opted on Physical side instead of magical. Get this if they has annoyingly painful right-clickers.
Blade Mail and Aghanim's Scepter: Why I listed these two item together is because they work wonderfully together, as a combination they makes Spirit Breaker into a terrifying initiator. Aghanim's Scepter provides extra health and mana, and makes Nether Strike an AoE
How to and when to use: Use your AoE Nether Strike to get close to your enemies and stun them, bursting down their support, and just as they recovers from the painful stun, and dying to kill you, makes them truly dying by activating Blade Mail. This combination works well with Armlet of Mordiggian, as Armlet gives you burst 475 HP, means they have to do more against you and so more against themselves.
Silver Edge: Oh my god, this is like a godsend to Spirit Breaker. It provides every things he needs: Attack Speed and damage and tankiness, a reliable burst and disable. This is a more "offensive" defensive item, while also giving a 40% damage reduction on the one who is unfortunate enough to be struck by you. You can grab this even if you don't build Shadow Blade first. If so, get the Sange first for the bonus Strength. If you do build Shadow Blade, finish Silver Edge ASAP then grab an Aghanim's Scepter for the amazing stats it gives you and the amazing ultimate upgrade.
Gets one of the items listed above (Scepter and Blade Mail treats as one)
So... You already has filled up most of your slots, let's move onto luxuries:
Luxuries
Assault Cuirass: basically best item on Spirit Breaker more tanky, more attack speed, and more damage due to Armor reduction aura.
Heart of Tarrasque: Every STR hero's wet dream. It provides less EHP than AC, but synergy well with Blade Mail. Item slot you ask? Sell that Urn of Shadows, this bros gives more than 400 HP heal.
Mjollnir: straight upgrade from Maelstrom. Gives 80 AS, a somewhat higher burst damage than Maelstrom, as well as a free luxury spot (it takes up Maelstrom slot instead of a new one). Get this if you already got a Maelstrom
Daedalus: Imagine your ult hits a squishy. Then imagine it was critical hit. The bonus damage from your ult will crit along, and deal health-blowing damage to your enemy. And well, occasional damage burst is what you love.
Monkey King Bar: get this against evasion heroes or you just want to stun lock someone so badly.
Silver Edge: if you don't buy it earlier, buy it later. Though, after the 35th minute, this is mostly situational, if you want to shut down Viper, 
Faceless Void, 
Phantom Assassin.
Boots of Travel: try to grab this after you finished your core; or worst; after a luxury. It gives incredible global presence, and it pains you less because you don't have to carry TP around. Upgrade after you had everything else.
So your inventory end game would be Travels, Drum, Armlet/Mjolnir, BKB/Halberd and 2 Luxuries or Blade Mail/Silver Edge, Scepter and one more Luxuries (seriously though Scepter is a luxury, I must list it with Blade Mail because they works together).
And that's the end of Item Chapter! Just kidding...
*SITUATIONAL*
p/s: no seriously this is purely situational
p/s/s: Emphasizing situational
Mask of Madness: Here you go MoM fanboys. Yeah I admit that MoM is an amazing item, it gives Spirit Breaker so much AS and MS, but since empowering haste reworks (long, looooooong time ago empowering haste used to gives bonus damage depends on MS) and reduced BAT, pure AS item is not effective anymore. The bonus MS could be overlooked because after ult and Charge of Darkness, your MS should be high enough. Also the worst part about it is it removes Spirit Breaker beloved tankiness, which is entirely bad. As stated, Spirit Breaker is good at tower diving, not anymore with MoM on. But I just have to list it here because it's a good ROFLstomping on anyone.
Dust of Appearance/ Sentry Ward: simple, dewarding. Also with the nature of Charge of Darkness still follows invisible enemies, keep charging them if they went invi, throw dust or place ward on contact, and makes sure he/she leaves your sight only when they are dead.
Bottle: Spirit Breaker can go mid. Just saying, don't try to steal mid all the damn time.
Oh it truly ends now... Tiring! Just kidding it doesn't end yet, I haven't introduced next chapter! Let's move onto friends and foes!
Uhhh... this is a team game right? So friends and foes should be listed.
Friends:
General:
+ Anyone with a disable can help you with ganks. Really, any disable helps.
+ Initiator: You are a follow up initiator if you do not built to initiate, have someone initiate and reaps the prize.
Notables:
+ 
Bloodseeker: This guy blood thirst gives you vision over gank-able target. And that makes your jobs entirely easier, and Greater Bash somewhat makes 
Rupture do something other than force enemy to stand in one place.
+ 
Sven: He has a MS and Armor boost, an AoE stun. What's not to love?
+ 
Dark Seer: Helps positioning Charge of Darkness, gives you 522 MS, the downsides is that he may *accidentally* KS you.
+ 
Magnus: an initiator, and pull enemy close enough for you to hit them with dem Charge of Dankness.
Enemies
General:
+ People with ranged disable
+ People with good escape mechanism
+ People that is more tanky than you
+ People has higher burst
+ People that can takes burst
+ People that slows you
Wow, that's a long list, but well, notable foes aren't that much, and even though listed they don't completely counter you.
Notables:
+ Bloodseeker: really, his ruptures ruins you. And having him not on your team is already a disadvantage
+ Viper: you hate this dude: Perma-slow harms your output, and with his range he can harass you out of lane pretty easy. Getting Blade Mail against him is highly recommended, even with no Aghanim's Scepter. Or you can just get a Black King Bar. Silver Edge is reccomended
+ 
Templar Assassin: she provides free ward for her team, and nuker/burster hates her.
+ 
Silencer: he can ruins your follow-up initiation, and his 
Last Word hurts you so bad since your spells has long cooldown. Focus him first or tell your team mates to do so.
So... I've added Middle Lane and support build of Spirit Breaker. Here are some of my thought on those builds:
Middle Lane Build
Odd eh? Not the usual dual gauntlets start. Well, the best part about middle lane is rune control, and of course that leads you to bottle. Starting with 3x Iron Branches will give you enough stats, and you are only five last hits away from your beloved Bottle. Bottle is an interesting item, though it lacks the burst damage of Urn of Shadows, it provides much more recovery. The lack of burst damage isn't that much of a problem, since your level (hence your damage output) would be far more powerful than side-lanes enemy. What's also differs from normal build is getting empowering haste at level 3. This makes you to get the 2 minutes rune earlier due to the slight boost of movement speed. Though, max out that Greater Bash at level 7 anyway.
The Offensive/Defensive items of choice should be the same as Standard Build
As you got the idea how to use Spirit Breaker mid, why would you use him mid? The answer is his amazing rune control thanks to Charge of Darkness and empowering haste. His high base damage allows out-last hitting enemies, and he benefits greatly from the extra levels.
Support Breaker
The first thing you notice is that the item build is almost the same as Standard Build, except that I list no offensive item. Also, even though all my rant about Greater Bash, I max it last. Let me explain the idea to you. Look at his core items: Urn of Shadows and Drum of Endurance, and they are listed under "Support" item. Also, if you look at Spirit Breaker's skill, both Charge of Darkness and empowering haste are wonderful support skill. One is a reliable stun, the other is an aura that grants your allies bonus MS to chase or to run. Using this build though, you won't be the main damage source of your team, and Greater Bash's chance are the same all level, you can usually max it last. He also has the global presence, always can be there to save the carry's butt. Now explaining the item build, I have no offensive item because explained before, you won't be the one doing damage, just a disabler, and you relies on your enemies to damage themselves. Aghanim's Scepter is another great item on this build, it makes your Nether Strike always do a level 4 Greater Bash. Buy Sentry Ward and Dust of Appearance since you are a support, and Charge of Darkness works wonder against invisible heroes.
So when to use Spirit Breaker support? Only when your team has amazing damage dealers already, but all you guys need is a proper support or a disabler. This happens a lot in pub games, though you can main spirtit breaker a support whole time, he is great on many teams, but just don't waste his amazing damage potential.
Well I think that's it. Hope you guys had fun reading!
Hey, I did it. I wrote a decent guide! Or at least that's what I think.
Smash em all with Swag of Dankness, and Empwning Haste your team to victory!
Give me your thoughts on what chapter I should add, or what I should have more in my guide, as well and judging my build and strategies. Thanks you all for reading and I will try to improve it as much as possible.
And I haven't found any good fanart for Spirit Breaker, so please tell me if you have or know one...
Updated about Silver Edge! And change a little to the skill part! Also change the guide's name to be less lame, or that's what I think.
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