Spirit Breaker/Guide

Hero

 

Strategy

 

Equipment

 

Gear

 

Talents

 

Relics

 

Responses

 

Sounds

 

Animations

 

Lore

 

Old Abilities

 

Changelogs

 

Known Bugs

 

Gameplay

Playstyle
Spirit Breaker usually serves as an initiator/ganker/tank role in the team. His skillset requires player to check for any ganking opportunity across the map, while helping his team secure space and farm. If he does so, a successful early-mid game Spirit Breaker can snowball into a semi-carry and crush his foes, carving a path to victory for his team.
Pros	Cons
Great ganker thanks to global initiation and durability. Can stunlock a target for a long period of time. Can solo-kill fragile heroes after charging at them from anywhere.	Poor teamfight contribution. Unreliable bash due to slow attack speed. Countered by decent vision on the map and sticking together.

Ability Builds

Generic Spirit Breaker
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	20	25

Talents

Hero Talents
+200 Charge of Darkness Bonus Speed	25	+25% Greater Bash Damage
Bulldoze 400 All Damage Barrier	20	+17% Greater Bash Chance
+45 Damage	15	-3s Bulldoze Cooldown
+4 Armor	10	+500 Night Vision

Notes:

• The armor talent does not benefit illusions.

• The night vision talent does not counter any vision reducing effect.

• Grants bonus attack damage.
  • Does not benefit illusions and is not affected by most percentage-based damage increasing or reducing effects.

Tips & Tactics

General

Greater Bash average stats

Greater Bash average defense value

• Chaining together Charge of Darkness with Nether Strike can deal high amounts of burst damage in a very short amount of time.
• Spirit Breaker has little teamfight presence due to his specialized abilities, but he can still be useful at neutralizing targets and forcing enemies back.
• When charging enemy heroes in mid game, make sure that they are alone. A lone enemy may wait out in the open while their ally hides in the trees, waiting for you to charge the bait hero, and be ganked. Therefore, Observer Ward can reduce uncertainty before charging.
• Despite being classified as an initiator Spirit Breaker is more of a hunter who takes out lone targets or chases down fleeing enemy heroes after a team fight. To actually initiate you will either need an Aghanim's Scepter so that your ultimate has an AoE presence which in turn weakens your carry potential, or use Charge of Darkness in a way that would let you bowl through all of the enemy team heroes (such as aiming for the farthest enemy hero while the enemy team is standing close to a line formation).
• Because Linken's Sphere triggers on cast, Charge of Darkness can be used to instantly and globally put an enemy's sphere on cooldown.
• Spirit Breaker's abilities allow him to keep stunning a single target, controlling them during long teamfights.
• Due to the massive speed boost Spirit Breaker receives while charging, he can catch up to a team fight quickly, even from across the map. While preparing for a team fight you might want to stand at the back of your team and let your allies begin to draw out disables and initiation spells from the enemy, then use Charge of Darkness on your target, this will disorient the enemy team as you are likely to be hitting a few of them on the way to your target not to mention that they will be left with no disables to stop you.

Abilities

Charge of Darkness

• Use Charge of Darkness to get close, stun your target, and make him vulnerable to your attacks.
• Black King Bar can be used without interrupting your charge, activate it just when you get close to the enemy to take advantage of its duration during the fight.
• Shadow Blade can also be activated while charging, greatly increasing the surprise factor of his charge and preventing easy charge interruption such as Telekinesis. In addition, the Shadow Blade bonus damage will be applied to the first attack from invisibility.
• Charge of Darkness allows Spirit Breaker to run through units, trees, structures and terrain. It does not indicate your enemies when targeted either, letting you setup ganks.
• Although Charge of Darkness is typically used to get into fights, it can also be used to get back out in a pinch; by targeting a creep in a different lane Spirit Breaker can move quickly to avoid death, then cancel the charge when he is out of danger.
• While it does not provide True Sight, the indicator will follow the invisible unit being charged and the charge will still hit an enemy that has gone invisible after being charged. This will cause the ability to interrupt channeling spells being performed by invisible heroes such as Sand King's Sand Storm.
• During teamfights you can spam Charge of Darkness in order to create chaos and disrupt your oponent's formation, try to target the backliners in order to get the most stuns possible.
• Use Charge of Darkness to stomp and clear creeps.

Bulldoze

• Spirit Breaker can use Bulldoze while charging, increasing his movement speed, thus allowing Greater Bash to deal more damage.
• Bulldoze's bonus status resistance helps Spirit Breaker tank enemy disables after he has initiated on them with Charge of Darkness.

Greater Bash

• Greater Bash deals more damage depending on Spirit Breaker's movement speed. Getting items that increase movement speed, such as Drum of Endurance, will improve your damage.
• Always try to angle Spirit Breaker in a way that you may push your enemy away from safety, the chances that you will get multiple bashes are slim but should still be considered.

Nether Strike

• Nether Strike deals major damage to the target enemy and teleports behind them, wherever they go. You can use this to catch blinking or teleporting enemies before they get away.
• Sometimes it might be a good idea to use Nether Strike on a spell immune hero to interrupt their actions as the greater bash will hit them regardless. Situations where for example your team gets caught in a Black Hole by a spell immune Enigma you can turn the tide of the fight if you can stop him right at the beginning.
• Avoid stealing kills from your carries. Try not to use Nether Strike when the enemy is already doomed.

Items

Starting items:

• Tango helps Spirit Breaker sustain during the laning phase, preventing him from returning to base due to enemy harassment.
• Healing Salve restores health as well.
• Stout Shield will greatly reduce incoming damage from physical damage during the laning phase. This is most helpful when the lane has one or more ranged heroes harassing consistently.
• Iron Branch is a cheap and effective way to improve Spirit Breaker's low mana pool, as well as his health pool.

Early game:

• Boots of Speed are essential for Spirit Breaker, as the improved speed will allow him to escape deadly situations, as well as catching up to an escaping enemy. The bonus movement speed will also provide additional damage because of Greater Bash.
• Magic Stick is a useful burst health/mana item if the enemies in lane will be casting many spells. It can later be built into a Magic Wand.
• Urn of Shadows aids ganking as it grants mana regeneration and healing. The damage over time can also cancel enemy healing items like Healing Salve and Bottle.

Mid game:

• Power Treads give attack speed, so Spirit Breaker will have a better chance proccing Greater Bash.
• Magic Wand is good for burst health/mana while providing a boost to his attributes compared to the Magic Stick.
• Mask of Madness gives bonus attack speed and movement speed when activate, increasing both the damage and frequency of Greater Bash attacks.
• Black King Bar makes you immune to many abilities that interrupt your Charge of Darkness, allowing you to engage and damage your target unimpeded.

Late game:

• Assault Cuirass will give Spirit Breaker a large increase in attack speed, as well as providing an attack speed/armor aura to nearby allies. The extra attack speed will cause Greater Bash to occur more often.
• Silver Edge grants you invisibility which could be useful for escape or to further increase your ganking/roaming capabilities. Attacking to break invisibility will disable enemy passives, reduce their damage, and give you a powerful 300 damage strike. It also grants a decent amount of attack speed, attack damage and attribute bonuses, it can also be used during charge before hitting your target in order to avoid getting disabled and thus avoiding breaking your charge.

Situational items:

• Aghanim's Scepter improves Nether Strike by greatly reducing its cooldown, as well as increasing its range. It also causes all nearby units to be hit by Greater Bash. This can be a good choice if your team needs a powerful initiation spell.
• Heaven's Halberd will not only increase Spirit Breaker's durability because of the added evasion and status resistance, its active ability can disarm enemy carries relying on physical attacks.
• Armlet of Mordiggian grants Spirit Breaker additional attack speed and damage output at the cost of his health every second. However, the life drain can mostly be mitigated by the lifesteal given by Mask of Madness, making it a useful purchase when used correctly.
• Monkey King Bar increases attacks damage and allows Spirit Breaker to hit enemies with evasion.
• Drum of Endurance increases the movement speed and attack speed of both himself and his team. The bonus movement speed and attack speed synergize well with Greater Bash.
• Moon Shard gives Spirit Breaker the largest single-item-slot increase in attack speed in the entire game, which causes Greater Bash to occur very frequently. Thus, it should be considered to keep it through the majority of the game until a more effective item can be purchased, at which point the Shard can be consumed and replaced - The attack speed bonus will be halved, but having a permanent 60 attack speed bonus without needing an inventory slot for it is extremely useful.
• Lotus Orb gives you good survivability stats and mana regen to allow you to use Charge of Darkness with little need to ever return to base for more mana. Its active will also make your initiation abilities stronger as spellcasters will need to think twice before attacking to nuke you or shut you down.