[1.1.9.0] Spellbreaker build advice needed

Hello Everyone,

first - thanks to anyone helping with the forum. helped me a lot with the game - much appreciated.

now to the matter at hand - I recently finished ultimate storyline with my spellbreaker and recently got most of the items I think i wanted for him. He’s the first build I tried building myself and not following a specific endgame build I saw somewhere here. Well, the first that’s “completed”…

Still, he has it’s weaknesses and I am unsure if the skill distribution is any good. now I would like to humbly ask for advice especially regarding devotions and skill distribution. It’s more of a bunnyhopping-build, jumping around dropping damage and most times that works wonders. problem is with single high damage output enemies and multiple stun sources. and somehow I reached a dead end in my head and can’t decide what to sacrifice where.

[1.1.9.0] https://www.grimtools.com/calc/O2Gn1LLN

so, well, thanks in advance for any advice!

best regards :metal:

KK

Hi, welcome to the forum.

First of all; glad you shared your progress. Now if I become too annoying by pointing your mistakes, sorry for that. You don’t have to optimize everything to have fun with the game but I’m gonna suggest those anyway so you can check, learn and choose to use or not by your free will.

Big question: What exactly you want to focus on? Using Shadow Strike? or Melee hitting? Because you don’t do neither of them efficiently right now.

The set you’re using is a melee set and mostly supports the WPS(Amarasta’s Quick Cuts etc) but the class combination you have no Auto-Attack skill so you gonna create one instead of using basic attacks. You can use this component which provides an Default-Attack Replacer https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/2888.

Or you can change the gear and focus on Shadow Strike which is more reasonable with the class combination you have because Star Pact have cooldown reduction bonus and it let you use Shadow Strike more often.

These are examples of Shadow Strike focused Spellbreakers with SR set and Morgoneth set but it can be done without them with ease.

If you let me know which one you wanna focus, we can help you through that way.

But the general problem with your build beside not focusing anything in particular;

You are using a pierce damage amulet yet you’re a cold damage build; a easy and good replacement for it is https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/7828 this.

You have focused your -%X Resistance Reduce debuffs like Night’s Chill and Rumor devotion(which is good) but there are 3 RR debuff type in this game and the other 2 can stack with the first one. You can get one by taking ‘‘Hand of Ultos’’ or ‘‘Viper’’ devotions and other by ‘‘Revenant’’, ‘‘Rhowan’s Crown’’, ‘‘Manticore’’, ‘‘Scales of Ulcama’’. Actual Resist Reduction formula check this to understand how RR works and stack together.

You are also not using the skill ‘‘Amarasta’s Blade Burst’’ and it’s buff node ‘‘Lethal assault’’ that will provide a good amount of damage to your all attacks during it’s time.

You have some other devotion, gear, component and augment problems but we can check those after your reply.

Also check the official game guide’s combat part

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Hey Ford!
Thanks a LOT for the detailed information! and don’t worry with being to harsh - I was asking for it :smile:

Yeah you’re absolutely right, the build is lacking in a focused way to deal damage. I just tried to build as much damage as possible at first wich worked pretty good till the more difficult stuff in Ultimate. At first I was content with Shadow Striking into mobs, Melee Hitting+WPS combined with the Flash Freeze/Ring of Steel. And that mostly worked for the campaign but got frustrating at the end of FG. As I said it definetly needs more focus. I didn’t consider using only Shadow Strike for damage - it didn’t occur to me to play with so minimal skill(s) :laughing: Thanks a bunch for the build examples you posted! I will look through them and see if that is a way I want to play!

Regarding your other advice regarding the Auto-Attack Skill - would this benefit the build while also sacrificing one of the seal of blades for it? The skill starts at 30% dmg and only gets to 110% - Why would an AA-Skill be better than the default attack with such a mobile build? Or would it just be a lot better to use an AA if the build focuses mainly on WPS instead of Shadow Strike? Am I missing something? Sorry if this is a dumb question. Oh, and do the WPS skills trigger with any AA Skill I use as default attack in general?

Regarding the Amulet - I was first using the Night’s Embrace Amulet but thought the additional armor piercing and attack speed on the will of the blade was better. Maybe the Executioners Judgement would be even better? Maybe even the Deathbound Amethyst but I yet have to find that one…

Gosh the RR are indeed hard to wrap my head around. But thanks a lot for the Formula. Wasn’t expecting that much Math but here we go. which devotions would you recommend to sacrifice for adding another RR devotion to the list? I definetly need to check this in detail later ingame… -Y% Resistance and so forth.

Yeah Blade Burst seemed like a good skill but I sacrificed it somewhere along the way for other skills. It seems I really have to cut down on the skills and decide where to lay the focus to get this build on another level.

So far thanks for all the detailed help - much appreciated!

KK

There are different ways to get lifesteal.

It’s a charged attack and starts with the %30 of the stats it has and in the end it provides %10 more than it shows. It’s not the best AA skill but it’s the best you have with Spellbreaker.

And if you wanna play hit&run then you should choose another gear because ‘‘Deathmark set’’ is an AA+WPS set which doesn’t support SS, RoS nor OFF. So yes if you wanna stick with DM set you gonna adjust your game to more static playstyle.

Night’s Embrace also a good alternative but not the Executioner’s Judgment, that one is for Blademasters. And Deathbound Amethyst is for cold casters.

The problems with your character is you lack some OA/DA, you didn’t invested your defensive skill like Maiven’s Sphere of Protection, you don’t have any damage reduction, you have low slow resistance. You invested SS but not invested Nidalla’s Justifiable Ends that provides cooldown reduction to it nor Star Pact that provides global CDR. And you definitely need more health and more skill points. Serenity relic it’s a good option for defensive manners also skill points is useful for your offensive stats aswell.

And for the last, you need Alkamos Rings, as a set. Now you are using one 75 version and one 94 version which doesn’t combine with each other. I’m gonna make some adjustments without changing the gear so much and find ring replacements until you got purple Alkamos Rings from SoT dungeon.(or atleast blue set)

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/0V090DMZ This setup would be very close to ideal. Didn’t fill the MI affixes nor the Serenity bonus but build needs some stun resist, health and chaos/pierce resistance.

Check skill point distribution, devotions, components and augments etc.

And this is a version without changing your items except again pants and amulet and with blue alkamos set. https://www.grimtools.com/calc/lNkGQxbN it needs chaos/acid/pierce resistances and slow resistance mostly along with health.

For your information, I don’t know what you’re aiming to achieve with this character but as long as you know the game mechanics and act like; it everything works in Ultimate Main Campaign. Such as Adcth, Damage Reduction, RR, Armor Absorption, Resistance overcapping, Damage Absorption, Physical Resistance, Monster skills and Damage types etc. So you can work your SS+Basic Attack combination up to a point but if you wanna have more efficient character and maybe do some end-game content like SR and Crucible, you need to make a choice between AA damage and SS damage becuase hybrids don’t work well in this game. I never made a Shadow Strike build so I don’t know how to make a cold SS Spellbreaker but I can try to theorycraft something like that without Morgoneth set nor SR set if you want.

And you can put SS into lmb, when you hold it it will hit basic attack when it’s CD, hit SS whenever it’s possible.

Sorry for the late reply. Thanks again for the advice. Especially with the Alkamos Rings - really didn’t see that yet :laughing: I will study the examples you posted and decide wich way to go forward, AA damage or SS damage. Again - much appreciated. That will definetly help a lot!


And @Crittrain’s SS breaker


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Spellbreaker, Level 100 (GD 1.1.9.7) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator Here is mine second character. I made it as an melee dual wield “glass canon”. Devotions are for cold damage, life leech and resistance reduction (Tip of Scales), some reduction reflection damage. Skill points: auras, Shadow Strike with big cooldown as a main attack (cooldown from skills Star Pact and Nidalla’s Justifiable Ends and from items. I can do Shadow Strike every 1.3 seconds). Glyph of Stormcap medal augment is a good item granted skill: some AoE and fun fast jump into a bunch enemies, then casting Ring of Steel (Olexra’s Flash Freeze somewhat similar, but I decided to choose Ring of Steel). Many items with +skills as build are hungry for skill points. High offensive ability, high damage.

Frankly I chose to get Ravager helm with +1 to all skills by cheating, and with some other items I found I use GD Stash Craft to change prefixes and suffixes to those that are good for my build. This build is unable to handle superbosses like Ravager. As I understand for these bosses you need much more defensive strategy, which somewhat annoys me. Maybe I try something like Soldier + Oathkeeper for defensive style walkthrough. But if you don’t intend to go that hardcore or competive stuff and just wan’t to complete almost all game stuff (maybe except Shattered Realms, quest that I don’t like), including “roguelike” skeleton-key-sections, it’s is a viable interesting option. Yes that build can die (mine died about 100 times in three difficulties), but it is rather directly fun and has couple active skills aside from left mouse button.

Probaly you can consider similar half-squishy build, but mainly acid than cold, - Nightblade + Occultist (Witch Hunter).