New player could use some build and talent advice

Hey all just started this game a few weeks ago, and i absolutely love it. I currently have a spellbreaker and im loving the phantasmal blade move along with the arcanist frost moves. I just dont seem to do much damage. I dont want to duel wield and any advice on tweeks would be greatly appreciated :). I pasted my grim tools below.

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/pZrzx11Z

The #1 thing is for you to decide what damage type you’re using. Your gear says cold, and TSS is a fantastic cold skill. But the skill you’ve most heavily invested in is PB, which does vitality and bleed (with a bit of cold and chaos from Nether Edge). And your devotions include Assassin’s Mark, which is a key devotion for physical or pierce builds, which is not what you’re doing (though you do have a pierce component on your off-hand for some reason). Pick one damage type (maybe two when you’re more experienced and know what you’re doing), build around that. Skills, gear, devotions, everything.

As usual for new players, you’re a bit under-invested in your mastery bars, but not too badly so actually. Your resistances are also a bit low, though how much so depends on whether you’re in Elite or if you’re still in the late stages of Normal/Veteran. Components can help you out a fair bit, regardless. They’re plentiful, so use them on every piece of gear. Your relic is notably bad - check the faction vendors for blueprints, once you meet Hyram in Malmouth (if you have AoM) he’ll have more, and you can do the Origin of the Slith quest from Kasparov if you haven’t already for another random relic blueprint.

Attributes - when in doubt, put everything in physique.

Looking at the build compendiums, I see there is a spellbreaker using both PB and TSS here, so maybe that could be useful to you as an end point to work toward. However PB won’t do cold damage until and unless you find and equip that specific level 94 off-hand (and if you only have the base game, it’s not available at all). The usual practice would be to level using some completely different setup, then respec at 94; I find that absurd and don’t play builds like that, but do what you like.

A more common approach to cold spellbreakers is to focus on TSS, and use Ring of Steel with the Ring of Frost transmuter alongside Night’s Chill, Pneumatic Burst, and Shadow Strike on the Nightblade side. Very fun, and you might get blue level 58 drops (the Eastern set) that support it nicely for a while. If you do that, you’d want to pull the points from Phantasmal Blades and put them into your arcanist bar, TSS, Frozen Core, Star Pact, and Maiven’s. (You’re gonna need a lot of skill points, obviously…). Warning, although it’s a lot of fun, this tends to be a bit on the squishy side and isn’t necessarily ideal for a first character.

RR is the key thing to aim for, so if you respec to cold, you’ll want Elemental Storm, Rumor, and Viper. Blizzard and Whirlpool are nice damage procs.

If you’d rather keep transmuted PB, you’d want to set up around vitality damage. I’ve never done a PB build myself, but I’m sure you can find ideas in the compendiums. And vitality builds are fairly common so that can help you with devotion setups (Will of Rattosh would be a top priority, assuming you have AoM). Vitality spellbreaker has no mastery RR support, and the arcanist mastery won’t be doing much for you at all. I see it’s not even in the Missing Builds Workshop, so I would not recommend this approach. Maybe do something with pierce damage using the untransmuted PB?

I really appreciate your in depth response! thanks so much. Is there any way you can link a talent build youd suggest for me right now leveling with my gear? Do you suggest i go two hander like that build?

I’m confused; mad_lee’s build uses the Mythical Trozan’s set, including the (one handed) weapon. Nightblade builds can go for two-handers, but I think those are generally Shadow Strike builds. If that’s something you want to do, sure, but that’s farther afield from what you seem to be aiming for.

Anyway, what to do at 55ish with the gear you have… Off the top of my head, assuming you want to do a cold TSS spellbreaker, and trying to change as little as possible in doing so, I end up with something like this. I’m also assuming you’re in Elite; if you’re still in Normal/Veteran, the resistances need less work. Getting Star Pact would be the big priority at this point; could shift even more points around to just go get it now.

You’re pretty light on devotion points for that level, so you might want to go looking for the shrines you’ve missed.

If you have the faction rep, crafted belts can give you +1 to skills from one mastery (probably nightblade from the Legion Waistguard). You could also try farming an Ellena’s Necklace for the amulet slot. Rolderathis’s Tome is a nice off-hand MI for cold TSS builds. If you have AoM, an Ugdenbog Chillstrife makes a good weapon for this kind of build.

I apologize for my confusing response lol. I altered my build and decided to go into a SS focused 2h build. I am using this person’s as my blue print https://www.grimtools.com/calc/a2d5QwdV

This is where my build is at so far https://www.grimtools.com/calc/4VxzwYeN

I know I have to severely work on my gear and attributes. I also could probably alter my devotions in a more efficient way. I also know DW is better for spellbreakers but I just like to go against the grain lol. Definitely know I need more HP and resistances but having trouble figure out how i can do that right now. If you have any other tips for me that’d be awesome! I really appreciate your help so far and input.

That should work. I’ve never done it myself but I know it’s one of the original spellbreaker archetypes from back in vanilla. Using a vitality weapon is not good, though… I’m not sure if there is a good cold two-hander you can get before Soulrend (and have fun farming Alkamos - he’s famously stingy with the loot). Looks like Death’s Vigil has a cold scythe available at 35 and 70, though the casting speed instead of attack speed isn’t perfect. From 60 to 70, I don’t know, good luck finding something semi-decent from random drops. What you have might be about as good as you’ll get. :man_shrugging:

Yes, definitely rework your devotions. Assassin’s Blade does nothing for a cold character. The other parts don’t really help get you where you need to go either. You should have a devotion reset potion from early in AoM. Or you can just refund the points manually (might need to farm aether crystals, but that’s easy to do). In addition to the RR devotions you want, Kraken is a big help to any two-handed build, so that would be another early priority.

Resistances - like I said, use components. Lots of Antivenom Salve on your armor slots to fix that abysmal acid/poison resist. Black Tallow on amulet and/or medal can help some with chaos. Augments can also help. You don’t get armor augments until 70, but you should have accessory and weapon augments available. Details depend on what rep you have with what factions; you can look around on grimtools or the wiki to figure out what to do with what you have access to.

Still no luck with the relic blueprints, eh? I remember that being a pain when I started out…

One note about the target build you linked - based on the skill point distribution, I suspect this pre-dates the patch that moved OA from Lethal Assault to Pneumatic Burst, and added OA (and aether resist) to Overload. The flat cold damage on LA is still well worth the heavy investment, though. And that build isn’t exactly hurting for OA.

For your own character at level 60, I’d argue that LA is more important than ABB. And I’m guessing you just switched out a piece of +1 to all nightblade skills gear? Night’s Chill should be kept at least at 10/10 at this point. More than one point in Phantasmal Armor or IEE is a little unusual, those don’t give great returns on investment (but are worth one-pointing to take advantage of +1 to skills items). I’d also point out that Nullification is a very handy skill, worth having a point in just in case you need it. Turning off an enemy’s buffs is really useful sometimes. Just wait until you meet Grava’thul and see him do it to you… :stuck_out_tongue:

I really appreciate your in depth answers my friend. This community is amazing and you are helping that. I am doing this with a friend who is a spellbinder who absolutely melts characters so it is easier than if i was alone., Do i need to beat the game on veteran to get the potion to revise devotion points? I really appreciate your help. Do youthink you could link me a devotion and skill tree you think would be best at this current time? just so i can have a barometer where i should be?

No problem. We were all new once, and I try to pay it forward when I can.

Spellbinder melting things, you don’t say? :stuck_out_tongue: Yeah, they tend to do that.

Yes, the Tonic of Clarity (devotion reset potion) requires killing Loghorrean so you can enter Act 5 (AoM). You get one from finishing the first main quest in AoM. Have you not reached Log yet even at level 60?

Skill/devotion changes, off the top of my head, and again trying not to change too much of what you already have on the skill tree, something like this. I didn’t edit in any components or augments on the gear, but that part is easy enough. I assumed 31 devotion points, since that’s about what one would typically have around level 60. You only have 24 so you still have some to track down. (Or possibly you’ve gained a ton of levels without progressing to new areas, somehow, if indeed you haven’t reached Log yet… On the plus side, your resistance situation is less alarming if you’re still in Veteran. :slight_smile:).