Spellbreaker - Duelist Staffbreaker
This build was last updated on July 30, 2024 and is up to date for the August 20, 2024 patch.
Overview
A duelist Power Spellbreaker PvP build with a healthy mix of defense and offense, using the recently introduced Warrior Staff weapon to boost its survivability.
Skill Bar
Staff
Dagger/Sword
Utility
Slot Changes
Utility
- over - both of these skills can be used to mitigate strike damage and break stuns. Balanced Stance is a bit weaker as a damage mitigation tool but helps way more against CC. If you don't expect to be facing any condi specs then Endure Pain could even replace .
- over - although Bull's Charge is a versatile skill that could also be used defensively, the banner offers more sustain and group utility.
Heal
- - can be a great reactive skill due to its low cast time and could easily heal you to max HP in outnumbered situations when timed correctly, but is more reliable with consistent benefits.
Template Code
[&DQIWKzM+PTenAHAAagAAAK0AAACyAAAAfAEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADLwA2AFkAAA==]
Specializations
Variants
- is great against projectile users.
Variants
Immobilize on
Daze will make it harder for you to set up burst or kite enemies.
can be considered if you want to focus more on being tanky, but the loss of
Equipment
Staff
Sigil
Sigil
Dagger
Sword
Sigil
Sigil
Rune
Amulet
Relic
Equipment Variants
Relics
- - helps a bit in condition matchups, has good synergy with .
- - improves your consistency by making sure that your main attack skills crit and makes a bit redundant, potentially allowing you to drop it for something else like . On the other hand it offers lower burst potential than Isgarren.
Runes
- - more offensive option.
Usage
Elite specialization basics
- (FC) recharges your Burst skills and . Always try to use it when you can refresh their duration, except if you're under heavy pressure in which case you can use FC purely for defensive means.
- Always try to make sure Full Counter goes off: briefly move into hostile AoE spells, tank Mesmer clones or Ranger pets, cast it in the middle of an enemy's attack animation, etc.
- FC is both one of the best defensive and offensive skill in the build as it blocks, evades, grants
Stability, and performs an unblockable AoE CC attack when triggered.
- Both burst skills and Full Counter cost adrenaline. If you only need a little more until you can use them then with a weapon swap can get you there.
General
- Settings: disable auto targeting, otherwise it'd be impossible to use skills like settings guide. for disengaging. For more tips check out our
- Playstyle: this build is all about weaving hard hitting skills into chains of block and evade frames while tethering yourself to the target with as often as possible. The combos aren't set in stone, rather you'll need to adapt based on what CDs are available. Minimize melee contact whenever you can't outdamage your opponent, dodge/block/evade as many things as possible, and spike targets when an opening shows.
- Any burst skill can proc , including .
- Staff is your defensive set, the only truly dangerous ability with good damage here is .
- On Dagger/Sword , and the + chain are your main damaging skills. Everything else in the build is basically a filler or something that's used to set up burst / survive enemy burst.
- reduces the CD of weapon swapping to 5 seconds, which keeps gameplay rather fast paced with minimal downtime. As a result you won't be auto attacking much unless you're cleaving a downed enemy.
- Despite its range is best used in melee to make it harder to react to.
- CCing a target removes a boon and deals damage/grants adrenaline via .
- All movement skills remove the Immobilized condition - list of movement skills in the build:
- Staff: and .
- Dagger/Sword: and .
- Rampage: , , and .
- Utility:
- briefly roots enemies in place after you CC them. This turns skills like and into great setup tools for your hard hitting abilities such as or .
Conditon cleansing & general survival
- Almost every single Staff skill has some healing attached to it.
- Skill #5 on both weapon sets can block attacks.
- and will be used to manage condition levels before resorting to mass cleanses.
- cleanses 5 conditions and should be used pretty much on CD, assuming you're missing a large chunk of health or need to deal with conditions.
- Burst skills cleanse conditions whenever they strike thanks to
- Getting
Blinded could make your Burst skill miss and thus the condition cleansing won't happen which is rather awkward. Dodge rolling however grants
Resistance via which renders
Blind ineffective, increasing the chance of a successful Cleansing Ire proc.
.
- Getting
- provides a steady stream of healing as long as you're landing those Burst skills (F1-F2).
- (SIO) is both a stun break and a source of condition removal for you and your team.
- Kite, a LOT. You want to run out of harm's way using mobility skills as much as possible before resorting to major defensive CDs.
- is great if you want to run away from pressure as it can build quite the gap while providing an evade frame.
Rampage
- is what you use when you quickly want to burst/CC a target, or desperately need mobility to either chase down someone or run away from a fight. Bonus points if you manage to attach just before using your elite.
- CC skills barely do any damage anymore, most of the damage in this form comes from autoattacks and .
- is a popular opener, allowing you to CC targets from range and then either follow up with for burst damage or to keep the CC chain rolling.
Top Streamers
- Twitch: Boyce
- Twitch: Keyba
- Twitch: Avatar
Ratings
![5 stars](/wiki/images/d/dd/5-star.png)
Wait till you face someone playing warhorn, flock relic, and banner of defense with heretic amulet. Impossible to kill.
![4 stars](/wiki/images/b/b1/4-star.png)
Only a few more busted builds on other classes seem to be able to handle this, but otherwise still a very strong choice.
Another viable option now would be putting Defense or Tactics banner to replace Bull's Charge. After the cast time reduction, these two banners (especially Tactics) really feel impactful in team fights and even duels. Tactics giving extra Stability and Resistance, with a Light Field for comboing into for extra strike damage/ condi damage mitigation, is extremely useful.
![5 stars](/wiki/images/d/dd/5-star.png)
One of the best builds born from the SotO weapon patch. Decent damage and high versatility with mobility, healing, unblockables, boon removal, CC.
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