Spellbreaker - Defense Hammerbreaker
Welcome to the Builds Archive. See the ones that gathered dust, were orphaned by their original writers, or became obsolete by balance patches. We keep the orphan builds together and salute the veteran builds that held a position in the good, great, or meta categories. Click here to view current builds.
Focused on: Strike damage, Control and Boon removal
Designed for: PvP Conquest
Overview
A Spellbreaker PvP build which offers a strong mix of damage and CC, made to teamfight.
Archival note: fell out of use completely, there are way more popular Power Spellbreaker builds out there right now
Skill Bar
Skill Variants
Utility
For the optional slot:
- - mobility, CC, even an evade frame for sustain.
- - extra sustain and some group support.
- - good against CC and strike damage.
Elite
- - more group support.
Template Code
Specializations
Variants
- Immobilize which is a valuable combo piece that could set up CC chains or bursts. makes the build even more tanky but gives up
Equipment
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, etc.
- FC is both one of the best defensive and offensive skills in the build as it blocks, evades, grants Stability, and performs an unblockable AoE CC attack when triggered.
- Full Counter costs adrenaline just like any other Burst skill.
General
- Settings: disable auto targeting, otherwise it'd be impossible to use skills like for disengaging.
- 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 .
- grants you half a bar of adrenaline on weapon swap. This might not seem like a lot, but it's quite useful especially in situations where you're under pressure and don't have the adrenaline to activate . Instead of scrambling to build some a adrenaline a simple weapon swap could get you there.
- All movement skills remove the Immobilized condition - list of movement skills in the build:
- Greatsword: and . These two skills also provide excellent mobility both in and out of combat.
- Hammer:
- Rampage: , , and .
- Utility:
Damage
- Both sets are capable of doing a lot of damage, but Hammer needs a little more setup than Greatsword as most of its damage is in .
- On GS your best attack skills are and . They are both quick skills on short CD.
- Aegis before going in. If it doesn't get blocked the blade will boomerang its way back to you, try to position yourself in a way that it hits the target on its way back too. This could even be used as a source of minor ranged burst damage if the target is just far enough for the blade to pass them right before it starts to return, hitting them twice in 1 second. is more of a filler skill. It's good if you don't want to get into melee (low on health for example) or if you want to remove
- is mostly just a mobility tool, the damage on it isn't bad but the pathing of the skill is (not to mention it has a very obvious tell).
- is rather hard to land against moving targets and isn't really a priority. It's good for cleaving downed enemies who are being revived or vs targets sitting in a CC, but Arcing Slice should take priority even then. If the target's getting out of the CC soon it's usually better to land a Whirlwind Attack (or Arcing Slice) on them while you still can rather than getting another strike of HB off.
- The 3 best skills to benefit from
- is the only true ranged skill on this set (not counting Earthshaker which is a melee leap). The Cripple makes it easier to catch up to fleeing targets so it has some value other than just doing great damage.
are , and . Fierce Blow hits harder if the target is CC'd, so if you use your skills in this order Earthshaker already sets it up perfectly. Of course any other CC works, even .
- Immobilize whenever you stun or daze a target. This is more relevant on the daze, as dazed targets could still move freely if it wasn't for this trait.
- No Escape turns into a great setup tool for burst chains, allowing you to immediately go on the offense even if you were being pressured. and are both great followups for the short immob.
procs an
- Weakness and recharges . Fierce Blow itself inflicts Weakness, so going FB ⇒ BB ⇒ FB is the dream scenario, but sometimes you may want to go straight to BB after an Earthshaker to prevent your enemy from avoiding your Backbreaker as it has quite an obvious and long cast time.
- Thanks to Earthshaker also applies Weakness, making it an even better combo piece for it.
is the best CC in the build. It also lasts longer against targets with
Burst combo examples
Hammer to GS:
- to proc the Immob from traits
- Weapon swap to GS
GS to Hammer:
- Weapon swap, now makes your next 3 attacks crit
Conditon cleansing & general survival
- and the empowered 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.
- (SIO) is both a stun break and a source of condition removal for you and your team.
- is great if you want to run away from pressure as it can build quite the gap while providing an evade frame.
- is the best defensive skill you could have against direct damage but it has to be used preemptively (unless you used it to break stun). Keep in mind that you're still vulnerable to condition damage, CC, and even life steal from skills such as !
- Even could be used defensively as a ground targeted escape tool. A mobility skill is never a bad thing to have for kiting, and with this you could even jump over gaps in the terrain, forcing some specs to go around or blow CDs.
- can be used as a substitue for dodging if you're out of endurance or want to keep the target pressured while evading their attacks. It's also a mobility skill, so you could even try to Whirlwind your way behind a pillar if you suddenly need to get defensive.
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.
- 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: Mijo
Ratings
Comments
Enjoy an ad-free experience & support the website, for less than $1 per month! Upgrade to Premium
We are seeking an experienced Build Admin for Throne and Liberty with a deep understanding of the meta across most weapons and game modes. Get in touch with Galaxian on Discord if you're a good fit for the role or know someone else who is. This is a paid position.