Guide to Spiritbreaker

Barathrum, the SpiritBreaker

By Zhen

The Global Ganker
Global in the sense that you can easily gank from one end of the map to the other with his massive speed from Charge. He has 2 stuns and a passive bash at his disposal. Once he lands a succesful charge, it is not easy to escape alive. Exploiting his strength as an early game ganker, he is almost made to gank 24/7 during this crucial period to completely shutdown the opponent's team

The Tower Diver
A strength hero when equipped with Strength treads and Bracers makes a fearsome tower diver. His unparalleled diving potential puts other ganker heroes to shame.

The Assasin
He moves in, he kills, he moves out. You can't outrun him, blinking can't help you, nor can tower hugging help you. Everything happens in amatter of 4 secs. A 2.5sec charge followed by a 1.5 sec Ultimate. Being a disabler might help, if you manage to disable him as he charges towards you. Trying to target a near-invisible hero (like PA's Blur)moving at top speed, not knowing from which direction he will appear, isn't an easy task to do.

Barathrum's Skills

Almost all of Barathrum's skills are unique. It is interesting how each of the skills actually work and Virot2 had came up with a thread pertaining to all the nitty-gritty details for each of his skills.

Link: All about Spirit Breaker, Details, details

The relevant details will be summarized again in each of the respective skills in this guide. Skill usage, how to use, and its synergy will not be discussed here but in the later sections under Strategy.

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Charge of Darkness

Barathrum fixes his sight on an enemy and accelerates towards it. As you increasespeed, you begin to merge with the shadows around you, becoming difficult to see until you stop the Charge or hit your target. Uponleaving the shadows, Barathrum shocks his opponent into an immobilestate for some time.

Level 1 - Accelerates slowly, 1 sec stun.
Level 2 - Accelerates moderately, 1.5 sec stun.
Level 3 - Accelerates fast, 2 sec stun.
Level 4 - Accelerates very fast, 2.5 sec stun.

Cooldown: 40 seconds.
Mana Cost: 120.

Detail #1:
Everyfour seconds, Barathrum's speed increases, maxing out after 12 seconds.The speed increases at each level (starting at 0 seconds) are:

Level 1 - 10/20/30/40%
Level 2 - 15/30/45/60%
Level 3 - 20/40/60/80%
Level 4 - 25/50/75/100%

Note: Max Speed is 522ms
WithTreads, his ms will be 360. At 40% increase, his total ms = 360*1.4 +360*0.08 (from haste) = 532 (capped at 522). Therefore with treads andlvl 4 haste, he needs 12sec/8sec/4sec/4sec for levels 1/2/3/4 Charge respectively to reach maximum speed.

Detail #2:
As of v6.44, the Charge buff (the icon you see in his hero potrait) will remain for 4 secs after he has landed his Stun. Previously, hisbuff will dissapear completely once the stun has landed, or when he stops the charge. This 4 sec buff simply translates to 4 sec of maximum bonus dmg from Empowering Haste (16% of 522ms is 83.5dmg). Withlevel 1 Charge lasting 1 sec and a level 1 NetherStrike at Level 7, this buff is devastatingly powerful.
Another area where this buff ismade useful is when you realise that it is too risky to stun the target just before 1000 distance from you. The 4 sec buff allows you to escape out of sight in an instant. This change change/buff was possible made due to problems with Barathrum getting stucked in ledges and cliffs when he stops suddenly.

Detail #3:
Other details include:

he gains shared vision of the target

Charge will continue even when target blinks or teleport away

Charge will target the 'real' image if target forms illusions

Collision size reduced to 0 meaning he can pass through creeps and ledges/cliffs similar to Spectre's Spectral Dagger ability. Charge however, is uncontrollable in a sense that you cannot manually spam-click ground to move through trees or across a cliff.

When a target does BKB whenCharged, the charge buff on the target will be dispelled and so does the shared vision. The Charge buff on Bara however will still remain and he will continue chasing the target. Worth noting is that his attack behaviour will change. If he crosses an area with enemy creeps,he will begin to auto-attack them first, kill them all, and once thereare no more creeps, he will continue chasing the target again. Similar effects will be observed when the target is purged, dispelled, Naixhiding in creep, or against Tidehunter's dispelling Kraken Shell.

There exist a small window of a few milisecs where you can avoid beings tunned by blinking or windwalking. This is when Bara is about to land the stun (which is actually a Storm bolt).

Every few secs, his image will progressively turn transparent to near invisible similar to PA's blur ability.

Illusions gain Empowering Haste

Attack triggers when Bara begins an attack. To prevent abuse, Haste only triggers a maximum once every 0.3 secs.

With Power Treads and Level 4 Haste, he has 388ms.
388ms ~ 62 bonus dmg
522ms ~ 83.5 bonus dmg
With Charge buff lasting another 4 sec after stun, you gain 4 secs of 83.5 bonus damage. Great Synergy.

Greater Bash triggers at the start of Barathrum's attack.
He may Greater Bash even on attacks that then miss or are disrupted.

Totalof 0.95/1.15/1.35/1.55 seconds of slide time for level 1/2/3/4 respectively. This can also be viewed in terms of Stun seconds.

GreaterBash triggers at most once every 1.5 seconds. Hencewise a level 4 bash, you will almost rarely get a chance to bash the target again while heis sliding.

Target will destroy trees in its slide path. If his path is blocked by a cliff/ledge, he will start making jerking movements.

Total slide distance of Greater Bash is 140.2/150.1/156.7/161.1

The bonus damage (25/50/75/100) is dealt all at once at the start of the Greater Bash

After 1 second, Barathrum teleports to the target, is ordered to attack and delivers a level 4 Greater Bash

OnceBara finishes casting Nether Strike, nothing will stop the bash. Evenif he died, his dead body will still bash the target. If target teleports to another location, Bara will still appear next to him.

Bara can target Magic Immune with Nether Strike. The bash slide effect will still occur

Skill Build
1. Charge
2. Haste
3. Haste
4. Bash
5. Haste
6. Nether Strike
7. Haste
8. Charge
9. Charge
10. Charge
11. Nether Strike
12. Bash
13. Bash
14. Bash
15. Stats
16. Nether Strike
17-25. Stats

Skill Build Justification

You will start off learning Charge. The stun can be handy when you are harrasing with an ally. Possible for first blood or even to save a dying friend. Anyways, even if you learn Haste at level 1, Charge at level 2, it wouldn't make such a big difference. It will only be a matter of time for you to reach level 2. Haste is taken later and subsequently maxed first (till Lvl 7). Only one point in Bash is needed early on, which you will learn at level 4. The 17% chance at level 1 is too good to pass up. Nether strike is learnt at 6, 11, 16. Charge is maxed next and finally Bash.
Most importantly, at Level 7 you must have Haste maxed out, learn 1 level of Charge and Bash as well as Nether Strike. This will maximize your killing potential as a ganker by Level 7.

Item Build

Core Build

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Total Costs: 700 (Bottle) + 1850 (Str Treads) + 1020 (2x Bracers) + 1950 (Mask of Madness)
= 5520 gold

I am not joking. Having played so many games with Bara, I can easily achieve Godlike status once these items have been attained. There is nowhere here in this forum where you can find such a cheap Core Build and I can assure you with this simple set of items, you can wreck massive damage even come late game.

Alternatively, Armlet is a great substitute (as of v6.49) for MoM. Personally, i have greater preference for MoM but for sake of completeness, I have added Armlet as analternative. I will draw out some comparisons with Pros and Cons of choosing one over the other under Justifications.

Alternative Build

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Total Costs: 700 (Bottle) + 1850 (Str Treads) + 1020 (2x Bracers) + 2850 (Mask of Madness)
= 6420 gold

Item Build Justification

Treads(Strength) -- The boots of choice. A very much needed item on SB. He needs the additional Ias to raise his Dps. The additional strength grants him additional damage and HP. Hence, saving space from the need to buy so many bracers.
Bonuses: +30%Ias, +10 Dmg, +190 hp, +65ms

Bracers-- For early game survival during ganks. Good HP boost and additional damage. Allows you to survive a tower dive.
Bonuses: +6 Dmg, +3%Ias, +3 Int, +114 hp

Bottle-- Yes. Bottle. Bara is one of the few heroes which I will go godlike every time, every game. The other one is Templar Assasin. Indeed the function of Bottle on him is the same as that of TA in that he needs to replenish him mana to sustain himself in carrying out more ganks. His ultimate has a great cooldown (75sec is as good as 60sec for Primal Roar) but carries along a high mana cost. At level 7, Bara's mana pool is barely 350mana. A charge and a Nether Strike will consume 320 mana. Going around ganking means alot of tower diving, hence the burst hp regen is very useful too.

Since you are ganking around from Top to Bottom Lane, you will crossing the Rivers quite a lot. Another reason to get bottle .. yeah.

Bottle is almost always gotten from the Side Secret Shops (Top/Bottom Lane) with the initial purpose of staying in the lane. When tangoes run out, Bottle comes in handy.

The Mask of Madness Versus Armlet Argument

I am not going into details on how Armlet works. If you don't have a clue on what the Item does, take a look on thisArmletGuide to have a basic understanding on how it functions. MoM is an age old which everyone should be familiar with. Along with the comparison, I will include a DPS Analysis in which I use a level 7 Spiritbreaker with the following items -- Treads, 2x Bracers, either MoM or Armlet as shown in the image. Also to note is that the Haste bonus dmg is 83.5 at 522ms. This value will be used as your main dmg output occurs within the first 4 secs after the stun.

DPS formula is as follows: DPS = [(1.0+Ias)/1.7]*[Avg Dmg]

Personal Preference

Like I mentioned on earlier in the game, it is a matter of preference. In my book, MoM is far more superior than Armlet. One may argue that the extra damage taken is going to make you drop like a fly in thick battles. As a MoM user, you will need to avoid biting more than you can chew. It comes through experience, good map awareness, and being able to predict if they are other heroes hiding and waiting to disable/nuke you. From experience, going the Armlet route usually leaves me with little health after a gank and sends me straight to the fountain. MoM allows you to recover life through neutralling.

Having an additional 50% Ias can grant you an additional Bash. It is based on chances, yes, but as far as Theorycraft is concerned, it is insufficient to come to a conclusion that Armlet has higher DPS than MoM and Armlet wins flat-out. A bash on a target could mean more additional hits, acts as a disable preventing him to cast a spell, buys time for your allies to reach your location, or even saves you a Nether strike since you won't be needing it to finish him off.

The best part of Armlet is likely the Hp boost you gain upon activation. Allows for better tower diving and survivability. Even so, the hp gain from Treads and 2x Bracers (total of 418hp) is more than sufficient to last you in battle. It is great for mindgames too but that is not something you want to toy around in higher level inhouse games.
Still, it's a matter of preference. If you don't buy my arguments, go ahead with the Armlet Route. To be honest, it is almost as effective as MoM after weighing their pros and cons. There exists a very thin line in which MoM is better than Armlet overall which is hard to see if you have little experience playing this guy.

Going Both Armlet and MoM?

Seriously, No. You should head straight for Tier 4 items. It is all about game progression. Building an item takes time. It may seem at that point intime, they enemy team is scattered with solo individuals around the map giving you an easy kill. It is highly likely that 10-20 mins later, they will begin to bunch up. In essence, you need to start building up your team items in preparation for the incoming team battles.
Tier 4 items like Assault Cuirass and Heart are powerful team items. One grants massive armor buffs/debuffs auras while the other transform you into a tank.

After Core Items

AssaultCuirass -- You can either grab a Platemail or a Hyperstonef irst. Usually I go for Hyperstone for greater killing power. You might need to free up some space, sell a bracer if needed. AC is built first before Heart. It has superb synergy on your hero. Armor bonus is helpful for survivability. The key bonuses that makes it deadly on Bara are the 50% Ias as well as the -5 armor aura debuff. One grants your greater DPS and higher bash chance while the other, amplifies your damage. Also to note is that your Empowering Haste Dmg is amplified also since it is of 'Type: Normal Dmg' reducable by armor.

Heart-- Heart and AC always comes in pair. If you get one, you get the other. The reason is simple. As much as you want to balance Ias and Dmg to maximize your DPS, you will want to maximize your EHP too with Armor and Raw Hp. Upon completion of this Item, you become an unstoppable tanking perma-basher.

Alternative
Satanic-- In case you went the Armlet route, this item will help you more instead of Heart. Great Lifesteal, good Hp bonus. As a dps cum tanker,it is important for you to have some form of lifeleech.

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