Balazan Crush Spiritborn Endgame Build Guide
Welcome to the Balazan Crush Spiritborn Endgame Guide! This build focuses on scaling and dealing damage with Balazan's Maxtlatl, more specifically its Poison DoT paired with Noxious Resonance . While there are multiple possible variations including Quill Volley, Rake and Thrash, this build uses Crushing Hand as its catalyst. Compared to the others, this setup is naturally a bit more tanky and can become even noticeably more durable thanks to the barriers generated from Crushing Hand, freeing up a rune slot (Que) to potentially go for even more defense (which is a general problem on these builds), but it deals lower single target damage and resets cooldowns less consistently.
In order to get the most out of this setup, we need several unique items. Razorplate is a natural choice that massively boosts our Thorns values to scale the pants while Loyalty's Mantle supercharges our Jaguar/Jaguar spirit hall combo, helping with cooldowns and amplifying our DPS.
With the main combo in place, the Jaguar proc becomes responsible for most of this build's damage output and we aim to trigger it multiple times per second. This leads to wild swings in damage depending on which buffs are currently active, how many times you hit each target and how many times you have been hit recently thanks to the stacking buff of Balazan's Maxtlatl.
Unfortunately, this build's great power comes at the cost of defenses since all of these slots are occupied with mandatory unique items. In addition, it has a relatively high skill ceiling due to the timing of various procs and cooldowns such as Qax, Plains Power and The Hunter, and thanks to Noxious Resonance performs much better against bosses with additional adds compared to single target encounters.
All in all, the Balazan Crush Spiritborn is an AoE powerhouse that offers a unique way to play the class and can take on the highest challenges in the game. Let's get started!
Requirements for this build:
- Balazan's Maxtlatl
- Razorplate
- Loyalty's Mantle
There are various double-dipping bugs that allow Jaguar main hall to benefit from damage buffs to the original hit and again for its damage proc. Beware that this build or variants of it include some choices leaning into this interaction, which could be fixed at any moment leading to guide adjustments and a loss of power. However, we believe that a fix to these bugs is very unlikely during Season 9.
Known double-dipping interactions occur with the following:
- Qax
- Plains Power
- Retribution
- Conceited
- Godslayer Crown
- Colossal (secondary effect)
- Viscous Shield
This build guide assumes you have a Level 60 Character and unlocked Torment 1. To get there, level up with one of our Spiritborn Leveling Guides. See how this Build compares against others with our various Build Tier Lists.
Season Theme
The Season 9 theme is the Sins of the Horadrim. This season allows you to craft unique Horadric Spells using three different components: a Catalyst, an Infusion, and three Arcana. You earn Catalysts and Infusions through the Seasonal Questline, and Arcana can be found while exploring Nightmare Dungeons. You choose a Skill as the trigger for your Horadric Spell. Once in Torment I or higher, Horadric Jewels can be crafted, which replace the Gems in your Jewelry, adding additional power to your build.
Endgame Horadric Spell
Catalyst
We use Disintegrate because it has a short cooldown and combines well with Vortex.
Infusion
We use Corrosive Vapor since we use the Wildfire glyph for its cooldown reduction effect, which allows us to benefit from its Fire damage for more output.
Arcana
- Reactive Ooze - Allows us to continuously attack even directly after triggering Qax.
- Fractured Core - Removes the damage resistance aura so that we can delete all packs instantly.
- Bottled Wind - Important defensive tool and great to boost our damage through Viscous Shield.
Optional Arcana
- Invigorating Helix - Can be swapped in for content without damage resistance auras such as Lair Bosses or Infernal Hordes.
Best-in-Slot Horadric Jewels
- Idol From Below - Offers a great stat line and periodically spawns Elites for additional Pit progression.
- Seal of Denial - Used for the massive boost to both Thorns and Barriers.
- Myriad Stone - This build is based on hitting very fast, so we go for ALL the Attack Speed we can.
Optional Horadric Jewels
- Tyrant Bane - Can replace Myriad Stone together with a stronger focus on Attack Speed for pit pushing (only when bosses take 5+ min).
- Liminal Echo (Softcore only) - Can replace Myriad Stone or Tyrant Bane if you're dying too often.
Learn more details about the season theme in our full Season Guide.
Skills & Gameplay
- Crushing Hand is our main ability. While it doesn't contribute any damage, it's what we use to trigger all other effects. Compared to other options, it has the added advantage of generating tons of barrier, making the build more durable by default.
- Ravager adds extra hits against elites, which helps with triggering Jaguar. For farming we use Measured Ravager while for difficult content we go with Replenishing Ravager and one source of "Lucky Hit: Chance to Heal" to stack it up.
- Armored Hide is our defensive tool and main source of Resolve. Keep an eye on your stacks and activate it as needed for powerful buffs such as Perseverance and Colossal.
- Vortex groups up packs from across the entire screen so the we can hit everything at once.
- Toxic Skin needs to be on the bar for the 100% damage boost from Replenishing Toxic Skin and can help to stack Tyrant Bane (but is never used outside of pushing).
- The Hunter is our Ultimate Ability. It's used for mobility and a range of offensive buffs: Extra Ferocity, Supremacy, Resolution and Harmonious Hunter. Thanks to Wildfire, we can reset its cooldown even without kills.
- Two points have to be added in any basic skill in order to unlock clusters further down the tree.
Skill Rotation
- Vortex enemies to group them up and knock them down to engage.
- Spam Crushing Hand at all times to deal damage and build barriers.
- Keep up Ravager and Armored Hide as much as possible.
- Activate The Hunter as often as possible for various buffs like Supremacy and Resolution or to move to the next pack.
- Focus on using Intricacy for Vortex during a run, then for Armored Hide during a boss fight.
Spiritborn Spirit Hall
Primary: Jaguar gives us a massive damage proc every 15th hit which double dips on various damage multipliers, massively amplifying our DPS.
Secondary: Jaguar adds more Ferocity for more Attack Speed and Plains Power .
Learn more details and how to unlock this system in our full Spiritborn Class Overview.
Paragon & Glyphs
Carefully check your Paragon Boards to ensure correct board rotation. Glyphs go from a radius of 3 to 4 at level 15 and from 4 to 5 at level 46. Some of them cannot be activated before reaching these thresholds! Progress through The Pit to rank up your Glyphs.
Use the slider to see the progression steps. At around Paragon 200, leveling slows down significantly and all important Rare clusters, Legendary nodes and Glyph sockets should be unlocked. Afterwards, you can min/max your build with minor tweaks and by picking up additional smaller nodes.
Balazan Crush Spiritborn Endgame Paragon
Some Glyph position swaps, board changes and other pathing adjustments may occur as you unlock your full potential. The setup displayed by default is the final version of the build before spending additional points that do not significantly impact your character's power.
Glyph Leveling Priorities
To Level 15
- Revenge
- Wildfire
- Ritual
- Colossal
- Hubris
To Level 46
- Wildfire
- Hubris
- Revenge
- Ritual
- Colossal
Learn more details about the Paragon System in our in-depth Paragon Boards and Glyphs guide.
Runes
You can have up to two Runewords in your setup, each consisting of one Ritual and one Invocation Rune. Socket them in Two-Handed Weapons if your build calls for them, otherwise place them into your Armor pieces to replace normal gems. The Balazan Crush Spiritborn focuses on the following combos:
Best in Slot
- Ahu + Qax - The 100% damage bonus double dips for Jaguar, giving us a massive damage buff that we can keep up near permanently after any target reaches 80% HP thanks to the high lucky hit of this build
- Poc + Ohm - War Cry adds more damage to the build and can be kept up consistently
- Igni + Jah (replacing Poc + Ohm) - Teleport allows us to go even faster and jump from pack to pack or over cliffs in speedfarming content
Alternative choices
As long as you haven't unlocked the final setup or found the top Runes, you can also benefit from these options:
- Mot - Can be included for massive defense from Dark Shroud
- Xal - Another defensive choice for more HP
- Cir - Generates a large amount of offering regularly
- Tam - We spam our core skill all the time
- Kry - To group up enemies more often
- Neo - Another good source of offering if you keep up barriers
- Bac - Another alternative for offering generation
- Que - Adding Earthen Bulwark grants even more defense and synergy with Viscous Shield
Learn more about Runes and how they work in our dedicated Runewords Overview and Runewords Tier List.
Mercenaries
Mercenaries are unlocked during the Vessel of Hatred campaign and assist you in battle. There are 4 separate Mercenaries to choose from, each with their own skill trees and abilities. You can have one hired (permanent) mercenary during solo play and a reinforcement who assists you from time to time in certain situations.
Hired: Raheir
He provides us with extra All Resistances, regularly applies an extra damage buff through Inspiration and prevents us from getting oneshot every 30 seconds thanks to Valiance. Beware that he's not present when playing in groups, so make sure you remain resistance capped without him.
Reinforcement: Aldkin
We choose Field of Languish for extra damage reduction which preferably happens exactly when we cast Vortex.
Learn more about Mercenaries and how they work in our dedicated Mercenaries Overview.
Stat Priorities & Item Progression
To enable the Balazan Crush Spiritborn to perform optimally, hunt for these stats on your gear with good rolls and aim to Temper ⚒️ & Masterwork Crit ↑ them accordingly. The green arrow ↑ indicates which affix is most impactful to Masterwork Crit, and it does not indicate how many Masterwork Crits you need on that particular affix. Keep in mind that certain stats, such as Armor, Resistances, Extra Size Tempers, Attack Speed, and more, have caps that may affect your priorities according to the items and Paragon points available at that moment.
Recommended Endgame Stat Thresholds
- 90%+ Attack Speed
- 2,200+ Dexterity
- 160%+ Movement Speed
- 950+ Armor
- 75%+ All Resistances
- 12,000+ Life
Recommended Consumables: Soothing Spices, Reddamine Buzz, Spiral Morning & Elixir of Fortitude II. Alternatively use Song of the Mountain or Elixir of Advantage II to cap out your Armor or Attack Speed if necessary.
Item Progression Goals
Before you dive into the Endgame with the Balazan Crush Spiritborn, take a look at this overview of the items used in the build. See below for further details about the different progression steps and variants. Some of your Skill Tree choices depend on what Legendary Aspects and Unique items are available to you. Keep in mind that while we can guarantee that everyone has access to the same Codex of Power Aspects, the exact progression is different for everyone.
Learn more details and how to farm Legendary Aspects and Uniques in our General Farming Guide.
Build Variants
This section is designed to guide your Balazan Crush Spiritborn from a fresh level 60 into the very late endgame using the three variants Starter, Ancestral and Mythic. At the final step, you should be fully decked out with a great all-rounder build. From there, follow the other min/max variants if you want to optimize around certain activities such as Pit Pushing, Speedfarming and more.
This build doesn't have a Maxroll-typical "Starter" variant because it requires certain Uniques to function. The goal here is to progress through the Torment difficulties as you unlock Ancestrals, Paragon points, all Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and the most important Uniques to pilot this build. Some Legendary Aspects are used temporarily to fill slots that may be replaced with more Unique items later on.
Gear & Skills
- Early on in your progression, focus on Armor & Resistances to survive. Each Torment difficulty adds a penalty of -250 Armor and -25% All Resistances and it's recommended to keep both capped (1000 Armor, 75+ Res) at all times. As you unlock higher power gear, masterworking levels and more Paragon points, you naturally scale your character into the higher difficulties and can start replacing some of these rolls with offensive or utility stats.
- "Lucky Hit: Restore Resource" (on weapon), "Lucky Hit: Heal" (on ring) and "Lucky Hit: Apply Vulnerable" are three key rolls to shoot for.
- Focus on reaching high Attack Speed, Dexterity and Ranks to Potent as your primary damage attributes on gear.
- Balazan's Maxtlatl is the core of the build. With it we convert Thorns into a Poison DoT every time we attack, which we then explode with Noxious Resonance. With this item you preferably get hit at least 3 times every 5sec to stack up its bonus. The actual Thorns damage is secondary.
- Razorplate gives us the biggest chunk of our damage by adding tons of Thorns.
- Loyalty's Mantle massively amplifies the bonuses of our Spirit Hall and reduces the cooldown of The Hunter to make it more easily spammable.
- Plains Power is our biggest damage multiplier, doubled on the weapon. The Mystic Circles have a massive impact on your DPS, so it's crucial to stand in them for higher end content and boss fights. Their timer is displayed on the buff bar. Paired with Mystic Circle Potency and the Jaguar hall double dip, this effect can give you up to a ~20x damage increase by itself.
- Conceited should be imprinted on the amulet for its synergy with the Jaguar main hall, even though it has the same value as Vehement Brawler's.
- Duelist's is an offensive aspect cosplaying as utility, so it goes on the boots.
- Unrelenting under perfect conditions gives you 166% extra Crushing Hand hits, roughly doubling overall Lucky Hit and Jaguar procs in real gameplay scenarios.
- Accelerating boosts our attack speed even further for even more procs.
This is the final version of the build's progression, including all regular Unique items, Mythic Uniques, Legendary Aspects, Temper mods and Masterworking, leaving you with a great all-rounder build for all content in the game. Additional variants use this as a baseline to optimize around certain activities.
Gear & Skills
- The only mythic that naturally fits into this build by default is Ring of Starless Skies. Replacing Accelerating, we can gain a similar amount of attack speed just from its stats while also gaining another 50% damage buff on top and making resource management a little easier, but it increases our The Hunter cooldown without an extra temper.
- If you are really desperate for better survivability, you can equip Tyrael's Might instead of Razorplate, but you are going to lose 50% or more of your damage output. Alternatively you can also use Shroud of False Death as a middle ground between damage and defense, but it's still a significant loss.
- As you min/max your setup, aim to keep your resistances capped and get your armor as close as possible to 1000. Don't forget you can use consumables, too!
This Speedfarming variant optimizes the build for easy activities like Helltides, Whispers, Nightmare Dungeons and lower Pit Tiers after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
Gear & Skills
- For speedfarming, the main difference is that we swap Replenishing Ravager with Measured Ravager to more reliably generate resources and fly from pack to pack with Crushing Hand.
- In addition, you can swap out Poc + Ohm for Neo/Bac/Igni + Jah to go even faster.
This setup optimizes the build to push the highest possible Tiers in The Pit after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
Gear & Skills
- For pushing the highest tiers, the only change to make is replacing Myriad Stone with Tyrant Bane. While we constantly remove our Poison through Noxious Resonance, it's still possible to slowly stack up the jewel over the course of long boss fights (5min+). To help with that, also activate Toxic Skin regularly with this jewel equipped.
- In pushing content, the execute effect of The Hunter becomes a lot more useful, so look for opportunities to finish off some low elites.
- Focus more than usual on making large pulls and focus down the elites first, then kite leftover enemies with you if necessary. Don't waste your time trying to finish off individual elites, even if they're already damaged.
- Beware that your damage output scales heavily with the number of targets present for this build, due to various mechanics such as Lucky Hit: Chance to Heal (Replenishing Ravager), easier uptime of Balazan's Maxtlatl stacks and most importantly the AoE effect of Noxious Resonance.
- Because of this, single target bosses become unkillable much sooner than add bosses when pushing up in the pit. By fishing for the right ones (especially Spiritcaller of Frost), you can squeeze out more possible tiers.
- When fighting monsters in high tiers of the Pit, remember that after crowd controlling elites for 5 seconds, they become Unstoppable for 8 seconds. This may be the right moment to start kiting them around because they can freely retaliate and it's difficult to keep them into the right position for shotgunning.
This setup optimizes the build to deal with high end boss encounters and lair bosses after you have finished the Mythic variant and reached a plateau in your progression.
Gear & Skills
- This setup is the same as the Mythic variant, but we don't require Vortex so we run with Counterattack. Keep in mind that not all attacks can be dodged and ground effects can still damage you.
- If your damage is overkill but you are really struggling to survive, you can also run with Endurant Faith or Craze of the Dead God to easily deal with anything a boss might throw at you. Replace Vehement Brawler's to fit these gloves.
FAQ & Mechanics
Once a guide is released, many players have questions on why and how we are approaching certain choices. In this section you can find the answers to the questions that have been asked the most.
The build works really well when you decimate everything in seconds, but may get overwhelmed if fights are long against high level monsters. There are several adjustments you can make when you have trouble with more difficult content:
- Check if your Armor & Resists are capped.
- Use defensive consumables.
- Roll Maximum Life instead of offensive stats on as many pieces as possible.
- Kite enemies when they become Unstoppable.
This build has a few key effects that can lead to wild swings in your damage output:
- Noxious Resonance (insane AoE, terrible single target in comparison)
- Qax (double dips, only activates after 80% HP threshold with Ahu)
- Plains Power (double dips, only covers a certain area and has massive scaling with tempers/masterworks)
- Balazan's Maxtlatl (stacks when hit)
- Replenishing Ravager (stockpiled stacks)
Make sure that you invest into and play around all of these as much as possible.
This build has no generator, but instead relies on Lucky Hit: Chance to Restore Resource (on weapon) and Reactive Ooze to generate resource. Make sure to have these properly set up. If you are still struggling, consider running with Lum until you fix it.
Generally hardcore and softcore share the same builds. Outside of being more prudent in your gameplay, you can also tweak the setup slightly to raise your survivability:
- Focus more on Armor & Resists, making sure that they are always capped especially as you transition into higher torment difficulties.
- Focus more on maximum life rolls, for example replacing DPS stats like main attributes, attack speed and additive increased damage rolls. Also masterwork life more than normal if no other crucial stats have priority.
- Focus on adding defensive skills, passives and paragon nodes first as you level up.
- Play on a slightly lower difficulty than normal, don't push into difficult territory. As long as you can deal with all enemies swiftly, they can't retaliate.
- Include a source of Unstoppable if possible to get out of crowd controls.
- Use defensive elixirs and incenses instead of offensive ones.
Mechanics
- Balazan's Maxtlatl doesn't stack when dodging, but does when blocking.
- The proc triggers once per attack, twice per Rake with Wild Claws.
- Needleflare and Bristleback aspects don't help to stack the Balazan buff.
- Bane works for the Balazan DoT.
- Bitter Medicine does not work for the Balazan DoT.
- Replenishing Toxic Skin works for the Balazan DoT.
- Mystic Circles can only spawn from the aspects Plains Power, Forest Power, Sky Power, Soil Power.
- They last 10 seconds and have a limit of 1 active at a time.
- They can not be overwritten with a fresh spawn while active.
- The lucky hit effect that triggers the circle will be immediately activated.
- Multiple buffs from multiple aspects can be active at the same time if skills of those spirits are used inside a circle.
- "Mystic Circle Potency" from tempers or Ritual amplifies most effects including damage done & barrier gained by the aspects.
- "Mystic Circle Potency" does not amplify armor gained from Forest Power.
- When combined with Sky Power you can relocate your active circle to the destination of your Evade.
- Counterattack can stack a maximum duration of 6 seconds, which can be refreshed indefinitely with enough cooldown reduction.
- There is no forced gap or downtime in the 100% dodge effect.
- Some damage over time and ground effects cannot be dodged, even if they hit instead of dealing DoT damage. Most notably, Explosive Elites are very dangerous when your survivability greatly depends on high uptime of Counterattack.
- The Minimum Ferocity is always active, even when Invasive Rushing Claw consumes 4 stacks to refresh its cooldown.
- Hits with other skills create an extra Ravager hit, once per attack per enemy.
- Replenishing Ravager increases the number of hits against elites, dealing the same damage each.
- Replenishing Ravager stacks are filled up by any individual healing source, such as any life steal, life on hit, life regen etc.
Barrier Generation works with:
- Auspicious
- Forest Power
- Enhanced Concussive Stomp
- The Protector
- Earthen Bulwark from Que
Barrier Generation doesn't work with:
- Gorilla primary hall
- Enhanced Crushing Hand
- While all the exact mechanics are much more nuanced, there are two separate Attack Speed Bonus caps of +100% that apply to all builds for a total potential of +200%. For Spiritborn, these two caps are distributed in the following way:
Cap 1
- Gear rolls
- Paragon nodes
- Elixirs
- Artillery Shrine
- Moonrise
- Hysteria (Varyana)
- Bloodthirst (Varyana)
- Bloodlust (Varyana)
- Myriad Stone
Cap 2
- Accelerating
- Rapid
- Ferocity
- Adaptive Stances
Read up more on Attack Speed in our dedicated guide by Ava.
Bosses are immune to Crowd Control (CC) effects and instead take Stagger Damage when hit by one. The amount of stagger damage dealt depends on the type of CC and is proportional to its duration. After being hit by a CC effect, the Boss will temporarily take less Stagger Damage from a CC of the same type.
Effectively, this means that when you're just spamming one type of CC you don't need to spam any more of it than what you need to keep a normal enemy permanently CC-d. To stagger the Boss quickly you need to use as many different types of CC as possible. After the Boss is staggered it gains a certain amount of stacking Stagger Damage Reduction for the rest of the fight:
- After 1st Stagger: 20%
- After 2nd Stagger: 40%
- After 3rd Stagger: 60%
- After 4th Stagger: 90%
Bosses naturally regain 1% of their Stagger HP every second and when that regen is combined with 90% Stagger Damage Reduction it becomes borderline impossible to Stagger the Boss again unless you bring a serious amount of crowd controls.
Video Guide
Coming soon.
Summary
The Balazan Crush Spiritborn is a highly mobile AoE powerhouse.
- Stack Thorns where you can.
- Cap arrmor & resistances and stack maximum life to survive.
- Play around Mystic Circles for maximum damage output.
- Let monsters hit you to stack up the Balazan's Maxtlatl buff.
- Focus on making large pulls for big AoE pops from Noxious Resonance.
- Enjoy the KABOOM feeling when you make large pulls!
Credits
Written by wudijo