Punisher Slayer Build Guide
Last Updated:April 28, 2025|Changelog
Welcome to the Punisher Slayer Build Guide! This build is a fast-paced back-attacking burst playstyle based on her Fury Meter. When full, you can enter Burst mode to significantly boost your powerful blows, including her identity skill Bloodlust.
Punisher excels at Stagger. Destruction can be tricky, mainly due to her skills being on long cooldowns and tied to Burst Mode.
- Want a more fast-paced and dynamic playstyle? Check out our Predator guide.
- For more information on some of the systems that make up your build, check out the guides below:
Builds
The exact amount of Crit varies based on your additional sources of Crit Rate, like Bracelets, Adrenaline level, Accessories, Elixir set, etc. You should aim to have around 90% Crit Rate to have room for a Crit synergy.
Similarly, Swiftness amount can be higher or lower depending on your cooldown gems. You should have enough to consistently hit a second Guillotine during burst.
Optimized Training points can be taken instead of Limit Break if this allows you to fit a second Guillotine during burst.
Skills Setup
- Brutal Impact, Guillotine, Volcanic Eruption and Bloodlust are your main damage skills, used only during Burst mode.
- Spinning Sword, Ground Smash and Furious Claw are your main Fury meter generators.
- Wild Rush is a mobility skill.
- Wild Stompis your Damage Amplification Synergy and your Counter skill.
To function properly, this build requires all Wealth runes, maxed Focus tripods and very high Specialization stat.
Skills Setup
- Brutal Impact, Guillotine, Volcanic Eruption and Bloodlust are your main damage skills, used only during Burst mode.
- Spinning Sword, Cruel Pierce, Wild Stomp, Ground Smash and Furious Claw are your Fury meter generators.
- Wild Stomp is your Counter skill, as well as your Damage Amplification Synergy skill.
Alternative Skill, Tripod, and Rune Options
Cruel Pierce can be replaced with Punishing Draw at 1808+ Specialization, assuming you have all your Focus Fury meter tripods at level 5.
- This removes one Destruction skill, but in exchange you gain a skill with Paralysis Immunity as well as a second Counter skill.
Wild Stomp
- You can drop the Wealth rune if you're using Cruel Pierce and have at least 1836 Specialization.
Skills Setup
- Guillotine is your main lesser monster and Elite killer. It does a big spin that should instantly kill everything in range and reduce its cooldown.
- Brutal Impact is ideal for Bosses.
- The rest of the skills are damage fillers to kill lesser monsters during Guillotine downtime.
Recommended Engravings
- Preemptive Strike
- Contender
- Raid Captain
- Cursed Doll
- Magick Stream
This build is optimized and meant to be used only in Kurzan Front. For Ebony Cube please use a Raid build.
Identity & Gameplay
This build focuses on dealing massive amounts of burst damage within the Burst Mode (Z) window with your Brutal Impact, Guillotine and Volcanic Eruption skills. Outside of that, you're trying to rebuild Fury Meter as quickly as possible to then repeat the burst process.
Activating her identity grants you the following effects for its entire duration:
- 20% Attack Speed and Move Speed
- 30% Crit Rate
- Resets the cooldown of Bloodlust
All attacks with a Back Attack affix receive +10% Crit Rate and +5% Damage when they land on the target's back-side indicator. It is important to position yourself accordingly as much as possible to take advantage of it, since her entire kit benefits from this.
Slayer Identity
Rotation
Fury Meter generation
- You cycle between your Fury Meter generation skills, using Spinning Sword twice.
- Maintain Damage Amplification with Wild Stomp. Pay special attention towards the end of your burst as Crushing Fear will be running out.
- The order of skills isn't as strict since you only use them once to generate enough Fury meter.
- Bear in mind that neither Furious Claw or Cruel Pierce have Paralysis Immunity, so they can be cancelled by basic boss attacks. Missing your Fury meter generators will significantly delay your burst cycles.
- Remember to reapply Damage Amplification with Wild Stomp whenever possible, even during Burst.
Burst Rotation
*
- Guillotine is only used twice during burst if you have enough Swiftness and a high enough Cooldown Gem.
- This skill order isn't strict, make sure to land all your hits in the enemy's back.
- You should also use Ragna Break and Flame Deathblade during burst whenever possible.
- Remember to reapply Damage Amplification with Wild Stomp whenever possible.
Gems
Gems are another significant aspect of your build, as they directly impact the damage and cooldowns of your skills. You can equip up to 11 gems at a time. Here are the ones you should focus on to maximize this build's potential, listed according to their priority.
Damage Gems
- Bloodlust
- Brutal Impact
- Guillotine
- Volcanic Eruption
- Furious Claw
Cooldown Gems
- Guillotine
- Brutal Impact
- Volcanic Eruption
- Furious Claw
- Spinning Sword*
- Wild Stomp
If you are using a Level 10 Annihilation Gem (T3) on Bloodlust, do not convert it to Tier 4, as it would result in a damage loss. It should be replaced with a Lv. 9 Doomfire Gem (T4) (or higher) eventually.
If playing 1.5 cycle, Spinning Sword has higher priority (right below Guillotine) as it will be your bottleneck. You should also keep your main damage skills cooldown gems at the same level.
Engravings
Engravings are a core part of your build. You can equip up to five at a time, freely swapping between them.
Engravings are listed in order of importance.
Recommended Setup
- Grudge
- Adrenaline
- Ambush Master
- Raid Captain
- Keen Blunt Weapon
Tripods
Tripods affect your skills directly by providing utility, damage, cooldown reduction or gauge generation. You should level up these first:
- Furious Claw: Quick Prep
- Ground Smash: Focus
- Cruel Pierce: Focus
- Spinning Sword: Quick Prep, Focus
- Guillotine: Quick Prep
Bracelet
Bracelets provide beneficial effects to yourself or to your party members depending on the rolls they have.
The primary goal is to get the main stats used by your build. After that, you should be aiming for Special Rolls to get more damage. Here are the effects you should look out for, in no particular order:
| Tier 3 | Tier 4 |
|---|---|
| Specialization | Specialization |
| Crit/Swiftness | Crit/Swiftness |
| Ambush | Crit Rate +3.4/4.2/5%. Crit Hit Damage +1.5%. |
| Circulate | Crit Damage +6.8/8.4/10%. Crit Hit Damage +1.5%. |
| Fervor | Damage +2/2.5/3%. Damage against Staggered foes +4/4.5/5%. |
| Hammer | Additional Damage +2.5/3/3.5%. Demon & Arch-Demon Damage +2.5%. |
| Wedge | Damage +4.5/5/5.5%. Skill Cooldown +2%. |
| Assail | On hit, Weapon Power +1,160/1,320/1,480 and Att. & Mov. Speed +1%. (max 6 stacks, 10s duration). |
| Precise | Weapon Power +7,200/8,100/9,000. When HP is above 50%, on hit Weapon Power +2,000/2,200/2,400 for 5s. |
| Superiority | Weapon Power +6,900/7,800/8,700. On hit, Weapon Power +130/140/150 (max 30 stacks, 120s duration). |
| Strength | Damage +2/2.5/3%. |
| Weapon Power | Additional Damage +3/3.5/4%. |
| Back Attack Damage +2/2.5/3%. | |
| Crit Rate +3.4/4.2/5%. | |
| Crit Damage +6.8/8.4/10%. | |
| Weapon Power +7,200/8,100/9,000. | |
| Strength |
Elixir
The recommended Elixir Set for this build is Master.
Critical can be used if you met the required Crit Rate with other sources such as bracelets, relic engravings, etc.
Credits
Written by Sekwah
Reviewed by Perciculum