Spirit Breaker

Barathrum the Spirit Breaker is a powerful ganker type melee strength Hero that concentrates on taking out single targets, while lacking in larger team fights. His Charge of Darkness lets him charge towards any target available, while knocking off all enemies in his path. If you see the charge coming, it may already be too late. He is picked mostly for his high damage given by his Greater Bash which crushes the life out of his helpless victims. Barathrum can instantly and quickly move to his enemy via Nether Strike and shock them with a soul-bashing blow. Tanky, mobile and with an array of high-damage knockbacks, including a passive one attached to his right clicks, Spirit Breaker's ganking capabilities are second to none.

Gameplay
Spirit Breaker plays like most ganker Heroes: he singles out a target and deals as much damage as possible while trying not to get killed himself. Charge of Darkness is the go-to gank initiator. It grants vision of the target, and causes him to move very fast towards them, then stuns and deals damage while also disabling enemies that get in his way. Although issuing a move or attack command while charging will cancel it, some items can be activated while charging (such as Black King Bar), thereby adding to Barathrum's power. If Barathrum is disabled while charging, the charge will be cancelled, meaning he needs to pay attention and avoid being stunned. Players will not see a debuff when being charged, making him more of a surprise. Charge of Darkness can also be used to grant vision of the target. If Barathrum charges an invisible enemy, they will still be stunned and will give shared vision, but will not be revealed. Once hit, he can follow up with his ultimate, Nether Strike, another disable that deals high damage and a knockback after a short delay. His aura, Empowering Haste increases his movement speed dramatically. Greater Bash has a universal 17% chance to stun the target, while also dealing damage based on Spirit Breaker's movement speed. This means any items that increase movement speed and attack speed, such as Mask of Madness or Drum of Endurance synergize perfectly with this ability. With a bit of luck, he can cause considerable damage in a short period of time without using either of his active abilities.

Recommended items
Starting:
 * and a help Spirit Breaker sustain during the laning phase, preventing him from returning to base due to enemy harassment.
 * will greatly reduce incoming damage from physical damage during the laning phase. This is most helpful when the lane has one or more ranged heroes harassing consistently.
 * is a cheap and effective way to improve Spirit Breaker's low mana pool, as well as his health pool.

Early-game:
 * are essential for Spirit Breaker, as the improved speed will allow him to escape deadly situations, as well as catching up to an escaping enemy. The bonus movement speed will also provide additional damage because of.
 * is a useful burst health/mana item if the enemies in lane will be casting many spells. It can later be built into a.
 * is a helpful item when roaming or ganking. Assuming a gank is successful, Spirit Breaker can use the Urn of Shadows to heal without returning to the fountain. The bonus mana regeneration also allows him the ability to use far more frequently.

Core items:
 * give additional attack speed, as well as durability and damage, all of which increase the effectiveness of.
 * is good for burst health/mana while providing a boost to his attributes compared to the.
 * gives bonus attack speed and movement speed when activate, increasing both the damage and frequency of attacks.
 * makes you immune to many abilities that interrupt your, allowing you to engage and damage your target unimpeded.

Situational items:
 * improves by greatly reducing it's cooldown, as well as increasing its range. It also causes all nearby units to be hit by . This can be a good choice if your team needs a powerful initiation spell.
 * will not only increase Spirit Breaker's durability from physical attacks because of the added evasion, it's active ability can disarm enemy carries relying on physical damage.
 * grants Spirit Breaker additional attack speed and damage output at the cost of his health every second. However, the life drain can mostly be countered by the lifesteal given by the Mask of Madness, making it a useful purchase when used correctly.
 * will give Spirit Breaker a large increase in attack speed, as well as providing an attack speed/armor aura to nearby allies. The extra attack speed will cause to occur more frequently.
 * will grant a significant damage bonus on when the bash occurs. This synergizes well with the other attack speed items used to increase the frequency of.
 * increases the movement speed and attack speed of both himself and his team. The bonus movement speed and attack speed synergize well with.
 * gives Spirit Breaker the largest single-item-slot increase in attack speed in the entire game, which causes to occur very frequently. Thus, it should be considered to keep it through the majority of the game until a more effective item can be purchased, at which point the Shard can be consumed and replaced - The attack speed bonus will be halved, but having a permanent 60 attack speed bonus without needing an inventory slot for it is extremely useful.
 * grants you invisibility which could be useful for escape or to further increase your ganking/roaming capabilities. Attacking to break invisibility will disable enemy passives, reduce their damage, and give you a powerful 225 strike. Additionally, it has a chance to slow enemy movement and attack speed for 4 seconds, making him harder to escape. It also grants 16 points of Spirit Breaker's primary attribute, Strength.
 * also gives you invisibility while also making you much more magic resistant during the invisibility, making escapes significantly easier, and can be activated before using to avoid being interrupted without needing a . It also gives him attack speed and natural magical resistance, making him a stronger tank.
 * gives you good survivability stats and mana regen to allow you to use with little need to ever return to base for more mana. Its active will also make your initiation abilities stronger as spell casters will need to think twice before attacking to nuke you or shut you down.

Tips

 * Black King Bar can be used without interrupting your charge, activate it just when you get close to the enemy to take advantage of its duration during the fight.
 * Shadow Blade can also be activated while charging, greatly increasing the surprise factor of his charge and preventing easy charge interruption such as Rubick's Telekinesis. In addition, the Shadow Blade bonus damage will be applied to the first attack from invisibility.
 * Use Charge of Darkness to get close, stun your target, and make him vulnerable to your attacks.
 * Nether Strike deals major damage to the target enemy and teleports behind them, wherever they go. You can use this to catch blinking or teleporting enemies before they get away.
 * Greater Bash deals more damage depending on Barathrum's movement speed. Getting items that increase movement speed, such as Sange & Yasha and Drum of Endurance, will greatly improve your damage.
 * Chaining together Charge of Darkness with Nether Strike can deal high amounts of burst damage in a very short amount of time.
 * Spirit Breaker has very little teamfight presence due to his specialized abilities, but he can still be useful at neutralizing targets and forcing enemies back.
 * Charge of Darkness allows Spirit Breaker to run through units, trees, structures and terrain. It also does not indicate your enemies when targeted, letting you setup ganks.
 * When charging enemy heroes in mid game, be 100% sure that they are alone. A lone enemy may wait out in the open while their ally hides in the trees, waiting for you to charge the bait hero, and finally be ganked. Therefore, Observer Wards can greatly reduce uncertainty before charging.
 * Although Charge of Darkness is typically used to get into fights, it can also be used to get back out in a pinch; by targeting a creep in a different lane Spirit Breaker can move quickly to avoid death, then cancel the charge when he is out of danger.
 * Sange and Yasha is a fair pick on Spirit Breaker, as the bonus movespeed improves the damage of his Greater Bash as well as his general speed, improving his chasing ability even further in conjunction with its maim.
 * Despite being classified as an initiator Spirit Breaker is more of a hunter who takes out lone targets or chases down fleeing enemy heroes after a team fight. To actually initiate you will either need an Aghanim's Scepter so that your ultimate has an AoE presence which in turn weakens your carry potential or use Charge of Darkness in a way that would let you bowl through all of the enemy team heroes (such as aiming for the furthest enemy hero while the enemy team is standing close to a line formation).
 * Due to the massive speed boost Spirit Breaker receives while charging (288 more than maximum movement speed), he can catch up to a team fight fairly quickly, even from across the map. While preparing for a team fight you might want to stand at the back of your team and let your allies begin to draw out disables and initiation spells from the enemy, then use Charge of Darkness on your target, this will disorient the enemy team as you are likely to be hitting a few of them on the way to your target not to mention that they will be left with no disables to stop you.
 * Sometimes it might be a good idea to use Nether Strike on a magic immune hero to interrupt their actions as the greater bash will hit them regardless. Situations where for example your team gets caught in a Black Hole by a magic immune Enigma you can turn the tide of the fight if you can stop him right at the beginning.
 * Because Linken's Sphere triggers on cast, Charge of Darkness can be used to instantly and globally put an enemy's sphere on cooldown.
 * While it does not provide True Sight the indicator will follow the invisible unit being charged and the Charge will still hit an enemy that has gone invisible after being charged. This will cause the ability to interrupt channeling spells being performed by invisible heroes such as Sand King's Sandstorm.
 * With the use of all of your abilities and some lucky bashes, you can keep a single target stunned for 8 seconds. This is a huge stun duration even late game and allows lucky Barathrums to snowball out of control on lone ganks.

Trivia

 * Barathrum's fun names are Roadrunner and Space-Cow, the latter of which is referenced by 's ally line: " earthspi ally 07.mp3 You aren't half bad, for a space cow." The line about the spirit breaker being a "Space-Cow" Is likely a reference to Astral Trekker, one of the famously imbalanced DotA heroes, whose model was reworked into the original Spirit Breaker model.
 * "Barathrum" means "underworld" in Latin.
 * His response Spir attack 03.mp3 "Rampage" might be a reference to who used to be his equivalent in Heroes of Newerth (most of the HoN hero abilities changed since the port)
 * Charge of Darkness' indicator is the astrological sign of Taurus, the Bull.