Where Winds Meet Tank build: Thundercry Blade and Stormbreaker Spear explained

The most consistent tank setup in Where Winds Meet leans on two Martial Arts: Thundercry Blade for Mo Blade and Stormbreaker Spear for Spear. Both sit in the Stonesplit Might line and are built to soak pressure, lock enemies in place, and still deliver meaningful damage through charged attacks.

Core idea of the Thundercry + Stormbreaker tank build

This tank build does three things at once:

• uses Stormbreaker Spear to taunt and debuff enemies
• uses Thundercry Blade to generate shields and unleash high-damage charge attacks
• cycles Combat Will (or Fighting Spirit/Battle Will, depending on wording in your UI) by blocking and rotating skills

Unlike pure DPS setups, the gameplay loop is built around standing your ground. You block often to refill your resource, keep Fortitude or super armor up to avoid crowd control, and then cash out with level‑three charge attacks that spike both posture and HP.

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Tank Guide - Stormbreaker Spear & Thundercry Blade Build

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Thundercry Blade (Mo Blade) – the shielded executioner

Thundercry is the Mo Blade Martial Art that turns you into a walking bulwark. Its kit focuses on shields, Fortitude, and heavy charge damage:

On top of that basic kit, Thundercry charge attacks can be held through three stages. At level three, the weapon glows red, and you release a large hit:

• Light charged attack – wide horizontal swing for AoE packs. Press light attack again immediately for an extra AoE finisher.
• Heavy charged attack – vertical, more focused hit for bosses or elites. Press heavy again for a large single‑target finisher.

In the Mo Blade + Spear tank setup, Thundercry is the “cash-out” weapon. Most of your big numbers come from lining up its level‑three charges under buffs like Formation Breaker and external debuffs like Vulnerability from Stormbreaker.

Stormbreaker Spear – taunts, weaken, and super armor

Stormbreaker is the tank spear Martial Art and provides the tools you need to control aggro and set up your Mo Blade damage.

The spear also has a defining heavy charge: holding heavy enters a multi‑strike chain with full super armor. Finishing this chain grants a short buff (often called Push or Drumbeat, depending on description) that increases the damage of your next charge attack by around 15% and can empower one of Thundercry’s skills.

Stormbreaker is not your main damage source; instead it:

• locks enemies onto you with a taunt
• adds Vulnerability, so they take more damage
• provides mitigation and Fortitude so you can stand in melee and block
• primes your next Mo Blade charges through buffs like Push/Drumbeat

Combat Will, blocking, and why this tank build feels aggressive

Both Thundercry Blade and Stormbreaker Spear use a resource often labeled Combat Will or Fighting Spirit rather than burning your endurance bar for skills. The loop is:

• Spend Combat Will on heavy skills (Storm Roar, Thunder Shock, Avalanche, etc.)
• Regain Combat Will by blocking hits, triggering specific talents, or using certain light skills
• Spend again on level‑three charge attacks and utility skills during your buff window

Because blocking is one of the fastest ways to refill this resource, tank play in this setup is naturally forward‑leaning. You are encouraged to stay in melee, face attacks, and only dodge when necessary, instead of playing a pure hit‑and‑run style.

Several Inner Ways and Mystic Skills amplify this cycle further. For example, Exquisite Scenery lets you trigger a counterattack after a successful guard that behaves like a free charged strike and restores Battle Will. Others extend shield duration, improve Fortitude uptime, or reward you for taking hits without being knocked down.

Recommended Inner Way for Thundercry + Stormbreaker tank

Inner Way choices define how well your tank survives sustained pressure and how punishing your charged attacks feel. These options align particularly well with Thundercry and Stormbreaker gameplay:

Once all Inner Ways are unlocked, Breakthrough upgrades shorten cooldowns or strengthen these effects further, but the base versions already provide a substantial increase in comfort and reliability.

Recommended Mystic Skills for a PvE tank

Mystic Skills round out the build by adding gap closers, panic buttons, and additional crowd control:

On top of these, mobility Mystics that let you reposition while charging or extend super armor windows feel very natural on this build, since both Mo Blade and Spear want you to commit to heavy animations without being interrupted.

Gear sets for tanking: Moonflare, Eaglerise, Flawless Defense

Gear choices focus on max HP, flat damage reduction, and anything that boosts shields or charged attacks. Set bonuses matter more over time than individual stat rolls because you can only activate two full set bonuses at once.

For weapon and trinket sets, Rainwhisper is often recommended early on because it adds HP and critical damage, and scales that crit damage further when you are shielded. Since Thundercry spends most fights under its own shields, that condition is very easy to satisfy.

Across all slots, secondary stats like block strength, fortified guard, accuracy, damage reduction, critical rate, and charged attack damage are all desirable. The build does not rely on extreme glass-cannon crit stacking to function; steady defensive stat stacking plus charge multipliers is enough.

Martial Arts and talent priorities

Talent allocation should support the way Thundercry and Stormbreaker actually play:

• On Stormbreaker Spear trees, favor nodes that:
  • Increase damage reduction
  • Extend weaken or Vulnerability duration
  • Improve super armor uptime during charge attacks
  • Boost guard stability and Combat Will restoration
• On Thundercry Blade trees, look for:
  • Higher charged attack damage
  • Reduced charge time
  • Larger or longer Formation Breaker-style windows (charge damage + no endurance cost)
  • More posture break and finishing blow frequency

Global character talents that increase max HP, damage mitigation, guard stability, shield gain, or damage reduction while charging all smooth out the tanking loop. Triggered talents that proc when you take hits work naturally here, as you are expected to be blocking and getting tagged frequently rather than playing a pure dodge game.

Even PvP-oriented talents that reduce CC duration, increase stagger resistance, or shorten recovery animations quietly help PvE tanks by reducing the number of openings where a boss can tear through you while you are stuck in a long animation.

Main PvE tank rotation with Mo Blade and Spear

Different players present the rotation with small variations, but the multiplayer-friendly loop looks like this.

Opening on Thundercry Blade

1. Start on Mo Blade and cast the shield skill (often labeled Shield Veil of Stillness or Predator’s Shield):
   • gain a large HP shield
   • top up Fighting Spirit/Battle Will
   • Swap to Stormbreaker Spear using your dual-weapon swap (default Tab on keyboard).

Setting up with Stormbreaker Spear

1. Cast Thunder Shock (Special Skill):
   • Knocks down the main target if possible
   • Applies Vulnerability for several seconds
   • Grants you Fortitude to resist CC
   • Immediately follow with Storm Roar (Martial Art Skill):
     • Taunts enemies onto you
     • Applies weaken/shock, so they deal less damage
     • Grants damage reduction and often Fortitude
     • Charge a heavy attack with the spear to trigger the multi‑hit chain and gain the Drumbeat/Push buff:
       • This buff increases your next charge attack’s damage
       • It also empowers one of Thundercry’s skills in the next phase

Swapping back to Mo Blade for the burst window

1. Swap to Thundercry with the dual-weapon swap.
2. Use your Mo Blade Special Skill (often called Sunrush Gale or a similar name):
   • Pulls weaker enemies toward you
   • Applies the Focus effect, halving the charge time of your next charged attack
   • Cast the Mo Blade Martial Art skill that becomes empowered by Drumbeat/Push (commonly Heaven’s Shift or Predator’s Shield in its upgraded form):
     • Gives you a fresh shield
     • Refills some Fighting Spirit/Battle Will
     • For roughly 12 seconds, increases charge attack damage by about 30% and removes endurance cost for charges

Charge execution phase

1. Begin spamming level‑three charge attacks with Thundercry:
   • Use light charges plus the follow‑up light attack finisher for AoE packs
   • Use heavy charges plus the heavy finisher against bosses or priority targets
   • Keep charging and spending Combat Will until:
     • Your buff window (Formation Breaker‑style buff) expires, or
     • Your Combat Will/Fighting Spirit is nearly empty
     • Block incoming attacks during this window whenever you are between charges to:
       • refill Combat Will
       • trigger Exquisite Scenery for additional instant counters

Reset and repeat

Once your buffs fall off or your resource dips too low, rotate back to Stormbreaker:

• Reapply Vulnerability with Thunder Shock
• Refresh your taunt and damage reduction with Storm Roar
• Rebuild Drumbeat/Push with another heavy spear charge
• Swap back to Mo Blade to repeat the damage window

For multiplayer content, this loop is reliable: spear phase to secure aggro and debuffs, Mo Blade phase to convert all those buffs into charge damage, with blocking stitching the two together.

This Thundercry Blade and Stormbreaker Spear setup is not the flashiest build in Where Winds Meet, and it will not race pure DPS players on meters. It trades raw speed for control: near‑permanent Fortitude, frequent shields, predictable taunts, and charge windows that can delete packs once everything is lined up. For group PvE and challenge content, that stability is exactly what you want from a tank.