Slayers 2 Breathing Style Tier List — All 8 Ranked

Which Slayers 2 Breathing Style is the strongest right now?

On the post-balance list dated 2026-09-22, Flame and Wind are the two S-tier styles. Thunder, Stone, Water, Sound and Serpent all sit at A, and Insect is the only style placed at B. That ranking reflects the game after v0.98 and v0.110, not the version most older guides describe.

Treat the S and A split as a snapshot rather than a law. Every placement on this page is an evaluation by a specific outlet on a specific date, and the only hard evidence behind them is the patch data underneath. The Water Breathing and Thunder Breathing pages carry the per-style detail if you want to check a placement against the moves themselves.

What did the pre-balance Destructoid tier list look like?

Destructoid’s list is dated 2026-09-20, which is before both v0.98 and v0.110 landed. It put Thunder alone at the top with S, and placed Wind and Water down at C. Sound, Serpent and Insect shared A, while Flame and Stone sat at B.

Nothing about that table was careless. On 2026-09-20 it was an accurate description of the build people were playing, and it is the snapshot most YouTube guides and aggregator sites still quote. The problem is that it was overtaken within forty-eight hours, and the sites that copied it never said so.

Why do the two Breathing Style tier lists disagree?

They disagree because they describe different builds. Destructoid ranked the game as it stood on 2026-09-20, Beebom re-ranked it after v0.98 on 2026-09-21 and v0.110 on 2026-09-22. Water, Wind, Thunder and Insect all changed in between, and those four are exactly where the lists diverge.

The gap is largest for Wind and Insect. Wind went from C to S, because its startup frames were cut across three moves and its knockback was removed. Insect went the other way in relative terms, trading invincibility frames for armor and losing its strict stun, so one list calls it A and the newer one calls it B. Water climbed from C to A on the strength of a consistency rework, while Thunder slipped from S to A after losing a stun and a large chunk of God Speed distance.

A third post-patch ranking exists and disagrees again. One outlet’s post-v0.98 list puts Sound, Serpent, Water and Insect at S with Thunder, Stone and Wind below, which is close to the opposite of the list above for Wind and Insect. That is the honest state of the evidence: three outlets, three dates, three arrangements. What is not in dispute is the patch data in the next three sections.

What did patch v0.98 change for Water Breathing?

v0.98 was the biggest Water buff since launch. Whirl Pool gained damage plus a 3.3-second strict stun and can now be cast while you are stunned yourself, turning it into an escape tool. Basin’s stun and ragdoll window grew from 1.5 to 2.25 seconds, with a faster dash and a longer slam.

The trade is real. Surface Slash no longer tanks hits through the swing, and Water Wheel reportedly lost its armor entirely, so Water became a style that punishes mistakes on the enemy’s side rather than forgiving yours. That is why the placement moved from the bottom of the pre-balance list to the middle of the post-balance one, and why the Wind Breathing comparison is worth reading before you commit materials.

What did the patches do to Wind, Thunder and Insect?

Wind gained speed and lost knockback, Thunder lost a stun and most of a dash, and Insect traded defensive frames for armor. Those three changes are the mechanical reason the two tier lists disagree so sharply, and they are also why a guide written on 2026-09-20 reads as wrong today.

Thunder’s startup time is the one entry on this page where sources flatly contradict each other. One outlet records Thunder Clap and Flash startup dropping from 1.1 seconds to 0.45, which is a large buff, while another records the startup increasing and the whole kit gaining about a second of delay. The two accounts point in opposite directions and neither has been reconciled, so the safe reading is that Thunder’s feel changed substantially and the direction is disputed.

What did patch v0.110 change after v0.98?

v0.110 landed on 2026-09-22 and walked part of the Thunder nerf back. It cut the cast time of Thunder Clap and Flash and Rice Spirit by 20 percent and lengthened their stun windows, so the version number looks older than v0.98 while the build is actually newer.

That version-number trap catches a lot of players. Read as decimals, 0.98 beats 0.110, but the game numbers its patches in segments, so v0.110 comes after v0.98 and is the newer build. If a page lists v0.110 as the earlier version, it has sorted strings instead of dates and the rest of its timeline is worth ignoring.

v0.110 also fixed block recharge so it continues while you are stunned, added a block recharge indicator to the bottom left of the PC interface, added a PvP rematch button capped at two uses against the same opponent, and stopped damage-over-time ticks from triggering counters. That last fix matters to anyone running a Flame or poison build, because burn ticks had been eating their own counter windows. Note the confidence level: the v0.110 version number has only one web source, though an independent tracker records two Roblox place updates on 2026-09-22 that fit. The update history and patch notes page keeps the full timeline with confidence labels.

What do you need before you can learn a Breathing Style?

Level 25, Wall Climb and Double Jump are the three requirements that apply to every style. Trainers sit on cliffs, rooftops and hidden platforms, so the two movement skills are not optional regardless of your level. After that, each style adds its own materials and a training chain.

Two traps are worth memorising before you travel. First, the trainer dialog is the authority on materials: the numbers move between sources and even between runs, with Stone’s Beast Core count reported as both four and five, so read the dialog in front of you rather than a table. Second, the Stone trainer Gyorei and the Serpent trainer Obari share their names with world bosses in the same regions, so check the nameplate says Trainer before you pull. The breathing trainer locations page covers the routes, and the Demon Horns and Beast Cores page covers the farming spots.

Which Breathing Style should a new player unlock first?

Serpent is the usual first pick, because its trainer is the closest to the starting area and its material list is the lightest of the eight. Water is the popular alternative but asks for 5,000 Wen and 30 Demon Horns, and Wind demands 50 Demon Horns, the highest requirement in the game.

Plan the unlock around the grind you already have to do. Demon Horns drop one per Hoyuzo Subordinate in the cave behind the Bamboo Grove waterfall, and two per High Demon in Iceveil Valley, so a Wind unlock means a long session in the snow before you can even talk to the trainer. Beast Cores come from Beast Born Demons around Mistfall and the nearby villages at night. If you are still choosing a clan to go with the style, note that Agatsuma is built for Thunder and Kocho is built for Insect, which the clan tier list covers in detail.

One more decision to make early: the style you pick determines which skill tree branch is worth your points. Buying moves you will abandon is the most common waste in the first thirty levels, and the skill tree guide explains how to respec if you already committed.

Is Serpent Breathing the same as Snake Breathing?

Yes, they are one style with two names. The in-game style is written Snake Breathing, and most guides including Destructoid and Beebom write Serpent Breathing. The same split shows up in demon arts, where Tamari and Temari refer to a single projectile art rather than two.

That naming mess explains a lot of double-counting on aggregator sites. The mainstream count is eight styles, agreed by four independent outlets, but one competitor lists Beast, Mist and Moon as rumoured variants, and the first game’s wiki still lists its own older styles with different trainers and a level 12 gate. None of that applies to this game, and there has been no official statement about additional styles. The Serpent Breathing page documents the trainer route, and the demon art tier list handles the Tamari and Temari confusion in the same way. Official showcases exist for seven of the eight styles and there is no standalone Serpent showcase, so the style is community-documented rather than officially previewed.

What is this page based on?

This page is built from Community Verified sources: Beebom’s post-balance list dated 2026-09-22, Destructoid’s pre-balance list dated 2026-09-20, and patch breakdowns from allthings.how and Pro Game Guides, cross-checked on 2026-09-23. Unconfirmed here: the exact Wen cost per style, several individual frame values marked single-outlet above, and the direction of the Thunder startup change.