What type of hero is Graves?

Graves is a mystic. Ability-focused heroes whose damage and control scale with spirit power. Complexity: moderate.

What are Graves' abilities?

Jar of Dead, Grasping Hands and Essence Theft, plus the ultimate Borrowed Decree. Each one has three upgrades that cost 1, 2 and 5 ability points.

How much health does Graves have?

Graves starts with 730 health and gains 35 more with every boon (each level from 2 onward).

Is Graves good for beginners?

Yes. Graves is one of the heroes Deadlock recommends to new players.

What should I buy first on Graves?

Most Graves players open with Restorative Shot, Extra Stamina and Extra Spirit. See the full Graves build for mid and late game items.

Mystic hero · Moderate

MorbidArea DenialNecromancer Good first hero

Graves starts with 730 health and a gun that deals 35 damage per second. Their abilities are Jar of Dead, Grasping Hands and Essence Theft, with Borrowed Decree as the ultimate.

Graves build Compare Graves

Health: 730
Regen: 1/s
Move speed: 7m/s
Sprint: +2.2m/s
Stamina: 2
Gun DPS: 35

Win rate 57.1% Pick rate 43.4% 1.4M matches in the last 30 days Counters and synergy

The kit

Graves abilities

Ability 1

Jar of Dead

Charges: 4

Passive: Collect death when anything dies nearby and store it in your Jar of Dead.

Active: Throw a jar to summon Deadheads that repeatedly deal Spirit Damage to enemies.

Deadheads follow you instead if there's no nearby enemies, and prioritize the target of your weapon.

Deadheads: 4
Damage: 16 ×0.25
Search Range: 7m
Dash Range: 15m ×1

I
Collecting death heals 0.16 health per pickup
1 AP
II
On Hit: Apply 24% Slow for 1s
2 AP
III
+2 Deadheads
+4s Deadhead Lifetime
5 AP

Ability 2

Grasping Hands

Cooldown: 34s
Range: 24m
Duration: 5s

Unearth a line of grasping hands, summoning a Ghoul and leaving behind a rift. Enemies who pass through take Spirit Damage and receive Immobilize.

Alt-Cast Alt Cast rotates the orientation of the wall.

Summon Count: 1
Damage: 90 ×1.6

I
+2s Duration
1 AP
II
+90 Damage and +10m Wall Length
2 AP
III
+ Ghouls Raised
-14s Cooldown
+0.75s Immobilize Duration
5 AP

Ability 3

Essence Theft

Duration: 4s

Your weapon steals Weapon Damage and Spirit Resist over time, up to a maximum amount per target.

Max Weapon Damage Stolen: 25% ×0.25 Spirit
Max Spirit Resist Stolen: 10%
Max Steal Targets: 3
Time for Max Damage: 4s

I
+5% Max Spirit Resist Stolen
1 AP
II
+20% Max Weapon Damage Stolen
2 AP
III
+1 Max Steal Targets
All Summons now apply Essence Theft
5 AP

Ultimate

Borrowed Decree

Cooldown: 140s
Range: 20m
Duration: 16s

Damage: 115 ×1.27
Move Speed: -64%
Summon Health: 180 +8 per boon
Melee Damage: 40 ×0.5
Summon Lifetime: 20s
Slow Duration: 1.25s
Explosion Radius: 6.5m
Time to Summon: 4s

I
+25% Ghoul Speed
-15s Cooldown
1 AP
II
+10s Duration
-0.3s Time To Spawn
2 AP
III
On Death: Deal +5% Current Health as Damage
5 AP

What players buy

Graves build

Full build

The items Graves players pick most often in the early game, and how often they buy each one.

I

Restorative Shot 800
Picked in 74% of games
I

Extra Stamina 800
Picked in 50% of games
I

Extra Spirit 800
Picked in 47% of games
II

Improved Spirit 1,600
Picked in 29% of games

From recent matches

Teammates and counters

All matchups

Graves wins 57.1% of 1.4M matches in the last 30 days. Here's who Graves does best with, the heroes Graves struggles against most, and the ones Graves beats most often.

Best with

The Doorman 54.0% won together, 1.0 pts above expected

Apollo 57.5% won together, 0.9 pts above expected

Lash 58.9% won together, 0.8 pts above expected

Counters Graves

Rat King Graves wins 49.3%

Paige Graves wins 49.4%

Seven Graves wins 51.2%

Graves counters

Shiv Graves wins 63.2%

Silver Graves wins 62.8%

Mirage Graves wins 62.5%

From recent matches

Items Graves players buy

Full build

How often Graves players buy each item and how often they win with it, over 1.4M matches in the last 30 days. Expensive items bought late often show high win rates because the game was already going well.

Item	Bought in	Win rate	Usually bought at
Restorative Shot	82.4%	57.3%	2 min
Extra Stamina	79.4%	57.4%	8 min
Improved Spirit	73.5%	57.6%	12 min
Extra Spirit	72.1%	57.3%	6 min
Toxic Bullets	56.0%	58.3%	21 min
Mystic Shot	53.7%	58.5%	9 min
Stamina Mastery	52.1%	58.3%	21 min
Enchanter's Emblem	47.5%	58.2%	13 min
Boundless Spirit	46.3%	59.2%	29 min
Arcane Surge	43.5%	57.2%	10 min

Highest win rates (bought in 5% of matches or more)

Siphon Bullets 63.1% won · bought in 13.1%
Diviner's Kevlar 62.4% won · bought in 8.1%
Spirit Burn 61.7% won · bought in 17.0%
Escalating Exposure 61.3% won · bought in 29.2%
Spiritual Overflow 61.0% won · bought in 16.3%
Torment Pulse 60.8% won · bought in 14.4%

Gun

The Teacher

DPS: 35; While firing
Sustained DPS: 21; Including reloads
Bullet damage: 3.6
Fire rate: 9.8/s
Magazine: 40; Empties in 4.08s
Reload: 2.8s

Damage over distance

Full damage to 7.62m Drops to 50% by 17.02m

Headshots deal ×1.65 damage. Bullets travel at 635 m/s.

Initiate to Eternus

Graves win rate by rank

How often Graves wins at each rank (by the average rank of the match) over the last 30 days. The middle line is 50%.

Initiate 55.0% · 23k
Seeker 55.0% · 40k
Acolyte 55.5% · 32k
Sentinel 55.3% · 24k
Mystic 55.7% · 19k
Ritualist 55.6% · 17k
Emissary 55.8% · 15k
Oracle 55.2% · 15k
Phantom 53.0% · 14k
Ascendant 51.6% · 5,021
Eternus 51.6% · 1,381

Every boon

Growth per level

Collecting souls levels you up. Each level from 2 onward is a boon, and every boon permanently adds:

Health: +35
Bullet damage: +0.05
Melee damage: +1.58
Spirit power: +1.1

Quick answers

Graves questions

What type of hero is Graves?: Graves is a mystic. Ability-focused heroes whose damage and control scale with spirit power. Complexity: moderate.
What are Graves' abilities?: Jar of Dead, Grasping Hands and Essence Theft, plus the ultimate Borrowed Decree. Each one has three upgrades that cost 1, 2 and 5 ability points.
How much health does Graves have?: Graves starts with 730 health and gains 35 more with every boon (each level from 2 onward).
Is Graves good for beginners?: Yes. Graves is one of the heroes Deadlock recommends to new players.
What should I buy first on Graves?: Most Graves players open with Restorative Shot, Extra Stamina and Extra Spirit. See the full Graves build for mid and late game items.

Case history

Graves lore

The daughter of high-power defense attorneys, Darcy Graves grew up in a home where every conversation was a debate, argument, or negotiation. It was exhausting. But while her parents were often too busy meeting with clients or working on cases to bond with her, the dead were always there to listen.

Graves enjoyed her time in the cemetery. It was a quiet place to calm her thoughts and talk through her problems...but one day her one-sided conversations started to change.

It began with a faint whisper. A woman's voice that seemed to respond to Graves' complaints. Intrigued, the teenager listened...and followed the voice's instructions until it guided her to a lead-lined box buried in Van Cortlandt Park. But while most high school students would freak out if they were to unearth a severed lich hand, Graves was certainly not most teens. The hand now free of its prison, the lich's voice grew stronger... It had spent years looking to find a student she could pass her knowledge to, and Graves was eager to learn.

Now a fledgling necromancer, Darcy balances not only her homework at Blackmore Academy...but the demands of graveyard denizens, each of whom have their own unfinished business that they seek her aid in resolving.