High end bowazon questions

Hey all I’m in need of some advice. The 2.4 changes to the Amazon have me excited to get back into playing my bowazon. Currently I’m using a physical build with a

Windforce and a reaper toll merc.

I’m considering switching to Faith. I was wondering if anyone else has used a Faith setup with an act 2 might merc using a Pride polearm? The 3 auras together seems like it would be really strong.

Secondly, would investing points into

Magic Arrow be enough to deal with physical immune monsters? Or would I need to use

Atma's Scarab?

2.4 with synergies you will get a ton of extra %enhanced damage (as well as attack rating with

Strafe) through your skills, meaning the %damage/AR you get from Faith is not as valuable. You can give your act1 merc a Faith if you want the

Fanaticism. IMO A2 merc with natural might aura+Pride will be best for you. This will boost your

Windforce's big damage (multiplicative of weapon damage but additive of ED on Fortitude, etc) Even with a perfect superior

Grand Matron Bow with perfect Faith rolls you're starting with a much lower damage number to be multiplied many times over by your skill, enhanced damage armors, etc. I haven't formally crunched the numbers but I would suggest you hero edit a single player character and try it out for yourself if you're interested.

Right now in the game I use

Magic Arrow to deal with the physical immunes if I don't feel like waiting for the scarab to proc. I plan on switching out of the cold

Arrows to free up points for synergy with

Strafe, and totally relying on

Magic Arrow for physical immunes, but am going to have to see how that works out, specifically for packs of physical immunes in WSK.

With the buff to

Magic Arrow, it works quite well even without more than 1 base point invested (one of the things I made sure to test on PTR).

Personally, I wouldn't give up my

Windforce for anything. It is just so far beyond what Faith and the like offer, it isn't even a comparison imo. Especially with 2.4:
-

Strafe gets AR, making the ITD on Faith less valuable by comparison
-

Strafe, Multi and Guided all get extra ED, making other ED (e.g. fana) less valuable by comparison while making the raw added dmg on

Windforce even more valuable
-

Strafe gets significantly more buffing than others, making it the preferred choice in more situations than now, to the point of also reliably replacing Guided on single targets/bosses. As a result, the added IAS from Faith's fana becomes less and less important because

Strafe is easy enough to

Cap without it (with a mere 80 IAS on WF).

And even independent of that, the knockback on

Windforce will continue to be one of the best defensive tools a Bowzon can have, making a full dex setup just so much more safe and enjoyable (I love my <500 life ).

I used to run a reaper's toll merc initially but gave up on that fairly quickly. Dropped it for Pride and never looked back. It outperforms what an A1 Faith merc would offer even without might, with might and Pride both up, it isn't even remotely close. Again also especially because the fana speed adds absolutely nothing for

Strafe.
The problem with reaper's is that it is a complete waste if your merc doesn't reliably hit stuff. And as is, I go through entire games (with clears of more than just one zone..happens regularly in CS + Pits games) without even having might because my merc gets a grand total of 0 hits off and hence never triggers it, due to everything dying so fast and at a massive distance. Hell, I even lose the Pride aura every so often because clear + run speed result in my merc getting lost somewhere 3 screens back for a while (I do hope the merc

Teleport changes help with that a bit).
The 2.4 buffs will just amplify that problem even further though "stuff dies too fast!" is very much a first world problem I suppose.

I'm of the opinion that ignore target defense is miles better than any other perk

Windforce has.

With

Windforce you can say buh-bye to

Multiple Shot which is the best thing for groups.

I have some archer friends who'd die on the Faith>

Windforce hill.

I have build my Bowazon in the last couple of weeks. I will keep it short:
Faith >

Windforce
(absolutely no argue for me)

Highlord's Wrath >

Atma's Scarab
(proc is too unreliable, use

Magic Arrow for phys immune)

War Traveler >

Gore Rider
(you don't need CB on your own - use G-Face on Merc for better CB because otherwise you'll always struggle with bosses / CB on merc is 1/4 / on bowazon it's 1/8)

The Reaper's Toll > Pride
(this one is optional, but Decrep and LL is nice because of G-Face and you don't really need the extra damage Pride is providing, Skills will get buffed enough / plus damage on merc is insane with reaper's / you can use G-Face and Pride together with Chains of Honor for LL, if you're a rich kid)

In my opinion, CB from merc is important, otherwise

Baal is a real pain in the ass. If you don't do bosses, go with Andy Face and Pride for example.

Just theorycraft it yourself: https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner-ptr/

Most importantly: Bowazon after the patch will still not be OP in terms of cost - effectiveness, but will be a hell of a lot more fun

i got 2 bowazon wf and Faith and Faith with Pride perseonally prefer setup wf and Faith on merc

@Mimic Let's not forget the 15% deadly strike which will stack with highlord's in addition to CB. In pure dps scenario

Gore Rider comes out on top despite the extra dmg from war travs (and has 5% extra speed) but if you want the extra MF absolutely go with

War Traveler.

For the knockback part,

Hit Power Gloves with 2/20 and anything on top (preferably mana leech) are good enough.

Queegon wrote: 2 years ago

@Mimic Let's not forget the 15% deadly strike which will stack with highlord's in addition to CB. In pure dps scenario

Gore Rider comes out on top despite the extra dmg from war travs (and has 5% extra speed) but if you want the extra MF absolutely go with

War Traveler.

For my build (with Highlord's), War Travs come out with higher dps - first proc chance comes from crit strike (16 points = 65% chance), second proc chance is deadly strike (33% Highlord's) = adding up to a 77% total crit chance (in theory).
If you add Gores you would gain 5% more crit chance for a total of 82% - not worth it imho, i'll go with 15-25 dmg instead. But of course due to the 2-step setup that crits are calculated with bowazon, in gameplay it can be noticeable. Also i don't think you need CB on bowazon at all, if your merc has it.

P.S.: for FRW i use GC/SC with 7%/3% and

Diadem with 30% - total of 85% with War Travs.

Cheers

Queegon wrote: 2 years ago

I'm of the opinion that ignore target defense is miles better than any other perk

Windforce has.

With

Windforce you can say buh-bye to

Multiple Shot...

They both have their benefits and I get why some people prefer Faith over WF but that argument is frankly beyond exaggerated.

ITD, against the mobs where it applies, only takes defense out of the equation and still leaves you subject to level difference. As a result, you get - at best - a 95% hit chance, possibly less. Typically a flat 95% once you're higher level since you'll always be close enough to your target's level.

WF on the other hand with decent gear gives you somewhere around 85-90+% hit chance, give or take (depending on lvl, gear and build).

Are you honestly claiming that those ~5-10% hit chance difference make multishot unusable?

Hyperbole, my friend.

Windforce offers higher damage potential and knockback with mana leech which both can be found on gloves, ML on ring as well.
Faith gives you a better breakpoint, extra skills (mostly relevant to passives), buffs your merc, negates any defense on enemies (mostly relevant to the

Multiple Shot where ~10% of your

Arrows miss, like you said), gives 300% AR for boss fights, offers 15 resists.

Extra damage, at any cost. A valid point, by all means. But it is what it is.

As I said, there's arguments for either side. But the multi +hit just isn't really one of them. Hell, even the 10% is exaggerated come end-game. I'm at 91-95% multishot hit chance across the board with WF at which point you notice no difference whatsoever, despite not being anywhere close to maxed on level or sharp/fine charms for even more AR.

And the rest goes both ways as you can just as well say having WF frees up your gloves/rings from KB/ML to use something better there.

Ultimately, it boils down to a matter of priorities, preferences and playstyle (the latter typically dictating the first two). Bowzons will die on either side of that Faith vs.

Windforce hill. I just happen to be firmly planted on the WF side of it.

Hell, if I wanted to play my zon defensively for example and not be an all-out full dex glass cannon, I would use Faith any day of the week. I'd be bored to Death with it and take forever to clear anything..but I wouldn't consider WF in that scenario either. Or if I wanted to take her into serious PvP again like the olden days (and not only because WF tends to be banned there anyways but because the attack speed becomes so much more important for it).

put a

Jah in your WF / hit the 89% IAS for 9 frames with gear - voilà, problem solved

Mimic wrote: 2 years ago

put a

Jah in your WF / hit the 89% IAS for 9 frames with gear - voilà, problem solved

You're gonna give someone a really expensive soon-to-be-regretted idea...

Agreed though, overshooting the 80

Strafe IAS and going to 90 for the extra frame on everything else is totally worth it.

I used to play bowazon back when bowazons were king.

If you want to "feel" strong, use a Faith.

If you want to be strong and also not break the bank, just use a WF.

If you got extra runes sitting, use a Pride merc, otherwise just use a reapers.

Suppose you do a bowazon Chaos run, it'll be about the same amount of time with Faith or WF, but WF is a heck of a lot cheaper.

Hey everyone I really appreciate all the input. I think I will keep my WF for now and I am going to work on farming a

Sur and 2

Lo runes for my merc: for Pride and Fortitude. Most of my charms increase attack rating but I am still dealing with low attack rating and low hit chance. I probably need to respec and put my points into dex. What is a good attack rating to have when stats, gear and charms are in place? Also, what are you guys doing to help with resistances? Right now my resistances are really bad. That’s why I mainly stick to the cow level. I’m using cats eye at the moment… should I switch to mara’s for the extra resistances?

This conversation is interesting, thanks all.

I've been playing a

Strafe Bowazon that is either geared up for P1 Chaos or P1 Pits.
The Chaos build has a Might A2 Merc that (lol) takes time to activate his aura. For the Pits build actually I prefer running with A1 Rogue with Harmony (

Vigor aura).

Faith has been more fun for me than

Windforce.
These runs are smooth, enjoyable, and I can TP when I need a few minutes. My P2-P4 builds are different.

I'm also currently running with 500-600 life! switch to Level 1 BO CalltoArms before Diablo kill and you're good to go.

I deal with physical immunes with an inventory of elemental damage charms. Won't work in P4 fo' sure.

I played WF extensively then got my Faith up and running. Now, I have a +3 bow skills and 13% ED GMB base for Faith, with a +2 skills and Lvl 15 Fanatacism rolls (some people are just touched by RNGesus), so I got a really great roll, but I prefer the Faith hands down.

WF was great and made me feel like a boss. The knockback was a visual cue of power, and it saved my bacon MANY times with those dolls. But, the high damage spread was annoying. 34-550 or something. When I hit high, I hit like a ton of bricks, when I hit low, I was just tickling enemies. Faith gives overall less damage, but more consistent, which I like. And the defense of the knockback is balanced by Faith's raise Returned proc. It isn't much, but those skelly meatshields do a good job being well, meatshields.

For resistances, I have CoH which takes care of a lot of it. (Ah hahahahaaha, I'm rich!) But, I also have a smattering of 11% single res, mostly lightning and a 15 all res GC. All of them found, not traded, so they are out there. I have

Laying of Hands for a variety of reasons, one being the 50% fire res. The

Atma's takes care of the poison res requirement. Cold is my lowest at 60% res in hell, so I just stick to the temperate regions and avoid the cold areas. All that said, Mara's is a good choice, but there are other options. Plus, Mara's pricing is still, in my opinion, a little wonky. A point or two in res is apparently worth a whole HR? I guess. If people are paying it, alrighty.

I roll with approx -30% all res, 280-350% MF

Glass Cannon FTW !
Love it. Recommend it.

Living dangerously. I roll with an bit of an overbuild, mostly gold res and 849 HP. But, I have 14%LL with my gear, so globe goes down, globe goes back up. Most of the time.