Magezon tips please

Snakecharmed wrote: 2 years ago

I don't have much input on gear, but I can speak a little to the playing experience of the build.

As a former mageazon player in D2C before elemental immunities and back when

Immolation Arrow had zero casting delay (both prior to 1.08), I have to say it got much harder to play in LoD to the point where the build was almost nonviable in a full 8-player Hell game. The appeal of the build was freezing monsters in place and then stacking immolation pyres as quickly as your attack speed would allow and letting them burn. LoD completely changed that and turned the mageazon into a utility build where your contribution to a party was limited to freezing, because you certainly weren't doing any killing.

It's a little more viable now in D2R with the minor tweaks they made in 2.4 benefiting fire, but still far more tedious than it was in D2C and only marginally better than it was in LoD.

I wish the following wiki page or its info had been readily available when I was still playing LoD, because I would have figured out much sooner that Infinity doesn't break cold immunity when the monster's cold resistance is above 117% and that there are many with much higher cold resistances.

https://diablo-archive.fandom.com/wiki/ ... Diablo_II)

I took another shot at a mageazon at the start of the D2R ladder and honestly, I thought the build still felt underwhelming. I quickly gave up on it and opted to rebuild based primarily around physical which I'm enjoying much more. The last time I considered a mageazon fun was in D2C. Since then, it has felt like being a significantly weaker bowazon with mana issues especially if your physical damage is low. The mechanics of the build feel clunky compared to what they were originally.

Give it a shot but don't expect too much from the build. A lightning spearazon is far more fun to play.

Thanks for the reply. Now I have to know what gear did you use this ladder when you gave up on the magezon. I'm really gonna crank cold dmg/sec to 11: Ice bow +3, faceted nightwing's(perf) 3 perf cold facets in the armor, 3/20 gloves, and going to invest a lot in energy as well as

Silkweave and a 15ias/3 mpk jewel.
If you did all that and gave up do tell, it might make me change course entirely.
And, come to think of it, now that cooldowns arn't shared(if it matters at all this case)- can't you alternate between immolation and freezing and that way still get some roasting in pyres? Though I understand pyre damage is miserable.

or.houster wrote: 2 years ago

Thanks for the reply. Now I have to know what gear did you use this ladder when you gave up on the magezon. I'm really gonna crank cold dmg/sec to 11: Ice bow +3, faceted nightwing's(perf) 3 perf cold facets in the armor, 3/20 gloves, and going to invest a lot in energy as well as

Silkweave and a 15ias/3 mpk jewel.
If you did all that and gave up do tell, it might make me change course entirely.
And, come to think of it, now that cooldowns arn't shared(if it matters at all this case)- can't you alternate between immolation and freezing and that way still get some roasting in pyres? Though I understand pyre damage is miserable.

I can tell that you'll be better geared than I was by what you're describing. Mageazon gear-wise, I was not well-equipped. Either my level wasn't high enough for everything I wanted or I hadn't been able to trade for everything yet. I was using

Lycander's Aim before making a Harmony

Blade Bow, which was a stopgap and future weapon switch for move speed. The rest was not specifically mageazon oriented, but was what I'd use generally: Fortitude,

Highlord's Wrath,

Raven Frost, SOJ,

Razortail,

Laying of Hands, and

War Traveler.

More so than the gear though, the gameplay felt clunky as I said before, and by that, I mean how you handle your keys and mouse buttons in tense gameplay scenarios. I got annoyed when I had to switch

Freezing Arrow for

Exploding Arrow and vice versa. I initially maxed

Immolation Arrow but I found it ineffective because if a monster is cold immune, they're not going to stand in place for IA to burn them, so I went with EA for the faster attack speed.

In theory, you could try to get the monster(s) to keep attacking a

Decoy that you'll constantly be re-casting while they stand in IA, but then you're trying to quickly juggle and switch three skills between two mouse buttons repeatedly.

Obviously, there's not much of an issue with monsters that aren't cold or fire immune. I just found that there were too many to ignore, and if I was ever in an area with both cold immunes and fire immunes, the constant switching was aggravating.

For non-C/F immunes, you could alternate between FA and IA, but the new 0.6s casting delay was difficult for me to adjust to because I was used to either FA and then sending a volley of IA in D2C or sending a volley of FA and then one IA per casting delay period in LoD. I will add that since the power of IA comes from the explosion and not the pyre, any casting delay on the skill caps its potential and effectiveness, hence why it was so awful in LoD.

It sounds like your ideal build is more or less following this D2Planner:

https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/0c0106k5#1

I'm not sure how well that works in terms of mana management, but I don't have any feedback to completely dissuade you from trying out the build. I think it still makes sense for you to try it out. I've sort of come around to it a little more after looking at that D2Planner and perhaps it could work for you if you have the gear. The DPS on that build is low though compared to a physical bowazon that doesn't even have a full inventory.

Snakecharmed wrote: 2 years ago

or.houster wrote: 2 years ago

Thanks for the reply. Now I have to know what gear did you use this ladder when you gave up on the magezon. I'm really gonna crank cold dmg/sec to 11: Ice bow +3, faceted nightwing's(perf) 3 perf cold facets in the armor, 3/20 gloves, and going to invest a lot in energy as well as

Silkweave and a 15ias/3 mpk jewel.
If you did all that and gave up do tell, it might make me change course entirely.
And, come to think of it, now that cooldowns arn't shared(if it matters at all this case)- can't you alternate between immolation and freezing and that way still get some roasting in pyres? Though I understand pyre damage is miserable.

I can tell that you'll be better geared than I was by what you're describing. Mageazon gear-wise, I was not well-equipped. Either my level wasn't high enough for everything I wanted or I hadn't been able to trade for everything yet. I was using

Lycander's Aim before making a Harmony

Blade Bow, which was a stopgap and future weapon switch for move speed. The rest was not specifically mageazon oriented, but was what I'd use generally: Fortitude,

Highlord's Wrath,

Raven Frost, SOJ,

Razortail,

Laying of Hands, and

War Traveler.

More so than the gear though, the gameplay felt clunky as I said before, and by that, I mean how you handle your keys and mouse buttons in tense gameplay scenarios. I got annoyed when I had to switch

Freezing Arrow for

Exploding Arrow and vice versa. I initially maxed

Immolation Arrow but I found it ineffective because if a monster is cold immune, they're not going to stand in place for IA to burn them, so I went with EA for the faster attack speed.

In theory, you could try to get the monster(s) to keep attacking a

Decoy that you'll constantly be re-casting while they stand in IA, but then you're trying to quickly juggle and switch three skills between two mouse buttons repeatedly.

Obviously, there's not much of an issue with monsters that aren't cold or fire immune. I just found that there were too many to ignore, and if I was ever in an area with both cold immunes and fire immunes, the constant switching was aggravating.

For non-C/F immunes, you could alternate between FA and IA, but the new 0.6s casting delay was difficult for me to adjust to because I was used to either FA and then sending a volley of IA in D2C or sending a volley of FA and then one IA per casting delay period in LoD. I will add that since the power of IA comes from the explosion and not the pyre, any casting delay on the skill caps its potential and effectiveness, hence why it was so awful in LoD.

It sounds like your ideal build is more or less following this D2Planner:

https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/0c0106k5#1

I'm not sure how well that works in terms of mana management, but I don't have any feedback to completely dissuade you from trying out the build. I think it still makes sense for you to try it out. I've sort of come around to it a little more after looking at that D2Planner and perhaps it could work for you if you have the gear. The DPS on that build is low though compared to a physical bowazon that doesn't even have a full inventory.

That d2 planner showed me I'll have so little res... like 0 in all. Good luck to me lol.
Anyway for cold immunes I think shooting Immolation then exploding(and repeat) is the best route. Should be seamless and more damage output than just using exploding. The quick cast should make this viable, I love quick cast anyway and pressing lots of buttons, it's engaging gameplay.
About damage and mana and overall build feel- I'll report back once I do this build and test some gear loadouts and farming spots. Should take me like 1 more week to get Infinity and build this girl... I hope.

You probably have the right idea going between

Immolation Arrow and

Exploding Arrow. Going between the skills just feels strange to me though. They're too similar and the only reason you can't use IA more is because of the casting delay, but using EA exclusively robs you of DPS on an already low-DPS build. I think IA is in a state of limbo right now and it's hampered by an old and limited game design. As much as I hate to give any credence to D3 considering how I remember almost nothing about that game despite playing it and RoS for over a year after it debuted, the one good thing about that game was the fluidity of the combat.

I think IA should work more like the Demon Hunter's Loaded for Bear as a giant energy dump with a massive mana cost and no cooldown and needs to hit like a fully synergized and mastered

Meteor. However, D2 can't really compensate for the DH's dual resource orb design which makes a skill like Loaded for Bear workable. In its current state, IA is a slightly stronger EA with a casting delay and a pyre that kind of tickles. There's no distinctive mechanic to the skill like how

Lightning Fury splits and rips apart an entire screenful of enemies.

Anyway, I wish you luck with the build. It's been some time since I've seen anyone dedicated to building it pretty much by the book and I'm curious how well it works in the current iteration of the game.

I just leveled a Fire/Ice Bowzon from 0-80. I solo'd the entire game by myself fine. Here's my experience.

Normal - get your staple pieces of Edge runeword, Stealth armor, Lore runeword, you will pretty much demolish anything with

Exploding Arrow until Nightmare.

Nightmare and late Normal you want to start investing points in your cold shots. I went really far into mid 60s with super budget gear, it's surprising how cheap this build was and still felt viable into early Hell:

Helm - Lore runeword
Ammy - Blue +2 zon skiller
Chest - Peace runeword (you can also try Treachery if you have a

Lem lying around)
Bow - Harmony in a +1

Stag Bow / Edge in a +1

Stag Bow on swap for

Chaos Sanctuary (the +demon/undead dmg is super under utilized).
Rings - Yellow rings with dex/AR, one had mana leech.

Boots -

Waterwalk
Gloves -

Magnus' Skin (any 20IAS)

Belt -

M'avina's Tenet

Note* - Your

Valkyrie and

Decoy are awesome, use them.
Merc - GET ACT1 COLD MERC w/ Insight BOW - you will be running out of mana and Act2 Merc early will just die randomly. Act1 stays behind and throws little slows out with Ice shot but mainly is there to supply you mana. Mine had very crappy

Edge Bow with Insight in it,

Shaftstop (I got lucky to find that) and

Duskdeep from late Normal until early Hell and she hardly ever died, it was amazing how good this Merc was at supplying me infinite mana.

Hell - I switched everything up mid-Hell as my damage wasn't cutting it. I got full M'avina's Battle Hymn, kept my ammy/ring/

Boots. This overall was pretty cheap, got most of the M'av pieces with PGems on this site. This took me all the way to lvl 80. I did also switch my Merc up to act2 w/ Might aura and Insight polearm /

Tal Rasha's Horadric Crest / Treachery armor.

So this is where my Zon is at right now and I go to lvl 85 Hell locations and farm them with my M'avs gear and have no problems. I recommend Sewers Lvl1 (no fire immune) and Swampy Pit (no cold immune) (both added as lvl85 in 2.4 and near Act3 portals).

illnecro wrote: 2 years ago

I just leveled a Fire/Ice Bowzon from 0-80. I solo'd the entire game by myself fine. Here's my experience.

Normal - get your staple pieces of Edge runeword, Stealth armor, Lore runeword, you will pretty much demolish anything with

Exploding Arrow until Nightmare.

Nightmare and late Normal you want to start investing points in your cold shots. I went really far into mid 60s with super budget gear, it's surprising how cheap this build was and still felt viable into early Hell:

Helm - Lore runeword
Ammy - Blue +2 zon skiller
Chest - Peace runeword (you can also try Treachery if you have a

Lem lying around)
Bow - Harmony in a +1

Stag Bow / Edge in a +1

Stag Bow on swap for

Chaos Sanctuary (the +demon/undead dmg is super under utilized).
Rings - Yellow rings with dex/AR, one had mana leech.

Boots -

Waterwalk
Gloves -

Magnus' Skin (any 20IAS)

Belt -

M'avina's Tenet

Note* - Your

Valkyrie and

Decoy are awesome, use them.
Merc - GET ACT1 COLD MERC w/ Insight BOW - you will be running out of mana and Act2 Merc early will just die randomly. Act1 stays behind and throws little slows out with Ice shot but mainly is there to supply you mana. Mine had very crappy

Edge Bow with Insight in it,

Shaftstop (I got lucky to find that) and

Duskdeep from late Normal until early Hell and she hardly ever died, it was amazing how good this Merc was at supplying me infinite mana.

Hell - I switched everything up mid-Hell as my damage wasn't cutting it. I got full M'avina's Battle Hymn, kept my ammy/ring/

Boots. This overall was pretty cheap, got most of the M'av pieces with PGems on this site. This took me all the way to lvl 80. I did also switch my Merc up to act2 w/ Might aura and Insight polearm /

Tal Rasha's Horadric Crest / Treachery armor.

So this is where my Zon is at right now and I go to lvl 85 Hell locations and farm them with my M'avs gear and have no problems. I recommend Sewers Lvl1 (no fire immune) and Swampy Pit (no cold immune) (both added as lvl85 in 2.4 and near Act3 portals).

Because I will have almost no mf, I'm considering cows. But tell me, what player count are you farming at(or how many players are in the games you play)?

Just online by myself usually. It does OK in cows, but takes a while to kill them TBH which is why the lvl 85 small dungeons are better IMO, you will melt them.

I played around with a Multi-shot build in Hell Cows with Treachery,

Buriza-Do Kyanon, Crafted Hit Ring,

Raven Frost,

Atma's Scarab,

Lava Gout,

Goblin Toe, Mav's

Belt A2 Merc with same gear as above and it's surprisingly good / way better for farming Hell Cows.

illnecro wrote: 2 years ago

Just online by myself usually. It does OK in cows, but takes a while to kill them TBH which is why the lvl 85 small dungeons are better IMO, you will melt them.

I played around with a Multi-shot build in Hell Cows with Treachery,

Buriza-Do Kyanon, Crafted Hit Ring,

Raven Frost,

Atma's Scarab,

Lava Gout,

Goblin Toe, Mav's

Belt A2 Merc with same gear as above and it's surprisingly good / way better for farming Hell Cows.

Well phys bowazons are better of course. I want to believe my gear will make difference in cows, we'll see. Sewers is just so annoying without Enigma(which I have no intention to use at first, nor did I make one). Swampy sounds real nice... let's see if getting away from dolls isn't too much of a hassle.

Ok, made my frost maiden/magezon- Auril. early report:
Leveling- boy infector in normal was so hard, died twice. Beyond that- everything went smoothly. In hell I stopped progressing and leveled her from 65 to 75(for torch), doing countess and

Tristram for xp- found a

Vex in the process hehe. Then I put the full gear on and went to town on all acts...
Gear(which I'm very proud of):
perf nightwing's with a perf facet
Ice in a +3 mat bow
highlord's
3/20 gloves

Raven Frost
duel leech with high light res and all res(which is a life saver for this glass canon)

Razortail

Silkweave
and the best part- an

Archon Plate with 3 perf facets and an 15 ias/3 mana per kill jewel
almost all skillers and sc have frw- I'm very fast, also have Harmony on switch. Infinity merc.
Everything, simply everything that wasn't cold immune was one shotted(p1). cold immunes died quickly from immo+exp arrow. It was melting corpses everywhere. bosses died very quick too. I thought ancients were going to be a problem- no. Not at all. Very quick.

farming- 8player cow- no. Too much hit points. It's doable but slow and very mana intense. Lower count cows- probably yes.
8p pits and Chaos- yes. A bit slow in pits, but really doable. As someone here stated- swampy pits(p8) are great for this character. Although I have very low res (40 light, 20 fire, negtives in cold and poison),

Decoy merc and valk are in the front, so I can one shoot souls from afar. If you go reckless- you'll die for sure. Gonna try farming that area for many hours to see if it generates runes (should do it, it has ghosts and souls, and dense rooms- when you get to a room). I really like the risk, a soul firing squad can one shot you, and you can one shot them... Interesting gameplay, not for everyone. Surprisingly merc doesn't die there at all. Thought the souls will fry him. Oh and finally a build that dolls arn't an obstucle for. Just one/two shot them from afar.

Largely, monsters that arn't fat and/or cold immune die very fast even on p8.

Oh and she can do trav on p1 easily. Didn't try higher p count games.

Mana is an issue when monsters don't die quickly and you need to spam a lot(like in cows p8). Otherwise it's fine, but she needs to pick up mana pots along the way. 8 mpk is a huge help, when fighting in dense areas, no pots needed. Also I put 45 hard points into energy, I think that's a must.

Exploding Arrow is better than

Immolation Arrow+exploding, much easier to operate, dont need to alternate with quick cast, which often doesn't go smoothly. Also 2

Exploding Arrow> immo+exploding damage-wise. Remeber that in immo+exploding setup there are no points to put in

Fire Arrow, so exploding is just 680 dmg on average in that setup(skill level 40).

I'm liking this build a lot for now, trying to farm stuff for my rgb wolf project - Fury hybrids with

Fissure from

Earth Shifter(red),

Rabies(green), and

Hurricane(blue). Let's see how long it will take me with this girl.


Need to try- using cta instead of Harmony, using Enigma instead of my pretty armor(will farm for an Enigma now).



Thanks for all tips! In particular the one who told me to decide where my gear goes- fire or cold, very very important tip.