I play a lot of bowazon. I've tried almost everything, gear, runewords, etc.
In my quest for the GG physical bowazon, I've gotten bored many times and tried other gear combinations.
These are my fun suggestions to spice up your gameplay.
*Suggestions assume max breakpoints are met for Strafe and/or Multishot.
**I am using A2 Pride/Might merc.
1. Brand Bow and Principle Armor
These two runewords are not really meant for Amazons but gosh dang-it if they aren't fun as hell to witness when you hit that StrafeKey.
Granting you 100% chance to cast both Bone Spear and Holy Bolt on striking, Strafe will ensure you are spreading these projectiles everywhere.
(I tried increasing their potency with a Magic Colossal jewel and Entropy Locket but any gains were negligible.)
I used Brand in a Blade Bow for better breakpoints. Shreds Chaos Sanctuary.
2. Phoenix Bow and Dragon Armor
This one performed a little better in cows than the former. There isn't much to say. Lots of Hydra and Firestorm procs make this very visually impressive.
Scratches the same itch Destruction does, with filling your screen with fire.
I play a lot of bowazon. I've tried almost everything, gear, runewords, etc.
In my quest for the GG physical bowazon, I've gotten bored many times and tried other gear combinations.
These are my fun suggestions to spice up your gameplay.
*Suggestions assume max breakpoints are met for Strafe and/or Multishot.
**I am using A2 Pride/Might merc.
1. Brand Bow and Principle Armor
These two runewords are not really meant for Amazons but gosh dang-it if they aren't fun as hell to witness when you hit that StrafeKey.
Granting you 100% chance to cast both Bone Spear and Holy Bolt on striking, Strafe will ensure you are spreading these projectiles everywhere.
(I tried increasing their potency with a Magic Colossal jewel and Entropy Locket but any gains were negligible.)
I used Brand in a Blade Bow for better breakpoints. Shreds Chaos Sanctuary.
2. Phoenix Bow and Dragon Armor
This one performed a little better in cows than the former. There isn't much to say. Lots of Hydra and Firestorm procs make this very visually impressive.
Scratches the same itch Destruction does, with filling your screen with fire.
Waaaay back in the day, one of the last projects I was working on before I lost access to the game was a Poison Bowazon. Because I, too, was a bored bowazon main.
Alas, this "screenshot" is all that remains of her.
The build concept, at least as far as I recall, involved Guided Arrow/Multishot/Strafe, the Venom runeword in a Grand Matron Bow for the main hand and Pus Spitter for the alt (for that Lower Resist proc, though now the plan is to use Plague on an act 5 merc), Dragon armour for the Venom skill proc itself, and of course an inventory loaded up with poison charms.
I remember having a hard time getting anyone to trade me the Mal rune for it in the first place because of how ridiculous an idea this was. If I was wasting it on *Venom* of all things, I clearly didn't need it that badly.
Was it good? Probably not. Can I make it good? Remains to be seen. I've got a lot of other more practical things to make before I can get back to this concept, but I'm still strongly looking at it, mulling over hybridising it with Poison/Plague Javelins for something genuinely toxic that would actually benefit more from rainbow facets, etc... Would let me put the Dragon in a shield for the weapon swap and use Bramble for the armour, as well. But then, at that point, am I even still doing the same bowazon concept anymore?
I'll have to make all these runewords for the chronicle eventually, so I see no reason NOT to go back to the drawing board with this nonsense again when I inevitably need to make myself a Venom. Looking forward to trying to puzzle it out again when the time comes, especially now that sunder charms are a thing.
The other thing I'd like to try someday is playing with fire (I too wish I could put Destruction in a bow), but that's a theory craft for another day. I always forget Phoenix can go in bows, but the Blaze on level up always makes me sad... Infernostrides are so much more reliable, Blaze is such fun I'll make the suboptimal slot Sacrifice on my shoes any day.
1. Brand Bow and Principle Armor
These two runewords are not really meant for Amazons but gosh dang-it if they aren't fun as hell to witness when you hit that StrafeKey.
Granting you 100% chance to cast both Bone Spear and Holy Bolt on striking, Strafe will ensure you are spreading these projectiles everywhere.
(I tried increasing their potency with a Magic Colossal jewel and Entropy Locket but any gains were negligible.)
I used Brand in a Blade Bow for better breakpoints. Shreds Chaos Sanctuary.
I think you’ve just invented the Unholy Avenger Bowazon!
The overall problem with stuff like this is really the same as it is for nearly every proc-based build:
Pretty much all of those skills that you might be proccing are balanced around the idea of having their synergies and in some cases a matching mastery. So not only are the proc versions typically a significantly lower level than the "real" version would be (which would be fine as you do often get more of them on proc builds) but they generally get no synergy/mastery bonus whatsoever as you're on the wrong class to allow for that. As a result, the damage for near every proc build is pretty laughable compared to "real" builds.
Some combinations are quite pleasing from a visual perspective, sure. But the performance is generally so bad that one has to really be heavily focused on solely the visuals for entertainment to endure playing it.
The overall problem with stuff like this is really the same as it is for nearly every proc-based build:
Pretty much all of those skills that you might be proccing are balanced around the idea of having their synergies and in some cases a matching mastery. So not only are the proc versions typically a significantly lower level than the "real" version would be (which would be fine as you do often get more of them on proc builds) but they generally get no synergy/mastery bonus whatsoever as you're on the wrong class to allow for that. As a result, the damage for near every proc build is pretty laughable compared to "real" builds.
Some combinations are quite pleasing from a visual perspective, sure. But the performance is generally so bad that one has to really be heavily focused on solely the visuals for entertainment to endure playing it.
Hey man not everything has to be meta. I'm still dealing primarily physical damage with these combinations equipped. It's just fun. I color match my jewels to my armors and wear gear that looks cool over the 'best' bases just for funsies. These aren't meant to be meta defining builds. Just something different.
And I know you're not critiquing, just stating why they don't work as well for this class. I personally don't enjoy following build guides.
Waaaay back in the day, one of the last projects I was working on before I lost access to the game was a Poison Bowazon. Because I, too, was a bored bowazon main.
rip poison bow.png
The build concept, at least as far as I recall, involved Guided Arrow/Multishot/Strafe, the Venom runeword in a Grand Matron Bow for the main hand and Pus Spitter for the alt (for that Lower Resist proc, though now the plan is to use Plague on an act 5 merc), Dragon armour for the Venom skill proc itself, and of course an inventory loaded up with poison charms.
I remember having a hard time getting anyone to trade me the Mal rune for it in the first place because of how ridiculous an idea this was. If I was wasting it on *Venom* of all things, I clearly didn't need it that badly.
Was it good? Probably not. Can I make it good? Remains to be seen. I've got a lot of other more practical things to make before I can get back to this concept, but I'm still strongly looking at it, mulling over hybridising it with Poison/Plague Javelins for something genuinely toxic that would actually benefit more from rainbow facets, etc... Would let me put the Dragon in a shield for the weapon swap and use Bramble for the armour, as well. But then, at that point, am I even still doing the same bowazon concept anymore?
I'll have to make all these runewords for the chronicle eventually, so I see no reason NOT to go back to the drawing board with this nonsense again when I inevitably need to make myself a Venom. Looking forward to trying to puzzle it out again when the time comes, especially now that sunder charms are a thing.
The other thing I'd like to try someday is playing with fire (I too wish I could put Destruction in a bow), but that's a theory craft for another day. I always forget Phoenix can go in bows, but the Blaze on level up always makes me sad... Infernostrides are so much more reliable, Blaze is such fun I'll make the suboptimal slot Sacrifice on my shoes any day.
I tried a bow with 5 Perfect Emeralds in it but poison damage stacks in such a weird hard to understand way. Even tried a Bowsin with Venom but didn't have nearly enough gear to make that into anything special.
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