Phyiscal Immunes?

[Myrakh-2]

Phyiscal Immunes?

Hi,

I've recently acquired a nice little Windforce, and yesterday was the day I became lvl 73 Only missing 2 pieces of gear, Mavina's diadem to reach the 120IAS, and Reaper's Toll for the mighty merc --- I haven't gone into hell yet. She's using Strafe as her main skill.

I'm planning to get Magic Arrow to at least lvl 13 after skills, as a backup for physical immunes that Decrepify doesn't break, or hardly breaks (after all, best case scenario, a physical immune monster is still left with 90% resist). Would this be "enough" to be able to kill those critters? Of course, lvl 20+ would do more damage, but I don't have unlimited skillpoints :-(

Does the physical -> magical conversion use the Might ed% as well? How about the %ed to demons from Laying of Hands? Crushing Blow, Deadly Strike, Critical Strike?

Talking about Crushing Blow --- not exactly related to dealing with PIs, but I'm currently wearing Gores. I'd have more excess Strength if I switch to War Travellers, but would that be a better choice from a raw damage point of view?

I'm currently planning to put one point into freezing arrow for the splash effect --- Highlords, anni and one bow-skiller bring this to 4, although I don't know whether I'll keep the bow skiller... I might be a bit short on resists, still trying to decide what Armor runeword to get (Lionheart has some damage, Smoke has lots of resists, Stone doesn't seem to have anything going for it, and the expensive stuff = too expensive). Well, if I use Lionheart I'll have excess strength, but that shouldn't stop me Currently I'm using an upper Viper

Would it be better to ignore Magic Arrow and up FA instead (not sure whether I still have magic at lvl 1, or already given it a bit more, though... but it took a weekend to level her up, so I could certainly do it again)? I decided to go for Magic since it doesn't use Mana at higher levels, and a magic/hard physical immune combo should be less common than a cold/hard physical immune --- so I'm thinking I'd use FA to freeze non-cold-immunes a bit, if I manage to practice enough to get the skill-switching programmed into my subconcious...

And again, not related to PIs --- are there any "recommendations" as to "how much vita is good"? I'm feeling a bit unsure about this, since both dex and and vita are needed...

 

[YogiRat]

Go for MA. Here is a repost of one of the best guides I've ever read. Unless you play in hell ancient tunnels, I don't think you have to worry about MI/PIs

 

[Myrakh-2]

Go for MA. Here is a repost of one of the best guides I've ever read.

Thanks for the pointer. I read through it, and except that he maxed Magic Arrow it's not too different from what I'm planning, skill-wise (granted, my current skill planning just says "lots" for Penetrate, since I don't know how much I'll need...).

The build also takes a slightly different direction, since I specifically aimed for 120IAS to max the Strafe speed with the Windforce (unless I got something totally messed up and it's not 120 I need... but I hope it's correct). He does, however, mention MA as a means to take out PIs --- so I guess I'll just wait and try it out on some PIs to see if lvl 13 is enough.

Still can't compete with single-tree elemental builds in nightmare (lightning fury or sorcs) for killing speed, but I'll see if it evens out when elemental immunities and higher resists show up in hell But then, I didn't choose a bowazon for a racing competition...

Unless you play in hell ancient tunnels, I don't think you have to worry about MI/PIs

Well, I'll see I'm not planning to get a third attack to cover these combos, since I'm assuming that IF I meet such a combo (has to be hard PI as well, so Decrepify doesn't break it...) I can probably just leave the guy alone and try to put some distance in between so he doesn't keep rising stuff... there aren't going to be whole packs of these, I hope.
I'll see whether I'll need my one and only dual leech ring in hell --- else I might get myself a Nature's Peace so I never have to worry about monsters getting up again after I've put them down, so a mummy I can't kill will be considerably less of a problem...

 

[sasja]

I think that a WWS on the switch is a much better option for a Strafeazon than either MA or FA. It won't cost you anything in skillpoints, and hands you a level 20 MA for free plus the chance to cast Amp and be able to switch back to your WF.

 

[Leohappy]

I'm planning to get Magic Arrow to at least lvl 13 after skills, as a backup for physical immunes that Decrepify doesn't break, or hardly breaks (after all, best case scenario, a physical immune monster is still left with 90% resist). Would this be "enough" to be able to kill those critters? Of course, lvl 20+ would do more damage, but I don't have unlimited skillpoints :-(

I personally think boosting magic arrow up is unneeded. Most areas, where bowzons have a chance to do some damage and can do well in 8pl games, don't have PI's at all (the Pit and Flayer Jungle for example). You haven't explained the purpose of your bowzon, so that's all I can say about the issue.

Talking about Crushing Blow --- not exactly related to dealing with PIs, but I'm currently wearing Gores. I'd have more excess Strength if I switch to War Travellers, but would that be a better choice from a raw damage point of view?

I think WT's are well rounded boots for bowa, IMO nn for Gores. There has already been a discussion regarding the issue not so long time ago so ----> goto search.

I'm currently planning to put one point into freezing arrow for the splash effect --- Highlords, anni and one bow-skiller bring this to 4, although I don't know whether I'll keep the bow skiller... I might be a bit short on resists, still trying to decide what Armor runeword to get (Lionheart has some damage, Smoke has lots of resists, Stone doesn't seem to have anything going for it, and the expensive stuff = too expensive). Well, if I use Lionheart I'll have excess strength, but that shouldn't stop me Currently I'm using an upper Viper

Freezing arrow is nice for freeze effect, not damage (for that, you need to make a Frostmaiden build). I'd go with Talrashas armor for resist+mf.

And again, not related to PIs --- are there any "recommendations" as to "how much vita is good"? I'm feeling a bit unsure about this, since both dex and and vita are needed...

Well If you have 1000life @90 you will be unstoppable. Life scs help a lot here. I can't see how playing with 500 life in Hell can be fun .

 

[Myrakh-2]

Yeah, it recently occurred to me that I could upgrade a WWS and put that on switch The Amp damage won't do anything --- with 33% chance to cast decrep, my merc's Reapers will almost immediately override it, and trying to "park" the merc somewhere is too much hassle.
Shouldn't a mercenary at least have SOME obligation to follow orders?

At the moment I still want to use a Reaper's on the merc --- decrep will help protect him (he's a might merc), and it helps me as well...
Currently my inventory is too full to do the more extreme version of this --- I can easily switch my own weapon, but I could also manually change the Reaper's for a Bonehew Shooting bonespears and not overriding the amp...

Am I right in assuming that WWS only fires magic arrows if you use the normal attack skill? I.e. I won't be strafing magic arrows with it?

Well, 1000 life would certainly be good (my only playchar this season so far, a Skelemancer, has >1K... but after a few points into strength I could dump everything into vitality, since he needs no dex...)

My chars don't have a defined "purpose" --- they just need to be able to handle everything the game throws at them without too many problems. Or at least almost everything --- e.g. I will have no way to protect my merc from Iron Maiden, so I'll have to accept that OKs are no good. And I doubt she'll be able to handle dclone... although that's something I'd have to try, should I feel like it (probably won't --- if I decide to spend the time finding a clone I'll probably just use the necro as usual, rather than risking to loose the clone to bnet )

They must work in 2 player games, and it's nice if they do well soloing in 4 players, but that's about it.

In any case, thanks for the pointers I hope I don't have more than 1 prereq point in MA at the moment, as the WWS seems to be a very good option for the weapon switch... except that I just checked my char list and found that I don't have one :-( Oh well... guess I'll need to buy one.

 

[YogiRat]

While decrep will definetly overide amp, it is also cast over a rather small radius. Against large crowds with both triggered, you will see an island of drecep surounded by amp. One of the cooler visuals in this game IMO.