Started Faith and Josephine - Twinking observations

[RobbyD]

So I started my Faith Strafer (Faith) and Dream Melee Enchantress (Josephine), and I think I've established a pretty good twinking formula. The basic idea is relying on OP Twinkage instead of main skill until about level 30. A lot of the twink gear needed to come from 1.09, so it's not extraordinarily easy to accumulate.

So both characters started with:
1. A 5 socket JoEnvy Long Bow (with a little help from GCs of Str),
2. Arctic armor+belt+gloves at level 2 (with a LOT of help from GCs of Str),
3. Hrarus' Boots at level 3,
4. Death's Gloves + Gloves at level 6 (keeping Arctic armor),
5. Angelic Armor + rings + ammy at level 12,
6. Replace the Envy bow with 07/09 Raven Claw at level 15, and
7. Duskdeep at level 17.

This setup pretty much made them untouchable until the Tombs (where the total 10DR from Angelic armor + Duskdeep apparently doesn't reduce the Mummies' black stars' damage).

For the mercs, I went Angelic bow + armor and Infernal cap for the Rogue, and Bloodthief + Duskdeep + Hawkmail upon initial hire of A2 merc (level 20). Iceblink at level 22, eth Battlebranch at level 25, and Face of Horror + eth Honor Partizan at level 27 (FoH for the STR to carry the eth Partizan at level 27).

I am going to play Faith as a proper Strafer in Act 3 (replacing Angelic with Skin of Vipermagi, Manald Heal, skill/res ammy), but I'm going to still rely on twinking for Josephine (checking to see if an 07/09 Kuko is similarly bugged). SoVM is my standard solution for Normal Big D.

 

[RobbyD]

So, since I made Harmony in a Matriarchal Bow for the elegance of matching level requirements (39), I wanted to give that to Faith at level 39... which is a challenge given the Str and (especially) Dex requirement of the bow. So, I kept a lot of spare stat points free (so she's a bit of a glass cannon - not a problem with a properly armored character in Normal), and I juggled some gear (already I had replaced the Angelic partial set for Skin of the Vipermagi, Manald Heal, and decent rare ammy and other ring for Big D) and pulled the trigger on the Razortail, which meant I had to replace the partial Death's - fortunately, Sigon's Gloves + Helm (didn't want to give up the +20 Dex from the Cow Boots she has on) gives almost identical IAS+leech AND +10 Str, and losing the resists are no big deal with Skin and decent rare bling.

At level 37, I had replaced the Honor Partizan, Iceblink, and Face of Horror with my eth Hone Sundan, Rockstopper, and Spirit Forge (have never used that armor before, and it's a nice filler before Duriel's shell is avaialble) with Tal and Sheal.

Finally, I reshuffled the charms to load up on of Dex and of Str charms, and I had her at 87 STR and 187 DEX at level 39 (in the first Red Portal area of Normal Act 5), so I replaced the Riphook she had been using with the Harmony Mat Bow.

Oh my. That bow is SICK in Normal Act 5. She got to level 41 in the next Red Portal area in no time flat! Had an XP shrine at the entrance, and cleared it out with the aura still active (almost a full level from that run)! I was seeing loot on the ground well past the monsters I was dealing with, so she seems to be killing monsters she doesn't even see.

I'll keep that and Lycander's Aim on switch to compare to see which is more effective in NM.

So, a couple observations on playing a Bowazon in 1.13 vs 1.09.

1. The Valkerie CAN KILL MONSTERS! At least a couple spawns of the Valk (I have that skill decently pumped) have had quite the bite. In 1.09, she never does any measureable damage.

2. Multi-Shot DOES appear to carry gear and charm based effects (specifically cold and poison) on all arrows, it just doesn't appear to leech with all arrows.

3. Strafe appears to be much improved over 1.09 - it's targeting awareness radius appears to be MUCH larger (Strafe would not target offscreen monsters in 1.09), and really applies the damage. I'm pretty sure the skill is bugged in 1.09 to not apply the enhanced damage.

4. I miss the piercing GA for bosses. Izual took a little while to take down with the Riphook. I'm going to have to go with Gore Rider for this build to have some CB, since the merc will not have it.