Witchwild String vs. PIs (rant) :-(

[Myrakh-2]

Witchwild String vs. PIs (rant) :-(

Well, I just got myself a 168% Witchwild string (20 gems), upgraded it (PUL+adds), and took it to Arcane Sanctuary for some guaranteed physical immunes and (the teleporter quadrant) a way to keep my merc and his decrepify away from the targets without killing him.

And I must say --- impressive. I think I've never wasted currency worth UM+ for an item so worthless as this :-( As a rough estimate, my Windforce with lvl 1 (+skills) magic arrow isn't much slower, if at all. I guess I'll have to count my skillpoints to see how much I could dump into MA, and get rid of the WWS... and maybe also run some numbers to see whether putting the most expensive +damage jewels into the thing would improve anything (if I could afford them).

I guess there is nothing that beats doing some numbercrunching beforehand :thumbsup:

 

[Lensor]

here are my 0.02$:

IMO the wws is a weel-rounded bow that is well worth its costs and that also happen to have 20MA as a nifty backup for those pesky stoneskin pi's (those who will still be pi after amp triggers).

It is not a bow to take on scores of PI's. Come to think of it, i dont think any strafer bow is. The point of a strafer is physical damage, hence all PI's is going to be a hastle, and they are not going to be killed as fast as non-PIs, now matter the bow. If you want a character that can breeze though an arcane infested by PI's, strafer is not the way to go. If you want a character that can slaughter anything in the Pit, the strafer is one of the top choices. The point is, build for where you will use the character the most, and tolerate that it may be slower in other areas.

Hence, be nice to my WWS! :rant:

 

[Leohappy]

I guess there is nothing that beats doing some numbercrunching beforehand :thumbsup:

As I already said in your other topic, there are some areas in the game where standard bowzon can't do much at all. It's always good to know the purpose of char like this, otherwise you'll likely end up with a char full of wasted skillpoints. My personal stance on the issue was always, that playing in areas like this with help of others (battle.net is a multiplayer environment after all...) is the best option, and place skillpoints in skills other than MA (like passives or critical strike...).

WWs is a nice bow, but is not a silver bullet that's just going to solve your PI problems.

PS: As you already figured out, MA with WF and some +skills can handle physical immunes fairly well, nn to put more pts into it IMO.

 

[wof]

I haven't upgraded my WWS but it's a great bow to have on switch as a complement to my WF.

I usually just switch to WWS and happily strafe away at the PI's until AMP triggers then switch back and oblitterate the buggers with the WF.

 

[itsPizzarific]

I haven't upgraded my WWS but it's a great bow to have on switch as a complement to my WF.

I usually just switch to WWS and happily strafe away at the PI's until AMP triggers then switch back and oblitterate the buggers with the WF.

i use a wand with amp charges hehe.

 

[Disco-neck Ted]

Last time I checked, Gavel of Pain was the only item with amp charges.

As for WWS vs. PIs, 1 point in freezing arrow is worth it to help the amp trigger off. Spectres/wraiths are usually closely packed together, and the CTC works on splash damage from FA. Add to that any reasonable level of pierce with splash for each time it hits and 2% CTC is not too bad, although personally I feel it is a little low. Once the amp goes off, then strafe away.

 

[yellowman]

amp damage ammy

try using atma's scarab.. it adds amp damage 5% of the time... works nicely with my amazon's wf strafe zane

 

[FrozenSolid]

I havent used wws for a while but I remembered it to be pretty decent vs pis.
Its an all around nice bow with all the useful stats. It really shines when amp kicks in.
An option would be to give your merc the reapers toll. Decrep activates 33% which is like all the time. Its nice for more phys dmg and can remove pi property on champion ghosts in the arcane sanctuary.
Reapers toll is pretty cheap now (pgems) since the new rws arrived.

 

[citybird]

Well, I just got myself a 168% Witchwild string
---snip---
and get rid of the WWS...

Ill take that WWS off your hands if you want to get rid of it.
Just let me know what you would like in trade.

 

[Dacar92]

Ill take that WWS off your hands if you want to get rid of it.
Just let me know what you would like in trade.

Make sure it goes to the trade forums. Or do it in PM's. But not here. Thanks

 

[jonbendale]

I've finally traded for the runes and made a Brand in a +3 Mat bow and made Wrath in a Great Bow for PI's on weapon switch.

Both of them work great! I fire one volley with the Wrath and switch back to WF. I can even kill Hell PI's pretty quick just by sticking with Wrath.

I throw on my Marrowalks with my Brand bow and the Bone Spears go nuts! Sometimes fills the screen with white. Is alot of fun and kills pretty quickly in Hell. Only pain is carrying the boots.

Had a Hellrack previously, which worked pretty well as well.

 

[Leohappy]

I throw on my Marrowalks with my Brand bow and the Bone Spears go nuts! Sometimes fills the screen with white. Is alot of fun and kills pretty quickly in Hell. Only pain is carrying the boots.

I'd also like to try out the Brand bow sometime before the ladder ends (I'll probably use Act1 merc with Faith, and Brand on my char+Marrows for more dmg). Can you say how well it works in 8player Hell games? So far nobody convinced me this combo is good and I really need some 1st hand experience. I was thinking Chaos Sanct must be one area where this really shines... am I right?

 

[citybird]

I took a look at the Brand Bow and this seems to me like the ultimate end game do it all bow. I think the only monsters that would be immune are MI/PI combos. that could be covered with FA easy. And as for deamons (ie: Diablo) 440-670% ED is nothing to sneeze at.

35% Chance To Cast Level 14 Amplify Damage When Struck
100% Chance To Cast Level 18 Bone Spear On Striking
Fires Explosive Arrows or Bolts
+260-340% Enhanced Damage (varies)
Ignore Target's Defense
20% Bonus to Attack Rating
+280-330% Damage To Demons (varies)
20% Deadly Strike
Prevent Monster Heal
Knockback

I have 2 mercs equiped with Bonehew which has 50% Chance To Cast Level 16 Bone Spear On Striking. They can take down most PI's with no problem. Imagine what a 100% Chance To Cast Level 18 Bone Spear On Striking would do to PI's with a 8/2 frame Strafe!! And it's RANGED!!

AND IT ALREADY HAS KNOCKBACK!! This opens up your glove slot for Uniqe gloves like Lava Gout or crafted +2 bow skillers with IAS and leach.

If you are not going for crafted knockback gloves (Hit Power Gloves) what would be better? Crafted Castor or Blood? I would think Blood for the Crushing blow and hope for +Skills or IAS

A couple of questions - how does Marrowwalk increase the damage from Brand?

Marrowwalk
Boneweave Boots

Defense: 183-204 (varies)(Base Defense: 59-67)
Required Level: 66
Required Strength: 118
Durability: 16
Assassin Kick Damage: 69-118
+170-200% Enhanced Defense (varies)
+20% Faster Run/Walk
+1-2 To Skeleton Mastery (Necromancer Only) (varies)
+10-20 To Strength (varies)
+17 To Dexterity
Regenerate Mana 10%
Heal Stamina Plus 10%
Half Freeze Duration
Level 33 Bone Prison (13 Charges)
Level 12 Life Tap (10 Charges)

I see nothing there that would help out an amazon increase BoneSpear damage. Unless the + to Skeleton Mastery is what you meen but that is Necro only or does it apply to a necro skill?

Second question - does + to all skills apply to the BoneSpear skill on the Bow? this could possibly bring it up to lvl 25.

+2 Shako
+2 Chains of Honor
+2 Ammy
+1 Annihilus Small Charm

I would probaly use Tal's Mask instead of the Shako for ML/LL/RA and I will probably never see an Annihilus charm but that is still lvl22.

Would a Necro Grand Charm bump it up?

I like the Highlord's Wrath ammy with this bow. It would bump your deadly strike into the 30-40% range.

I also like Gore riders with this bow:

Defense: 140-162 (varies)(Base Defense: 43-53)
Required Level: 47
Required Strength: 94
Durability: 34
Assassin Kick Damage: 39-80
+160-200% Enhanced Defense (varies)
30% Faster Run/Walk
10% Chance Of Open Wounds
15% Chance Of Crushing Blow
15% Deadly Strike
Requirements -25%
+20 Maximum Stamina

the open wounds goes nicely with prevent monster heal on the bow and you get another 15% Deadly Strike. Also if you go with the Crafted Blood gloves the Crushing blow will stack ;-)

While chains of Honor would go nicely with any build it is a bit expensive. Fort is also good for this build but let's face it, some of the mods are not used by a zon AND it's expensive.

Lets scrool up a bit on the Arreat Summit rune word page and look at Duress:

3 Socket Body Armor
[B]Shael + Um + Thul[/B]
+40% Faster Hit Recovery
+10-20% Enhanced Damage (varies)
Adds 37-133 Cold Damage
15% Chance of Crushing Blow
33% Chance of Open Wounds
+150-200% Enchanced Defense (varies)
-20% Slower Stamina Drain
Cold Resist +45%
Lightning Resist +15%
Fire Resist +15%
Poison Resist +15%

do you see where I am going with this?
HINT: If you are lucky you can get Um from your Nighmare Hell Forge Quest ;-)

I see Crushing blow/Open Wounds/Deadly Strike all in the 50% range which meens with a 8/2 frame rate straif it's constantly going off.

Where do you get an 8/2 straif from? you ask?
I think you need 60% ias with a -10 bow (I am thinking a mat bow would be nice for this rune word)

Gloves 20%
Ammy 20%
Helm 15-45% (15% IAS Jewl or 15% IAS Jewl in Mavina's True Sight 30%)
Belt 10%

With MAV's True Sight you only need an ammy or the gloves.

What do you think?
Thanks for your input.

 

[Superhal]

i broke down and got freezing arrow. i was pretty irritated that i had to use 41 skill points for it with 1 synergy. however, as an added bonus: the arrow can be blocked/miss and the freeze will still do damage. by switching between multishot (which also has a special property that allows it to nearly ignore AR) and FA, i was able to solo dclone with a nature's peace ring (and roughly 2 mil gold for potions. but it was worth it.)

ps. i also don't like wws.

 

[JanusJones]

I took a look at the Brand Bow and this seems to me like the ultimate end game do it all bow. I think the only monsters that would be immune are MI/PI combos. that could be covered with FA easy. And as for deamons (ie: Diablo) 440-670% ED is nothing to sneeze at.

AND IT ALREADY HAS KNOCKBACK!! This opens up your glove slot for Uniqe gloves like Lava Gout or crafted +2 bow skillers with IAS and leach.

As far as mercwear, Bonehew's Spirit isn't synergized, which means it's only going to do a measly 192-204 Magic damage. In Hell, this means a heaping pile of NOTHING. In other words, go for a Arioc's Needle (+skills will up your merc's Might aura, increasing your physical damage considerably!) or a Pride polearm if you're rich (for a Concentration aura in ADDITION to the Might! Yowsa, major damage!). Reaper's Toll is another VERY nice choice for the Decrepify - if you do go this way, you can afford IAS on your gloves. "Slows Target" is an important modifier for a BRAND bow Strafer - because the Bone Spear triggers "on hit," you want to make sure enemies can't move too far between hit one (arrow) and hit two (bone spear). Also, put Reaper's Toll on a Holy Freeze merc and there will be very few things which you can't pin down and Strafe into the ground.

If you are not going for crafted knockback gloves (Hit Power Gloves) what would be better? Crafted Castor or Blood? I would think Blood for the Crushing blow and hope for +Skills or IAS

It does look like fun, I agree. However, a quick point: Dracul's Grasp will go a loooooong way towards keeping a Might Merc alive. The Life Tap curse will activate almost all of the time, which will keep your spear vanguard (merc+valk) up and tanking and make sure that no stray missle shots take you down. Once again, though - if you decide on a Reaper's Toll you can swap out Dracul's Grasp for more IAS - always a bonus! :thumbsup:

A couple of questions - how does Marrowwalk increase the damage from Brand?

I see nothing there that would help out an amazon increase BoneSpear damage. Unless the + to Skeleton Mastery is what you meen but that is Necro only or does it apply to a necro skill?

Second question - does + to all skills apply to the BoneSpear skill on the Bow? this could possibly bring it up to lvl 25.

Would a Necro Grand Charm bump it up?

Ahhhh. The answer, my friend, is SYNERGIES - the magic of the 1.10 patch. Even "cast on hit" stuff like the Bone Spear on Brand is synergized by CHARGES of skills - like the level 33 Bone Prison charges on Marrowwalks! Thus, a lv. 18 Bone Spear (168-178) is more or less worthless - almost no extra damage worth mentioning. However, add the synergy from a level 33 Bone Prison on Marrowwalks (+7% damage per level to Bone Spear) and we're talking a whopping 556-589 damage - nothing that impressive if we weren't STRAFING at 2 FPS! The damage from a 10 hit Strafe piles up NICELY. The link you need to do the number crunching for Skills is Chippydip's Skill Page . Check this out - no character should be built before his or her skills are planned!

As far as +skills, it doesn't work to increase EITHER "cast on hit" or charges of skills - thus the extra bonuses will only work for Zon skills, not the Bone Spear.

I like the Highlord's Wrath ammy with this bow. It would bump your deadly strike into the 30-40% range.

I also like Gore riders with this bow: the open wounds goes nicely with prevent monster heal on the bow and you get another 15% Deadly Strike. Also if you go with the Crafted Blood gloves the Crushing blow will stack ;-)

While chains of Honor would go nicely with any build it is a bit expensive. Fort is also good for this build but let's face it, some of the mods are not used by a zon AND it's expensive.

Lets scrool up a bit on the Arreat Summit rune word page and look at Duress: I see Crushing blow/Open Wounds/Deadly Strike all in the 50% range which meens with a 8/2 frame rate straif it's constantly going off.

Okay - several things here:

First: without Marrowwalks Brand's Bone Spear will not do enough damage to make a difference in Hell. I use a Buriza on my Windforce Strafer (it's a 1.08 with an Ohm in it :lol: ) and it's not enough to take care of P-Immunes with it's cold damage (about 32-196). Thus, swap out the Marrowwalks and you lose the ability to handle Physical Immunes. In addition, Crushing Blow is at a 1/8th penalty on ranged attacks (1/8th or 1/4th, I've forgotten - anyone remember which?), so Crushing Blow is MUCH less effective on a Strafer than Deadly Strike. This makes Duress a much less attractive choice - unless, of course, you're going for the cold damage, OW, and Deadly Strike - all very nice mods!

In addition, Deadly Strike and Critical Strike (the zon skill) can't both activate on the same hit - only one or the other. This means that between the skill and a Highlord's (more or less THE ammy of choice for a strafer!) you will be perfectly set for Strafing.

Where do you get an 8/2 straif from? you ask?
I think you need 60% ias with a -10 bow (I am thinking a mat bow would be nice for this rune word)

Gloves 20%
Ammy 20%
Helm 15-45% (15% IAS Jewl or 15% IAS Jewl in Mavina's True Sight 30%)
Belt 10%

With MAV's True Sight you only need an ammy or the gloves.

What do you think?
Thanks for your input.

Ok. One problem here: Matriarchal bows can reach 2 fps with only 60% extra, it's true. To check your numbers, the place to go for Weapon Speeds is here . Now the main issue I have with Mat Bows is their damage range: 20-47 as opposed to 14-72. When you apply the enhanced damage from an armor like Fortitude or a Might Merc you start talking a SERIOUS loss of damage from a Mat bow: 25 lost max damage turns quickly into 100 lost damage and more (especially when adding in the ED from a high Dexterity!).

Thus the loss in speed may be worth the overall increase in damage - with 120% IAS you can reach 2 fps with a Grand Matron Bow - almost impossible without silly hacked items (though you can make it with the following setup: 20% gloves, 10% Nos's Coil, 20% Highlord's, 35% from an Andy's Visage with a 15% IAS jewel, and a 3 socket armor with 3 15% IAS jewels - think Griswold's, Natalya's, Black Hades - or an upped Twitchthroe with a 15% IAS jewel in it). You can get a 3 fps Strafe, however, with an insignificant extra 15% IAS - easily attainable simply with Highlord's! This opens up your gear choices considerably: gloves could be whatever you chose (Drac's Grasp!), as could armor, helm, belt . . . etc. To tell the truth, however, it's a hard choice between the 2 fps Mat bow and 3 fps GMB - especially given that the difference is 8.3 attacks per second versus 12.5 attacks per second.

I think I'm going to make a new thread detailing the options for gear. Thanks for getting me thinking! :clap:

 

[citybird]

I saw your new thread here:
http://forums.diabloii.net/showthread.php?t=357475

so no more hijacking this thread.

PS (and on topic): I got a 170% WWS an upped it. It rocks in hell ,-) now i just need FORT and some more uber gear to get out of Act3 hell with my lvl 80 zon.

PPS: And yes i did beat andy and durel on my own.