v2.4 took too long and my interests have landed elsewhere.
This patch will also widen the margin of discrepancy between what is viable in pvp and what is not, to a much greater extent than they already did when they first released D2r with all of its initial mechanical changes.
Long story short, I’m done. Sorry guys, I’m deleting this guide as it will be outdated anyway once v2.4 drops, and I don’t want this thread to keep getting bumped. Look elsewhere for your info once v2.4 drops.
Sorry boys, I can’t do this anymore. The pvp is honestly bad in D2r and in no way comparable to the good balance that existed in Diablo 2 LOD original.
One question regarding skill distribution - How many points should/can I put into Valkyrie? I ask because in your Windforce & Act 1 Rogue Merc setup you mention the Valkyrie, but not anywhere else. I’ve seen some recommendations saying 17 points and up for the gear she wears.
Otherwise, thanks a ton. After having some issues with Act bosses, your method of switching to a javelin and shield has helped so much. Also, while Strafe was pretty impressive early on it just became too much of a liability for the reasons you gave.
Due to +skill gear, even small amounts of +skill gear, you won’t need more than base 1 into Valk. What’s more important are the base points added to dodge/avoid/evade. The Valkyrie and the Decoy actually, get the same bonuses for dodge/avoid/evade that you get from the base points added. So adding to dodge/avoid/evade makes your Valk & Decoy tank a lot harder. Once you get a hold of like Torch, Anni, Faith bow with +2all skills, +1highlords, possibly +2diadem if you are running diamond/shadow faith over gmb, the Valk will tank really really hard.
Not sure what guide you’re reading that says add 17 points to Valk, but there is absolutely no reason to do that. Base 1 is plenty in conjunction with her dodge/avoid/evade synergies and her being alongside of an a2 merc help draw the aggro.
Bowazon is one of the most fun classes in the game. So just going room to room gunning everything down is its own reward. But this also makes Bowazon great for clearing areas a Sorc is going to avoid, like Hell Trav, Chaos, WSK, etc.
Yeah, Bowa is best at just big wide open areas for mass mob kills to find things that MF doesn’t really effect. Bowa can’t stack MF like a Sorc or Hammerdin, and it isn’t so hot at teleporting around to get to act bosses either. Best to aim at that mass mob kill speed for finding runes, jewels, good base drops for creating runewords.
Hello I thinking about maxing magic arrow (pierce,magic damage) instead of guided arrow (no pierce, full physical) is it viable ? Or i missing something
I’ve always played Amazon since D2LoD, and thanks to your guide, I am absolutely having a BLAST.
I came looking for a guide after act 1 hell phys immunes on the way to countess mauled me. Since I’ve respec’d to this build, nothing has stopped me! And switching between jav and bow is endless fun!
I can’t say this enough…
Thank you!
I have little to no gear yet, I can’t wait to see this really shine when I have the full kit!
You need the most expensive game to be very mediocre
once you have the most expensive gear, you don’t really need to mf or run stuff anymore, so basically you just play for fun then, so don’t bother much farming
You’re build is based around God gear. What if you don’t get it?
I’ve cleared all of Hell without it as a Bowazon. I’ve never used Multi shot and cleared Hell.
Freeze them in place a Strafe them down. It’s not hard.
Now do a guild for what players will actually be wearing. Not looking through the gear lists and picking each piece of God gear. Any class built almost anyway you like works in God gear.
It is true thou a great bow makes it so much easier like with and physical class a weapon is your top need. More times than not.
That’s not true at all. The “Budget Bowa build featured in this guide and in the twitch videos is hardly ultra expensive end game gear”. And even if you do accumulate & use one of the two elite methods listed in this guide, then you can farm mass mob kills for HRs like no one other class.
Eh? You must have skipped down and only read the ultimate end-game setup portion.
The first portion of the guide “The Walkthrough” explains to you how to walk through the game and complete Hell Diff with absolute bottom barrel gear.
The suggested “Budget Bowa” end-game setup to get started is a far cry from “God Gear”. That setup will cost you much much less than even getting a basic MF Sorc started. The Eth Titans in that setup can be replaced with normal Titans. I just happened to get lucky in the video with an Eth Titan drop during the first week of release.
Of course the two elite methods listed are packed with Godly Gear recommendations. This is clearly a purposeful listing because these are the two ultimate end-game gear setups for a Bowazon. No Bowa guide would be complete without listing these two historical setups. Furthermore no guide for any class would be complete without listing and showing the ideal best possible end-game setups to strive for. That’s just how guides work.
As far as all of this:
This is a guide for Bowazon, not Frostmaiden. Within the community there is a distinction between these two defined names. Bowazons are Amazons that use physical based damage setups in conjunction with Guided Arrow & Multiple Shot and sometimes Strafe situationally but only at a base lv 1. Multi is always better than Strafe in 9/10 situations. Frostmaidens are Amazons that use Freezing Arrow and + skill gear setups to bolster it. Whatever Strafe/Freezing Arrow setup you mention that you’ve used would be considered a subclass variant. You couldn’t call that a Bowazon or even a true Frostmaiden.
It is absolutely true.
I own most of the endgame gear and the amazon is still mega slow in clear speed.
It is fun to play, yes. It is slow because of 2 things:
multi shot got nerfed to hell and e.g. cows were buffed with tons of armor
you need to run everywhere
With budget gear, e.g. Eaglehorn or buri it really does negative dmg basically. If you play on players 8 you cannot kill a thing. WF is hardly a starter item btw, it is still one of the rarest items in the game.
frost maiden / phys hybrid setup will net you a lot better results and give you the flexibility to kill everything in the game.
Freezing arrow is better for example in cows and chaos
With multi shot you can farm more effective in the pits and tunnels
the combination works well, but still need very expensive gear to be able to clear an area in an effective speed.
you can check out that version, it is pretty fun and according to my experience superior to both builds. No mana issues, no immunity issues, somewhat solid clear speed.
As much as I would love that they buff amazon back to 1.09, as it currently stands you need omega gear or you do jack compared to classes that can play naked and have a better clear speed ;/
There is a difference in terminology within the community between what a Bowazon is and what a Frost Maiden is. This is a guide about Bowazon walkthroughs and Bowazon end-game setups, both budget starter into the end-game and elite end-game setups. This is not a guide about Frost Maidens.
The budget build listed in this guide is not slow clear speed. It works fine for 1 to even 8 player. It’s the best you’ll do for a Budget Bowazon starter into the end-game, which is what this guide is for. This guide is not a Frost Maiden guide.
Bowazons are not Paladins using Blessed Hammer. You cannot compare Bowazon mass mob damage output to some of the other classes that are notoriously overpowered for single target boss kills, like Hammerdins or Blizzard Sorcs, or Smiters. This guide points out several times that Bowazon is not for single target boss kills, but rather for mass mob kills as it possesses the largest area of effect attack in the game, Multiple Shot. Bowazons do not deal heavily single target DPS unless they are wearing crushing blow and using something Jab or Strafe.
Bowazons shouldn’t be using Enigma. It isn’t that they can’t use Engima, it’s that using Enigma is not optimal for what a Bowazon is good at. If you want to put an Enigma on a Bowazon, you may as well be playing a Sorc or a Hammerdin and going for single target boss kills. The only Amazon builds that works decently with Enigma are Javazon builds based around the lightning side of the tree. Even Frost Maidens are bad with Enigma. They lose too much potential power based damage.
Buriza and Eaglehorn do not deal negative damage. You can easily solo walk hell with Buriza, Sig Glove/Boot, small source mana leech. Buriza is actually a lot of damage my dude. It’s 2nd only to Windforce concerning unique bow damage output.
Windforce is not one of the rarest items in the game when considering trading. It trades for low value even shortly after a reset. This guide is for players in multiplayer who have access to trading. Windforce is easy to get a hold of, even with an Um rune.
In no way are Frost Maiden setups anywhere nearly as effective as a standard Bowa that is built correctly. I have no idea where you are drawing this conclusion from, but it is simply not true. Go look up the skill charts in Arreat Summit and review the small damage gains that Freezing Arrow gets. The truth is that during the end-game, Frost Maidens begin looking for ways to increase their damage output. What eventually happens is that all Frost Maidens realize that to increase their damage output and general kill speed, they need to begin tweaking more and more for physical damage. Usually the first thing that happens is they realize putting on a Faith Bow is yielding more damage than Ice Bow. Then from there out they begin noticing that each small tweak towards power is yielding greater kill speed. Then they realize they don’t need the freeze off Freezing Arrow and that the 20 points can be better spent elsewhere. At a certain point, they end up realizing that they’ve almost entirely converted into a full power based Bowazon. ← This is just true. It’s not that Frost Maidens CAN’T work. It’s that sheer raw power damage as an option on Amazon is just better than the skill based bow skills for literally every reason mentionable. 1) You have how Critical Strike interacts with raw power damage. 2) You have how Faith Fanat aura interacts with +max dmg charms, which is just way more damage than stacking +bow skill GCs. 3) Gear provided for Bowazon IAS/ED% is just so much stronger and better designed than anything to support a Frost Maiden. 4) Mercenaries can give you Might aura and either Pride for Concentration aura or Reaper’s for Decrep -50% phys resist, all of which is massively ramping up the DPS output for the power based Bowa much more than a Frost Maiden could benefit, even with Infinity.
When you look at Arreat Summit and the reality occurs to you that Freezing Arrow at lv 20 only has a base 310-320 cold damage, and only benefits 1 synergy for damage from Ice Arrow, and how many things in hell diff have cold immunity or at least high cold res, and that Amazon does not get a Cold Mastery like Sorc, you might want to consider what’s going on here with sheer DPS output potential. http://classic.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/amazon-bow.shtml
Futhermore, Frost Maiden setups are a waste of resources ultimately. I already stated in this initial guide post but I’ll say it again. It “feels” like you’re getting away with a budget setup with Frost Maiden. But what happens is that once you actually enter the end-game and want to tweak for more damage, you realize there is no way to tweak Frost Maiden damage because the only way to tweak Frost Maiden damage is to begin stating as a power based Bowazon. This is when it occurs to a player that trading to get the Frost Maiden setup was actually a waste of time & resources and that they should have just been working to accumulate power based gear to begin with, which would have saved resources & time in the end. Frost Maiden setups, although fun and I love them dearly, are an unnecessary detour from the inevitable power based Bowa.
If you’re a player who just wants to play a Frost Maiden because you like it and it is fun, that’s great. Do it, enjoy it. But posting in a guide like this and claiming that Frost Maiden is better than a power based Bowazon is just plainly misinformed.
The only thing where I could be wrong here, is if Immolation Arrow now in D2r, is also strangely bugged like Firewall in Cooley’s build. As of D2r, Firewall is dealing WAAAAAY more damage than it used to. People think it is because FW was based off FPS ticks for its damage output, and now that the native FPS is much higher, FW is now ticking damage way way more often than it used to. Whatever is going on, if that same thing is happening with Immolation Arrow, it is possible that a Frost Maiden setup using both Freezing Arrow and Immolation, could be strong vs. single target now in D2r. But it would still never be as good of a crowd killer as a pure power based Multiple Shot Bowa that can mow down mobs 2 screens off in a massively wide cone.
yes but maybe it should?
because playing through with physical is just bananas when there is a better build available if you got 0 gear.
we may have a different idea about what is slow and fast. Hitting a mob pack for straight up 20 seconds with multi shot till everything is dead is indeed very slow.
so I should compare it to a hamster or what?
You have high kill speed, high mobility chars and you have the boss slayers and then you have the snail that is called bowazon who is basically the worst boss killer in the whole game and since the nerf has terrible killspeed for everything above player 5 as well.
You are always comparing builds with the top builds to get an idea.
enigma has 2 good points even without straight teleporting to bosses.
great frw
repositioning merc
you can use enigma quite well for chaos runs, if you don’t like tele gear with charges. Fortitude is obviously the bigger dmg out put.
you can beat this game half naked, doesn’t mean it is satisfying.
Pumping 50 guided arrows into a cow till it drops will kill your fun pretty quickly. So yeah it is pretty trash for in terms of dmg output for phys zons.
see it trading for gul-vex, but whatever. Considering wf as starter gear is kinda meh, that is all i am saying.
Depending on your budget and depending what you farm.
yes exactly. For most frost maiden builds faith will actually be superior, at least in terms of convenience. (mana)
Ice does more dmg to certain mobs and areas though, it is more a case by case base but generally i would suggest faith as you can also switch easily to phys.
you never needed the freeze in the first place. The dmg in the skill window is also missleading. The splash dmg is where the dmg comes from. Using freezing arrow on a single mob obviously won’t do much.
what you do not consider is that some mobs have incredible phys dmg reduction (armor)
My freezing arrow can do up to 36k dps while guided arrow does with max setup just 11k or something.
The biggest disadvantage of freezing arrow compared to multi shot is simply that it is way harder to hit mobs that are a little spread out.
nono, what I was saying is:
Pure frost is garbage
Pure phys is garbage till you get god like gear and then is still not mega awesome
THe good thing is that amazon skills are all pretty trash and you have plenty of skillpoints to max the phys and frost side (frost just requires 41 skillspoints anyways)
the sheer amount of 3/20/20 charms you need is just crazy
For myself going pure bowa (without jav side) I actually prefer Shadow/Diamond over GMB for Faith - this let me use Atma/Razortail.
I either missed it, or you didn’t mention Mav diadem - this is “the Item” for bowas imo - Larzuk it, put any 15 IAS jewel in it and you keep up with all your breakpoints while getting GG circlet. It is sort of like for other classes using tele staff till you get Enigma.
Also I prefer GC over SC.
Enigma on Bowa is horrible armour Forti > Eni and this is nowhere close.
If this takes 20 seconds then teleport animation for zon must take about 20 minutes.
Also consider where and how you will be farming with bowa - CS, Pits, Cows and you will want to clear it, not go for bosses/packs only - neither of this benefits from teleport greatly. As for being slow - with Harmony on switch, Cats Eye, Mav’s belt my Bowa was in Pit faster than my Sorc (I actually kept last two in my Inv for swap)
Also by Frost/Phys hybrid I am guessing you mean Freezing + Strafe (as Freezing + MS doesn’t make much sense). Admittedly didn’t try it, but just play style itself doesn’t seem to come close to killing speed of MS in big open areas.
Look man, say what you want, but please be considerate to the fact that I wrote up this thread to be helpful, not confusing. So if you are not sure about the facts of what you are saying, please think twice before posting.
Clearing up a few more things:
Yup, already noted. Read the first paragraph of the guide. I directly point out that playing a Bowazon on a walkthrough is a struggle and then proceed to explain that this guide was written for those who insist on playing Bowazon, not Frost Maiden, not Javazon, but a Bowazon.
Here is the link to the demo again, which shows the Budget Bowa mowing down mobs in Chaos in 1 seconds and killing Diablo with a base lv 1 Jab in under 10 seconds with no crushing blow: D2r Budget Bowa End-Game Setup - Twitch The damage output is fine for a budget setup.
Yeah exactly. That’s why I said don’t use Enigma.
You don’t need to tele reposition mercs in Chaos, Cows, or anywhere a Bowa MFs.
I think you’ve been running Bowazons incorrectly all of these years or something man. Watch the demo link I posted. You can very clearly see that what you are saying is just not true at all.
You’re saying an awful lot but you’re aren’t reading anything. The Windforce is not “Starter Gear” it is for when you hit the end-game and need to build a budget setup rather than aiming directly at Faith & Fortitude. The gear I suggest during the actual walkthrough is to trade to get a cheap Skystrike from lv 28 to lv 41, and then trade to get a cheap Buriza to carry you through rest of Hell Diff walkthrough. The Windforce is to be obtained at the end of the Hell Diff walkthrough, which is easy to trade for with your cumulative drops + w/e came from your Hell Diff forge quest. This is simply not difficult to do.
This Budget Bowa setup is cheaper to build than even a starter MF Sorc.
No, Frost Maiden is ineffective. Whatever wealth & resources you’ve invested into a Frost Maiden, it can be converted into a full power based Bowa that is in every way stronger than a Frost Maiden setup.
What you didn’t consider was actually reading this guide before commenting on it.
In the guide, I suggest to put Reaper’s Toll on the merc so it casts Decrep to kill physical immunity. You can also use a Lacerator with the weapon swap proc to make Amp damage. Nothing in the game can be immune to a Bowazon that strips physical immunity and also can convert its power damage into lightning damage on javside with Lightning Bolt.
Now you’re just fabricating garbage. You can go to this calculator or any of the others, and see that even with full synergies and even with a lv 80 base Freezing Arrow, it only deals about 5900 cold damage. [Diablo II Skill Calculator - Skill Planner - D2Anya - D2 Item Shop](https://www.d2anya.com/article-35-diablo-2-items-skill-planner) Realistically at base 20 with full synergies, you’re looking more around 1100 cold damage which is completely useless in Hell Diff when 50% of the creatures or more are immune to cold or have a lot of cold res, and you don’t have Infinity or even Cold Mastery. It’s a waste of 40-60 points my man. All your damage is coming from physical on your Frost Maiden and all components that can buff physical damage like your merc’s Might or Conc aura or Decrep from Reaper, is so much more effective & practical to use in Hell Diff. The sooner a player accepts this and restats, the sooner they are able to profit from it.
You can keep arguing with me, but there is a reason why every single other person who has ever written a guide for Amazon, has said the same exact thing that I am telling you now, about physical based Bowas vs. Frost Maidens.
Again, if there were one redeeming thing that MIGHT make Frost Maiden good in D2r, it would be to experiment with Immolation Arrow, which might actually be hitting a lot harder in D2r in the same way that Firewall is now hitting in D2r, due to incrased FPS rates. Freeze mobs in place and toss Immolation under them. This might actually be strong now, and would be worth testing. But even so, that’s looking at smaller condensed mob kills. A Frost Maiden, even with a high powered Immolation, would never be as good of a mass mob mulching machine as a high powered Multiple Shot Bowa that can hit everything within 2 screens off with a very wide cone. Frost Maiden might have strong boss kill potential with a bugged Immolation though. Definitely worth testing and that point would be worth wearing Enigma for +2 skills and tele or possibly even an Ormus Robe.
also:
Nice to see a response from someone whom I can tell plays Bowazons. Thank you.
Yes, in normal D2 I would have suggested using a Mav Diadem as well, which is how I had always done it during walkthroughs. But in D2r people were seriously overpricing Mav Diadem in first week or two, and I found it much cheaper to just get a hold of any 3os helm and a few budget IAS jewels.
Also about Diamond/Shadow bows, this is my gig. I’ve written A LOT of content vouching for why Diamond specifically is better than GMB in pvp at least, which is mainly because it allows you to bolster the setup around the Diamond Bow, making javside much much stronger than a javside with GMB. Seeing as how Bowas are javside 50% of the time or greater in pvp, this generally results in Diamond making for stronger setups than GMB for pvp. There are only a couple matches where GMB is better, and that is vs. Necros & Trappers where the Nosferatu 10% slow is beneficial vs. the Clay Golem strikes “so he can’t hit you and slow you as easily” and vs. Trappers “because 10% slow effects their trap speed which is for some reason based on IAS not FCR”, otherwise Diamond setup are always better in pvp. In even pvm, Diamond Faith is only about a 15% decrease in average damage per second than a Faith GMB. Usually by the time I am ready to build a Faith, I’m already honing in on a pvp setup and I end up skipping the GMB Faith and just make a Diamond Faith at that point. It’s definitely an adequate alternative option in pvm, because it allows other options that completely make up for that 15% decrease in DPS from GMB Faith, as you’ve already noted with the atma/razor option while maintaining 7fpa.
I actually also use Diamond exclusively put Shadow there only because I know some people use this one. Personally never were able to pass on minimum damage on Diamond.
My dude, Diamond/Shadow Bows are probably gonna end up being new meta for pvm and pvp. Lots of testing being done via d2jsp right now. Apparently the old limits on IAS from the old game have been removed. So it is possible to achieve faster frames than in the old games.
So GMB Faith with 13, 14, 15 Fanat can achieve 7fpa with 95% ias “which is the fastest possible in original D2”. Apparently now in D2r, there is another breakpoint for GMBs & Hydras at 215% ias to go to 6fpa. Unfortunately with normal gear this is impossible to achieve without a hero editor.
However, Diamond & Shadow Faith at 13, 14, 15 Fanat, could hit 7fpa at 65% ias. Now in D2r, they can hit 6fpa at either 150% ias or 155% ias “Can’t remember which it was” but this is actually obtainable on gear through the use of 45/120, 60/160, Cat’s or Highlord’s, Nosferatu, 20% gloves. Even though you lose 140% enhanced damage from a Fort when you opt to use a 60/160, the thing is… 6fpa is almost twice as fast of a rate of fire from 7fpa. So ultimately, with a 6fpa Diamond or Shadow, we are going to be getting a lot more actual DPS “Damage Per Second” than by using a 7fpa GMB Faith. And even in pvp, that stun lock is going to be just as nasty and dangerous as Mind Blast with no WSG. Bowa might end up being second only to Trapsin in dominance, concerning pvp.
Futhermore, if you wanted to look into strange Matriarchal Faith setups which can obtain 7fpa at 45% ias, they can now obtain 6fpa at I believe it was 105% the testers said. There could be some interesting setups within Matriarchal now, but I don’t think it would outweigh the optimized DPS values achievable though Diamond/Shadow.
Either way, these new breakpoints if not patched, will rewrite the end-game for this guide. Which I’m sure I’ll get around to when the time comes after proper testing.
Thanks for the info.
Just run quickly numbers in my head and it seems that MB lets you keep Forti if you use Sigon (boots+gloves) although WT should be still way better I believe. As for pvp it seems you can be mean and use Cleglav’s gloves at 6FPA (have to keep armor, but get to choose belt and Amy)
Edit: There is also bunch of Treachery setups not sure though how they are fare against lack of damage from armour.