My faith in great bow with 13 fana need only 46 ias so its nice…I always used windforce and a1 faith merc but this seems better with a2 might reapers toll merc.not pride yet
Great guide. I just “finished” my bowazon yesterday. Had to cut some corners here and there. Couldnt find a 30frw 3os diadem or gg knockback gloves so Im wearing a giants skull with 2x 15/30ed. Cant hit the last breakpoint at the moment but its still putting in work! Pride merc is the way to go. I also went with cta on switch. Didnt want to mess around with a hybrid.
My gear:
Giants Skull - 2x 15ias/30ed
Fortitude in superior wire fleece for the look
Faith GMB (got lucky with perf +2 15 fanatacism)
laying of hands
razortail
war travs
Highlords atm (have atmas and cats eye but since i cant hit the last breakpoint i opted for more damage)
ravenfrost
rare ring with max damage/AR/Dual leach/Str/Fire res
CTA/Spirit on switch
Merc has
Pride in an Eth thresher
Eth fortitude in great hauberk
Andys with 15ias jewel
Question. Would chains of honor be preferable on merc to boost the Concentration aura? The merc rarely gets a chance to do much damage anyway so i didnt know if that would be the way to go over fort on this build. Also helps negate the fire res from andys
If you mean GMB then that’s for Strafe which is for many reasons bad skill (it have it uses though). For MS you actually need 95 IAS if I remember correctly and this locks you in Cats Eye/Highlord + Nosferatu/Goldwrap combo (unless you drop Forti). Also if I remember correctly if you roll 12 on fana, you would need sigon/IK boots+gloves to reach max BP.
no i mean Great bow…weapon speed -10 this faith bow was originally for my merc but once i try it never go back… 95 ias is bp for windforce and a1 13fana merc…now i stand 46 so much more slot variability
Not at all. By far your best option for a Bowa merc is to get the absolute highest defense Ethereal 4os Base that you can get your hands on and make it into a Fortitude. Of course you want to pair it with an Eth Andy’s usually socketed with a 15%ias +Fire Res jewel. That high defense value on Fortitude especially with the Chill Armor, really is just everything. And of course other bonuses is that it grants +300% ed so the merc at least can hit things and heal himself with the Andy, and then the Lo in the Fort adds +5% max res to light, so the merc ends up with 80% light res vs the most dangerous stuff like Black Souls and eating massive Charged Bolt hits when standing point black range against a Light Enchant monster. In other words, a good Eth Fort is the best way to keep him ALIVE so you don’t have to mess around too much with the Conc aura going down too often.
Not sure what you’re using for GMB for, but you need 95% ias with a lv 13 or 14 or 15 aura to hit 7fpa with normal attacks, GA, Multi. Also, you should scroll up and read my recent post here that updated how we’ve discovered that there are new breakpoints in D2r. Diamond/Shadow, Matriarchal, Great Bow, are capable of hitting 6fpa now. Grand Matron can technically 6fpa, but it is impossible to do because there is no way to have enough IAS on gear to do it.
Mucha, you want to use a Matriarchal Bow for the Amazon. It’s the same thing as a Great Bow with a tad more damage and potential for +3 Bow Skills. Also, Matriarchal, Great Bow, Diamond, Shadow, they can all achieve 6fpa now. Great Bow & Matriarchal is achieving 6fpa at like 105% IAS I believe it is, you need a lv 14 or 15 Fanat to do it. Diamond/Shadow was reported to hit 6fpa at I believe it was 155%. And then GMB Faith technically hits 6fpa at 215% IAS but it’s impossible to do because there is no way to actually put that much IAS on gear.
So yeah this guide is going to need to be updated at some point. The old two elite methods from D2original most certainly will be outdated by this new 6fpa thing going on.
I just made it in GMB due to that being what most guides suggested. And getting that other gear is easier said than done. lol Everything is still too expensive. Im happy with my build at 8fpa at the moment.
Yes, I understand. as i said originally was for my merc and yet it is still a better weapon than windforce.that surprises me
and 6fpa sound interesting, how many ias need with 13 fana ?
Sorry my bad, confused myself here.
Do you know maybe if anyone found a setup for MB to match/outperform Diamond?
If I am not mistaken you are on the same 8 FPA with Atma.
Actually it’s looking like Matriarchal just might be Better than Diamond/Shadow because it needs less IAS so you can keep slots open in your jeweler armor to put in rare jewels that have mods like 30% ed 10all res 4 life rep.
But you know what? I need to keep my mouth shut and stop the theory-crafting for now. I am currently in the process of doing some very expensive tests for the sake of the amazon community. I’ll get back with you guys soon on it.
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Thank you for the comprehensive guide and the research regarding the new IAS situation in d2r.
I played a lot Bowazon in LoD and can attest that in the usual farming regions for this build pierce did help a lot. And since virtually every other PVM guide has “pierce is more important than anything” set in stone I was just wondering why yours does not? I am sure there is a reason for that and I’d love you to make a case why you opted to not have pierce on 100% (using razortail). Just curious if anything changed in d2r or if the other guides and my experience are faulty in this regard.
The whole 100% pierce thing is just a myth that’s been handed down by word of mouth to word of mouth to word of mouth, and people just copy/paste it to each other because they don’t question it. This stuff started waaaay back in .08 before Faith bows were a thing or torches or Annis to grant +skills, as well as when Guided Arrow used to pierce and turn back and hit again, resulting in this beehive like effect that could deal ungodly damage that was never intended, which is why pierce on GA was removed. This is where the “Gotta have 100% pierce” came from.
So back then, WF could only achieve 8fpa at 150%ias. This was done by having 60/160 armor, 45/120 helm, Cat’s or Highlord, 20% on WF with 15% in a jewel, or further with 20% in gloves. With these old low +skill setups, base 1 pierce didn’t get a lot of bonuses, so it was convenient to wear Razortail which marginally added a lot of bonus pierce, the flat whole number damage, and was largely the better damage bonus you could achieve on a belt. However nowadays, we have A LOT of miscellaneous +skill sources. +2 from Faith, +2 from gloves “if you’re wise to take passive not bow skill gloves”, +1 if you’re wearing Highlord over Cat’s Eye, +3 from Torch, +1 from Anni, even +1 from Battle Command if you have a CTA. So with a base lv 1 Pierce, those +skills would make it lv 11. a lv 11 Pierce is 73% piercing. Without the CTA +1, it would be lv 10 at 71% piercing. This is roughly 7 out of 10 of your arrows already piercing all of the time.
Now back in the WF days, you were looking at a base lv 1 Pierce being bolstered by +2 gloves if it was Passive over Bow, +1 Highlords, and that’s it. So you’re looking at a lv 4 Pierce which is only 49% piercing. THIS is why having Razortail pierce +33% was important back then, as well as just being the only option that was good in general. Also the build structures were different back then, before massive overhauls. Back then it was very convenient for a Bowazon to actually have 10 points to drop into Pierce to make for 100% piercing, which was great to run when Cows was the only meta XP method.
However nowadays, everything is different. If you wanted to use a Razortail now to achieve 100% piercing, you would be instantly dropping your potential 7fpa with a GMB Faith to 8fpa. This is because 7fpa requires 95% ias and that is only achievable through using 45/120, Cat’s or Highlord, 20% gloves, 10% on a belt. You have to use Goldwrap or Nosferatu to achieve the 7fpa. And that 7fpa is far far far far more important in terms of DPS “damage per second” than gaining 33% pierce on top of an already 71% or better pierce that you already have. Of course you could ditch Fortitude and use 60/160 or something, but I guarantee you that the DPS loss from doing that, would be detrimental and the 33% pierce would in no way make up for that. Again, with modern v1.14 setups, you will have a 71% or greater pierce anyway, with only base lv 1 pierce and no razortail.
Why would you not add more base points to Pierce? Because there are other things that are more important to add to. First of all, we get a total of 111 skill points by lv 99, with quests. so realistically let’s aim at looking at 102 skill points you have to use at lv 90.
Here is the mandatory:
- 20 Critical Strike
- 20 Guided
- 10 Multi, or you could go 5 Multi if you have end-game gear and all +skill sources
- Base 1 Strafe - “Also Cold Arrow will have to be base 1 as prereq”
- Base 1 Jab, yes it is important, this is your boss kill skill and it also is your UBER kill skill. The base 1 Jab is just more DPS than anything else, while granting safety behind 75% block, dodge bonuses, stacked resistance from Stormshield, as well as 35% damage reduce. 1 on 1 against any boss or powerful single target like Diablo, you just want to be using Jab when you are running a glass cannon Dexterity based Bowazon. And yes, with a few simple cheap gear swaps, you can tear up the UBERs with a base lv 1 Jab without altering your normal Bowazon skills or attributes at all.
- Base 1 Lightning Bolt, yes you need it. When you hit end-game gear and have Pride for Concentration on your Might merc, you need the Lightning Bolt to kill physical immunes. SOMETIMES you find things that are both phys and light immune, but it doesn’t happen very often. The Light Bolt is based on your physical damage output. It turns 3/4ths of your physical damage output into Lightning Damage.
- Base 1 Light Fury, no you don’t really need this if you only want to PvM. But if you want to PvP, you will need base 1 Light Fury. It’s about the physical throw damage, not the lightning. It allows you to hit with physical damage while having the Stormshield up for defense, without needing AR to hit with that physical damage. It works just like GA in that aspect. GA and Fury are the two most important skills that a Bowa needs in PvP.
- Then of course you need base 1 into all over passive skills. A lot of people lately think that you either want to max Valk or not take it at all, which is the strangest flavor of the month thing I’ve heard in the past 20 years. You want base lv 1 Valk, in both PvM and PvP, as well as Decoy. A base lv 1 Valk becomes really powerful the more universal +skills you get like Torch/Anni ect ect, in conjunction with the synergies it gets from Dodge/Avoid/Evade. In single player the base lv 1 Valk will do its job pretty much half the aggro that the a2 merc has to take, which greatly increases his survival rate. In multi-player games, the base 1 Valk gets its life total amplified and it becomes a super tank that rarely ever dies unless it walks into an Extra Strong Pack of Death Lord Frenzy Gods with Fanatacism. Then you want 10 Dodge, 10 Avoid, Dump the rest of points into Evade to max it, which would bring you to lv 93 actually. At lv 90, the Evade would only be 17.
Why do you want 10 Dodge, 10 Avoid, 20 Evade? Because when you are running a Dexterity based glass cannon Bowazon for maximum damage output, those dodge skills are what allow you to get away with it. If you try to take away points from Dodge or Avoid or Evade, so that you can add to Pierce, you become vulnerable to the point that you will need more Vitality, and the more points you add to Vitality, the less points you are adding to Dexterity for DPS output.
TLDR summary:
In the end, trying to stat for 100% piercing instead of 71% piercing that you virtually get for free, isn’t worth the loss in sustain or raw damage output.
Also understand that piercing isn’t always helping you to begin with. For example, piercing is useless when you are smacking Diablo around or using Crushing Blow on Jab vs. UBERS. In the old cow farming days, pierce was great when you were herding packs of like 30+ cows towards you in a really tight packed mob. But nowadays, while running various different areas, you are very rarely against 30+ mob packs in tight high density like that. Realistically you’re gunning down packs of 5 or 6 things as they come at you, and most of the time those things are sort of closing in around you in a crescent, not coming at you in a massively high density pack like cows. So quite often the pierce isn’t doing anything in those situations. Also consider that if you are firing a lv 15+ Multi Shot “16 arrows” at a pack of 8 things that are relatively close to you, with the way that Multi works, only 1 arrow can hit a monster at a time anyway, and then the other arrows in your crescent volley will go through that monster after 1 hits. So even with 0% piercing, if you were firing 16 arrows at 8 things in a mob ball, all 8 of those things are going to hit anyway due to the nature of how Multi works.
The whole pierce is a must thing, is old mythos back from the cow farm days when things worked very very differently.
Trust me when I say, the free 71% piercing you get with modern setups and base 1 Pierce is enough piercing.
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Is this a hard point or a goal for + to skills.
I’m curious, it seems that at lvl 15 you get 63% 20 68% 25 71% 30 73%. The levels between 15-20 are 1% per point, 20-25 your getting half a percent per point over lvl 25 is about .25% over 30 it’s .20% meaning 5 skillers to get 1%. The sweet spot for the level would be about 22’ish. With a decent level of + to skills you can get away with 10-15 hard points.
I was thinking of making a thread but since I’m posting. What are the options of Ubers for the Bowzon. I’m not asking if it’s optimal just what is needed to get it done. I saw some Youtube vids on a Mav build doing it, I know it will be slow, but what is everyone’s thoughts? From farming the keys to Ubers on strictly a Bowzon/no Jab.
You always want 20 base points into Critical Strike. Simply put, there just isn’t anything else important enough to add to when you’re aiming at physical damage based builds. Keep in mind Critical Strike works with every skill that lands physical damage. So trying to pump Jab or trying to pump Strafe, only works with those skills, whereas Crit Strike works with all physical damage in general. With all end-game gear, you’re going to get +9 to +10 skills on top of a base lv 20 which will land the Crit Strike at a 72%. If you go Rare Diadem setup for pvp with a Diamond or Shadow, you would end up with 74% at +12 “there is another jump in % at the end maximum gains”
Again, there just isn’t anything else worth adding to. You could try to pioneer some different builds by saving points here and there, and then trying to dump them into something like base 10 pierce or base 10 plague jav or w/e it is you’re trying to hyrbid, but I 100% guarantee you that you will realize that gear provided for Amazon in general, just doesn’t support hybrid builds that work like this. In the end you either go pure lightning based Javazon or pure physical based Bowazon, if you want efficiency in both PvM and PvP. Builds based around Freeze Arrow & Immolation, and all this other stuff, they just don’t pan out in the end. If you main Amazon for many years and try all of these different options, you’ll see the several reasons in the end, why it’s either Lightning Javazon or physical Bowazon or go home. In the case of physical Bowazon, we are working with the options of Crit Strike, Multi, GA, Strafe, Jab, Light Bolt, Light Fury, and of course Passive skills for utility both passive & active.
Keep in mind that I am not saying that you “can’t” run a variation of the template I’ve presented in this guide. I am simply stating what I have found to be optimal from 20+ years of playing Bowazon as a main in both PvM and PvP.
In example of this, considering you have an end-game Bowa with enough +skill gear to grant the free 71% pierce, I urge you to run 10 Chaos games with base 20 pierce and then run 10 Chaos games with base 1 pierce. Record the clear times. You will see that all of those points dumped into pierce is making no difference in average clear times. But if you were to lose even 5% off of Critical Strike, and were to run the same test in 10 Chaos games with max Crit Strike and then 10 Chaos games with base 10 or 15 or w/e, you will see an increase in average clear times because 5% off of Critical Strike is a definite ensured loss in DPS “damage per second”, it absolutely will slow your kill speed, even if you don’t view this as a substantial loss.
Thing is, if you were to save points to add to something else, let’s say Plague Javelin or Charged Strike, your gear won’t support those skills, they won’t have synergies, and they will be so low damage that they won’t be worth using. It’s just better to optimize for the best DPS possible when you are on a Bowazon. Go do the testing yourself if you have to, I encourage it. You’ll see that this relies on not only maxing Critical Strike % along with factors like enough AR or ignore target defense and IAS based on power damage gear, but also factors like block rate and dodge skill %, as well as Valk & Merc tank factoring, so you can do more standing and firing, and less kiting and running and healing. ← All of this equates to actual potential damage per second. If you were to start taking away points from Crit and Dodge Skills, you’re gonna lose raw mathematical DPS and it will force you to do a lot more running & kiting and less standing still to deal damage.
If that makes sense.
As far as UBERs go, all you need is Dracul’s for tap, toss on a Goblin Toe for Crushing Blow, stacked resistance vs. Conviction Aura “Which you can just prebuff with a Treachery using the Fade proc” just go out into cold plains and let a mob hit you until Fade procs and then put back on your Fortitude, and sorb gear like Raven/T-God/Wisp/Dwarf and also bring a Demon Limb to buff your Attack Rating before going in, always helps. UBERs are pretty easy on Bowa with base lv 1 Jab. You absolutely do not need to change any of your build to run UBERs, only the gear outfit with some easy and relatively cheap swaps.
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I am truly amazed how much effort you put into answering our questions in such detail, big kudos!
Other guides and streamers do not go that extra route and leave the viewer with lots of questions unanswered for. Just today I watched MrLlamaSC’s video showing off an Amazon build with the new “buggged” speeds - but most of the other tutorials/guides on YT and the likes are similar. The rationales for his choices mostly go like “sure put on these super expensive items, you have that for this of course, here you naturally use this and use the other thing for that”, without actually explaining why it works. You on the other hand build strong cases here with substantial points, which actually justify choices instead of just repeating “this has always been BIS”. Again highly appreciated.
What you are saying really makes sense to me and made me change my build plans for my new bowa, going to give your build a shot. Just the offhand suggestions with Titans/Stormshield/Jab sound so awesome, can’t wait to test it out on Diablo himself. Though I am poor and will thus not be using Faith but a Windforce (which I still need to get).
So, to reach 8FPA I’d need 147 IAS. If my math works out, using a Shael’d Windforce (40%), LoH (20%), Cats (20%), and 5*15% (75%) IAS in helmet/body combined nets me 155% (could even go for an ED/IAS in the Windforce here if only I had one). This leaves 1 potential socket free in helmet or armor and does not need IAS in the belt. Since using WF means I already have mana leech, I can just use a life leech ring which I got already. Using Nosferatu’s on the other hand would open up a lot of other possibilities, e.g. freeing up 1 more socket from helm/body and not needing to rely on leech from ring at all (and wearing 2 Ravenfrost for example). Apart from the unneeded pierce, the Maxdmg and Dex bonus from Razortail look appealing. Credendum would net me 5 more Dex points, but +10 Maxdmg sure beats that. Mhh…
What would be your recommendation in the belt slot for my setup? Since I don’t have Faith on me nor Pride in Merc, I kinda need to get some DPS from my gear.
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Nice guide; very detailed.
From my experience, the levels you suggested going through normal mode seem quite conservative. Level 18-20 by the end of act 1? That’s what im hitting if i play /players 8, but for regular single player im lucky to hit 14. Going beyond that and the xp/hour starts to grind to a halt and it’s best to just move on to the next zone.
Anyone else finish at similar levels?
Did you see the very bottom portion of the guide where it talks about a Budget Bowa setup? THAT is what I suggest for if you are wanting to grind by with bare minimal gear that just baaarely gets you started in the end-game after a hell walkthrough, so you can begin XPing and MFing around.
Quick recap, all you REALLY need to get started with Bowa end-game is this:
- Windforce - Socket it and put in a 40%ed jewel, WF itself already has 20%ias
- The best Titans you can get a hold of, upgrade them, and wear a Stormshield with them, socket a P Diamond into the Stormshield for stacked res while javside.
- You can use literally any 3os helm and put in the best 15%ias +dmg jewels that you can get your hands on. If you have to go ultra budget, just use plain IAS jewels. What’s important to start is the 45%ias on the helm.
- Get a hold of a 3os Natalya Armor and put in the best 15%ias +dmg jewels you can get your hands on. Again, use plain IAS if you have. What’s important is the 45%ias on the Nat’s. The 75% poison reduction and life bonus on the Nat’s is better than trying to use some kind plain 3os or 4os armor.
- Belt can be many different things while using WF. Really it’s up to you. You don’t need the 10%ias on the belt for 8fpa WF with this starter end-game budget setup. There are actually lots of options here initially.
- Laying of Hands, still the best budget starter for Zons. That 350% damage to demons is no joke for laying down the DPS on act bosses or the many things in the game like Izual.
- War Travs should be your standard boots. Goblin Toe is your alt boots for UBERs. Bowa will never need boots other than these two.
- Cat’s Eye or Highlord’s - Raven - Some good Rare Ring of course. You’ll still want dual leech on the rare ring because when you swap to Jab on javside, you won’t have the manaleech on WF.
- For your charms, you’ll want to focus on +all res budget to start. Usually if you can get a hold of a cheap Torch and even without Anni, you’ll only need about 4 GCs that have anywhere from +13 to +15 all res, and you’ll be able to have sturdy res on bowside and beyond max res while on Stormshield so you can tank hard while Jabbing.
That budget will give you exactly 150%ias for 8fpa WF side.
Oh and might I add that the most important upgrade you can do FIRST, is getting a hold of a Pride Runeword for your a2 Might merc. That Concentration aura from Pride is easily the most important PvM upgrade you can strive to achieve. It’s an awful lot of damage bonus, regarless of the rest of your setup. When the merc loses the Reaper’s and no longer has Decrep to kill physical immunes for you, you’ll just need to make sure you make use of Lightning Bolt and Magic Arrow when/if there are physical immunes.
Quick Question in regards to Eth Titans on swap. How big of a dmg difference between say a 160ED to 190ED? Is it huge or pretty minimal in terms of kill speed.
It’s actually significant in the end when you’re talking Zons with above 400+ Dex, wearing things like Fortitude, 45/120 helms, being effected by Might & Conc as well as other ED& modifiers.
For example, the 15-25 whole number damage on War Traveler. If you have a full end-game Zon and look at your character screen damage as you unequip and reequip War Trav, you’ll see that the 15-25 whole number is actually adding up to around 225-350 in the character screen.
So if a 160ed Titan vs. a 200ed Titan is a difference of 20 whole number damage on the Titan, you’ll be looking at a similar loss in damage in end-game stats.
Personally with Titan’s, I don’t use sets that aren’t Eth and above 195%. And always make sure you use cube to upgrade your Titan’s to elite version Matriarchal Javelins. It matters on physical based Bowa.
Thanks for the guide, the detail and explanations are great! I wanted to try amazon, but wasn’t happy with the Freezing/Exploding Arrow setup when I got to Hell. I respecced to try strafe instead of exploding as a secondary dmg source, but it’s sort’ve meh. Searching for other options is what lead me to your guide.
Two questions:
- I’m playing HC and the 750ish life total in your video scares me… Is there a balance point for HC where it might be worth more Vit and less Dex? Or would the loss of dmg from the Dex be worse?
- I’m currently wearing the full Mav’s set - would your build work with that set while i put together your suggested items, or would you stay with a Freezing Arrow setup until you had your budget pieces assembled?
Honestly, the sooner you begin converting to a power based Bowa the better. The whole Freeze Arrow thing is an illusion. When you’re running PvM with power based Bowa you’re wearing Raven Frost for cold slow and Nosferatu for another 10% slow. ← This is really all you need in terms of impeding monster movement. With the rest of the setup you just want DAMAGE, and this is best achieved through power Bowa setups.
For hardcore you definitely want to stat much more defensively. It feels like you wouldn’t need to, but in truth there is always that super mob spawn that happens about once every 20 to 30 games that completely surprises you somehow when 20x Extra Fast with Fanatacism Lightning Bolts come ripping at you from offscreen via a mob of Burning Souls, followed by some mob of Extra Strong Conviction Death Lords that spawned right next to it. In those moments you just want to survive and the VITA dump matters. For hardcore, I would definitely stat as a vita based Bowazon. Enough STR & DEX to wear gear, dump the rest into VITA just like a PvP Zon would. You’ll lose a bit of damage but it’s just something that needs to be done in HC or you will eventually die. This is how it is for all classes in HC, it’s just best to stat for VITA.
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