Goodbye to the D2 Amazon community

Amazon
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Geez, impale doesn’t crit? Okay that changes things. I was thinking there MAYBE was some sort of strat that actually helps you to land impale strikes. I dunno, like maybe getting a sufficient number of guideds so when they tele on you they get kb’d or blocklocked enough for you to land an impale.

Prolly should have stated more clearly when I was saying that zons outrange other chars that I meant using multi/guided and strafe. Strafe was buffed and it is not actually bugged, so that means all the attacks from it ARE going off. The mechanics were also changed so that physical attacks have more chances of landing now, and if I read the patch notes correctly (some of it is not clearly worded) it means that ppl now can’t block in the middle of a tele and stuff, so that means you can now just stand there and strafe and possibly outtank some casters that were problematic in LOD, for example necs. So the tactics will only be the same as before: it will always be at close range because you have multi/GA and they use teleport. I figured may as well just see if we can find something that can 1-hit them. Lol

I think EBOTD Ghost Spear may be quick enough, but it’s only 18 frames at best and may only be of use on a few occasions. I know it’s just theorycrafting, have to test it out to see for myself lol

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Lots of things about to change in this guide for v2.4 release. I need to see the final changes before ultimately updating the OP post though.

One big thing right now to mention, is that slow% no longer works for pvp in D2r. There is no longer a reason to use Cleg’s unless they fix this. Even Nosferatu 10% slow isn’t working. So it’s looking like the advantageous reasons to use a GMB over Diamond in some matches, are being lost for pvp.

If they keep the FHR change though, it’s looking like that will actually pan out well for Amazon, regardless of if we like or want that change.

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Hi Mate,
I came across your thread and several of your posts, many thanks on sharing your experienced and math-backed calculations! You really display high level content with elaborate explanations and good vocabulary here and surely help many ama-players with their decisions.
At this occasion, I would like to share what I found a nice and playable build with the bowa on PTR. If you find the time, you could share your 2 cents with me/us here. I hope this is the right spot for such a post, as I have no intention of hijacking your thread here.

Note: I am also one of the old guys who played D2:LoD back in the days and just got attacked to his beloved bowa, although she was never really meta. I must add, that I am a hellish lazy player and dislike chugging, gear changes from the inventory in mid-fight or repeated and carefully timed weaponslot-switching. I just need it convenient and easy. I mainly play only PVM.

As I could read in your guides, you stack up CS to 20 and get 10/10/5 on dodge, avoid and evade. I feel like all those suffer heavily from diminishing returns and tend to utilize the skillpoints otherwise. I have no math-backed facts here, I just feel like penetrate is way more important over stacked up CS for example, or rather AR in general, which is why I tend to max Penetrate and Jab, even if its just a little extra AR for the Bosses and Ubers.
Also, I always just thought that Guillaume and Gores are a must have for every physical fighting class for DS and CB, which are additionally freeing some skill points that therefore do not need to be invested into CS. The setup will have roughtly 61% DS and 50% CB. This leads me to my current status on how I think (can’t find the source, so i’m not 100% sure on this) the CS/DS is calculated. They are calculated in series for each hit and can never proc both, only one of them. So for example if we have a CS at base 5 and 9 with +skills we would have 54% chance for CS, the remaining 46% CS doesn’t proc, we have a chance of 61% for DS to proc (0.610.46=0.28), that leaves us with a chance of 54+28=82% chance to do double dmg. Another increase of CS to lets say 20 base and therefore 24 with +skills this would be 70% (CS) + 18% (0.61 DS0.3 if CS doesn’t proc=0.18) = 88% chance for double dmg. Thats 6% for 15 skill points. If this assumption is correct, I would prioritize AR over it.

Lets get to the build at lvl 85 (mainly PVM directed):
Jab 20
Lightning Bolt 1
Magic Arrow 9 base to hit 13 with +skills for 0 mana cost and decent % Magic dmg
Multishot 10
Penetrate 20
Dodge 5
Avoid 5
All other passives 1
Valk 13 + rest of points if leveling further

The main attack is Multishot, the second skill to be constantly used is MA, especially for PIs and as the general left click attack, can also be used against non-leechable enemies if you are lazy as I am and dont wanna chug manapots.
Lvl 20 Jab feels like it does help a lot with more successful hits on bosses, no math or data tho.

Equipment:
Helmet: Guillaumes with 15% IAS + %ed or res jewel
Chest: Forti
Amu: Highlord
Rings: Rare dualleecher + Raven
Belt: Razor (SoE, TGods or Dungs if Mist is used)
Boots: Gores
Gloves: LoH
Weapon: WF + 15% IAS ED jewel, Faith GMB, Mist Mat Bow
Switch: Titan and Stormshield with 15% IAS + %ed or res for 46 IAS bp even with dracs on Jab

For Ubers: Dracs and TGods

The WF version hits the 9 fpa bp, Faith GMB 8 fpa bp, and Mist Mat Bow also hits 8 fpa bp.

Guillaume vs 3x 40/15 helmet:
If my assumptions are realistic, keeping DS and CB of the helmet, in addition to 15 str which means more vita and 30 FHR, isn’t necessarily inferior to reaching the next higher bp. Simplified calculation for 8 vs 7 bp on GMB is 3.12 vs 3.57 attacks per second = 12.2% less. If we directly translate this to dps we trade 12.2% dps and 120%ed on the helmet if you are rich enough for 3 40/15 jewels for 35CB, 15DS and 15 str with means 15 more into dex and thus 15%ed and a little more AR and thus higher chance to hit. On this simplified calculations and assumptions from my side both versions seem to be quite close.

Merc:
For WF build: A1 cold with Andariel, Fortitude, Faith/Mist if you are rich or A2 might with Guillaume/Coa, Treachery/Fortitude, Reapers if youre not so rich
For Faith build: A2 might with Guillaume/CoA, Treachery/Fortitude, Reapers Toll
For Mist Build: A1 cold with Andariel, Fortitude, Faith if you are rich or A2 Might with Guillaume/Coa, Treachery/Fortitude, Reapers if youre not so rich

Reading your posts was actually a true revelation to me in terms of having Titans and Jab on switch for Boss and Uber fights. I was running around them and spamming GAs like a headless speckfly which worked out till hell baal but not too good for Ubers and I was wondering why this was still a poor, ineffective and slow way of killing - well, many thanks for that insight.

Please feel free to correct me and add your professional opinon on this.
Many thanks in advance and my deepest apologies for this very long post.

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Ok, I’m going to go right down a bulleted list with these responses. I am not telling you that you are wrong. But there are some things you should be aware of and consider:

  1. My build uses 20 Crit, 10 Dodge, 10 Avoid, 20 Evade, 20 Guided, 10 Multi, base 1 Jab/Bolt/Fury and all other passives. Extra points past lv 93 you can put wherever you want. This same build can be used optimally in both PvM and PvP.
  2. Dodge, Avoid, Evade definitely suffer from diminishing returns, but quite frankly there isn’t anything to add to that is as important as 10/10/20 into those skills. Not only is this important in PvP, but in PvM, these skills are what let’s a glass cannon with no BO get away with being a glass cannon with no BO. Evade is the most important for both PvP and PvM. It works vs. both melee and ranged, and it works during your most vulnerable points when you are moving to reposition. When a player chooses to stand still and attack, usually they do this during a wise moment when they know they won’t get hit often or maybe not at all. It’s when you are moving to reposition to find those safe positions, that Evade matters.
  3. Penetrate is definitely not more important than Critical Strike in terms of DPS output if you have a good inventory of +max/ar charms. Ok so, Critical Strike in the end game with a lot of + skills is going to yield between 72% and 74% Critical Rate. A base lv 1 Penetrate in the end game will already offer you between about +90% to +100% attack rating. Once you begin to accumulate even half an inventory full of +max/+ar charms, base lv 1 Penetrate is most certainly all the attack rating bonus you’ll ever actually need. Against general mobs, this will be plenty, and even against act bosses and UBERs it’s plenty. Faith Bows also grant +300% to attack rating AND ignore target defense. So if we are talking bowside here, you certainly would never need more than a base lv 1 Penetrate. The real debate here would be centered around javside attack rating with Jab only because Light Bolt and Light Fury do not require AR to hit. So first of all, how often are we using Jab? Well 90% of the time the Bowazon is moving through mob infested areas and hammering things with bowside which has ridiculously high AR with a Faith Bow. Every once in awhile the Bowa may come across a physical immune and it has to use Light Bolt to deal with it, which doesn’t require AR. Sometimes it may be a physical and light immune, and in that case it has to use Magic Arrow to deal with it, which is hitting with ultra high bowside AR bonus. And then every once in awhile, there may be a reason for the Bowa to swap javside and actually use Jab against normal mobs, champs, uniques, but these never have anywhere near enough defense rating to stop a base lv 1 Jab with base lv 1 Penetrate with even half an inventory of +max/ar charms. You’ll have anywhere between a 6k and a 9k attack rating Jab depending on how good your charms are and if you have AR on your rare ring. And this is just with Eth Up’d Titan’s. If you were to get a hold of a set of Eth Rare Cruel Fool mod javs, it would be adding massive amount of AR beyond that. In this case we’d be looking at more like a 13k to 14k AR Jab even with subpar charms in rings and only base 1 Penetrate. The only time we are really using Jab and would need more than a 9k AR to create a debate output DPS output, would be against act bosses and UBERs. Other monsters don’t have enough defense total to threaten dropping bellow a 85% to 90% hit rate with about 9k AR on Jab and of course you’re just using Faith Bow 90% of the time to mow down mobs anyway.
  4. “Continuation of 3” Let me example how attack rating has this weird diminishing return so we can be on the same page before I explain this next part. So I went into a game to give you some exact numbers here. It is a hell diff game and I am in Act V. I go down into the Worldstone and target some Demon Imps. When I am on bowside with my Faith, I have 13999 attack rating and it says I have 94% chance to hit the Demon Imps. When I swap to javside and look at Jab, I have a 6678 attack rating, but still an 86% chance to hit the Demon Imps. So all of that bonus to AR on the bowside, which is double that of Jab, is only actually granting +8% chance to hit the Demon Imps. When I go to Baal with those same AR values, the Multishot 13999 AR has an 82% chance to hit Baal, whereas the 6678 AR Jab has a 70% chance to hit Baal. so there is a 12% chance difference, which is larger of a margin of difference than the Demon Imps. The higher the chance to hit a target gets up past 90%, the diminishing returns really start to kick in. What this really means is that you want to aim at having enough AR for act bosses and UBERs between about 85% and 90% to hit. If you try to pump AR past that, it begins to require an inordinate amount of AR to even get slight increases. ← These are hard diminishing returns. So what I"ll do is I’ll test Demon Limb Enchant buff on Multi & Jab to further demonstrate what I mean vs Baal. Enchant puts Multi to 19044 which is an 85% chance to hit Baal. Then the Jab with Enchant goes to 11934 which is an 80% chance to hit Baal. See the Jab gained a 10% increase but the Multi only received a 5% increase. Again, we want to aim at around 85% to 90% to hit act bosses and UBERs because that is realistic without requiring inordinate amounts of AR to achieve beyond 90% which at that point your dipping too far into your stat/skill/resources to achieve when there are better ways to spend those resources. So it’s looking like if we really wanted to optimize for Jab vs. act boss & UBERs we’d probably want to be in the vicinity of dipping enough to get Jab to have around 20000 AR for a solid integer between 85% and 90% to hit act bosses & UBERs. Keep in mind that Hell Baal has only 2947 defense. Even UBER Baal only increases his defense to 3150, barely an increase at all. So whether it’s from obtaining really high AR charms & Rare Rings or Eth Cruel Fool Javs or simply by adding Penetrate, just remember that if you are tipping over 20000 AR with Jab, you’re going too far and there are better ways to spend your resources, such as simply adding to Critical Strike, for a much higher chance to deal double damage with that 80% chance to hit that you already had. In PvP, don’t worry about that AR. The only targets that actually have high defense are the targets you won’t be needing AR against anyway, because you’ll just need to be hitting them with GA, Bolt, Fury, which don’t require AR.
  5. Now you need to be aware of what you’re sacrificing by wanting to dip so far into AR and Crushing Blow and Deadly Strike like that. Alright so by utilizing your skill points into Critical Strike you are essentially getting a free “3 out of 4 hits crit”. Then you can wear War Traveler for 15-25 flat integer damage, which when effected by all the enhanced damage mods on your character including auras, turns out to be A LOT of damage. Using my character to example this, that 15-25 is actually adding +287min and 478max to Guided Arrow, and +239min and 402max to Jab. That is A LOT of hard damage. The thing is that that damage is working with the 3 out of 4 hits will crit. If you choose Gore Rider and Highlord’s to aim at stacking DS, you miss out on the hard damage, and believe it or not, the sligh increase in chance to save double damage is very small by adding DS into the Bowazon build and it will yield less DPS than just wearing War Traveler. With a max Critical Strike you are essentially getting 7 crits out of 10 chances. By adding Gore & Highlord, let’s say you are very high level and that is adding 50% DS into your build. That 50% DS will only have a hance to work on the 3 misses from Critical. The DS will land one save and add one more crit, and then it will miss one, and then have a 50% chance to save a 2nd crit. This is the difference between 7/10 crits landing and then 8/10 crits landing maybe sometimes land 9/10 crits. If you add all of this up, the solid flat damage from the War Travs on those guaranteed 7/10 hits, which even works ON NO CRITS, is actually adding a lot more damage over time than trying to implement Deadly Strike. And remember, there really just isn’t a reason to not add to Critical Strike. ← Another reason for this is because you want to use Cat’s Eye over Highlord’s for the fast run. Having fast run to get around in Chaos & Cows and what not, is a large part of your clear speed actually, just as large of a part of clear speed as a caster having max cast rate so it can teleport fast to different places. But again, this is considering that you are using your Zon primarily for XPing & MFing common places in the game, such as Chaos, Cows, Trav, ect ect. If your goal is to primarily just run UBERs all of the time, that’s a different story that we’ll get into in a moment.
  6. Crushing Blow on your Zon is doing so so little when you are using bowside against general mobs. Trust me on this, the War Trav damage and enhanced speed from a 45/120 tiara is just worth so much more in kill speed. Crushing Blow on ranged attacks is greatly nerfed. Crushing Blow in general is also virtually useless in PvP. Crushing Blow on melee attacks is great vs act bosses and UBERs. But again, my point is, how often are you fighting act bosses and UBERs with your Zon? The point of my guide here, is to provide a general standard Bowazon build that is optimized for fast high density mob kills, that can be easily converted into a single target striker that is able to complete UBERs, and that can also be very easily converted into a meta PvP Bowazon simply by restating the DEX into VITA. This guide here is not a guide to optimize performance in UBERs. If I were to design an UBER Zon it would look quite a bit different, and I think the build you are trying to use is more aimed along these lines. Let’s take a look at this:

If I were to create an UBER Zon, I would do this:

  • Enough STR/DEX to wear gear and have max block, rest into VITA, maaaaybe add some extra STR/DEX for enhanced Jab damage.
  • 20 Crit - 10 Penetrate - 10 Dodge 10 Avoid 5 Evade - Base 1 other passives - 1 Jab - 20 Fend - 1 Bolt 1 Fury “So you still ranged when needed and a way to deal with physical immunes that is not Decrep or Amp” - No bow skills - Add extra points at high levels to Penetrate. This would be a physical based Javazon or Spearzon, with the purpose of farming UBERs and it will be damn near as good at it as a Smiter, still be able to deal with mobs with Fend, and be relatively cheap to make even on a ladder reset. Of course you could upgrade this theoretical setup for a more elite version, but what I am listing here is just something realistic to aim at for giving a Javazon based around CB a good purpose.
  • Eth Up’d Titan’s & Stormshield to start. Socket Stormshield with 15%ias
  • Some cheapo CTA setup on swap so you can have BO
  • Guillame’s socketed with 15%ias, for 35% CB
  • Fortitude
  • T-God’s
  • Drac’s for the Tap & life leech
  • Gore Rider for 15% CB, and yes the DS as well as OW will help enhance the DPS
  • Highlord’s not even for the DS but because it has 20%ias and 35% light res stack
  • Raven Frost
  • Dwarf Staf
  • Get a hold of a cheapo Anni/Torch, some cheapo +all res Grand Charms until you can max out your res factors, and then load the rest of the inventory with cheap +max/ar charms.
  • Of course get your a2 merc the usual good stuff to bolster him for general mob killing while XPing and boosting your phsyical damage, like wearing Reaper or Pride, but don’t worry about relying on him in UBERs. Zons can’t teleport so they can’t reposition the merc well and he always ends up dying. Just expect to solo UBERs without a merc.
  • I’m not gonna lie, the loss in IAS and ED% from not wearing the 45/120 will effect flat integer DPS in a significant way, but over all this setup would crunch UBERs with a 50% CB on Jab and an upgrade to attack rating from adding more to Penetrate. It would also be far cheaper to build than a Standard Cow Killer Bowazon. But this UBER Zon here would be god awful terrible slow at mob killing ^^

Remember I am not saying you are wrong. I just wanted to point out some things you should consider for the sake of discussion. The Bowazon build I have presented in this guide will certainly be a stronger high density mob killer than the build you had detailed that you are using. Your build on the other hand is more like a Javazon designed to specifically deal with UBERs, sort of like the build that I theory-crafted up there.

Again, this guide was not designed around optimizing for CB% and UBERs. It was designed for optimizing a standard meta Bowazon for high density mob killing, that is also essentially the same meta Bowa used in pvp, that CAN run UBERs with a few simple gear swaps without needing to token restat at all, as a bonus convenience to to running a character that isn’t actually designed for UBERs.

I hope that helped with a bit of insight into the math there.
You wrote a lot for me to respond to lol.

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On top of everything TSBoyer said:
Maxed CS allows you also to use equipment directly increasing your damage - and this damage will additionally benefit from CS. If you don’t max CS - you either loosing bonus damage from Helm/Boots (because you using Guiliame/Gore), or loosing bonus damage from CS.

Also:

This is correct, however for melee only, due to CB mechanics with ranged attacks. This guide is for Bowa with Jav side as support. With assumption that (PvM wise) you will spend 90+% off the time on the bow side. Your gear choices are more suited to spearzon with bow side as support.

@TSBoyer Somewhat off topic and out of curiosity: do you have maybe any data on new Fend frames? I am just wondering if Titans/SS with Kelpie on swap, wouldn’t be optimal setup for Java/spear hybrid.

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@TSBoyer
Many many thanks for the detailed and perfectly understandable answer!
I can follow up on all of your points perfectly and must admit, that either of your builds - the bowa and the theorycrafted fendzon both would outdps my somehow neither-nor hybrid build in either mfing or ubers.

My original goal was a 100% content clearing PVM bowa, who is also quite good at bosses and Ubers. Sacrificing a bit of kill speed in mfrunning was included in my thoughts.
But overall it just makes more sense to have either your proposed bowa or the fendzon to have completive speeds at either category.

I guess I’ll run two amas once 2.4 goes live :smiley:
Once again many thanks for the explanations and your input.

@malpka
Also many thanks to you for the further explanations on CB.

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For a players 8 solo pure bowazon.

You can always carry gface (15max/15ias) and gores in your cube, then switch it over just before starting a Diablo or Baal fight.

To that, faith matriarchal bow is the bow of choice with a 75max/15ias circlet (or a 15ias/36-51 damage circlet, but GL getting that one), you just need another 30ias from the rest of gear to hit the 7fpa attack speed. Atma’s ammy used in both setups.

Ubers will require a different kit out and a respec, but consists of 75% CB, OW and slow.

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I actually play tested a spearzon for a good half a day in the PTR. I didn’t exactly have the tools to be able to measure exactly how the new Fend frames are working, but I can say that it is a lot faster than it was before. Even with mediocre PTR available gear, I found Fend to be quite viable in Hell diff as a mob clear. It’s definitely no clear speed like a high powered Multishot, but it’s viable.

As far as Kelpie is concerned, it would probably be useful early game when some things are actually still dangerous, but as you progress and get good gear and even act boss damage is no longer dangerous to you while standing and tanking on a jav/shield zon, I believe the Kelpie slow% will be a waste of a weapon swap.

I mean honestly, why even worry about the slow% if you can stand in 8player Diablo’s face and tank so hard that he never drops you bellow 95% health, as example? At that point, swapping to Kelpie for the slow proc would be a DPS loss each and every time you did it.

Now for UBERs, I don’t know. Maybe Kelpie would be useful but even early into release when I made the video demonstrating the Bowa UBER kills, I don’t think Kelpie necessarily would be important for anything other than slowing down the bosses DPS, and using Kelpie would slow down my DPS, which can be a bad thing with the life regeneration factor that UBERs have. Kelpie swap also would remove your shield which is a huge thing in UBERs and could allow the UBERs and the minions to land hits on you that they normally wouldn’t be landing.

All in all I can say Kelpie slow% is really just for safety if you are concerned about not being able to adequately tank vs. something. Otherwise, Kelpie is in every way a loss in DPS and time spent not being behind your shield.

You know what? I just might have to run an UBER zon early season for the sake of farming torches and doing something different with these new patch changes. I’ll bet you an UBER zon like that would be easier to put together than even a budget Smiter. You’d need two characters though. You’d want a Sorc to start as well, just to farm the keys and give them to the UBER Zon.

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Oh yeah. Idea was to use Kelpie till you get geared properly. I think fastest way to progress for Zon (assuming respecs, or planning actual hybrid) would be LF and 1-20 Fend. Thats where Kelpie comes in. You clean everything usually with LF and for LI: swap, Fend, swap, jab. In theory it should save you ton of time on running - you dont have to chase annoying mobs, while dangerous one can be taken pretty much head on with 75% slow. Basically only time wasters would be LI ranged.
From what I checked, range of Fend with Lycander (one supplied on PTR if I am not mistaken) is quite impressive and Kelpie if I recall correctly has the same range

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I am back with some very simplified math…
Surprise, surprise - you were right all along :smiley:

Blockquote
I am not telling you that you are wrong.

But I was, thanks for being nice, understanding and respectful anyways.
But facts are as you said: WTs are better than Gores on your build, CS is important to max on your build and is a heavy driver of dps and the 120/45 Tiara is >>> Guillaume - nothing to add.

Lets get to the point.
I divided the calculations in some major blocks:

  • 1 Weapon and pre-calculation dmg

  • 2 Chance to Hit: idealized as 0.95 for WF, 1 for Faith becasue of itd

  • 3 Damage Multipliers: 4 for 400 dex, 3 for 300%ed Fortitude, 1.2 for 120/45 Tiara, 2.54 for lvl 13 faith aura

  • 4 CS/DS calculation

  • 5 extra damage added after multiplication (CB, elemental dmg)

For CB calculations I simplified it as added flat dmg after multiplication, based on 12000 health point enemies (Chaos Sanctuary Venom Lords, Hell Cows are in that range). For further simplification of the diminishing returns of CB as the max health is lowered, I just used half of the max hp as a baseline since the relation is linear. Therefore 50% CB on a 12000 max health enemy would be: 0.5*(6000*0.125)=375

Lets get to the point:
TSBoyer Amazon Build DMG RokoIvan calculation:
(((184.5 (avg dmg Faith GMB) + 20 (avg dmgWTs))x(1.2 (120% Tiara ed)+3 (300% Forti ed)+4 (400 dex)+2.54 (lvl 13 Faith))x(0.75 Multishot multiplier))x((0.72 (Critical hit chance)+(1-0.72 (chance not to crit)x0.31 (chance for DS from Highlord))x2)x1 (Chance to hit))+120 (Flat Faith fire dmg)=
2778 dmg per hit

3.57 (attacks per second)x 2778 dmg= 9917 dps
Just for the sake of completeness, your build with gores instead of WTs: 9807 dps
WTs are better

My build:
((281.5 (avg dmg WF))x(3 (300% Forti ed)+4 (400 dex))x(0.75 Multishot multiplier))x((0.5 (Critical hit chance)+(1-0.5 (chance not to crit)x0.61 (chance for DS from Highlord and Guillaume))x2)x0.95 (Chance to hit)+(0.5 (50% Chance for CB)x(6000(half enemy max hp)x0.125(12.5% CB damage)))=
2676 dmg per hit

2.77 (attacks per second)x 2676 dmg= 7412 dps

You build deals astonishing 2600 dps more! If you use many +max dmg charms and guided arrow here and then, the difference in favor of you build would rise even higher due to the large multipliers.

I tried it out with your build and no ed on the helmet, only 45 ias tiara:
8857 dps

Still over 1400 dps more than mine.

Your build with WF instead of Faith:
7873 dps

Well, still more than 450 dps more…

All I can say is, your build seems to be the best in crowd melting and farming all around, can’t so anything about it :smiley:

I played around with my spreadsheed and tried some other builds with mist and botd - your build is just leading far ahead.
BotD is somewhere at 5700 dps with your loadout and at 5000 with mine.
Mist in a Matriarchal Bow is at 5000 dps.

Thanks again for your input and the explanations, feel free to comment/correct my calculations. I dont guarantee for correctness but I guess one could use those numbers as a rough estimation.

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I was going to reply about the damage calculations earlier, but saw that you were a hybrid and did not know which way you leaned towards more, but yes:

  • Crushing blow is really only useful vs Diablo and Baal/Ubers. Keep in mind as well that multishot only procs CB with the middle 2 arrows, making CB pretty much useless for multishot
  • Faith based builds with an act 2 mercenary will have superior DPS when compared to other bowazon based builds. The choice in faith base you use however depends on how you want to play your bowazon, example cited in my earlier post. WF + Pride comes a close 2nd in DPS, and other bows are further behind from there.

A couple of further notes:

  • ITD doesn’t bring your chance to hit to 100%, it just removes the defense part of the equation when calculating chance to hit. The max chance to hit is still 95% unless your attacks have a specific “always hits” modifier (such as guided arrow)
  • Highlord’s vs Cat’s eye - yes, Highlord’s will have a higher DPS than Cat’s eye, but Cat’s eye will likely have a faster clear speed anyway due to the FRW, depending on if you’re playing on players 1 or 8. I’ve play tested this in players 1 and Cat’s eye is faster (for me)
  • For faith based builds, 15max/15ias jewels in your circlet will likely give you more damage than 40ed/15ias jewels
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Just want to point out that we elaborately tested this in this thread and strangely enough, the +15max never seems to yield greater DPS than +40%ed, which I was surprised really. Keep in mind I am talking about average damage output here, not just looking at the +max side.

Start reading about here → Bowazon PvM & PvP Guide - Talking About New Patch - Amazon - Diablo 2 Resurrected Forums (blizzard.com)

1 Like
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Of course we are assuming average damages.

We’re assuming a pure bowazon with Faith + Pride (not only is this the highest DPS build overall, Pride been cited as one of the act 2 weapons of choice in this thread) as well as a glass cannon build (say 500 dex) using a 15% GMB base with max damage charms (say 90). And lastly as pointed out, there’s a bug mixing sets of jewels with both mods so it’s really either 120/45 or 45/45 circlets to choose from.

120/45 damage calculation
(383 + 40 + 90)/2 * (1 + (500 + 300 + 120 + 288 + 345 + 230)/100) =
256.5 * 18.83 =
4,829.895 average base damage

45/45 damage calculation
(383 + 40 + 90 + 45)/2 * (1 + (500 + 300 + 288 + 345 + 230)/100) =
279 * 17.63 =
4,918.77 average base damage

Also, a 45/45 circlet benefits more from guided arrow/strafe’s enhanced damage as well as any damage from demons mods such as LoH.

A side benefit for 15/15 jewels is they’re easier to roll (1 in ~16,000 vs 1 in ~34,000) and are in less demand, so should be cheaper.

EDIT: That specific post that you’re linking to (97 to 100) is using calculations based on a PvP bowazon without a merc. Yes, if not using a merc, then 40/15’s will be better.

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Actually it seems that contrary to what I believed for last x years, after including might + pride 45/45 is… better.
If I didnt make some mistake (fully possible as I am half asleep now) it seems that for 45/44 (couldnt be bothered with .5 damage) vs 45/120 following applies:
If average damage/18.3333 < ed/100 (because of percent) then 45/44 is better.

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Yeah, I’m actually running a bunch of calculations right now on a handful of things because what he brought up is definitely going to provide some alternative options for pvm.

45/120 is definitely better for pvp when you can’t rely on the merc aura and need to stat for vita. But in pvm with those auras, it’s looking like you can pull off significantly higher damage not only by wearing a 45/45, but also right now I am calculating removing Fortitude and replacing it with a Jeweler’s that has 4x 40%ed/15max, which would be a 160%ed/60max armor.

I’ll post some actual math here in a moment. So far what I’m seeing though, is that replacing 40%ed/15%ias with 15max/15ias is never good for Javside, neither in pvp or in pvm with merc & DEX stats. But surprisingly, with the merc, if a person wanted to dip out a bit of Javside single target killer damage and go for more mob killing power with bowside, 45/45 and even replacing Fortitude with 160%ed/60max Jeweler’s is a significant bolstering past what has been widely considered pvm meta for almost two decades now.

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Wouldn’t the 160/60max armour bug out also due to the ed/min/max bug?

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45/120 is definitely better for pvp when you won’t be having reliable access to the merc’s auras. 45/120 is also looking to be better for Javside damage in all situations, both pvp and pvm, and regardles of if you have merc auras on or not.

However, what you pointed out there, is most certainly elevating pvm bowside damage past what I thought was possible. Looking back, I guess I never did these calculations for anything outside of pvp builds. Thanks for pointing this out btw.

I went a little further, and looked into not only replacing 45/120 with 45/45 which is about a 3% increase in damage over using 45/120, but also replacing Fortitude with a Jeweler’s 160%ed/60max, considering you had the merc auras. Ultimately, wearing both the 45/45 and the 160ed/60max would yield about a 6% damage increase over using 45/120 and Fortitude. And that’s not even considering the fact of how you pointed out that the more +max also benefits more from skill ed% like from GA or Strafe. Also, the damage you are losing on Javside is insignificant in pvm with auras, compared to what you gain on the bow. It’s only like a 1% loss on Javside in pvm with auras. The loss is much more significant in pvp however. The only question here is “Quite exactly how does the jewel bug work? Is that armor even viable to build due to the jewel bug?”

I know that in the past I have found that the jewel bug can be sort of worked around in certain ways, not always but sometimes. For example, If you try to put 40%ed/15max directly into a weapon that already has ed% OR +max, the jewel will bug and only one of the mods on the jewel will become active and actually work. Under what circumstances does it allow ed% to work or the +max to work? Not too sure about that. I also know that if you put a 40%ed/15max into let’s say a 4os armor that does not have any ed% or +max on it, both of the mods on the jewel will work. However, I am unsure that if we put a 2nd 40%ed/15max into a Jeweler’s armor, if it will bug or not bug. I remember reading a thread about this a very long time ago on d2jsp where some guy already had gone far out of his way to test various scenarios with the jewel bug during socketing and posted all of these rules he had discovered, to essentially understand how it works. I remember he was claiming that natural ed% or +max mods on an item were different than mods added by jewels, in terms of how they triggered the bug. He had also claimed things like if you put in ed/max and then ed/min and then ed/max and then ed/min again, it would avoid the bug somehow. I have no idea how to dig that thread up but I’ll try. I don’t want to quote anything here yet as true because I don’t want to be wrong on it. But yeah, I’ll have to dig in and see if I can find that thread or one like it, and then run a few tests myself with cheap jewels.

He’s definitely right about bowside damage in pvm with auras.
Not only is it more with just a 45/45 over 45/120, but replacing a Fort with 160ed/60max would also be a significant upgrade in DPS output. Now we just need to figure out if you can actually make a 160%ed/60max without it bugging.

While using my previous stats for an equation in that link up there, and without going TOO FAR into showing all the numbers so it isn’t a text wall “check the math for yourselves if you don’t believe it” here is what I was seeing in a nutshell:

  • 45/120 use with merc auras and pvm DEX build: 4442 average standard attack
  • swap 45/45 over 45/120 still merc auras & DEX: 4,559 average standard attack
  • keep 45/45 on swap in 160ed/60max Jeweler over Fort: 4708 average standard attack
  • 45/120 with 160ed/60max Jeweler merc & DEX: only 4650 average standard attack

And that’s just with a Diamond Faith on standard attacks ^
With the PTR changes to Strafe, the new full standard attack + ed% off Strafe is going to be enormous DPS output. We’d be looking at around lv 30 Strafe with +150%ed. With just the Diamond we’d be looking at Strafing at 4940 average damage, which is going be 9980 crits 3/4ths of the time. Replacing the Diamond with a GMB for pvm will look like 5095 average Strafe, with crits at 10190. ← That’s insane clear speed, probably equal to a Hammerdin at that point when that’s ratting off of Strafe. And this is only calculations using the 45/45. That damage would be even higher if the Jeweler’s 160%ed/60max worked, or some other version of that armor where we could wiggle in jewels for similar damage without triggering the bug.

There is no doubt that the 45/45 is better than 45/120 in pvm with the merc auras & DEX stating. It will lower Javside damage a very slight bit but for most pvmers this would be entirely worth it. Even going as far as stating to 160%ed/60max Jeweler’s over Fort would also be worth it if you were bold enough to go a bit more glass cannon than normal, but we need to figure out if that can even be done without the jewels bugging.

Boys, the more interesting thing that this made me begin to think about, was the possible use of a JMOD in pvp that utilizes 40%ed/15max for Javside over Stormshield. If it were possible without it bugging, we could make a shield that blocked as well as Stormshield, that granted the additional kind of DPS output as a Phoenix Shield.

If this could be done, there are ways to upgrade Bowazon pvp meta, especially due to how things are changing in D2r. The Bowazon is proving to be needing some alterations for it to run smoothly in pvp at this point. It might also be possible with a JMOD like that + a good set of Eth Rare Cruel Fool Self-Rep Javs, to ditch the bow entirely and just build a Phalanx Zon that can use CTA on the swap. You’d seriously be dealing so much damage with a setup like that, you’d hit a Paladin twice with Lightning Fury and if they both crit, he’d die. Only things that could really engage you and have a chance of dealing with that kind of bully DPS, would be Barbs with enormous life value, Bone Armor, and EShield. Even most characters that had 75% block would still get popped and die from 2 direct hits after you threw about 6-8 Light Furys. Even the Light Bolt damage that went under block % would be really jacked up and high.

At any rate, I’ve got to test this now and figure out how the jewel bug works in detail. If anyone wants to help, much obliged.

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Some preliminary findings:

Stormshield

  • socketed with 40/15max + sabre + 156 str = 9-65 damage
  • socketed with 15max/-15req + sabre + 156 str = 8-65 damage

So it looks like the bug exists, even if the socketed item didn’t have any ed or max damage prior to it.

Jeweller’s Archon Plate of the Whale

  • empty + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 48-246

  • socketed with 15max/15ias + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 48-291

  • socketed with 40ed/15max + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 54-291

  • socketed with 15max/15ias x2 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 48-336

  • socketed with 40ed/15max x2 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 60-336

  • socketed with 15max/15ias x3 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 48-381

  • socketed with 40ed/15max x3 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 67-381

  • socketed with 15max/15ias x4 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 48-426

  • socketed with 40ed/15max x4 + 15% GMB + 200 dex = 73-426

So it looks like the bug exists for armour, even if the socketed with just 1 40ed/15max jewel.

Side note: Jeweller’s Archon Plate of the Whale looks dope in the character list screen!

15% Grand Matron Bow

  • empty + 200 dex = 48-246

  • socketed with 40ed/15ias + 200 dex = 63-333

  • socketed with 40ed/15max + 200 dex = 63-378

  • socketed with 40ed/15ias x2 + 200 dex = 81-420

  • socketed with 40ed/15max x2 + 200 dex = 81-510

So it looks like the bug doesn’t exist for weapons.

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I can finally post again, some softie reported my posts so my account was on hold.

The bug never existed in weapons. You get the bug when inserted in armor then ed part applies to min dmg only, max dmg part applies in full.

If you’re looking for pure dmg Windforce offers more than enough max dmg by itself. A jewelers armor and helmet of the whale with 45/120 + 60/160 would require 25 more ias to hit 8fpa BP with Windforce. Combine that with Might+Pride and ed you get vs demons from Laying of Hands and you’re going to mow down everything. Faith doesn’t stand a chance in PVM.

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I did the Ubers with my kicksin in PTR 2.4 . Uberbaal seems to be bugged, I hardly hit him with max speed and 16k attack rating. I think he is really hard with a kicksin, easy with a smiter and almost impossible with other chars. I don’t know whether it is a bug. It would be nice if we did Uber runs together for confirmation. If the bug is real, you can’t do ubers with ama. She’ll be stuck at Baal.