The Good, The Bad and The Ugly of 2.4

General Discussion
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This is specifically for melee classes (my favorite).

The bad: Wolf and Bear Druids got deleted from the game with the attack speed shenanigans. They need to either revert or rework the attack speed formula to allow the frames per attack to reach at least 5 or 6 with high end gear, I think they are either stuck on 10 or 11 frames per attack atm on PTR which is a complete joke and irredeemable if the patch goes live in such a state.

Assassin changes in the Martial Arts tree are very nice, but are held back because of 2 reasons:
1-Next hit delay issues on the projectiles from Claws of Thunder and Phoenix strike. Dragon claw and Dragon Talon finishers release the second and/or third charges too quickly, this results in only the first finisher charge hitting the enemies, this activates a 4 frame hit delay, so the second finisher charge that comes out in 3 frames or less will not hit the same enemies.

2-There still aren’t any Claws that deal high amounts of physical damage. This sort of pidgeon holes the Assassin into playing the caster role with traps or being a kicker uber slayer, or a hybrid of the 2. If we got high damage claws we could play a max Dragon Claw, max Claw Mastery build like a Frenzy Barb dual wielding high damage swords or axes, but no such Claws exist that deal damage like the good one hander swords or axes (Grief runeword, etc…)

The good: Spearazon is fixed, it was always close to being viable but had a few problems. It still needs very specific gear, for example very hard to obtain spears such as Breath of the Dying runeword on Ghost Spear or Ethereal Hone of Sundan upgraded to elite, socketed with a Zod rune and either 2x Shael or 2x Jewel with 15IAS and x%ED, and furthermore also needing specific attack speed breakpoints that only look reasonable with an act 1 Merc with Faith bow, but when you obtain all of the pieces you are rewarded.

1-Dodge/Avoid lock: this was suicide against travincals, black souls, etc… dodge lock has been removed from the game, so Amazon’s will no longer get dodge locked ever again. The build was unplayable until this fix because Fend relies on life steal to survive which was impossible while stuck in dodge animations. This also helps tremendously with the next hit always misses issue that often resulted in death. This is a massive buff; The Devs giveth us the Amazon at the same time they taketh away the Animal Druids.

2-Not enough DPS in high player games (player 4 and up). This has been completely fixed. The turbo attack speed of Fend in 2.4 is enough attacks per second to proc
Atma’s Scarab like crazy, this fixes the damage problem completely, because anything with the amp damage curse dies insanely fast.

3-Physical immune: See above, this is partially fixed with the attacks per second increase on Fend making Atma’s Scarab proc extremely frequently, so attacking packs of physical immunes for example Stygian in the throne of destruction is no longer suicide, if anything you might need to chugg a potion waiting for the Amp proc.

TLDR: New and faster Fend combines with Atma’s Scarab to deal insane damage, and the amazon is tanky enough with the new Dodge/Avoid changes to be an effective platform to deliver the dps. Blizzard deleted 1 melee class from the game (wolf/bear druid), did nothing to help 1 melee class (assassin), and they entered a fresh, new melee class into the game (amazon).

Net change = delete your Druid and make an Amazon instead, and trade for Atma’s Scarab, ethereal Hone of Sundan, and 15ias %ED jewels before the price sky rockets on these items because if you love d2 melee classes like me, you are going to want to rock one of these geared out Spearazons at some point because 2 frame melee attacks proccing Amp damage and melting a pack of enemies is just too fun to pass up. Bosses are easy too with the 45% crushing blow on the Hone Sundan Spear + Goreriders, etc… and a 5 frame jab or with a little more attack speed push a 4.66 frame Jab and a Amp damage chance from Atma’s making bosses dissappear.

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Have a spearzon build you can share? I wanted to make a barbarian 2H but seems they are trash from reading. This sounds cool.

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Just gonna say u dont have to socket zod into eth hone sundan, it has repair dura mod already :slight_smile:

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Sure thing! Barbarians thrive with dual wielding, most notably 2x Grief runeword on Phase Blades. The Spearazon build I am giving you is fine for players 1 on the current patch, but you will die in dodge locks and have problems with physical immunes, etc… This build is fully intended for the 2.4 patch that is not yet out, but it is a good idea to start accumulating the gear needed. Once the new patch is out this build will shred.

Mercenary: Act 1 with Faith bow, Treachery armor,
vampire Gaze/Tal Rasha/ Crown of Thieves/ Andariels, etc…

Weapon: 2 choices, both amazing

Ghost spear 6 sockets: Undying runeword, must be Ghost spear because the WSM is 0 instead of the 10 or 20 on other spears. Any WSM higher than zero will make it too difficult to achieve certain attack speed break points.

Unique Hone Sundan, upgrade to elite. If on a budget throw in 3x shael. In order to really make this weapon shine though you need it to be ethereal and throw in a zod rune with 2x shael runes. The final form of this weapon is ethereal, upgraded to elite, zod rune, 2x jewel with 15ias and 40%ED. This is the best spear in the game, the final form and much more powerful than the undying runeword. I just recieved word that you might not need the zod rune? because of the repair mod, not sure how fast it repairs itself so I will cautiously let others take the wheel on that topic, don’t want you to ruin a rare and expensive item.

Weapon switch: You need a call to arms to get the hitpoints needed to tank damage from certain enemies for example the exploding voodoo fetishes in act 3, also use maybe a spirit shield to get more skill points into the battle orders buff for more hit points and duration.

Armor: Fortitude. You can use Enigma if you have it already, but the build really needs fortitude to function properly on players 4 or higher and it is too difficult to reach the good FCR breakpoints for enigma while keeping the lethality of the build in my opinion.

Helmet: Vampire Gaze, socket an Um rune.

Amulet and Rings: Atma’s Scarab and Raven frost are required for the build to function, the second ring could be a nice rare, Bul Kathos, Wisp, or a second Raven frost for more attack rating.

Gloves and belt: You absolutely have to have at least 30% attack speed, which combined with fanatacism aura from the faith merc will give you the breakpoints you need. I don’t care if you use sigon’s gloves and belt, or Lay on Hands with Nosferatu’s Coil, just get the 30% attack speed somehow (actually only 25% is needed). This will cap out your fend attack speeed, and give you a 5 frame jab, if you want the 4.66 frame jab you need to dig for a total of 40% attack speed somehow, change the build as needed to achieve this, but never give up your Atma’s for highlords, the build won’t work without Atma’s

Boots: Goreriders is required, the only boots that make sense for this build.

Charms: you need to cover a deficit of resists using charms, so never make this character until you have accumulated lots of charms with resist all or resist fire/lighting. Also you may need help from other players to rush the Anya quests in Nightmare and Hell just to get your resistances up to a functional level before the build is really playable. At least 1 or 2 attack rating charms are also required especially if you roll low on your Raven Frost.

Net result: Max penetrate, critical strike, fend, and jab, 20 point dump into all 4 of those, don’t worry about diminishing returns or even how much + to skills you have because there is zero value in spending the points elsewhere. Put at least 1 point into dodge, avoid, and evade, then put all left over points evenly into those 3 defensive passives. Assign Fend to right mouse button, hold down right mouse button, everything dies, rinse and repeat, put jab on left mouse click, use jabs on bosses or any big and tough single opponent = enjoy being a god in melee combat.

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If the repair durability is enough, can proly do 3x 15-40 in the Hone and thus be able to use LoH and SoE/Dungo for additional durability and damage