FA Amazon, advice and help on endgame please

[Jocular]

After a small hiatus from the game and these forums, I'm back. Currently with a level 45 Blizz sorc, and a level 14 FA Amazon. I had made a FA zon before using Ice and other high end gear, and she was definitely one of my favorite characters ever. However, I know that my items this time will be of lower quality, and I'd like some input on if she's viable in hell at all.

Firstly, Wizendraw, Melody, Or Buriza?

Obviously Wizendraw's -cold% resistance would be really helpful in Hell. However, I do need to be able to deal with CI monsters, right? Does Buriza (or some other relatively easily found/created bow) have the punch to deal with hell monsters using strafe?

Next, I'm right in assuming the best place to mf for cold charms is norm cows, yes? I haven't looked up the ilvls, and mlvls, and yadayadalevels in a while, but I think I remember that Cows drop higher levels of charms, gems, and runes?

Finally, will this character be too frustrating for me to play? Will I become stuck in late NM with maxed out Cold and Freezing Arrow, with the monsters' health ever increasing? This is what I fear. I'd love some help. Thank you.

 

[SunsetVista]

Some thoughts about FA from my Fishyzon (FA + Lightning Fury):

FA is extremely mana intensive. Try to get some mana per kill gear (or Insight merc?) unless your physical damage is enough to leech the mana.

FA is awesome with pierce!

I'm using Lycander's Aim for the +skills, but I used Wizendraw before that I think. It was useful.

You'll have the skill points for a good Strafe as a CI backup, that does sound like a good idea. Harmony is easy to make and can get you pretty far.

Cows is good because there are so many monsters. You don't need mf there since all the charms are always magical anyway so you can focus on kill speed.

You'll probably be able to make it through NM, but you will need a CI solution in Hell.

 

[srrw]

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The Cow Level arealvl is 28/64/81 in N/NM/H. I would personally run LK for charms.

Harmony RW is easily obtainable and has decent damage for strafing when made in an Elite Bow. Other easily found options are Buriza and Witchwild String.

 

[Jocular]

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The Cow Level arealvl is 28/64/81 in N/NM/H. I would personally run LK for charms.

Harmony RW is easily obtainable and has decent damage for strafing when made in an Elite Bow. Other easily found options are Buriza and Witchwild String.

I know the alvl isn't optimal for the charms I'm looking for, but I was hoping for some confirmation on my assumption that cows have an inherently higher drop rate for charms compared to regular monsters.

Thanks for the responses, but I'm hoping for some more in depth information regarding bow choice, and whether a budget SP FA amazon build is possible in hell.

 

[felixbavaria1]

Harmony is a really nice runeword (some may even say OP for the price). It also adds some considerable bonus damage to your freezing arrows (55-160 iirc), and also gives you a bonus to Valk (capped at +3). Suitable bases (any 4os Elite Bow) can drop from Act V NM on.

Buriza is definitely capable of killing Hell monsters, also has bonus cold damage and 100% pierce, which is insane with FA.

Kuko Shakaku works perfectly in Normal and NM on due to its low requirements, + skills and pierce.

Wizendraw is nice for killing Act Bosses and (Super) Uniques with high cold resistances. It's the most reasonable way to kill Hell Duriel with a FA zon.

FA zon is one of the most powerful untwinked builds if you can solve the mana problem. Even with a cracked Short Bow, you will absolutely own anything up until NM Act V where cold immunes start showing up regularly. Make sure to get an Insight merc, a 4os Partizan will do as base. Good mana leech can be hard to find untwinked.

If you don't use Buriza you should put enough points in Pierce and/or equip Razortail.

Edit: I'd also argue for Multishot / GA instead of Strafe if you're on a budget, because it is superior against crowds, works well with base attack speed and single CI targets can be killed by merc / valk.

 

[Jocular]

Thanks felix. I forgot that the +valk on harmony is an oskill, how sad

While harmony is nice, I feel that Buriza's cold damage, pierce, and overall physical damage outweighs harmony's vigor aura, and bonus to valk. However, using the german weapon speed calculator, getting to 9, or even 8 fpa with a matriarchal bow is relatively easy, and for buriza getting to even 12 fpa seems difficult. Which do you think is better? I'm leaning toward Harmony a bit.

Do I really need GA? You said yourself single targets can be killed by merc/valk. Thanks for the affirmation on multi. I've been hemming and hawing over which one to use, or both.

 

[pharphis]

Are you against a hybrid?
I was under the impression that a mediocre lite fury backup was way better than anything else you can do with a bow.
Charged strike works excellently on bosses.

 

[felixbavaria1]

Hmm let's look at my Matriarchs.

My untwinked gunslinger never had any problems in /p3 Hell using a 13 fpa Multishot (Harmony Shadow Bow).

My untwinked poison / FA zon used a CtA GMB at 11 fpa with FA, no problems in /p3 Hell, either.

You can find these chars in the Mat/Pat compilation (Marletta and Silya).

My M'avina set zon has 70% IAS with a GMB (10 fpa), quite OP with FA as far as I remember.

Then again, I'm a slow player so attack speed doesn't matter that much for me. I also think that 4os elite amazon bows are notoriously hard to find.

I think FA / MS is definitely Hell viable untwinked / on a budget but hybrids simply provide more bang for the buck.

Edit: GA is just icing on the cake if you don't feel like idling while your valk and merc poke CI monsters.

 

[SunsetVista]

Hell Cows drop from the Good TC, which includes gems, charms, jewelry, and runes, more often than some other kinds of monsters.

You can read about this on the Wiki here: http://diablo2.diablowiki.net/Item_Generation_Tutorial#Hell_Cow

I suggested Harmony for the added lightning and fire damage rather than the cold+vigor aura. 'Edge' is also a nice budget choice since the ED against demons helps a lot.

 

[Jocular]

Hmm let's look at my Matriarchs.

My untwinked gunslinger never had any problems in /p3 Hell using a 13 fpa Multishot (Harmony Shadow Bow).

My untwinked poison / FA zon used a CtA GMB at 11 fpa with FA, no problems in /p3 Hell, either.

You can find these chars in the Mat/Pat compilation (Marletta and Silya).

My M'avina set zon has 70% IAS with a GMB (10 fpa), quite OP with FA as far as I remember.

Then again, I'm a slow player so attack speed doesn't matter that much for me. I also think that 4os elite amazon bows are notoriously hard to find.

I think FA / MS is definitely Hell viable untwinked / on a budget but hybrids simply provide more bang for the buck.

Edit: GA is just icing on the cake if you don't feel like idling while your valk and merc poke CI monsters.

At your advice, I messed around with the poison javelin damage, and jeez. I think that's my calling right there. I've always loved a good Novamancer, and to combine that with a FA amazon sounds wonderful. From your thread about Marletta, I see you maxed both poison javelin skills. Is that completely necessary? I would like to be able to sink some points into my passive skills as well :/

Are you against a hybrid?
I was under the impression that a mediocre lite fury backup was way better than anything else you can do with a bow.
Charged strike works excellently on bosses.

I've looked at that, but it's really a lot of skills. 99 skills, with only 1 in valk, 4 in pierce, 20 in each cold arrow skill, and 20 in CS and LF. I wouldn't be able to deal with CI's until level 70 at least. Plus I like bowazons more, so I'd rather try to find a bow friendly option. It would obviously need less skills if I had a titans, but I'd rather not assume myself finding one until it's in my hand. On that note though, does it need 20 in each? (LF and CS).

edit: Thanks for the link Sunset, I've been hoping for someone to confirm that for me. And yeah, I think you're right about harmony. Definitely my bow of choice unless I find the runes for ice:crazyeyes:

 

[felixbavaria1]

I see you maxed both poison javelin skills. Is that completely necessary?

Well the damage looks great on paper but if you calculate the dps, it's not that much. Plague Javelin benefits a lot more from +skills than other skills do, with every skill point above 20 providing 10% more dps or so.

Then again, the listed damage is for real, so if you just cast a Plague Javelin and run away, your targets will take 10K+ damage. It's a great fire and forget spell and it just takes patience.

My FA / Poison zon does not have any active passive skills (lol) except decoy. Against CIs, you simply cast decoy to herd the enemies, and then throw a Plague Javelin. Non-CIs can't do anything since they are frozen. IIRC, she never died in Hell.

LF does not need synergies to be effective, in fact, it does not even need to be maxed. It's ridiculously OP. Without Titan's you will find yourself to become Charsi's best customer, though.

I guess you can go 20 FA / CA / LF and aim for 17 Valk after +skills which will give you good damage against all kinds of mobs, and Valk + Merc + decoy should be able to clean up the rest. Would be a cool build to try actually (Fishypassivezon?)

 

[Jocular]

Good to know LF doesn't need synergies to be useful, I haven't played with a Javazon since before 1.10.

And yes! It does sound like a fun build to try. I think I will. I would absolutely love to try the poison style one, but I feel that one would work much better twinked with high end items to boost the javelin skill tree, and allow for more skills to dumped into the passive tree.

Thanks for all the help.

 

[Maltatai]

Viable?
Absolutely.

Too frustrating for you?
Always hard to answer such questions. Personally I just guardianed a frost maiden (a few hours ago actually) which has been one of the most interesting, and demanding, characters I have played.

Guided arrow and cleglaws gloves (usually very easy to obtain) works wonders against the ancients and many other troublesome enemies. I was able to best the ancients with Kuko Shakaku (not upgraded) and a maxed guided arrow without using more than an extra quiver of arrows two mana potions, which I did not even need to drink anyway. Even my stupid town guard survived. So obviously that bow can be useful in hell too.

Nadir is excellent to use when going down stairs in case you encounter a nasty stairtrap. Blind them and escape.

Something to think about apart from what other skills to use is whether to go for a mageazon type or a manaleeching type with good physical damage as well. Both have their drawbacks.

If you decide to go for lightning javelin skills, don't forget that plague javeling may still be worth a point due to the cloud, effectively preventing regeneration for many enemies even with one point.