Matriarch Markette - Strafer

[sirpoopsalot]

Matriarch Markette - Strafer

I'll be brief(ish) this time:


Markette - level82
Str: 103
Dex: 370
Vit: 75
Ene: 15

Life: 1181
Mana: 312
Resists: 75f / 28c / 80l / 75p

AR: 14838
Damage: 781 - 3692 (5/3 Strafe, according to the calc)


Skills (with equipment):
23 Strafe
23 Critical Strike
26 Valk
50% for each of Dodge, Avoid, Evade (12/7/12, iirc)
8 Pierce
5+ Penetrate (remaining points will go here)
14 BattleOrders
23 BattleCommand


Equipment:
Faith Crusader Bow
Fortitude Archon Plate
Rare Circlet (+2 skills, 20 dex, 15f/45l/32c/15p resists, +13 max dmg - socketed with Ambergris Jewel of Carnage (30/13)
Atma's Scarab
Razortail
Laying of Hands
Gorerider's
Ravenfrost (20/204)
Rare ring (4 LLeech, 3 MLeech, 26 fireres, 20 lightres, +6 dex)

Switch: beta-CtA + Lidless Wall

6x Sharp GC's (various 2nd mods)
1x Shimmering GC of Life (15/18)
1x Shimmering LC of Vita (7/34)
2x Amber SC (FHR and +Life)
5x Fine SC (various 2nd mods)

Might Merc:
Obedience Thresher
Duress Archon Plate
VampGaze (10 resists jewel)


Notable Finds:
Dol/Hel Hellforge <-- :thumbsdown:
Rockstopper (poor roll)
Meatscraper
VampGaze (poor roll)
Gut Siphon
Skin of the Flayed One
eth Steelclash
Wizardspike
rare Demonhide Sash (24 FHR, 43 life, 8f/12l/29p resists... close to being really good)
2os Smoked Sphere (+3 Blizzard, +3 ShiverArmor, +23 Life, required level = 24)
Lionbranded GC
Ruby GC of Inertia (30/7)


Notes:
1. Yep, she's a pretty generic strafer. She doesn't have quite as much damage as a WF-strafer (she still rolls along just fine though), but the Faith has other benefits like the increased merc and valk attack speeds (and damage), +15 resists, as well as...

2. The 10% Reanimate as Returned was continuously going off (in the SpiderForest in Act3, I counted 8 on screen at one time). Normally, when the Faith bow's on a rogue merc, these 'summons' are completely useless (their AI makes an Act2 merc look like the reincarnation of Einstein). In this case, they were such a consistent presence, and strafe can kill at such long range, that they drew a lot of enemy fire along the way.

3. No deaths, no NDE's, and she was such a fast killer that I only had to give the merc ~5 potions all game too. This is possibly one of the safest builds I've played.

4. Atma's Scarab was reliable enough for physical immunes, but I'm probably going to switch that for a teleporting amulet and put a Reaper's on the merc instead - sometimes it didn't fire up fast enough for my tastes. With my ~150 elemental damage and super-fast attack though, even without Amp I could take things down tolerably fast.

5. My lack of Knockback wasn't an issue. And between my Goreriders and the merc, there was enough Crushing Blow to make boss battles reasonably fast too.

6. She'll likely be switched over to a MF setup and start running Pits. I'm not sure she'll be any faster than my Hammerdin, but she'll probably be safer around the archers.

7. Overall, she's reasonably fun to play. There isn't a lot of challenge, but if you just feel like mowing down some enemies, she's one of the best.


Edit: I meant to, and forgot to, thank the people that helped in my planning:

MrAkon
Neksja
lionheartthebrave
Eric Xanthu

:worship:

 

[Thyiad1]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Wow. Nicely done - and quick too. Wasn't it only the other day you were talking about this?

Shame about the terrible rune drops but hey; you got a Jah!

:thumbup:

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Yeah, it's been a week or so. I should've played hell on /players3 or 5, because she rolled through Hell at a pretty leasurely (sp?) pace in 3 or 4 hours.


Which reminds me... edit of the first post coming...

 

[lionheartthebrave]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Nice strafer, don't you mean 9/3 though?

No complaining about the drops, I got a Gold Blade Barrier, and that was it (and that was from the WSK1 at p8), with the HF drops identical. Also I'm Ohm away from infinity, and in two sets I can't even cube a Gul of it

Seems a lot of life for a strafer, get some +max damage charms and enjoy

The pits wil be fine, I had about half that life and it was safe, may all your drops be gold/green/red

EDIT: thanks for the credit

 

[Neksja]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Wow, nice one :thumbup: Congrats!

As you mentioned, Knockback wasn't an issue, but were there any situations that you would've wanted to have kb? I'm not sure if I could do ranger attacker without any KB, that's why I just had to do some crafting to get gloves for my Thrower.

As you've planned using her in Pits, but how about Chaos Sanctuary? My strafer loves to be there, just because I normally hate the place, but strafer just laughs there and keeps on going Plus, you'll get to whoop Big D's *** in the end of every run :tongue:

also thanks for the credit

 

[Greebo]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Congrats on the Mat!

Two questions:
(1) What do you want to use as her MF gear?
(2) How did you get lvl 23 Battle Command?

--Greebo

EDIT: For (2) I found that, stupid question. Sorry. Beta-CTA is insane.

 

[dryzalizer]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

YAWN. Don't you think it would have been much more interesting without that hax BetaCTA? Then you would have an interesting writeup!

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Nice strafer, don't you mean 9/3 though?

Not according to the weaponspeed calc - that says 5/3 (I'm guessing it's because of the Fanaticism aura on Faith). If it's wrong, you know who to blame .

As you mentioned, Knockback wasn't an issue, but were there any situations that you would've wanted to have kb?

As you've planned using her in Pits, but how about Chaos Sanctuary?

The only real area where I would've wanted knockback would've likely been the physical-immune Frenzytaur's that sometimes spawn in the Cystalline Passage in Act5. In my case, I was lucky to not encounter them, but otherwise my damage was high enough for hit recovery for almost everything, and at a 3-frame strafe, a monster that went into hit recovery was as good as dead.

Yeah, the CS was a breeze too (Lord de Seis didn't even manage to get off a single curse). I thought about running it, but the boss-pack density is low in RoF/CS, and BigD has his drop capped to TC84, so I won't be running there.

What do you want to use as her MF gear?

Well, I'll likely drop the amulet, helm, boots and a few charms... I should be able to keep the killspeed up pretty high with the bow and armour, as well as a few helper pieces.

I haven't worked out all of the kinks, but I'm thinking about trying a partial Tancred's Set (amulet+boots) instead of the usual WarTrav's + something else. A Shako seems natural, as does a Gheed's and a few charms. 250-300 MF should be pretty attainable without a huge sacrifice to damage, and with a small sacrifice to resists.

YAWN. Don't you think it would have been much more interesting without that hax BetaCTA?

Interesting - maybe... safer - no. :tongue:

 

[Eric Xanthu]

Re: Matriarch Markette - Strafer

Nice use of your haxbow. Thanks for the credit, although I'm pretty sure I just told you to give Faith to the merc and use a real bow. :tongue: