The Herald of Ash : A Physical Bow Build

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Flouyd wrote:

You should switch Master of Force with Deadly Draw. You get 2% more phys and 21% more attack speed that way.


And do you really need both prolif and inc. aoe? they both do the same don't they?

[edit] and lose 2 10% phys in the shadow tree for Sniper for 28% proj dmg

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Necropasia wrote:

I really love the concept, the math seems sound, all around a fun build concept. I personally, however, would make one huge change to it. I would take the piercing shots notable, and add a pierce support gem into the mix (and/or proj weakness depending on level/qual of pierce. 20/20 gem is 74% chance to pierce if memory serves), completely eliminating the need to rely on infractum. As I see you've allocated point blank, I would take that one step further by using chin sol. Dps would see a quite substantial increase.

I'm very tempted to roll up a new toon around this concept right now, but I'm having too much fun with a Dagger ST crit build running HoA in much the same way that you're doing here.

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elboyo wrote:

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Flouyd wrote:

You should switch Master of Force with Deadly Draw. You get 2% more phys and 21% more attack speed that way.


And do you really need both prolif and inc. aoe? they both do the same don't they?

[edit] and lose 2 10% phys in the shadow tree for Sniper for 28% proj dmg

Attack speed is a mostly useless mod for this build. The unspecified physical damage was taken to support my level 19 Puncture gem. The bow damage nodes do not double-dip with this skill.

I know that Poison Arrow clouds benefit from projectile damage, but I do not think that Puncture bleeding does. If projectile damage also applies to bleed, then there is no question that I would change the points.

Both Proliferation and Increased AoE are essential to link with your Herald of Ash. Increased AoE both improves the range at which the ignite effect can occur at and it expands the proliferation radius. Without these two together, you may be able to kill single packs with one attack, but you are very unlikely to kill multiple packs.


Thanks for the feedback. If anyone has definitive information about the projectile nodes, I would love to see a developer response.

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Daniel_GGG wrote:

Things that will directly affect bleed damage from Puncture (off the top of my head):

• Damage modifiers
• Damage over time modifiers
• Physical damage modifiers
• Projectile damage modifiers (if applied with a projectile)
• Area damage modifiers (if applied with an AoE)
• Totem damage modifiers (if applied with a totem)
• Trap damage modifiers (if applied with a trap)
• Mine damage modifiers (if applied with a mine)

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elboyo wrote:

The problems with the Chin Sol for this build are quite numerous.

1) 5% critical hit chance -> This would lower my crit chance from roughly 40% to roughly 27%
2) Chin Sol's base damage is much lower than Infractem's. (160 vs. 200)
3) This build will not have enough mana to support manual cursing, so you would need a Pierce
gem. This requires giving up one of our damage multiplying gems.
4) This also requires 5 additional skill points to allocate the Piercing nodes.


Eventually this build will use a crafted Harbinger Bow. Ideally it will have >8% crit chance and a per-hit damage of 250 or so.

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Necropasia wrote:

I agree that a crafted harb would likely be ideal. I only mentioned chin sol due to it's interaction with point blank. PB alone: +50%, PB + CS: +200%.

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jdweber1982 wrote:

Up to what level maps have you solod(With mods if you remember)?

How do you feel about this build @ 90? With life/defensive adjustments you mentioned in previous posts do you think this build is viable for a beefy single target boss like Atziri?

Thank you for the excellent guide. I'm currently running an EK shadow and love it but I'm searching around gathering 1.2 build data for potential future builds.