[0.10.4b] Bow Marauder (The Shocker (tm)) [**TO BE UPDATED SOON 1.0.0**]

Just picked up this bow around level 55.



Was a nice improvement over my purely physical 5l that I had.

Loving this build so far, really haven't had any problems and I play safe enough to not have to deal with many close calls other than the poison arrows on merciless act 2 since I only have about 8% chaos resists.

:)

@VenatorPoE: Thanks for that posting.
Realy a very nice and funny build! I love it...:-)

Note: I got interrupted in the middle of writing this to run 3 hours of errands, and I am not really in the mood to go back ensure everything is coherent when it got stitched together...

berkobob:

Yeah, think some aspects of our builds are just going to be a little divergent since you have 2x my health and 1/2 my damage due to different starts :p.

As far as chain goes... Just making sure... are you saying its not working based on visual clues, or are you actually giving it a fair shake and saying its not working based on how fast stuff dies? I just ask because I did have a similar feeling when I first used chain (for about ten minutes) because I couldn't really "see" it chaining most of the time. Then I realized it was simply because when you fire it into a big pack of guys, half the time it is "bouncing" to a guy that is basically touching the guy it initially hit, and the projectile speed of LA is so fast you don't really get a visual on the bounce.

Anyway, I run maps and docks/lunaris temple 3. So far I have only run like 3 or 4 maps because I was trying to get a feel for how rare they are before I used up my reserve. I'll probably start running them more often now since I have stockpiled around 10. All the maps I have done so far have been solo, but its mostly because I really NEED to do a sale or something cause my stash/inventory/20 storage alts are full, so if anything decent drops it creates a mess that I don't want to have to deal with in a team lol. I have joined a couple docks teams before, but it didn't really seem any faster than solo, the difference in my kill speed when I wondered off in a 6 player team vs solo was basically 0 vs trash mobs, and I could tell champs/yellows had more HP, but its not like I had trouble soloing in a 6 player. Currently after auras I have about 5k def and 2.3k HP, aside from 2 DC based deaths, the only time I have tied post Piety has been turning a corner into a pack of extra fast/vulnerability curse mobs in the really dark part of lunaris near the end lol. I do also have to be careful when I cross paths with Krole, as the attack where he slams the ground and sends out that cone of blood can do like 95% of my health lol. Good news is I can kill him in the time it takes him to kill 2 decoy totems, so I just need a pit/ledge and to chain those :p.


Did some testing of some things yesterday. did not directly test FA over LoH because I didn't what to mess with chroming stuff lol.

With my current build:
EH (listed): 4.35k (.3 sec/attack)
LA: 1.29k

Using bloodrage or frenzy to get my 3 frenzy charges
EH (listed): 4.68k (.28 sec/attack)
LA: 1.42k

Interpolating from this, 15% IAS is about +0.13k on LA, so 40% from FA would be about .35k, roughly 24% more DPS, definitely not bad

Overall verdicts:
I do like the easy of using Bloodrage over the constant annoyance of frenzy if I ever decide to use frenzy charges, however, I didn't really notice any increase in kill speed since stuff already dies so fast, and I did occasionally notice the HP drain. Now if it came with a move speed buff....

FA over LoH is a notable increase in DPS, however, as stated above, I am not sure I would really notice the speed increase. I also think the effective life drain from not having LoH would be greater than the life drain from BR, and that was notable at times, so I think (for now at least) I'll stick with LoH for the added safety.

What it does mean though, is that if you sustain either BR or Frenzy, you might start approaching the point where my duelist ending path is a wash with morsdraconis's ranger/shadow ending path.



I guess I can throw in that Assur's build is FAR more geared for HC than default, you can be FAR less tanky than he builds if you are not going HC. His "upgraded" version is a perfectly fine build, it mostly just trades some damage from the templar area and some of the nodes by unwavering for some more health and IG. It can probably come pretty close in damage if you get a virtually perfect thicket bow that has high phys damage and dual elementals to actually take advantage of Iron grip. I do think he could clean up his ending bits that go into ranger area by going into duelist instead as we discussed a few pages back, but its minor change. Basically trades a some elemental damage/resists/life regen/unwavering/berserking for Iron Grip and about 120% more HP. For HC that seems pretty reasonable, but its really hard to justify that much HP for a default league ranged character in my mind, and I like having a little more resist from my passive tree so I am less restricted on my equipment. His build would also need some decent +int gear if he plans to use Wrath/Conductivity to their fullest extent.

Also, I don't really want to get to much into trying to put the numbers in my head down on paper, but unless someone can convince me other wise I really can't see IG being worth it for this build, even with a high phys damage bow. Even if you had a bow with 150% phys damage, and two good elemental mods, if you stack a bunch of damage from your rings/gloves/necklace/quiver, that added damage will be HEAVILY weighted towards elemental the way the mods work, and when I try to run through numbers in my head I get that even a 75% physical damage bonus from IG will be diluted enough by elemental damage, that it wouldn't necessarily outweigh the extra elemental damage (and possibly berserk) that you could pickup instead of IG. Now, I mostly did this in my head while sitting around, so I can definitely see IG coming out ahead under some certain circumstances, but they mostly involve having a bow that would put the price range of this build beyond casual :p

Also, still looking at ideas for a totem should I ever get an extra 4l (either by finishing my gloves or getting my better slotted bow to have good mods. Right now I am looking at either RAT+RoA+WE+FA, RAT+Split+WE+Chain or FA, RAT+EH+LMP+WE (though I dont have an extra EH), overall none of them would really add anything useful, just want something cool to make me non-standard. I figure no one uses RAT, and I already have a bow focus, so why the hell not. Leaning towards the RoA one atm cause the visual is cooler

i dont see how your RaT will stay alive long enuf to fire more than 1 volley?
unless u are the meat shield standing in front of RaT?

Another totem option: spell totem + conversion trap
convert the monsters you're fighting (including rares, but not uniques/boss) to your side

Anyone know if this is gonna be nerfed? I'm under the impression that it's probably the strongest build in the game?

How do you guys keep your INT up to keep leveling up Wrath/etc?

"

ishikabe1 wrote:

How do you guys keep your INT up to keep leveling up Wrath/etc?

int nodes to static blows

Is Grace + IR really worth it?

I cant see any difference in gameplay between 100 and 2,1k Armor at all. The only real danger in A3 Merci (Lvl 61 now) are ele mobs due to my sad res (25-68) and somehow i dont want to waste ~120 health for a effect i cant notice at all.

"

return33 wrote:

Is Grace + IR really worth it?

No. IR isn't worth it at all in general. I honestly have no clue why this build attempts to use eva or ar, when this build is vastly superior while using ES on top of HP.