WindForce socket choice

[Xenthe]

Good Day,

My current strafezon has 20ias (from Highlord) and 20ias (from glove, the one that cast enchant).

Will another SHAEL rune socket inside my WF be any help ?

Thanks.

Xenthe.

PS : if SHAEL is not a good choice, kindly advise what I could use ? (not that rich, no CHAM, BER, OHM etc, best jewel I had is a 3x ED + 3 dex)

[Relativity]

Zod. Hehe j/k.

I think probably shael, but then again I don't know what the breakpoints for WF are (you'll have to look them up and see if an extra 20 ias from shael would help reach a quicker firing rate). However, I can't think what else would be better in a bow than ias if you aren't that rich...

[det]

http://www.diabloii.net/characters/amazon/faq2.shtml#What is IAS?

WF is a [10] speed bow, so you are now firing at 10 fps and have actually 60 IAS (20 is on WF, 20 on Highlords, 20 on gloves.) Shael will get you to 80, but you need 89 to reach the next BP, so slap on that Goldwrap or a IAS jewel into helm or armour

[Xenthe]

Thanks for the info.

Season Greetings.

[Xenthe]

http://www.diabloii.net/characters/amazon/faq2.shtml#What is IAS?

WF is a [10] speed bow, so you are now firing at 10 fps and have actually 60 IAS (20 is on WF, 20 on Highlords, 20 on gloves.) Shael will get you to 80, but you need 89 to reach the next BP, so slap on that Goldwrap or a IAS jewel into helm or armour
http://diablo2.ingame.de/tips/calcs/weaponspeed.php?lang=english

I had visited the above website and seems that the info is slightly different from yours.

Based on the website, the next BP is 120 IAS, there was nothing mentioned about the 80 IAS.

Care to clarify ?

Thanks.

[The_Worst]

That 120% ias is for 9/2 strafe. 89% is for other bow attacks to get 9 fps. 149% ias is for 8 fpa. Can't go faster with windforce.

[5Ws]

for wf, 89 is the ideal, 120 is kinda crazy since you have to constantly account for ias while switching equipments, 89 ive found is perfect, at least for me.

[XZON]

Actually 120 ias for straffer is ideal as it gets you to 9/2 breakpoint. (9 frame regular attack 2 frame each additional arrow). 89% is 9 frame regular attack, 3 frame each additional arrow. Really, what is the difference between 10/3 and 9/3 on a 10 arrow volley? 1 frame (wow). Now what is the difference between 9/3 and 9/2 on a 10 arrow volley? 9 frames (now that's something). Makes more sense to me that 9/2 is way more important to hit than 9/3 for a straffer.

Now, you can get some ias from armor. laying of hands is pretty much standard gear (20% ias). Cats eye or highlords also standard with 20% ias (some like atmas but not necessary with wf and a merc with reapers toll).
20% from wind force & 20% from shael. Now you are at 80%. Now you need 40% more.

options:

1. nos coil or upped goldwrap (10%) + 15% ias jewel in helm (tals mask is sweet) & 15% jewel in armor = 40%

2. stealskull with 15% ias jewel (25%) + armor with 15% ias jewel (allows tgods vigor or razortail) life leech a little low here.

3. Andarials vissage with 15% ias jewel (35%) + upped goldwrap or nos coil (10%) - now you could socket the wind force with 15% ias / ed% jewel.
With this set up no ias needed from armor allows COH or Fortitude.

4. Mavinas Helm with 15% ias jewel (45% ias) - now again you can socket the wind force with the ias/ed% jewel. IAS not needed from belt or armor with this set up (no life leech though)

#3 happens to be my personal favorite with COH.

As you can see, there are enough options to make 120% viable. Do it. You will never want to go back.

[5Ws]

right, and when you wanna go a little pit running, which i believe most strafers do from time to time, that 40% is pretty hard to come by.

[XZON]

right, and when you wanna go a little pit running, which i believe most strafers do from time to time, that 40% is pretty hard to come by.

I pit run all the time on ladder in games up to 8 people, solo. I never die and have around 200% MF. COH 30%, Gold wrap 30%, war travs 47%. Gheeds & 7% mfsc's. In single player games or 1 to 2 people, I do ridiculously fast runs. Pits are not about having high MF. They are about volume. Best way to do a lot of runs, is to do them fast. Best way to get more items is to do them in multi player games. I could go 9/3 and load up on MF but to run the pits in single player games??? Makes little sense to me.

P.S. I used to run the pits with an upped buriza multizon with 350% but I could not do them in games with a lot of people. I find much more usefull stuff with my 9/2 straffer including high runes. (Vex, Ohm, 2 x Mal)

There is no way in hell you can safely do pit runs in 8 player ladder games (solo) with 9/3 windforce. You just can't knock 'em back or kill them fast enough.

[XZON]

5ws...I hope you don't think I am being overly confrontational. It's just that "ideally" you would want the fastest killing possible. I do realize that not everyone has access to the perfect gear & may have to make sacrifices to hit 120% ias. I have a ton of charachters and gear so I knew exactly what I wanted to do when I started this straffer. I really can not beleive how fast she kills now. I thought I had powerfull amazons in the past but this build is absolutely a joke. I used to think the pits were dangerous and would occasionally die down there. I don't think either I or my merc have died in 1,000 runs and none of them were in private games.

[chipmc]

Personally, I use Shaeled WF, LoH, Mav helm with 15% ias jewel, and Cats Eye. I'm hitting 9/2 and its easy to get at least 200% mf with the rest of the gear. Which seems to be the sweet spot with the Pits, and pretty much any other mf area. I take care of my life leech with a Carrion Wind.

[Shandrakor Deathstalker]

I bought a WF yesterday...but it was already Ohmed. Xzon, is there any way I can hit that swanky 9/2 breakpoint with an Ohm in my WF, or am I going to have to Hel it and stick in a Shael?

Right now my zon's using Fortitude, but I'd be willing to mod that if I can hit the 9/2 breakpoint.

I guess the big question is wether it's more valuable to hit higher breakpoints or do more damage per hit. I'm envisioning this gal to run the pits while others baal.

OT: I was planning on getting her a Might merc. However, I now see that a Faith rogue could make for a very swanky merc. Which should I go with? A Faith would allow me to use Fortitude, right? And how much MF should I pack on this gal?

[XZON]

I bought a WF yesterday...but it was already Ohmed. Xzon, is there any way I can hit that swanky 9/2 breakpoint with an Ohm in my WF, or am I going to have to Hel it and stick in a Shael?

Right now my zon's using Fortitude, but I'd be willing to mod that if I can hit the 9/2 breakpoint.

I guess the big question is wether it's more valuable to hit higher breakpoints or do more damage per hit. I'm envisioning this gal to run the pits while others baal.

OT: I was planning on getting her a Might merc. However, I now see that a Faith rogue could make for a very swanky merc. Which should I go with? A Faith would allow me to use Fortitude, right? And how much MF should I pack on this gal?

you can hit it but not easy. mavinas helm 15% ias jewel=45%, cats eye/highlords = 20%, nos coil/goldwrap=10%, ik gloves & boots = 25% (total 100% + 20% WF =120%)

sig's boots gloves also give 30% but i would not recommend.

ik boots & gloves really are not that bad but giving up 350% ed to demons & 15-25 base damage while running pits is a bad idea.

lets look at the ohm first 50% base damage of a bow with a base of 10-68. thats 5-34 more damage before external modifiers (dex, ed from fortitude) = 19 1/2 average base damage. war travlers add 20 average base damage before modifiers so i would get rid of the ohm before i would trade off the war travlers (which is the only way to hit 120% ias while wearing fortitude). Based on this it makes more sense to hell the wf & socket with a decent 15% ias - 25 to 30 ED% jewel. Not ridiculously expensive (I paid ist for 15-30) and makes up for 60% of the ed% you lost from ohm. Now you can hit the 120% ias breakpoint with war travlers and laying of hands & you become a major fast killing machine in the pits. Does seem kind of a waste though to waste the ohm though. Mathematically speaking though, pits have a lot of larger packs and the extra speed from 9/2 will make up for the loss in damage.
(total you are losing about 54 points average damage per strafe arrow is you change to the jewel I mentioned. Not really much at all.

I also run the pits while others baal and as long as you don't get too crazy, you will not even get hit. I use coh instread of fortitude as I always like the resists and skills but your damage will be much higher than mine anyway. More I think about it, go for the speed. Your damage is ridiculous enough.

Now a faith merc. bunch of random thoughts......now you will have no problem hitting breakpoints. Now you can keep the ohm. damage should be about the same as might merc. Can you keep her alive? When she does get killed, do you stop & go back to town or deal with the slower attack you will have. Iron maiden no longer a problem. No iron maiden in pits. nice for chaos sanc runs. where is the meat shield? is valkerie enough?

Can't make a recommendation here though. lots to think about. I personally like having my merc get in the way of the badies. Hell, with all that damage, you could use a holy freeze merc. God knows you have more than enough damage with WF / fortitude anyway.