Need help choosing: Wizzy or Hoto

[sica]

Hi all,

I need ur help choosing the right wep for my pvp wind druid. This druid has max block with ss (99fcr) and uses vs non physical attacks spirit (163 fcr). My question is choosing wizzy or hoto.

Equip for 99 fcr:

Shako or Jalals (um or shael) / amu 2 druid 10 fcr 20 str 14 all / enigma / ss (eld) / arach

2 options:

1: hoto + fcr ring + soj (more dmg)
2: wizzy + 2 soj (more mana / res)

Equip for 163 fcr

2 druid 20 fcr 35 life 15 all res circ / amu 2 duid 10 fcr 20 str 14 all / enigma / spirit 35 fcr / arach

2 options:

1: hoto + 2 fcr
2: wizzy + fcr ring + soj

If anyone could point out to me what the best options are, or maybe even give options vs different characters that would be great.

Regards,

Sica

[Rauth]

Lets see if I can make a quick rundown of opponent-specific gear choices. I'll try to cover all the main ones, and throw in a little strategy while I'm at it for fun.

First up, barb. Obviously you will need ss to survive a decent barb. If you aren't worried about mana, then go with the hoto for more damage. You'll need all you can get against a barb.

Bone necs. Go with the hoto here again, obviously with the spirit. You might consider keeping a doom in stash to get a nice edge over the necs that like to walk down when you tele on them and spear up. The doom will make that tactic pretty useless. You should also be able to get to 99 cast rate with doom, which is really all you need. Doom will also make hurricane kill a LOT of pub duelers without even trying.

Poison necs. Try to keep a death gloves in stash for them, and use wiz for stacked res. You're probably going to get hit no matter what, but they will die well before you. Just be careful of the facet.

Summon necs. You could win this one naked.

Any sorc. I'd go with the wiz and spirit here, because against a good sorc, your cyclone armor Will break, and you don't want to die in 1 hit after that. The only ones that will give you huge trouble are the ES ones, but you can beat them as well if you are careful.

Trapsins of any kind. You're pretty much screwed against one that knows what they're doing, but if you can get them to chase you, you can catch them offguard and namelock for a quick kill. Only go with wiz here if you need the res, they can't lower it like other elementals.

WW sins. Depending on if they use mind blast/traps a lot, this can be easy or impossible. Go with the ss for sure, and you might consider the wiz over the hoto if you need res, since they Can lower your psn res with facets.

Hammerdins. Same as bone nec basically. I haven't tried doom against them personally, but it might mess up their desynching, so give it a shot. Don't forget to keep 3-5 wolves up at all times and you should be fine.

Smiters. These can range from easy to really hard depending how well they use desynch charge. Ss for sure, for the DR. Try to stay around puddles and teleport onto your own attacks so they can't hit you without taking some damage themselves.

All other pallys. Use whatever you want, you should win without too much trouble. Use doom to Really annoy the zealers.

Bowzons. Ss and hoto for sure, although if you do everything right, you won't even get hit due to minion stack. Use doom for overkill if you want.

Javazons. Wiz is a good choice here, since many javazons have a massive amount of -res. Doom on the other hand, pretty much cripples them. Doom is just great. I'm not sure if I would use ss here at all, because the actual javalin damage is minimal, but blocking animation is annoying as hell, so spirit may be your best bet here.

Melee druids. Ss and hoto is the best way to go here, but again, use doom if you are feeling mean. Shouldn't be a problem unless they are rabies, in which case, leave off all your summons(including oak) and get them to run into your nados while being careful not to get infected.

Other windies. Ss for the DR, hoto if you don't mind mana potting. These can be long duels, so mana might actually be an issue. Windy duels can be kind of random. Practice is your best strategy here.

Fire druids. Wiz if you really want to be prepared, but hoto will work just as well. I'd still keep ss since volcano does phys dmg. Treat them like a very slow sorc that can't really hurt you.

I think that about covers all the mainstream duelers. Anything that isn't mainstream is probably easy to kill, so use whatever you want.

Side-note on wiz/hoto debate. Any duel you can win with hoto, you can win with wiz. I got tired of switching out and just always used wiz myself.

Lastly, have fun.

[sica]

Hey thanx for writing that all down, I enjoyed reading it :D. My conclusion from this would be, loose the hoto and use wizzy. It annoys me to grab for pots all the time, thats why probably wizzy + soj would be a good option. Other comment by people are welcome too.

And buy a doom ^^.

Actually never thought of doom as an option, cuz does the whole cold dmg and - res contribute so much to the killing of people?

Anyway, I'm gonna try it this week in pubbies

Sica

[RetroStar]

Hey thanx for writing that all down, I enjoyed reading it :D. My conclusion from this would be, loose the hoto and use wizzy. It annoys me to grab for pots all the time, thats why probably wizzy + soj would be a good option. Other comment by people are welcome too.

And buy a doom ^^.

Actually never thought of doom as an option, cuz does the whole cold dmg and - res contribute so much to the killing of people?

Anyway, I'm gonna try it this week in pubbies

Sica

The only thing that has cold dmg in it is hurricane which isn't effective at killing.

[Rauth]

Doom is mostly for the slow, but it WILL make many people go into fhr from hurricane when they otherwise wouldn't, which is generally a good thing. I mean, how many people bother to stack 50ish cold res over max? Not many. And if they do, odds are they are sacrificing Something. If you can get hurricane to trigger fhr when you tele on them, you can get that first nado off much easier before they can escape. Doom is by no means a perfect all-around weapon, but it is great for certain matchups.

I also found it annoying as hell to need mana pots all the time, so thats another reason I always used wiz. Lots of times in pubs you never even get hurt, so its just annoying to go back to town for mana.

Good luck, and remember, the best strategy vs any class is to duel them until you are sick of it. Doesn't really matter if you are winning 100:0 or losing 0:100, as long as you are learning something.

[sica]

Doom is mostly for the slow, but it WILL make many people go into fhr from hurricane when they otherwise wouldn't, which is generally a good thing. I mean, how many people bother to stack 50ish cold res over max? Not many. And if they do, odds are they are sacrificing Something. If you can get hurricane to trigger fhr when you tele on them, you can get that first nado off much easier before they can escape. Doom is by no means a perfect all-around weapon, but it is great for certain matchups.

I also found it annoying as hell to need mana pots all the time, so thats another reason I always used wiz. Lots of times in pubs you never even get hurt, so its just annoying to go back to town for mana.

Good luck, and remember, the best strategy vs any class is to duel them until you are sick of it. Doesn't really matter if you are winning 100:0 or losing 0:100, as long as you are learning something.

Since I'm on ladder it will take me sometime too get that doom, CTA is a higher priority atm ;). But i sure will check it out.

And I have the same, it annoys me to get pots all the time. But atm i have 163 fcr and i use 1 soj and i have around 750 mana (without bo) and i can manage quite easily. Only prob i have is vs good fb sosos, don't know how but the out-tele me all the time and with 2 or 3 hits im gone...:C any advice :lol:

[RetroStar]

And I have the same, it annoys me to get pots all the time. But atm i have 163 fcr and i use 1 soj and i have around 750 mana (without bo) and i can manage quite easily. Only prob i have is vs good fb sosos, don't know how but the out-tele me all the time and with 2 or 3 hits im gone...:C any advice :lol:

Your best friend would be tele namelock. They tele faster than you, shoot faster than you, have a higher range than you. You're disadvantaged.

One or two tornado will probably kill them though if they're 200%fcr ones.

[Rauth]

Presumably he is Trying to namelock them.

My advice would be to try this:

When they sorc is offscreen spamming fbs at you from the north, run towards the sorc diagonally(dodges fbs) and try to get the sorcs feet to appear in the Very top corner of your screen. You can get a namelock here, but the sorc won't be able to see you because of the Life/Mana orbs. You can catch a Lot of sorcs off-guard this way.

Another tactic would be this:

Make the sorc come to you. Tele away a few screens like you are retreating to recast or whatever. Make sure you spam some nados backwards as you go. The sorc will usually chase after you and sometimes you will get a lucky nado hit. Even if you miss with all the spammed nados, you can catch the sorc off-guard by quickly changing directions and going for the quick namelock. Be careful of incoming fbs though.

Yet another tactic to try would be this:

When you namelock the sorc, assume that he will automatically teleport away, so be ready to namelock a few times in a row in quick succession. Do not stop to cast nados until you Know you will get hits. If they try to just tele out of the namelock and spam back, they will die. They can escape by teleporting away a few screens, but even that sometimes won't save them, especially if you are fast.

Overall, you need a LOT Of practice namelocking to be good at windy. If you can't namelock fast, you will not beat some of the better casters. Also, if you ever miss a namelock, quickly retreat to a safe location and recast whatever needs recasting. Trying to teleport on a spamming fb sorc after you've already been hit is suicide in many cases.

Again, keep practicing. Find the best duelers you can, and duel them for as long as they are willing. It may seem impossible to beat some people, but the more you practice, the easier it is. I played windy for like 3-4 months on ladder before I switched to nonladder, and then I basically got 2-3 times better, so there is always room for improvement.

[inkanddagger]

fhr breakpoints are also much better wih wiz.

[Rauth]

fhr breakpoints are also much better wih wiz.
Yeah, I thought that as well, but I couldn't recall ever seeing hard proof of it beyond my own experience.