Attributes

[stonerrock]

I'm about to start playing and I want to know exactly what dexterity and strength do. Do they actually imrpove my attack rating or do they just allow me to hold better items?

And how effective are bows at waxing the stronger enemies later in the game? Would it be wise to invest in a bow AND a sword?

[AnEvilPeanut]

a couple of questions.... what character class are you playing?
strength adds 1% damage per point, so in my opinion its never worth investing in more than you need to for your gear
dex mostly helps blocking. it may add some AR but i dont think its a good primary source for AR, you'd be better with a ravens ring or angelic combo or something like that

as far as the bow/sword combo goes, it depends which bow and sword, what character you are playing, and what style you want. bows generally need high dex while swords need high strength... this would not leave much for life.

[Anthraquinone]

Generally speaking, strength does

increase melee damage
allows you to wear items


dex does:

increase attack rate
increase chance to block (if you have a shield)
allow you to wear items


Now whether or not you need loads of str or dex very much depends on what character you are going to make. A barbarian with low str won't do much damage and the same is true for an amazon low in dex. Look at the builds in the strategy compendium http://strategy.diabloii.net/

About you're last question: no, it won't be wise to invest in bow and sword at the same time.

-AnQ

[Arkardo]

As a general rule of thumb, you should only invest as much strength as you need for your gear, and enough in dexterity for maximum block chance IF you want your character to block.

Whether you want to block, depends on factors like Softcore/Hardcore, PvM (fighting monsters) or PvP (fighting other players), the character class and the choice of shield; melee builds generally get max block, casters don't. Virtually all Paladins use maximum block, because it's so easy with Holy Shield. Virtually all characters (except two-handers, of course) meant for PvP use blocking. For characters that use, say, a Stormshield, which has a naturally high blocking percentage, it's a good idea to block.

In case you're wondering: Energy is almost never invested in, because items and your natural mana increase per level is usually enough to support you. An exception would be a Sorceress that utilizes Energy Shield and characters from new players that don't yet have items to increase the mana pool from their characters.

Vitality: all that you can spare. More life is always good.

[arbing]

A barbarian with low str won't do much damage.


i'll have to disagree on this one because the damage on a barb is much more dependent of his weapon rather than str. So if you have a high damaging weapon (grief, ebotd etc.) you'll have good damage whether you invest on str or not.

[Crowd Control]

Doesn't dex give a stronger bow attacks? I'm not sure on this. However, since you have to spend pretty strong in dex for any Bowa the option comes to wield a Phase Blade which is a sword that requires rather alot of dex. Butttttt, the Amazon does not have any skills worth for a sword. They usually involve a pike or whatever to enable skills like fend and jab.

Also as to the original question, there are not many cookiecutter builds without expensive gear options, so bear that in mind. Bowa's need good gear to survive hell.

[admante]

Dex increases attack speed? Really? Never heard of that before.

[arbing]

Dex increases attack speed? Really? Never heard of that before.

no... i believe you mis-read it, he meant dex increase attack rating (which increase your chance to hit AKA ar).