My strafer lost her fear! Is knockback any good?

[wrugoin]

Bare with me as I tell you my tail... :coffee:

Since level 35, my strafer has utilized the Rattlecage Gothic Plate. At the time, it was self found and much better then the crappy rare armor I was wearing... However, I began to see the advantages of this armor once my strafe skill matured. 25% crushing blow was a nice plus against bosses and the +200 armor was helpful, however the value that I have found in this Unique is the 40% fear.

I play solo 95% of the time and when you find a rush of 7 to 10 monsters coming your way, realizing your valk and merc are still behind you, it was such a wonderful crowd control to strafe a stream of arrows into them and see half of them peel off and run away. This instantly made my survivability increase 10fold... and from level 35 to 89, my strafer has utilized the Rattlecage.

Well, I'm finally wealthy enough to afford the finer things in Amazonian life... A Faith GMB, Gore Riders, Raven Frost, Dual Leach Rings... and a shinny new Fortitude Armor.

Woohooo! FORTITUDE ARMOR! I'm loving life.... until I realized that I'm really missing my fear. It has become a staple of my playstyle. It would seem like my only alternative to get it back would be to replace my helm with The Face of Horror Mask... and I'd be giving up my awesome Zon Circlet.

SOOOOooooooo Getting to my point (thanks for getting this far) What's your opinion of Knockback on a Strafer? I feel I can replace my gloves with a good set of Knockback, 20% IAS gloves, however, before I make the investment, I need your opinion if KB is efficent in keeping those monster rushes from surrounding me....

Please dispense with any advise you believe will help me.

THANKS! :thumbup:

[Inda]

Knockback will make you think, "How did I ever manage to live without this?". Sure made me say that.

~I

[Bladewind]

Great thing about fear is that it makes boss running relatively painless. Since a single strafe will have practically 5 or 6 monsters running with their tail between their legs.

[Ghoulz]

Strafe and Knockback are best friends.
Replaced my bow zon's 80/30 Giantskull with dream, and now she sucks...

[Bladewind]

Why would u want a dream for a zon ? :S.

[Crying Freeman]

In my experiences, I find Knockback far more useful than the Chance to Flee. It becames annoying really quick, because some monsters will have you running after them, just to find more 3 packs of champions. Knockback will just make so that they come closer, get knocked back, and repeat.
Besides, when in higher levels(or as soon as you can), you will want Amplify Damage, whether in WWS or in Atma´s, and Terror overrides that.

[wrugoin]

Lots of great feedback here. I think knockback will do just fine. I didn't imagine that Faith + Fortitude would drop my targets as fast as I'm currently seeing. I'm realizing that I don't need the fear as much as I use to with my old Harmony Bow...

[Davidus]

Howltusk
Great Helm

Knockback
Hit Causes Monster To Flee 25%

[Trueblood]

You didn't mention your gloves. Maybe a +20IAS, knockback gloves would serve you well.

[skyjuice]

KB/Flee does not work well with amp damage.

You want targets to be as closely packed to maximize that already low curse level (atmas) and them being kb and runnin to the 4 corners is not going to help.

That yards count alot and makes the difference to dealing x2 damage.

[Ghoulz]

Why would u want a dream for a zon ? :S.

My melee zon is using her old helm:dontknow:

Bah, I gave half of her gear to my new mage zon, wasn't touching her anyways since then.

KB is a bit annoying for a melee character though. But hey, 2000 more damage just from that helm alone is too good to pass up.



I should try knockback with my throw barb. I been using leap to push em back:dizzy: Heck he does 12k with Elacerators and merc and he feels as weak as my zon sometimes.