Elemental damage isn't affected by physical damage modifiers (Critical Strike, dexterity, Guided Arrow, Strafe, Might, Concentration, Fanaticism, Heart of the Wolverine, Amplify Damage), so most of the time, elemental bows aren't important to the amazon. A bow with 723 poison damage is a bow with 723 poison damage, not 723 physical damage, so no matter how much dexterity you have, the bow will always carry the same range of damage. Thus, a high damage elemental bow with low requirements (like a short bow, for example) would be just as good as a high damage elemental bow with high requirements (like a hydra bow).
Elemental damage takes priority over physical damage during two phases of the game. The first is the very beginning, when your bowazon doesn't have enough levels to handle the higher enhanced damage affixes: because she doesn't cause enough damage to leech back significant amounts of life or mana, elemental damage is just as good, if not better, than physical damage. As soon as she's able to handle bows with 70 or more maximum damage, physical damage takes the fore. The other place where elemental damage carries priority over physical damage is at the very end of the game in Hell difficulty with its numerous physical resistant and immune monsters. A bow with 3-800 lightning can do more damage against a physical immune monster than a normal bow. The different sorts of elemental damage are as follows:
Cold has the least damage of all the elements, but is the most important to the bowazon. Its primary importance is slowing down monsters who are vulnerable to it. Cold damage is of particular interest to bowazons because of interchangeable and cumulative chill-freeze times (explained under Cold Arrow Skills). The most cold damage a rare bow can have is 1-4; a magical hibernal bow of the icicle can have as much as 46-144; a magical jewel of the glacier can have as much as 5-15. The king of cold damage bows is the Buriza-do Kyanon ballista with 32-196 cold damage.
Fire is the middle ground of all elements: it has a good range of immediate damage, but at the same time is the most resisted of the elements. It has no special properties. The most fire damage a rare bow can have is 9-20; a magical condensing bow of incineration, 179-260; a rare jewel of burning can have as much as 25-50. A good fire damage bow to use would be the Kuko Shakaku cedar bow with 40-180 fire damage.
Lightning has the highest instant maximum damage of the elements, but the lowest minimum damage. The problems with minimum damage can be circumvented with multiple sources of lightning, but this won't solve the problem of its wild range of damage. The most lightning damage a rare bow can have is 6-120; a magical shocking bow of storms, 7-600; a rare jewel of thunder, 1-100.
Poison can cause more damage than any of the elements, but its damage is gradual rather than instant. For the general user, even a little poison is enough, as it prevents monsters from regenerating and if one counts potential life lost as damage, then poison becomes very powerful. For example, an urdar in an eight-player game in Hell difficulty regenerates 300 life per second. If it's poisoned for 10 seconds, it's been prevented from regaining 3,000 potential hit points. Against ten urdar, ten seconds of poison equal to ~30,000 life lost due to lack of regeneration.
In v1.10, poison rates are added up and durations are averaged. If a poison attack hits a monster that's already been poisoned, the stronger poison takes precedence. Easy as that.
Non-elemental damage effects usually fall outside physical and elemental damage: non-elemental effects usually work equally well with either while being independent of both. Non-elemental effects include crushing blow, deadly strike, hit freezes target, knockback, open wounds, prevent monster heal, slows target and the ability to cast curses and spells upon striking a target.
Crushing Blow (re: "CB") does damage that is a fraction of the current life of the victim. That fraction varies depending on monster type; the chances of inflicting a crushing blow are cut in half for all missile weapons. For normal monsters, CB from a missile attack (such as a bow) will cut a monster's by 1/8 their base life. Against champions, uniques and super uniques, this is lowered to 1/16 their base life; players and hirelings have the lowest percentage, at only 1/20 their base life. Crushing blow is affected by physical resistance; physical immune monsters are unaffected by CB. Crushing blow has an absolute cap of 90%; additional amounts of CB are wasted.
While CB works wonders for characters with low physical damage, a bowazon can rely less and less on CB as she obtains bows with increasingly heavier damage. She simply does too much damage too fast to even consider CB's low chances of going off and (relatively) lower damage.
Crushing blow is offered by Goblin Toe light plated boots (25%), Rattlecage gothic armor (25%), Gore Rider war boots (15%), Guillaume's Face winged helm (35%), Venom Grip demonhide gloves (5%) and the Ber rune (20%) when used in weapon. For more information, please refer to the Damage: Crushing Blow section of Spirea's Diablo II Resource and Special Effects: Crushing Blow from Tommi Gustafsson's Weapon Damage Calculations.
Deadly Strike is double damage. Though deadly strike offers a more consistent chance of double physical damage than the Critical Strike skill alone, deadly strike and critical hit are mutually exclusive. A bowazon can't have both occur at the same time (re: quadruple damage), but if she fails her critical strike check, she can then check for deadly strike damage. Thus, a character with 98~100% deadly strike would find the Critical Strike skill redundant.
Deadly strike is offered by Gore Rider war boots (15%), Guillaume's Face winged helm (15%), Highlord's Wrath amulet (24-37%), Witchwild String short siege bow (39-99%), Widowmaker ward bow (33%), and the Lo rune (20%) when used in weapon.
Hit Freezes Target (re: "Freezing") is a modified version of freezing via cold damage; it paralyzes a target. How much damage a character can cause is irrelevant: the target is simply frozen upon being hit. The chances of freezing a target with a ranged attack are:
Knocks Target Back (re: "Knockback") isn't an effect that causes direct damage, but one that forces a positional change between the bowazon and her targets. Knockback is important to the bowazon, as only a ranged combat specialist could take fully exploit its nature. No other character in the game will find knockback useful all the time; they either don't need it, can't use it or find it detrimental to their playing style. A sensible bowazon would do well to use knockback since it increases the range between her and her target, leaving it unable to retaliate due to being knocked back three to four steps and stunned while it's being knocked back. So long as a target is being locked, it can't do anything, allowing a bowazon to adopt the offensive very quickly. Unlike other non-elemental effects, knockback generally can't be resisted — small monsters get knocked back 100% of the time, medium monsters 50% and large monsters 25% — though act end bosses like Duriel are immune. Uniques and champions are rarely knocked back and frozen targets can't be knocked back until the freezing wears off.
Knockback is offered by Cleglaw's Pincer's chain gloves, Howltusk great helm, Horadric Hit Power gloves and the Nef rune when used in a weapon. For more information, please refer to Ms. Gentur's Knockback Bow Guide for more information. Knockback does work against other players but is discouraged in PvP.
Open Wounds is a modified version of poison damage; whatever percentage of open wounds is shown on a weapon, divide it by two: this is a chance of making a monster bleed uncontrollably. They lose health while bleeding. Open wounds lasts for four seconds and seems to be resisted by physical resistance, but monsters that are physical immune can be affected by open wounds. Otherwise, open wounds is simply too weak for the bowazon to consider using at higher difficulty levels. Open wounds is offered by Crow Caw tigulated armor (35%), Gore Rider war boots (10%), Riphook razor bow (30%), Toothrow sharktooth armor (40%) and the Um rune (25%) when used in weapon. For more information, please refer to the Damage: Open Wounds section of Spirea's Diablo II Resource.
Slows Target is a modified version of chill via cold damage; it slows down the target's movement and attack rate. This isn't the same as a Holy Freeze aura: slows target won't slow down animation, casting or recovery speed. The maximum of slows target is 50%; any more than that is wasted. It has no fixed duration, but its effect on monsters are undone by a successful [counter] attack on the player. While this has limited applications in melee (since slowed targets can always counter a melee character), this has many possibilities for the bowazon, who can easily avoid counterattacks. Slows target is offered by Blackhorn's Face death mask (20%), Cleglaw's Pincers chain gloves (25%), Riphook razor bow (30%) and Nosferatu's Coil vampirefang belt (10%).
last updated: Thursday, June 21, 2007
© 2000-2007 AK404. All rights reserved.