Not surprising, but the basics on attribute allocation haven't changed a bit from v1.07 to v1.10. Even with the multiple corpse system of v1.10, it's strongly suggested that you be able to equip everything you have without having to equip other items first, or at least make sure that the equipment that adds to your strength or dexterity can be worn without the aid of additional items.
For those who are meticulous about their attribute point allocation, I would strongly recommend downloading GA Finley's Diablo II Character Stat Point and Equipment Planner, available here as a zip file. To open the file, you'll need WinRAR; to use the file, you'll need an MS Excel reader.
For more information on gems, jewels, runes, charms, attributes and magical affixes, please refer to the Arreat Summit.
Strength affects damage with melee weapons and the ability to equip items. For a bowazon, strength exists only as a requisite to stronger bows, so a specific target number should always be kept in mind. Amazons start with 20 strength. Suggested target ranges are (with LOD items in boldface):
If your bowazon is in CD2, the most she will need is around 73-95 strength, just enough to equip a rune or gothic bow, respectively. My recommendation is 100: if you don't find a bow that uses up that much strength, it's fairly unlikely that you're going to consider the wasted points a huge loss, and if you find a bow requiring more strength, then you won't have to work too hard to make the grade. Even in LOD, this is fairly balanced: 50-70 strength gives her access to good bows and armor, but limits future options; anything over 134 isn't recommended unless you really want to use a colossus crossbow, as the hydra is the heaviest bow.
Again, strength is needed only to hold the bow. Developing strength for other things like armor is inefficient: bowazons don't need it because defense rating is a low priority (explained in Defense Rating), and on the whole, most of the heavier unique/set armors aren't that good for a bowazon anyway.
Rare gloves give up to +1-15 strength; rare rings and body armor can go to +16-20; rare amulets, belts, and circlets can go as high as +21-30. Amethysts of varying quality in helms and armor give +3-10 strength. In LOD, small charms can have +1-2 strength as a suffix; large charms, +2-5; and grand charms can have up to +3-6. Rare jewels of virility have +5-9 strength. A Fal rune gives +10 strength when socketed in anything.
The average bowazon thinks about dex every eight seconds. Dexterity is important: it raises damage with bows, attack and defense ratings, so it isn't unusual for high-level bowazons to have base dexterity scores in the 300s. Amazons start with 25 dexterity. Suggested target ranges are (with LOD items in boldface):
Bows obviously have very high dexterity requirements. Here's why:
The formula for dexterity bonus damage is:
What this means in practical terms is that you get a bonus to your total damage score equal to 1% of your bow's damage for each point of dexterity your character has. So if you have a bow that does 25-100 physical damage and you have 200 dexterity, you get 50 points added to minimum damage (25 × 200/100) and 200 points added to your maximum damage (100 × 200/100). Assuming no other damage modifiers, the damage in your character screen would show 75-300 damage.
In addition to increasing damage, each point of dexterity adds 4 points to Attack Rating (AR) and every 4 points of dexterity adds 1 point to Defense Rating (DR).
— Icemage
Every point in dexterity yields your character five Attack Rating points, base.
In softcore, investing in heavily in dexterity is a fairly safe bet. Yes, you'll be taking great pains to avoid direct confrontation and hiding behind your minions, but it eventually pays off with higher damage and a strong AR base. (Given that bowazons also have no AR modifiers to their physical damage skills, you'll need all the AR you can get your hands on.) Your defense and ability to take a hit will suffer, but your character will have 1-3 minions to hide behind and D/A/E to serve as your shield, so it's a fair trade.
In HC, you might want to investing in dexterity after your bowazon is able to use the bow you want, then start pumping vitality and skills like Critical Strike and Penetrate (along with +AR items) to compensate for the lowered damage and AR. However, as I have no experience with HC, this is only a suggestion.
Rare gloves, rings, body armor and boots have +1-15 dexterity. Rare amulets, circlets, bows, crossbows, magical rings and gloves can have up to +16-20. Magical amulets, circlets, bows, crossbows, top out at the absolute limit of +21-30. Emeralds of varying quality in helms and armor give +3-10 dexterity. In LOD, small charms can have as much as +1-2 dexterity as a suffix; large charms, +2-5; and grand charms, +3-6. Rare jewels of daring have +4-9 dexterity. A Ko rune gives +10 dexterity when socketed in anything.
Amazons start with 50 life, 84 stamina and 20 vitality; they gain 2 life and 1 stamina per clvl. Every point of vitality adds 3 life and 1 stamina. Vitality is important to the bowazon; if she isn't placing points into dexterity, she will be investing in this. My personal recommendation for softcore is, at most, 100 vitality: it isn't so much that I feel I am cheating myself out of damage and it isn't so little that my bowazon crumbles in less than ten hits. Bowazons have a high chance for survival with minimal vitality, thanks to avoidance, leeching, and minions, but with bad luck, lag spikes, poison, smart targets and not quite-as-smart minions, this "paper tiger" style can be suicidal (though entirely possible with some difficulty), so adding vitality, investing in D/A/E or using +life items with a target of 500-700 life isn't unrecommended.
While dexterity is a bowazon's most prominent attribute, after a while, damage begins to take a back seat and keeping your character alive becomes more important. The switch from dexterity to vitality is entirely up to the player, but for most, it usually occurs around the 200-250 dexterity mark. (Less if your bowazon uses a Might merc: see Damage and Hirelings.)
However, in most cases, vitality is also the one attribute that can be passed over the most, thanks to charms and items that add life: for example, a small charm of vita (+17~20 life) is about as good as 5~7 points of vitality, so three of these can easily replace up to four levels worth of stat points that will be going to vitality. (Many thanks to Manarina for the tip.) On a larger scale, a plate of the whale can add up to 100 life, which is worth ~33 vitality.
In HC, find as many +life items as possible, with a target of 900+ life. Like all characters, the bowazon must balance her capability to cause damage against her capability to survive it: more vitality equals less dexterity which equals less damage, but while your bowazon can have too much dexterity due to diminishing returns on damage and attack rating, she can never have too much life. With more life, she will be more able to withstand a few good hits before having to retreat with lowered chances of being caught in "hit stun" (see FHR).
However, a general rule of thumb is regardless of how much life she has, so long as a bowazon can keep her orbs filled, then all is well, no matter how much is needed to fill those orbs in the first place. This can easily be achieved through high damage and life leech.
If you need quick sources of life, rare rings give +1-40 life; rare amulets, belts, body armor, and circlets give up to +41-60; magical amulets, belts, body armor, and circlets can have as much as +61-100 life. Rubies of varying quality in helms and armor give +10-38 life. Magical amulets and body armor can also have the Centaur prefix (+{0.5/clvl} life); magical circlets can have the Elephant prefix (+{0.25/clvl} life & mana). In LOD, small charms have +5-20 life as a suffix; large charms, +6-35; and grand charms, +5-50. Rare jewels of spirit have +3-8 life; magical jewels of hope can have +9-20. An Io rune gives +10 vitality when socketed in anything (which adds up to 30 life, so perfect rubies, which give +38 life, are still a better option).
Oh yeah, one more thing. If given the choice, go for items with +life over items with +vitality, +%life, and +life/clvl. Items with +life get multiplied by +% life effects like Battle Orders and Oak Sage, but items with +vitality, +life/clvl, and +vitality/clvl don't. In addition, +% life items are additive, not multiplicative, with other +% life effects. Similarly, +mana gets multiplied by +% mana effects, but +energy, +mana/clvl, and +energy/clvl doesn't. (Thanks to adeyke for the tip.)
Amazons start with 50 mana and 15 energy; they gain 1.5 mana per clvl. Every point of energy adds 1.5 mana. For most conventional builds, mana won't be a problem because most bowazon skills don't use up a lot of mana and because she can leech mana with the proper equipment: the more damage your bowazon does, the more mana she can afford to burn because she can quickly refill her orb with one or two attacks. I tend not to invest in energy at all, and recommend the same for most builds that depend mostly on physical damage: 1.5 mana per attribute point is is a lousy return on your investment.
There are exceptions to this rule, of course. The most noticable is the high-level valkyrie, which won't be too much of a problem because by the time a high-level valkyrie finally dies, you'll have leeched back at least three times the mana needed to summon her in the first place. Another exception is the Freezing Arrow skill: at higher levels, this skill drinks mana like Guinness. It leeches mana back, but on the average, not nearly enough to make it a "free use skill." The last example are magezon builds who depend on massive amounts of mana leech to fuel their high-mana skills, an extraordinarily large mana pool or both; the more mana you have, the more mana you regenerate per second. (See Magezons and refer to the Mana Regeneration section of VenomousVixen's Complete Sorceress Guide.) In any case, amazons will find it more advantageous to use +mana and mana leeching items than actually investing in energy.
Rare rings, and magical helms can have +1-15 energy; rare amulets, circlets, and magical rings give +16-20; magical amulets and circlets top out at +21-30 energy. Rare jewels of knowledge have +4-9 energy. A Lum rune gives +10 energy when socketed in anything.
Rare body armor, boots, gloves have +1-40 mana; rare amulets, circlets, and rings, up to +41-60; magical amulets, circlets, and rings, +61-120. Magical amulets and circlets can also have the Memory prefix (+{0.5/clvl} mana); magical circlets can have the Elephant prefix (+{0.25/clvl} life & mana). Sapphires of varying quality in helms and armor give +10-38 mana. In LOD, there are no energy charms, but small charms have +1-17 mana as a prefix, large charms can get +2-34 mana and grand charms can have up to +3-59 mana.
What should be apparent here is that the bowazon doesn't require strength to inflict damage like other warriors, a ton of vitality to stay alive, or energy to use skills. With the blanket nature of a bowazon's prime requisite and the nature of her passive skills, all she really needs is dexterity and compared to even a sword & shield barbarian with his high strength and vitality, she comes out on top because she isn't sacrificing anything or compromising her playing style, proving her inherent superiority in attribute choices above all other classes. A bowazon that puts almost all of her points into dexterity isn't a variant (like the titan barbarian who focuses almost exclusively on strength), but the norm; the only argument among most bowazon players is how many attribute points shouldn't go into dexterity.
last updated: Wednesday, September 01, 2004
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