The Chaos Sanctuary Bowazon
by general_patton
General Idea (no pun intended)
Last ladder season I played a zerk barb for fun, one that utilized heavy amounts of enhanced damage to demons to destroy the chaos sanctuary. I decided to apply the same idea to an amazon.
Keep in mind that this guide is not set in stone, so adjust your stats and skills according to your personal preferences. I'm not claiming this guide to be the best, merely different from most cookie cutter windforce builds and fully capable of soloing the chaos sanctuary in 8 player hell mode.
Now on to the stats
Strength - Enough for gear.
Dex - The rest of your stats into here
Vit - None, unless youw ant a little extra survivability. You don't need to remake the zon if you sink a few points into here.
Energy - None
Skills
Skills are a personal preference. Some prefer Magic Arrow over Cold Arrow for physical immunes. Some prefer to max Guided Arrow to kill Diablo with. I will leave the decision to your own taste, this skill allocation is not set in stone.
Max
Penetrate - Adds Attack rating, enough said.
Cold Arrow - Converts a large percentage of physical damage to cold damage. The cold/physical immunes that you encounter can be dealt with accordingly, I just prefer the extra speed when killing swarms of physical immunes. As I said before, some prefer to max Magic Arrow.
Ice Arrow - synergy bonus, not necessary but adds some damage to Cold Arrow.
Guided Arrow - For the max damage builds, maxed guided arrow owns bosses.
5-10 points into Multishot
1 point into strafe - best attack in crowded hallways, strafe is a 1 point wonder.
Dump some points into the Dodge Skills
1 point into Valkyrie, they make for a decent tank and are useful when fighting Diablo.
1 point into Freezing Arrow, its a great crowd control skill in places such as the Cow Level.
1 point Pierce - stacked on top of Razortail, it equals over 100% pierce, and that is a great thing to have.
The Cold Arrow versus Magic Arrow debate
Maxing out one of these skills to kill physical immunes is essential on a PvM bowazon, because you will encounter physical immunes and you will have to kill them somehow. I have tried using an Atma's amulet, and I found that strafing until Amp Damage proc'd was inefficient at best because the mana bulb drained quite fast. Cold Arrow carries a moderately heavy mana cost, but that can be dealt with using mana pots or leeching monsters that are behind the physical immune one from pierce. Magic Arrow converts less physical damage into magic damage, but it also costs zero mana and no arrows. I prefer Cold Arrow, find what suits your preference.
Equipment
This is where things get weird
Armor - Artisans (Armor) of the Whale socketed with 40% ED, 15% IAS jewels. This armor is essential in reaching the 7 frame breakpoint. This build doesn't use Fort, it can't afford the loss in attack speed. If you want to use Fort, you will have to wear a Cats Eye (or Highlords) along with a Nos Coil, and that's just horrible. Pierce is a must have for PvM.
Helm - Artisans Diadem of the Whale socketed with 40% ED, 15% IAS jewels. Also needed to reach the 7 frame breakpoint.
Boots - Wartravelers - Adds damage, strength, a minor amount of vitality, some run/walk, and magic find. Great mods on a set of boots, you will need the strength.
Gloves - Laying of the Hands - 350% ED to demons is amazing for a demon basher build, and it also grants 20% IAS and fire resist.
Belt - Razortail - 10 to max damage, 15 dexterity, 33% pierce. The greatest PvM bowazon belt ever.
Ring 1- Ravenfrost, as perfect as you can get. Grants Cannot be Frozen, attack rating, dexterity, cold absorb, mana, and some cold damage.
Ring 2- A rare ring that must have dual leech, and preferably has attack rating, dex, life, resists, or other nice mods. A blood ring with mana leech would be ideal.
Amulet - There are some choices you could make here. I prefer Highlords for the added deadly strike, 1 to skills, light resist, and some extra IAS (not really needed in this build). You could use a Cats Eye for the run walk and dex, or a Seraphs for the enhanced damage to demons and the undead. If you can't find a nice rare ring, you could substitute the highlords for a Crescent Moon for the life and mana leech. Its your decision.
Weapon
Brand Superior Grand Matron Bow with a base of 3 to bow and crossbow skills -
4 Socket Missile Weapons
Jah + Lo + Mal + Gul
35% Chance To Cast Level
14 Amplify Damage When Struck
100% Chance To Cast Level 18 Bone Spear On Striking
+260-340% Enhanced Damage (varies)
Ignore Target's Defense
20% Bonus to Attack Rating
+280-330% Damage To Demons (varies)
20% Deadly Strike
Prevent Monster Heal
Knockback - Very useful in the Chaos Sanctuary, it keeps back the hordes of monsters as you fire volleys of arrows.
Fires Explosive Arrows or Bolts (15)
Up to 670% Damage to Demons on one weapon, this is my favorite choice for Chaos Bowazons.
Weapon Switch
Call to Arms is overrated. If you play the zon right, you shouldn't get hit. And when you do get hit, it has a really good chance of casting Amplify Damage, which is triples your damage. This is my choice for weapon switch
Weapon - Lawbringer Phaseblade- Yes, its the Lawbringer. Formerly the weapon of choice for act 3 mercs, this makes a great weapon switch. Why? Because it has Sanctuary (knocks back the oblivion knights when you just run the seal bosses). It also casts Decrepify, which when using the weapon switch can be very deadly against masses of monsters and bosses. It is a well known glitch that certain mods apply to arrows after the arrow is cast and the weapons are switched, such as curses and open wounds.
The strategy goes as follows, stand back a little ways from a mob of monsters and cast Strafe. When you are done with the strafe animation, you should have just enough time to switch weapons and proc Decrepify with the strafe. A 3 frame attack makes casting Decrepify all the more likely, and it majorly messes with Diablo. Decrepify doubles your damage, so its worth using a few frames to switch weapons. As a bonus, it slows down monsters as they come towards you.
Shield - This is personal preference. Some like stormshield, but that takes an ungodly amount of strength. Tankage is always nice on a weapon switch, so I would use either a Sanctuary Tower shield or a Headhunter's Glory troll nest with 3 um's slapped in it for a ton of resists. The zon is a glass cannon, it can maxblock with virtually anything.
Inventory
Inventories are fairly flexible. Run walk charms for more running speed, max damage charms for more damage, and 20/5's for more life and resistances. A perfect annihilus is always recommended, but a torch can drop games. Maxed fire resistance is always nice when killing Diablo, but Diablo can be outranged using a bow. This really epends on your playing style and budget. I recommend having 1 long duration poison charm to counteract monster life regeneration.
Mercenary
Act 1 Fire bow rogue mercenary
Weapon - Faith bow in either a hydra or diamond bow. You need the fanaticism to hit the 7 frame breakpoint, and extra damage and attack rating is always a plus.
Armor - Fortitude, increases Mercenary damage and resistances.
Helm - Andariel's Visage with a Fire damage/IAS/ max damage jewel. Nice life leech for merc survivability along with IAS.
Strategies
Take the River of Flame waypoint and follow the road across the River of Flame to the Chaos Sanctuary. The Chaos Sanctuary is in the same place every game, so finding it should be easy, assuming you have an IQ higher then 65.
Run through the Chaos Sanctuary, mowing everything down in your path. I always prefer to go turn right, go north, then go west to kill the seal monsters. When Diablo spawns, simply cast Valk/decoy to the other side of him. Cast Strafe and then weapon switch. If you do it right, Diablo is decrepified and that much easier to kill.
Have fun. Feel free to critique my guide.