Guide for 1.11 Ladder PvP WWsin


Introduction:

Hi, I'm Zephiris and I duel on euscl and euscnl. I'm specialized in assassins and finally decided to write a guide of my own. I decided to create this guide, because of the increased questions about wwsins. I haven't been around very long, but for the past half a year my brains have absorbed all the information I could obtain about assassins. I also dueled daily and learned that way how to get the best out of a wwsin. First I’d like to thank the makers of those two guides that already are here, but they are a bit outdated, especially now when 1.11 patch came with the new torch. The two guides I mentioned are Ghost Enigma PvP Assassin by Kodachi and Bramble PvP Assassin by xu-godx (this guide is really old). If you are really into getting to know all about wwsins, you should read both guides and all the comments there are. When I was around 95% done making this guide, Speedländer posted even more detailed guide that holds really much useful information here: WW/Kick Ghost Variant by Speedländer. I disagree with some points on that guide, like the usefulness of the kicks, but that guide holds insane amounts of information. Especially I liked the dueling strategies and tips there. You have to read his guide. That guide is fresh and the guy who wrote it knows his stuff, best character guide that exist. I first thought that I won't post my guide here, because he posted just before me, but then after few days I decided that it would've been waste not to post this.

This build is mostly designed to own in public duels, but so far I've done fine in private duels also. My guide will combine best parts of these two main wwsin builds and make you able to play as a ghost and a bramble with same char, depending on the situation. Basically bramble is better for using against melee and ghost better against casters and ranged. When against casters on pubs, bramble build will work fine, maybe even better than ghost. I duel maybe 95% of the time with the bramble setup on, it's quicker to kill enemies and I think it's more fun to own people fast and do like 10 kills without needing to go back in town to heal. When using enigma; smiters, v/t’s and other wwsins can take you out easier, but with bramble setup only the best ones can match you. WW barbarians have always the advantage over you, but with bramble setup you should be able to kill average ones. When in private 1v1 duel vs. bowazon, pnb necro and sorceress you will need the enigma. With bramble you will feel like a turtle trying to catch the rabbit. Good casters won't get even near you and the duel might last long, but in the end they will win if they have equal skills/gear than you. Also in TvT I find that the ghost build is better. Mobility is a really good advantage.

Equipment:

Items listed in green are what you use in bramble setup. Items listed in blue are what you use with ghost setup.

Weapon1 (left): Rare claw* or Fury Suwayyah and Fury Runic and Precast claw**
Weapon2 (right): Chaos Suwayyah, and Chaos Runic and Precast claw**
Helm: Rare Circlet¹and CoA (15ias/15all + -15req/15all)
Armor: Bramble and Enigma
Gloves: Trangs
Belt: Verdungos and Arach
Boots: Rare resist boots
Amulet: Maras and Angelic and 15+fcr amulet²
Ring1: Raven
Ring2: Raven, Angelic, Wisp, Fcr ring and BK

*) The stats which we look in rare claw are Fool's mod, ed, extra sockets, skills, etc. Make sure that you reach the last IAS breakpoint with it. Socket the claw with Um rune(s) or if it needs IAS then 15ias/40ed or 15ias/15allres. Table for IAS is provided later in guide.
**) Precast claws should be +3 shadow skills / +3 venom, socketed with 2x +5/-x poison facets.
¹) Stats you should seek for circlet: Skills, sockets, resists, strength, dexterity, life, frw and fcr. You should socket the circlet with +5/-5 poison facet, 15res/15ias (recommended) or 15res/9str jewel.
²) For an amulet 15fcr is a must, unless you use fcr circlet instead of CoA when using ghost setup. You also want that amulet has 2 skills and nice res. It's recommended that you have some strength and maybe dexterity on this amulet so you can wear your items without putting any stat points.

Switch: CtA and Demon Limb + Sigons/Lidless/Splendor

Charms: Annihilus, Torch, 9x Shadow skills, 10x 20 life/res small charms. Ideally sc’s would be 20life/5allres, but 20life/11litres and 20life/11fireres do just fine also. If you think resists aren't problem you can consider max/ar/life or ar/life sc's.

Optional gear: For helm you can use shako, if you can't find a good circlet. The only good things in shako for this build are 2 skills, 2 all attributes life and mana. Note that the life and mana from shako won't be boosted with bo. For boots you can use gores instead of resist boots. Also aldurs boots are nice for 50 fireres, 40frw and 50life. Some might prefer to switch for dancers (if you have the str), when using ghost build because of added skills and FHR. For absorb / max res items I find that one wisp is enough. I need to use it usually only when FoH and trapper are teamed up in pubs. You can add tgods, dwarf, etc if you find them useful and have space in stash. Also some 30litres / life and other res charms might be useful.

Main idea is to use Bramble, but if you think you need enigma switch to it. When you wear ghost (enigma) setup, make sure you have 65 or more fcr. More fcr is useless, because you can't achieve the next breakpoint (102) when wearing enigma and claws, so if you have fcr on circlet you don't need the amulet or you can leave ring out and get 5+ fcr assassin amulet.

Stats:

Like usually:
Str: Enough for gear
Dex: Enough for gear
Vita: Rest
Energy: None

When wearing bramble setup, you need 106str (Verdungos) and 99dex (Claws), these might be more depending on type of your rare claw.

With the best possible items you will get:
Str: Base (20), Anni (20), Torch (20), Circlet with 15all/9str jewel (39), Rare claw (15), Chaos (10)¹ = 124str
Dex: Base (20), Anni (20), Torch (20), Raven (20), Boots (15), Amulet (5), Circlet (20) = 120dex

¹) Note that Chaos Suwayyah has 99 str req and that the 10 str bonus doesn't affect so much, when you need only 106 str total.

With ghost setup, you will need 148str (CoA, it should have -15req/15allres jewel in it) and 115dex (Claws).

With the best possible items you will get:
Str: Base (20), Anni (20), Torch (20), Chaos (10), Amulet (30)¹, Fcr Ring (20), Enigma (74)² = 194str
Dex: Base (20), Anni (20), Torch (20), Raven (20), Boots (15), Amulet (20)¹, Fcr Ring (15), Circlet (20) = 150dex

¹) It might be impossible to craft an amulet with 15fcr and high str & dex, but showing just that you can get more than enough stats from items.
²) Strength on enigma is based on character level, at lvl 99 it's 74. In lvl 90 it's 67.

So with the best items and a high level character you don't have to put any str or dex. I know it is almost impossible to get all those rare items, so just get as good items as you can get and sacrifice some vita in str/dex. I'm just pointing out what is best. I am aiming to have those godly rare pieces of equipment in this ladder and I think you should also. For example I bought 2 godly circlets (2assa, 30str, 19dex, 14fireres, 14coldres, 14psnres, 51litres…) and (2assa, 29str, 17dex, 39life, 13allres...) here on jsp forums, other costed me 7ist, other 8ist. Good rare claw is harder to find, because they aren't gambled nor do many people include fools mod claws in their bots njip files. There were better claws around in euro ladder than my rare claw (it's not even nearly as good as it could be) in last ladder season, but not many. I believe there will be more godly ones in this ladder season.

Skills:
(Useless prerequisites are in quotes, if you get a skill from a claw that needs prerequisite, you will not need to put points in the prerequisites)

Shadow Disciplines
20 Claw Mastery
20 Mind Blast
20 Venom
1 Blades of Speed
9+ Fade (9 pts should give you level 35 fade when precasting, which is enough if you use the gear I listed)
12+ Claw Block (12 pts will give level 26 block, when using bramble and angelic)
1 Cloak of Shadows
1 Shadow Master
(1 Shadow Warrior)
(1 Psychic Hammer)

Traps
1 Wake of Fire
1 Blade Fury
1 Blade Shield
1 Lightning Sentry (this is optional, I haven't used it much, it's for stunning with WoF)
(1 Fire Blast)
(1 Blade Sentinel)
(1 Shock Web)
(1 Charged Bolt Sentry)

Martial Arts
1 Dragon Flight
(1 Dragon Talon)
(1 Dragon Claw)
(1 Dragon Tail)

These are total 98 skill points. You get it at level 87. If you get some skills from claws, it will be less (I get LS and DF from claws). So I need 7 points less. Rest of the pts I suggest putting in claw block and fade. I leveled to 94, I maxed claw block and put 15 to fade. I don't know where else to put those extra points. Putting in DF is kind of useless, since all good casters, amazons won't get hit with DF, bad casters/amazons aren't a problem, DF'ng melee is suicide. Also you probably won't be using high damage boots. I think that putting pts to shadow master is also almost useless; it won't do much difference on it. Putting extra pts in traps won't be even close enough to do damage. Cloak is almost useless, it somehow has huge PvP penalty, and so putting pts in it isn't a good idea. If you find kicks to be useful, put points to Dragon Talon, but then you probably should use shadow dancers or up your resist boots to elite version.


Tables:
(Breakpoints you get with bramble setup are listed in green, and those with ghost setup are listed on blue.)

Faster Hit Recovery
FHR . . . . . . Frames
0 . . . . . . . . 9
7 . . . . . . . . 8
15 . . . . . . . 7
27 . . . . . . . .6
48 . . . . . . . 5
86 . . . . . . . 4
200 . . . . . . 3

You can increase fhr with 12fhr skillers if you find a need for them, also when using Dancers with enigma setup, gets you to the next bp.

Faster Cast Rate
FCR . . . . . . Frames
0 . . . . . . . . 16
8 . . . . . . . . 15
16 . . . . . . . .14
27 . . . . . . . 13
42 . . . . . . . 12
65 . . . . . . . .11
102 . . . . . . 10
174 . . . . . . . 9

You have to get that 65fcr with ghost setup.

Whirlwind Attack Speed
WSM-IAS . . .Frames
33+. . . . . . . 12
32 to 25. . . . 10
24 to 10. . . . .8
9 to -12. . . . . 6
-13 and lower. 4

WSM = Weapon speed modifier, you can find WSM for claws here: Arreat Summit. For example Runic Talon has -30 WSM, which means it has 30 base IAS. If you make chaos in Runic Talon, it gets 35 IAS; it will have then total speed of -65. You will get fastest WW IAS breakpoint with every claw, if you make chaos / fury in them, but if you have a rare claw, you need to make sure the IAS will be enough. Only IAS from the claw will affect the WW IAS. You need to get the fastest WW breakpoint with each claw. Basically with rare Suwayyah and Scissors, you need at least 13 more IAS on the claw, with War Fist you need at least 23 IAS, with Battle Cestus and Wrist Sword you need 3 or more IAS. With other elite claws you don't need IAS on them to achieve last WW breakpoint. Even the tables are down to 12 frame attack, the slowest WW attack you can get with a claw is 8 frames, by using a War Fist without any IAS in the claw.

Trap Laying Speed
You might want to calculate your trap laying speed with Weapon Speed Calculator, but I will give some most common examples. You should always equip fury on the "glove side" (the claw what is above your gloves on screen). If you use chaos/rare claw, equip the one with more IAS on the glove side.

Glove side / Boot side => ias needed for max trap laying speed
Runic Fury 40ias / Runic Chaos 35ias => 10 ias
Feral Fury 40ias / Runic Chaos 35ias => 15 ias
Runic Fury 40ias / Feral Chaos 35ias => 15 ias
Feral Fury 40ias / Feral Chaos 35ias => 25 ias

Suwayyah Fury 40ias / Suwayyah Chaos 35ias => 10 ias for next breakpoint, then for next 90 ias, too far to reach.

Dueling Strategies
I won’t list here long dueling strategies for different classes, because I think that I can’t add much to those three guides that I listed at the top of this guide, I suggest you read Speedländers guide and follow his dueling tactics, just use ww instead of kicks, if you aren't good with kicks. Just do your precasts with venom claws, bk ring, maras and arach, then enchant yourself with the Demon Limb. After that you are ready to battle. It’s not necessary to precast, but it doesn’t bother me and I think it’s worth it. Venom, enchant and fade durations are long enough. You can also use more precast gear, like +3 shadow helm (2x poison facet) and +3 shadow amulet.

Thanks
My mates in oOR: xp0, stamp, BonGHaT, xtravical and Renhammer.
Speedländer and other assassin experts.
For Njaguar and Mousepad for making D2 playing more enjoyable.
Mods of d2jsp for keeping the forums clean.
All nice and trusted traders in euscl.

This post was edited by Zephiris on Aug 22 2005 11:37am

Intresting guide

It'd be better if you could explain other options for helmet and amulet, incase people can't fire rare or magic items...

Oh and also a link to the guide with dueling strategies please =)

But yeah, nice guide, oh another suggestion, what kind of damage is optimal for both the bramble and ghost builds?

Ah, I got wrong link in speedländers guide.. it links to his guide on other forums.. Here is a link to his guide here on jsp forums, if some mod could change that I would be appreciated:

http://forums.d2jsp.org/index.php?showtopic=637238

That guide is the one with great strategies.

For helm I listed there that you can use shako, for ghost build you will need a FCR amulet or FCR circlet, there is no other way to get 65fcr on ladder. If you have FCR circlet, use Mara's then.

For bramble build you should aim to get 7k+ dmg on chaos, with precast. With enigma over 4,5k is good.

This post was edited by Zephiris on Aug 22 2005 12:15pm

7k, jesus, I'm only doing 6.1k with my bramble 50, coa 2*5/5 facets, maras, dungos, shadow dancers, 1 * bk4, 2 * +3 sd claws... oh you must be using +5/6 venom claws, which I can't afford, darn ^^

Well I got 6x 3/3 venom claws, for unsocketed I've paid Ist and with 2sox I've paid 2-3 Ists usually. (former ladder prices)

i got a 298% ed fools mod 1+ max 1+ min dmg runic talon, would it be good as secondhand claw, or do i need ias aswell?

Zephi... i could have written it myself

No dude.. very nice, finally some stuff i missed in other guides.
Ow and Lightning Sentry is not optional.. its necessary to keep a high FHR in lock (atleast in my experience)

But definately.. Thumbs up!

Yes it's nice, it will hit the last ww breakpoint. It will also give max trap laying speed when using Runic chaos on glove side.

Thanks for the compliment xeopolite, one of the assassin experts .

I agree that you should only have 1 point in dragon flight, but I defiinitely disagree that it doesn't hit good casters. All you have to do is teleport with shadow master out, and you will be hitting good casters easy with dragon flight. As soon as you teleport 1 screen away, your shadow master mind blasts the person you are chasing. That gives you more then enough time to dragon flight them and score a hit. If you do it right, you'll land at least half of your dragon flights if you use your shadow masters mind blast.

Also, there seems to be a lack of emhasis on stun locking. Stun locking is the only thing that makes WW sins good in private games. Any ww sin can own it up in pubby games, but to do well in private, you need to be a very good stun locker, or it just won't work.

Nice guide though. I wish you the best of luck finding all that stuff on the new ladder season

wait till ladder ends then replace your rings | ammy with 2 x fcr rings and 12+ fcr ammy