A range 5 2-hander seems good vs. a smiter, I would rather Nef the weapon than lose ias on gloves though.

Of course it would be death against a BM zealot that switches to smite when he can't handle a melee duel.

Great idea!

Hmm...I'll confess that I hate running to town to switch gear. If it were a PURE smiter, then I could gear accordingly at the start of the duels. In the case of a vs. smiter duel, and if I invested a hard point into conc, I would probably go: Twitchthroe, 6os Giant Axe (with nef and 5x maxers), and a Duskdeep. Maybe even death's combo as well if there is cold damage involved.

In rjg's case (zealot with smite backup), I could keep just the 6os Giant Axe (with nef and 5x maxers) on weapon switch instead of shout prebuff gear. I wonder if it would be effective enough by itself.

Or am I worrying too much about 2% (possibly) of the duelers out there who might have smite or be an 18 smiter?

I'd still like some opinions on investing a hard point into conc. I just checked the Arreat and this is what my pros and cons would be (factoring in the +1 from sigons shield):
Axe Mastery: 11 vs 14 (-15% damage, -24% AR, -2% crit)
Bash: 1 (Would this be better vs smiters instead of using a Nef on switch Axe?)
Stun: 1
Concentrate: 1 (with +3 from helm) 5 vs 4 (+10% defense, +10% AR, +10% damage) includes 5% from bash synergy

Overall the total differences would be: -5% damage, -14% AR, -2% crit, +10% defense). It's not as horrible as I first imagined it might be.

EDIT: Since this is my only level 18 dueler on East (and the only one I care to have), I would like to make him as versatile as possible.

This post was edited by Shademehr on Feb 1 2007 06:45pm

i have an 18 defi smite on west if anyone wants to duel a conc barb with it

Well now that I think about it, KB doesn't work vs. smite. Smite is uninterruptable. When my vlld basher duels smiters, he doesnt knock them back if I go toe to toe. However, a 6os 2 hander is a good idea.

When you duel vs. smite, this is what you do. Take 1 swing, run away, take another swing, run away, repeat like this. This means you will be getting 1 attack attempt for every 1 smite. Their stun won't be hurting you.

A Giant axe is only range 4, you really want a range 5 weapon. You want to start your swing animation as soon as possible since they will interrupt you if they smite before you finish the attack. Unfortunately, you lose a ton of damage and AR if you use a range 5 since you use axe mastery

A War Scythe with Sigons and twitch will hit 13 fpa. It's not very fast but it's only 1 frame slower than your usual war axe attack. Also a War Scythe will do a hefty 32-167 if socketed with 15/20ed jewels. A Giant Axe would be 15 frames - yikes slow!

This post was edited by breakbeatz2 on Feb 1 2007 07:04pm

Yeah, that's one of my big fears about going with a different weapon type.


It took me MONTHS to get the 19-20ed/15max jewels for my war axe... ugh.

I need to just shop some random Giant Axe and try vs. Bigspots smiter and see if it's even worth pursuing. Disappointing that the KB doesn't work

Thanks for all the ideas so far guys!

Maybe try a zeal charged scepter too.

zeal barb is surprisingly effective overall. id make one if i had an extra set of perfect charms and jewels...lol

I don't think you really need duskdeep. Unless it's an offensive build (which means it'll have 250defense maybe), they'll be doing 2-3pvp damage per smite. I suggest a rare ring with ar, mana, and damage reduced by 2.

his is a defensive smiter. thats 9 pvp dmg.

OMG HLD KILL THREAD ANYONE

I joined some game to look at my smite damage and hosted him



edit: nubby hdin I just stood under him

This post was edited by majestikk on Feb 1 2007 10:16pm