Introduction
Welcome to the Strafezon Guide for D2R. This guide is made to help you comprehend the basics of the Strafezon build, a strong ranged Amazon that concentrates on the Strafe skill, an art buffed in recent patches. We'll discuss gear, skills, breakpoints, and general gameplay ideas to make sure you’re prepared to tackle Hell’s minions.
Tip: Buy cheap d2 resurrected runes from professional d2r runes shop MMOWTS, with constant delivery and a safe deal!
I. Skills Breakdown
Primary Skill - Strafe
Put 20 points in Strafe, because this is your main damage-dealing skill. Strafe shoots multiple arrows at a rapid pace, hitting multiple targets inside a line.
Put 20 points in Multishot, because this is the strongest damage synergize to strafe, and offers you a wide damage radius ability, helpful for areas such as the Cow Level.
Put 20 points in Guided Arrow, because this is another damage synergize. You will not be utilizing this frequently in PvM content because Strafe and Multishot are most of your skills.
Secondary Skills
Valkyrie (Up to 20 points): A powerful tanking companion that distracts enemies helping with crowd control. Valkyries become powerful, offering another damage soaker alongside your merc.
Pierce (10-15 points): A passive skill that boosts the chance of your arrows passing through enemies, dealing harm to multiple targets. 100% pierce ought to be easily attainable for beacons, using the right gear choices. Aim for this.
Critical Strike (10-15 points): Another passive skill that boosts the chance of dealing double damage together with your attacks.
Utility Skills
Decoy (1 point): A dummy that distracts enemies, is beneficial in tough situations or is an additional frontline shield.
Inner Sight (1 point): Lowers enemy defense, allowing you to hit them more reliably. An optional ability given you begin dealing damage offscreen and don’t require close-range damage buffs.
Slow Missiles (1 point): Slows enemy projectiles, offering some protection against ranged attacks. Useful if you're having survivability problems.
Dodge / Avoid / Evade, Any extra skill points ought to be used on these three fantastic defensive utility skills, further buffering your evasiveness. This is important given you’re very fragile, despite perfect items.
II. Gear Breakdown
Weapon: Windforce (Unique Hydra Bow) if you're using a Faith merc, or Faith (Rune Word) inside high damage, fast bow base. Grand Matron Bow, Matriarchal and Shadow bow bases are fantastic choices. Faith grants a Fanaticism aura, increasing your overall DPS and it is required to optimize this build.
Armor: Fortitude (Rune Word) or Chains of Honor (Rune Word). Fortitude offers more damage and resistances, while Chains of Honor provides additional resistances, life, and +2 to any or all skills. Fortitude can be viewed as the more widely chosen option given your relative safety at range.
Helmet: Andariel's Visage (Unique Demonhead) or Giant Skull (Unique Bone Visage).
Andariel's Visage offers increased attack speed, life steal, and +2 to any or all skills, while Giant Skull grants knockback and strength, in addition to 2 sockets for IAS/Damage jewels. Knockback is a key mod for beacons because the animation when hitting minions provides you with extra leeway and time. A more expensive option is a magic circlet with FRW or leech mod and 3 sockets. Use 3 Enhanced Damage and IAS jewels for the top damage choice.
Gloves: Laying of Hands (Set Bramble Mitts) or IAS (Increased Attack Speed) Rare gloves with resistances. Laying of Hands supplies a massive damage boost against demons, while IAS gloves can assist you to reach the next breakpoint. This is a fantastic option given demons constitute a huge chunk of the overall monster types. Use this ideally with a knockback from Giant Skull. Alternatively, You can use a group of 20ias knockback gloves with additional mods if you're able to find a pair.
Belt: Razortail (Unique Sharkskin Belt) or Nosferatu's Coil (Unique Vampirefang Belt).
Razortail grants 33% (high), Pierce, assisting you to reach a 100% Pierce chance with fewer skill points. Nosferatu's Coil provides additional attack speed and life leech but misses the powerful Pierce mod.
Boots: Gore Rider (Unique War Boots) or War Traveler (Unique Battle Boots).
Gore Rider offers crushing blows, deadly strikes, and open wounds, while War Traveler provides extra damage, magic finds, and vitality. War Travelers make the perfect general-purpose boot, while Gores is much better for boss-killing.
Amulet: Atma’s Scarab, Highlord's Wrath (Unique Serpent Lord), or Cat's Eye (Unique Amulet).
Atma’s scarab can be viewed as our top option for the amplified damage procs and boost for your attack rating. It does however lack IAS, which makes it more difficult to achieve top breakpoints. Highlord's Wrath grants increased attack speed, deadly strike, and +1 to any or all skills, while Cat's Eye offers attack speed, faster run/walk, and dexterity. Cat's Eye is my preferred selection for balanced damage and speed, however, the high DS from Highlords is difficult to overlook.
Rings: Raven Frost (Unique Ring) for Cannot be Frozen along with a Dual Leech or Attack Rating ring. This is the ideal setup to ensure you have sufficient life and mana leech for self-sustaining. A raven frost supplies a whole host of useful mods for any Bowazon, and something should always be used. High AR and Dex are particularly helpful to this build.
Charms: Sharp Grand Charms of Vita (for additional damage and life), Fine Small Charms of Inertia (for additional damage, attack rating, and faster run/walk), as well as an Annihilus and Hellfire Torch for further skills, attributes, and resistances. Any mixture of Max damage, AR, FRW, Life, Resistances, or FHR is useful for your charm slots. An optional Gheeds ought to be used, along with a physical sunder charm may be used (although isn't recommended if you're using Atma’s scarab that will remove physical immunity with Amplify Damage procs.
III. Breakpoints
Increased Attack Speed (IAS) Breakpoints:
Strafezon depends on high attack speed to manage damage quickly. To optimize your Strafezon, you need to achieve certain Increased Attack Speed (IAS) breakpoints, which are specific values that offer faster attack animations. The breakpoint values rely on your bow's base speed and any additional IAS from gear or auras.
For example, having a Windforce bow (-10 base speed) and Highlord's Wrath amulet, you'll need 89 IAS to get to the 9 frames per attack breakpoint. Here's a simplified breakdown of IAS breakpoints for Windforce:
0% IAS: 13 frames
9% IAS: 12 frames
37% IAS: 11 frames
63% IAS: 10 frames
89% IAS: 9 frames
The breakpoints for Faith will change due to the Fanaticism aura. You can use a breakpoint calculator to locate your exact needs.
IV. Gameplay Tips
Positioning: Strafezon excels at ranged combat, so make certain to keep your distance from enemies. Utilize Decoy and Valkyrie to attract aggro from you.
Crowd Control: While you lack crowd control, your knockback will behave as one, use strafe and multishot to push enemies further from you, and freeze their animation.
Mercenary: Act 2 Nightmare Defensive (Holy Freeze) or Offensive (Might) mercenaries are popular choices for any Strafezon. Equip all of them with gear providing you with life leeches, resistances, and auras to aid your Amazon further. A pride merc will grant one more high-level concentration aura that will further amplify your damage output. Remember that you'll still need Fanatacism from some source hitting an optimal ias breakpoint, so self-using Faith is going to be necessary.
Kiting: If you find yourself in a dangerous situation, please run, reposition, and continue attacking. Strafezon's mobility is a vital part of her survivability.
Conclusion
The Strafezon build is a strong and versatile Amazon setup that may excel in both PvE and PvP content. By comprehending the gear, skills, and breakpoints, you can optimize your character for top performance in Diablo 2 Resurrected. Remember to practice good positioning and crowd control tactics, and you'll be on the right path to conquering the difficulties that Diablo and the minions have to give you. Good luck!