10-13-2003, 08:32 AM
Although lightning fury is stronger and more suited for cow runs, I find that the other two melee lightning skills are more practical for bosses and small groups. These are Charged Strike and Lightning Strike.
Here are the important skills I'm plan to max: Charged Strike, Lightning Strike, Lightning Fury.
The best boss-killing skill is Charged Strike (combined with synergy from lightning strike and lightning fury). Since the bosses tend to be chunky, they soak up all the bolts. When a chunky monster takes in all the bolts, it loses life amazingly fast (Duriel and Izual are especially attractive targets). The skill ALWAYS HITS, so having steal mana, prevent monster heal, extra elemental damage is recommended.
Lightning Strike is a bit buggy at the moment. All monsters will be hit by it at least once every time the skill is use. However, there is a bug -- the chains of lightning cannot overlap, and hence cancel each other when they target the same monster. However, it is still superior to Charged Strike at killing mobs. Whenever the monsters are also far apart from each other, this reduces the cancelling out effect, which makes the monsters lose hp faster. To avoid the cancelling effect, I recommend sometimes switching back to charged strike to let the lightning strike finish its chaining while you deal more damage.
The best benefits these two skills have over lightning fury is that they have relatively low mana cost. You need only mana pots and maybe bit of mana leech. I'm using a stick with +5 mana to each kill, and it's sufficient with mana pots.
A high block shield is a must though. I would put in enough dex for +70% block. The rest goes into life and around 100 str (use +str mods if you want better weapons).
This amazon is not really dependent on her weapon. You need only a cheapo javelin (prevent heal mod is useful, and mana leech too) and enough IAS to get a fast attack fps (best is 4 fps). Sometimes having a stick that does no damage is even better than a Titan. That way, you can pull off more lightning strikes.
At the moment, I'm only using Charged Strike and Lightning Strike (14 pts in each). Already, I find that act 5 nightmare is a breeze (although I'm level 60). If I manage to max these skills along with lightning fury, I'm sure the synergies will make them viable in Hell difficulty.
Here are the important skills I'm plan to max: Charged Strike, Lightning Strike, Lightning Fury.
The best boss-killing skill is Charged Strike (combined with synergy from lightning strike and lightning fury). Since the bosses tend to be chunky, they soak up all the bolts. When a chunky monster takes in all the bolts, it loses life amazingly fast (Duriel and Izual are especially attractive targets). The skill ALWAYS HITS, so having steal mana, prevent monster heal, extra elemental damage is recommended.
Lightning Strike is a bit buggy at the moment. All monsters will be hit by it at least once every time the skill is use. However, there is a bug -- the chains of lightning cannot overlap, and hence cancel each other when they target the same monster. However, it is still superior to Charged Strike at killing mobs. Whenever the monsters are also far apart from each other, this reduces the cancelling out effect, which makes the monsters lose hp faster. To avoid the cancelling effect, I recommend sometimes switching back to charged strike to let the lightning strike finish its chaining while you deal more damage.
The best benefits these two skills have over lightning fury is that they have relatively low mana cost. You need only mana pots and maybe bit of mana leech. I'm using a stick with +5 mana to each kill, and it's sufficient with mana pots.
A high block shield is a must though. I would put in enough dex for +70% block. The rest goes into life and around 100 str (use +str mods if you want better weapons).
This amazon is not really dependent on her weapon. You need only a cheapo javelin (prevent heal mod is useful, and mana leech too) and enough IAS to get a fast attack fps (best is 4 fps). Sometimes having a stick that does no damage is even better than a Titan. That way, you can pull off more lightning strikes.
At the moment, I'm only using Charged Strike and Lightning Strike (14 pts in each). Already, I find that act 5 nightmare is a breeze (although I'm level 60). If I manage to max these skills along with lightning fury, I'm sure the synergies will make them viable in Hell difficulty.