First time Hybrid Question

Zon experts,

I am currently attempting my first zon and I am looking for some help. I have read some guides but I dont not have the bestest gear and am not weathly by any means. Any advice would be great.

Here is my (sad) setup:

Helm: G Face w/15ias Jewel

Armor: Toothrow(It sucks I know)

Gloves: Laying of Hands

Boots: War Travs

Rings: 8LL Carrion and 7 Manald

Ammy: +2 Zon Skillz rare w/ 4 LL

Weapon 1: Harmony Great Bow (helps for phys immunes)

Weapon 2: Titans w/ Spirit Monarch

20 Strafe

16 Multi

17 Valk

20 Light Fury

Few points left....

Char is currently lvl 62 and still in NM act 5. Just looking for some help/advice on what to look for as far as equipment goes. All my stuff is self found so I wont be trading so plz do not list uber-godly chit as I cannot afford it.

Thanks in advance.|||Okay a little advice.

Skills

20 Strafe

17 valk (with+skills) and 1 point in all passives

20 Charged strike

20 Light fury

Rest in the power ups.

Multi isnt worth more than a single point if you have strafe to be honest just leave it at 1 point and with eventual +skills you will have more than enough points into it for it to be useful.

Charged strike is what should be maxed first as a bowas main weaknesses are the bosses and charged strike is the best skill for the job.

Look for.

Shako(15 ias jewel)

Skulders (Perfect topaz or 15 ias jewel)

These should improve your killing and mf.|||Okay.

First off, you need CBF, so if you have a Ravenfrost, put it on.

Second, LoH are great gloves for melee and for a strafer who has Knockback elsewhere on her gear, but in your case I would try and cube Hit Power gloves with 20%IAS if your main skill is Strafe OR throw on Frostburns if you use Lightning Fury more.

(Strafe/LF is generally not a good combination because they benefit from different types of gear; Strafe calls for +damage and IAS while LF needs +skills and +mana. I would suggest that you respec to LF+ Freezing Arrow)

Toothrow sucks indeed. You'll be better off with any IAS armor. Ideally I would recommend Treachery, but even Twitchthroe works. One interesting and rather cheap option is Spirit Forge with two IAS jewels; 30% IAS, +15 ST, +life per level and some fire damage on top of that make it better than Twiththroe for characters without blocking. If you have a general shortage of Uniques, at least make yourself a Peace armor (Shael+Thul+Amn); +2 Amazon skills and +2 Critical strike is still a huge improvement on Toothrow.|||Thanks for the help!!!!

I may look to just go straight bowazon and use strafe and freeze arrow. I figured "why not" since I found the Titan's and made the Spirit, to try a hybrid.

I have a Twichthroe and Skullder's on a mule so I will swap them too and see with works better.

I have never had much luck with crafting in the past but I may try it out again. I did find an Eaglehorn, my old "power-ranger" used to use with a nef in it. That may not be the best option for knockback but it's still there I guess.

IAS Jewels are pretty hard to come by for me so that kinda rules them out. I do have a Cats Eye ammy? Should I swap that out and go with that instead of the other ammy? Haven't found a Ravenfrost yet. Hopefully someday soon.



Thanks for the help.|||Cat's Eye will be MUCH better than +skills for a strafer, but +skills is better for LF.|||I personally think that the jav half takes care of itself just from the skillpoints, and I built my hybrid entirely for the bow side. That means just put 20 pts LF, 20 pts CS, prereqs, Titans+Spirit on switch, and your javazon half is done

The bowazon half, I'd go with the Eaglehorn+Nef for sure at the moment, its the second best option till you can find a WF. The javs will take care of PIs, and the few LI+PIs you may encounter can be dispatched with your 1-pt Magic Arrow effectively enough.

My strategy is usually to open with a few LFs to thin the herd if the monsters are dense, a few MS volleys to clear the LIs and the rest, and then Strafe to clean up the few survivors.|||Just an update....

I respec'ed to go pure bowazon using strafe and freeze arrow. Got my Harmony great bow and eaglehorn and weapons. Now using Cats Eye as ammy and using Crow Caw for armor and goldwrap belt for the ias on both. Total is 80 IAS between helm, armor, gloves, belt, and ammy and another 20 from Harmony bow.

Thanks all for the advice!|||As far as I am concerned, once you have Strafe, everything else is unnecessary. Especially if you have Atma's Scarab for an ammy, or a WWS, or high level Magic Arrow. You don't need to hybridize with a Bowazon; it's when you go the elemental route that you need secondary attacks.|||Yes, a strafer with Atma's never has to worry about immunes (except for Possessed Ghosts), but hybridizing gives you three advantages: one, CS and LF are superior skills in many situations (namely, vs large packs, and vs bosses), so having that option increases your efficiency; two, strafers are still slow vs PIs, since even when broken they can have 95% physical resists; three, hybrids in jav mode have max block and better resists, meaning you have an option for when you need better def.|||Quote:








Yes, a strafer with Atma's never has to worry about immunes (except for Possessed Ghosts), but hybridizing gives you three advantages: one, CS and LF are superior skills in many situations (namely, vs large packs, and vs bosses), so having that option increases your efficiency; two, strafers are still slow vs PIs, since even when broken they can have 95% physical resists; three, hybrids in jav mode have max block and better resists, meaning you have an option for when you need better def.




1)CS is superior to Strafe vs. bosses, no question; LF is NOT superior to Strafe vs. large packs unless they are PI packs.

2) Strafers with Amp wear down even the toughest PIs pretty quickly. Also, PIs are not too common beyond a couple of areas; also, Strafers often back up their main skill with Magic Arrow and WWS has Lvl 20 Magic Arrow built in. Also, a Strafer can pack a fair bit of elemental damage on the gear (300 poison damage per hit from Treachery's Venom, 30-90 cold damage from Ravenfrost x2, 1-30 Lightning damage on Highlords etc. which helps wear down PIs. If you're using a Rogue merc with Faith, much of her damage will be elemental. If you're using a Might merc, you can arm him for elemental damage (Crescent Moon/Rift/etc).

3) Strafers can engage every monster on the screen at the same time, which reduces the need for block; and if you're using WWS it mitigates the resists issue somewhat.