iamblades said:
Jav is the more durable build, and does better single target damage, bow is good at mowing down rooms full of stuff really efficiently.
With respecs in the game now it might be worth it to level bow and respec jav at max level, dunno how much quicker you can do it.
Nowadays, for everything but PvP javazons outclass bowazons: Bowazons can get decent single target damage with top-end gear due to their potential to attack faster than basically any other class in the game but they will never touch the multi-target damage of even a modestly-geared javazon. The largest advantage that bowazons have is that they are more prepared to deal with single immunes than javazons are but seeing as javazons aren't that bad at it in the first place that's not much reason to shy away from playing them entirely.
Skill builds for javazons are very obvious: more than 90% of your points will be going into synergies for lightning strike and lightning fury. You also want one point in every passive and one point in valkyrie if you're planning on soloing a lot/playing hardcore.
Javazons always use shields and benefit from dex in that it will make them more viable at immune breaking, so I highly recommend that all javazons invest enough dex to get max block. Also, with max block, dodge, evade, and avoid, your relatively small vit investment won't really matter.
EDIT: Misread, didn't see that you were going bow. The problem with just dumping vit is that without stupendous gear you actually will have to pay attention to your chance to hit, so it may become necessary to invest a little more than necessary into dexterity (or to get itd/rtd on your items).
Fallout-NL said:
Hmm, very interesting. Maybe you could provide a full breakdown of skillpoint allocation? Or perhaps link to a guide for a build like this?
PREREQS Total - 10
Teeth
Amplify Damage
Weaken
Iron Maiden
Life tap
Decrepify
Blood Golem
Skeleton Mage
Iron Golem
PRIMARY SKILLS + SYNERGIES Total - 74+
Poison Nova - 20
Poison Explosion - 20
Poison Dagger - 20
Lower Resist - 1+
Corpse Explosion - 1+
Bone Armor - 1
Clay Golem - 1+
SECONDARY SKILLS Total 79+
Golem Mastery - 1+
Summon Resist - 1
Skeleton - 1+
Skeleton Mastery - 1+
Revive - 1
Bone Wall - 0+*
The barebones build occupies 79 points. You should expect to have around 105 to work with after all is said and done, because it is extremely unlikely that you will make it past level 95 (if you do, good for you; you can definitely put the points to good use). I'll explain the plusses below, as well as the inclusion of Bone Wall. There is a LOT of room for variation here.
Lower Resist
This is generally a bad place to invest points unless your gear is very bad. Diminishing returns hit this skill like a rock at around eight points, so if you have more than +6 skills, you should only put one point into this. If you don't, however, this is one of the best investments you can make.
Corpse Explosion
If your gear is high-end, this is where you will want to invest some extra points. I usually invest enough to bring its total up to around skill level 30 once my gear is completed; this usually amounts to around 5 hard points (the remaining 25 coming from gear). This is just preference though, as corpse explosion does not diminish at all and gains exactly .33 yards of effective range every level.
If you plan on running Nihlathak, you will need a high level corpse explosion. If your gear is bad, I would still invest a few points into this anyway, although not too many as your minions will likely need the attention more.
Clay Golem
With mid-range gear, your clay golem will probably never die and you won't need to invest more than a single point into it. But at lower levels and with worse gear, you may feel the itch to put in a few points. The build certainly has room for it, so don't feel too bad if that's the route that you decide to go down.
Golem Mastery
Alternate route for points. Golem Mastery offers more health per point at the expense of not receiving a bonus to slow. The latter is more important if you intend to spend a lot of time fighting act bosses or single targets.
Skeleton
If your gear is not good, skeleton (and skeleton mastery) are absolutely not worthy investments because without a serious boost from gear the skeletons simply will not be able to hold up based solely on your leftover points. However, once you get around, say, +8 skills, skeletons become a seriously viable tank without too much of a point investment. If you plan to use skeletons, you should aim for around 30 soft points, as you will find that it takes a very long time to get extra skeletons after that and they're sort of worthless past ten anyway.
Skeleton Mastery
Plain 'ol skeleton is a better investment most of the time as it nets you more skeletons, but once you reach a magic number (that allots you with however many skeletons you want to work with), skeleton mastery becomes a more worthwhile place to put your points because it offers a greater stat boost and also makes your revives more potent.
Bone Wall
Bone wall is here because bone wall actually provides a greater boost to bone armor than putting points into bone armor does. If you don't feel the urge to cart thousands of skeletons around with you and you want to increase your survivability outright, you should consider investing some points into bone wall. Keep in mind that only hard points affect syneriges, so that having a level 10 bone wall that is only base level one and is boosted to level 10 because you have +9 skills will only add an additional 20 health to your bone wall.
EDIT: It is also worth noting that bone wall is a nice utility skill if you are playing with a group of undergeared characters and you need to do something like Baal's minions where you expect the minions to be in a certain place.
I can paste the exact build that I am using if a reference is needed.
We'll see how it goes.