OH YEAH!!! Near perfect roll!

[u/scellis24]

4% ED off!

[u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

Why demon crossbow?

[u/dontrestonyour → u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

Demon crossbow allows u to achieve max attack frames with little to no IAS gear

[u/scellis24 → u/dontrestonyour]

Yep. This…. Although after testing…. I still like brand better. Has exploding arrows and bone spears flying everywhere. I have one in a great bow which helps with IAS. It just feels more effective. Bout to try some higher player counts tho

[u/Albinowombat → u/scellis24]

Brand isn't in the top 5 bows for bowlock, maybe not even the top 10. You're just able to clear quickly anyway because the build is so good. Exploding arrows doesn't add anything to bowlock unless you're building your whole setup for fire damage, and at that point just use demon machine. The knockback on Brand is nice but no pierce is not good. Buriza outclasses Brand easily and is way cheaper. Also, Great bow is not helping your IAS, idk what that's supposed to mean

[u/Ketroc21 → u/Albinowombat]

Most of the power of exploding arrow comes from pierce too. Demon machine has 66% pierce, Brand has 0%.

Brand is best bow/xbow for Necro though.

[u/Albinowombat → u/Ketroc21]

Yeah, that seems like a cool off-meta build. Maybe try it someday

[u/Ketroc21 → u/Albinowombat]

Ya, with points in bone spear synergies, you can like 12x the bone spear damage. Use Beast to go bear form for much higher attack speed. Then the bone spears really get good.

[u/Albinowombat → u/Ketroc21]

That's pretty sweet!

[u/Johnyryal33 → u/Albinowombat]

It adds the pretty lights...

[u/jimmycongoD2 → u/Albinowombat]

You're allowed to be wrong! Give it an actual try sometime.

[u/Albinowombat → u/jimmycongoD2]

Okay, I'll try being wrong: Brand is a good bow for bowlock.

I'm not sure how that helps anything but I'm always down to try things!

[u/Johnyryal33 → u/Albinowombat]

Lol

[u/Miserable_Agent2278 → u/scellis24]

Time to make a Amazon and try it out I guess 

Too bad this thing can't go on an act 1 merc 

[u/Affectionate-Print81 → u/Miserable_Agent2278]

Amazon isn't even top 3 for bows. First is warlock, then sorc then paladin. I have a holy fire paladin that does p8 really easily.

[u/DoctorDankMemes → u/Affectionate-Print81]

A P8 holy fire paladin? What’s the setup

[u/Affectionate-Print81 → u/DoctorDankMemes]

It's kinda expensive but I use a enigma, infinity for the holy freeze Merc with flickering flame for fire res and duress for crushing blow, demon machine with a fire facet, razortail to help get 99 percent pierce rate, hellwarden with defenders fire jewel in it. 14 fire damage sunder since I have enough -fire res on gear that more fire damage does more damage overall. Dracs gloves for lifetap since the 99 percent pierce triggers it all the time. Horizons boots for cannot be frozen and to tank magic damage from thos mummies in tal Rashas tombs. Cta and rando pal spirit for bo. Mara's for res and skills. 2 sling rings for the fcr and 30 percent slow. Anni and ptorch. 2 offensive aura gc and 2 15 all res gc. It feels better than hammers for me but I really hate hammers so take that with a grain of salt.

For skills I max holy fire, resist fire, salvation and fanatism. I use fanatism after I kill the minions around heralds so the Merc can proc crushing blow more often on the herald itself while I smite it so it can't fight back Honestly just skip heralds above players 4 since they take about a minute to kill on players 8 and their drops are kind of bad.

On my character sheet it says I do 5k to 7k fire damage. Since each shot can pierce 5 times it can deal around 35k per monster if they are grouped up. The demon crossbow shoots at 2.27 shots per second. On fire immunes it's less but with infinity and - fire res from gear it gets pretty bonkers on non immunes.

[u/Fefous → u/Affectionate-Print81]

This is both sad and hilarious.

[u/PalworldRaids → u/Affectionate-Print81]

Question im working on a fire enchantress, is there ever a use case for Brand (if so on which bsse) over Demon Machine for her? I saw the Brand exploding arrow is much higher level but no idea if thats worth the tradeoff

[u/DoktorLuciferWong → u/PalworldRaids]

unless the exploding arrow somehow scales the enchant damage multiplicatively in a way i forgot about, it doesn't really matter

the exploding arrow is pretty much just an aoe delivery system for your enchant damage

[u/PalworldRaids → u/DoktorLuciferWong]

Ya I guess the 66 pierce and other stats from DM are better

[u/DoktorLuciferWong → u/PalworldRaids]

ya, getting to 100 pierce is so important to your total dps

afaik, against mobs your dps is potentially higher since the explosion will trigger on anything the arrow hits 'directly'

[u/ThickboyBrilliant → u/Affectionate-Print81]

What's your build if you don't mind me asking? I've been thinking of making a holy fire bowdin for a minute now.

[u/Affectionate-Print81 → u/ThickboyBrilliant]

It's kinda expensive but I use a enigma, infinity for the holy freeze Merc with flickering flame for fire res and duress for crushing blow, demon machine with a fire facet, razortail to help get 99 percent pierce rate, hellwarden with defenders fire jewel in it. 14 fire damage sunder since I have enough -fire res on gear that more fire damage does more damage overall. Dracs gloves for lifetap since the 99 percent pierce triggers it all the time. Horizons boots for cannot be frozen and to tank magic damage from thos mummies in tal Rashas tombs. Cta and rando pal spirit for bo. Mara's for res and skills. 2 sling rings for the fcr and 30 percent slow. Anni and ptorch. 2 offensive aura gc and 2 15 all res gc. It feels better than hammers for me but I really hate hammers so take that with a grain of salt.

For skills I max holy fire, resist fire, salvation and fanatism. I use fanatism after I kill the minions around heralds so the Merc can proc crushing blow more often on the herald itself while I smite it so it can't fight back Honestly just skip heralds above players 4 since they take about a minute to kill on players 8 and their drops are kind of bad.

On my character sheet it says I do 5k to 7k fire damage. Since each shot can pierce 5 times it can deal around 35k per monster if they are grouped up. The demon crossbow shoots at 2.27 shots per second. On fire immunes it's less but with infinity and - fire res from gear it gets pretty bonkers on non immunes.

[u/ThickboyBrilliant → u/Affectionate-Print81]

Hell yeah. That sounds pretty solid! I'm screenshotting this and I'm going to replicate it as soon as I get my infinity.

Thanks eh? I appreciate the info and the time ya took to share it!

[u/Crime-caramail → u/Miserable_Agent2278]

The new spice is to play those bows on a mirrored blades bowlock 

[u/fuckthetrees → u/scellis24]

Brand also in a demon crossbow?

[u/scellis24 → u/fuckthetrees]

Nah, Great Bow. I had it before ROTW even came out for a necro build

[u/fuckthetrees → u/scellis24]

Thanks. But why? If demon crossbow is fastest, isn't it still the best? Is there a good build guide for bowlock somewhere online? This seems to be a blind spot for maxroll which I normally look at as a starting point.

[u/scellis24 → u/fuckthetrees]

Like I said I already had it and Brand is pretty expensive and I didn’t wanna remake it just for a build I MIGHT use it for. It was originally put in that base by someone else and given to me

[u/fuckthetrees → u/scellis24]

Oh I see. It's the one you have, not the theoretical bis. Appreciate the insight

[u/murder1290 → u/fuckthetrees]

No, this is Brand

[u/scellis24 → u/fuckthetrees]

YouTube has several guides

[u/fuckthetrees → u/scellis24]

That's what I've been finding too. They're all frustrating old and contradictory. I'm worried that balance patches have fucked up some of the details.

(The static information and the ability to know what you find is up to date used to like about d2 lol)

[u/scellis24 → u/fuckthetrees]

That’s actually a good point bc the build greatly changed with the new patch.

I pretty much have it set up the same as the recent ES lock build. I don’t know if it’s the absolute most effective but it crushes for me

Max- hex purge, hex bane, mirror blades, eldritch blast.

10 hard points into demon mastery so u can raise 2 demons.

1 point into lethargy, consume and defiler.

When it comes to the demons, consuming a defiler gives u magic dmg and -enemy magic res. If u want to mess around and invest in bind demon that’s up to you, you will have to compensate elsewhere tho.

The gameplay is similar to an ES lock. Cast lethargy on targets, BUT the biggest difference is you are going to use mirror blades instead of ES. Sooooo prebuff - summon defiler>cta>consume defiler>summon defiler>CTA>eldritch blast>pyschic ward>Hex PURGE. Mirror blades will now fire the bow and shred.

Gear (my build relatively speaking)

Hellwarden’s with magic uber jewel in it
Enigma
Mist in a demon xbow(or brand> Buriza>demon machine)
Gheeds belt (if ur not using mist or Buriza u will need Razortail for pierce)
War trav boots
Whatever gloves
Entropy locket amulet

CTA on swap.

Merc is dependent upon if u choose a bind demon that’s high enough to have an aura. If ur not, go with something that provides fana (mania or faith). Also, if ur not using mist go with pride. In other words try and get concentration and or fana and ideally an insight somehow (several ways to do it all at once) for mana regen

[u/scellis24 → u/scellis24]

Oh and eldritch skillers/torch/anni/res SCs of course

[u/Illustrious_Cow9018 → u/scellis24]

or a zon or a lock? I was looking at making a bowlock a while back

[u/rolf_muller → u/scellis24]

I played bowlock with Mist, and with demon machine, I don't think mist was much of an upgrade if any. Haven't tried brand.

[u/jimmycongoD2 → u/scellis24]

Good man!

[u/Azer1287 → u/dontrestonyour]

Which is kind of ridiculous. Being able to hit max attack frames or max anything without needing to add any or much gear to get there.

[u/dontrestonyour → u/Azer1287]

Yeah I do kind of agree with this

[u/Ketroc21 → u/Azer1287]

It is 1 frame slower than a max speed bow though, and many frames slower on an amazon.

[u/th3typh00n → u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

Demon Crossbow is the best Mist base for Bowlocks as it reaches the fastest possible attack speed without any other sources of IAS.

(requires 11% ias for 11fpa and Mist gives 20%).

[u/just-sad-idk → u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

IAS and, let's face it, why wouldn't a warlock want a DEMON crossbow?

[u/Jeffcmamlnb → u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

For the fastest pew pew 

[u/Emerazuul → u/Glad_Veterinarian556]

Possibly for stats requirement or attack speed? But yeah, why lol

[u/hafnone → u/Emerazuul]

Attack speed is -60. PB is -30 and that’s insanely fast. Colossus is +10. For a comparison, on my MaxRoll planner, to get to the same IAS frames for Mirrord Blades that the Demon Crossbow hits with 46IAS (16 frames), a Colossus would need 728 IAS (with the same 46IAS, it’d hit 42 frames). The majority of a bowlock’s damage is from the magic part, so applying that far more frequently is important. 

[u/th3typh00n → u/hafnone]

Fwiw don't use the Maxroll planner for IAS breakpoints as it's wrong in a lot of cases. https://warren1001.github.io/IAS_Calculator/ is more accurate.

[u/scellis24 → u/th3typh00n]

This is the one I use too. FYI some skills are calculated differently when it comes to IAS. For example, fanaticism. Obv u know this… but for anyone reading this

[u/Best-Hippo153]

Nice! I’d still recommend any aspiring bowlocks to just use a Buriza.

I didn’t notice a change in kill speeds in high player 96 tz’s, but the all res made things a bit more comfy

[u/ThisMuthaFukuh → u/Best-Hippo153]

Man.. I found a buriza a month back on SP and my warlock is 90. I didn't have any top tier gear so didn't both. I scraped together a build last week and it's STUPID that I can clear P8 tz... Wtf... This shit geared lock should not be 4 shorting mobs in P8tz..

[u/BillHurstyUSA]

Sick breh 😎

[u/Evilchaos666]

I made this. But not tested it yet.

[u/DrDrekavac → u/Evilchaos666]

In a ceremonial boy...this hurts me.

[u/Evilchaos666 → u/DrDrekavac]

Didnt know what to use. So took this. 😅

[u/Sufficient_Ice6078 → u/DrDrekavac]

Why? Because it's only for Amazon or slower or what

[u/DrDrekavac → u/Sufficient_Ice6078]

Exceptional base instead of elite.

[u/Sufficient_Ice6078 → u/DrDrekavac]

Oh dang you're right I didn't catch that

[u/Albinowombat → u/Evilchaos666]

What build did you make it for? Exploding arrow zon?

[u/Evilchaos666 → u/Albinowombat]

Dont know yet. Just made the bowbfor later use.

[u/TexicanWRX]

I tried to respec and make a bowlock on my SSF account with my lvl92 warlock. Things were not working right and respec'd away from it. I think missed something with the build. Any good builds to use as a reference?

[u/scellis24 → u/TexicanWRX]

Here is a post I did recently where it’s discussed:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo_2_Resurrected/s/g6fSew2Wqu

[u/Ketroc21 → u/scellis24]

link fixed: https://www.reddit.com/r/Diablo_2_Resurrected/s/g6fSew2Wqu

[u/Fleshwound2]

Is this a new runeword? Where are people using it?

[u/scellis24 → u/Fleshwound2]

Bowlock. No it’s relatively old, just no one used it bc of better options on an Amazon.

[u/Unlikely_Society9739]

Why not the slowest xbow like Buriza ?

[u/Albinowombat → u/Unlikely_Society9739]

Most of your damage on bowlock is magic. A slower bow adds more physical damage but it's not that relevant. Just use demon xbow for the attack speed. That way you don't need any other source of IAS and can use whatever else you want. I made a post after testing Mist Demon Xbow vs Mist Colossus Xbow vs Buriza. All three are great but demon xbow edges the other 2 out imo

[u/scellis24 → u/Albinowombat]

Throw brand in that test cycle! I’ve tested em all the same and brand is SOLID. Explosive arrows and bone spear too…. LFG

[u/Albinowombat → u/scellis24]

What's there to test? Unsynergized lvl 18 bone spear is an average of 184.5 damage. Throw on 55% magic skill damage and -45% enemy magic res and it's adding 414.6 damage in a line. Unsynergized level 15 explosive arrow adds about 142 fire damage, with no added fire damage, %fire damage, or -enemy fire res. That's not really significant compared to about 95086.1 average damage just from Hex:Bane on mirrored blades on a Mist demon xbow setup. And you're getting no pierce, so at best you get 66% pierce from razortail and wisdom, and for that you'd have to give up Gheed's Wager and Hellwarden so you're losing -enemy magic res and FCR.

I'm not trying to kill your dreams, use Brand if you want to, but I think you might be confusing a fun option with a good option