New to forums but been playing since launch on all 5 archetypes. Been watching a lot of vids lately on Demon Hunters and notice a lot use Hungering Arrow with either devouring or spray runes. I myself had been using these skills.
Today however i noticed that hungering arrow with spay rune is VERY similar to evasive fire with shrapnel. There are some key differences though
Evasive Fire (shrapnel) VS Hungering Arrow (spray of teeth)
Slightly more single target damage, slightly less aoe damage but doesn't rely on crit for aoe component - everyhit will aoe
Generates 1 extra hatred per shot.
The biggest plus is that if mobs get too close to you it will automatically vault back 15yards.
biggest draw back is no piercing.
So 15yards isn't much but if one of your passives is Tactical Advantage(2sec run speed increase after V, SS ir EF) like im sure many people use, it is effectively hungering arrow using spray with a vault thrown in for good measure when stuff is about to melee you for only 4 discipline cost instead of 8.
One thing I notice when I play my other characters is getting mutiple abilities rolled into one another is a huge boost, so with this 1 ability it seems superior to me to hungering with spray.
TL:DR- why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel
Thoughts?
Personally, i hate when it vaults me, i have a feeling of what my disc. is at depending on how much i've used ect. i don't like when it forces you to vault away. Also i think that with piercing, helps add more single target dps. And to me idc if it relies on crit b/c when you have 45% chance to crit and when you crit you do 80% of trash mobs health it works out perfectly the way i see it.
Being vaulted away at a time where you don't want to be vaulted away is idiotic as fuck. Also, The only point where you should be using Spray of Teeth is if you're at +86% crit chance for singletarget, or 46% for 2 targets. Thing is, you have much stronger abilities for AOE, so having your generator be purely singletarget (devouring arrow) is alot more beneficial than taking another AOE-damage ability, when a chain of ten ball lightnings will get rid of any AOE-pack anyway.
New to forums but been playing since launch on all 5 archetypes. Been watching a lot of vids lately on Demon Hunters and notice a lot use Hungering Arrow with either devouring or spray runes. I myself had been using these skills.
Today however i noticed that hungering arrow with spay rune is VERY similar to evasive fire with shrapnel. There are some key differences though
Evasive Fire (shrapnel) VS Hungering Arrow (spray of teeth)
Slightly more single target damage, slightly less aoe damage but doesn't rely on crit for aoe component - everyhit will aoe
Generates 1 extra hatred per shot.
The biggest plus is that if mobs get too close to you it will automatically vault back 15yards.
biggest draw back is no piercing.
So 15yards isn't much but if one of your passives is Tactical Advantage(2sec run speed increase after V, SS ir EF) like im sure many people use, it is effectively hungering arrow using spray with a vault thrown in for good measure when stuff is about to melee you for only 4 discipline cost instead of 8.
One thing I notice when I play my other characters is getting mutiple abilities rolled into one another is a huge boost, so with this 1 ability it seems superior to me to hungering with spray.
TL:DR- why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel
Thoughts?
Because Hungering Arrow
1. It acts as a homing missle that track mobs like a champ
2. It has 35% chance to pierce the target (and can pierce the 2nd target if it procs), this stacks extremly well with high attack speed and crit chance for Spray rune. eg; Spray aoe effect proc 3 times in a row in 2 secs.
3. You will be suprised to see how much disc the EF will waste when you are fighting melee champion packs in inferno difficulty.
4. HA attack range goes off the screen, makes kiting possible, which is essential in DH gameplay in later stage.
It also depends on how you like to play, I have 4 survive/disc skill, then my aoe generator ( spray of teeth), and my single target is impale with the crit rune.
yeah all very good points i was having a play around with it in act 1 and i just tried doing some act 3 its definately a downer not being able to offscreen mobs which hungering allows you to do. Thanks for the input guys
New to forums but been playing since launch on all 5 archetypes. Been watching a lot of vids lately on Demon Hunters and notice a lot use Hungering Arrow with either devouring or spray runes. I myself had been using these skills.
Today however i noticed that hungering arrow with spay rune is VERY similar to evasive fire with shrapnel. There are some key differences though
Evasive Fire (shrapnel) VS Hungering Arrow (spray of teeth)
Slightly more single target damage, slightly less aoe damage but doesn't rely on crit for aoe component - everyhit will aoe
Generates 1 extra hatred per shot.
The biggest plus is that if mobs get too close to you it will automatically vault back 15yards.
biggest draw back is no piercing.
So 15yards isn't much but if one of your passives is Tactical Advantage(2sec run speed increase after V, SS ir EF) like im sure many people use, it is effectively hungering arrow using spray with a vault thrown in for good measure when stuff is about to melee you for only 4 discipline cost instead of 8.
One thing I notice when I play my other characters is getting mutiple abilities rolled into one another is a huge boost, so with this 1 ability it seems superior to me to hungering with spray.
TL:DR- why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel
Thoughts?
Why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel, Thoughts? Evasive fire will kill you as much as save you. That vault backwards costs discipline. Against fast mobs you will be vaulting back non stop and have no discipline for smoke screen so as soon as they get to you you are dead. And if you are using evasive fire instead of hungering arrow you are using evasive fire as your primary hatred generating which forces you to spam it which forces you constantly lose discipline. And covering fire rune for evasive fire is better for AoE than shrapnel.
Hungering arrow has a huge range, I play at max res and hungering arrow strikes stuff off my screen, evasive fire does not. Hungering arrow also seeks targets so it is good for shooting blindly finding mobs. Hungering arrows pierce is a 35% chance to double damage, thats basically a second chance to crit, that can crit, its insane single target damage.
IMO though, using spray of bone with hungering arrow is a waste of a rune. Hungering arrow is designed for single target damage, the only rune worth using with it, IMO, is devouring arrow. Devouring arrow with a xbow crit build for me has crit upwards of 320k damage. And that is not "extremely lucky" that is a pretty normal occurrence. Plus hungering arrow can kill one target while piercing it to go on and kill a separate target.
I also use evasive fire, but I use covering fire with it. Its great for clearing out packs of mobs and breaking stuff, we all know braking stuff is cool! Plus being that I use it situationally I don't "waste" discipline on it by accident and end up not having enough for smoke screen. It is also mildly useful for invulnerable packs if you use it right.
Besides those 2 I usually use Elemental arrow/frost arrow rune. Makes invulnerable packs go poof stupid fast, great single target damage, annihilates packs, and slows for easier kiting.
As to using tactical advantage I really don't understand that unless you are doing some silly low damage DH build that's designed to tank or run away instead of just killing stuff. Steady Aim, Sharpshooter, Archery and a 2 handed crossbow. Just blow shit up and you don't have to run away. Plus those passives are perfect for under 1 million gold gear DHs, meaning fresh inferno DHs.
Evasive fire takes some time to get used to b/c of the auto vault but I have replace hungering arrow with it entirely. 9/10 times, the auto vault doesn't happen when I don't want it to.
IMO, its much better against elites. I use covering fire and it hits all 3 elites, seems to do more dmg overall - although I haven't theorycrafted it. After changing to covering fire as my primary hatred generator, Act 3 inferno is so much easier for me...
IMO though, using spray of bone with hungering arrow is a waste of a rune. Hungering arrow is designed for single target damage, the only rune worth using with it, IMO, is devouring arrow. Devouring arrow with a xbow crit build for me has crit upwards of 320k damage. And that is not "extremely lucky" that is a pretty normal occurrence. Plus hungering arrow can kill one target while piercing it to go on and kill a separate target.
Spray of Bone constantly procs on original target, which is +50% damage on the first target regardless of priecing. Also, Hungering Arrow with Spray of Bone is the second most effective and spamable aoe ability (with Ball Lightning being the first) that scales extremly well with crit chance and attack speed.
With a lot of people gearing up and starting to use Cluster Arrow with Cluster Bombs as hatred dump, Spray of Bone is the top choice of spammable aoe ability, granted that you have atleast 40%+ crit chance.
I had been using Devouring Arrow since the rune became available, but after I achieved 50% crit chance and tried Spray of Bone, I never went back.
IMO though, using spray of bone with hungering arrow is a waste of a rune. Hungering arrow is designed for single target damage, the only rune worth using with it, IMO, is devouring arrow. Devouring arrow with a xbow crit build for me has crit upwards of 320k damage. And that is not "extremely lucky" that is a pretty normal occurrence. Plus hungering arrow can kill one target while piercing it to go on and kill a separate target.
Spray of Bone constantly procs on original target, which is +50% damage on the first target regardless of priecing. Also, Hungering Arrow with Spray of Bone is the second most effective and spamable aoe ability (with Ball Lightning being the first) that scales extremly well with crit chance and attack speed.
With a lot of people gearing up and starting to use Cluster Arrow with Cluster Bombs as hatred dump, Spray of Bone is the top choice of spammable aoe ability, granted that you have atleast 40%+ crit chance.
I had been using Devouring Arrow since the rune became available, but after I achieved 50% crit chance and tried Spray of Bone, I never went back.
I tear down Inferno butcher in less than 20 seconds, Belial in less than 35 second, and Azmodan before he starts dropping pools using Hungering arrow/devouring arrow with only 22% crit and using just hungering arrow/devouring arrow. I'm sorry, but you will never prove to me that losing that kind of single target damage is worth adding AoE that is just as easily gained by using another ability that is designed to be an AoE ability.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
Hungering Arrow is amazing single, and the 50% AOE is just icing. I say it has made my Azmodan go from one full blood pool duration to just 1-2 blood pool. But that could just be cluster bomb. I find that the damage from evasive fire just drops off, even though it has a lot of advantages.
Hungering arrow can be almost twice as much single target damage than evasive fire! Spray of teeth sacrifices a little bit of that strong single target damage (devouring) for extra AoE damage
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
I never said Spray of Bone IS the best singer target rune in the first place. If you don't understand my point in the second post, here it is:
Spray of Bone is being utilized in a lot of high crit cluster bomb build as an reliable aoe ability, so that the build will not require Elemental Arrow/Spike Trap/Multishot/EF; therefore free up a skill slot for defensive/utility spells.
Spray of Bone DOES proc the +50% damage on its original target, and it scales as better as Devouring Arrow with high end gears.
To sum up the about two just to give you an idea that the rune is not "waste and useless".
Edit: Since you claimed that you can kill azmodan before he starts dropping pools with just hungering arrow and 22% crit chance, I gave it a try and failed with my 61.5% crit chance and 120k dps with no SS. Care to share your DH profile and method?
Evasive fire builds are viable with careful use. The backflip can be as much of a liability as a bonus, especially considering the disc cost. However it is a lot of fun!
I think most people go HA because it's just easier to use. And I think slightly more damage depending on rune.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
I never said Spray of Bone IS the best singer target rune in the first place. If you don't understand my point in the second post, here it is:
Spray of Bone is being utilized in a lot of high crit cluster bomb build as an reliable aoe ability, so that the build will not require Elemental Arrow/Spike Trap/Multishot/EF; therefore free up a skill slot for defensive/utility spells.
Spray of Bone DOES proc the +50% damage on its original target, and it scales as better as Devouring Arrow with high end gears.
To sum up the about two just to give you an idea that the rune is not "waste and useless".
Edit: Since you claimed that you can kill azmodan before he starts dropping pools with just hungering arrow and 22% crit chance, I gave it a try and failed with my 61.5% crit chance and 120k dps with no SS. Care to share your DH profile and method?
I have no interest in sharing my profile with these boards as too many people her QQ and I rag on them for it. I would rather not risk in game harassment.
That being said I wait for my 100% crit to build from sharpshooter, go in and spam hungering arrow and use smoke screen when he targets me with anything. My 5.5k DPS sorceress drops erosion on him and he eventually goes "Blah ur OP" and bends over. Right now with passive I am at 145k DPS, with my actual progression gear set I am also at a 1.45 attack speed. If I start as far from azmodan as I can I get 3-4 guaranteed crit HA's which do over 400k damage on pierce. Killing him as quickly as I can take a bit of luck, but not much.
Also, I understand what you are saying about the spray of bone. But, IMO (in my opinion since you don't seem to understand what IMO means) losing the insane single target damage off devouring arrow is not worth it. I am not saying you are wrong and I am not attacking you so stop getting all defensive. I am saying that IN MY OPINION it just isn't worthwhile.
If you have 50% crit on top of a 35% pierce and you are doing a crit damage build like I am (2h xbow w/crit dmg & a socket with a emerald on top of crit/crit damage on every item it is available on running marksman) you should be able to whole sale slaughter any boss in the game faster than I do. Either that or you are using 1 hand crossbows, at which point I would not fault you for using spray of bone as that would probably equate out to more damage at that point.
Edit: Also, sometimes I kill him before pools. I made it sound as if that was the norm, it is not, that's my bad. Also I logged in game to check my progression gear stats, I am at 34% crit in progression gear right now. 22% is my MF junk. So, my bad x2.
I personally use Evasive Fire - Covering Fire it's great AoE and it still does 125% damage. I kinda like the vault on it but it does get annoying somethings especially vs a single fallen or something to that nature. I farm Act 2 alot because it's so easy and I can wear my MF gear but ay, that's just me.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
I never said Spray of Bone IS the best singer target rune in the first place. If you don't understand my point in the second post, here it is:
Spray of Bone is being utilized in a lot of high crit cluster bomb build as an reliable aoe ability, so that the build will not require Elemental Arrow/Spike Trap/Multishot/EF; therefore free up a skill slot for defensive/utility spells.
Spray of Bone DOES proc the +50% damage on its original target, and it scales as better as Devouring Arrow with high end gears.
To sum up the about two just to give you an idea that the rune is not "waste and useless".
Edit: Since you claimed that you can kill azmodan before he starts dropping pools with just hungering arrow and 22% crit chance, I gave it a try and failed with my 61.5% crit chance and 120k dps with no SS. Care to share your DH profile and method?
I have no interest in sharing my profile with these boards as too many people her QQ and I rag on them for it. I would rather not risk in game harassment.
That being said I wait for my 100% crit to build from sharpshooter, go in and spam hungering arrow and use smoke screen when he targets me with anything. My 5.5k DPS sorceress drops erosion on him and he eventually goes "Blah ur OP" and bends over. Right now with passive I am at 145k DPS, with my actual progression gear set I am also at a 1.45 attack speed. If I start as far from azmodan as I can I get 3-4 guaranteed crit HA's which do over 400k damage on pierce. Killing him as quickly as I can take a bit of luck, but not much.
Bullshit. It was proved long ago that no matter the distance to the boss, if you crit the target, then it'll reset - and any shots fired after will start with your 22%+3% crit chance. You can't get 3-4 "guaranteed" HA crits. As you can see, proven by this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqkpDBEf_T4&feature=player_embedded The second shot is fired before the first shot hits Asmodan, which means while sharpshooter had 100% crit chance. It doesn't crit.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
I never said Spray of Bone IS the best singer target rune in the first place. If you don't understand my point in the second post, here it is:
Spray of Bone is being utilized in a lot of high crit cluster bomb build as an reliable aoe ability, so that the build will not require Elemental Arrow/Spike Trap/Multishot/EF; therefore free up a skill slot for defensive/utility spells.
Spray of Bone DOES proc the +50% damage on its original target, and it scales as better as Devouring Arrow with high end gears.
To sum up the about two just to give you an idea that the rune is not "waste and useless".
Edit: Since you claimed that you can kill azmodan before he starts dropping pools with just hungering arrow and 22% crit chance, I gave it a try and failed with my 61.5% crit chance and 120k dps with no SS. Care to share your DH profile and method?
I have no interest in sharing my profile with these boards as too many people her QQ and I rag on them for it. I would rather not risk in game harassment.
That being said I wait for my 100% crit to build from sharpshooter, go in and spam hungering arrow and use smoke screen when he targets me with anything. My 5.5k DPS sorceress drops erosion on him and he eventually goes "Blah ur OP" and bends over. Right now with passive I am at 145k DPS, with my actual progression gear set I am also at a 1.45 attack speed. If I start as far from azmodan as I can I get 3-4 guaranteed crit HA's which do over 400k damage on pierce. Killing him as quickly as I can take a bit of luck, but not much.
Bullshit. It was proved long ago that no matter the distance to the boss, if you crit the target, then it'll reset - and any shots fired after will start with your 22%+3% crit chance. You can't get 3-4 "guaranteed" HA crits. As you can see, proven by this video:The second shot is fired before the first shot hits Asmodan, which means while sharpshooter had 100% crit chance. It doesn't crit.
I don't know if true or not, but keep in mind Nether Tentacle is very slow and most of us are not stacking IAS like pre 1.03 anymore either. You still have that 1 second to contiously crit right? Hungering Arrow is a lot faster, but I am still hesitant it can get 3 or 4 guaranteed crit in. Maybe he can get 2 crit atleast? But if that's the case, it makes more sense to try to crit with 2x cluster bombs.
IMO though, using spray of bone with hungering arrow is a waste of a rune. Hungering arrow is designed for single target damage, the only rune worth using with it, IMO, is devouring arrow. Devouring arrow with a xbow crit build for me has crit upwards of 320k damage. And that is not "extremely lucky" that is a pretty normal occurrence. Plus hungering arrow can kill one target while piercing it to go on and kill a separate target.
Spray of Bone constantly procs on original target, which is +50% damage on the first target regardless of priecing. Also, Hungering Arrow with Spray of Bone is the second most effective and spamable aoe ability (with Ball Lightning being the first) that scales extremly well with crit chance and attack speed.
With a lot of people gearing up and starting to use Cluster Arrow with Cluster Bombs as hatred dump, Spray of Bone is the top choice of spammable aoe ability, granted that you have atleast 40%+ crit chance.
I had been using Devouring Arrow since the rune became available, but after I achieved 50% crit chance and tried Spray of Bone, I never went back.
I tear down Inferno butcher in less than 20 seconds, Belial in less than 35 second, and Azmodan before he starts dropping pools using Hungering arrow/devouring arrow with only 22% crit and using just hungering arrow/devouring arrow. I'm sorry, but you will never prove to me that losing that kind of single target damage is worth adding AoE that is just as easily gained by using another ability that is designed to be an AoE ability.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
Because this game is about fighting groups of mobs. Once you get down to a single target, you've already won the fight. Congratulations. It doesn't matter how fast you can mow down a boss, they drop crap.
Another point no one has mentioned yet is that Spray of Teeth has fantastic synergy with Nightstalker for massive discipline regeneration, which is also more important than killing that one monster really fast.
P.S. Spray of Teeth is designed to be an AoE ability.
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New to forums but been playing since launch on all 5 archetypes. Been watching a lot of vids lately on Demon Hunters and notice a lot use Hungering Arrow with either devouring or spray runes. I myself had been using these skills.
Today however i noticed that hungering arrow with spay rune is VERY similar to evasive fire with shrapnel. There are some key differences though
Evasive Fire (shrapnel) VS Hungering Arrow (spray of teeth)
One thing I notice when I play my other characters is getting mutiple abilities rolled into one another is a huge boost, so with this 1 ability it seems superior to me to hungering with spray.
TL:DR- why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel
Thoughts?
Just my 2 cents
Because Hungering Arrow
1. It acts as a homing missle that track mobs like a champ
2. It has 35% chance to pierce the target (and can pierce the 2nd target if it procs), this stacks extremly well with high attack speed and crit chance for Spray rune. eg; Spray aoe effect proc 3 times in a row in 2 secs.
3. You will be suprised to see how much disc the EF will waste when you are fighting melee champion packs in inferno difficulty.
4. HA attack range goes off the screen, makes kiting possible, which is essential in DH gameplay in later stage.
Why use hungering with spray when you could have evasive fire with shrapnel, Thoughts? Evasive fire will kill you as much as save you. That vault backwards costs discipline. Against fast mobs you will be vaulting back non stop and have no discipline for smoke screen so as soon as they get to you you are dead. And if you are using evasive fire instead of hungering arrow you are using evasive fire as your primary hatred generating which forces you to spam it which forces you constantly lose discipline. And covering fire rune for evasive fire is better for AoE than shrapnel.
Hungering arrow has a huge range, I play at max res and hungering arrow strikes stuff off my screen, evasive fire does not. Hungering arrow also seeks targets so it is good for shooting blindly finding mobs. Hungering arrows pierce is a 35% chance to double damage, thats basically a second chance to crit, that can crit, its insane single target damage.
IMO though, using spray of bone with hungering arrow is a waste of a rune. Hungering arrow is designed for single target damage, the only rune worth using with it, IMO, is devouring arrow. Devouring arrow with a xbow crit build for me has crit upwards of 320k damage. And that is not "extremely lucky" that is a pretty normal occurrence. Plus hungering arrow can kill one target while piercing it to go on and kill a separate target.
I also use evasive fire, but I use covering fire with it. Its great for clearing out packs of mobs and breaking stuff, we all know braking stuff is cool! Plus being that I use it situationally I don't "waste" discipline on it by accident and end up not having enough for smoke screen. It is also mildly useful for invulnerable packs if you use it right.
Besides those 2 I usually use Elemental arrow/frost arrow rune. Makes invulnerable packs go poof stupid fast, great single target damage, annihilates packs, and slows for easier kiting.
As to using tactical advantage I really don't understand that unless you are doing some silly low damage DH build that's designed to tank or run away instead of just killing stuff. Steady Aim, Sharpshooter, Archery and a 2 handed crossbow. Just blow shit up and you don't have to run away. Plus those passives are perfect for under 1 million gold gear DHs, meaning fresh inferno DHs.
IMO, its much better against elites. I use covering fire and it hits all 3 elites, seems to do more dmg overall - although I haven't theorycrafted it. After changing to covering fire as my primary hatred generator, Act 3 inferno is so much easier for me...
Spray of Bone constantly procs on original target, which is +50% damage on the first target regardless of priecing. Also, Hungering Arrow with Spray of Bone is the second most effective and spamable aoe ability (with Ball Lightning being the first) that scales extremly well with crit chance and attack speed.
With a lot of people gearing up and starting to use Cluster Arrow with Cluster Bombs as hatred dump, Spray of Bone is the top choice of spammable aoe ability, granted that you have atleast 40%+ crit chance.
I had been using Devouring Arrow since the rune became available, but after I achieved 50% crit chance and tried Spray of Bone, I never went back.
I tear down Inferno butcher in less than 20 seconds, Belial in less than 35 second, and Azmodan before he starts dropping pools using Hungering arrow/devouring arrow with only 22% crit and using just hungering arrow/devouring arrow. I'm sorry, but you will never prove to me that losing that kind of single target damage is worth adding AoE that is just as easily gained by using another ability that is designed to be an AoE ability.
I mean, why give up that kind of insane single target DPS when I can just get evasive fire/covering fire or elemental arrow/frost arrow which mows down mobs in less time? Makes no sense at all IMO.
Scatter Trap & Jagged Caltrope.
Hungering Arrow is amazing single, and the 50% AOE is just icing. I say it has made my Azmodan go from one full blood pool duration to just 1-2 blood pool. But that could just be cluster bomb. I find that the damage from evasive fire just drops off, even though it has a lot of advantages.
profile: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/vanboon-1499/hero/3962228
http://i.imgur.com/8AfIp.jpg 4/4pc natalyza dps: 73k (w/o ss), dex: 1967, health: 22k, resist: ~150, mf: 90%/261%
I never said Spray of Bone IS the best singer target rune in the first place. If you don't understand my point in the second post, here it is:
Edit: Since you claimed that you can kill azmodan before he starts dropping pools with just hungering arrow and 22% crit chance, I gave it a try and failed with my 61.5% crit chance and 120k dps with no SS. Care to share your DH profile and method?
I think most people go HA because it's just easier to use. And I think slightly more damage depending on rune.
I have no interest in sharing my profile with these boards as too many people her QQ and I rag on them for it. I would rather not risk in game harassment.
That being said I wait for my 100% crit to build from sharpshooter, go in and spam hungering arrow and use smoke screen when he targets me with anything. My 5.5k DPS sorceress drops erosion on him and he eventually goes "Blah ur OP" and bends over. Right now with passive I am at 145k DPS, with my actual progression gear set I am also at a 1.45 attack speed. If I start as far from azmodan as I can I get 3-4 guaranteed crit HA's which do over 400k damage on pierce. Killing him as quickly as I can take a bit of luck, but not much.
Also, I understand what you are saying about the spray of bone. But, IMO (in my opinion since you don't seem to understand what IMO means) losing the insane single target damage off devouring arrow is not worth it. I am not saying you are wrong and I am not attacking you so stop getting all defensive. I am saying that IN MY OPINION it just isn't worthwhile.
If you have 50% crit on top of a 35% pierce and you are doing a crit damage build like I am (2h xbow w/crit dmg & a socket with a emerald on top of crit/crit damage on every item it is available on running marksman) you should be able to whole sale slaughter any boss in the game faster than I do. Either that or you are using 1 hand crossbows, at which point I would not fault you for using spray of bone as that would probably equate out to more damage at that point.
Edit: Also, sometimes I kill him before pools. I made it sound as if that was the norm, it is not, that's my bad. Also I logged in game to check my progression gear stats, I am at 34% crit in progression gear right now. 22% is my MF junk. So, my bad x2.
Bullshit. It was proved long ago that no matter the distance to the boss, if you crit the target, then it'll reset - and any shots fired after will start with your 22%+3% crit chance. You can't get 3-4 "guaranteed" HA crits. As you can see, proven by this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqkpDBEf_T4&feature=player_embedded The second shot is fired before the first shot hits Asmodan, which means while sharpshooter had 100% crit chance. It doesn't crit.
I don't know if true or not, but keep in mind Nether Tentacle is very slow and most of us are not stacking IAS like pre 1.03 anymore either. You still have that 1 second to contiously crit right? Hungering Arrow is a lot faster, but I am still hesitant it can get 3 or 4 guaranteed crit in. Maybe he can get 2 crit atleast? But if that's the case, it makes more sense to try to crit with 2x cluster bombs.
profile: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/vanboon-1499/hero/3962228
http://i.imgur.com/8AfIp.jpg 4/4pc natalyza dps: 73k (w/o ss), dex: 1967, health: 22k, resist: ~150, mf: 90%/261%
Because this game is about fighting groups of mobs. Once you get down to a single target, you've already won the fight. Congratulations. It doesn't matter how fast you can mow down a boss, they drop crap.
Another point no one has mentioned yet is that Spray of Teeth has fantastic synergy with Nightstalker for massive discipline regeneration, which is also more important than killing that one monster really fast.
P.S. Spray of Teeth is designed to be an AoE ability.