History

First introduced in Build 104 nearly 10 years ago, the Huntress wields a bow and wears leather armor. Her ability is the trap, which damages and debuffs the first enemy to run across it. With the same stat caps as the Archer but a significantly different ability, she is a powerful class that excels at taking down groups of enemies or running dungeons. She is unlocked by reaching level 20 on the Rogue and Archer. To see her stat gains, caps, and averages, click here.

Equipment

The bow is often looked down as a fairly weak weapon but becomes rather deadly in the hands of a Huntress with maxed 75 attack, even without a dexterity boost granted by Archer's quivers.

The Bow of Covert Havens (tradable), Bow of Mystical Energy, and Bow of Deep Enchantment are the most powerful bows in the tiered list. By using a spread of three arrows and enemy piercing, these bows are able to mow down groups of enemies. Players that are particularly skilled at dodging can exploit the "true" range of the three shots (3.56 tiles) to get better damage on single targets. Unfortunately, the weaker damage per shot makes it worse than other UT bows as defense increases.

The Doom Bow (and two reskins) is a slow shooting, hard hitting untiered bow firing one shot. It shines against enemies with (very) high defense as the damage will still be in the hundreds. Since there are only so many shots at a time, precision is required to use this item well. It might be helpful to equip dexterity-increasing items to offset the slow firing rate. Berserk buffs from Warriors and the Lifebringing Lotus trap are more than helpful in this regard. If possible, use sparingly--it's a very valuable item.

On the other hand, the Coral Bow is an untiered bow that only shoots two arrows, but at a higher rate of fire. This allows for players to get both shots in at a further distance away without suffering a noticeable loss in DPS. It is for this reason that the Coral Bow is often used alongside the Doom Bow to clear smaller minions and gods. And, like the Doom Bow, it's a rare and valuable item so try not to use it unmaxed.

The Bow of the Void and the Deathless Crossbow are untiered, single-shooting, very rare bows that boast extraordinary DPS at dagger range. While the Void Bow outputs more damage than Deathless in all cases, Deathless shoots straight, and extremely fast to boot. Though the Thousand Shot is often seen as a middle ground to the Doom Bow and the Coral Bow,
these two bows are the "true" middle ground, boasting great DPS without any glaring weaknesses than range.

Ability

The Huntress's ability is her trap. Traps are persistent, debuffing, AoE attacks that last 20 seconds on the ground and take 1 second to land. Like poisons, they can be thrown into unseen/black tiled areas. Yet it is in the status effects and functional variations these traps come in that gives Huntresses their great flexibility.

As you tiers increase, it's damage, radius, and MP cost greatly increases, coupling with a small attack bonus from T4 and up. Still, good Huntresses carry a variety of traps, for there are specific situations in which each shines.

The starting Hunting Trap is, for the most part, a defensive trap. It's low MP cost allows it to be spammed around the battlefield to Slow enemies in a pinch or around unloaded rooms in tougher dungeons. Here's how: when faced with a new room, launch a trap around the corner, poke your character around the corner, drawing the enemies, and back out. The helpless vampires/brutes/jackals will blindly follow you, activating your trap, and leaving themselves ready to be ripped apart by your powerful bow. Correct use of T0 trap turns otherwise-dangerous dungeons a more approachable affair, and makes the Huntress almost unequaled solo dungeon clearing.

The Giantcatcher Trap (tradable) / Depthchaser Trap are used for their greater damage and area of effect, which make them useful for getting soulbound damage on gods and damaging events and dungeon bosses. While not as damaging as many other abilities, the Giantcatcher Trap deals 350 damage with an attack bonus of 5, and the Depthchaser Trap does 400 with an attack bonus of 6, which is enough to qualify for potion drops on all gods. As of the last class balancing patches (X.15.0.0), all traps have significantly reduced MP costs which makes them more spammable. These traps cost 105 and 110 MP to use respectively so they should not be wasted on enemies that will die quickly.

The Coral Venom Trap is an untiered trap that inflicts Paralyze instead of Slow. It has the same radius as the T0 trap, does the same damage as the Giantcatcher Trap, and costs 100 MP, but is no longer the highest damage dealing trap with the release of the Trap of the Vile Spirit. Unless immune, Paralyze is more helpful to inflict on a group or single target than slow, because it completely immobilizes them. This allows you and your group to hit the enemy more accurately, killing them faster.

The Trap of the Vile Spirit is an untiered event white dropping from the Ghost Ship that allows the Huntress to fulfill a more offensive-oriented role than other traps. This trap completely sacrifices debuffing and has a smaller radius than the T0 trap, for a massive damage increase. While traps such as the Giantcatcher deal 350 damage, the Vile Spirit deals a whopping 650 damage and possesses a cheaper mana cost which enables better spamming for even more damage. This makes the Vile Spirit ideal for situations where damage is favored. Make sure to be precise when you're using it!

The Honeytomb Snare is an untiered trap that expands upon the concept of cheap slows. This trap has the highest radius of any other trap in the game, but only possesses a total Slow duration of 8.4 seconds per "pulse" from the sentry. This trap is designed for dishing out slows to massive hordes of enemies, and compliments the supportive debuffing role if nothing else. This can be very effective in areas with a high monster density, and sees greater effectiveness against enemies that resist Paralyze.

The Cave Dweller Trap is an untiered trap that spawns a Crystal Sentry that attacks single enemies for 5 seconds. This trap is intended for fighting single targets and dealing damage as it inflicts no status effects. It is also very useful for dealing damage to dungeon minions if you're able to spam your ability, creating multiple turrets on the ground, since it only has 0.5s cooldown. When compared to the Trap of the Vile Spirit, the trap can only target one enemy at a time but does more DPS when stacked, cost 10 less mana, and even grants 6 more attack to increase overall DPS.

The Lifebringing Lotus is a special trap that deals no damage and does not inflict any status effect on enemies. However, any players that stand within a certain range of it upon impact will receive {{template-healing}} Healing and {{template-berserk}} Berserk for 4 seconds, making it a viable swapout for when there are no warriors around to apply berserk, or if you are alone. It also has no cooldown, making it easy to have very long buff periods if you have an MP Healing pet.
In addition to its support potential, this trap also has a hefty boost of +5 DEX and +40 MP, allowing for a noticeable increase to your DPS. This item is exceptionally potent if paired with the Centaur’s Shielding armor, which increases the user’s ATT by 12 for 3 seconds when they shoot, but only if inflicted with Red Cross Healing.

Armor

The leather armors worn by the Huntress amplify her protection against enemy attacks and enhance her attack speed through increased dexterity. Leather Armor allows her to take a bit more punishment than Robe classes but less than Heavy Armor.

The Hydra Skin Armor is the best tradable tiered leather armor. It provides Huntress with a substantial boost to her DEF stat and providing +5 Dexterity. The Wyrmhide Armor and Leviathan Armor are a small upgrade, providing +19 / +21 DEF, but are soulbound and can only be acquired by fighting in the Lost Halls or Oryx Sanctuary.

The Spectral Cloth Armor is an untiered leather armor obtained from Davy Jones. This armor amplifies the Huntress’s speed and provides a better DPS boost than a tiered leather armor, while sacrificing some defense. This is an armor that should be used by Huntress who are prioritizing DPS.

The Beehemoth Armor is an untiered leather armor obtained from The Nest and the Killer Bee Nest event. This armor is a very useful rushing armor, as it provides the same defensive strength of Hydra but grants speed instead of dexterity. The armor is beneficial if you want to prioritize moving faster over attacking faster.

Ring

Like other leather armor wearers, the Huntress is a midrange class. For rings, HP is often better than Defense in Godlands but in many dungeons (such as Abyss and UDL) Defence rings become very viable. As a fresh level 20 the Huntress is a good class for farming godlands and soloing Snake Pits and Undead Lairs. However with tiered bows, even after the buff which increased the true range (might be a glitch but reskins are exempt from the spread rebalancing) by about a tile, to try to shotgun everything with all your shots will be risky at times, especially unmaxed as you will have to go into melee range. Instead, play at whatever range you feel safe at (this is partly a reason why tiered bows are less popular than Coral and Doom Bow).

The Ring of the Pyramid is a particularly good ring for the Huntress to use. Having a whopping 75 base attack, the Huntress's damage will stand out even more with the +4 ATT buff for it. Besides, the +4 DEF and 100 HP also help with survival, which is equally important for the Huntress.

The Forgotten Crown is also a very good ring for the Huntress. Having the highest offensive stats in the game, it pounds the DPS of Huntress over the roof. For every class, this ring is better than the Ring Of Unbound Attack at improving DPS, while at the same time providing a 110 hp bonus. However, this ring is notoriously hard to obtain, and if lost, just as hard to get it back. Play with caution.

The favourite of many players, the Ring of Decades. With a 190 HP bonus, what more is there to say? While not essential, this will greatly help survival, especially in tougher dungeons with high damage shots that make your Defense a joke. The Ring of Exalted Health is a cheaper alternative that gives 50 less HP. The regular Unbound Health is still fairly popular because it is a lot cheaper (Unbound is around 3 Life more expensive than Exalted but it gives 40 more HP).

For poorer or unluckier players, the Experimental Ring is also a good ring to have. Compared to the rings above, this is much easier to obtain (one can do so by simply completing a few Mad Labs). This ring is a nice mix of offense and Defense. The 60 MP is beneficial for a huntress, allowing a maxed-mana huntress to throw one extra trap with just a lvl 60 MP heal pet. The 4 VIT, 4 DEF, and 60 HP also aids in survival.

A riskier and a bit more uncommon ring is the Ring of Unbound Attack. This ring compliments the Doom Bow really nicely, boosting its damage through the roof, and can make a huntress have a whopping 99 attack if coupled with the Hirejou Tenne armor and either the Depthchaser or Vile Spirit trap (The Vile Spirit Trap would be recommended for a pure damaging combo). Unlike the The Forgotten Crown, this ring only increases the damage per shot, not the rate of fire. Therefore, this ring is more suited for accurate players that prefer to maximize the damage on a Doom Bow. Using this ring is riskier than others stated above, because it doesn't provide a health boost. If you are willing to sacrifice some survivability for higher damage, then one may prefer to use this ring.

For a tiered offensive ring, it would be preferred to use UBDex rings over ATT counterpart (when she is farming on godland); as it can increase her DPS significantly until 35 defence. The varied nature of UT weapons’ shot count or fire rate will alter the effects of boosted DEX compared to ATT. This said, rings are available that boost both ATT and DEX and will provide better DPS increases than a straight tiered ring.
**Note:** This guide merely states what are a FEW of the BEST rings to obtain.

Set Tiers

The Huntress has **two** Set Tiers composed of 4 items that can be worn together in order to achieve their full potential. If you use at least 2 items of the same set, you receive a stat bonus, which increases the more pieces you wear. When the full set is equipped, your character will instantly transform into a giant magical creature which has unique abilities and bonuses.
{{template-horticultural-huntress-set-navigation}} **Total of Bonuses for using the full set together**: +100 HP, +60 MP, +3 DEF, +13 SPD, +13 DEX **Overall Stat Bonus including the equips**: +100 HP, +170 MP, +13 DEF, +21 SPD, +33 DEX, +5 VIT The Horticultural Huntress Set is a Damage-focused set. The Bergenia Bow bow uniquely pierces armor, in exchange for not piercing enemies. It boasts surprisingly good DPS for an armor-piercing weapon, and has an 8-tile range. The bow’s armor-piercing trait makes it good for higher DEF enemies, as it always outdamages the Doom Bow at any DEF. This bow also has 8 range, the longest of any bow. It is good for clean Tombs; Shatters; and Lost Halls, due to ignoring the high DEF stats of bosses and certain enemies. All the 3 other items as well as the final set status bonus will provide DEX bonuses for the huntress, capping at a total of +33 Dex bonus and 170MP, with the drawbacks of having less defense and a relatively small HP bonus. It's an extremely good DPS set but you could arguably achieve higher damage-per-second by using a DPS build.
{{template-swarming-set-navigation}} **Total of Bonuses for using the full set together**: +40 HP, +5 ATT, +5 DEF, +5 SPD, +8 DEX **Overall Stat Bonus including the equips**: +120 HP, +12 ATT, +22 DEF, +12 SPD, +8 DEX The Swarming Huntress Set is a general-use set that provides a balanced amount of offensive and defensive stats, being outclassed by specific stat-focused sets but able to decently deal with most threats you will face. The Nectar Crossfire bow has 4 shots that deal average damage if you manage to hit all 4 shots, but will be easily outclassed if you do not manage to get all hits in. This set is ideal for clearing large chunks of minions because of the ease to hit multiple enemies with a quad-shot bow, but is arguably outclassed by tiered bows. Also, the bow is terrible against high defense enemies, because the more shots you have the harder it is to pierece an enemy's defense. As said before, it's a general set that doesn't have any specific focus or strenght.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Two main strengths of the Huntress stand out. The first is, as discussed before, her strength in running dungeons safely. The second relates to the "piercing" effect of bows, which allows her to destroy multiple enemies much faster than other classes. Like the Archer, Huntresses are often seen as a "middle of the road" class; it's not as powerful as the Wizard, nor as durable as the Knight, rather it is a good option for those who like to try a bit of everything, midlands, godlands, dungeons, and (when maxed) events - while not being as squishy as robe classes. The Huntress now has greatly reduced trap costs, which is no longer a weakness. Be warned that the Huntress's DPS is rather low when unmaxed and hitting with only one arrow. To get more damage in one must get dangerously close to enemies, which provides the Huntress with an interesting risk vs. reward playstyle. However, when one maxes Defense (and ideally, Attack, Speed, and Dexterity), the Huntress becomes a juggernaut and can be played rather recklessly in godlands with plenty of room for error. Maxed Huntresses also excel at running higher-level dungeons such as the Abyss of Demons and Tomb of the Ancients.

Group Role

The Huntress has somewhat of a role only in dungeons for non-stationary bosses that move around a lot and are hard to hit, like the Crystal and Fungal Cavern , and the role is to slow or paralyze to help get hits easily to kill the boss faster, but in fact rather benefits from soloing dungeons, when one can set and activate traps without the interference of other players. She can, however, get soulbounds with the best of them, and one should in no way be averse to teaming up with other players to run through godlands destroying all in sight.

Event and Dungeon Bosses

Huntresses can play a very important part in taking down Cube Gods and Skull Shrines (where one generally wants a higher-tiered trap). They can launch a trap into the masses of minions in order to make an opening to attack the Cube or Skull or launch traps directly onto the event to qualify for a soulbound drop for not only the Huntress, but the whole group. Dungeon bosses are not immune to the trap's slow and damaging effects if they are under a phase of invulnerability. In that respect, it is still important to time your trap effectively if you plan to get more soulbound damage on a dungeon boss.

Summary

Huntresses can be used to great effect if the trap is used properly, and in the right situation. Great max stats let the Huntress function even better, comparable to a steamroller in the Godlands, and an awesome group support class. The Huntress is a powerful class that isn't frail, and has plenty of room for error. It's also a bit easier to take out constructs on a Huntress using a Coral Venom Trap, as it's easier to paralyze the mobile constructs compared to the Archer's quiver. The Huntress's traps are a perfect mix between offense, defense, and group support, and makes the Huntress stand out from the Archer.

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