Holy Melee Paladin

Well, first of all sorry if this is on the wrong board, the guide board has well just guides so I don't know if I should post it there if this is on the wrong board sorry in advance.

All these years whenever I played Paladin I always used the unholy tree, I remember there were 2 guides from the holy tree on the old forum but it was before the tree was reworked entirely and now after a couple of months of hibernation ( I even lost my old profile and I was kinda active back then, doubt anyone will remember me though) I'm trying to play a holy melee paladin , I just want to know if anyone here tried some build with the new holy skills and how it went, especially compared with the unholy melee variant, if so could you please tell me which skills and stat points you focused just for reference?

Kisses from your favorite uncle.

I remember an uncle Phil back in the old forum. Guess it was you.

To your question: I personally haven't played HM pala until lvl 120. I heard it still does work, but it's rather unpopular because the unholy trees are atm better. (because of the passive stat boost, def boost, transformation and so on... It's just easier and lazier to play)

A couple of positive aspects were given to the HM pala. Plague isn't an uberskill anymore, so you have a better clearspeed now even early on (dunno how good it scales though). Plus you don't have to wait to be hit when using retaliate. You can simply cast the 1st HC skill and all your retaliates automatically retaliate enemies. So this basically gets rid of the whole "damn I can't retaliate because I have too much defense" - "damn I don't have enough defense and die instantly"- problem. You can just go full defense and still retaliate like a pro. But you don't have %DR now in your holy tree. It's now in the BRC.

I really doubt Marco would make a single build completely useless. Just try it out or wait for others to comment.

Indeed the pros of the unholy are way greater as far as I can see but I should try to do a long run with the holy counterpart but whenever I'm reading the holy melee skills I can't seem to understand how it will be powerful enough to at least stand on its own.

HechtHeftig wrote:I really doubt Marco would make a single build completely useless. Just try it out or wait for others to comment.

Yeah I think the same as well, he probably tinkered with it and playtest some skills to see how they evolve

As you said before, main reason Holy tree isn't played is because Unholy is so much better, I however haven't heard good things about Holy Caster (seems like it doesnt hold its own, not just that it's underwhelming when compared to uhc), didn't hear anything about holy meele.

Maybe you can do the test run and report back on meele.

I played kind of a hybrid holy melee when the new tree was introduced and it was pretty fun. Solar Flare, Frozen Breath (eventually becomes just cc skill as mana cost hits the roof on high lvls) and Retaliate were the main killers, Retaliate for crowd control and life/mana leeching, Incarnation gives nice spell dmg for skills/procs and all the ar/ll you need. Plague was not that good even with Retaliates 5/4 wdm. Biggest problem was single target killing, Solar Flare/Hammerstrike just doesn't cut it. So it's pretty much a must to use something like crafted Balefire weapon asap (syncs nicely with Incarnation).

It really sucks that Solar Flare locks oskills but that's how D2 works. Sigma surely fixes that or maybe even MXL 2017?

you can find a few of them here viewtopic.php?f=40&t=491

ChuckNoRis wrote:you can find a few of them here viewtopic.php?f=40&t=491

Oh, thank you! I will try some of them.

Not a very good choice! Dark paladin is better

KENT2222 wrote:Not a very good choice! Dark paladin is better

Character x is better than character y. This is not the best advise to give, and too many people just jump to this conclusion because they are looking for an easy game, rather than one they want to play. Just because Unholy is more efficient than holy, and about 100 times more popular does NOT mean that its not a good choice. I leveled a holy melee and had a blast doing it. The character itself is very fun. Dont get me wrong, it is VERY difficult to do various things throughout the game using the holy spec, I had lots of help/twinking to do it once times got rough and walls were hit, however, as I said, it was hella fun. There are always lots of people around to help. People need to stop jumping to cookie cutter builds and experiment around a little. Just because you can't 1 shot dest baal, does not mean "y" character sucks.

Be a man and get that two handed hammer out and start beating the shit out of things. Trust me. Fun (and frustration) will be had. :hammer:

...or get a long three-bladed spear and unleash deadly punishers, bringing doom to your enemies.

Venom Sting
Holy Lance (Sacred)
Two-Hand Damage: (132 - 147) to (480 - 505)
(Paladin Only)
Required Level: 100
Required Strength: 514
Item Level: 120
Strength Damage Bonus: (0.16 per Strength)%
Amazing Grace
10% Chance to cast level 50 Punishers on Striking
+(2 to 3) to Paladin Skill Levels
60% Attack Speed
+250 to Maximum Damage
150% Bonus to Attack Rating
(30 to 35)% Life stolen per Hit
+(171 to 200)% Enhanced Damage
-35% to Enemy Poison Resistance
+(50 to 100) to all Attributes
Socketed (6)