Building a Sun Paladin

[Dranwin]

Been trying to build a successful sun paladin since I unlocked them last week. They are SUPER strong early game, just domination survival, was able to toe-toe fight Bill and it was awesome..because of their great early game I can usually get them out to Diakara or Sandwyrm..then things fall apart. I don't do enough damage unless I find a sick randart..and my survivability only goes so far to some of the bigger casters...

What is a successful approach?

I have been focusing on Str/Magic/Con at first...Is magic an importance further on? or do I just want the skill level requirements.

I thought maybe Just be a warrior with some great util spells?

[Grey]

Warrior with util spells really. Assault is your main bad boy, but finding a good weapon and shield to match is important too. And pump Weapon of Light to max, it goes great with all the shield tree attacks. Keep your positive bar maxed out with the odd dose of Healing Light, Firebeam, Sunburst, etc - the spells aren't much use themselves compared with the benefits of having a full Pos bar to play with. Beware of randart shields, they tend not to have much shield attack damage (which depends on material type usually). Another nice thing to have is a slime weapon coupled with the projecting attack - you can get several hits in on baddies before they reach you, and they'll be nicely slowed when they finally do. With the light damage attacks they get a pretty easy ride through Tol Falas too. Just remember to get decent stun res, and watch out for freezing buggers...

[greycat]

For one-on-one fights, I like to open with Shield Pummel, then drop a Searing Light on them while they're standing next to me. This gives light damage while they stand there and take my weapon's beating, and it also recharges Positive Energy.

If you focus on defense/armor like a Fighter, then you can still apply this to fights against multiple opponents. Let them come to you (you can use Wave of Power while they're approaching). Don't use Searing Light until they're adjacent. Let that work on one of them while you beat on another one, and hopefully your armor will keep you alive.

That's basically how I played up to the mid game, which is about as far as I've gotten one....

[Dranwin]

Yea, the strategy of stunning in the sunburst is how i've been proceeding and its really effective. I cant decide whether or not heal and barrier are worth pumping. I feel like...since im using them constantly as ways to pump my sun power I should raise them to level 5, but without a decent focus in magic, later on in the game they seem almost like a waste of a turn. Like I could have used that turn to attack and hopefully kill something rather than just heal myself for 100 and take 150.

[Final Master]

You have no reason to not max magic as it effects almost every single talent you will have access to. Also, barrier = one of your most important talents. The damage shielding that it grants scales nicely with both magic and talent level, it also gives you positive energy, AND the duration works PERFECTLY with a certain few other talents. Healing light and Bathe in Light are worth 1 point each to unlock the lvl 3 and 4 talents in that tree that you will probably want to max as well.

I suggest Mag/Str/Con/Dex myself - and going as defensive as possible. Your offense will come and catch up quicker than you think when you are always taking 40% of the damage that you should be.

[Dranwin]

At what point have I "Maxxed magic" or are they're literal maxes to stat levels.

[edge2054]

Providence is great.

Barrier is great.

Healing Light is better for an Anorithil (because it can crit) but it's still good.

Pretty much everything scales with your Magic. I tend to put enough points into strength to wear any gear I want to use and to put a point (and just one point) into assault. The rest go into Magic and Con.

Max weapon of light, as has been said. It scales much better then the shadow blade version and it goes off every time you land an attack. Brandish, Shield Pummel, Assault, and Overpower all hit more then once which means more then one weapon of light proc each turn.

For Chants max resistance first and then (if you have generics to spend) dump some into fortress.

Blind is one of the best crowd controls in the game so Sunflare or whatever the blinding one is is worth investing in but you can put it off till the east.

For AoE damage I'd use Brandish and Retribution, keep energy up with Barrier, Searing Light, Healing Light, and your Blind. This should give you a good balance between offense and defense. Once you feel comfortable with your positive energy bar invest in either second chance or shield of light as a second line of defense.

Final thought on generic talents. The first point in the weapon damage talent is 33%, the next nine give you the other 66%. You get hit from strength and dex so your strength will help you hit more often so you don't need to max the weapon hit talent.

[Sirrocco]

Personally, I play a lot of weapon-based characters (mostly Cursed and wyrmics thus far) and I haven't had one that I've intended to take past 5 in the damage talent. The to-hit talent is more reactive. If you're hitting everything well, leave it alone. If you start missing and it's getting annoying, crank a point or two into it. Sun paladins actually get it a bit easier here, since they *do* have non-hitrate abilities, so you can decide that certain specific almost-impossible-to-hit enemies (like dreads, say) are just going to be handled with spell effects, while you keep your hitrate in a nice range for consistently hitting everything else.

[Hachem_Muche]

Besides what's already been posted, you should keep in mind that a Sun Paladin is a Hybrid class that works best with a balance of skills and stats as you level up. That means improving strength, magic, and con steadily, with an emphasis on str at first, so you can use better weapons and armor.

The biggest problem with the Sun Paladin is the lack of mobility and ranged attacks. (Conscientiously use cover whenever it's available against ranged opponents.) For this reason, I pump up searing light and (especially) sunbeam early on so that I can have decent (medium) ranged attacks and keep my positive energy recharged. By level 15+ you should be able to get into a rythm of alternating physical attacks and magical attacks so that your positive energy is never depleted and you rarely have to wait for resources to keep your offense going (at least for the first several turns in a combat). Between combats, I like to use Bathe in Light (just one point) to keep my positive energy topped off, and it's also one of the few ways available to heal escorts.

Of the weapons and shields skills, you'll probably use shield pummel as your opener most of time (I stop at 3 talent points) as it's the most stamina efficient melee attack, so put a couple of points in it early, and then one point each in Reposte, Overpower, and Assault as they come available. Overpower is a stamina hog, so use it as your 3rd choice (after pummel and assault) against bosses. Reposte eventually gets 5 points, but not until mid game when you are tough enough to brush off 3-4 mobs beating on you simultaneously.

Healing Light, Barrier, and Providence are key end game abilities, but I don't generally skill them up past 1 point until my magic is at least 30-40 so that they are worth using in the middle of combat. (Use an infusion as your primary source of healing.) Providence (one point) is wonderful in the late game when you start facing opponents that dump a lot of debuffs on you (certain very annoying orc casters, in particular), but you won't really need it until you get to the far east.

Of the Divine/Combat tree, I like to focus on Weapon of Light at first and then Wave of Power as soon as it becomes available. WoP is by far your hardest hitting ranged attack and it's range is based on strength, which should be your highest stat throughout the game. Accordingly, I usually max it out even before Weapon of Light.

I hope at least some of this wall of text helps!

[edge2054]

Since I didn't say this earlier and Hachem sorta just touched on it, Barrier probably isn't a great ability to use in the middle of a fight unless you have it at 5/5 with a lot of magic. Up until that point though it's a great pre-cast before you engage (it's also handy for soaking trap damage early on).

Providence is buffed/nerfed on the SVN just as an FYI (the duration has been cut but the healing has been doubled, it was to much of a one point wonder so I'm trying to encourage investing more then one point into it). Also Shield of Light got tweaked a bit (increased the healing at the base and lowered the cost so it'll only take positive energy equal to the damage dealt or 2 points, whichever is less).

[greycat]

At what point have I "Maxxed magic" or are they're literal maxes to stat levels.

Yes, there are actual limits to the number of points you can dump into a stat at a given experience level. You can't get to 60 base stat until something like level 29.

I think the limit goes up about 1.5 points per experience level, so if you're trying to maximize one particular stat, what ends up happening is that on level N you'll be able to put 2 more points in, then on level N+1 you'll be able to put 1 more point in, and so on. The other 1-2 points have to go into a secondary stat.

[Sirrocco]

...and after you've gotten to 60 base stat, you're done and it doesn't go any higher.