Sun Paladin Guide-Sustains and Shields 1.25

[Atarlost]

Shield of Light consumes positive energy each time it triggers. If you use a lot of positive consuming attacks, it won't work. Hence why my guide ignores any consumers and focuses just on generators.

I won't say this was never a concern, but I didn't have any real problems. Brandish wasn't spammed, but I used it for groups and Wave of Power saw very heavy use. I suspect I ran a higher crit rate than you since I ran low strength in favor of cunning and dex (with precise strikes). Being a ghoul probably didn't help either. lower speed=fewer actions=fewer crits=fewer Sun's Vengeance procs=fewer Sun Ray cooldown reductions=less positive energy.

[Red]

I just did a quick search. The first level 50 Sun Paladin and the first level 50 Corruptor from the character vault were used.

The Sun Paladin, with 5/5 Shield of Light, healed just under 17 HP per hit.

The Corruptor, with 1/5 in Fearscape, did 70 damage per turn.

Shield of Light is great at dealing with DoT, but Fearscape has such a huge DoT it doesn't work there. While I still wouldn't advise swapping out of sword and board to handle it (dispersal is a much better option, and chances are you can tank the damage without a ton of trouble so long as you play LoS games or kill the Corruptor quicklike) this is a case where Shield of Light is not the answer.

As for you having much more positive energy, I've never personally managed to get 100% crit rate. With anything. I've never ran high crit classes, but it still seems like something that's done more on Insane (with your extra rares) or with item vaulting, so I don't rely on crit procs as much as top-notch builds do.

[Atarlost]

I just did a quick search. The first level 50 Sun Paladin and the first level 50 Corruptor from the character vault were used.

The Sun Paladin, with 5/5 Shield of Light, healed just under 17 HP per hit.

The Corruptor, with 1/5 in Fearscape, did 70 damage per turn.

Shield of Light is great at dealing with DoT, but Fearscape has such a huge DoT it doesn't work there. While I still wouldn't advise swapping out of sword and board to handle it (dispersal is a much better option, and chances are you can tank the damage without a ton of trouble so long as you play LoS games or kill the Corruptor quicklike) this is a case where Shield of Light is not the answer.

Halve the DoT for Retribution and that's 35. Apply resistance. I had 55%, but let's pretend I had no fire resistance or heart of poosh so just 15% from thick skin. That's down to 30. The heal is 17 and a fraction. Spell crit was 68%. Crit mult 215% That makes an average heal of 30 and a fraction. Worst case I would have had to switch off between retribution and barrier/bathe in light while evading if I got fearscaped by something I couldn't kill. The DoT element of the Fearscape certainly wouldn't be the threatening part; it would be the tiny, inescapable level that counting as a demon wouldn't help with. It might be worth swapping against luminous/radiant horror randbosses with fearscape since you'd want to shut off SoL for them anyways, but that's an awfully rare contingency to waste even a pack slot on, much less talent points.

As for you having much more positive energy, I've never personally managed to get 100% crit rate. With anything. I've never ran high crit classes, but it still seems like something that's done more on Insane (with your extra rares) or with item vaulting, so I don't rely on crit procs as much as top-notch builds do.

My melee crit rate was "only" 79% for my sword and 77% for the shield. Of course riposte adds 33% so those had been maxed for a while. If I hadn't been a shalore that would drop to 69% and 67%, but would still hit 100% even for the shield on ripostes. A lucky normal difficulty endgame character looks more like my staff paladin test at 104% melee and 75% spell crit with 266% crit mult on a cornac. You may as well hope for the latter because in building towards it you at least wind up something like the former.

[Red]

And that's why I'm on normal-I forget the little details. And the medium sized ones. And sometimes large ones. Point taken, Shield of Light even wrecks massive DoT. You'd need a truly ridiculous rare with something like 200-400 DoT to really hurt.

How? How do you get these numbers? I have never managed to get numbers like that on any character.

[Red]

Made an edit to the Shield of Light entry about DoT effects. Thank you for the info, Atarlost.

[Atarlost]

And that's why I'm on normal-I forget the little details. And the medium sized ones. And sometimes large ones. Point taken, Shield of Light even wrecks massive DoT. You'd need a truly ridiculous rare with something like 200-400 DoT to really hurt.

How? How do you get these numbers? I have never managed to get numbers like that on any character.

95 cunning: 28.5%
Precise Strikes (TL 7) at 90 dex : 27%
Sun's Vengence (TL 6.5): 12%
Magic of the Eternals (TL 5): 10%
Riposte (TL 5.6): 33% on the first 3 weapon hits after a block
Ring of the Warmaster: 5% on weapon attacks (also why Combat Techniques and Shield Offense have 1.4 multipliers)
Morrigor: 12% spellcrit and 7% crits with Morrigor
Randart Shield: 5% crits with Randart Shield

So basically stack cunning and dex, max Precise Strikes, and look for crit boosting gear. Precise Strikes would have been a little weaker without the ring of the warmaster so it's probably giving 10 or 11 melee crit, which is nice but not exceptional. I wound up with +10% mental crit just from it being on a couple randarts I was wearing for other reasons so the boost from Warmaster isn't exactly something I couldn't have gotten otherwise.

The staff test cornac had no precise strikes or magic of the eternals and less cunning from gear, but had a +18% phys crit staff, +10% from dakhtun's gauntlets, enough +luck equips to more than offset the lower cunning, +18% phys and spell crit from other equipment, and 12% melee crits from Righteous Strength. He struggled finding good staves for most of the game, but that second merchant staff was a monster with a ridiculous crit rate, a higher crit multiplier boost than Dakhtun, and significant extra and negative life, armor, defense, and two oncrit bursts for clearing bone shields before the real damage hit.

[Red]

Okay, it's making more sense now. I just don't build for crits, you do, so that explains the gulf of differences.

I won't really be making any changes to the guide based on crits, since this build focuses on other things, but that's good to know for future characters. Thanks.

[OrionJAnderson]

Your analysis of racial synergies is screwy, largely because you over-value life rating. Life rating is very important in general, but it's not especially important for a paladin; on the contrary, it's unusually unimportant. First, you're a class with a life bonus. A ghoul may have 16, but a shalore still has 11. That's a big difference, but that doesn't matter because 11 is enough. Sun Paladins, especially sword and board paladins, have healing and shields and cleanse all over the place. That means you only need enough health to avoid instant death and you have the tools to recover. And if you're smart about how you come around corners, then you can include a few hundred points of barrier in your "max health."

What that means is that you've way underestimated Shaloren. Global speed means more time to cast additional heals and shields, which also generates more positive energy. Crit bonuses make it easier to proc free sunrays, generating yet more positive energy, and increase the effectiveness of all your survival spells. Timeless extends the duration of your Providence while bringing your tank spells back off cooldown. It also means you've way over-estimated ghouls. Paladin is a great class for ghouls, but that doesn't mean ghouls are a good class for paladins. You shouldn't need that much CON or burst resistance. Retch is nice for the AoE damage, but if you need a heal-over-time button you have bathe in light. Gnaw is just bad, so the leap is really the only good part. You also underestimate halflings. Whether they're better thandwarves or just equally good is a matter of opinion, but they're not worse. Critical chance is just too strong on paladins.

Higher are terrible. You don't want any points in willpower, so their first racial will be pretty much useless. None of their talents does anything you want or need. They are seriously worse than Yeeks. Yeeks are bad, but at least they get silence resistance. Confusion and Silence are killer statuses, silence resistance is rare, and global speed never hurt anybody. You left out Ogres (the way better option for massive HP) and deliberately omitted doomelves. I'd rate them solidly average. Their first racial is a double teleport that is great for paladins. Their second is a defense passive that's mostly redundant for paladins. The third is weird, and the fourth looks useful for bosses but not oustanding (I haven't gott then on my doomelves yet)

[Atarlost]

You left out Ogres

No he didn't. It's a 1.25 guide that hasn't been updated.

[OrionJAnderson]

Weapon of Light: This talent is beautiful. Because nearly all your attacks are weapon based, this adds a lot of light damage to everything you do, and the defensive bonuses from powering up damage shields lets you make any attack operate as just a little bit of defense too.
5/5

Weapon of Wrath: More weapon damage? Yes please. This talent, just like Weapon of Light, will seriously buff your damage once a fight gets going. the Martydom effect works great with your immense HP pool, as does the extra damage based on lost life. Once you get Weapon of Wrath, it's worth your time to save Shielding effects for part way through a fight, once you've taken a few hits and can gain extra damage.

5/5

I'm surprised you would invest this much. These skills add damage per-hit. As a ghoul without blinding speed, you're not going to make a lot of attacks. With 5/5 assault and 5/5 crusade, you're blowing people up with spike damage.

Sun Ray: Nice bit of extra damage, one of your longer ranged abilities. Overall not very useful on this build except in conjuction with Sun's Vengeance.
1/5

I think this is absolutely worth the 3/5 for the blind. Even in the late game it can save you a lot of trouble from archers and casters, and you'll be casting it for free.

Suncloak: An absolutely godly ability that this build cares very little for. Since very few spells are used by this build, the spell bonuses are mostly irrelevant. The main reason to get Suncloak is to get is to drop the maximum amount of damage you can take, however, if you play as a Ghoul you already have this effect passively.
0/5 for Ghouls, X/5 for other races

Your build uses Crusade, Retribution, Path of Light, Healing Light, Providence, and Barrier. The problem isn't that you don't use spells; it's that spell speed interacts poorly with global slow. And, of course, that you already have the defense passive. For non-ghouls and builds with weapon actives, the speed can be great. Wave of Power and brandish are also spells.

Fast Metabolism X/5
Spell Shield X/5

Why? The regen on fast metabolism is pretty irrelevant next to your healing. Spell save is nice but you're already rocking the chant. I'd think anything spend here would be better spent on more stamina, on riposte, or on sun ray.

Riposte 1/5

This allows an extra counterstrike at 4/5 (or maybe 5/5 for sun paladins?)

Temporal Form-The first prodigy I got in my play through, with Irresistible Sun second. Not a bad choice if you're having trouble with status and the immunites would help or you happen to have a ton of temporal damage gear lying around, but probably not worth it. Only on the list because I personally played with it.

You shouldn't need temporal damage gear. It says it sets your temporal damage bonus equal to your highest damage bonus, so just stack +light.

[huldu]

I see a lot of "love" for the teleportation rune, which is quite a surprise for me. I'd say it might have saved me at most 10% of the time when I needed it and that's being optimistic! It has got me killed far more often than not. But yes, you'd use it when there often is no other alternative. I just hate counting RNG to save you because that rarely happens in reality. That's why I personally do not like the rune and how it works, the lack of control over it and it's purely RNG based(like much else in the game sadly).

Looks like an interesting class, unlocked it a couple of days ago and tempting to give it a try. I only play on roguelike so I'm used to dying a lot on various classes. Highest I've got so far is 37 on a summoner but way too many close calls for my liking. Just trying to find a class that can take me to 50 without dying(lol).

[Effigy]

Teleport rune is random, but it's invaluable as a tool for reseting fights or escaping from an unwinnable situation. The key is using it before you run out of other options, so you're not completely screwed if it drops you near some other enemies. If you're in a situation where you feel the need to use it, in my experience it has a better than average chance of putting you in a better position. That being said, random is random.

I try to have a Teleport-like effect on every character I play, and as early as possible. It really is a game changer if you use it properly.

[Tigerle]

Wave of Power is imho one of the best paladin skills and worth to get on 4/5. It is a melee attack from afar with bonus damage and a possible 2nd attack. If you collect chance to daze you can make your enemies harmless before going near and use your rush for another target. Don't be worried about ranged attackers!

[Atarlost]

Wave of Power is imho one of the best paladin skills and worth to get on 4/5 for maximal range. It is a melee attack from afar with bonus damage and a possible 2nd attack. If you collect chance to daze you can make your enemies harmless before going near and use your rush for another target. Don't be worried about ranged attackers!

Range is based on strength. Talent points only effect the damage and the chance of a second attack, at least up to 1.33. I suppose it may have been changed in the development branch.

[Tigerle]

yes, you're right. 4/5 for maximal range was path of light
But nevertheless some points in WoP are good.