Temple Guardian - Combat Support build - "Paladin"

[Viper7 0]

Note: this build has only been tested to level 87, (silver and gold difficulties completed). This is console build so theres no guarantee that it works as well in PC version(mainly due to difference in hot key system). At least based on the changes that I have heard on the upcoming expansion it should not have much effect on this build, all skills rings will just not help as much but death blow should still work rather well with melee, however the gear I have used to level 87 is not all that good so the changes should not affect this build much.

 

The build should be very Hardcore cabeable as it goes a bit overkill on the defensive features of TG by using shield, armor and HP.

 

The build is NON-utility build so its recommended to have a high level character with at least bargaining to support the character with all skills rings and other good rings such as shield energy +X%, absorption warding energy +X%, etc etc.

The build is Paladin build (a bit like in Diablo 2) which means it was build to be a "tank" with high supportive elements like healing, boosting teams damage/attack/defense, while fighting along their side. .

 

What kind of char will this build develop to?:

Atleast based on logic and my knowledge Paladin should become a TG with really high survivability because of insanely high reflect(high level combat alert.), damage migitation(Toughness, armor lore mastery, shield[reduce], gear), armor(armor lore, toughness and gear ) and HP (constitution mastery.)

 

The melee damage probably wont be as high as with some TG builds, nor will you do much damage with source warden (PALADIN is not an Area of Effect MAGE!) so we tend to focus on having SW-Combat Arts as more of debuff's or boosts to help ourselves and the team.) However trough tactics lore and battle extension/Dedicated blow the char will do fairly good damage to take down the bosses without too much trouble.

 

 

Attributes

I use these mainly to balance the atribute growth so if you want you can also

- But points to stamina (to get high level buff's and Combat Arts as quickly as possible)

- But points to vitality (to get insane hp regeneration and overall hp)

- But points to willpower (increased spell resistance and more shield power)

- But points to strength (to improve the overall damage and attack accuracy)

 

why not int you may ask, well main reason is that this build is not aimed to be an huge Magic damage dealer and putting enough points to int for it to actually matter might severely handicap your char. Attributes like stamina, vitality and dex increase far more things than just spell damage.

 

1-50: Stamina (100%)

Stamina is great since it lowers your ca Regen ratios. This allows you to have higher level CA:s at beginning.

 

50-80: Dexterity and Vitality (50%/50%)

combat alert gives nice boost to defense, but we need more base defense for it to be more useful. Dex boosts both attack and defense and TG:s normal growth rate in these 2 attributes is poor so increasing them manually doesn't hurt.

 

81-100

Since around level 80 and 81 the dexterity starts to be quite high compared to other stats its nice to use these attribute points to balance out other stats as well. At 81 I decided to swap dexterity with willpower to increase the shields power. As shield gives nice damage migitation its good to have it around for much longer.

 

101+: havent decided yet *unsure*

 

Skills:

 

1. Devout guardian focus (good to keep high, also gives mod points to dg Combat Arts)

Well we need this to improve DS, Combat alert, T-energy shroud and battle extension and dedicated blow so its great to have it as soon as possible.

 

2. Armor lore (master as soon as possible)

Paladin has always been a class that can take damage, with armor lore mastery we will open up these great damage mitigation modifiers in armors and pauldrons. Also Armor lore + toughness will improve your armor and mitigation a lot.

 

3. Tactics lore (good to keep high, also gives mod points to dg Combat Arts)

Combat alert is one way to improve our characters damage dealing cabeabilities. Now lets combine it with another one to really increase the damage. at level 40 or so combat alert gives me around 200% dmg boost while tactics lore gives around 200% as well.

 

4. Constitution (having around 30-40 points at it before level 75 helps)

This is one skill that lets us stay alive in combat, it also makes the character more "fool proof" against situations where everything else just fails.

It also increases the HP regeneration quite nicely when mastered.

 

5. Sword lore/ hafted lore (increase when ever you feel that you miss too much)

Since combat alert improves our accuracy based on %, it would be nice to have a good base value on our attack. Not to mention that it also increases the attack speed and provides us with nice unlock able modifiers.

 

6. warding energy lore (depends on how much you want to rely on shield)

Since TG is "handicapped" and can't wield a shield, we will be using a energy shield instead. Energy shield absorbs 60% of the damage dealt to tg while it has the energy to sustain the shield, this skill both increases the energy amount and regeneration rate while opening new modifiers as well!.

 

7. Toughness (2nd skill to master)

This might feel like it would have only little effect, but mastering this gives you around 10% damage mitigation on all elements, with this and armor lore mastery modifiers we can shoot our damage mitigation trough the roof! It also gives extra armor to all elements which get boosted by armor lore as well.

 

8. or 9. Source warden focus (do not bother with this untill your survivability and killing power is high enough )

One could think that untill getting this skill our character will be just a knight in shining armor. But Source warden skills gives our character some magic abilities to heal our team mates, improve magic resistances, debuff enemies etc etc.

Area of Effect damage dealing skills are not bad eather.

 

9. or 8. concentration (same as sw focus but less important)

Well we want the 2nd buff don't we? it also decreases the regen times of both dg and sw ca:s so its nice to have around. Even if its increased only by all skills +X modifiers

 

10. Source warden lore (when you start to want more damage on sw skills)

To increase the effectiviness of Sw combat arts. It also improves casting speed and critical ratio while providing modifier points.

 

 

CA:S

 

DG

 

Combat alert - <1st>

- Barricade (TG cant use a shield so everything that adds defense is welcome addition)

- Riposte (the insane reflect ratio at higher levels makes this your favorite ca)

- Party Protection (We want to help our friends and this build is heavily based on this skill as cast able ca so..)

 

I keep the regen time at 10s, the duration improves at every level so it will eventualy be more than the cooldown + regen.

 

T-Energy Shroud <3rd/4th>

- Power (makes the shield last a bit longer)

- Reduction (more damage mitigation = less damage = win)

- Reflect (combat alert already offers great Ph-reflect so magic reflect is great addition!)

 

Deadly spears (extra "skill" for extra modifications)

Both are fine, but I picked the Batter, since it can save your life. (note: but it will make your Area of Effect killing cabeabilities lower)

Singe - this with fiery ember sounds nice

Jab - more hits!

 

Battle extension (2nd extra "skill" for extra modifications)

Double Attack - For more hits!

Impairment or efficiency - doesn't really matter as Combat alert already improves hit rating.

Double Attack - Guess we could use some more hits?

- Very good when used as passive, not really efficent as skill but not completely worthless.

 

 

LF

 

No skills from here are needed.

 

Source warden

 

These are skills that you wont be upgrading at lower levels. But getting charged grid, untouchable force to max modifications will help you. Since we dont have repair in our combat alert it could be nice to have combo where combat alert + charged grid are both activated. This will make our character pretty much unkillable for duration of both effects. (health regen + insane reflect + insane defense boost)

 

Charged Grid <2nd>

- Substance

- Substance ("the healing spell")

- Longetivity (Since the spell needs some serious leveling its good to keep it active for longer)

Note, with constitution master, high level source warden lore and good CA level this should also grant us with pretty much immortality.

 

Untouchable force (mainly making the char more annoying to kill) <2nd>

- Mind control (whats more annoying than to be stunned?)

- Calm (Whats more annoying than to be stunned while having attack speed lowered?)

- Crumble(to add annoyance factor to even ranged enemies)

 

Icy evanescence and fiery ember are both good skills, however I would like to leave them for you to decide what to use them for. They are great debuffs but also have nice damage dealing cabeabilities as well.

 

but I am planning to pick:

 

Fiery ember

scald

churn

sustain

 

- this makes fiery ember the debuff that lowers enemies attack speed.

 

icy evanescence

Ice needles

deep frost

conservation (makes it easier to level and faster to regen)

- this makes icy evanescence a effective Area of Effect damage dealer.

(note: its not bad idea to have 2 debuffs/boost, but as you can only do one at the time)

 

I personally like to have my enemies hit slower than making them run slower as Paladin is melee char after all, Slowdown from fiery ember + untouchable force = slow motion for every1 else except you and your team

Slower running speed for enemies has it uses too tough, it may save team members who are underleveled compared to other team members, or just lack defensive power. Damage migitation or bonus damage are both good, bonus damage makes your team do more elemental damage, but migitation makes your team take less damage.

 

 

Gear

 

getting those All skills rings for your sockets will help a lot. Toughness which I am planning to leave at level 75 will continue to get boosted by all skills rings. Armor lore will be at really high levels because of these as well. These are rather important as many of the skills are important but we only have so little skill points to spare. Skills like sword lore, source warden skills, constitution DG focus and tactics lore all need points. At level 80 my sword lore is still around 20 which would make me miss a lot but since its boosted by all skills rings and the attack rating is boosted by combat alert my hit accuracy is actually quite good.

 

getting the Armor lore mastery as fast as bossible actualy has a reason thats related to gear.

There are Armours and pauldrons that have armor lore mastery modifier that gives damage migiation. At level 80 I have 8% damage migitation in both my armor and pauldrons and 10% migitation from greaves of demiurge. The shield also gives me 7% and toughness probably around 12%. this lessens the damage quite a lot.

 

Leveling.

 

I have done my leveling from 45-87 mainly in Orc caves, mainly because they do high damage so I can keep in check that my defense is good, and they give loads of experience and good drops. This lessens the amount of work I need to do with utility chars. However if you dont want to grind in the orc cave you are free to find different methods of training like doing quests or using deadly spears or possibly SW Area of Effect CA to do some Area of Effect killing at higher levels.

 

Early levels:

Just try to do the first 2 main-quest missions and fetch yourself a bit ca:s trough the rune master quest or get at least combat alert, T-energy shroud, Battle-extension. If you dont have these just to get enough ca runes to trade something for them while you are leveling your first levels. Its also advice able to buy yourself a full gear from the shop as fast as possible, try finding the ones with best armor.

 

Armor lore is good to start with as it offers you decent armor boost at the beginning and lets you wear gear of higher level so that it wont slow you down. However spend your mainly to devout guardian and tactics lore at the beginning to unlock modificatiosn to combat alert and T-energy shroud. Depending on are you playing with your friends a lot you can eather take the party protection mod or just leave it for later since it doesn't really help YOU at all. Magic reflect of T-energy shroud can also be less useful than battle extension modifications at start of the game (only few mobs actually use magic at the beginning).

 

when you have modded combat alert and T-energy shroud with the modifications you want, you might consider getting armor lore to your level. This build isnt as "just" as many others so your free to but some points to wpn lore if you feel that your missing too much with combat alert, its good if you miss without combat alert as it reminds you to cast it (I had like 15 wpn lore at level 75 so..).

Constitution is rather good to improve too as it increases your survivability quite a lot if you get in to situations where you don't have nether combat alert or shield on.

 

Don't bother with the bosses before gaining like 20-30 levels. Especially optional ones since considering their time + effort/experience value is rather poor. Also don't bother with quests so much as they are more of a nice "extra" before getting to higher difficulties where you might actually get some experience and items from em. But if you get bored to "grinding" they are a nice alternative.

 

- Keep armor lore at your level, it will make you take a lot less damage and if you have utility char to provide gear, your paladin can get his hands on these a lot faster.

- improve Tactics lore, toughness and devout guardian focus as your secondary focus

- Put points to warding energy lore, constitution and weapon lore every now and then(WEL=CST>Wpn lore). (weapon lore usually gets boosted enough by all skills rings)

- when you get concentration put atleast 9 points to sw focus to fully modify the buff Untouchable force, Do not waste too much points on SW skills as its more important to get armor lore mastery and toughness first. After those you might want to but few points in to both to get better healing spell and buff. All skill rings are godsend for these skills as with high skill level boost you can get more use out of these.

- Try to master armor lore and Toughness both before level 80 (I mastered armor lore at 75 and toughness at 78)

 

Battle:

 

- Against mobs

Just gather some nice ammount of mobs and when ready cast combat alert and battle extension and beat them to death. Deadly spears is nice too, but not very good at leveling if you took batter like I did, batter is better for tougher mobs like bosses as if they get push back they usually have this moment of "***" which allows you score a few extra hits and it might save your life at least in early game. Gore is far better choice for Area of Effect leveling.

 

- Against bosses

Depending on the boss, normal bosses fall down fairly quickly if you just cast combat alert -> run next to them -> cast deadly spears and activate battle extension simultaneously (press BE while deadly spears works with combat alert as well) depending on your level the bosses will go down rather quickly and the damage they might give to you is rather controllable.

 

Gar colossus

If your fighting him on lvls 17-25 he might be rather tough opponent because of the shield. But theres a trick to make his shield last a lot less damage. Just destroy the T-energy rocks that appear when he throws them.

 

Octopus

This is probably easiest boss with faccettelion, however he doesnt seem to be damaged by deadly spears.. This makes the battle a bit longer as he also has rather high evasion. On every difficulty I have used maybe 1-2 potions when fighting him (mainly because of the poison) but he still takes a while to take down. Faccettelion however is a joke atleast against the paladin.

 

Swirling mist of miasma

Defeat the skeletons he sends to damage him, however BEWARE of the dangerous mist swirl he tries to cast on you. It will deal some serious damage to any character no matter what the build is. So try not to run trough those small tornadoes and try not to stay on the same place for too long. surest method is just to run around casting deadly spears as you can move and damage at the same time, it will make the fight a lot longer tough.

 

The nameless guardians

They all have different attack element, so many receive a lot damage from these because they lack the armor for certain elements, try to get as good armor against the 3 elements and once you get one down check its element from the last monster you killed and remove the elemental runes from that element to other elements.

 

However avoid fighting without combat alert and the shield.

- You'll take 60% more damage and even more because of T-energyshields reduction mod.

This is more of "just to make sure" rule or method to save potions on early levels and I cant wait every1 to have a secondary char to support their char with uber items or the support is limited.

 

- Without combat alert you'll take a lot more hits, not only your defense will be down but the Combat alerts (mod) reflect 50%+ as well. If you know how to recast the combat alert as often as possible in battle this will not happen.

 

- Check sacred wiki for the element of the boss, this can help you alot since high armor lore boosts both elemental and p-armor. For example its far easier to kill a dragon if you are equipped by top quality fire relics and bossily accessories. After level 75 it gets a bit easier as you'll get access to Damage mitigation armors.

 

As for levels I prefer to keep

combat alert - 15+10s

T-energy shroud - +30%

battle extension - just but all runes to this you can find, the more the RG on this the better..

Dedicated blow - under 1s

 

SW-Area of Effect combat arts 25-30s

Charged grid 30-40s

Untouchable force +30%

 

Controls PS3/X360 - My preference

Triangle/Y - combat alert R + Triangle/Y Fiery ember

square/X - battle-extension R + square/X Charged grid

Circle/B - Deadly spears R + Circle/B Icy Evanescence

Cross/A - Attack button R + Cross/A Dedicated blow

 

- I was asked to post my build here by member of sacred2 official forums member gogoblender so I did.

Edited September 20, 2009 by gogoblender

[gogoblender 3,069]

Ahh, you got my pm, thank you for contributing your build! It's so detailed, you've put a lot of work into it, and I'm sure it will have utility for players.

 

Thank you for adding it here to the collection for reference.

 

Welcome to the boards!

 

 

gogo

[Viper7 0]

Ahh, you got my pm, thank you for contributing your build! It's so detailed, you've put a lot of work into it, and I'm sure it will have utility for players.

 

Thank you for adding it here to the collection for reference.

 

Welcome to the boards!

 

 

gogo

 

Ty

 

Well the build is not yet, complete as I have yet to beat gold or niob (currently improving my bargaining character (just to make sure that my gear will be efficient enough or overkill).

This build has few down sides tough, depending on deadly spears first mod the leveling with normal mobs cab be a bit slow(if modded knockback) as you cant really use it as Area of Effect, but the characters survivability allows rather efficient training in the orc cave.

 

Another downside is that while you have great tanking cabeabilities it will limit your damage a bit, normal mobs take 1-2 hits to kill(thanks to double hits you can still 1 hit most) but most elite mobs take few extra hits to take down. Orc cave orcs (and many other mobs with high damage) will do their best to assist you because of massive melee reflect. Bosses go down fairly quickly as long as you don't have to run away to regain shield, deadly spears does great damage, combat alert -> battle extension combo gives you rather high chance to hit depending on your weapon lore level.

Main reason for lack of damage is lack of points distriputed to strenght, so theres a margin of preference for more experienced players to distripute some points to strenght instead of the atribute I used. However putting the first 50 points to stamina are imo rather important part of this build as Combat alert and T-energy shroud both help a lot, and having these at highest level bossible helps even more.

Edited September 21, 2009 by Viper7