2h avenger - need advice

[zrk]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Also, dont forget reaper's toll. Its a dark horse, among the top non-dupeword weapons for almost all 2h melee builds.

 

[Norrit]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Personally, I would go with a kira's guardian. It's so amazing for this build that I can't fathom why would you use anything else. It has cannot be frozen, tons of resists and FHR to boot. If you socket it with a shael rune you have half your FHR right there.

Then again, I would advocate the champion axe BoTD instead of the other options, because I'm a speed freak, and you have so many things you HAVE to cover (IAS breakpoint, FHR breakpoint, resists, life/mana leech, +skills, etc) that there's not a great deal of flexibility.

I'd go with:

helm: kira's guardian (shael or um)
amulet: highlord's wrath
weapon: EBotD Champion Axe
armor: I'd really like to try ormus' robes (with 15% across all elements), but pretty much anything here will be useful from fortitude to chains of honor and even duriel's shell. CoH is probably the best if you can afford it. CoH + kira's cover all your resists nicely.
gloves: Laying of Hands
belt: the good old string of ears or verdungo's hearty cord
rings: 2 life/mana leech rings (remember, you don't need raven because kira's give cannot be frozen)
boots: War travs if you're going with shael'd kiras and the lower FHR; or treks if you're not.

 

[Pyrotechnician1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Some of my responses to this rely on the original posters choice to use the great poleaxe:

Ye, it's really not as bad as people make it out to be, even with something like LT and Decrip. I mean, if you can't survive because your LT just got overwritten by Decrip then you're clearly doing something else wrong.

RE the rest: Fair enough, I just found them reaaally squishy. If you can get your DR close to 50% then that's great, but other than that Defense is the only way to shrug off hits. I guess Treachery's res, DR (Fade should be active most of the time on this char), FHR and IAS is tough to beat

Definately agree with you on this, life tap and decrep together, either all your enemies are really slow and do half damage or you have an unlimited supply of health, what could be better?

The only other option is to stack actual integer dr but without some major gear changes this would be difficult. Fade is going to be pretty much always active, and without the IAS the weapon will have to change to reach the last bp.

Also, dont forget reaper's toll. Its a dark horse, among the top non-dupeword weapons for almost all 2h melee builds.

He's going to use the reaper's on the merc, so hes getting the best of both worlds, a large damage weapon with lots of additional stats and the ctc decrep.

Personally, I would go with a kira's guardian. It's so amazing for this build that I can't fathom why would you use anything else. It has cannot be frozen, tons of resists and FHR to boot. If you socket it with a shael rune you have half your FHR right there.

Then again, I would advocate the champion axe BoTD instead of the other options, because I'm a speed freak, and you have so many things you HAVE to cover (IAS breakpoint, FHR breakpoint, resists, life/mana leech, +skills, etc) that there's not a great deal of flexibility.

I'd go with:

helm: kira's guardian (shael or um)
amulet: highlord's wrath
weapon: EBotD Champion Axe
armor: I'd really like to try ormus' robes (with 15% across all elements), but pretty much anything here will be useful from fortitude to chains of honor and even duriel's shell. CoH is probably the best if you can afford it. CoH + kira's cover all your resists nicely.
gloves: Laying of Hands
belt: the good old string of ears or verdungo's hearty cord
rings: 2 life/mana leech rings (remember, you don't need raven because kira's give cannot be frozen)
boots: War travs if you're going with shael'd kiras and the lower FHR; or treks if you're not.

By switching the weapon it allows for a lot of different gear choices since your pretty much reliant on the armor to provide the extra ias that you need to hit the last breakpoint. At this point you could go for any of the armors you mentioned since they would probably work out nicely.

The kira's suggestion however I don't really agree on, mainly because you actually lose FHR, DR%, a possible extra socket and a plus skill. For what?some extra resist and cbf. Personally Raven frost is probably the best to have anyway since it has a nice dex and attack rating boost with the cbf mod. If you can afford the COA, go for it, with an Um rune its comprable and imo better than kira's.

 

[zrk]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Hey - dont forget BoTD colossus blade and war pike. Remember, theyre perhaps the best weapon in the game for 2h zealots, and has style in the bucket loads. So if you get tired of avenging monsters, you can continue to pump zeal damage with no trouble, and have the speed to back it up, unlike the popular polearm and maul suggestions here.

 

[Pyrotechnician1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Wouldn't use the War pike per say, especially on a Paladin, since its part of the spear class, the FHR table is different so you won't be able to hit the lower breakpoints, it will also require an additional 20 ias to hit the last breakpoint which could be harder than you think at this point.

The Botd colossus blade isn't bad though, its only 5 more ias needed and it maintains the same average damage in a shorter range (will have to be closer to hit them). Takes a little more stats than the great poleaxe but it could definately work.

Edit: Yay post 100! haha.

 

[Norrit]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

By switching the weapon it allows for a lot of different gear choices since your pretty much reliant on the armor to provide the extra ias that you need to hit the last breakpoint. At this point you could go for any of the armors you mentioned since they would probably work out nicely.

The kira's suggestion however I don't really agree on, mainly because you actually lose FHR, DR%, a possible extra socket and a plus skill. For what?some extra resist and cbf. Personally Raven frost is probably the best to have anyway since it has a nice dex and attack rating boost with the cbf mod. If you can afford the COA, go for it, with an Um rune its comprable and imo better than kira's.

I was thinking it more as an alternative for vampire gaze. Of corse if you have access to a CoA, then it will surpass both gaze and kiras easily.

 

[Pyrotechnician1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

I was thinking it more as an alternative for vampire gaze. Of corse if you have access to a CoA, then it will surpass both gaze and kiras easily.

From what the OP was saying it seemed like he had access to a COA and was going to use it for this build, although I could be wrong. In that case though switching out the gaze for a kiras, you would lose the life leach, mana leach and damage reduction. The life and mana leach you can gain part of back through your second ring since he wouldnt need the cbf from ravenfrost anymore, but he would lose the dr%. Either or would work, but in the case of Gaze you could use charms to compensate for the FHR and res, where in the case of Kira's your ring would have to make up the leech difference.

 

[wacktapaz]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Hey.
Nice to see so many people commenting on the post.
Im currently leveling my avenger so that i can reach the levels needed for the gear.

The items i have so far are:
Breath of the dying, eth great poleaxe.
Treachery, 14ed. boneweave.
String of ears, 15dr, 8%ll.
Sandstrom.
Laying hands.
Ravenfrost and a rare ring and amulet mentioned earlier in this post.
so the only thing missing at this point is the crown of ages...

 

[zrk]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

You can skip a lot of the expensive survival gear and instead go for turbo boost in damage - guillaume helm, highlord amulet(adds WAY more to damage than the other proposed options, including seraph and rare amu), gores, enigma, arach(faster tele, adds more to damage than other belt options).

no monster, no (survival) problem. As uncle Stalin used to say
or no risk - no profit.

What ever version you prefer, the bottom line remains the same - Botd doesnt do your work for you. You need to have the top notch other pieces of armor to really slam monsters down hard, and this is what my gear suggestions will do.

 

[hubb]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Crit only works with the physical part of his damage and has no affect on Vengeance. If he uses that setup where does the other ~120 all res he needs come from?

That setup would only result in a dead paladin. A two-handed Avenger is not an uninterruptible WW barb with 5k HP or a shielded Grief-Zealot.

 

[Norrit]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Crit only works with the physical part of his damage and has no affect on Vengeance. If he uses that setup where does the other ~120 all res he needs come from?

That setup would only result in a dead paladin. A two-handed Avenger is not an uninterruptible WW barb with 5k HP or a shielded Grief-Zealot.

Agreed. If you could compensate for it elsewhere, I'm still intrigued by the 15% all elements ormus' robe as an armor. I'll probably try it out sometime but finding such an ormus is no easy feat. My best roll so far was 15% fire 14% cold 13% lightning =(

 

[heroesmm]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Hey buddies, glad to see the hot discussion on such a nontraditional char!
Well, a question is: why do you think that Treachery is a must because of its 45 IAS? To reach the 78 IAS needed by BOTD great poleaxe, this combination would be enough: 30 from Crown of Ages socketed with two 15 IAS jewels, 20 from Highlord's Wrath, 20 from the glove (Laying of Hands, Lava Gout, etc.), 10 from the belt (Nosferatu's Coil or Goldwrap). This way your armor is free from providing IAS, and you can think of some other choices. Certainly Treachery is great for fade and venom, but it has no enhanced defense, and it is dangerous if you encounter huge elemental attack before fade is activated. I would like to recommend armors with high defense and damage reduction, e.g., Leviathan, Shaftstop (up), Gladiator's Bane. Or the rune word Prudence, which is the armor with the highest defense for a hero (not for a pet), and gives 25-35 all resists (great for the builds short of resists, including this), 25 fhr, 3 pdr (hehe), 2 mana each kill (better than nothing). Wearing these armors, you will get hit much less, decreasing your desire to dr and fhr. So, there is plenty of room out of Treachery, isn't it?
Another question is: if you cast holy shield with switch weapon and shield, would the defense bonus keep when you use the 2-hand weapon? If the answer is yes, then your defense can be substantially enhanced, although without the bonus to blocking.

 

[Clervis1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Good suggestions. Too bad this thread is two and a half years old. Everybody who posted on it is probably dead by now.

 

[heroesmm]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Good suggestions. Too bad this thread is two and a half years old. Everybody who posted on it is probably dead by now.

Thanks for your reply. Do you have any idea on my 2nd question, casting holy shield then switching to the 2-hand weapon?

 

[Pyrotechnician1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Good suggestions. Too bad this thread is two and a half years old. Everybody who posted on it is probably dead by now.

Hey, I'm not dead thank you very much. I actually ended up making a build using some of the information in this thread (since I was very active in it originally). You can read all about the guy here:

http://www.purediablo.com/forums/sh...anded-Vengeance-Conviction-Paladin&highlight=

I didn't have botd availabe to me so I made some other gear choices and went with tomb reaver paired with shaftstop. Overall a pretty solid build.

As far as your suggestions go, dropping treachery would be great if you can get the Ias elsewhere while keeping up all of your other stats including DR% and Res. Pretty much if you can make some arrangement of gear that gets everything to the needed breakpoint and maintains durability of the character run with it.

Casting holy shield and then switching to a non shield setup loses the defense bonus so doing so is pointless.

 

[Doctor Clock]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Well, a question is: why do you think that Treachery is a must because of its 45 IAS?

Treachery is great not only for the IAS, but also Fade, which boosts resists (60%) and adds 15%DR. It also has FHR, so it provides four stats a 2h Paladin really values.

I would like to recommend armors with high defense

On a 2h avenger, you won't have the defense bonus from Holy Shield, so you won't be able to get high defense no matter what armor you are wearing. Maybe if you have a Barb using high level Shout and a defiance merc around at all times. But even then, defense is just not a reliable survival stat in my opinion. Vit, resists, %DR, FHR,and PDR are much better.

it is dangerous if you encounter huge elemental attack before fade is activated

This rarely if ever happens. You can just prep your character by going to the Cold Plains and getting hit a few times to trigger Fade at the start of your session. Without a shield, you'll get hit enough that Fade will always be up.

Your proposed set up could work. The issue I am seeing is that so many of your items only provide IAS. With a shieldless Paladin, every item kind of needs to pull double duty to make up for the lost resist and the fact that you are going from 75% blocking to 0% blocking.

I don't think Treachery is a must. It is really good and really cheap, though, so always a great option. That's the great thing about unconventional characters, they force you to look items and the game in a difference way.

Everybody who posted on it is probably dead by now.

YOU'RE DEAD!@

 

[Clervis1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

YOU'RE DEAD!@

I'm confused. This is clearly the Paladin forum, but you're all a bunch of necros.

 

[Pyrotechnician1]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

I'm confused. This is clearly the Paladin forum, but you're all a bunch of necros.

Pretty sure I haven't necro'd anything recently. Just answering the questions of necros is all.

P.S. Don't go trying to turn this into a cool guide like the drop bear. I got my mark on this first!

 

[heroesmm]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Treachery is great not only for the IAS, but also Fade, which boosts resists (60%) and adds 15%DR. It also has FHR, so it provides four stats a 2h Paladin really values.

On a 2h avenger, you won't have the defense bonus from Holy Shield, so you won't be able to get high defense no matter what armor you are wearing. Maybe if you have a Barb using high level Shout and a defiance merc around at all times. But even then, defense is just not a reliable survival stat in my opinion. Vit, resists, %DR, FHR,and PDR are much better.

Nice to hear from you!

Suppose your enemy has attack rating of 5000, and your defense is 1000 wearing treachery, and your levels are equal, then your chance of being hit is 83%. On the other hand, wearing prudence your defense could be 3500, then your chance of being hit is 59%. The latter scenario is certainly far from satisfactory, but isn't it much better than the former scenario?

 

[Doctor Clock]

Re: 2h avenger - need advice

Sure. Are those the numbers you actually get when comparing the two armors? I don't have any Diablo 2 characters to check anymore. In any case, I have ignored defense on most of the characters I have built, and I've done some unusual and underpowered builds. They seem to end up surviving fine without it. I don't think defense is bad, I just think other stats are better and my play style has developed to not rely on it. If defense works for you though, go for it.