Vengeance Questions

[Serdash]

Vengeance Questions

Alright, I've gotten an idea that a Vengeance pally can be made pretty pwn when you can get Conviction from your mercenary. But I'm not exactly sure how I should distribute points or anything like that, or even gear. So I've got some questions.

1) Vengeance Damage. Would the elemental damage from Vengeance be better if I were using, say, a BotD? Or would the Elemental damage be the same if I were using, a Crescent Moon Phase Blade? I'm wondering how a high damaging weapon works versus a low damaging weapon that may have elemental damage like the runeword Lawbringer.

2) Skill Placement. From what I understand it's not very normal to max out any of the resist auras since there are too many points to max them all, but since I'm using Infinity to gain a level 12 Conviction, that saves quite a few points to either put in synergies or an entirely different aura. My ideas...

20 Vengeance
20 Fanaticism
10 Resist Fire
10 Resist Cold
10 Resist Lightning
1 Holy Shield

The fanaticism could ensure that I get the fastest attack speed possible with Vengeance, assuring that I'm dealing the most amount of damage as possible. And if I'm using BotD, that's just more raw damage on top of it all.

20 Vengeance
20 Resist Fire
20 Resist Cold
20 Resist Lightning
1 Holy Shield

This route gives me the maximum synergies possible aside from Salvation, which is, IMO, not worth the 2% Per level, although points after this could be placed there for the minor damage boosts. I would have to try and ensure I have a fast attack rate through IAS, but other than that it wouldn't be too hard to do.

3) Equipment

Well, if my idea about using Infinity instead of a straight Conviction aura works, I should be able to get by with this.

Weapon: BotD/CM Phase Blade/Lawbringer <Insert Item Here>
Amulet: Mara's Kaleidoscope/Scintillating Amulet of Life Everlasting
Helm: Griffon's Eye(+lightning skill damage/-light resist works on this, right?)/Artisan's Tiara of Life Everlasting(3x Sol)
Armor: Duriel's Shell/Shaftstop/Jewellers Ancient Armor of Amicae(4x Sol)
Shield: HoZ/Gerke's Sanctuary(Sol)
Belt: Arachnid Mesh/String of Ears
Rings: SoJ/BKWB/Dwarf Star/Ravenfrost
Boots: Gore Riders
Gloves: Dracul's Grasp

I figure I can go a raw damage output route focusing on +skills to boost vengeance, or I could go with a Damage Reduced by X route, getting 22 (Amulet) + 43 (Armor) + 44 (Helm) + 20 (Shield) = Damage Reduced by 129. That would reduce the amount of damage I take drastically, not to mention I would also gain a bit of MDR from items, resulting in a quite sturdy paladin.


Other than that, I need answers to the above questions, suggestions, advice, etc.

I suck when it comes to things like this.

 

[The Cow King]

Hmm that's a very interesting approach indeed. While the IAS from fanatiscm surely enables more interesting gear choises and helps with leech, remember that you still lose hella alot of damage from having a lvl 12 conviction when compared to a lvl 25 conviction.

If you indeed can get your hands on BotD and all that gear, I would personally take the damage reduce route. It would make avenger a huge tank with nice leech. Withouth player it still won't be an abbot quality abbot, but I guess it could still pretty much tank anything.

When it comes to Avenger weapons just pick the biggest and fastest piece you can get your hands on. Personally I prefer speed over huge damage, since it pays it back in the attack speed. But as said, the fanatiscm would allow for more weapon possibilities.

But nonetheless, capping yourself with a lvl 12 conviction will make you lose almost half of your elemental damage, so I'm not sure if it really is worth it. While you gain many other perks (perhaps), your killing speed wont really increase much (could be even lower!), and you would constantly have to worry about your merc taking the dirt.

Also from that gear setup you would be lacking severely in resists, unless you're packed full of res charms. The damage reduce won't compensate against elemental damage, and every monster on hell pretty much have some.

Just my 1600$.

 

[Jingizu]

An example:

+7 all skills
20 vengeance, 10 resist auras

Your vengeance will add +226% fire, lightning and cold damage (3x226% are computed from your weapon damage). After that, this elemental damage will be increased by conviction.

Simply compute how high will be your elemental damage with BoTD for example and compare it with elemental damage from other weapon.

As for me, I will surely choose high damage weapon with CB:tongue:

 

[maxicek]

The way I understand it is that Vengeance takes the weapon damage and any on weapon ED and add to that the fire, lightning and cold damage. Off weapon ED is not counted, but +to max/min damage is. So the biggest hurtiest weapon you can find is what you need. If it has elemental damage too (not poison) that is a bonus.

The aura enhanced damage from Fanaticism will not help the Vengeance damage, but will help the base physical damage.

On the conviction side of things, I think you need a skill calc. Remember that the effect of vengeance is greatly increased when you pump out that lvl 25 aura and send the monsters resists plunging into the minuses. If you can get you attack speed high enough, you may be better without the fanaticism. Effectively it is:
(Fanaticism+Normal Attack)+(Vengeance+lvl 12 conviction)
against (Vengeance+lvl 25 conviction).

On the synergies, remember that you don't need to level them all the same. 20 pts in lightning will get you +10 to lightning resist max. Always a bonus.

Edit:
If you haven't already, have a read of Asmo's guide, it is very good.

 

[Serdash]

Jingizu: I didn't quite understand you, just the way you said it was confusing. Could you maybe explain in a formula that would make more sense? Such as my BotD does 173 to 564 one handed damage. So the elemental damage I do would be...?

CowKing: I know I'm going to be losing damage from not having a higher level conviction, the idea is to make a build that can make up for the lack of conviction with a high damaging weapon that not only provides reasonable damage for Vengeance, but also allows the paladin to survive via leeching.

 

[Jingizu]

Jingizu: I didn't quite understand you, just the way you said it was confusing. Could you maybe explain in a formula that would make more sense? Such as my BotD does 173 to 564 one handed damage. So the elemental damage I do would be...?

BoTD
173-564 base damage

Vengeance adds 226% (in my example)

That is:
+391-1275 cold damage
+391-1275 fire damage
+391-1275 lightning damage

TOTAL 1173-3825 Elemental damage


Lawbringer Conquest sword for example:
Base damage 37-53
Adds 150-210 Fire Damage
Adds 130-180 Cold Damage

Vengeance gives you:
+83-120 fire damage
+83-120 lightning damage
+83-120 cold damage

TOTAL 529-750 Elemental damage


I hope I didn't make some mistake

 

[Hrus]

I think you would do better damage with your own conviction. With a high speed weapon like eBOTD, you don't need speed from Fanaticism much. The physical damage ED from Fana is nice though. But you will loose ~1/3 of the elemental damage...

 

[Jingizu]

I think you would do better damage with your own conviction.

That's right, for elemental damage...

But damage from eBoTD and max Fanaticism is quite high I think :shocked: and could compensate the loss of elemental damage (I don't know, someone should compute it )

Edit: Sorry Hrus, I read your response once more and realized that you said the same as me :shhh:

 

[Llathias]

I think the questions have been answered, but I'd like to stress a few things. With vengeance, use the highest physical damage, fast weapon you have (that's why some people -like Asmo- use extra hurty Ogre Mauls). If you want to make use of significant elemental damage on a physically weak weapon coupled with Conviction, use zeal for faster delivery, as the Vengeance will have a very insignificant effect.

As for the Infinity Conviction vs Intrinsic Conviction, at lvl12, the skill provides -85% resists. I don't remember if oskill auras benefit from +all skills equipment, but if that's the case, you'll reach -100% at lvl15 (+3 skills). For monsters with no resistance to any one of the 3 elements, more is not needed (only for that single element). Although most monsters would have resistance to at least one of fire, cold and lightning, as each element constitutes 1/3 of your elemental damage, the gain from a higher level Conviction wouldn't be as significant as it might seem. Still, I'd advocate use of Griffons as it offers +dmg as well, and is 1337!

Finally, if you use Fanaticism on a BotD wielding character, I don't think you'll need damage reduction. With you and your merc, monsters won't live long enough to land you 2 hits, and you'll leech back the damage you might occasionally receive from the 1st hit.


ps. That's what you get after such a long time of not spa... posting! I was intending to post just one sentence!