The main priority: Build a melee paladin who is the best dueler in the game.
If you listen, succeed. Pay close attention. It will be the little things.
Little thing #1: Use a controller. This is the fastest way you can do everything & this din is mostly based on speediness.
As he has to be. Pro chainlocking & such may slightly outdo the controller in a few situations. I'm not here to debate that, at
the same time it may not. Overall, for this build - controller is best. Also this guy is stronger then the tele smiters vs all.
>>When you know how to use him right<<
Hustle Charger - by Oddayoung
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That's what I call this guy, because hustle brings it all together & is by far the most useful item in slot.
If any1 points out things that seem like their better. They're not. Follow what I'm saying. There's reasons.
Mainly being the speed & evade on hustle trumps all. This solves the big issue with paladins, plain & simple
they're not fast enough vs many duelers. This guy is. Dig this - he can't be chainlocked by a smiter. Which
is their #1 trick vs a charger.
Charge is the main. I wanted it to be zeal, it shouldn't be. Zeal is viable but a bit weaker then the charger.
Here's the good part though, the way this guy is built zeal comes right next to charge in terms of usefulness.
Oh yes. You will be zealing quite a fair amount. Since charge is based of AR & min max, Zeal takes priority over
smite. I have a feeling to do some zealing.
This dueler will be using a grief so yes smiting will be taking place as well. None of that ethereal rare looks cool stuff.
Grief. Best dueler in game. Ethereal rares.. better at charging paladins >only< & not by much. By all means swap to one vs
another din - those random dins who come into pubs with 30k armor. Yes eth rare w cruel / fools mod is better for this
one scenario but >worst< in all others. Use my setup. I got a easy swap for the random 25-30k defense paladins. With grief.
Lets cover that now.
Little Thing #2: If charge isn't hitting a paladin - they're at or above 25k defense. So for these guys swap shield to
Cleglaws Claw & gloves to Cleglaws pincers. Clegs is frowned on by some because the gloves have 25% slow on them.
Still.. these add around 7k attack rating getting us to 24k Ar in vigor. Almost always use vigor charge vs paladins.
I'll talk more on that later.
Let me get into AR numbers briefly. Using enchant, in my setup its 17k Ar charge using vigor aura, 21k with fantacism.
With a 17k zeal. We shoot for the lowest possible AR we can get away with because if we want the best dueler - we never
overshoot a stat there needs to be balance. This toon undoubtably can vs all & I strongly believe is the best at doing so.
With practice of course & as long as the little things are right.
Highlight of this build - our guy reaches 125% FRW. He is the second fastest charger that can be built.
65 % FRW off hustle armor, 30% off our helm & boots a piece.
The fastest charger clocks in at 145 FRW by adding a M'vinas belt - not worth it.
The setup I have now is what we want. A m'vinas is used on one of our few swaps though.
Main Setup
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Helm: Artisan's Tiara Of Speed [3 os tiara with 30% FRW ] Sockets: BerBerBer
Armor: Hustle [build in something with above 400 armor & a str req anywhere under 114]
Belt: Verdungo's Hearty Chord
Ring 1: Rare ring [most important affixes: Attack Rating , Life Leech, Lightning Res, + Min]
Ring 2: Ravensfrost
Amulet: Highlords Wrath
Weapon: Grief PB or Z [Grief pb pulls off a 4.8 frame zeal w 2 range, Grief Z has 3 range & roughly 50 more max dmg but a slower zeal]
Shield: Phoenix [40+ all res base under 114 str preferably]
Gloves: Bloodfist
Boots: Gorerider
Inventory
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
2 Steel Grand Charm of Balance [12% FHR & 110+ AR]
1 Ochar Small Charm of Balance [5% FHR & 6 light res]
3 Steel Grand Charm of Vita [115+ AR & 30+ hp preferred]
1 Sharp Grand Charm of Sustenance [8+max & 60+AR w 30+hp]
1 Sharp Large Charm of Vita [6 max & 40 Ar w 30+hp]
1 Sharp Large Charm of Inertia [+5% FRW & 5 max w 35+Ar]
8 Steel Small Charm of Vita [30+Ar & 18+hp]
3 Emerald Small Charm of Vita [10+poison res & 18+hp]
3 Amber Small Charm of Vita [10+ light res & 18+hp]
anni & torch.
Lets not get overly picky about this charm or that. This is my exact setup, if you want to slide some 3 maxers in place of steel charm of vita.
Go for it. Remember this, the charge attack rating must come up to 17000 - 17300 with vigor aura. The 3 maxers may allow us to take a point or two
out of charge synergy might & put in holy shield.. but its w.e really. Final adjustments thats up to yall just don't deviate far from what I got here.
I'm showing my dueler & saying that I'm probably at 98% of how strong this build can get to. I don't care about the 2%, if you do & want to optimize
its fine. Remember this: Don't move out the Emerald SCs, or the amber ones. Please don't. Random most likely bm WW assasins who try to disguise as GM
duelers will rip you apart. Hidden poison damage. They'll probably never admit it. We're not running to the stash for these guys.. we want a main setup
that can face all the real S tier duelers without a swap. (which we come real close to, in my setup theres only 3 very fast swaps.. only 1 piece exchanged)
On swap CTA with spirit shield.
Skills
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1 salvation
8 holy shield
20 charge & zeal
20 vigor
6 sacrifice
This is the bare minimum, it totals out to level 94 here.
I suggest no less then level 97 just to make sure our AR
stays crisp vs higher level duelers. Any points after 94 use
wherever you want. It doesn't matter.
Swaps
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String of Ears vs wind druid (need I state why)
M'avinas Tenant vs Necromancer (increases our charge speed)
30% lightning res gloves vs jabber zon (jab does lightning damage, It looks like physical but its mostly lightning)
Thats it. Yes you can swap cold res charms & some items vs a blizz sorc. Not needed. You can outmaneuver them with sheer speed & win more times then not.
You can swap out AR charms for poison res charms & items when facing bm poison necro or bm poison javazon. Don't face them in my opinion. If you do
don't swap out hustle. Some poison javazons have lightning damage as well so it becomes a guessing game of what to swap to. I can show how to beat them
but this would get too wordy because theres 3-4 different bm variations of the javazon. We need some lightning res, a high amount of poison res & PLR to win.
[But while we're guessing what swap they are, they will beat us 1-5 times. Is it worth it?]
Lastly.. vs fire swap. Again these are mostly bm builds. I'm talking those fissure druid guys. Random fireball sorcs. As if they're following the accurate
numbers in there - res stuff to be gm. Show no mercy unless its a friendly fire sorc who actually seems to be in Gm numbers - for those guys no Rising Sun.
Heres the vs fire swap: String of Ears for the fire druids w Laying of Hands & Aldurs Advance. Oh and swap out 3 grand charms of balance for three
shimmering grand charms with 14+ all res. Pop on The Rising Sun Amulet. They bm we bm back. Or lose every duel lol. These fire druids are near untouchable
by anyone. Our hustle charger is the only toon basically who can take these guys out.
Now its time to close off.
Big Thing Use the dang vigor aura as needed. You keep hearing me say "17k AR in vigor aura" etc. Thats because vigor aura is the ONLY way to face other dins as a charger.
So here's how this goes down. We charge >>> off their screen with our super speediness <<< TO BREAK THEIR NAMELOCK. When that player does
not show up as a red target on our minimap - it breaks their namelock after about 2 seconds. So the idea here is to charge away from them till the red target
which is our opponent disappears off our minimap & keep charging even after they've disappeared for 2 more seconds. Boom they now have to namelock us
again to land their smite. Which is very hard to do when we can run in on him at any angle really fast. [Watch out for puddle huggers, find shortest route in]
We quickly swoop back in with charge & more times then not. They will not land a single smite on us. A paladin who stands & zeals is smarter, zeal may hit us when we're charging in.
Lets face it though - the smiter has a really weak zeal anyhow & once you get good at outmaneuvering them (charging back in from random angles). More times this duel goes our way.
(if the guy standing & zealing, swoop in with fantacism aura & smack em with a few smites n charge away - see we always have an answer)
Here's the most important part though - stay on the move. Always be vigor charging its the only way the smiter won't be able to chainlock us. I quit d2 in 2023 because the charge paladin
couldn't be fast enough to avoid being chainlocked & smited. It requires 120 frw from items - frw charms in inventory don't affect charge speed. I waited till hustle came to see how it works
& bingo. The whole game just turned upside down on the smiters face. They teleport to us try to start chainlocking but we have moved away too fast. Technically this could be done
before hustle using enigma, 30 frw helm, boots & 20frw from M'vinias tenant. The only drawback is that toon doesn't have enough damage reduction so to me it wasnt worth it. Not to
mention all the other drawbacks with enigma. With hustle I can dodge hammers, nados etc. With enigma I can still be a good dueler, but the hustle turns me into a great one. I was tired
of unfair duels & being the underdog always. Now I'm happy. The odds are even & the more skill we have puts it more into our favor. >>>Its finally worth it<<<<
To wrap this up..
Vigor aura is the only way we will catch certain duelers.. but its ok to try our luck with fantacism charges randomly.. or when it just feels right.
Our charge is strong enough with vigor to cause massive damage with phoenix & one synergy maxed.
Strategy
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Use speed to outmaneuver & work in good angles to hit our opposition quickly with a charge & charge back out.
Also when opponent least expects it throw a quick zeal or smite (randomly) after some charges. It will just start
feeling right after lots of practice. Thats when its like.. dude this is awesome.
Last little things: Vs necros before duel begins say "plz dont use bp" meaning bone prison.. its bm vs toons with no nigma.
Vs bowazon, if you really want you can swap to a doom, but charging them down from good angles with grief works.
Controller setup auras on R buttons I suggest. The letter buttons use for skills.
Widowmaker bow I don't suggest, it seems in theory to make duels go better but doesn't play out like that.
Simply we have the speed to get into the right angles - why waste time plucking arrows that do 100-350 dmg.
Not worth it. When you become really good you can charge hammerdins when they tele to start new hammerfield.
When you become really really good you can know that theres a certain angle that your able to zeal or smite hammerdins
at when they stomp you without hammers ever touching you. I do this when they try stomp - move slightly outward then back
in & zeal. Its an instinct you must develop. I can do this on their stomps more times then not.
Conclusion
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Heres our guy: 39 DR, 86FHR, 70+ deadly strike, 3400+hp (im at 3450 hp with good charms not the best but pretty good)
20 fire res, 20 cold res, 53 poison res (lot of toons bring their dmg up w psn scs), 118 light res (need extra here)
17-22k AR
3-4k defense (with low defense sweet spot is 3k to create a 10% chance roughly for high AR toons to miss us, anymore aint better unless 10k
& that we will not get. I tried it with exile.. literally created no difference vs high AR duelers)
To all those who think these numbers aren't good enough. With hustle it is. Hustle brings evade. Again... a 40% chance to dodge everything (except smite).
Even while standing. Lastly what keeps everything crisp is FHR. It is still important & in the duels that really count. Vs WW barbs, assasins or zeal dins.
I do believe vs melee its really important. Because when melee attacks if that attacks faster then whatever our hit recovery is hits us twice because
we're still in hit recovery animation when their next attack comes through.
With Hustle & 86 FHR >>>>these numbers do hold<<<< - nicely.
[More DR not worth it to swap out phoenix & lose damage. I tried with using a lanceguard shield with ber.. amongst other things.. this setups best]
Enjoy.
Oh & I got excited about the zeal earlier so I'll cover that. This toon ends up at 17k zeal AR with fantacism. 17k makes zeal throwable vs all.
>>Its mainly used against dual wielding barbs, WW sin, druid pets & then the druid<< after closing the distance with charge.
So when I say zeal is throwable vs all - I mean its actually useful, when just thrown at the right time. I was hitting 25-30k defense >shield< barbs with zeal.
Obviously to win vs >>shield barbs<< I worked the angles & used> mostly smite.. a charge here and there in fantacism when their trying to position themselves.
Most importantly, we don't want to play the AR game with zeal or charge. "Oh they raised their defense! I'll raise my AR in main setup!" no we have smite then or clegs
vs the high defense paladin.
Good luck guys. Remember to drink chamomile tea. It'll make a 4-5 hour sleep feel like a 7-8 hour one after consistent consumption.
Proper sleep is the most important thing when it comes to functioning. Or even becoming stronger IRL. Before seeking strength seek stillness.
Peace.
This post was edited by Trevor3413 on Aug 31 2024 11:37am
D2:R