FOH/Smiter-Hybrid Leveling (Skill Prioritization)

Build from: https://www.icy-veins.com/d2/foh-smiter-paladin-build
This version that doesn't worry about lightning damage frees up quite a few skill points from

Conviction & FOH synergies, so it works well with

Smite as a secondary

I personally like to one-point-wonder

Redemption, even though it takes 4 prerequisites

The question is: once

Holy Bolt & FOH are maxed, what is the best order for topping up

Smite,

Holy Shield, and

Fanaticism? I don't think I found the same answer twice, from all the sites I checked haha

Is it straight forward, max one, max the next, max the last (and what's the order, if so?)... Or is it best to jump around and bring them up together? Or alternate two, and leave the third for last?

Like I said, couldn't find consensus, and doing the calculations (base damage, +% damage, attack speed, etc. Is beyond me hahaha)

Thanks as always, and GL out there!

It depends on your gear, on your playing style and so on.
For example, if you use smiter for Uber only then you can change gear for Uber. If you want smiter as backup for boss/immune then you don’t want to change gear. Your gear setup won’t be the same for both cases.
You want enough

Fanaticism to reach breakpoints.

Holy Shield is when you want more blocking.

Shooter wrote: 3 hours ago

[..]
The question is: once

Holy Bolt & FOH are maxed, what is the best order for topping up

Smite,

Holy Shield, and

Fanaticism? I don't think I found the same answer twice, from all the sites I checked haha

Is it straight forward, max one, max the next, max the last (and what's the order, if so?)... Or is it best to jump around and bring them up together? Or alternate two, and leave the third for last?
[..]

If you're worried about the order of it, you're inherently still talking about leveling.

Typically, that's the one point in time where survivability might still be an issue which is why - personally - I'd go with 1 pt in fana +

Smite and then max

Holy Shield first. It does add to your

Smite dmg as well but first and foremost it massively boosts your defensive capabilities at that stage.

Similarly, smiting at that stage kinda sucks in general (thanks to typically still a lack of core smiter items). As a result you'll likely rely far more heavily on your merc while lvling than you do on your own

Smite dmg. And because of that, I for one would focus on

Fanaticism before

Smite next. Still offers you some offensive benefit but more than that it boosts your merc further.

Once that's done, finish up

Smite.

Adding to the above, realistically, you'll only use

Smite on bosses and stuff that isn't hurt by the FoH

Bolts which is a fraction of what you come up against. Another reason to focus on

Smite last and get the stuff that always helps first.