Hammer/foh paladin hybrid

I wanted to share the build I've been playing recently. For some time, I tried a dedicated FOH paladin build but I found it to work great in a few places and not so much/or too slow in others. I'm the type that likes to clear all mobs everywhere I go so it's partly my fault. A couple weeks ago I changed my spec and am now doing a FOH and hammer hybrid. It's been years since I used hammers, and maybe that's why I'm finding it so fun?

Spec FOH
increase the FOH magic damage (Fist of Heavens and

Holy Bolt) ignoring the extra lightning damage skills like

Holy Shock. It might be worth putting one point in it though to benefit from all the added +skill points. FOH is my primary attack skill specially as I

Teleport or run towards groups of mobs.

Hammers
Next is adding skill points to raise the dmg output of hammers (

Blessed Hammer,

Vigor,

Blessed Aim). Finally, the auras I walk around in are almost exclusively in

Concentration which increases the dmg output of

Blessed Hammer and every so often, I'll switch to

Redemption

Gear

• https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/cr8xk0ul

125 fcr breakpoint makes casting all the things and teleporting great. Currently using mf gear > 400% with decent gold find as well. Spirit on the shield gives me plenty fhr so I don't get stopped along the way. FOH and Hammers hit plenty hard for P1 which is what I play. Have max all resistance and I did put many points in dex to get to max block or close to it - my

Helm and ammy both have a little dex.

Merc
Act 2 with

Prayer for hp regen and using Insight for mana regen. Allows me to spam hammers or foh non-stop. Great for

Baal when he mana leeches too. Rearely need to use

Redemption because of this combo.

Play Style
Run around with

Concentration on casting FOH on groups of mobs. If mobs rush at me and circle me, I cast hammers. If I find a straggler I'll use hammers. On bosses, hammers for quick kills. If my hp seems to get a little low, I'll switch to

Redemption for a tick and back to

Concentration. I tend to do this with TZ

Nihlathak. Often I start with FOH and switch over to hammers in large groups.

Thoughts
I like using more than one skill to play the game - something about using both hammers and FOH makes it more fun to me. For example, in act 5 throne, I can spam hammers until the wave of mobs shows up and switch to foh. I'm enjoying farming all TZ now instead. Overall, I give the build 2 thumbs up and maybe I'll get to lvl 98!

As a fellow enjoyer of juggling many buttons and clearing all sorts of places, your build looks fun to play — thanks for sharing!

I've seen second-hand how much a pure FoH Paladin struggles with zones including a significant presence of non-Undead or -Demons, so mixing in some hammers sounds great. Any areas you particularly enjoy farming with your new hybrid setup?

Runasutaru wrote: 3 days ago

Any areas you particularly enjoy farming with your new hybrid setup?

I used to skip the act iv TZ's other than Chaos. I did them last night and it was enjoyable. I also found

Tal Rasha's being more pleasant being able to kill the beatles pretty quick with hammers while clearing most of the others with foh. I'm using my paly on all TZ's atm, not being picky as I was before.

azeroti wrote: 3 days ago

Gear

• https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/cr8xk0ul

Shako+

Magefist is better in every metric than a cheap circ+chancies (except gold find)

uuee wrote: 3 days ago

azeroti wrote: 3 days ago

Gear

• https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/cr8xk0ul

Shako+

Magefist is better in every metric than a cheap circ+chancies.

Good call! I don't need the extra gold from chancies since I have a gold barb so yeah, I agree I should make that change. I'll try it tonight, thanks.

uuee wrote: 3 days ago

azeroti wrote: 3 days ago

Gear

• https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/cr8xk0ul

Shako+

Magefist is better in every metric than a cheap circ+chancies (except gold find)

Well, as long as you do not care for the "look-metric"... (Btw, if no one looks, in p1 games my Sorc wears a

Shako+

Topaz instead of Nightwings, too )

oOKIWIOo wrote: 19 hours ago

[..]
(Btw, if no one looks, in p1 games my Sorc wears a

Shako+

Topaz instead of Nightwings, too )

You yourself are looking. Which is the only person you should care about in that context.
Though nightwings is beyond fugly anyways so going from that to

Shako..no big visual loss.

Schnorki wrote: 3 hours ago

oOKIWIOo wrote: 19 hours ago

[..]
(Btw, if no one looks, in p1 games my Sorc wears a

Shako+

Topaz instead of Nightwings, too )

You yourself are looking. Which is the only person you should care about in that context.
Though nightwings is beyond fugly anyways so going from that to

Shako..no big visual loss.

I cast that much blizzard that it conceales my Sorc at least a little

Thank God I am at least colour blind (not joking). But you´re right: Both "options" are a complete aesthetic failure...

this build seems counter intuitive - at least to me.

The full force of the boring BH din originated way back in LOD where i last stopped playing it. Simply OP but boring class to play because primary skill is all you need.

& an Enigma as standard uniform.

Spam hammers. Tings die. I fell asleep with BH spam in LOD in my younger days and god forbid me what would happen if i do so now..

Why make a hybrid when you can focus on pure BH and not gimp yourself?

FOH is great as a FOH/Smiter hybrid that's for sure.
D2r made a great change to FOH -tip of the hat to that- by allowing

Bolts to 100%

Pierce & travel 2 screens away.
Totally raised the dead &

Revive interest in the Din class for me.

Now they need to get back & look at the

Shock Wave bear druid. . .