A Guide to Survival for a PvM Zealot.
Introduction
So you made a paladin. You have heard about the wonders of paladins knocking out bosses in seconds or running uber tristram in 1 minute or 50 seconds if they claim so and you decide to try one.
Now you have this dark skinned fellow in front of the stash staring back at you with a short sword and buckler and now ye thinking, " HOW AM I GONNA MAKE HIM WORK ??!". Lucky for us though the Zealot is relatively easy to play.
And this guide will teach you how to make him work.
Skills and stats
Skills
-----
20 Sacrifice (synergy !)
20 Zeal (left click button)
20 Fanatiscm (right button)
10 - 20 Holy Shield (i prefer to max this for def and more 1 pt smiting fun)
Rest prerequisites and 1 pt wonders
Stats
------
Str: Enough for gear, but if you are untwinked i recommend more. Safe levels to aim for is 118 str for guardian angel for an untwinked dude. But if you are pimped out in gear and all then well calculate your str correctly.
Dex: Enough for 75% block with a shield. In general if you are untwinked, shoot for more, you can't be sure when are you getting a HoZ (best blocking pala shield ever), pimped out fellos add as required.
Vita: Everything else. 1K life is the absolute minimum. That is about 300 vit right there, yup u need that figure and leave the rest to +life items. In general more is good.
Energy: None. Zeal cost 2 mana. Even without mana leech, you will still have enough mana at higher levels to attack more than 50 times. So don't waste any points in here.
Crux of the Gameplay
As we mentioned earlier, stories of super paladin doing impossible things seem far fetch to the newly oriented but here I will share their secret.
Crushing Blow yep repeat after me C-r-u-s-h-i-n-g B-l-o-w.
You might be thinking what the hell does this do, but to make it simple here how it goes. It basically takes away a fixed portion of a monster life away per hit. 1/4 for monsters while 1/8 for bosses.
Big deal you might say as you cull your 100th quill rat with your little short sword but reconsider this. Crushing blow affects bosses and champions, super uniques and the yada yada, all which have normally far higher hp than to be 1 hit KO.
Some simple math:
Normal Andariel has 1024 hp: You deal 50 dmg and have some crushing blow equip. Cb takes off 128 hp from her and then you toss in another 50 dmg from your piddly Rixot's keen (25% CB!). As a result, you will kill her faster.
Now this is only a small scale scenario.
Imagine if you are faced with 60k hp Boss monster. It will take nearly forever to cut him down with 1000 dmg but with CB (removes 1/8 of boss hp per hit) the Boss will lose about an average of 7500 hp per hit !! And that is CB alone and not your damage added ontop of it. Marvel at the numbers.
But of course this is the best case scenario as it does not factor in the Bosses normal damage resistance (normal damage resistances reduces CB effectiveness) as well. But heck whatever, makes you kill faster is great and that translates to longer life !
Tap their life for your own
Another must is a source of Lifetap. It can come from either a wand, a dagger or the Unique Glove's Dracul's Grasp, Exile and Last wish weapon.
Why Lifetap ?
Because anything that lets you:
1) Leech from unleechables
2) Steals back 50% life per hit
3) Has a little radius thus allowing your merc and party benefit as well.
4) Has a sufficient duration for your tapping needs.
Is a very good thing and key to tanking very strong mobs. This also what makes uber pallies stand up to heavy damage.
Strategy and Survival
1. Cast Holy shield
2. Select Zeal on left and Fanatism on right
3. Hold down left click button.
4. Chop chop chop
Best part of it is that the zealot does not require too much thinking and is thus great even after you are drained from a hard day work or just spent awake too long in the night.
However, not everything is fine dandy for the zealot.
The 1 hit wonder
You walked into Chaos Sanctuary and chopping your merry way through and suddenly you died. "XX Killed by OBlivion Knight". You rubbed your eyes ! Waargh it can't be true, my invincible zealot of doom can't be killed !
Well bad news for all there is something called Iron Maidern. It is a dangerous curse that reflects about 2x of your melee damage back to you thus slaughtering you. The bad boys that cast it are Oblivion Knights and they lurk all over the Chaos Sanctuary and appear as Guest Models in ACT5 NM and Hell !
What i gonna do ??!
1) Be extra careful, the moment you spot em use throwing or ranged weapons and take em out.
2) If you spotted them earlier, you can use Charge to rapidly close the distance and get the first hit and hopefully slay them. OKs tend to curse Decripfy on something approaching them so you can avoid the negative effects of IM using this tactic. But this is also a bad idea if it sends you right into packs of Doom Knights and Venom Lords.
3) Get a party member to help out, preferably casters or bowers. Hell level OKs are always immune to cold and need to be taken out by Fire, Light or Magic. Lit or magic is better since the Fire Immune Doom Knights tend to congregate around OKs and thus block out fireballs and such.
4) Don't zeal blindly. General rule of the thumb if there are Doom Knights chances are there is an Oblivion Knight somewhere.
If cursed. Stop attacking and run. Either tp out to town to get IM removed or touch a shrine or use Cleansing aura to get it off faster. When using Cleansing you will be vulnerable to other monsters still, so use throwing weapons as back up.
Waah i can't hurt em !
Physical immunes ! Those things are basically immune to phyiscal damage which is your normal mode of attack. Your Vaunted Crushing Blow is counted as a physical damage as well so it will not work too !
What i gonna do ??!
1) Use a strong elemental attack weapon. Azurewrath, Baranar's Star, Gimmershreds all can work ! Use Conviction aura (if u have it as a 1 pointer) to speed up the process.
2) Conviction + Vengence. If you have a nice big big damage weapon like say Ebotdz this can do the job well enough. Vengence won't work with +damage weapons like Grief though.
3) Use OW and poison ! They still affect PI especially OW.
4) If you merc has an elemental damage weapon or is an Iron Wolf let them do the killing. Your party can serve for this effect as well.
5) Run away ! Use smite, knock him silly a few times then bail out.
If the enemy is undead PI, you can use 1 pt Sanctuary and whack the living day lights out of them, even when they are Physical Immune. Azurewrath also serve for this effect.
Those bolts of lightning from them hurt !
Ok we are talking about Gloams and Lightning enchanted monsters. Gloams / Black Souls are the new kids in the block, their nuclear lightning bolts of doom are the bane for many chars. Lucky for pallies, pallies have class specific shield that can gain resistance as automods and a handy salvation aura ! However, even with maxed out LR, they will still hurt you a ton especially if there are 10 huge bolts streaking into your face.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Run ! Don't walk blindly into the lightning bolts.
2) Slap on ultra expensive light absorb gear like Wisp Projector and laugh at them for healing you. Lightsabre and tgods are nice to have but Lightsabre's damage is not too desirable even with CB gear due to Gloams / Black Souls having strong Physical damage reduction.
3) Kill them ! This bastards are particularly adversed to Sanctuary aura, since Sanctuary automatically negates their strong Physical Damage resistance. Be sure to be able to tank a few hits while u rush towards them. And life tap.
If your lit resist aint max from the start, i suggest Salvation. This aura is also a party saver in this kind of circumstances.
Multi Shot Lightning Enchanted monsters might not be dreadful as the past, but once you encounter one with Conviction aura, OH THE PAIN. Even more dreadful is meeting Gloams with this kind of mods.
The solution is similar to the one above except every hit will trigger another Charge Bolt of massive hurt. You might want to consider fighting the monster with Salvation aura on in this situation but if you are not too worried and confident that you can tank the hits, use fana and zeal to wipe him out quickly.
Against gloams with such dreadful mods however, i advise you to use Salvation. There is still the lightning bolt from off screen to contend with !
These guys explode and i die !
Hell yeah those undead stygian dolls ! They have a nasty mode of self destruct that turns your char to swiss cheese the moment they die if they explode too close. Since you fight melee, damn this will happen often and it will !
Being ungodly fast and small to target doesn't help much either.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Let the merc do it ! You paid him for a reason damn it ! On a side note he won't get affected by the blast so let him happily cut them down. On another note, if you are feeling particularly nasty, you can lure the buggers near an annoying party member loud mouth and let him kill them and get killed in the process !
2) Spot some DR gear. You can't have too much of DR since it will affect your resist (more important than DR) and CB. I don't suggest this.
3) Pump more vit. If you have like 1k hp minimum you should not die in 1 blast. You are a paladin ! A knight can't be slain so easily.
Extra Strong EXtra Fast Fanatism and CURSED / ManaBurn !
FRENZYTAURS !
These huge minotaurs are tough brutes that are always spoiling for a fight, they are also counted as the animal class, so stuff like LoH (ED against Demons) loses a great deal of effectiveness against them. And one more thing they cannot be chilled and have frenzy !
So a pack of those spawning those mods above will be a real challenge, so let's show em the meaning of steel.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Have your best weapon at hand, some chest thumping, holy shield, max block and stand your ground. Those frenzytaurs with these mods are going to outrun you anyway so no point giving them free hits. Recommended if you have very strong gear and a RENEWABLE source of lifetap aka Exile, Draculs, Last Wish.
2) If the top solution sounds suicidal or you are ill afford to stand up against those odds straight away, you can run away tp out and swap on whatever DR gear you got. Hey they outnumber you anyway so why not get alittle more advantage. Vamp gaze, Shaftstop even String of Ears can be bought with pgems on realms anyway so don't be afraid to keep a few in stash ! Lure them a few at a time. Lifetap is still needed of course.
Of course there is CoA, dungos and blah blah as DR gear but if you have those you should look at solution 1. Enjoy a good fight !
3) Let's gang up on them ! Parties are there for a reason. Don't be surprised to see some casters torn to pieces one those monsters dashes upon them though. In fact you guys might have to fight all over the place which is a good thing since you can focus on one at a time.
4) Retreat, if you are playing untwinked and solo this might be the only way, this bastards are seriously strong and will take time to kill and they always come in packs thus your merc and you might not be enough to stop them. Lifetap and CB will be your route to salvation if you still intend to take em on.
More to come......
Introduction
So you made a paladin. You have heard about the wonders of paladins knocking out bosses in seconds or running uber tristram in 1 minute or 50 seconds if they claim so and you decide to try one.
Now you have this dark skinned fellow in front of the stash staring back at you with a short sword and buckler and now ye thinking, " HOW AM I GONNA MAKE HIM WORK ??!". Lucky for us though the Zealot is relatively easy to play.
And this guide will teach you how to make him work.
Skills and stats
Skills
-----
20 Sacrifice (synergy !)
20 Zeal (left click button)
20 Fanatiscm (right button)
10 - 20 Holy Shield (i prefer to max this for def and more 1 pt smiting fun)
Rest prerequisites and 1 pt wonders
Stats
------
Str: Enough for gear, but if you are untwinked i recommend more. Safe levels to aim for is 118 str for guardian angel for an untwinked dude. But if you are pimped out in gear and all then well calculate your str correctly.
Dex: Enough for 75% block with a shield. In general if you are untwinked, shoot for more, you can't be sure when are you getting a HoZ (best blocking pala shield ever), pimped out fellos add as required.
Vita: Everything else. 1K life is the absolute minimum. That is about 300 vit right there, yup u need that figure and leave the rest to +life items. In general more is good.
Energy: None. Zeal cost 2 mana. Even without mana leech, you will still have enough mana at higher levels to attack more than 50 times. So don't waste any points in here.
Crux of the Gameplay
As we mentioned earlier, stories of super paladin doing impossible things seem far fetch to the newly oriented but here I will share their secret.
Crushing Blow yep repeat after me C-r-u-s-h-i-n-g B-l-o-w.
You might be thinking what the hell does this do, but to make it simple here how it goes. It basically takes away a fixed portion of a monster life away per hit. 1/4 for monsters while 1/8 for bosses.
Big deal you might say as you cull your 100th quill rat with your little short sword but reconsider this. Crushing blow affects bosses and champions, super uniques and the yada yada, all which have normally far higher hp than to be 1 hit KO.
Some simple math:
Normal Andariel has 1024 hp: You deal 50 dmg and have some crushing blow equip. Cb takes off 128 hp from her and then you toss in another 50 dmg from your piddly Rixot's keen (25% CB!). As a result, you will kill her faster.
Now this is only a small scale scenario.
Imagine if you are faced with 60k hp Boss monster. It will take nearly forever to cut him down with 1000 dmg but with CB (removes 1/8 of boss hp per hit) the Boss will lose about an average of 7500 hp per hit !! And that is CB alone and not your damage added ontop of it. Marvel at the numbers.
But of course this is the best case scenario as it does not factor in the Bosses normal damage resistance (normal damage resistances reduces CB effectiveness) as well. But heck whatever, makes you kill faster is great and that translates to longer life !
Tap their life for your own
Another must is a source of Lifetap. It can come from either a wand, a dagger or the Unique Glove's Dracul's Grasp, Exile and Last wish weapon.
Why Lifetap ?
Because anything that lets you:
1) Leech from unleechables
2) Steals back 50% life per hit
3) Has a little radius thus allowing your merc and party benefit as well.
4) Has a sufficient duration for your tapping needs.
Is a very good thing and key to tanking very strong mobs. This also what makes uber pallies stand up to heavy damage.
Strategy and Survival
1. Cast Holy shield
2. Select Zeal on left and Fanatism on right
3. Hold down left click button.
4. Chop chop chop
Best part of it is that the zealot does not require too much thinking and is thus great even after you are drained from a hard day work or just spent awake too long in the night.
However, not everything is fine dandy for the zealot.
The 1 hit wonder
You walked into Chaos Sanctuary and chopping your merry way through and suddenly you died. "XX Killed by OBlivion Knight". You rubbed your eyes ! Waargh it can't be true, my invincible zealot of doom can't be killed !
Well bad news for all there is something called Iron Maidern. It is a dangerous curse that reflects about 2x of your melee damage back to you thus slaughtering you. The bad boys that cast it are Oblivion Knights and they lurk all over the Chaos Sanctuary and appear as Guest Models in ACT5 NM and Hell !
What i gonna do ??!
1) Be extra careful, the moment you spot em use throwing or ranged weapons and take em out.
2) If you spotted them earlier, you can use Charge to rapidly close the distance and get the first hit and hopefully slay them. OKs tend to curse Decripfy on something approaching them so you can avoid the negative effects of IM using this tactic. But this is also a bad idea if it sends you right into packs of Doom Knights and Venom Lords.
3) Get a party member to help out, preferably casters or bowers. Hell level OKs are always immune to cold and need to be taken out by Fire, Light or Magic. Lit or magic is better since the Fire Immune Doom Knights tend to congregate around OKs and thus block out fireballs and such.
4) Don't zeal blindly. General rule of the thumb if there are Doom Knights chances are there is an Oblivion Knight somewhere.
If cursed. Stop attacking and run. Either tp out to town to get IM removed or touch a shrine or use Cleansing aura to get it off faster. When using Cleansing you will be vulnerable to other monsters still, so use throwing weapons as back up.
Waah i can't hurt em !
Physical immunes ! Those things are basically immune to phyiscal damage which is your normal mode of attack. Your Vaunted Crushing Blow is counted as a physical damage as well so it will not work too !
What i gonna do ??!
1) Use a strong elemental attack weapon. Azurewrath, Baranar's Star, Gimmershreds all can work ! Use Conviction aura (if u have it as a 1 pointer) to speed up the process.
2) Conviction + Vengence. If you have a nice big big damage weapon like say Ebotdz this can do the job well enough. Vengence won't work with +damage weapons like Grief though.
3) Use OW and poison ! They still affect PI especially OW.
4) If you merc has an elemental damage weapon or is an Iron Wolf let them do the killing. Your party can serve for this effect as well.
5) Run away ! Use smite, knock him silly a few times then bail out.
If the enemy is undead PI, you can use 1 pt Sanctuary and whack the living day lights out of them, even when they are Physical Immune. Azurewrath also serve for this effect.
Those bolts of lightning from them hurt !
Ok we are talking about Gloams and Lightning enchanted monsters. Gloams / Black Souls are the new kids in the block, their nuclear lightning bolts of doom are the bane for many chars. Lucky for pallies, pallies have class specific shield that can gain resistance as automods and a handy salvation aura ! However, even with maxed out LR, they will still hurt you a ton especially if there are 10 huge bolts streaking into your face.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Run ! Don't walk blindly into the lightning bolts.
2) Slap on ultra expensive light absorb gear like Wisp Projector and laugh at them for healing you. Lightsabre and tgods are nice to have but Lightsabre's damage is not too desirable even with CB gear due to Gloams / Black Souls having strong Physical damage reduction.
3) Kill them ! This bastards are particularly adversed to Sanctuary aura, since Sanctuary automatically negates their strong Physical Damage resistance. Be sure to be able to tank a few hits while u rush towards them. And life tap.
If your lit resist aint max from the start, i suggest Salvation. This aura is also a party saver in this kind of circumstances.
Multi Shot Lightning Enchanted monsters might not be dreadful as the past, but once you encounter one with Conviction aura, OH THE PAIN. Even more dreadful is meeting Gloams with this kind of mods.
The solution is similar to the one above except every hit will trigger another Charge Bolt of massive hurt. You might want to consider fighting the monster with Salvation aura on in this situation but if you are not too worried and confident that you can tank the hits, use fana and zeal to wipe him out quickly.
Against gloams with such dreadful mods however, i advise you to use Salvation. There is still the lightning bolt from off screen to contend with !
These guys explode and i die !
Hell yeah those undead stygian dolls ! They have a nasty mode of self destruct that turns your char to swiss cheese the moment they die if they explode too close. Since you fight melee, damn this will happen often and it will !
Being ungodly fast and small to target doesn't help much either.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Let the merc do it ! You paid him for a reason damn it ! On a side note he won't get affected by the blast so let him happily cut them down. On another note, if you are feeling particularly nasty, you can lure the buggers near an annoying party member loud mouth and let him kill them and get killed in the process !
2) Spot some DR gear. You can't have too much of DR since it will affect your resist (more important than DR) and CB. I don't suggest this.
3) Pump more vit. If you have like 1k hp minimum you should not die in 1 blast. You are a paladin ! A knight can't be slain so easily.
Extra Strong EXtra Fast Fanatism and CURSED / ManaBurn !
FRENZYTAURS !
These huge minotaurs are tough brutes that are always spoiling for a fight, they are also counted as the animal class, so stuff like LoH (ED against Demons) loses a great deal of effectiveness against them. And one more thing they cannot be chilled and have frenzy !
So a pack of those spawning those mods above will be a real challenge, so let's show em the meaning of steel.
What i gonna do ??!
1) Have your best weapon at hand, some chest thumping, holy shield, max block and stand your ground. Those frenzytaurs with these mods are going to outrun you anyway so no point giving them free hits. Recommended if you have very strong gear and a RENEWABLE source of lifetap aka Exile, Draculs, Last Wish.
2) If the top solution sounds suicidal or you are ill afford to stand up against those odds straight away, you can run away tp out and swap on whatever DR gear you got. Hey they outnumber you anyway so why not get alittle more advantage. Vamp gaze, Shaftstop even String of Ears can be bought with pgems on realms anyway so don't be afraid to keep a few in stash ! Lure them a few at a time. Lifetap is still needed of course.
Of course there is CoA, dungos and blah blah as DR gear but if you have those you should look at solution 1. Enjoy a good fight !
3) Let's gang up on them ! Parties are there for a reason. Don't be surprised to see some casters torn to pieces one those monsters dashes upon them though. In fact you guys might have to fight all over the place which is a good thing since you can focus on one at a time.
4) Retreat, if you are playing untwinked and solo this might be the only way, this bastards are seriously strong and will take time to kill and they always come in packs thus your merc and you might not be enough to stop them. Lifetap and CB will be your route to salvation if you still intend to take em on.
More to come......
