my only comment would be that I would prefer maxing Vigor and dumping remaining into Blessed Aim, simply because Vigor has the small use case of running around in town, where Blessed Aim simply has nothing that you're ever going to actually use it for, and they're worth the same amount of synergy % damage. Other than that, really good guide, and thanks for bringing this tri-brid pally to the public eye so to speak!
After maxing Vigor, wouldn’t maxing concentrate be better than blessed aim? Concentrate improves 15% damage per level where blessed aim only gives 14% synergy bonus?
Cool tribrid! I'm not sure if someone already mentioned/commented this, but I just wanted to point out that your current gear/equipment setup warrants you 115% FCR (unless i maybe missed something?). This isn't a break point for a Paladin and is at an awkward crossroads. IMO you can make your toon better by swapping some gear out to improve your damage output/speed. The two breakpoints is 75% and 125%... having 115% FCR is basically the same as 75% FCR. If you're wanting 125% FCR then I'd look into swapping out that Mara's for a 2/10 FCR/@res Paladin ammy to get you to the 125. However, for PVM, I don't think 125% FCR is necessary. 1.) You can swap out the HotO (115-40=75) with a Grief to improve your smite damage significantly and not have to worry about swapping/carrying a Last Wish around. IMO the 15% CB from Gore's will carry you more than enough to get the boss down to about 50% health, wherein CB damage begins to fall off and the extra +damage from Grief will begin to take over. You can also consider putting on a Gface (w/Cham) instead of the Shako for more CB. Not only does swapping on the Grief improve your Smite, but it also gives the option to kill straggler enemies and/or bosses with Zeal or Charge. 2.) Keep the HotO and Spirit (40+35=75) and swap out the Magefist with Steelrends (30-60%ehdamage/10% CB) or 20% IAS/10% CB Blood crafted gloves. I'd probably keep the Arachnid's on for primarily the +1 to all skills, but you technically can swap Arachnids Mesh for Tgod's (more survivability against gloams lightning via. max lightning res and absorb), or Verdungo's, or String of Ears, or a 10% Open Wounds Blood crafted belt. However, as previously mentioned the Arachnid's has quite a bit of use even though you aren't benefitting from the 20% fcr so I'd personally keep it on if I went this route and was good in regards to survivability. 3.) Swap the Spirit for a Phoenix runeword @res paladin shield (115-35=80). This would give you up to 400% ehdamage for your smite and also Redemption aura, therefore solving your mana consumption issues allwhile bolstering your smite. Yes some of these gear swap examples remove some +skills, but TBH your Hammers and FOH/Holy Bolt are just used for AoE against packs and IMO losing anywhere from 1-3 +skills won't hurt your Hammers, or FOH/Holy Bolt, so much so that it becomes useless against enemy packs. There is quite a few different other ways to swap things around for the 75% FCR, but i wanted to try and keep to the things you already had equipped. Anyway, If I were to choose one of these examples then I'd probably go with swapping the HotO for Grief as it'd allow me to not have to worry about swapping Last Wish on/off and I can use Zeal or Charge to essentially finish off straggler enemies and/or the boss. One thing I'd add to this is also consider (if you're lucky) swapping the Mara's for a 2/20 FCR/@res Caster crafted amulet. This way you can then swap the magefist gloves for one of the ones previously mentioned.
Thanks for sharing, after testing on PTR single player, for all of those excited ones using this while leveling or early on, you can have quite hard times even on P1. This build is an endgame build and when you don’t have enough plus skills it is not that great overall. When maxing out FOH, it is ok dmg - I had 2 spirits and Lore helm so only plus 5 skills and FOH was fine, holy bolt better, but hammers were very weak until lvl75 and smite was just pathetic at that point. I think for leveling it is better to go pure hammerdin and once you beat the game or hit lvl 75 the transition can come. But having at least plus 10 combat skills, netter gear and being lvl 85 plus is kind of mandatory to make it work so you actually can do everything and do not struggle, eventually having fun.
My exact experience at lvl 75/76 where I maxed Fist, Holy Bolt, and Hammer and then am on the way to maxing vigor. It's got great damage on undead/demons but the hammers are just a tad lacking, especially when they are hard to aim without Enigma. So I'm farming Mausoleum/Sewers right now while working my way through Act 2 since I can take on the undead. Slowly I'm leveling and the hammers are getting more damage. Would recommend this more for end game, but the 75 spot does seem to be a good time where the damage is balancing out in early Hell.
I built this build in ladder 1 D2R. I changed it up a bit. Used a CTA on a 2/2 blessed hammer/conc scepter for the 125fcr side and on switch is a Crescent moon Phase Blade and upped hoz. Although I only use hoz setup for Uber bosses I change out fcr gloves, fcr helm and boots for dracs, kiras and goblin toe but with a semi full character (6x pcomb/anni/torch) I am doing 6k hammers, 7k holy bolt, 1k smite damage max res max block and about 2700 life with only 3 battle orders. Thanks for the build made it my own.
What a video! Literally a solo build for everything in the game…on ONE character and capability for content completion! Appreciate this! Definitely going to utilize this and test it out myself! ❤️🙌🏽
Marco ❤ one update for the build. I made a variant that only used 1 point concentration and gave my merc Pride for the deficit. Went max vitality with no stat points spent anywhere else (intentionally). Gear was set to just be ultra low with respect to strength. You do give up max block but honestly still plays smooth. 75% All rest, max fcr, and still pretty much clears entire game solo.
Pretty much your original variant is undeniable, it’s S++ since it’s excels at any range any monster type. Honestly between this and the holy fire + FoH hybrid classes, they just absolutely stomp anything in their way, a pair of these paladins pretty much dominates anything
Hey man so Cooley did some testing with this. turns out the most damage setup is 19 hard points into hammers, 3 hard points into conc then max the synergies if you're going the FoH/hammers route
They only counter I have to that is that points in conc only net 7.5% damage increase whereas synergies are a 14% increase. So I'm not sure exactly how he had it built, comes down to whether you go down to into vigor I reckon.
The final result in point distribution for optimal BH dmg varies, depending on your +skills. I've a spreadsheet to help calculations because the distribution is not intuitive. Cooley's calculation was based on the best possible gear, i believe.
Is the only change in the written guide vs this the prioritization over vigor? I’d like to give this a try on my foh/smiter as definitely feeling limited in thr areas I can farm. I’m just about at 10 skills. I would like to get a point into redemption and salvation if possible - so where should I steal those points from? Thanks!
I actually ran something similar to this in pvp back on old d2, but with lightning damage on FoH in mind. The switch to focusing only on the holy bolt damage was also something I observed for mashing chaos, seeing the two combined is great and I'm probably going to start with hammer and transition into FoH/holybolt farming for hell chaos to gear up for ubers. Then when I finally get enigma I'd probably respec into this version. Great video
I've really been digging your content! As long as they don't nerf the holy bolt damage from fist of heavens, this should be a stellar build. I'm looking forward to duo/trio leveling with a zoo druid and maybe a summons necro. that one point in fana will be great!
This is probably a dumb question and I assume the answer is "crushing blow" but: is the damage on a fully synergised Holy Bolt not enough to melt bosses anyway? Iirc those numbers get pretty high
So He'll Baal has 1.6 million life on P8. Holy Bolt maxes out at 20k magic damage per second. So it takes 81 seconds to kill Baal. Crushing blow first till around 10% remaining life takes less than a minute and then finishing with Holy Bolt ends up being faster.
You can also save points by using Pride on merc if you use act 2. Level 20 Pride is possibly going to net you more than a hard point with plus skills, so you can spend everything you can in synergies. Plus you can get Might, so it gives a tiny bit more of an argument for subbing out last wish for a weapon with even more skill efficiency. Redemption/BH/Conc/Fanat/whatever can be had from a good CTA scepter. Upped HoZ and +3 Fanat CTA Caddy wouldn't be as strong as grief/LW, but way more efficient in space. Haven't tested the usefulness of a maxed-out cta, but with BH and FoH already able to clear everything when combined, smite/melee is gonna be an afterthought anyways. Love your analysis! Great vid!
My only issue with this is you now have a completely useless mercenary, and the point of hybridizing is to increase DPS pop output vs single targets and bosses. The Merc plays a huge role in that effort.
@@MacroBioBoi That is true. Act 5 is useful. I can hardly stand act 2 ai, but unfortunately he's the only one who can use certain items. There probably isn't an absolute perfect way to do it. But the concept itself is pretty amazing. Keep up the great work! You're a smart dude and you're humble at the same time. Great recipe for success, dude!
Looking forward to running pits/trav with a fohdin making this build. everything in the pits/trav is susceptible to holy bolt, and the maxed vigor gets you there almost as fast as tele. Can theoretically run a lvl 85 area (pits) at ~ lvl 45-50 immedieatly after hitting a1 hell. All the champion skellies in tamoe highland also die to it :D
Have you tried ubers with this build? Or did you have the chance to fight diablo clone? Do you think with enough resistance for uber mephisto (maybe 1 point in salvation?), crushing blow and life tap it will be ok? What would you change in gear?
@@MacroBioBoi Checked it out. Great work. Answers all of my questions. Thanks again. Keep up the good work. I’ve been looking for “UA-cam” builds that are 2.4 updates vs old version metas. Because we all know some things have changed.
Pretty surprised also the FOH build included 'holy shock and conviction' which is practically useless in solo imo. Even in groups- as a fohdin , maxing out holy shock is just dumb. My question is - would this build work without optimal gear ? Maybe only +5 to skils ?
I'm a poor single player with no skillers, no Call to Arms, no Grief, basically I've never seen a rune over maybe Ist or Um. Is this build viable with mid-range gear from hell meph running only, for maybe players 3? I don't know that I have the gear to really buff the hammers etc.
Cool. I usually play characters in single player, so I was thinking 20 FoH, 20 BHammer, 20 HBolt, 20 Blessed Aim, 1 point wonders of holy shield, meditation, redemption, salvation, and fanaticism. Any points over level 86, if any, into vigor. I would probably run concentration at level 1 plus I think I have gear to get +7 skills. Or I could sometimes run my one point wonders as needed. Thanks for the video and the reply!
i'd like to see the optimized FOH for chaos. i've been ignoring the lightning damage because it's throwing away 20+ points. holy damage only feels great. finat + m5 frenzy + holy bolt spam to kill diablo. switch to redemption as needed. use the extra points to get finat, redemption, max holy shield and max fire res which make you even more unkillable. im skipping conviction/holy shock
Only thing else that’s possible is if your doing party play, you could do 20 into sanctuary and it’s synergy. That way the entire team will make short work of the Chaos. That’s specifically only for team play and undead/demon areas to benefit the team and not slow your personal killing speed.
@@kristopherleslie8343 sanctuary aura won't increase your party's kill speed, only knock back Undead types. The removing physical resistance only works for melee attacks from the person with the aura.
@@MacroBioBoi I’m looking at it from the knock back but I can see that being dope on some builds and kinda “meh” on others. Yea the damage bonus lol hell I never even use it lol cause the character screen be lying!
@@MacroBioBoi it does definitely kill things even in hell :) but had to have a good amount of points. It basically neutered the undead from even attacking which can be useful but it’s very very niche
Why not one point in redemption? I’m doing a playthrough on single player with monster density modded to 20x and there’s not been any other paladin build I’ve tried that could really mow through the crazy density. Surely someone else could do it better than me but I just finished act IV nightmare. Being able to switch to redemption for resource management has been very useful.
@@MacroBioBoi hmm I guess there is a sort of cost:benefit analysis that could be done. We would need to compare the time it takes to switch to redemption and get refilled versus drinking and picking up potions. I’m actually thinking more about the context of the modded high density playing though. When there’s a lot going on and also I may not be confident that the potion will refill my health fast enough, switching to redemption while still casting hammers/foh, getting refilled, then swapping back to concentrate has been an effective strategy. That said, I have no issues with the “drink a potion” route either.
I put 1 point in redemption as well this build helped me get past hell I was struggling with my hammering in act 5 I made the switch at lvl 80 with bad gear 2 spirits and goblin toe is my only decent gear
@MacroBioBoi This is my first time actually looking into builds for this class so if this makes no sense let me know. but ive never used smite and have always gone zeal. is there a way to instead of using the smite skill tree to use the zeal one instead. I dont really care about vigor and was thinkin just put the extra into sacrifice/zeal or fanaticsim but again I have no idea how any of this really works. Kinda wondering how would someone build this out for just playing casually through the game not caring about speed or good items?
You should check out the Zealer build guide on d2r.Maxroll.gg (the website I write for) to get a better handle on the Zealer. He's much more gear dependent, and needs Attack Rating. Smite is good on this build because it always hits, even if you don't have melee gear.
How do you lock your right skill but quick change your left click skill?? We need to keep the aura on the right but when I quick attack, it uses the right click key to attack and I lose the aura.
This build is not a secret build its been known for along time for hardcore pvpers but for players that want something new and fresh this would be it for you. cant wait to do some lld with a druid.
I like the smite one more for HC play since FCR does nothing to FoH and we already tested the build with a lot lower gear options and it still does really well.
Wouldnt it be possible to only focus on hoy bolt / FOH with mostly fanaticism aura and let your act 5 merc kill what you cant, and making him almost unkillable by healing him with holy bolts ?
Hey macro, i have a nice build idea for a hybrid FoH/Smiter paladin. The build has crushing blow/open wounds/life tap proc/ 75% fcr BP and IAS. Astreon's iron ward (Crushing blow/4 Pcomb) socketed with ias and res jewel maybe? 2/20 paladin circlet with some nice stats socketed with ias jewel, 35% FCR spirit shield, enigma, maras, arach, drac, gore riders or golbin toes, raven frost, SOJ or BK. what do you think?
i put a similar build together but i have 1 pnt in medication for when i just want mana regen and foh in tomb or chaos. and that i dont rly care for the mercs dps
That is the build I was going for and just for the test purpose i was wondering if 20 points on FOH is trully needed since you are killing with HB area of effect and dmg. I couldn't test PTR FOH realu needs upgrade?
Why dump the rest of the points in vigor instead of concentration? When you're swinging those hammers, concentration aura will benefit the merc and party as well.
This is an excellent idea, thanks for sharing. I will most likely still opt for maxing oout the lightning part. The reason being that I played hammerdin for way too long and am happily looking for a fresh and new build.
Thx for the confirmation Was thinking why on earth other streamers were maxing smite and fanatisism which doesnt add to much use Was thinking how would a half baked hammer would be seems good to me
Instead of investing into Smite, could you instead put a point into conviction if you want to only focus on BH/FOH? Would the prerequisites be worth the investment? My idea is that you'd use Concentration, cast hammers, swap to Conviction, and then spam FoH.
The conviction aura bumps up your lightning damage but the lightning damage is the worst part of FoH. And you have to pick up smite already for Holy Shield.
Only 'hard' points into a skill will apply to the synergy, unfortunately. The + skill will directly effect the skill if being used/ casted so tearhaunch really won't boost your damage.
Everyone who says Foh is ONLY useable for chaos runs are flat out wrong. There are numerous good farming areas where Foh destroys just about 90% of enemies in the blink of an eye. By far my favorite build, especially on console
sir i build it today ........ i cannot explain how crazy this build is ........ HollyS***.... atm i have the wrong headpiece and wrong ammy with a total emptyy inventory .... and it rocks :D thx alot for your work
ok so i converted over my fully geared hammerdin to fist/hammerdin *one point smite and fanat* and wow ... it just wrecks. Fist to clear screens hammers for things fist cant kill ... smite for ubers
neat theory crafting. Mostly useful if you want a pally to do baal runs with, since holy bolt no longer has hammer synergy so hammerdins cannot clear wave 2 anymore. The idea of a "boss killing merc" doesn't work, since mercs have a 75% damage penalty to bosses. Your merc is doing nothing
That last conclusion is incorrect. New Act 5 Merc can solo Ubers and Mercs have always been the biggest contributor to clear speed on Bosses with crushing blow for caster builds.
@@MacroBioBoi I mean that's just wrong. Merc is less than 5% of boss damage for any boss farming build. Even the new a5 merc that everyone is raving about takes several minutes to kill p1 mephisto with perfect gear without stacking crushing blow, and mephisto has the lowest phys resist of any act boss. The only way your merc does anything to bosses is if you only gear him for crushing blow, and it will still be slow. Even with 100% CB it takes a5 merc well over a minute to kill any uber bosses, and that's on p1.
@@zanido9073 crushing blow does not scale with Players settings. Of course only him attacking is going to kill lv 99 Baal with 4.5 times it's base health at a slow rate. What's your argument here? So far you've said P1 Mephisto without crushing blow is slow, Kills an Uber boss in little over a minute, and against the worst possible boss in the game on P8 he slowly kills that. I'd recommend using the whole build I showcase, and remember that Mercs function differently if you put them in different scenarios.
Why not astreons. 85 dmg added to smite. 25% Slow. 33%Cb. 4 combat skills . 10ias. You can only cast foh at 75 fcr optimally. So 35% from spirit shield. 20% fcr from arach with an additional 10% slow for a total of 35% slow and 20% fcr from magefist. Much steonger smite. Stronger foh and hammers and obviously the slow vs bosses means 35% less dmg taken.
This is the standard end game gear setup for a Hammerdin. Not sure what's unrealistic about it. It isn't Dual Spirit, Stealth, a Lore helm, and 0 skillers, I agree.
Terrible build on a budget 1) without skiller charms and gg gear, the damage of hammers is trash and it's faster to kill animals packs with the lightning damage. 2) maxing blessed aim before vigor makes no sens, vigor is more useful 3) without lightning damage, the targeted mob always survives while his pack dies from holy bolts, therefore it makes you waste time by having to cast more 4) FOH is better with a controller because of the auto-aim
Dear Macro BioBoi! You have 3 minutes TLDW version, 13 minutes LW version, can we also have an hour long version with more details, examples, calculation etc? I found all your said 'long' videos not long enough... Is it only my? Really everyone want to watch basically a music clip version of video? You can just read the text, you know, if you really want to save precious seconds of you life...
So Vlad, to be 100% honest no one else wants to watch me explain a build for an hour. People are angry when videos are ten minutes long. I appreciate that you want more indepth info and longer form content, but that's just not one of the options right now.
@@MacroBioBoi I was able to catch you once, you a very nice guy! But timezones are exist (and I already have weird schedule due to remote work for another timezone). So anyway, thanks for invitation!
everyone and there brother is making these vods lol... these videos only create flavor of the month builds. I'am old old school where when u figure out some great skill/gear combination, u fuckin keep it to urself to be unique and different from everyone else. Hell u can't even go this build anymore b/c everyone is gonna do it now. this is also how things get nerfed b/c everyone knows about it and does it. Can't nerf something that the community dont know about yet
What someone plays does not affect what other people play, or their play experience in any way other than PvP. Even then, the meta is so tightly defined that you play what beats the other builds in your group and your skill will eek out small percentage wins over unfavorable matchups. It's literally my job to educate people about interesting ways to play this game. Can't gatekeep a build while streaming now can I?
D2Planner for the Character for your to check out:
d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner-ptr/at0106z4
You are solid! Thank you
Doing my theory crafting
You should call this build the Captain America lol. Throwing attacks like Avengers Endgame when he gets Mjolnir.
@@chris5240 ^ this right here
@@chris5240 facts
my only comment would be that I would prefer maxing Vigor and dumping remaining into Blessed Aim, simply because Vigor has the small use case of running around in town, where Blessed Aim simply has nothing that you're ever going to actually use it for, and they're worth the same amount of synergy % damage. Other than that, really good guide, and thanks for bringing this tri-brid pally to the public eye so to speak!
In retrospec you're correct. Thanks for your kind words!
I'm gonna make a pally now and name him Neal Peart
Thanks, I was wondering what advantage blessed aim had over Vigor... this cleared things up!
After maxing Vigor, wouldn’t maxing concentrate be better than blessed aim? Concentrate improves 15% damage per level where blessed aim only gives 14% synergy bonus?
Not gonna lie I’ve got shit tier gear on my pally and this build slaps. Thanks for the vid!
Cool tribrid!
I'm not sure if someone already mentioned/commented this, but I just wanted to point out that your current gear/equipment setup warrants you 115% FCR (unless i maybe missed something?). This isn't a break point for a Paladin and is at an awkward crossroads. IMO you can make your toon better by swapping some gear out to improve your damage output/speed. The two breakpoints is 75% and 125%... having 115% FCR is basically the same as 75% FCR. If you're wanting 125% FCR then I'd look into swapping out that Mara's for a 2/10 FCR/@res Paladin ammy to get you to the 125. However, for PVM, I don't think 125% FCR is necessary.
1.) You can swap out the HotO (115-40=75) with a Grief to improve your smite damage significantly and not have to worry about swapping/carrying a Last Wish around. IMO the 15% CB from Gore's will carry you more than enough to get the boss down to about 50% health, wherein CB damage begins to fall off and the extra +damage from Grief will begin to take over. You can also consider putting on a Gface (w/Cham) instead of the Shako for more CB. Not only does swapping on the Grief improve your Smite, but it also gives the option to kill straggler enemies and/or bosses with Zeal or Charge.
2.) Keep the HotO and Spirit (40+35=75) and swap out the Magefist with Steelrends (30-60%ehdamage/10% CB) or 20% IAS/10% CB Blood crafted gloves. I'd probably keep the Arachnid's on for primarily the +1 to all skills, but you technically can swap Arachnids Mesh for Tgod's (more survivability against gloams lightning via. max lightning res and absorb), or Verdungo's, or String of Ears, or a 10% Open Wounds Blood crafted belt. However, as previously mentioned the Arachnid's has quite a bit of use even though you aren't benefitting from the 20% fcr so I'd personally keep it on if I went this route and was good in regards to survivability.
3.) Swap the Spirit for a Phoenix runeword @res paladin shield (115-35=80). This would give you up to 400% ehdamage for your smite and also Redemption aura, therefore solving your mana consumption issues allwhile bolstering your smite.
Yes some of these gear swap examples remove some +skills, but TBH your Hammers and FOH/Holy Bolt are just used for AoE against packs and IMO losing anywhere from 1-3 +skills won't hurt your Hammers, or FOH/Holy Bolt, so much so that it becomes useless against enemy packs.
There is quite a few different other ways to swap things around for the 75% FCR, but i wanted to try and keep to the things you already had equipped. Anyway, If I were to choose one of these examples then I'd probably go with swapping the HotO for Grief as it'd allow me to not have to worry about swapping Last Wish on/off and I can use Zeal or Charge to essentially finish off straggler enemies and/or the boss. One thing I'd add to this is also consider (if you're lucky) swapping the Mara's for a 2/20 FCR/@res Caster crafted amulet. This way you can then swap the magefist gloves for one of the ones previously mentioned.
Yep, this was PTR with preloaded gear. You'd get the 125 breakpoint.
that is the best comment i saw here, pros for that huge info boost. it helped me in better understand fohdin.
Thanks for sharing, after testing on PTR single player, for all of those excited ones using this while leveling or early on, you can have quite hard times even on P1. This build is an endgame build and when you don’t have enough plus skills it is not that great overall. When maxing out FOH, it is ok dmg - I had 2 spirits and Lore helm so only plus 5 skills and FOH was fine, holy bolt better, but hammers were very weak until lvl75 and smite was just pathetic at that point. I think for leveling it is better to go pure hammerdin and once you beat the game or hit lvl 75 the transition can come. But having at least plus 10 combat skills, netter gear and being lvl 85 plus is kind of mandatory to make it work so you actually can do everything and do not struggle, eventually having fun.
Exactly, that's why I make a point in the video to discuss this, and when the tipping point to respec from Hammers into FoH happens. You're spot on.
My exact experience at lvl 75/76 where I maxed Fist, Holy Bolt, and Hammer and then am on the way to maxing vigor. It's got great damage on undead/demons but the hammers are just a tad lacking, especially when they are hard to aim without Enigma. So I'm farming Mausoleum/Sewers right now while working my way through Act 2 since I can take on the undead. Slowly I'm leveling and the hammers are getting more damage. Would recommend this more for end game, but the 75 spot does seem to be a good time where the damage is balancing out in early Hell.
Did you even watch the video? 😂
I built this build in ladder 1 D2R. I changed it up a bit. Used a CTA on a 2/2 blessed hammer/conc scepter for the 125fcr side and on switch is a Crescent moon Phase Blade and upped hoz. Although I only use hoz setup for Uber bosses I change out fcr gloves, fcr helm and boots for dracs, kiras and goblin toe but with a semi full character (6x pcomb/anni/torch) I am doing 6k hammers, 7k holy bolt, 1k smite damage max res max block and about 2700 life with only 3 battle orders. Thanks for the build made it my own.
What a video! Literally a solo build for everything in the game…on ONE character and capability for content completion! Appreciate this! Definitely going to utilize this and test it out myself! ❤️🙌🏽
Honestly it feels like a Shogun is a proper name considering how powerful, over every class in this game this character is lol.
Could probably take 1 of the points out of vigor and slap it into redemption to solve mana problems. Worth a thought
Marco ❤ one update for the build. I made a variant that only used 1 point concentration and gave my merc Pride for the deficit. Went max vitality with no stat points spent anywhere else (intentionally). Gear was set to just be ultra low with respect to strength. You do give up max block but honestly still plays smooth. 75% All rest, max fcr, and still pretty much clears entire game solo.
I never liked pride on Merc, because insight is just free. But I'd you like it, you like it. Where do you put the points tho?
@@MacroBioBoi just max out the synergies for hammers minus concentration since any plus skills will work for that when or if merc dead
Pretty much your original variant is undeniable, it’s S++ since it’s excels at any range any monster type.
Honestly between this and the holy fire + FoH hybrid classes, they just absolutely stomp anything in their way, a pair of these paladins pretty much dominates anything
@@MacroBioBoi also I have a insight staff on swap for myself. Low level str. Even better if it has teleport.
@@MacroBioBoi also I could just use insight with a iron golem too now that I think about it. But the mana just doesn’t seem to go low right now.
Now THIS is the kinda build I was looking for. I was thinking about going FOH/Zeal hybrid. Looks like I'll do just fine!
Absolutely
Hey man so Cooley did some testing with this. turns out the most damage setup is 19 hard points into hammers, 3 hard points into conc then max the synergies if you're going the FoH/hammers route
They only counter I have to that is that points in conc only net 7.5% damage increase whereas synergies are a 14% increase. So I'm not sure exactly how he had it built, comes down to whether you go down to into vigor I reckon.
The final result in point distribution for optimal BH dmg varies, depending on your +skills. I've a spreadsheet to help calculations because the distribution is not intuitive. Cooley's calculation was based on the best possible gear, i believe.
Coooleys build was built for PVP and focused more on FOH lightning damage.
@@Jimzeefury No he built a PvM version as well. But also yes this was with good gear
@@tpola3648 Did he do it on stream? I only see a video of his PVP FOHAMDin.
Is the only change in the written guide vs this the prioritization over vigor? I’d like to give this a try on my foh/smiter as definitely feeling limited in thr areas I can farm. I’m just about at 10 skills. I would like to get a point into redemption and salvation if possible - so where should I steal those points from? Thanks!
I actually ran something similar to this in pvp back on old d2, but with lightning damage on FoH in mind. The switch to focusing only on the holy bolt damage was also something I observed for mashing chaos, seeing the two combined is great and I'm probably going to start with hammer and transition into FoH/holybolt farming for hell chaos to gear up for ubers. Then when I finally get enigma I'd probably respec into this version.
Great video
Thank you! Hope you enjoy the journey this season.
I've really been digging your content! As long as they don't nerf the holy bolt damage from fist of heavens, this should be a stellar build. I'm looking forward to duo/trio leveling with a zoo druid and maybe a summons necro. that one point in fana will be great!
Fanat for your friends should be a bumper sticker
And thank you for your kind words!
This is probably a dumb question and I assume the answer is "crushing blow" but: is the damage on a fully synergised Holy Bolt not enough to melt bosses anyway? Iirc those numbers get pretty high
So He'll Baal has 1.6 million life on P8. Holy Bolt maxes out at 20k magic damage per second. So it takes 81 seconds to kill Baal. Crushing blow first till around 10% remaining life takes less than a minute and then finishing with Holy Bolt ends up being faster.
You can also save points by using Pride on merc if you use act 2. Level 20 Pride is possibly going to net you more than a hard point with plus skills, so you can spend everything you can in synergies. Plus you can get Might, so it gives a tiny bit more of an argument for subbing out last wish for a weapon with even more skill efficiency.
Redemption/BH/Conc/Fanat/whatever can be had from a good CTA scepter. Upped HoZ and +3 Fanat CTA Caddy wouldn't be as strong as grief/LW, but way more efficient in space. Haven't tested the usefulness of a maxed-out cta, but with BH and FoH already able to clear everything when combined, smite/melee is gonna be an afterthought anyways.
Love your analysis! Great vid!
My only issue with this is you now have a completely useless mercenary, and the point of hybridizing is to increase DPS pop output vs single targets and bosses. The Merc plays a huge role in that effort.
@@MacroBioBoi That is true. Act 5 is useful. I can hardly stand act 2 ai, but unfortunately he's the only one who can use certain items.
There probably isn't an absolute perfect way to do it. But the concept itself is pretty amazing.
Keep up the great work! You're a smart dude and you're humble at the same time. Great recipe for success, dude!
@@rssimpson15 thank you for the kind words!
How did you kill the Baal wave 2? They are magic immune. How did you deal damage to them?
Holy Bolt bypasses magic immunity on undead and demons.
@@MacroBioBoi Oh wow. This changes everything.
@@MrLazyleader It's pretty gg
Looking forward to running pits/trav with a fohdin making this build. everything in the pits/trav is susceptible to holy bolt, and the maxed vigor gets you there almost as fast as tele. Can theoretically run a lvl 85 area (pits) at ~ lvl 45-50 immedieatly after hitting a1 hell. All the champion skellies in tamoe highland also die to it :D
I have foh smiter, level 67, lousy gear, hell pits is easy
I was running tower Andy and pits at around 63 with just foh. With pretty poor gear and only 1 spirit
Have you tried ubers with this build? Or did you have the chance to fight diablo clone? Do you think with enough resistance for uber mephisto (maybe 1 point in salvation?), crushing blow and life tap it will be ok? What would you change in gear?
I didn't do Ubers, yes you can on this build. Prebuff with treachery, swap to a Black weapon and throw on a TGods belt.
Is this doable without all the plus skill GC? And without the call to arms or the A5 merc? What would a secondary merc be? Thanks
Yes but worse, yes but worse, Act 2 Might Insight
@@MacroBioBoi Thank you! Relatively new starting out and wanted to try this build. Much appreciated. Subbed.
@@BleuQuill80 thank you kindly. Checkout the leveling guide on D2.maxroll.gg and the FoH build guide for the Respec once your at a high enough level!
@@MacroBioBoi Checked it out. Great work. Answers all of my questions. Thanks again. Keep up the good work. I’ve been looking for “UA-cam” builds that are 2.4 updates vs old version metas. Because we all know some things have changed.
One thing I do differently is heard the mob like a javazon then nuke like literally all of chaos in the middle lol
Pretty surprised also the FOH build included 'holy shock and conviction' which is practically useless in solo imo. Even in groups- as a fohdin , maxing out holy shock is just dumb.
My question is - would this build work without optimal gear ? Maybe only +5 to skils ?
It's less effective until you have around +8-10
This build is cool but really makes u pop a lot of mana pots. Would it work with insight merc?
Sure
I'm a poor single player with no skillers, no Call to Arms, no Grief, basically I've never seen a rune over maybe Ist or Um. Is this build viable with mid-range gear from hell meph running only, for maybe players 3?
I don't know that I have the gear to really buff the hammers etc.
It absolutely is, I would not worry about the Smiter aspect, in your case.
Cool. I usually play characters in single player, so I was thinking 20 FoH, 20 BHammer, 20 HBolt, 20 Blessed Aim, 1 point wonders of holy shield, meditation, redemption, salvation, and fanaticism. Any points over level 86, if any, into vigor. I would probably run concentration at level 1 plus I think I have gear to get +7 skills. Or I could sometimes run my one point wonders as needed.
Thanks for the video and the reply!
i'd like to see the optimized FOH for chaos.
i've been ignoring the lightning damage because it's throwing away 20+ points. holy damage only feels great.
finat + m5 frenzy + holy bolt spam to kill diablo.
switch to redemption as needed.
use the extra points to get finat, redemption, max holy shield and max fire res which make you even more unkillable.
im skipping conviction/holy shock
This is the way ^
Only thing else that’s possible is if your doing party play, you could do 20 into sanctuary and it’s synergy. That way the entire team will make short work of the Chaos. That’s specifically only for team play and undead/demon areas to benefit the team and not slow your personal killing speed.
@@kristopherleslie8343 sanctuary aura won't increase your party's kill speed, only knock back Undead types. The removing physical resistance only works for melee attacks from the person with the aura.
@@MacroBioBoi I’m looking at it from the knock back but I can see that being dope on some builds and kinda “meh” on others. Yea the damage bonus lol hell I never even use it lol cause the character screen be lying!
@@MacroBioBoi it does definitely kill things even in hell :) but had to have a good amount of points. It basically neutered the undead from even attacking which can be useful but it’s very very niche
Yea I miscalculated the synergies! This is the best thanks buddy 🙌🏽🤷🏽♂️ now if only we had ptr lol
You can still play on single player
Blessed hammer synergies give +14% per level. Concentration gives 15% per level, what am I missing?
Why not one point in redemption? I’m doing a playthrough on single player with monster density modded to 20x and there’s not been any other paladin build I’ve tried that could really mow through the crazy density. Surely someone else could do it better than me but I just finished act IV nightmare. Being able to switch to redemption for resource management has been very useful.
I think wasting time with redemption is inefficient when your belt has slots for potions right on it.
@@MacroBioBoi hmm I guess there is a sort of cost:benefit analysis that could be done. We would need to compare the time it takes to switch to redemption and get refilled versus drinking and picking up potions.
I’m actually thinking more about the context of the modded high density playing though. When there’s a lot going on and also I may not be confident that the potion will refill my health fast enough, switching to redemption while still casting hammers/foh, getting refilled, then swapping back to concentrate has been an effective strategy.
That said, I have no issues with the “drink a potion” route either.
I put 1 point in redemption as well this build helped me get past hell I was struggling with my hammering in act 5 I made the switch at lvl 80 with bad gear 2 spirits and goblin toe is my only decent gear
So would there be any benefit of splitting the vigor points into concentration?
You get less benefit out of concentration than you do out of Vigor, since you only gain 1/2 of the concentration bonus.
Make your CTA in a scepter with +redemption so you can do a quick weapon swap when you're low on mana
@macrobioboi How well can this build, or a variation of it, handle ubers?
Very well. Just need to swap out PDR and light absorb
@MacroBioBoi This is my first time actually looking into builds for this class so if this makes no sense let me know. but ive never used smite and have always gone zeal. is there a way to instead of using the smite skill tree to use the zeal one instead.
I dont really care about vigor and was thinkin just put the extra into sacrifice/zeal or fanaticsim but again I have no idea how any of this really works.
Kinda wondering how would someone build this out for just playing casually through the game not caring about speed or good items?
You should check out the Zealer build guide on d2r.Maxroll.gg (the website I write for) to get a better handle on the Zealer. He's much more gear dependent, and needs Attack Rating. Smite is good on this build because it always hits, even if you don't have melee gear.
How do you lock your right skill but quick change your left click skill?? We need to keep the aura on the right but when I quick attack, it uses the right click key to attack and I lose the aura.
Love the theory crafting and trying something non-cookie-cutter! By the way, if you mouse-over the skill, it says "Fist Of THE Heavens" (FOTH)
Thanks. I do know the full name of the skill. Most people have previously referred to it as FoH
This build is not a secret build its been known for along time for hardcore pvpers but for players that want something new and fresh this would be it for you. cant wait to do some lld with a druid.
Yeah, this PvM build didn't exist but FotH gets used in PvP a lot.
The link to this build doesn’t work for me and just says the website isn’t trustworthy
Can you add this build to max roll please, as well I’m trying to just do foh/ smother for Ubers any thoughts
It's on Maxroll already, under the FoH build guide
I like the smite one more for HC play since FCR does nothing to FoH and we already tested the build with a lot lower gear options and it still does really well.
I'm a veteran hc player looking for like minded people to help/run with on ladder launch hit me up!
@@matthewvandenbranden1307 yeah sure
@@matthewvandenbranden1307 let me know your discord
Wouldnt it be possible to only focus on hoy bolt / FOH with mostly fanaticism aura and let your act 5 merc kill what you cant, and making him almost unkillable by healing him with holy bolts ?
You can, that's just weaker and slower in general. A character will always out DPS a mercenary
Hey macro, i have a nice build idea for a hybrid FoH/Smiter paladin. The build has crushing blow/open wounds/life tap proc/ 75% fcr BP and IAS. Astreon's iron ward (Crushing blow/4 Pcomb) socketed with ias and res jewel maybe? 2/20 paladin circlet with some nice stats socketed with ias jewel, 35% FCR spirit shield, enigma, maras, arach, drac, gore riders or golbin toes, raven frost, SOJ or BK. what do you think?
I like Heavens light over Astreons but this would be a great hybrid option.
does this work with starter build or should I go full fohdin until I get good gear then respec
The Tribrid is viable once you have +10 skills is say.
i put a similar build together but i have 1 pnt in medication for when i just want mana regen and foh in tomb or chaos. and that i dont rly care for the mercs dps
That is the build I was going for and just for the test purpose i was wondering if 20 points on FOH is trully needed since you are killing with HB area of effect and dmg. I couldn't test PTR FOH realu needs upgrade?
You need to bump up the hard points to get the best base for the synergy to up the HB damage. It's a different value than your Holy Bolt skill.
Why dump the rest of the points in vigor instead of concentration? When you're swinging those hammers, concentration aura will benefit the merc and party as well.
It's a synergy for the skill itself. Significantly stronger at our +skills.
@@MacroBioBoi Indeed, I did a respec test, and it's stronger when synergized as you suggested in the video. Who am I to argue with a D2R pro lol.
Instead of doing hammers/concentration could you just buff holy bolt with hammer synergy?
They change the synergies in 2.4 so Hammer doesn't synergize with Holy Bolt
@@MacroBioBoi well that’s dumb… was gonna say you get 12-14k hb… so basically a better hammer
This is an excellent idea, thanks for sharing.
I will most likely still opt for maxing oout the lightning part. The reason being that I played hammerdin for way too long and am happily looking for a fresh and new build.
That's 💯 valid too!
Thx for the confirmation
Was thinking why on earth other streamers were maxing smite and fanatisism which doesnt add to much use
Was thinking how would a half baked hammer would be seems good to me
Great minds!
Instead of investing into Smite, could you instead put a point into conviction if you want to only focus on BH/FOH? Would the prerequisites be worth the investment? My idea is that you'd use Concentration, cast hammers, swap to Conviction, and then spam FoH.
The conviction aura bumps up your lightning damage but the lightning damage is the worst part of FoH. And you have to pick up smite already for Holy Shield.
@@MacroBioBoi What's the best aura to use with FoH then? For the holy damage
@@ozzie6268 no Auras apply to magic damage, so any aura for sustain/res/Merc damage
this build is a breath of fresh air, but one question what do you think about losing some dps+mf for the 125fcr breakpoint?
Honestly, you can easily use Hoto and just keep a Smite weapon in cube or stash for when you need it instead of always using it. Get that 125 bp!
interesting build man ... might have to go with this beginning ladder season - fresh AF
i think tearhaunch greaves is good for this?
Tearhaunch are generally fine to start for sure.
Only 'hard' points into a skill will apply to the synergy, unfortunately. The + skill will directly effect the skill if being used/ casted so tearhaunch really won't boost your damage.
Awesome ideas…can this work with zeal/FoH?
Hmmm I don't think so, you'd have to lose the hammers part to accomplish that imo
@@MacroBioBoi yes I was just thinking it would be a way to add some much needed AoE attack to a mele build.
where do u get lifetap from?
Draculs, Exile, or Last Wish.
Finally! Let’s get it bro
Everyone who says Foh is ONLY useable for chaos runs are flat out wrong. There are numerous good farming areas where Foh destroys just about 90% of enemies in the blink of an eye. By far my favorite build, especially on console
yup
Can this build take the ubers for the torch?
For sure
have you tried an auradin/FoHdin hybrid?
Yes, it's not great. If you use the Holy Shock Aura that is.
another great deatailed guide!
Thanks!
You could also have an act merc with pride to have the higher level concentration aura over there, saves you one point at least.
But then your mercenary does 0 DPS, which is not worth it.
@@MacroBioBoi I dunno, from your footage it seems like the merc damage seems kinda irrelevant lol
That is to say, you're the one killing everything
@@TheGamingDandy The Merc becomes relevant on Bosses especially, or on non-Demon/Undead packs on higher player count.
sir i build it today ........ i cannot explain how crazy this build is ........ HollyS***.... atm i have the wrong headpiece and wrong ammy with a total emptyy inventory .... and it rocks :D thx alot for your work
Glad you're enjoying it. We have a Dream Pally guide on Maxroll, what is your build?
Jack of all trades build is music to my ears
The only one problem with the full FoH build to he can't farm cow level. Is this build strong enough to beat cow level? Obviously fast cow clear. :D
P1-p3 cows is possible for sure.
why would you do Cow when you can do CS?
Where that maxroll guide to that beast? I swear i have read it but can’t find anymore…
Fist of the Heavens. Tri-brid variant
@@MacroBioBoi hmm i cant find it via google and also not on maxroll pala guide section either.. i am confused:D
Nvm i thought its a separate guide:D
Is FoH set 75cr or do you need to build to 75?
It doesn't have a set FCR. It has a cooldown, but you still need FCR to reduce its animation length.
Have your tried Ubers with this build yet?
Not this season but 1 point smite 1 point Fanaticism and prebuff treachery has always been enough to do them.
Has anyone tried rift as a hybrid? You can take advantage of conviction then and do a one point zeal and smite build
ok so i converted over my fully geared hammerdin to fist/hammerdin *one point smite and fanat* and wow ... it just wrecks. Fist to clear screens hammers for things fist cant kill ... smite for ubers
It's super gross.
Been playing around with it since 2.4 launched and it just slaps everything.
Is the tribrid or foh smite build better
Tri-brid. Smite is a 3 point investment.
@MacroBioBoi would hoto be the best end game weapon. Better then the scepter in the guide?
@@MacroBioBoi Is FOH build in general ( any of the 3 variants ) s tier?
@@justinthomas8154 yes absolutely
@@MacroBioBoi someone said its damage falls off in p8 to make it not S tier, im confused
Voted best build ever 🤩
Marco do you think this will be your first build when the real ladder comes? I was still thinking your doing sorc 😂😃
I hope this doesn’t get nerfed
Same
Could this solo ubers?? I want to test it so bad
Yep
Ayyy what it dooo
Fine, I'll do it myself!
I was pretty proud of that.
This is the way
Would you go as far as calling this the "holy triumvirate " build? Or as I like to call it.. the RUSH build lol .
Oooh I like that a lot
@@MacroBioBoi see that's what I appreciates abouts you.. lol you enjoy corny dad jokes
isn't this just a V/T?
A what?
Vindicator/Templar. Don't get me wrong, I like your build. You added some points into hammer but basically v/t.
i run this build but no points in conc..... i Run Redemption..... with Mist Merc
or pride merc
My max hammer is less than 7k with gear I'm so frustrated
That's still pretty strong considering is does bonus damage to undead and demons (since all act Bosses are demons that's pretty nice)
Holy Trinity
Just noticed that QR code
We were sponsored by Marvel Strikeforce that day.
@@MacroBioBoi already had it downloaded :) that game is super fun
how about Hoz for greater damage? you would be already at the 75fcr
Both are great options.
looks funny, but not using a fc amulet or 1 fc ring is kinda stupid. 115 fc doesnt mak sense at all.
PTR with limited gear for testing. 125 bp is reachable, obviously.
why dont get a javazon if u want roll on the entire game with 1 char.. she do it well and way better than every pally
Why don't you eat a grilled cheese sandwich if you want a sandwich with cheese on it? Because of the flavor!
neat theory crafting. Mostly useful if you want a pally to do baal runs with, since holy bolt no longer has hammer synergy so hammerdins cannot clear wave 2 anymore.
The idea of a "boss killing merc" doesn't work, since mercs have a 75% damage penalty to bosses. Your merc is doing nothing
That last conclusion is incorrect. New Act 5 Merc can solo Ubers and Mercs have always been the biggest contributor to clear speed on Bosses with crushing blow for caster builds.
@@MacroBioBoi I mean that's just wrong. Merc is less than 5% of boss damage for any boss farming build. Even the new a5 merc that everyone is raving about takes several minutes to kill p1 mephisto with perfect gear without stacking crushing blow, and mephisto has the lowest phys resist of any act boss.
The only way your merc does anything to bosses is if you only gear him for crushing blow, and it will still be slow. Even with 100% CB it takes a5 merc well over a minute to kill any uber bosses, and that's on p1.
@@zanido9073 over 1 minute to kill an Uber boss...think about that statement.
@@MacroBioBoi just tested your exact merc setup against p8 baal, except i used cham in gface so he wouldn't get frozen. Took 11 mins 55 seconds.
@@zanido9073 crushing blow does not scale with Players settings. Of course only him attacking is going to kill lv 99 Baal with 4.5 times it's base health at a slow rate. What's your argument here?
So far you've said P1 Mephisto without crushing blow is slow, Kills an Uber boss in little over a minute, and against the worst possible boss in the game on P8 he slowly kills that. I'd recommend using the whole build I showcase, and remember that Mercs function differently if you put them in different scenarios.
YAAAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!
I even give Pilot that shout-out too.
Why not astreons. 85 dmg added to smite. 25% Slow. 33%Cb. 4 combat skills . 10ias. You can only cast foh at 75 fcr optimally. So 35% from spirit shield. 20% fcr from arach with an additional 10% slow for a total of 35% slow and 20% fcr from magefist. Much steonger smite. Stronger foh and hammers and obviously the slow vs bosses means 35% less dmg taken.
I recommend Astreons when discussing crushing blow weapon options.
why thats going to be a expensive as heck build dang you need to come out with build that 99% players can play cheaply and farm
This is a very average Hammerdin build. Ignore the Last Wish, you don't need that at all.
i have a better quesiton - why are your keybinds so scuffed xd
cool build tho
Nah these keybinds are the way.
Yea yea they made paladins SS tier. What’s new? This is what everyone wanted.
Impossible to achieve character edited gear…. Not a realistic gear setup.
This is the standard end game gear setup for a Hammerdin. Not sure what's unrealistic about it. It isn't Dual Spirit, Stealth, a Lore helm, and 0 skillers, I agree.
Terrible build on a budget
1) without skiller charms and gg gear, the damage of hammers is trash and it's faster to kill animals packs with the lightning damage.
2) maxing blessed aim before vigor makes no sens, vigor is more useful
3) without lightning damage, the targeted mob always survives while his pack dies from holy bolts, therefore it makes you waste time by having to cast more
4) FOH is better with a controller because of the auto-aim
!leggies
Hammer will soon be nerfed and will be complete crap.
Good thing this is a FoH paladin build with Hammers as a back up
Dear Macro BioBoi! You have 3 minutes TLDW version, 13 minutes LW version, can we also have an hour long version with more details, examples, calculation etc? I found all your said 'long' videos not long enough... Is it only my? Really everyone want to watch basically a music clip version of video? You can just read the text, you know, if you really want to save precious seconds of you life...
So Vlad, to be 100% honest no one else wants to watch me explain a build for an hour. People are angry when videos are ten minutes long. I appreciate that you want more indepth info and longer form content, but that's just not one of the options right now.
@@MacroBioBoi Okay :( Well... At least you know you have some lovers for longER videos too!
@@MacroBioBoi I understand you working for the majority; that's fine.
@@mapron1 you can always check out the live stream since I do all of my theorycrafting, builds, and gameplay on it!
@@MacroBioBoi I was able to catch you once, you a very nice guy! But timezones are exist (and I already have weird schedule due to remote work for another timezone).
So anyway, thanks for invitation!
Everyone knows the hammerdin is and will be the best pali
Everyone minus me and everyone that has played this build.
everyone and there brother is making these vods lol... these videos only create flavor of the month builds. I'am old old school where when u figure out some great skill/gear combination, u fuckin keep it to urself to be unique and different from everyone else. Hell u can't even go this build anymore b/c everyone is gonna do it now. this is also how things get nerfed b/c everyone knows about it and does it. Can't nerf something that the community dont know about yet
What someone plays does not affect what other people play, or their play experience in any way other than PvP. Even then, the meta is so tightly defined that you play what beats the other builds in your group and your skill will eek out small percentage wins over unfavorable matchups. It's literally my job to educate people about interesting ways to play this game. Can't gatekeep a build while streaming now can I?
And literally nothing was nerfed in 2.4, there are only buffs. Idk where this fear of nerfs is coming from in the community.