Diablo 2 Resurrected: Ladder Season 8 - Melee Paladin Zeal/Smite Guide

D2R Ladder 8 has launched! While Blizzard didn't add any meaningful updates (YET AGAIN); they did fix some bugs, which is promising. The state of balance still needs some fixing, especially for mosaic assassin. There's also a bunch of quality of life they initially promised but abandoned in favor of Lilith 1 (the 4th best Diablo).

I decided to roll a build I've never tried before. This time around I decided to go for a melee Paladin (zealot/smiter). I've always played hammerdin, and in recent years FoH, but never tried melee. Let me say it was both challenging and awesome once I got the gear for it. Melee Paladin is very gear dependent. 

Credit: Activision/Blizzard

There's multiple build guides on icy-veins, maxroll, and wowhead, plus some other sites and youtube videos. However, don't be fooled by these sites. There's actually an ancient D2 secret a friend of mine let me in on. Smite doesn't really scale off of more points in the skill. It scales based on gear, specifically damage, IAS and Crushing Blow. My first attempt was following the popular build guides online, which are heavily written for very specific content (uber Tristram). However, I was able to make a good all around zealot/smiter who could do any content in the game by going away from these guides because they were too content specific for me. I highly recommend checking the old purediablo and forum posts for 1 point smiter builds if you're curious about researching it but I'll walk you through it below. 

For leveling through normal and nightmare max out fire aura, zeal, and holy shield first. Then fire resist and sacrifice equally until each are maxed. You may also want 1 point in lightning resist. You will be running around with holy fire on right skill and zeal on left skill. You focus your melee attacks on the big enemies while the smaller ones die to fire. This build got me through nightmare but was fading in A5 NM. 

As usual, ensure you put enough points in strength and dexterity to equip your gear as you go, and don't lose track of the attributes your items are giving you because you could end up trying to swap gear and suddenly can't equip it because you're replacing something with strength on it. 

Leveling/Budget Gear: 

• Helms: I start with whatever I find then transfer to 2os helmet for Nadir (Nef+Tir) then to Lore (Ort+Sol), Peasant's crown or any circlet with +pally skills is fine too. Eventually you'll want Guillaume's Face for end game, which you'll eventually want to socket a 15ias/20-40ed jewel into.
• Chest: Use whatever you can find until you get a 2 open socket base to build Stealth (Tal+Eth). I always run Stealth while leveling any class, while continually upgrading it as I find new bases. You can also utilize any decent rare or unique chest until you get to end game. Eventually I got a spirit shroud which lasted me through hell campaign when I found Guardian Angel which I'm still using. Eventually you will want Chains of Honor or Enigma in an elite armor base. Until then and upgraded Spirit Shroud, Viper Magi, or regular Guardian Angel will do just fine. You could also use hustle if you want.
• Weapons: Use whatever sword or paladin weapon you can as you find them. You can look for 2os, 3os or 4os swords, flails, scepters, and maces as well and build some starter rune words. Black is probably bis starter melee weapon in a 3os flail. However, finding a paladin specific mace or scepter with +specific skills and open sockets can also be used to build some cool rune words. Note your melee damage scales off weapon damage and attack speed so it's important to keep them updated. 
• Shield: Use any shield as you level but focusing on paladin shields. Look for paladin shield bases with 2/3/4 sockets. You can build rhyme (cannot be frozen), ancients pledge (resists), or spirit (+2 skills) to play through the game. You want bases with high defense, high chance to block, and high all resist. Pally shields with sockets and 40+ all resist are best in slot until you get Herald of Zakarum (Hoz). Once you get HoZ you will want to upgrade it to a zakarum shield base and socket it with an Um. 
• Gloves: Any gloves with defense, life, resists will do while leveling. Once you you can afford it you'll want any attack speed gloves. You can use laying of hands, blood fists, lava gout, or venom grips as filler if you find them. Eventually you'll transition to Dracul's grasp in the end game.
• Belt: Always try to to upgrade belts early and often from 4 to 6 to 9 to 12 potion slots. You can use Thunder Gods (Tgods) for lightning resist, which helps when fighting uber Mephisto. Otherwise you can use just about any end game belt for this build for most situations. I've been using an upped Nightsmoke the whole time without issues, including easily defeating ubers. Ensure you have 1-2 columns of healing potions, 1-2 columns of rejuvenation potions, and 0-1 columns of mana potions.
• Boots: run/walk speed, life, resists are always what you want on boots when leveling. Aldur's, Rite of Passage, Infernostride, Waterwalk, and Natalyas's if you're lucky while leveling. There's also plenty of yellows that can roll with good stats, including run/walk, life, resists, and MF%. In the end game you'll want Goblin Toe for crushing blow then eventually Gore Riders.
• Jewelry: Rings and amulets wear whatever you can find while leveling. Prioritize life, resists, mana, attributes, and attack speed. MF doesn't hurt either.
• Rings you'll need Raven Frost mandatory for cannot be frozen and eventually Bul-Kathos. You can also craft a blood ring with resists, life, and leech on it until you get a BK. I crafted a dual leech (mana/life) with all resist on it which has been fine for even ubers. 
• Amulet, you'll always want an amulet with +skills to help get you through NM & Hell. In the end game go to Highlord's, Mara's, or a +1-2 skills crafted blood/safety/hp amulet. I've been using Eye of Etlitch which has served me fine even in ubers.

• Charms: Same as any end game you want annihilus, torch, and gheed's. Pcomb skillers are nice as well but not mandatory. While leveling I usually try to utilize charms with FHR, life, all resist, single resist, or MF% but I usually only carry 1-3 GC's and a 3-4 SC's at all times for extra defense. 
• Physical sunder is optional. I found having a merc with decrepify (A2 with reaper's toll or A5 with lawbringer) was far more favorable than having a sunder charm. Just note that life tap and decrepify override each other which can be annoying at times.

Attributes: As always enough points into strength to equip gear and dexterity to hit max block while holy shield is active (75% chance when you hover over defense in your character sheet). Then put all the rest in vitality. 

Ultimately you will want a grief phase blade and upgraded HoZ so those will be your limiting factors. Anni + Torch + gear will give you attributes so re-speccing in the end game will happen at some point. You only get 3 re-specs so use 1 at end of nightmare, 1 after leveling to ~70-80 if you need it, and 1 in end game once you get most/all your gear. 

End game points: 142 strength (for upped hoz), 136 dex (for grief pb), the rest in vitality.

Skills (end game): 

• Combat - unlock skills to get to Holy Shield & Zeal. Max out Holy Shield, Zeal, and Sacrifice. You don't need more than 1 in Ice Arrow because it doesn't give you any damage increase. 
• Zeal/Smite will be your main attack skills. Assign Zeal to left click/main attack and Smite to another skill button. Use Zeal to attack 99% of enemies and only use smite on bosses. 
• Offensive Auras - Max out Fanaticism. Fanaticism will be your main offensive aura. Assign it to a skill button on your right skill.
• Defensive Auras - Put 1 point in Defiance, Resist Fire, and Salvation. All remaining points go into Resist Lightning.
• Salvation will be your main defensive aura. Assign it to a skill button that you can quickly swap to on right skill. I often swap to this when dealing with high elemental damage enemies and mephisto. 
• Movement ability will be charge. Set this to its own button to cast it. Note that running into objects stops you in your tracks and burns your mana so aim carefully when zooming. I usually go in short bursts from pack to pack of enemies.

Merc: 

I have a rule of thumb. If I'm melee/tanky then I utilize a ranged merc. If I'm ranged or weak then I utilize a melee/tank merc. However, this build is a bit different because you will need a melee merc hacking with you. This means A2 Might or Holy Freeze or A5 Frenzy are best mercs to use for this build. 

Ethereal items are always BIS for mercs because they can't lose durability and will come with higher stats. However, you can utilize non-eth until you find or afford better. Always itemize yourself over your merc first so non-eth is fine. 

A2 Merc: Might (best damage) or Holy Freeze (good survivability)

Weapon - You want your merc to be casting decrepify so reaper's toll is mandatory. You could also run some other budget runewords if you have the base and extra runes (Malice, Honor, Passion, Obedience, Insight, Strength) until you find a reaper's. 

Helm - start with Nadir or any good rare/unique until you find something like Andariel's Visage, Crown of Thieves, Stealskull, or an eth elite 3os base to build the new runeword Bulwark (Shael+Io+Sol). 

A5 Merc: Frenzy (damage and speed). I tried A5 merc this time around because I wanted to try something new. He couldn't survive ubers without gg gear but he could do everything else in the game. 

Weapons - 1-2 Law Bringer in phase blade. Law Bringer has decrepify and the chance to cast stacks so having 2 is a good thing, but you need at least 1. You can also free up the second slot for another rune word such as Plague (for cleansing aura), Death (crushing blow), BotD or Headstriker or Last Wish or Grief (damage), Fury (frenzy stacks). There's lots of room to play on weapons. 

Merc Chest: use anything with good defensive stats until you find a good base to make or Smoke (Nef+Lum). Then use that until you find an elite ethereal base to make Treachery (Shael+Thul+Lem) until you can afford to make a Fortitude (El+Sol+Dol+Lo) or Chains of Honor. Duriel's shell is another good budget chest option and is what I used until I made treachery. Note that once you get Fortitude or CoH you should still equip Treachery until fade procs then swap it out (only necessary for harder content like ubers or harder TZ).

Generic D2R Playthrough Guides: 

For playthrough, magic finding, and trading guides please look at my past blog posts. They are largely unchanged but I suggest you fine tune a few things that go with this build and this ladder theme. 

Melee Paladin Gameplay:

Cast your Holy Shield and keep it up at all times. 

Use your charge ability to zoom from pack to pack or to zoom through a level quickly. 

Use Zeal for 99% of your attacks and only smite on bosses or enemies who are immune to physical. 

Keep your merc healed. Understand that if lifetap doesn't proc you need to heal yourself, otherwise don't panic when your health goes up and down. 

Switch to Salvation aura when up against high elemental damage enemies.

Overall this is a B tier PvM build and S-tier for bosses and ubers.