Drow Paladin - New Player Friendly - Standard KotC THF Build

[Goldeneye]

Drow Paladin | New Player Friendly | Standard Two Handed Fighting Build
20 Paladin
Drow: Lawful Good

EDIT: This build is now out-dated. I realized that it would be better of as a Human. I recommend anyone interested in this build, use my
NEW AND UPDATED HUMAN VERSION OF THIS BUILD HERE

EDIT: Many players come to DDO from other MMORPG's, and stop in the forums looking for advice to build a paladin. However, most of the paladin builds on the forums require 32pt build to be unlocked, and require special equipment, items, and tomes. As a result, many new players are discouraged by the complexity in paladin builds, and end up creating yet another THF Barbarian. The goal of this build, is to provide a simple, yet solid Paladin build that would make a powerful and effective character for a new player.

STATS: Drow

16 STR +4 Ranks
10 DEX
14 CON
10 INT
8 WIS
17 CHA +1 Rank

*Every 4 levels (4/8/12/16/20) you will get
1 ability increase. At level 4, invest into CHA.
At levels 8/12/16/20 invest in STR.

FEATS:

1 Paladin (Feat) Two Handed Fighting
3 Paladin (Feat) Power Attack
6 Paladin (Feat) Toughness
9 Paladin (Feat) Improved Critical: Slashing
12 Paladin (Feat) Stunning Blow
15 Paladin (Feat) Improved Two Handed Fighting
18 Paladin (Feat) Greater Two Handed Fighting

HP BREAKDOWN

200: Paladin (10 per level)
120: Con
20: Heroic Durability
10: Draconic Vitality: 10
20: Minos Legens
45: GS/ MIN II Item
30: GFL
18: Toughness
20: Racial Toughness IV
40: Class Toughness

Total: End-game, properly geared, around 523
*Hit points will vary depending on
Enhancements, gear, and tomes, and level.

SKILLS

1. UMD
2. Diplomacy

Instruction: every level, put as many skill points into UMD and Diplomacy as you can.
This build has just enough points to max each skill.

ENHANCEMENTS LEVEL 20:
THESE ENHANCEMENTS ARE JUST AN EXAMPLE
OF HOW I WOULD MAX OUT THE DPS ON THIS BUILD.
you can easily reset your enhancements, so I don't
care what you set them to. Choose whatever looks good
experiment on different combos.

Enhancement: Paladin Weapons of Good
Enhancement: Unyielding Sovereignty
Enhancement: Follower of the Sovereign Host
Enhancement: Paladin Courage of Good I
Enhancement: Paladin Courage of Good II
Enhancement: Paladin Bulwark of Good I
Enhancement: Paladin Bulwark of Good II
Enhancement: Paladin Divine Sacrifice I
Enhancement: Paladin Exalted Smite I
Enhancement: Paladin Exalted Smite II
Enhancement: Paladin Exalted Smite III
Enhancement: Paladin Exalted Smite IV
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Lay on Hands I
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Lay on Hands II
Enhancement: Paaladin Extra Lay on Hands III
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Smite Evil I
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Smite Evil II
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Smite Evil III
Enhancement: Paladin Extra Smite Evil IV
Enhancement: Paladin Knight of the Chalice I
Enhancement: Paladin Knight of the Chalice II
Enhancement: Paladin Knight of the Chalice III
Enhancement: Paladin Redemption I
Enhancement: Racial Toughness I
Enhancement: Racial Toughness II
Enhancement: Paladin Heal I
Enhancement: Paladin Heal II
Enhancement: Paladin Devotion I
Enhancement: Paladin Devotion II
Enhancement: Paladin Energy of the Templar I
Enhancement: Paladin Energy of the Templar II
Enhancement: Paladin Charisma I
Enhancement: Paladin Charisma II
Enhancement: Paladin Toughness I
Enhancement: Paladin Toughness II
Enhancement: Paladin Toughness III
Enhancement: Paladin Divine Might I
Enhancement: Paladin Divine Might II
Enhancement: Paladin Divine Might III

TOTAL: 80 AP

SPELL LIST:
Spells are swappable in taverns, and shrines.
Good spells include

Divine Favor
Lesser Restore
Bull's Strenght
Eagle's Splendor
Resist Energy
Cure Moderate Wounds
Holy Sword!
Zeal!!

TIPS FOR LEVELING:
This build is fun to level. Your first priorities are to get items
that increase your STR, CON, and CHA. In addition,
you will need a WIS item to increase your wisdom
before you are allowed to cast spells at level 4.
As a Two-Handed Fighting melee character, I recommend
Falchions, but Greataxes, and Greatswords also work.
Also, Smites and Divine Sacrifice are your friend.
Use them all the time to do some sweet damage.

Remember: Crit smites are ridiculous damage.
Use your feat Stunning Blow first, because if the
enemy fails their Fort save, every hit becomes a
crit... and you are guaranteed delicious smite-crits.


QUESTION & ANSWER

Q. Why did you go Lawful Good?
A. All paladins must be lawful good.

Q. Why did you go 17 CHA?
A. Some of a paladin's best abilities come from CHA. Without a high CHA, a melee would be better off as a Barbarian or Fighter.

Q.Why did you put the level 4 ability raise into CHA?
A. Remember, this build is intended for newer players. 18 CHA at low levels will be very nice. Also, I wanted to make sure that once the player is level 20, they could use a +2 CHA tome to unlock Divine Might IV. If you are an experienced player, and want to wait until you get a +3 CHA tome, you can put that ability increase into STR.

Q. What about AC?
A. I'd rather reduce my damage by killing monsters faster. It's more fun that way.

Q. Why did you choose Drow?
A. One of the big issues that makes most Paladins poorly suited for a new player, is that they have too many stats they need (STR, CON, CHA, and DEX if you want more AC or TWF). As a result, most paladin builds call for 32pt builds, something that most people won't have access to when they first start the game. Drow are much easier to unlock (requiring 400 favor) then 32 pt builds (which require 1750 favor). Drow are essentially 32 point builds, with points already invested into DEX, INT, and CHA.

Q. Why did you go Two Handed Fighting
A. Ideally, paladins get the most benefit out of Two-Weapon-Fighting, however without 32pt builds it is almost impossible to get your DEX high enough to unlock TWF without severely sacrificing some other aspect of the build. In addition, you only need to focus on obtaining 1 weapon for each situation, where a two weapon fighting character would need to buy 2: 1 for each hand.

Enjoy! Post in this thread, or PM me if you have any question/comments regarding this build.
This has been yet another build by Krythan! If you give me credit, call me Krythan. Like my builds: read more in my signature!

[Visty]

swap stunning blow and powerattack
you wont use PA at lvl3 much anyway and a few stunned mobs help alot

[Goldeneye]

swap stunning blow and powerattack
you wont use PA at lvl3 much anyway and a few stunned mobs help alot

At level 3, mobs don't have enough HP for Stunning Blow to make a huge difference, however the extra damage bonus THF gets from Power Attack is huge at low levels, as long as your to-hit is high enough. (Getting the Anger's Wrath set: Necklaceand Boots will help make up your to-hit penalty.

[Visty]

another thing which just came to my mind, as you arent going for twf, imo drow isnt a usefull race, or to word it better: there are better races

with 28pts you can do the same stats as human too, though 16 instead of 17 cha but you also get a feat, HV and human adaption, which all are worth more then +1 basecha imo

with 32pts you can do the same stats and even have 1 buildpoint left which could be used in int to get more skillpoints once you got a +1 int tome

also your last question is wrong:
"Q. Why did you go Two Weapon Fighting"
as you didnt go TWF

[Goldeneye]

Ok, you're right. THF Human, I can go:
16 STR
15 CON
16 CHA

or

16 STR
13 CON
17 CHA

That probly makes more sense. I'll let this thread sit here for a bit, then I'll crank out a human version.

Good point.

[Vissarion]

Why diplomacy instead of balance? Seems like the latter would be more useful on a THF DPS Pally.

[vettkinn]

Balance, comrade, balance. A shield-less pally lying in the ground is usually a dead pally.

[Goldeneye]

I could understand eating a +2 INT tome, and putting those points towards balance, however I personally prefer Diplo over Balance. Considering that Diplo is a class skill for paladins, and this build will have very high CHA, this character's diplo ability is through the roof... that and diplo is FUN!

In terms of balance, if you think you'll have a problem:

• wear a +15 Balance item
• Wear a +6 Dex item
• eat a +2 dex tome
• get a GH +4
• prayer +1
• put on your Head of good fortune +2

=plenty of balance.

Investing 23 ranks at .5 increase per point is a personal choice. You can do it if you want.

[MithrilSoul]

Thanks to the OP for this.

And regarding the question of power attack versus stunning blow, as someone who has recently created a THF pally (human, not drow, but otherwise pretty similar to this build), I would say PA is extremely useful. Doing any quest I can find at normal or hard difficulty, I never turn it off and have no problems hitting mobs. Elite quests I usually start seeing enough misses that I will turn off PA, but that's it. With 18 strength currently, PA gives me +8 damage on every single swing...incredibly useful for a newbie who doesn't have twinked out +60 gear like old timers might have. Plus, between the fact we are killing most mobs in one blow (and most "bosses" even in only 3-4 blows) and with the relatively minimal number of Smites we have at the low levels, it seems to me that the (Stunning Blow + Smite) combo, while powerful, isn't really needed early on. I suspect as levels increase and bosses start seeming more like real bosses (i.e. they take more than a few hits to kill) the value of the PA goes up considerably.

Of course, for a human due to the bonus feat you could have it all. THF, PA, and Toughness all by level 3, which would allow for taking Stunning at level 6.

Anyways, good advice here for anyone looking to make a first pally.

[Krag]

I could understand eating a +2 INT tome, and putting those points towards balance, however I personally prefer Diplo over Balance. Considering that Diplo is a class skill for paladins, and this build will have very high CHA, this character's diplo ability is through the roof... that and diplo is FUN!

In terms of balance, if you think you'll have a problem:

• wear a +15 Balance item Do you have extra slots to spare?
• Wear a +6 Dex item
• eat a +2 dex tome
• get a GH +4
• prayer +1
• put on your Head of good fortune +2 It's a great item to temporarily boost your UMD/Haggle/Intimidate but in regular combat situation Litany and Bloodstone are better choices.

=plenty of balance.

Investing 23 ranks at .5 increase per point is a personal choice. You can do it if you want.

Comments in red.

[Aschbart]

A few questions:

1. I always see Minos leggings listed for 20 HP, but the item description says just 'Toughness', like the feat's name, and so I always thought it gives you the feat, Toughness - which is 22 HP total (3 HP for level 1, +1 HP for levels 2-20 each). Or is it just a straight 20 HP buff and doesn't really refer to the like-named feat?

2. Why did you pick up Paladin Heal I and II, but not for instance Divine Sacrifice II or III? Seems like a better choice if you're trying to max out dps. Not?

3. Why did you bother listing all that raid gear at all (green steel and others), when your intention was to build a new player build? I am a new player myself (highest char 11) and from what I've picked up about raid items it will be highly unlikely my very first (or second, or even third) character will ever be my best equipped one, as I always strive to improve and create better builds, before even bothering to level to the (current?) cap. But then maybe that's just me

4. Why use the Spell, Holy Sword, when you also got the Paladin Holy Weapons enhancement?

I agree to previous posters' suggestion to try human instead. sounds like a good advice. Drow are pretty sweet for paladins, but more for the dual rapier TWF kind than two-handed. The racial weapon enhancements help a lot here. I am unsure however if it's wise to go pure paladin on a TWF build though, since on top of the TWF feats you might want to add in Extend (for longer Zeal), Oversized TWF (to overcome attack penalties and be able to always use Power Attack), or Force of Personality (huge boost to will save).

These are all considerations from someone who didn't yet have the opportunity to try it out, so take the suggestions with a pinch of salt

[Visty]

A few questions:

1. I always see Minos leggings listed for 20 HP, but the item description says just 'Toughness', like the feat's name, and so I always thought it gives you the feat, Toughness - which is 22 HP total (3 HP for level 1, +1 HP for levels 2-20 each). Or is it just a straight 20 HP buff and doesn't really refer to the like-named feat?

2. Why did you pick up Paladin Heal I and II, but not for instance Divine Sacrifice II or III? Seems like a better choice if you're trying to max out dps. Not?

3. Why did you bother listing all that raid gear at all (green steel and others), when your intention was to build a new player build? I am a new player myself (highest char 11) and from what I've picked up about raid items it will be highly unlikely my very first (or second, or even third) character will ever be my best equipped one, as I always strive to improve and create better builds, before even bothering to level to the (current?) cap. But then maybe that's just me

4. Why use the Spell, Holy Sword, when you also got the Paladin Holy Weapons enhancement?

I agree to previous posters' suggestion to try human instead. sounds like a good advice. Drow are pretty sweet for paladins, but more for the dual rapier TWF kind than two-handed. The racial weapon enhancements help a lot here. I am unsure however if it's wise to go pure paladin on a TWF build though, since on top of the TWF feats you might want to add in Extend (for longer Zeal), Oversized TWF (to overcome attack penalties and be able to always use Power Attack), or Force of Personality (huge boost to will save).

These are all considerations from someone who didn't yet have the opportunity to try it out, so take the suggestions with a pinch of salt

1. it used to be the feat but now its a plain 20hp
2. my guess would be because those are prerequesists for his PrE

4. because its still one of the best weapons around there, its cheap and will bypass any relevant DR

[Ralmeth]

It looks like a nice beginners build. I have a few suggestions on the original build based on my own experience:

Balance vs Diplomacy:
I also think you should be putting extra skill points into balance. I think it would be more valuable to be able to get back up after being knocked down.

Take Divine Sacrifice:
Being a DPS pure Paladin, I highly recommend going to either Divine Sacrifice II or III. Spam divine sacrifice in combat and this will noticeably increase your DPS (and for those that care, the kill count). You could drop LOH III and perhaps Bulwarks II (as you are not a AC build).

Swap ITHF and Toughness
I agree that power attack at 3rd level is very helpful and would recommend leaving this as is. I would suggest rearranging some of your other feats so you can get Improved Two Handed fighting at 6th level. Getting lots of splash damage from ITHF is a lot of fun so I would suggest taking this earlier. You could push toughness back to 12th level and move ITHF to 6th. If you go Human, you could of course move ITHF up with no penalty.

Best of luck,
Ralmeth

[Goldeneye]

Thank you everyone for the good advice. +Rep to everyone.
(Ralmrth, I'll rep you tomorrow when I get more)
I took everyone's advice, and re-wrote this build as a Human
NEW HUMAN VERSION AVAILABLE HERE

[lord_of_rage]

A few questions:

1. I always see Minos leggings listed for 20 HP, but the item description says just 'Toughness', like the feat's name, and so I always thought it gives you the feat, Toughness - which is 22 HP total (3 HP for level 1, +1 HP for levels 2-20 each). Or is it just a straight 20 HP buff and doesn't really refer to the like-named feat?

2. Why did you pick up Paladin Heal I and II, but not for instance Divine Sacrifice II or III? Seems like a better choice if you're trying to max out dps. Not?

3. Why did you bother listing all that raid gear at all (green steel and others), when your intention was to build a new player build? I am a new player myself (highest char 11) and from what I've picked up about raid items it will be highly unlikely my very first (or second, or even third) character will ever be my best equipped one, as I always strive to improve and create better builds, before even bothering to level to the (current?) cap. But then maybe that's just me

4. Why use the Spell, Holy Sword, when you also got the Paladin Holy Weapons enhancement?

I agree to previous posters' suggestion to try human instead. sounds like a good advice. Drow are pretty sweet for paladins, but more for the dual rapier TWF kind than two-handed. The racial weapon enhancements help a lot here. I am unsure however if it's wise to go pure paladin on a TWF build though, since on top of the TWF feats you might want to add in Extend (for longer Zeal), Oversized TWF (to overcome attack penalties and be able to always use Power Attack), or Force of Personality (huge boost to will save).

These are all considerations from someone who didn't yet have the opportunity to try it out, so take the suggestions with a pinch of salt

At endgame yes weapons of good is insane if you are one of those lucky thf pallys rocking an epic sos or a pair of epic chaos blades twf. But thats a huge grind.