Looking for build guide for 18Lock/2 Paladin (for beginner)

[RedSkiesAtNight]

I've been extremely impressed with the Warlocks with a splash of paladin. Their ability to out-tank and out-dps is astonishing. I've never played a caster before, but I want to do so now. Can someone help a beginning caster with a build guide for 18Lock/2 Paladin shield-bearing 'tanklock?'

What beginning stats? Feats? Gear recommendations? Skills? Spells? Spell rotation? Changes along the way?

Many thanks in advance!!

[unbongwah]

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...k-18-Paladin-2

Be forewarned that warlocks are about to be nerfed: https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...ce-Change-post

[slarden]

I would caution against this build with the changes recently announced.

This build got most of it's benefit from things on the known issue list that were planned to be changed:

1) Divine Grace: gives a warlock a huge save boost (25 or so), but with the changes you will only get +8 to saves. This sounds like a lot, but warlock saves are low. Even with +8 your saves will be on the low end. You can take force of personality to use your charisma modifier for will save and reflex save hardly matters because you will have 50% damage reduction from MRR. So the only downside is fort saves and even with +8 you will rarely make your save in difficult EE content

2) Arcane spell failure. Paladin gives heavy armor proficiency with you will have 5% arcane spell failure if elf, half elf, drow, morninglord or warforged. Otherwise you are at 20%. Not to mention going pure warlock with ES capstone gives you full BAB bonus. That means a 18 warlock / 2 paladin will have PRR of 38 with heavy armor (2x BAB 19x2=38). A 20 warlock gets full BAB with ES capstone which ends up being 28 rather than 24. So with medium armor your PRR is 1.5x BAB with the new formula which is 42 in medium armor. That's right, a 20 warlock with ES capstone in medium armor gets more benefit than a 18 warlock / 2 paladin in heavy armor. So the only benefit you get from heavy armor is armor abilities like shadow guardian - not worth it and not needed in my opinion.

Paladin does grant shield proficiency so it saves you one feat, but you have room to take shield proficiency, shield mastery and improved shield mastery if you aren't going for spell DCs. If you use EE Skyvault shield with those feats and legendary shield mastery twist - it gives you 45 PRR and 15 MRR.

My suggestion to anyone that wants a warlock with good PRR is go ES capstone, 45 PRR from EE skyvault and you will be close to 140 PRR and 125 MRR without any past lifes. Then go tier 5 soul eater for max dps - although you are giving up crit damage you get survivability and decent DPS. Medium armor with EE Skyvault shield gives no arcane spell failure at all - you will be safe with the upcoming changes.

2 Pal splash for heavy armor is a net PRR loss, a net MRR loss, dps loss, hp loss (20% bonus from ES capstone) and save bonus isn't worth it compared to pure 20 warlock with medium armor, ES capstone and souleater tier 5.

Basically, 2 paladin makes no sense at all any more. 2 fighter has some merit with shield proficiency and 2 feats for presumably shield mastery and improved shield mastery - allowing you take 3 spell focus feats on top of that, but 20 warlock with the ES capstone still makes more sense if you are building for survivability since you get DPS, HP and dps from the capstone.

If building solely for DPS souleater tier 5 with tainted scholar capstone makes the most sense.

[AtomicMew]

My suggestion to anyone that wants a warlock with good PRR is go ES capstone, 45 PRR from EE skyvault and you will be close to 140 PRR and 125 MRR without any past lifes. Then go tier 5 soul eater for max dps - although you are giving up crit damage you get survivability and decent DPS. Medium armor with EE Skyvault shield gives no arcane spell failure at all - you will be safe with the upcoming changes.

With how heavily ES is being nerfed, I feel it's best to avoid it altogether.

Half elf 17 warlock/3 paladin with medium armor and skyvault. Tainted scholar core 4 (21 AP), Tier 5 soul eater (~39 AP), half elf (3 AP) to remove arcane spell failure, sacred defender (13 AP). I think with the investment in tainted scholar (pact damage and crit damage) this will offer similar DPS while having much better defenses.

[slarden]

With how heavily ES is being nerfed, I feel it's best to avoid it altogether.

Half elf 17 warlock/3 paladin with medium armor and skyvault. Tainted scholar core 4 (21 AP), Tier 5 soul eater (~39 AP), half elf (3 AP) to remove arcane spell failure, sacred defender (13 AP). I think with the investment in tainted scholar (pact damage and crit damage) this will offer similar DPS while having much better defenses.

Souleater is the only tier 5 that makes sense. You need at least 7 points in Tainted Scholar for utterdark blast otherwise ES is pointless. You need 41 points in ES for capstone and 32 points min for Eldritch wave so yeah it's going to be a very tough road.

You would need to pass on all the Souleater tier 5s and tainted scholar crits.

On the other hand by cutting out ES completely you are losing 72 spellpower and I am not sure how easy it will be to maintain the 30 spellpower from Exalted Angel Blood and Radiance without the aura, so that's a hit of 100 spellpower possibly. You also lose the passive aura damage which for me is on top of my normal spell rotation so it's ends up being bonus damage compared to the pew pew style of soul eater tainted scholar.

Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar you don't need to dip to a third tree for utterdark blast so you can take all the soul eater tier 5s on top of the 60% crit damage + pact damage. While I suspect Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar wins I still want to test both options. It's 1 feat, 2 AP and 1 augment to wear medium armor with no arcane spell failure.

[AtomicMew]

Souleater is the only tier 5 that makes sense. You need at least 7 points in Tainted Scholar for utterdark blast otherwise ES is pointless. You need 41 points in ES for capstone and 32 points min for Eldritch wave so yeah it's going to be a very tough road.

You would need to pass on all the Souleater tier 5s and tainted scholar crits.

On the other hand by cutting out ES completely you are losing 72 spellpower and I am not sure how easy it will be to maintain the 30 spellpower from Exalted Angel Blood and Radiance without the aura, so that's a hit of 100 spellpower possibly. You also lose the passive aura damage which for me is on top of my normal spell rotation so it's ends up being bonus damage compared to the pew pew style of soul eater tainted scholar.

Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar you don't need to dip to a third tree for utterdark blast so you can take all the soul eater tier 5s on top of the 60% crit damage + pact damage. While I suspect Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar wins I still want to test both options. It's 1 feat, 2 AP and 1 augment to wear medium armor with no arcane spell failure.

I don't think blood and radiance is a big loss, since there are a lot of strong twists. I generally run: sense weakness / empyrean / radiant power / cocoon.

Btw, blood and radiance description is: "Each time you cast a light based spell, you gain Endless Ardor: +1 sacred bonus to positive energy for 10 seconds. Each time you cast a positive energy spell, gain Righteous Fervor: +1 sacred bonus to light spellpower for 10 seconds. "

Am I missing something? It seems like you gain light SP by casting positive energy spells.

[Morroiel]

I don't think blood and radiance is a big loss, since there are a lot of strong twists. I generally run: sense weakness / empyrean / radiant power / cocoon.

Btw, blood and radiance description is: "Each time you cast a light based spell, you gain Endless Ardor: +1 sacred bonus to positive energy for 10 seconds. Each time you cast a positive energy spell, gain Righteous Fervor: +1 sacred bonus to light spellpower for 10 seconds. "

Am I missing something? It seems like you gain light SP by casting positive energy spells.

Aura is bugged - it procs both endless ardor and righteous fervor.

[Morroiel]

Souleater is the only tier 5 that makes sense. You need at least 7 points in Tainted Scholar for utterdark blast otherwise ES is pointless. You need 41 points in ES for capstone and 32 points min for Eldritch wave so yeah it's going to be a very tough road.

You would need to pass on all the Souleater tier 5s and tainted scholar crits.

On the other hand by cutting out ES completely you are losing 72 spellpower and I am not sure how easy it will be to maintain the 30 spellpower from Exalted Angel Blood and Radiance without the aura, so that's a hit of 100 spellpower possibly. You also lose the passive aura damage which for me is on top of my normal spell rotation so it's ends up being bonus damage compared to the pew pew style of soul eater tainted scholar.

Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar you don't need to dip to a third tree for utterdark blast so you can take all the soul eater tier 5s on top of the 60% crit damage + pact damage. While I suspect Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar wins I still want to test both options. It's 1 feat, 2 AP and 1 augment to wear medium armor with no arcane spell failure.

To keep stacks up - use the cure mod wounds sla. It can usually provide 5+ stacks each time you cast it depending on your playstyle (obviously if you solo that's not going to happen).

Yeah I've now tried all the different splits I could think of and they all fall short of Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar in terms of damage (both aoe and single target). Though I'm not used to playing a character this squishy - I have to remind myself that I'm now a glass cannon.

[Morroiel]

I don't think blood and radiance is a big loss, since there are a lot of strong twists. I generally run: sense weakness / empyrean / radiant power / cocoon.

Radiant power? What destiny do you run in - draconic? That seems like an enormous loss - both in terms of dps and dcs?

[AtomicMew]

Radiant power? What destiny do you run in - draconic? That seems like an enormous loss - both in terms of dps and dcs?

I run shirady ;o

[slarden]

To keep stacks up - use the cure mod wounds sla. It can usually provide 5+ stacks each time you cast it depending on your playstyle (obviously if you solo that's not going to happen).

Yeah I've now tried all the different splits I could think of and they all fall short of Soul Eater / Tainted Scholar in terms of damage (both aoe and single target). Though I'm not used to playing a character this squishy - I have to remind myself that I'm now a glass cannon.

Unfortunately glass cannons have very little place in this game outside of easy EN raids since you can be a cannon just as easily without giving up defenses for the revamped classes. With the dps nerfs I agree that the only good option left is soul eater / tainted scholar and you won't want to multiclass because giving up the tainted scholar capstone means too much dps loss with the other nerfs. Soul eater / enlightened spirit is far behind on dps. tainted scholar / enlightened spirit combo will be a trap for new players after the update.

I am thinking my shiradi caster with adamantine plating may actually be better overall than warlock after this nerf. Simply because survivability is better, casting range is further away with enlarge and dps was behind a warlock, but I am not so sure there will be much dps difference once this update hits live. Shiradi is a solid B build and that is where I think Warlock will most likely end up after the update.

I'll give warlock a try before switching to something else, but diversity is dead. I am playing a warlock on my main and an alt.

[slarden]

Aura is bugged - it procs both endless ardor and righteous fervor.

Not sure if it is bugged or not - I think a few enlightened spirit aura procs are considered positive although I agree that is a very questionable call. Yeah the aura makes is very easy to keep up blood and radiance and "reborn in light" is prepped very quick.

[JOTMON]

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...k-18-Paladin-2

Be forewarned that warlocks are about to be nerfed: https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...ce-Change-post

Good warning, the changes will impact all paladin splash builds.
The linked build is still decently functional, but will take a hit to saves.

I would caution against this build with the changes recently announced.

This build got most of it's benefit from things on the known issue list that were planned to be changed:

1) Divine Grace: gives a warlock a huge save boost (25 or so), but with the changes you will only get +8 to saves. This sounds like a lot, but warlock saves are low. Even with +8 your saves will be on the low end. You can take force of personality to use your charisma modifier for will save and reflex save hardly matters because you will have 50% damage reduction from MRR. So the only downside is fort saves and even with +8 you will rarely make your save in difficult EE content

2) Arcane spell failure. Paladin gives heavy armor proficiency with you will have 5% arcane spell failure if elf, half elf, drow, morninglord or warforged. Otherwise you are at 20%. Not to mention going pure warlock with ES capstone gives you full BAB bonus. That means a 18 warlock / 2 paladin will have PRR of 38 with heavy armor (2x BAB 19x2=38). A 20 warlock gets full BAB with ES capstone which ends up being 28 rather than 24. So with medium armor your PRR is 1.5x BAB with the new formula which is 42 in medium armor. That's right, a 20 warlock with ES capstone in medium armor gets more benefit than a 18 warlock / 2 paladin in heavy armor. So the only benefit you get from heavy armor is armor abilities like shadow guardian - not worth it and not needed in my opinion.

Paladin does grant shield proficiency so it saves you one feat, but you have room to take shield proficiency, shield mastery and improved shield mastery if you aren't going for spell DCs. If you use EE Skyvault shield with those feats and legendary shield mastery twist - it gives you 45 PRR and 15 MRR.

My suggestion to anyone that wants a warlock with good PRR is go ES capstone, 45 PRR from EE skyvault and you will be close to 140 PRR and 125 MRR without any past lifes. Then go tier 5 soul eater for max dps - although you are giving up crit damage you get survivability and decent DPS. Medium armor with EE Skyvault shield gives no arcane spell failure at all - you will be safe with the upcoming changes.

2 Pal splash for heavy armor is a net PRR loss, a net MRR loss, dps loss, hp loss (20% bonus from ES capstone) and save bonus isn't worth it compared to pure 20 warlock with medium armor, ES capstone and souleater tier 5.

Basically, 2 paladin makes no sense at all any more. 2 fighter has some merit with shield proficiency and 2 feats for presumably shield mastery and improved shield mastery - allowing you take 3 spell focus feats on top of that, but 20 warlock with the ES capstone still makes more sense if you are building for survivability since you get DPS, HP and dps from the capstone.

If building solely for DPS souleater tier 5 with tainted scholar capstone makes the most sense.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...k-18-Paladin-2
* this build will likely get evolved to a /2 rogue instead of /2paladin due to the splash 2/paladin nerf, just waiting for the live changes to hit.

1. Divine grace change will impact this build bringing saves down by 17 to mid/high 70's, can make back a few points with in raid drops of quality bonuses farming DOJ... but this will take some farming.
...Saves are still good, just no longer no-fail great....Force of Personality is already factored into the build.

2. The change does impact other builds that were taking advantage of the non-working ASF and heavy armor., The Porcupine build does not use heavy armor so is not impacted by ASF change, it uses Mithral body.
Warlocks have easy access to Tensors Transformation so BAB is not an issue. . the BAB changes to armor only screws over classes without easy access to Tensors/Divine power.

3. Shield mastery feats are expensive for what you get back, I wouldn't bother.

4. /2paladins are pointless now, DDO has nerfed them out of viability. only reason to keep it on Bladeforged is to avoid having to LR it out., Bladeforged still has its own perks... immunities, self recon..
...better off with Pure Bladeforged Warlock after changes (requires LR), /2rogue evasion/umd/trapping or /2 monk for evasion/feats, could go fighter for feats/armor perks.

5. ES is still the best tree for self survivability and tank oriented dps with auras/bursts. going T5 TS or SE would change you to a run-a-round pew pew build. not a tank type.

All in all Warlock is still as solid class.. and it should be since it is the current pay to win class not a pay to be mediocre class.

With how heavily ES is being nerfed, I feel it's best to avoid it altogether.

Half elf 17 warlock/3 paladin with medium armor and skyvault. Tainted scholar core 4 (21 AP), Tier 5 soul eater (~39 AP), half elf (3 AP) to remove arcane spell failure, sacred defender (13 AP). I think with the investment in tainted scholar (pact damage and crit damage) this will offer similar DPS while having much better defenses.

I would not go this route for a tank type, would be ok for a pew-pew'er... not enough self healing, and..

Lose:
Celestial Spirit: Immune to knockdown effects. When enabled, your Eldritch Blasts gain 3d6 Light damage. Your Eldritch Aura now affects enemies every 2 seconds
Shape Vestments: Passive:While wearing Light Armor, you gain +10 Maximum HP and +5 Magical Resistance Rating. While wearing Medium Armor you are proficient with, you gain +20 Maximum HP and +10 MRR
Medium Armor Proficiency: Passive: You gain proficiency in Medium Armor, and the ability to cast arcane spells in medium armor without arcane spell failure
ES: PRR/MRR/light power/burst/blast


Gain:..
nerfed Paladin saves..
not enough prr/mrr to cover what you lost in ES
ASF spell failure.
more damage output .. if you can stay alive.. better run-a-round pew-pewing. instead of tanking..

[JOTMON]

Unfortunately glass cannons have very little place in this game outside of easy EN raids since you can be a cannon just as easily without giving up defenses for the revamped classes. With the dps nerfs I agree that the only good option left is soul eater / tainted scholar and you won't want to multiclass because giving up the tainted scholar capstone means too much dps loss with the other nerfs. Soul eater / enlightened spirit is far behind on dps. tainted scholar / enlightened spirit combo will be a trap for new players after the update.

I am thinking my shiradi caster with adamantine plating may actually be better overall than warlock after this nerf. Simply because survivability is better, casting range is further away with enlarge and dps was behind a warlock, but I am not so sure there will be much dps difference once this update hits live. Shiradi is a solid B build and that is where I think Warlock will most likely end up after the update.

I'll give warlock a try before switching to something else, but diversity is dead. I am playing a warlock on my main and an alt.

Warlock trash DPS is still decent, Boss DPS is where warlocks fall apart, reducing the ES damage will hurt the class more at endgame then at levelling range.

Shiradi armoured caster tank is a solid route, basically the easy button mash caster, I just hate the whole randomness of procc'ing shiradi crits.

[slarden]

Warlock trash DPS is still decent, Boss DPS is where warlocks fall apart, reducing the ES damage will hurt the class more at endgame then at levelling range.

Shiradi armoured caster tank is a solid route, basically the easy button mash caster, I just hate the whole randomness of procc'ing shiradi crits.

I agree, but I played around with Shiradi quit ea bit. I think it adds alot more dps to a wizard / sorc vs. a warlock due to the # of chances for procs. The only time I felt I had better dps as a shiradi is when I got 50% proc rate from audience with the queen - and that is very rare. Still, gambling types love that sort of payoff even if it doesn't happen much. Reborn in the Light + blood and radiance etc. etc. is a much more reliable and consistent dps boost.

I am getting ready to post my U28 patch 1 Warlock 17 / Fighter 3 soul eater/tainted scholar concept build tonight. I think it should have solid defenses, offense and even a decent evard's DC. It's a concept build at this point, but it will be much better than anything centered around 41 points in ES / Tier 5 ES which will really suck bad. In my experience, a nice balance between defense, offense and evard's cc beats maxing out any 1 of the 3 at the expense of the other 2.

I haven't totally abandoned the idea of 20 warlock soul eater/ tainted scholar, but I think you would need alot of divine/pdk past lifes to make that work as well with how hard some enemies hit in the current end game.

[JOTMON]

I agree, but I played around with Shiradi quit ea bit. I think it adds alot more dps to a wizard / sorc vs. a warlock due to the # of chances for procs. The only time I felt I had better dps as a shiradi is when I got 50% proc rate from audience with the queen - and that is very rare. Still, gambling types love that sort of payoff even if it doesn't happen much. Reborn in the Light + blood and radiance etc. etc. is a much more reliable and consistent dps boost.

I am getting ready to post my U28 patch 1 Warlock 17 / Fighter 3 soul eater/tainted scholar concept build tonight. I think it should have solid defenses, offense and even a decent evard's DC. It's a concept build at this point, but it will be much better than anything centered around 41 points in ES / Tier 5 ES which will really suck bad. In my experience, a nice balance between defense, offense and evard's cc beats maxing out any 1 of the 3 at the expense of the other 2.

I haven't totally abandoned the idea of 20 warlock soul eater/ tainted scholar, but I think you would need alot of divine/pdk past lifes to make that work as well with how hard some enemies hit in the current end game.

That is where I was currently stuck... I was enjoying endgame with the warlock build, doing incremental 20's in raids.. but the nerf to /2 paladin was good motivation to jump back into the TR cycle.
Now I am embracing the mindless TR rinse/repeat for stacking divine/morninglord past lives.
biggest challenge now is to figure out how to empty the TR cache without giving up my precious loots..
Will rework my build to something else after the changes hit live.. looking at /2 rogue (personal preference).. maybe pure... time will tell...

[unbongwah]

4. /2paladins are pointless now, DDO has nerfed them out of viability.

I wouldn't say it's pointless - +8 to saves can still be a big deal, depending on your build - but I think pal 3 or 4 splashes will become a lot more prevalent. Pal 3 gets you access to defensive stance: +25 PRR, an extra +6 to saves (+3 from stance, +3 from raise in DG cap), and possibly +6 CON/+6 STR/+20% HPs. Pal 4 is another +3 to saves cap (so effectively +17 to saves total w/CHA 44+), grants Turn Undead for Div Might and access to metamagics, and access to T4 enhancements.

[slarden]

I wouldn't say it's pointless - +8 to saves can still be a big deal, depending on your build - but I think pal 3 or 4 splashes will become a lot more prevalent. Pal 3 gets you access to defensive stance: +25 PRR, an extra +6 to saves (+3 from stance, +3 from raise in DG cap), and possibly +6 CON/+6 STR/+20% HPs. Pal 4 is another +3 to saves cap (so effectively +17 to saves total w/CHA 44+), grants Turn Undead for Div Might and access to metamagics, and access to T4 enhancements.

I agree with him that 2 paladin levels is pointless unless you already have good saves which warlocks do not.

For will save you have force of personality and FOM gear - plus harper pin as backup. For reflex save you can get near or even above 100 MRR without ES which is the equivalent of always making your save. For fort saves 8 or even 11 isn't going to matter in difficult EE content.

I think 3 fighter is far better than 3 pal. Shield proficiency, tower shield proficiency are both auto-granted and you get 2 fighter bonus feats for say shield mastery and improved shield mastery. after weighing the pros/cons I will most likely be running 17 warlock / 3 fighter with medium armor and a tower shield (if no PRR past lifes for an alt) or with no shield on my main.

The DPS is still a question mark, but with eldritch wave doing 3 cone attacks scaled at 150% spellpower every 8 seconds your DPS will be ok even without the 30% crit damage capstone from tainted scholar.

[unbongwah]

I think 3 fighter is far better than 3 pal. Shield proficiency, tower shield proficiency are both auto-granted and you get 2 fighter bonus feats for say shield mastery and improved shield mastery.

Master's Touch grants tower shield prof. So ftr vs pal 3 will basically boil down to 2 extra feats vs +11 to saves. Well, and Kensei vs KotC, I suppose.

[AtomicMew]

I agree with him that 2 paladin levels is pointless unless you already have good saves which warlocks do not.

For will save you have force of personality and FOM gear - plus harper pin as backup. For reflex save you can get near or even above 100 MRR without ES which is the equivalent of always making your save. For fort saves 8 or even 11 isn't going to matter in difficult EE content.

I think 3 fighter is far better than 3 pal. Shield proficiency, tower shield proficiency are both auto-granted and you get 2 fighter bonus feats for say shield mastery and improved shield mastery. after weighing the pros/cons I will most likely be running 17 warlock / 3 fighter with medium armor and a tower shield (if no PRR past lifes for an alt) or with no shield on my main.

The DPS is still a question mark, but with eldritch wave doing 3 cone attacks scaled at 150% spellpower every 8 seconds your DPS will be ok even without the 30% crit damage capstone from tainted scholar.

+11 to saves is still extremely powerful, I don't see how this is better than 2x feats from fighter. No fail fort saves are achievable with twists, and warlock isn't tight on twists.