For some reason, I’ve been a bit obsessed with shield pistol builds recently (to the point that I stay up till 7am!), probably because the ones I’ve seen thus far don’t make a lot of use of the shield itself. And without further ado, I present:
The Glorious Stronghold Lord: (https://www.grimtools.com/calc/YZeKDvr2) In all honesty, the Stronghold set was actually a pain in the ass to use because it only gives +1 to all skills which is nice, but misses out on bonuses and modifiers to specific skills. Still, it looks pretty tanky for something that can kite
Next, is the Blocking Unblockable Tactician: (https://www.grimtools.com/calc/DV96WXWZ) (And people said the Wrathguard sucks. In all serious, please tell if it does have problems). I’m much more confident in this build, at least in terms of DPS due to Shifting Sands, Ulzaads Decree and 95% elemental to pierce conversion. Probably even tankier than the warlord due to Inquisitor’s Seal. A little more button pushy though.
And finally, the Unholy Markswitch of Ch’thon: (https://www.grimtools.com/calc/q2m63qWV). Gonna be honest, I’m looking forward to this one the most because it has lots of lifesteal and chaos damage (even if it is a bit piano-y to play) while the best kiter of the three. What makes this one so good is using Touch of Chaos so skill points can be put elsewhere; it even saves devotion points that would be used on Revenant or Manticore! My biggest complaints are that it’s not full WPS unlike the previous two and it lacks full damage conversion, but you can’t have everything I guess.
And frankly, I’m not sure I can stop there either. I’ve considered things like acid/vitality Righteous Fervor, an elemental Inquisitor combination, Savagery, Firestrike, you get the gist. Opinions and criticisms are welcome and build suggestions even more so.
I kind of made these builds specifically to incorporate using shields in them. I’m not super concerned about how powerful they are, as long as perform well in combat generally speaking. Maybe diving a little deep into the Shattered Realm.
Stronghold Purifier with either Shattered Set or Justicar are both incredibly (like really really incredibly) tanky and deal respectable damage. All other concepts are gimmicky and will have gimmicky performance I am afraid.
Tactician and that Chaos build won’t have enough damage/tankiness to outleech/facetank high end content.
My advice: play whatever you want and explore different builds yourself. But at the same time, you can always check with players who have more experience so you don’t waste 100 hours on a character that doesn’t really work the way you expected him to.
The problem is weapon damage, and also attack speed. Offensive shields are few and far between. That being said a pierce paladin with wrathguard and mythical oathbearer should be quite strong.
I thought jaxxon proc is very good. I don’t know how it works or if it shotguns. It can all be changed, it was just to show that the weapon damage, full phys and ele convert, RF mod and 100% wps can be pretty strong
that was tried a few times by builders I know but with two Oathbearers and it was pretty bad. Really really low damage and aoe and overall depressing performance.
Hmm, but using the wrathguard adds substantial flat damage (110+) and more attack speed. I know paper stats are not to be trusted, but the damage and AoE seem of higher potential than a fire stronghold build.
yet it’s just a noob trap pistol and noob trap archetype (Pierce ranged Paladin). It has been tried many times and results were always poor. You need Fire Strike for ranged. And Pierce works poorly outside of Belgo/Blademasters/Valdun/Infiltrators
