Holy Freeze Paladin by Isumi

Holy freeze paladin guide (SC)

Sup y'all, holy freeze din is a great build for boss killing & elite hunting, and mediocre for killing large groups. Holds its own very well on p8. I used it for ubers & sanctum, and im sure it can do cave of horrors as well. I just geared it out using stuff I already had, so there might be some budget gear I didn't think of. Not exactly sure if this is good as a ladder starter, but it certainly becomes very very strong. You can also repurpose this into a transcendence build, but I think melee is better.

Video of p7 ubers & gear: https://youtu.be/R2JGt-goHyE

the way some mechanics work that are relevant to holy freeze dins:

1: melee splash applies an attack that uses your basic attack rating, not your zeal attack rating.

2: melee splash will shot gun bosses (many hits hit the boss, many will miss due to low ar & block though). in my experience: If my base hit does 5% damage, the melee splash will add another 1-5% on top of it.

3: your holy freeze damage will double dip from %cold mastery. It applies once to the skill itself, then again on the melee hit. This makes mastery really powerful

4: your melee splash hits will not use the double dipped damage. It will only apply your base cold damage, as shown in the stats screen (press 8)

5: the damage you gain from holy freeze caps at 32767, but the applied hit can go higher from %cold mastery. Your melee splash hit therefore will not go above 32767. Other sources of flat cold damage, like viruvium go above this.

6: charge is retarded, and wont do damage properly. You will often find the target you charge to take very little damage, for no reason. Charge will still proc your melee splash though, and it's a very effective movement skill so we use it to move around anyways. Also: Even if you have charge as your selected skill, if your close enough it will do a basic attack, which is good.

7: charge will get you stuck sometimes, you can unstuck yourself by swapping weapons. Its important to have capped res on swap so you dont die while getting unstuck.

8: I haven't been able to confirm this first hand, but apparently the damage cap for a single hit is 83k, checked after resistances are calculated (so doing a 100k hit to a monster with 20% resistance, will still do 80k). Source here: https://d2mods.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8747

9: mohsets "attacks ignore demon's resistance" will work on bosses

10: "Ignore targets defense" will not work on bosses, or the leader of elite packs. Not sure if it works on champions or not.

11: -%targets defense does work on act bosses and elites, but only at half effectiveness

12: having a good balance of +skills, %aura mastery and %cold mastery will increase damage more than having a lot of one stat.

13: ilvl 99 paladin weapons, hats & shields are not able to roll +paladin skills. Only regals and below are able to.

14: losing +skills instantly turns off your aura, and it takes a moment to turn back on. This means that when you lose the effect of empower or resurgence, you lose all your damage for a time. Dont use empower or resurgence.

holy fuck thats a lot of shit. Hopefully all that info helps you out.

There are a few super important stats you need:

ignore targets defense (trying to cap basic attack ar for melee splash isn't worth it)

melee splash (our aoe)

fortify (allows us to run 75 all res on p8 and not die)

Cannot be frozen (destroys our frames)

enough ar and -%target defense to hit bosses (missing this makes boss kills really slow)

%life on kill (we will do almost no physical damage, so life leech wont work)

overcapped IAS if you plan on doing ubers (for duriels holy freeze, and the slow effect the bugs give)

skills should be: 20 in holy freeze, resist cold, salvation, offensive aura mastery

1 into zeal, charge vigor, holy shield + pre reqs

remaining skill points into zeal.

stats are enough to wear gear, rest into vit

if a piece of armour gives str, you can make it self support by having +stats on swap

if you are using viruvium, you should aim for 2100+ life, and remaining points into dex

gear:

weapon: diamond craft phase blade or paladin weapon.

If your using a divine or worldstone crystal I would prefer a PB for the much easier frames, and ITD being attached to PB allows you to augment 15% elemental damage. If you dont have mohset you can use the frostbite augment from killing fields

If you decide to go with a paladin weapon, be sure to augment ITD. The only source of ITD is weapons themselves. Regal spam is probably better than divines/worldstars, since those wont roll +3 offensive auras.

good sockets are amn (-30% target defense), shael (20% ias) and cham/ohm (elemental pierce)

theoretically you can socket 3x amn in your weapon, and not get ITD, but I haven't tested it.

body:

bis: worldstar ruby craft, with 30% cold damage augment from KF, and 3 sockets, in a loricated mail, self supporting via +str on swap. My sockets are egers prisms. This gives high ias, life on kill, +str, sockets for customizability, lots of damage from 30% cold, ar from loricated mail. Its absolutely insane

There is no other clear good armour, depends on what you need. Some good options are raiment, rhuvenale, glimmermesh, Viper magi, Chains of honor, coat of the divine.

hat:

Viruvium or Nightwings veil.

Nightwings is super easy to get and incredibly strong, but viruvium on a maxed out character will be stronger

Nightwings is also a source of CBF & pierce

amulet: a good paladin class ammy is best (30+ enchantment of cold, 30 all res, some max res, increased aura effect)

Other strong ones are: barb set ammy (splash)

maras

auriels

meph ammy

spirit of etlich (very budget, very effective)

shield:

I use an op worldstar shield (diamond craft, monarch, 3os, 20% phys res augment)

Assuming this isn't available, the next best thing is champion of zakarum

If you cant find that, your best off regaling some paladin shields

If you dont need resistances, aemyr's tenants is probably good

belt:

verdungos.

rings:

mohset (god ring for ubers, all bosses and most many monsters are demons. Only non demon with high cold res is coldhands in matrons den, which have low hp anyways.)

eonband (safety ring)

nature's peace (prevents corpse explosions from the jewel boss in sanctum)

cains ring with 10% elemental damage augment (lots of damage)

lorells gem (damage + pierce)

bulkathos (damage + life)

void frost (damage + cbf + meme CTC)

heart of carnage (splash)

garnet ring craft (life on kill)

I use mohset + eon for ubers, natures peace + eon for sanctum.

gloves:

most gloves are really weak for us. A good rare can help cap res

if using viruvium, a worldstar craft gives 14~% pierce. I don't think this is worth though.

frost burns gives 20% cold mastery

anathema helps against poison in sanctum

aspect of the hunter gives grace, ias, -target def, some str.

DONT use avatar of the hunter. Empower is a trap.

I use avatar for ubers, anathema for sanctum.

Boots:

If your not using a ruby crafted body, you should use ruby boots.

If you only have regal/blessed try pairing it with a garnet ring for decent life replenish.

If you dont need life replenish, zakarums pace is sick

astronox gives sick ias, and cbf

charms:

primary: %cold or +offensive skills. Depends on your setup which gives more damage.

secondary: cold pierce or IAS, one poison charm to disable ubers regen.

tertiary: avalanche on striking. DONT USE EMPOWER

valour: templar. Maybe justicar if no mohset.

Merc: I dont run a merc. In ubers he dies too much, and in sanctum I need to get all the kills near the corpse explosion boss, so he has no corpses to explode. If you really want to run one, you can use an a5 merc with splash + a sword using the kf frost bite augment. Or just run an a3 merc like a normal person.