Mid levels: Crescent Moon vs. Lightsabre

[:1]Just got my zealot up to 55, and he is currently using Crescent Moon in a Phase Blade. The thing is beastly fast and the CTC Static is fantastic.

I have a Lightsabre lined up for 58, but I'm not sure if I should switch.

I was debating keeping both of them and using the LS on switch once the static from CM got monsters down to half health.

For comparison:

Crescent Moon

10% Chance To Cast Level 17 Chain Lightning On Striking

7% Chance To Cast Level 13 Static Field On Striking

+20% Increased Attack Speed

+180-220% Enhanced Damage

Ignore Target's Defense

-35% To Enemy Lightning Resist

25% Chance of Open Wounds

+9-11 Magic Absorb

+2 To Mana After Each Kill

Level 18 Summon Spirit Wolf (30 Charges)

Lightsabre

+150-200% Enhanced Damage

Adds 10-30 Damage

Adds 60-120 Magic Damage

Adds 1-200 Lightning Damage

5-7% Mana Stolen Per Hit

5% Chance To Cast Level 14-20 Chain Lightning On Attack

20% Increased Attack Speed

Ignore Target's Defense

Lightning Absorb 25%

+7 To Light Radius

I'm just not sure. Most of the guides I see assume you can get Grief or BotD, and my weapon choices are much more limited than that.|||Physical zealot or lightning zealot? If physical zealot lightsaber will do more damage most of the time, but I like your idea of using crescent moon at the start to work beefy stuff (bosses, maybe champion packs and stuff too) down to half.

If lightning zealot, crescent moon all day long baby. You need the ITD if you're not maxing zeal and fanat, plus the -enemy lightning resist is just sexy sexy.|||Both weapons are good as mid lvling weapons. Personally I like cresent moon as a primary weapon because of it's static proc effects, however if you lack a source of mana leech, lightsabre is a comparable alternative.

Both has ITH.

Both is hella fast with zeal.

The only drawback from crescent moon would be dealing with physical immunes and perhaps the occassional lite immunes which static does not work against. And this is where lightsabre excels as it does add magic dmg into the mix, and it's mana leech frees up a gear slot where you might use better ones. The typical mana leech source gear are Vamp gaze, manald heal ring, orphan's call belt, mavina belt, or any rare/crafted glove with one.

Overall, I would place lightsabre above crescent moon for the reasons that it is a great allrounder wpn for mid lvling. Cresent moon will be faster in-terms of cutting down mobs by way of static, and lightsabre being slower.|||Great, thanks! I've been using lightsabre as the primary (crescent on bosses) and it's working pretty effectively. Got to 74 and am now in act 1 of hell... Guess it's time to start thinking about an upgrade.

(Edit: Physical zealot, by the way.)|||Well, speaking of "upgrades"--Eldritch (or one of his posse) dropped a freaking LO for me!

Had a 5 socket phase blade lying around and made Grief this morning. Haven't had a chance to play with it yet--but I'm looking forward to melting packs in hell.

Now I just need to decide whether to keep my Sanctuary (rolled "only" 97 resist all) or try for Exile. It would be nice to ditch my Defiance merc and get Holy Freeze or even an A5 barb for once. But I'll have a ton of resists to make up if I'm not rocking Sanctuary (even with it I'm only 70/75/70/75).|||Try making a spirit pally shield outta a high res base. That should make up for the lost of resist if you remove sanctuary and gain a +2skills in return. However, a typical zealer would usually go for a HoZ for it's offensive (occasional smite) and defensive bonus (high def & better resist if you pdiamond/um it).

Congratz on the Lo drop and grief. I highly doubt there is a better weapon available to a zealer. Should you worry about facing phy immunes, an atma scarab should work wonders for a high speed zealer.|||Sanctuary is fine. You'll probably gain some HP if you spec around HoZ, other than that I wouldn't go for Exile until you can make up the res elsewhere*. Seeing as you've got plenty of +def% from Holy Shield I'd drop the def merc for HF in any case.

*What's your current setup? If you've got Exile you can drop them for Laying of Hands which takes care of fire res. Light is the only other one that really matters and you can get that from charms.|||Quote:








*What's your current setup? If you've got Drac's you can drop them for Laying of Hands which takes care of fire res. Light is the only other one that really matters and you can get that from charms.




er, why can he drop drac? He doesn't have exile. Better to pick up resists from charms or from metalgrid or maras or a rare ring (resists + mana leech) and keep the dracs.|||He's currently 81 and using:

Helm: Guillames (I have no idea how to spell it!)

Amulet: low 20s Maras // Highlords (having trouble deciding)

Armor: Stone

Weapon: Grief PB

Shield: Sanctuary (97 res all) in an elite paladin shield.

Belt: mid-Verdungos // TGods (again, can't decide)

Gloves: Dracs

Boots: Gore

Rings: Raven (22x AR) || Carrion Wind

My main concern now is that he's actually fragile.

I have a pretty dismal charm setup, and have almost 1100 hp and ~70s resist to all, depending on Mara's vs. Highlords.

I like the idea of swapping to Laying of Hands and Exile. But I need to find a suitable shield for it (ethereal, high resists, and 4OS...), so I'm not holding my breath.

I am highly thinking about just dropping Defiance--but I need to read more about defense and how useful it is. With my merc I'm up at 20k, but I don't know how much that matters, especially since I only really am bothered by Gloams. And with Lifetap going off, I don't know if it matters that I take the occasional physical hit anyway.

What are my glaring holes? I think armor, but I don't have the runes to make CoH or Fort. I also like my Clay Golem buddy. =P|||Quote:








He's currently 81 and using:

Helm: Guillames (I have no idea how to spell it!)

Amulet: low 20s Maras // Highlords (having trouble deciding)

Armor: Stone

Weapon: Grief PB

Shield: Sanctuary (97 res all) in an elite paladin shield.

Belt: mid-Verdungos // TGods (again, can't decide)

Gloves: Dracs

Boots: Gore

Rings: Raven (22x AR) || Carrion Wind




Amulet: Either is fine. Maras if you need the extra resist & skills for cta + holyshield prebuff, or Hilords if you need the extra ias for zeal breakpoint. If you do not have a merc with reaper's toll to handle physical immunes, an atma scarab will do wonders for you.

Armor: IMHO, Stone (Shael + Um + Pul + Lum) is a poor choice for an armor. You are better off using Treachery (Shael + Thul + Lem) armor instead at a fraction of the rune price, and way better mods (Fade proc, +45ias, +20fhr). I would even take Lionheart (Hel + Lum + Fal) armor over Stone. The trouble with Treachery on a pally is probably your supposed high def and block (with holyshield), which might prevent Fade from proc'ing often enough.

Shield: Sanctuary is fine for a highblock and resist shield, but a spirit shield will grant you 2 extra skills and up to +45res if you've managed to find a good base. Herald of Zakarum shield is likely the best choice for most pallies (even a zealer), and socketing it with a Pdiamond or Um will give you 69 or 72 total resistance from the shield alone.

Belt: Dungos if you prefer to have extra vita, fhr, some dr. Tgods if you want the str, vita & lite sorb. The final choice for this depends if you have hit a comfortable fhr breakpoint.


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My main concern now is that he's actually fragile.

I have a pretty dismal charm setup, and have almost 1100 hp and ~70s resist to all, depending on Mara's vs. Highlords.




Have you invested all your stat points? At level 81, you should have at least 1.5k life or more. You need only keep your str & dex sufficient enough to wear your gear

Guillaume's Face str req is 115 (minus str bonus from maras, dracs, tgods - and torch/anni if you have one)

Grief phase blade dex req is 136 (minus dex bonus from maras, ravenfrost - and torch/anni if you have one)

Which leaves the rest of your stat points going into vita.


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I like the idea of swapping to Laying of Hands and Exile. But I need to find a suitable shield for it (ethereal, high resists, and 4OS...), so I'm not holding my breath.




Lifetap procs from dracs keeps you alive more often than not IMO, and if you feel that your current HP is low enough to give you trouble, I wouldn't recommend taking them off just yet. Although, LoH's +Edmg to demons is very appealing.


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I am highly thinking about just dropping Defiance--but I need to read more about defense and how useful it is. With my merc I'm up at 20k, but I don't know how much that matters, especially since I only really am bothered by Gloams. And with Lifetap going off, I don't know if it matters that I take the occasional physical hit anyway.




I usually run solo (or with an act 1 merc for some builds), and even without an act 2 defiance merc, my max'ed holyshield brings me over 10k in defense (or much more if you put in extra points into defiance skill to synergize holyshield - I usually don't bother with it unless I have leftover skill points that aren't going anywhere).

My current pally is a dreamadin with max'ed res and 95% lite res. Coupled with Tgods, I can safely say I can afford to go afk in the middle of a pack of Soul mobs, and have them heal me.



Edits: One thing to note about curse procs from gear. If you are using dracs, do not use atma scarab ammy, as the most recent proc will cancel out the other. Either pair up LoH with atma scarab, or go with maras/hilords with dracs.