Build Introduction

The Hammer Paladin is by far the strongest farming and PvM character in Diablo 2 and D2 Resurrected, and is also very efficient for PvP. If you enjoy obliterating any enemy that comes in your way with one hit, this is definitely a build you should try! Although the endgame build is quite expensive, even with budget gearing options you will be able to crush monster mobs within seconds.

Gameplay

Attacking skills: Use Blessed Hammer as your primary attacking skill in combination with Concentration Aura. Blessed Hammer deals magic damage and there are very few monsters with magic immunity in the game, so you will rarely need to rely on a secondary attacking skill. In case you run into immune enemies, use Holy Bolt for attacking, or just let your mercenary kill them. Blessed Hammers deal damage on a wide area, but often miss enemies. If you want to make sure that your hammers don't miss, teleport on the chosen monster.

Movement: For maximum movement efficiency is, teleporting is the best option. If you can afford the Enigma Runeword for body armor, you will be able to cast teleport anytime. Otherwise you can buy amulets from Vendor NPCs with gambling that have teleport charges, and repair the amulet whenever charges run out. Having % faster cast rate on your items can greatly improve your teleport casting speed. The second best option for movement is switching between your attacking aura (Concentration) and running aura (Vigor), which increases your runspeed by almost 50%.

Survivability: Even in budget setup your survivability will be decent, the only monsters that could cause you serious trouble are Uber Bosses. Defensive auras like Redemption for life and mana recovery, Salvation for allresistance, or Defiance for extra defense can further boost your survival chances.

If you want to improve on your survivability, use Call to Arms D2R Runes as your switch weapon in order to be able to cast Battle Orders which can almost double your life. Having 75% block chance with Holy Shield skill activated and having 75% all resistances on Hell difficulty is highly suggested, so put points on your Dexterity Stat until you reach 75% chance to block, and get charms with resistances to achieve 75% to all four resistances.

Having % physical damage reduction, additional life, increased maximum resistances, elemental damage absorption, faster hit recovery, faster block rate, higher defense, % bonus to defense, or cannot be frozen stats on your items can further increase your survivability up to a point that your character will become almost immortal and can very safely play even in Hardcore.

Party and Solo play: Except for Uber Tristram, you will be able to quickly solo the entire game on your own. In parties members will be happy to have you as Concentration aura provides a huge boost both to Physical and Magic damage. If most of your party members use elemental damage for attacking, you can switch to Conviction aura to lower monster resistances. When needed, you can also help your party out by using your defensive, or other offensive auras.

Magic Find: This build is simply the best at MFing amongst all builds, period. You can quickly teleport or run to any Boss and kill it within seconds. Gearing allows you to have very high magic find %, while also dealing huge amounts of area and single target damage, making hammerdins the perfect option for finding valuable D2R Ladder Items.