Lightning/Death Sentry (Trapsin) Build Skills for Diablo 2 Resurrected

1. 1 point to all prerequisites
2. 20 points to Lightning Sentry — Main damage skill, max out immediately
3. 20 points to Death Sentry — Synergy for Lightning Sentry, max out after Lightning Sentry
4. 20 points to Shock Web — Synergy for Lightning Sentry, max out after Death Sentry
5. 20 points to Charged Bolt Sentry — Synergy for Lightning Sentry, max out after Shock Web
6. 1 point to Mind Blast — Crowd control, 1 point when available
7. 1 point to Burst of Speed — Mobility, 1 point when available
8. 1 point to Fade — Resistances and damage reduction, 1 point when available
9. 1+ points to Shadow Master — optional if you want an extra Minion to help

Playing a Trap Assassin is fairly simple, making the build well-suited to newer players while still introducing them to a number of mechanics.

The Assassin has a high Life total and great gain of Life per point spent in Vitality. This allows for some mistakes and helps prevent her from getting locked in Hit Recovery like other less forgiving characters such as the Druid or Amazon.

Further, the Trapsin has many great crowd control skills such as Cloak of Shadows and Mind Blast that can shut down attackers and allow her to escape or simply keep a safe distance from dangerous monsters. Specifically, Mind Blast can temporarily Convert a monster to create a distraction, allowing the Assassin to lay down her Traps in relative safety.

In terms of laying Traps, generally a 4:1 Lightning Sentry to Death Sentry ratio is preferred. This is because the damage from Lightning Sentry is going to be higher and more useful for killing monsters while the singular Death Sentry will provide suppelementary area of effect damage through Corpse Explosion. If there are a lot of extra corpses, using a few more Death Sentry may be preferable while moving on to the next group of enemies.

Note that Traps are considered minions by the logic of the game, meaning that the -% to Lightning Resistance and +% to Lightning Damage (and equivalent attributes for other elements) do NOT apply to them, even if the Character Sheet indicates they do.

The following section discusses how many attribute points should be allocated to each of the primary stats.

Enough for gear — For a Trapsin using a Spirit Monarch, this will be 156 Strength as that is usually the highest Strength requirement for commonly used gear. If choosing to use another shield or claws with lower Strength requirements, then just adjust your Strength to that value. This number always changes based on the gear you are using, though, so make sure to always double check the requirements for each piece of gear you have as well as how much Strength each piece will provide once equipped.

Enough for Gear — Dexterity is great for increasing Block Chance, but if you are not planning on investing points to max that out, it is often not worth taking any additional Dexterity, as the return on Attack Rating and Defense is very low.

Everything else into Vitality — 250+ points. Every excess attribute point should be allocated to Vitality, as long as you can meet the Strength and Dexterity requirements of your items by the time you wish to equip them. Not only does this increase your Life total, but this also increases the chance for Healing Potions to crit, doubling their healing output. Further, additional Life reduces the chance that you will be put into hit recovery.

Nothing — Allocating attribute points to Energy in a final build is universally considered sub-par for almost every character due to the widespread availability of Mana Potions. While leveling, if you find yourself struggling with Mana you can allocate a few points to Energy that you can then remove with a respec later on.