Punish

Active Skill · Primary · Crusader

5 Runes
From level 1

Effect

Generate: 5 Wrath per attack

Strike your enemy for 335% weapon damage and gain Hardened Senses, increasing your Block Chance by 15% for 5 seconds.

Requires Shield

Runes

5 Runes

Roar

from level 6 · Fire damage · Proc coefficient 1

When you block with Hardened Senses active, you explode with fury dealing 75% weapon damage as Fire to enemies within 15 yards.
Celerity

from level 17 · Physical damage · Proc coefficient 1

When you block with Hardened Senses active, you gain 15% increased Attack Speed for 3 seconds.
Rebirth

from level 26 · Physical damage · Proc coefficient 1

When you block with Hardened Senses active, you gain 12,874 increased Life regeneration for 2 seconds.
Retaliate

from level 45 · Holy damage · Proc coefficient 1

When you block with Hardened Senses active, you deal 140% weapon damage as Holy to the attacker.
Fury

from level 52 · Lightning damage · Proc coefficient 1

When you block with Hardened Senses active, you gain 15% increased Critical Hit Chance for your next attack.

The proc coefficient scales the chance of on-hit effects (e.g. legendary powers, gems, Life per Hit) for each hit of the skill. Game files, version 2.8.0.

Punish

Punish is a primary generator that requires a shield: it shatters your enemy for solid damage, produces Wrath and grants you the 'Hardened Senses' effect, which raises your block chance for several seconds. So it pairs resource generation with a defensive self-buff and fits shield-based melee builds perfectly.

The runes mostly hook into a successful block while 'Hardened Senses' is active. Retaliate is offensively appealing, because a blocked attack throws Holy damage back at the attacker, strong in Holy-focused and block-heavy setups. Players after pure defense benefit from Rebirth, which raises your life regeneration markedly after a block and so bolsters survivability in prolonged fights. Punish is thus a reliable generator that makes you tougher to bring down even as you dish out damage.

Roar, Celerity and Fury

Punish is available from level 1: 335% weapon damage, 5 Wrath per attack, and Hardened Senses for 15% more Block Chance over 5 seconds. Besides Retaliate and Rebirth there are three more runes, all triggering when you block with Hardened Senses active: Roar (level 6) makes you explode for 75% weapon damage as Fire within 15 yards, Celerity (level 17) raises attack speed by 15% for 3 seconds, and Fury (level 52) adds 15% Critical Hit Chance to your next attack. Since Punish itself raises Block Chance, it also creates more opportunities to trigger its own runes.

Angel Hair Braid

The belt Angel Hair Braid (Crusader only) gives Punish the effect of every rune. Each block with Hardened Senses active then brings the fire explosion, Holy damage against the attacker, Life regeneration, attack speed and Critical Hit Chance all at once.

Thorns of the Invoker

In Thorns of the Invoker, Punish becomes a Thorns weapon. The 2-piece bonus makes your Thorns damage hit all enemies within 15 yards and raises it by 90% for 2 seconds for every Punish or Slash hit and every block, up to 10 times. Punish supplies both: hits and, through the higher Block Chance, extra blocks. The 6-piece bonus increases the attack speed of Punish by 100% and makes it deal 67,500% of your Thorns damage.

by eRnstl