Hey guys, thanks for checking out our Crusader Leveling Guide! Crusaders have a bad reputation for slow leveling – but this isn’t the case! Crusaders have an extremely good leveling speed as long as you let go of the shield!
I HIGHLY SUGGEST YOU OPEN our D3 Leveling Process (all classes). It answers the usual leveling questions. “Leoric’s?” “Grinding?” There’s a ton of supplemental info there.
S28’s Altar of Rites VASTLY affects leveling
S28 is the ‘Season of Massacre Leveling’ due to Node A in Alter of Rites:
“Double massacre exp bonus and duration”.
Every other method is made worse by this. Also, Node C is “no item level requirement”…
First of all, see our Altar of Rites guide / order to get a clearer picture of what I’m talking about. Basically, this hinges around “Opening your first Challenge Rift Cache”, and if you want to take it ASAP. Also, there couple notes on Node C there, specifically how to get Node C with or without the cache.
I’ll be pasting this reminder in all leveling related content. GL leveling your sader in S28!
Crusader Leveling – Quick Navigation:
FULL Leveling Build | Summary/Reminders | Leoric’s Crown? | Notes | Fresh Level 70!
!!! Challenge Rift Material Spending !!!
As mentioned in our general all classes leveling guide, you SHOULD be doing the Challenge Rift and WISELY be spending the resulting materials from it. TLDR: Challenge Rift -> Attempt Deaths Breath upgrade and Blood Shard gambles for a good legendary.
For a leveling Sader, the chances are pretty slim…
Death’s Breath
Upgrade 1H Flails. Hopefully, you get something good (Gyrfalcons, Johannas, Darklight). The chances aren’t so hot as 4 of 7 1H Flails are pretty much junk.
Blood Shards
Gamble for Shields at Level 1 to 15. Hopefully, you get a Guard of Johanna. It’s the only possible legendary shield at this level.
Alternate Strategy: Blood Shards for Heart of Iron (Chest L15). It’s 50% easier to get compared to Johanna’s Guard with shards, but is far less OP…
Crusader Leveling: FULL BUILD per Level
This build is not SUPER optimized for MASSACRE (S28, you should be doing it)|
but it doesn’t need to be, given how easy it is to level.
Put your level in the box on the upper right – or hit back / next found in the bottom right! If you don’t have a great legendary shield… LET GO OF THE SHIELD! Use a 2H Weapon WITHOUT Heavenly Strength! It’s a huge help to DPS! But if you have a great 1H Weapon, you might as well use Fervor.
Imagine the times I did that before I discovered shield-less! Support us!
Crusader Leveling Skills & Reminders Summary
Crusader Leveling & Leoric’s Crown – When, and is it worth it?
Review our D3 Leveling Process (all classes) for more notes on this. Summary:
It’s worth it || You must be minimum L16 (to be safe)
You must beat him in Campaign Mode || You must not have beaten him previously
This is still worth doing, but you have to wait until you’re L20 . Just make sure when you DO make this detour, you’re either A) Prepared to handle it as quickly as possible, or B) Just lookin’ for a change of pace from however it is you’re leveling it up.
Make it a mini-game! Get to Skeleton King as fast as you can! Steed Charge and Falling Sword while equipping a 1H and Fervor (Passive) should cut your travel time A LOT.
I dislike rushing to Leoric right at the season opener. It’s painfully slow without mobility and a fleshed out build. But alas, this is only my suggestions and observations…
Crusader Leveling Notes
Playing the Build
“Brainless AoE & Elite trashing”. While many builds rely on synergies and cute little interactions, this Crusader leveling build relies on raw BRUTE FORCE. It works, too.
Smite – Shatter is an utterly brainless, imba AoE generator. It also heals you in tandem with Holy Cause. It does impressive damage while shield-less in a 2-Hander.
Fist of the Heavens is much the same. Once you get Fissure, the damage is just crazy. This and Smite take care of most generic encounters – but they kinda suck vs. elites…
Falling Sword, that’s where this comes in. The rest of the kit pretty much facilitates the BURSTING DOWN of elites. Condemn is much the same.
Steed Charge is essential in finding better fights for you (or hunting more elites to kill). While your single target damage isn’t exactly poor – it takes the same time to kill ONE guy and a CHUNK of guys (So you’d obviously want the chunk…). Don’t underestimate the DoT!
Laws of Valor-Unstoppable Force is great – and you should be popping it every chance you can get. More specifically, when you’re about to Fist (of the Heavens) them.
Followers – Hire them!
Templar is not only the best utility follower (Heals and Resource Gain), but Crusaders pick up strength gear which increase Templar’s DPS. “Take all the left skills!“, as their the best support choices. Periodically, give him your trash 1-handers, rings, amulet and shield.
Crafted Yellow Weapons
Craft 2H Axe (yellow) from the blacksmith in town. Every few levels, check if you have a new one to make. It should ideally have Strength on it, too. While any 2h weapon is OK, axe is recommended for its high weapon damage.
Level 61, don’t delay and make a new one. There’s a HUGE stat difference from previous ones. Needless to say, this should be the first thing you do once you hit 70 as well.
Crusader: Gems while Leveling up
Red Gems (Ruby)… good ‘ol red gems. Best for Helm (+EXP%!!!), Weapon (Flat Damage) and since Crusaders use Strength as their primary stat, any other socket too.
Don’t be shy to slot Red Gems EVERYWHERE! DON’T SAVE THEM, combine them often!
Fresh 70 Crusader, now what?
Grats on max level Crusader! The end-game starts now! So, now you’re going to want to setup your fresh level 70 Crusader – and there’s a guide for that linked just below. But before you get all excited go ahead and Craft a level 70 2H Mace!
Other TeamBRG Crusader Guides
- Crusader Leveling
- Crusader Fresh Level 70
- Crusader Speedfarming General
- Crusader BEST Speedfarm Build
- Crusader Support Builds
- Armor of Akkhan | Akkhan Set Dungeon
- Roland’s Legacy | Roland’s Set Dungeon
- Seeker of the Light | Light Set Dungeon
- Thorns of the Invoker | Invoker Set Dungeon
For more info on other D3 classes, go to D3 Directory Guide.
Crusader Leveling – Quick Navigation:
FULL Leveling Build | Summary/Reminders | Leoric’s Crown? | Notes | Fresh Level 70!
Grats on max level Crusader! I hope our Crusader Leveling Guide helped you out!
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Really like this for cursed chest/temple fallen or nephalim rifts. I combine it with thorns gamble level 1 to get heart of iron and cube it. Use iron skin reflection instead of condemn and barrel of spikes on horse, thorns scales off strength and vitality all the way through and makes elites/RG much smother doing this you can switch to master around lvl 30 and t1/t2 when you reach your level 70 weapon with reduced requirement.
“IMPT: Craft a new L61 2H Axe for a HUGE BOOST.”
Erm… craft a lvl 70 2H Axe at around 40 and reroll lvl reduction for an even BIGGER BOOST”.
Hey guys,
Been playing d3 os PS4 since release, but never took part in seasons. Using this guide for my first season and LOVING IT. Great build and a thorough guide make it easy to understand (so far. just hit L50). looking forward to the fresh 70 guide. keep up the good work, folks!
The extremely low damage versus elites and guardians truly hampers this build and slows down clearing to a crawl. I’m not finding falling sword nor Condemn and their very long cooldowns in the leveling phase being enough to make up for this.
Should probably stick to massacre bonuses I guess instead of bothering with nephalem rifts.
Thankfully this build works with massacres as well. Against guardians, you have to lineup your burst or it will be miserable. Nephing with this build shines at around 20+. The damage output was great when I last used this provided that you’re keeping updated with strong 2H weapons and NOT USING A SHIELD.
Looks like a great guide and I’m going to start using it but I do have one question – What does it mean when it says (AUTO)?
Thank you! Auto – it’s when a skill automatically unlocks for a particular skill “button”
This really needs an update, many of the skills has been push one level and are therefore no more available at the recommended level e.g. shield glare and slash – electricty ;D
will update soon… currently going through the items first… apparently some items changed… will fixed this as soon as i can
Hi! Nice guide for a beginner like me. I am enjoying playing that Crusader. That being said, it seems that now (maybe due to a recent patch?) the Steed Charge is on the same key that Condemn. So I chose to discard Steed Charge and keep Condemn and am left to choose another skill between Iron Skin, Consecration and Judgment. I am currently using Iron Skin but yould you have a recommendation (skill + rune) consistent with your build?
Hi! Try this: press Esc – Options – Gameplay. then under Interface,make sure that there’s a check mark on Elective mode. You’ll be able to customize skills selection now.
Great guides, they have helped me a lot. One question, why do we switch from 2H axe to 2H mace at 70?
2h mace has a higher base damage
To elaborate on this… 2H mace has a higher base damage, true. So why not craft it while leveling up? Oddly they aren’t available to be crafted pre level 70…
Started this, but I’m slow so I’m just at around level 20. Once I went 2H axe, I swapped shield glare for Iron Skin just because, I mean having an ability you use is better than an ability you can’t use. So far it’s nice. I don’t play often though so I’m not like rushing through or anything.
Yeah I noticed that as well. Subbed out for Iron Skin as well since no shield for Shield Glare….
If you take Heavenly Strength as a Passive at Level 10 it allows a Shield with a 2 hander. Unfortunately the guide says the Passive at this level is “irrelevant”. Not if you want to use Shield Glare!
Help me alot, got to 70 having a blast in 3 days
The only problem I had with this build is that at 16 you say to pick up Righteousness and use a 2h axe, but that takes away the ability to wield a 2h and shield. The button 1 ability for 12-21 requires that you have a shield and you don’t get another button 1 ability until 21. Not to say you can’t replace that button with your own choice, but if you’re going for the all-inclusive leveling build you might want to add something in between 16-21 for button 1.
I just used this guide last night, worked great to get me to lvl 34 in a few hours. I didn’t even notice an issue with button 1 from 16-21.
Shield Glare is very irrelevant at 16+, it’s just a placeholder until you get Condemn. Once you hit 16 and craft a 2h axe and red gem it you will be instantly killing mobs with Smite-Shatter alone until 21 if you’re leveling on normal – expert (which you should be on fresh characters). You won’t even need Condemn for a while since you’ll still be killing elites really fast at 21 with just Smite-Shatter.