Lion_Aleydro is a level 83, softcore Martyr/Zealot on USEest. Worked great until hell and then it got way to painful for my tastes to maintain.
I actually found a bloodrise (+3 Sacrifice) in normal with this character and used the rune upgrade formula to make it exceptional and keep the damage up in nightmare. I used this weapon until I traded for a 12%LL demon limb and thats when I started dying. Bloodrise wasn't providing the damage I needed (20 sacrifice, 20 fanat, 10 redemption) and once I got something that did hell level damage the combination of big life loss, hard hitting from Hell monsters, AND those with even partial "immunity" to life leech proved fatal more than I liked. I found myself turning off sacrifice and just going with a normal attack. Then I thought, well that's stupid, I'll just put one point in Zeal and use that as an alternative. Then I just started using that one point zeal because it was better. The tons of LL I had acquired worked great with Zeal too so I was almost never at risk and that's when I abandoned my martyr ways and became a zealot.
Lucky thing about Sacrifice is its 12% damage synergy with Zeal. If you make it to hell, try it out and don't like it, you can just start putting points into zeal and switch over to the classic zealot. It was still quite fun going through normal and NM as a Martyr. I did trade for a dracul's grasp and when I get a lifetap from it I can use Sacrifice. Combined with an Exile (15% chance for level 5 lifetap on striking) runeword (haha good luck just need Vex, Ohm, AND Ist) you could get lifetap on probably every encounter. Truth is, with the Baranar's Star I'm using now I don't really need to switch back to sacrifice to get the damage I need in any situation and I still only have 1 point in zeal.
Another point for those unsure but wanting to try: don't max redemption. I have 10 points in redemption and with the LL I have now I just don't need it much except in an extreme pinch.
I actually found a bloodrise (+3 Sacrifice) in normal with this character and used the rune upgrade formula to make it exceptional and keep the damage up in nightmare. I used this weapon until I traded for a 12%LL demon limb and thats when I started dying. Bloodrise wasn't providing the damage I needed (20 sacrifice, 20 fanat, 10 redemption) and once I got something that did hell level damage the combination of big life loss, hard hitting from Hell monsters, AND those with even partial "immunity" to life leech proved fatal more than I liked. I found myself turning off sacrifice and just going with a normal attack. Then I thought, well that's stupid, I'll just put one point in Zeal and use that as an alternative. Then I just started using that one point zeal because it was better. The tons of LL I had acquired worked great with Zeal too so I was almost never at risk and that's when I abandoned my martyr ways and became a zealot.
Lucky thing about Sacrifice is its 12% damage synergy with Zeal. If you make it to hell, try it out and don't like it, you can just start putting points into zeal and switch over to the classic zealot. It was still quite fun going through normal and NM as a Martyr. I did trade for a dracul's grasp and when I get a lifetap from it I can use Sacrifice. Combined with an Exile (15% chance for level 5 lifetap on striking) runeword (haha good luck just need Vex, Ohm, AND Ist) you could get lifetap on probably every encounter. Truth is, with the Baranar's Star I'm using now I don't really need to switch back to sacrifice to get the damage I need in any situation and I still only have 1 point in zeal.
Another point for those unsure but wanting to try: don't max redemption. I have 10 points in redemption and with the LL I have now I just don't need it much except in an extreme pinch.