New to Game - Getting Wrecked as Templar

I downloaded this game a year ago, but never played it until now, so I'm new to the game.

Anyways, I'm level 53 and I've died 340 times! I'm getting wrecked... I want to cast spells, mostly lightning, without being squishy.

Can anyone help me build a strong leveling build for Templar, one that's tanky and uses ligtning?

Here's my characters profile. Maybe someone can explain from this why I'm dying so much... Character is named Nirvanis.

https://www.pathofexile.com/account/view-profile/Nehanzen/characters

Hello brother!

Your profile is set to private so even with the link I don't think we can see your gear/gems (I can't at least) but let me give you some basic suggestions about surviving Wraeclast (I'm a rather old player, never been in endgame stuff nor top notch builds but I have a good knowledge fo the general game).

First of all, you seem to have at least a decent grip of the game since you are around my level which means you have the knoweldge needed to understand the builds that are listed in this forum, check them for some insight. Most of them tell you in the thread title which is their main spell or style.

Second, make sure you take the Ascension class in Sarn labirynth, it gives a lot of good stuff. Obvisouly you need to have already decided which build/skills you want to use because there is no reset of Ascension passive points as I recall.

Third, lightning is a bit tricky for Templars as there are not so many lightning nodes in the passive tree that are close (but you can check with some passive tree builder which nodes you can and can't take), remember that you will need to pick some health/armor/energy shield/elemental resistence ones in order not to die instantly. About skills setting I can give you some suggestions; Smite is a good lightning damage booster, same as Herald of Thunder then you need a heavy hitter spell and something to apply the Conductivity curse.

The way to tankiness can come from different sources, the best one I can think of is wearing a shield and using Tempest Shield as buff and going as Inquisitor to deal a lot of damage and crits (but be careful because mana reserve with Tempest Shield and Herald of Thunder might mean you won't be able to use an Aura too unless you go for a lot of mana reserve passives). I've given a look to the Hierophant Ascension class and it seems like a good candidate for a spell caster if you are willing to use some totems too.

Always keep in check your elemental and chaos resistence, armor and energy shield values.

If you have any more questions just ask.

How about an "Arc Totem Hierophant" build? It uses the chain-lightning skill 'Arc', but instead of casting the spell himself, he cast it via his totems. And as a Hierophant (a Templar ascendancy), he can have many totems out at once.

If you like this kind of build, search for "Arc Totem Hierophant" via Google.

If you prefer casting lightning spells yourself rather than through totems, then I strongly recommend using a Witch instead of a Templar. The witch ascendancy 'Elementalist' allow for lots of cool buffs to your lightning damage.