Are Blood Magic Templars effective?

Wanted to know if anyone knows if Blood Magic Templar are effective or not? I've been running around with "Malachai's Simula", and I am liking the Gameplay so far. Its actually much easier than relying on the normal Mana Pool, mostly because the pool you are drawing from is much larger, the Pots restore more, quicker, and you are not splinting your Pots between 2 Pools. That being said, I DO have to rely on Zombies to pull alot of the Aggro away.

So the biuld I've been trying to aim for, focuses on building my Health and ES pools, maximizing Health Regain/Leech, while buffing minions.
It'd looks something like this;

https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUAhMREciNNQDa0-YuMBVs8BZ_f73ydgIM43QUYXaloogAUTfAfBLOb7Irk874G6SdhRUdrrDdH5wvesEz_r2w8LV8_f-Mx-5tY5FFnm64-d-PfvxRxpzCezVW1wQSsqiftxPb46_cycqnqGLyf7w4nL-OfpKxQUC7_og89_FhjjM_G2Ix2TdiePIFv-oAqmNkLpwidrlOlDF8cp8auGJFQRxQg975ul_KcNroZLvnoQYe3PmqsWpGofdP7gsdNuRCXRATMvPfXm6GPRqrEhWDDbVxrhEji9wFvi3q2-vemjmTkIhpsFm8kquNqNukYZRJp

With that build, I'd have, according to the builder;
8 % additional Chance to Block with Shields
108 % increased Armour
110 % increased Energy Shield from equipped Shield
15 % increased Life Recovery from Flasks
73 % increased maximum Energy Shield
101 % increased maximum Life
6.099999999999999 % of Life Regenerated per Second
3 % of Physical Attack Damage Leeched as Life
4 + Life gained for each enemy hit by your Attacks
30 + Life gained on Kill
50 + to Dexterity
160 + to Intelligence
1 + to Maximum number of Spectres (2)
2 + to Maximum number of Zombies (5)
310 + to Strength
76 + to maximum Life

And that Raises an Interesting Question. if Blood Templar's ARE viable, should I even bother getting the Keystone? Or keep "Malachai's Simula" and use the points on something else?

Anyone have any Suggestions?

Firstly, take a quick look at this thread. Maybe PM Ventripotent (the OP) as he has made a Blood Witch; but gone through a lot of the Templar area, and is also using Malachai's Simula. It looks like it's quite viable, even in Hardcore leagues.

Secondly, don't plan a build around 120 points. You probably won't get to level 100 in your life time and you almost certainly won't kill all the bandits in every difficulty, which is needed to get to 120 skill points. Aim for milestones - the first end-game milestone should be around 85 points, as this is about level 70. Make sure you plan some builds using a lot less skill points so you know the most efficient way to progress to your end-game build.

Thirdly, use a character builder like poebuilder.com (there are offline ones too) as they allow you to see what kind of stats you'll have from your passive tree without manually counting everything.

Fourthly, you're planning on having +101% life at level 100?? Are you crazy? You should aim for around 2% life per character level; more if you're using Blood Magic. And with Malachai's Simula, your mana costs will be increased.

From looking at your tree I can additionally say: you will need to do further research on game mechanics. Life steal from the "Lust for Carnage" cluster, as well as all forms of "x% of Physical Attack Damage Leeched as Life", will not work for spells. You may want to take a closer look at the tree to minimise how you're "wasting" points on attributes.

Ok, makes sense. Hows these sit?

100 Skillpoints
https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUBhMREciNNQDa0-YuMBVs8BZ_f73ydgIM43QUYXaIAFE3wHwSzm-yK5PO-BuknYUVHa6w3R-cL3rBM_69sPC1fP3_jMfubWORRZ5uuPnfjpzCezVW1wQS8n-8OJy_jn6SsUFAu_6IPPfxYY4zPjHZN2J48gW_6gCqY2QunCJ2uU6UMXxynxq4YkVBHFCD56EGHtz5qrFqRqH3T-4LHTbkQl0QEzLz318NtXGuESOL3AW-Lev4K8kU64aZXTeP-jzWS2CQ2xdi9aHQ=

85 Skillpoints
https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUBhMREciNNQDa0-YuMBVs8BZ_f73ydgIM43QUYXaIAFE3wHwSzm-yK5PO-BuknYUVHa6w3R-cL3rBM_69sPC1fP3_jMfubWORRZ5uuPnfjvJ_vDicv459QUC7_og89_FhjjM-Mdk3YnjyBb_qAKpjZC6cIna5TpQxfHKfGrrc-TbkQl0QEzLz318NtXGuESOL3AW-Lev4K8kU64aZXTeP-jzWS2CQ2xdi99kg=

Anyone Know?

Again, use a character builder to plan passive tress; not the official browser passive tree. Here's the link to the poebuilder version of your 85 point tree.

Next: what skills are you using?
Is your only required item going to be Malachai's Simula?

I can immediately see some small issues with your passive tree; you have picked certain paths that are less efficient and thus you are wasting points on +10(attribute) nodes. Also, you picked the 3 0.6% life regen nodes near Marauder, but you could have foregone one of them to take the 1% life regen node near the Templar. You took that pretty-much-worthless 3% reduced mana costs in the Templar area when you have access to 3% reduced mana costs AND 5% maximum mana. You seem to be going physical attack damage, yet didn't take a lot of efficient nodes that you could have, and also took the 12% Elemental Damage node in the Templar area that you didn't need to. If you're using Malachai's Simula, you should be going Elemental Damage anyway, as you'll be using spells.

Most of these could have been seen easily if you used a character builder; I know poebuilder highlights what nodes you will lose when you hover your mouse over a node you have chosen.

Hope this helps :)

My idea of a very similar passive tree, for 83 points.