Ice Nova Build Help

I'm pretty sure this has been asked/talked about before, but I'm trying to make an effective scepter/shield nova Templar. So far it's worked out pretty well for me but I was wondering if I could get the opinion of the masses.

Skills:
Ice Nova
Tempest Shield
Frostbite
Molten Shell
Lightning Strike (for single enemy)

A few comments:

For your build, Tempest Shield is not really worth it. It reserves a huge chunk of your mana, and you don't make the most of it since you do not max out your block chance, lighting damage or shock duration/chance. IMO Tempest Shield is really an all-or-nothing proposition. You either make your entire build around it, or it's just a waste of mana. For your build, you would probably be better off using the mana reservation to run Discipline aura (extra nrg shield) instead.

You would probably be better off using Glacial Hammer instead of Lighting Strike for single enemy, since you are going to be taking cold damage nodes instead of lighting nodes.

Do not skip the two Body and Soul node-circles! As a melee character, you need to be able to tank a lot of damage or you will die. While Ice Nova does help with your defences by chilling/freezing the mobs around you, it may not always be enough. Without enough defences, you will not be able to stand in the middle of a crowd of monsters to use Frost Nova most efficiently.

Likewise, don't skip the "+5% elemental resistances with shield" nodes. In higher difficulties, not only are there elemental resistance penalties, but elemental mobs also become more common.
One of the greatest advantages of a sceptre + shield Templar is the ability to get a lot of elemental resistance both from passives and the intrinsic elemental resist mods on many of the Templar (armour/es) shields.

Instead of going for increased mana nodes way over in the Witch/Shadow part of the tree, you can run the Clarity aura (increased mana regen) instead. Frost Nova is not a particularly mana-intensive skill, so it would not be very hard to get to a point where your mana regen is fast enough to sustain Frost Nova spamming pretty much indefinitely. You can use these passive points to get more energy shield and reduced energy shield regen delay, which is right along your path in the Witch part of the tree.

Thank you for the reply. I tend to get overwhelmed with the size of the passive tree so I really appreciate the assistance. I'll try with your recommendations.

Working on a nearly identical build. Going well thus far :-)

I have a very similar build using mainly frost. It's worked very well so far

skills im using are:

2x flame totem
tempest shield
shield charge
glacial hammer
ice nova with reduced area increased damage
the -cold resist curse i can't remember the name of atm
molten shell

I've been thinking of replacing glacial hammer with lightning strike and focusing mainly on lightning dmg instead of cold.

im in act 2 ruthless and its starting to get a little tough. for single target damage glacial hammer is decent. I think i'm way behind on my weapon so that's why the damage output of gh is kind of low

This is how I am going to spec mine.

http://tinyurl.com/b2dhmwa