I’m looking to play a rive build. Previously I’ve only played it as a way to proc healing hands so the damage wasn’t as relevant as it attacking fast. Now I want it to be the star of the show. I don’t really know how to prioritize the different paths on the tree. I know for sure that I’m taking Weapon Specialist and I know for sure I’m taking Foe Cleaver since I’m 2h. I probably always want the pull in. After that though, do I just get rid of 3rd strike and buff up 1 and 2 or is it worth building around the 3rd strike stuff if I’m going for direct damage?
You will see and test if u need more aoe/mana return or not 
I prefer to take third hit but without it rive is also good
There are so many points I want to take in Rive lol. I still need to find me a +4 levels to rive at some point. At the moment my setup isn’t doing much damage. Not sure how much of that is the gear vs getting the skill build wrong.
This is what I’ve got at the moment: https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QWe2zX4o
Definitely need to improve gear in places, but I can’t help but feel like I’m missing a lot of potential damage in the tree. I’m also not nearly as tanky as I thought I’d be with all the less damage taken. So idk.
Take it easy and test. Is so fast to respec at higher cc you will have ton of fun with testing stuff
GL&HF! 
ps. About your link to LET: What are you trying to achieve here max blok chance? Why don’t you cap your Reduced Bonus Damage Taken From Critical Strikes? This one stat give you a lot of anty-onshot strenght. That’s the first thing I will fix in your setup. Don’t be afraid to change the Helmet to ordinary type with reduced bonus dmg ftcs.
Also: boost your HP. It is too low. Aim for 4k+ HP. Also: you don’t need so much endurance, unless you aim for specific shield that gives you block chance.
ps2. what cc are you farming at now with your setup?
The gear is kind of a hodge podge because I just put it together from stuff in the stash. The reduced bonus damage taken from crits is definitely something I should just do. I was kind of hoping between some of it from the passive tree and blind it’d fine, butt yeah I should probably just use either citadel boots or the helmet. I do sort of like the idea of the mana helmet just because Rive can generate a lot of extra mana and I don’t really need it for much else, but maybe it’s not worth.
At the moment just messing around around 200-300 corruption to play with the build and level skills. But even there it’s been slow.
EDIT: I swapped out of the vk support things back into the usual paladin support splash and it’s feeling a lot better when I don’t need to keep pressing extra buttons all the time.
I pushed Rive upto 1000 corruption in 1.1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wGFkzIpd1Y
Build is now defunct due to the Echo node getting void conversion.
Rive has a solid defensive core from Seed of Ekkidrasil and Titan heart but really needs the damage to justify its highly melee nature.
My recommendation would be to go with Void Rive(now the best version) using Apathy’s Maw and stack Vitality, you get both flat damage(Rive node) and more melee Void damage (VK mastery bonus) as well as a ton of life and capped necro/poison resists. New VK passives are also crazy strong and if you get enough attributes you can go dual Red ring for even more DR.
Third hit is always good for crit Rive as it has higher damage effectiveness and grants penetration from the Flamedrinker buff. Healing hands has a really good synergy as it procs more ignites and after your third hit removes all ignites, the next healing hands applies ignite which means you always have Savagery’s more damage against ignited active.
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The void version is almost certainly better/more coherent, although part of what I wanted to do was to just make use of Merophage. Not that it’s the most interesting unique, it’s mostly just a pile of stats, but I wanted to find a place where we at least cared about it being a 2h sword. Also Forgemaster’s Might. 4 item sources of less damage taken + a shield? Sign me up.
I also might try my really stupid idea I had before which was to add Mourning frost to this to get more flat damage out of the dex stacking and the Merophage sort of helps with this since it’s increased damage is generic. That said, until I find some gear that makes more sense for this, the dex stacking is kind of limited to whatever I’m getting from passives and red rings. So maybe not as exciting as I’d hoped.
I’ve always liked not having it, but definitely do what others have said and test it out.