https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/Ap6Xz1KB
Here’s my guy. I like it, i like its damage 
but struggle a bit with defenses. Especially with harbingers. I avoid them completely.
I’m trying to focus on more armor now, but items don’t come to me. Some nicer mystic plate eludes me. I get over 3k resting ward. I roam around 150-200 corruption right now. At 220 it dies more than i like.
Anything obvious i’m missing here?
Thanks
There is not that much you can do on SB for defence, best defence is offense here, 1shot them before they 1 shot you 
Farm eye of reen, try to slam t6-t7 melee atack speed on it. Go for Diothaen’s Bloody Nib (slam dex). Find shattered chains + orobyss ring. Try to get as much dex as you can, cuz it gives you dodge raiting. Also try to get crystal sword with t7 atck speed + flat melee cold+dodge raiting. Swap surge for teleport, cuz it gives you armor+ mirror image could be usefull. Also traitor’s tongue gives you +4 to shatter strike + some parry chance. Swap cold shred blessing for armor and crit multi for dodge. Take frostguard node in flame ward. https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/BEJ88MXo here is my profile I am farming 500c like ez, but I still need so much more gear. I am killing emperor of corpses + its harby before they can even do something, I am swaping 1 red ring to siphon of anguish+ shattered chains for bosses. On monos I use 2 red rings+belt with cleans + crit reduction, even with 2 red rings I feel squishy as hell, using them cuz of +all res and attributes xD
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Also your skill trees are awfull, just copy mine.Whiteout triples your dmg for shatter strike, Iceblink is mandatory as well. Just hold shatter strike + mana strike = infinite mana
Passives are bad as well, copy mine, do not want to explain every single node here =)
Edit: oh I just noticed that I have Critical rejuvenation node in mana strike, cringe used it for lvling 
Attack Speed is king for Spellblades, faster attacks = more ward generated.
Skills
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Enchant Weapon - why points in ignite chance? Why maxed chill chance? Put them in cold damage and attack speed.
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Shatter Strike - you had only 1 point in attack speed, fixed it
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Mana Strike - removed points from mana on kill/boss hit and moved them into attack speed.
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Surge - I’m not sure how much Ward are you getting from this setup in monoliths, but on bosses it’s probably a very small amount. I’m also not a fan of increasing the travel distance, but that’s up to personal preference I guess
I switched points into damage and invulnerability. -
Flame Ward - you don’t actually have any sources of Fire Aura other than your Flame Ward and the 10% chance per second, basically you’re wasting points into something you’re not really using much. Mental Aegis is bad for your build. You only have 250 mana, and you’re spending it too.
I swapped the points into Ward generation and Extra Charge, as you have high Ward Retention %.
If you are using it on autocast, then don’t add the point into Extra Charge, as it would stop autocasting.
Lord_mamon’s idea to use the armor node also works, but you have to remember that armor and DR only exists for ~4s out of every 15s.
Passives
Your points are pretty tight, so not much you can do.
You could switch some points into Reactive Ward and Silver Rune in Mage, which would give you an emergency 700 Ward when your HP gets damaged, but that passive really shines if you have more HP than 1k
Gear
- Get attack speed instead of % Increased Cold damage on your swords.
- I would throw out the frostbite gloves and equip some Eternal Gauntlets.
- You don’t have crit avoidance maxed, so either find that or you could also put affixes on your chest, belt and gloves to get 100% reduced damage taken from criticals.
If you want to go for armor, you could swap your belt and find different affixes for armor, but it will probably take some time before you find the right pieces.
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Yep, good points there. Engaging imperial packs without flame ward on(with armor node) is a 80% rip for me 4s is more than enough to melt them =)
- Surge - i tried it more for theme and to learn it. Ward gain wasn’t noticeable. Increased distance travel was for moving through echoes faster. I switched back to teleport because i use teleport on every mage.
- Enchant Weapon - i like passive buffs, hence ignite. I cast it occasionally, so active buffs aren’t often used. I’ll check cold buffs though
- mana strike - will redo later
- flame ward - redone
- i will consider some nice gauntlets if i find any
thanks for ideas so far
Ward’s main defensive synergy is with:
- more ward generation, so more attack speed on spellblade is preferred
- armor, not health or endurance because endurance does not apply to ward
For armor against bosses, you want Throne of Ambition, this will give you a large damage and defensive boost for Harbingers.
You might also want to consider using teleport for both armor and the idol suffix that gives stun immunity after teleport. This is helps with accidents when your ward is low and if you get stunned then, you’re likely dead.
Flame ward is going to be a major source of defense for spellblades too. You want cooldown reduction where possible so that Enchant Weapon and Flame Ward have higher uptime. If you get a really good body piece you can try to aim for a sealed affix of +1 to flame ward charges. With the tree node that gives you an extra charge too, you have 3 charges of flame ward for really tough moments. That will dramatically boost your survivability through difficult fights or accidents.
You know what? I tried some cringy thing, check this out https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/Ap6XX1LB xD xD xD 2h shatter strike build, it is a huge dps loss, but defence is there for sure 
You have 36% more dr compared to DW and this is with out flame ward on Also you can add merophage + %hp loss per sec on gloves for even more DR Attack speed + dex is a king for this build, mby I will try some sword catcher stuff(If I will manage to hit t7 attck speed on it) for more dps
Edit: just killed abby in this setup, was giga slow. It took about 1.5 min, when my DW is erasing it in less than 10 seconds
If you want more DR, you could take your current DW build, fix your belt base and drop the Kestrel for a purple armor base.
It was 58% armor DR before, it’s 71% armor DR now, that’s before Teleport armor and Flame Ward armor. We traded some dps and a haste source. If you really want haste, and keep the extra armor, you could get it from experimental boots affix: https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/Qnw5zrVB
Yep, I was aiming for that, exept ward decay threshold on belt(cleanse is a must have for 600c+). But t7 dex affixes does not fucking exists in this cycle I got more red rings than t7 dex items After another 250k favour spent on exalted body armor I just rage slammed 4 lp kestrel with what I had at that moment
Yeah that makes sense. It’s way less players/gear in the pool after reset + dex builds being popular.
At least you can slam stuff, I just get disconnected before reaching Julra
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