Build:Antique Spellblade

Full Build Details
This build heavily relies on items, enchantments and abilities added by The Soroboreans DLC, however you can use some of the vanilla items to achieve similar results. For the most part, the point of this build is having a lot of sustainability via mana cost and stamina cost reductions, while having fairly large mana pool without sacrificing too much stamina and health. The trade off, of course, is having no base elemental resistances and somewhat low physical and impact resistance. However, most of downsides are negated by the fact that this build is using shields and has quite good mobility, while having quite good crowd-control due to high impact damage inflicted on enemies and Brace and Counterstrike skills. You can go for any faction you like, however The Holy Mission of Elatt provides most benefits for this build. You can also replace Shamanic Resonance with Well of Mana for this build (see skills portion of guide).

You should sacrifice at least all of the health and stamina gained from Spellblade's Awakening for mana and finish your faction's main quest line to comfortably use your skills. You can sacrifice more later, if you find yourself requiring larger manapool.

Equipment
Antique Plate Set is chosen for this build due to both massive mana cost (for a non-mage targeted set) and stamina cost reductions it provides when Economy enchantment is applied to it(-45% mana cost, -30% stamina cost). It provides best bonuses to ethereal and fire damage out of all other sets, which is two main damage types (aside from physical) used in this build. While it has quite low physical resist, protection value of this set is rivaled only by Tsar Set, which means it can tank low damage physical attacks quite comfortably.

Boozu Hide Backpack is a direct upgrade from Scaled Satchel, providing 15 extra carry capacity and 10% corruption resistance, while still allowing to dodge roll without removing your backpack. It also fits the set visually. If ability to dodge roll is not as detrimental to you, you can swap it for Zhorn's Hunting Backpack, for extra 10 carry capacity, 75% preservation and even more stamina cost reduction.

The combination of Mace of Seasons and Fabulous Palladium Shield is best for this build, because both of them apply Elemental Vulnerability on enemy, further increasing your elemental damage. Mace of Seasons, also has second highest base damage out of all 1-handed maces, which will increase damage of your Imbues (since portion of the damage added by them is calculated from a percentage of weapon's base damage). You can also swap your shield for Ornate Bone Shield, to apply Haunted without usage of Hex skills. Another good alternative is Inner Marble Shield, since it applies Confusion on Shield Charge, which will further improve your impact damage.

Luxury Tent is a tent of choice for this build. Stamina cost reduction it provides, most of the time, is far better then mana cost reduction provided by Mage Tent, since you will rarely use more than 3-4 spells during each engagement.

Don't forget to acquire Light Mender's Lexicon for enabling rune spells and additional +5% mana cost reduction while applying buffs before combat.

Skills
Base skills for this build are:

Kazite Spellblade:


 * Steady Arm
 * Shield Charge
 * Fitness
 * Spellblade's Awakening
 * Infuse Fire
 * Elemental Discharge

While you can take Infuse Frost instead of Infuse Fire, your damage output will be lower, since your equipment grants no bonuses towards frost damage. Gong Strike is a viable, yet riskier option to take instead of Elemental Discharge, since you can sometimes apply new imbue mid combat with Mace Infusion and Infuse Wind, without consuming any boons.

Warrior Monk:


 * Brace
 * Slow Metabolism
 * Focus
 * Steadfast Ascetic
 * Master of Motion
 * Counterstrike

Master of Motion is usually preferable to Perfect Strike, since most of the time you will play defensively. Same goes for Counterstrike.

Cabal Hermit:


 * Reveal Soul
 * Call to Elements
 * Weather Tolerance
 * Shamanic Resonance
 * Infuse Wind

Infuse Wind is insane with this build. While not granting any damage, it increases impact and attack speed of your weapon at expense of higher stamina burn rate(which is manageable due to high stamina cost reduction this build provides). Mana Push is also a great skill for this build, adding even more potential impact damage. While the main point of Reveal Soul in this build is to use it with Spark to restore your mana, you might as well add Conjure to summon allied ghost from time to time.

Rune Sage:


 * All of the runes

Well of Mana is also a viable alternative to Shamanic Resonance as your final breakthrough skill. It will provide you with extra 40 mana, ability to heal yourself without using potions or foods, and lightning infusion without joining The Holy Mission of Elatt or using imbue potions. However loosing extra 25% impact damage on rage boon and 10% extra damage on other boons, as well as Infuse Wind spell may not be worth it. If you decide to go with Well of Mana, don't forget to grab Arcane Syntax and Runic Prefix. While Internalized Lexicon is a quality of life improvement which will allow you to cast runes without lexicon, Runic Prefix will buff your Runic Protection, Runic Heal and imbue your Runic Blade with lightning, which are main uses of runic magic in this build.

Neutral skills: Any Hex or Boon granting skills you can get your hands on. It would also be a good idea to take Enrage, which grants rage boon at expense of burning some of your hp.

Other useful skills:


 * Sigil of Fire in combination with Mana Ward, to further buff your fire damage.


 * Sweep Kick, as well as Push Kick, is another way to enhance your impact damage output. However most of the time it's a little bit of an overkill. Sweep Kick also benefits greatly from using Inner Marble Shield.


 * Both Fast Maintenance and Armor Training are good in any build, so there is no reason not to take them.


 * If you will be using hexes, it is probably a good idea to add Torment to the mix for some extra damage and debuffs.


 * Efficiency and Metabolic Purge are also quite good in any situation.

Consumables
Foods: Remember to stay hydrated(in-game and irl) and bring with you various teas and Pungent Paste to recover burnt hp and stamina.
 * Alpha Sandwich - Provides you with health recovery 4 and rage boon. Detrimental, if you don't want to burn your health with Enrage;
 * Bread Of The Wild - Your bread and butter. Provides with health recovery 5 and a warm boon.
 * Marshmelon Tartine - Food of champions. Cheap, easy to acquire, good shelf time. Stamina recovery 5 is no joke.
 * Cierzo Ceviche - Allegedly your family's signature recipe. Provides with Elemental Resistance and mana recovery 2. You won't need more mana recovery than that.
 * Savage Stew - Good alternative to Alpha Sandwich, provides Impact Resistance Up. Also balances out your diet of bread based dishes.
 * Gaberry Wine - Goes well with savage stew. Grants you mana cost reduction and physical resistance, while decreasing your impact resistance. Not sure if you want to drink it though, since most of the varnishes are made out of it.

Potions: Don't forget to bring enough healing and few astral potions in case you won't find any souls to consume or simply ran out of mana entirely. Also stock up on Spiritual Varnish for ethereal damage and Bolt Varnish if you are not a part of The Holy Mission of Elatt.
 * Hex Cleaner - Removes most of the non-damaging debuffs.
 * Warrior Elixir - Extra oomph for your physical and impact damage and free discipline boon.
 * Fire Stone - required to cast Sigil of Fire. Not necessary if you don't plan to cast Immolate.
 * Any elemental boon potions you don't have skills for yet or need extra of.

Combos
You can skip Sigil of fire+Mana ward combo if you don't have time or fire stone.

Don't forget to use Sweep Kick to capitalize on confusion, inflicted by Inner Marble Shield.

This combo provides more ethereal damage then basic version, but less damage overall, while also greatly reducing impact damage you deal.

Frost, Lightning and Decay buffs are just a combo of respective boons, imbues and hexes while wearing Mace of Seasons and Fabulous Palladium Shield.