Just finished 10th 140~150 gladiator run with new axe and new setup, completed 7 times, died 3 times. Thought I’d share some thoughts on new stuffs.
In town with 5 toggles (Counter Strike, Menhir’s Bulwark, Field Command, Void-Ward Aura, Aether-Ward Aura) + Blood of Dreeg
Inside the crucible with 5 toggles + Blood of Dreeg + 4 celestial blessings (Blessing of Ulo, Empyrion’s Guidance, The Might of Amatok, Ulzuin’s Pact) + 2 Defenses (Stonewall Banner, Vanguard Banner)
New highest damage dealt and highest damage received. 35 damage more than my max health. 75% crit mutator + Fabius = 
feelsbadman. Very surprised at the new highest damage dealt with a faster weapon and less points in Blitz. Less physical converted to other crap really is a huge deal.
http://grimcalc.com/build/9yOafUA
Naked, no gear on.
http://grimcalc.com/build/l0bsiAn
+Skills, Attributes, and Devotions
Big changes :
Gear: Obviously new weapon. With the increased attack speed compared to the old mace, I was a lot more comfortable dropping attack speed from Squad Tactics and Solael’s Witchfire, giving me points to max out Blood of Dreeg and bring Field Command up to 12. My new attack speed is at 153%, only 4% lower than when I was running 12 Solael’s Witchfire and 12 Squad tactics with the mace. This change alone makes axe MUCH better than mace. I would still recommend at least 150% attack speed regardless of weapon choice though. Tyrant’s prefix gives a better version of the Oleron’s Blood component, letting me use Purified Salt instead. Some of you might prefer Haunted Steel for life leech, but running with 3% from Berserker devotion and the added Tip the Scales skill from Scales of Ulcama devotion, I feel VERY comfortable surviving. All my deaths came in the form of HUGE chunks of health disappearing in seconds, and more life leech will definitely NOT help. Also, everything Purified Salt gives is useful, while the only thing Haunted Steel gives is life leech.
Skills: As mentioned before, dropped Solael’s Witchfire entirely and maxing out Blood of Dreeg. Just keep attack speed at least 150% and you’re good. Another change I made was NOT maxing Blitz. It feels good to have maxed Cadence and Blitz at the same time, but I have nearly killed myself 3 times now with maxed Blitz into a mob with reflect. 16 in Blitz is still more than enough to clear out trash mobs, and going any higher just puts us in a riskier position than we need to be. Maxing it out really doesn’t help that much on kill speed when it comes to tougher mobs as well.
Devotions: Dropped Rhowan’s scepter obviously, and because of that, I felt the need to pick up Assasin’s Blade in order to keep constellation bonuses. Still not fond of it though, doesn’t feel required. If they would add some physical damage, or all damage, or even dome OA to the prereqs I might feel better about it. Dropped Ghoul because Berserker gives 3% leech, and the big one is adding Scales of Ulcama. I was skeptical with how much uptime this would have at first, but after 2 runs, I am never speccing out of this for this build ever. Not only does it help out with life leech, it also ensures that our mana will never run out. I have never used a mana potion since I picked this up. I even swapped out my 2x Ectoplasms for 2x Roiling Bloods, though that obviously isn’t needed. If you need more resists, Corpse Dust is a great source of Vit resist. Still think there are lots of tweeking potential in this area, I feel like I can afford to drop more offense in favor of higher defense.