Just wanted to say nice build. I’m a dual wield fanatic so I think I will have to try this 
The change to explosive strike makes me want to try fire strike+guardian’s gaze with this build could be fun vs huge packs lol
This build has made me want to use a Sab again.
Thanks TomoDaK! I will check out Guardian’s Gaze, I didn’t give it a serious try before.
Thanks jabs! It’s a lot of fun.
16 levels later (46 atm) - wow, I love this build!
since level 33-35 I died not often and the kill speed is so fast!
question about the weapons:
at the moment I use 2 blue swords, but I have also 2 yellow daggers with affix +acid damage. both are very low with base damge, should I use it anyway?
Normally, you are better off improving base damage or attack speed (if not at the cap), rather than +acid, because +acid is just adding to what is likely a pretty large multiplier, but adding to base damage is adding to the multiplied amount. Let me give an example:
Avg. Base xAcid Result
----------- ------ -------
10 1,000 10,000
15 1,000 15,000
10 1,500 15,000
Notice it took 5 increase in base to get the same result as 500 increase in the multiplier. So, unless your acid multiplier is really small or the increase in multiplier is huge, you will benefit more from increasing the base acid damage (or converted damage) more.
However, using Lethal Assault (LA) makes this an abnormal case. LA adds a huge amount to your base damage (765 added acid for me at the moment), so there isn’t any easy answer to your question. What I do, to get a rough guess on this sort of thing with this build, is take the items in question over to a training dummy and see the change in Firestrike sheet DPS after proc’ing LA with each item. There is a lot of other damage from WPS skills and such not accounted for in the a sheet DPS, but I think the comparison between 2 items doing it that way is a reasonable guide.
Naturally, I will defer to Edisonian or an other expert as I’m most definitely still learning a lot about this.
That’s a very good answer, Gaean.
To add a little bit to it, you can actually calculate which one is better. There are two components at play, the base damage and the multiplier. To get the multiplier, add up the “Bonus to Magical Damage” listed when you hover over your Spirit number with the bonus to Acid damage. To get your base damage (proc Lethal Assault first), then change your left attack to a weapon attack and hover over Weapon Attack that is shown on the second screen of your character sheet. It will list the elements. Divide your Acid damage listed there by your multiplier.
Now, regarding which one is better: the value from base damage is proportional to your multiplier, and vice versa, the value from your multiplier is proportional to your base damage. For example, looking at the table that Gaean gave, you can see that going from 10 base damage to 15 exactly increased your damage by 5000, which is equal to +5 base damage x 1000 multiplier. Likewise, adding 500 to your multiplier increased your total damage by 5000 because that is +500 multiplier x 10 base damage.
So, to evaluate a weapon with higher base damage but lower multiplier, just multiply the additional base damage x your current multiplier, then compare to the additional multiplier x your existing base damage. Whichever one is higher is better.
Here’s an equation for it, where Δ is the change to the value provided by gear.
Benefit from more base damage:
Δ(Base Damage) x (Current Multiplier)
Benefit from more multiplier
(Current Base Damage) x Δ(Multiplier)
Whichever one is higher is better.
great, thank you both for your explanation!
Thank you so much for this build!
It’s the first Nightblade I’m having fun playing and I tried a couple already.
All the others I tried were either TOO button-mashy or they lacked heavily in the AOE department. This one is just the right mix in my opinion.
Glad to hear!
The ability of the build to dish out both AOE and good single target damage is one of my favorite things about it too.
cool build… i failed with my dual wield spell breaker before and got bored with it to deletion… this might be the fix. thanks for all your efforts in producing this kick ass build.
Would like to thanks the OP for the good guide and xls about res reduction which is really great. Must be the reference for everyone 
In the Madqueen video you are using Grasp of Unchained Might instead of Iceskorns. Do you use those for bosses instead?
That was an older gear setup. I swapped to Iceskorn Talons for more bonuses to skills that are useful for this build, plus more cold damage bonus is nice too. They are highly recommended in order to help max Lethal Assault. Grasp is useful for the slow resistance and is also fine if you can achieve +10 to Lethal Assault from other gear.
Ok thanks for letting me know. I am working on a BM version of this build. I know cadence isn’t the most “synergistic” but Deadly Momentum adds a lot of flat physical which I can convert 50% of into acid. I’m interested in comparing between the two builds!
Sounds interesting! I look forward to hearing about it!
I’ve actually built Witch Hunter and Trickster versions of this build too, and maybe I’ll get around to posting them. The Blademaster version I’ve also considered and I think would be very strong. This build here started very much as an experiment to try to squeeze as much synergy out of dual-wielding and WPS as I could, and to that end I am very happy with how it performs. A BM could very well be strong without as much synergy, given how good Soldier is in general. In that case, probably less investment in WPS and more in the amazing Soldier passives would be the way to go.
Have you seen my dual-wielding WPS calculator? I think you would find it useful. Here’s the link:
http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49287
Since Cadence hits 33% of the time, I only have WPS up to ~66% so in a perfect world the 2 non cadence hits will be NHH procs. I had a WH version of the build too (before Venomblade set) and I found it to be too squishy. The reason I chose BM was because the +50% phys to acid on venomblade intrigued me, and the soldier is good at staying alive. Once he’s finished ill let you know the results.
Oh and thanks for the spreadsheet, it will come in handy!
That spreadsheet is siiiiick.
You’re welcome!
Awesome, thanks!
I have my acid Sabo with all the end game pieces listed. How do you have almost capped attack speed and 2600 OA? I know it’s down to the rolls of the MI’s but I’m at about 150% AS with Bas Claw and Rift Slicer and sitting around 2200 OA. I’d love to see the rolls on the Zan shoulders and rings.
Awesome guide by the way and cool build.
Thanks!
Well, firstly those pics are with Lethal Assault active, which gives +190 base OA which is further increased by +% OA. I have a Corrosive Viloth’s Ring of the Dranghoul with +90 OA, Peerless Eye of Beronath with +100 OA. Otherwise I don’t see other significant sources of OA. What is your Rift Scourge Slicer affix? For attack Speed, I have a Rift Scourge Slicer of Fury, which gives +10% total speed and +17% Attack speed, and a Gollus ring of the Rifthound. Hope that helps!