Level 89 Hybrid Crit Frost Blades Trickster^3.25

Notes

Flasks
Prismatic Tincture - Attack Speed Suffix - (Ele Pen is more on paper dps, but high APS is important for more Inverted Res / Double Damage hits -> higher Shock ramping + ramping charges up faster)

STIBNITE/Jade -> Evasion Suffix (Stibnite becomes better later)
Silver Flask for Onslaught -> Avoid Stun Suffix (50% + 5 tattoos = stun immune)
Diamond Flask w/ Crit Suffix (or Bottled Faith)


Pantheons
MAJOR - If you dont have ailment immunity, Brine King is mandatory
		If you DO have ailment immunity, use Solaris
MINOR - I swap between the Shock Reduction, Curse Reduction, and Burning Ground MINORS often depending on what Im doing.


Defensive Layers
Fortify (chest implicit)
Endurance Charges (Enduring Cry)
Flesh and Stone (20% less damage taken)
100% Spell Suppression with 66% less dmg taken
Spellbreaker - 50% chance to start Recharge
85+% Chance to Evade
Guard skill of choice (Steelskin/Immortal Call)
Stun Immunity (with flask up)
Ailment Immune (with jewel)
High Life and ES Recovery via Instant Leech/Polymath
Screen-wide Freeze
10k+ HP pool (13k+ with nice gear)


Ailments
Early (campaign) you will take One Step Ahead for Freeze+Chill immunity. Once you have access to Brine King Freeze immunity + Cannot be Chilled Boot Craft, you should un-spec One Step Ahead and take Polymath/Swift Killer instead(whichever you???re missing).
Before you go for Stun Avoidance, you can use a Shock Reduction Flask Suffix and the minor Pantheon.  Ignites are not a big problem (usually) because of high Life+ES recovery.
If you acquire a Stormshroud, use Torment Essences + Avoid Shock and Avoid Ailments boot implicits to reach 100% immunity from just boots.
If you acquire Ancestral Vision, use Loathing Essences + Avoid Ailments implicit on boots.



Accuracy Capping
The most efficient way to Accuracy cap is with 1 T1 suffix (Glove or Helmet, 550+), the Attack Speed Accuracy wheel + Close Range mastery, Blind (Tattoo), and 1 Accuracy roll on an Abyss jewel (~200+). (Precision is an alternative option)
Any additional Accuracy beyond this is likely a waste.
I do not recommend Hits Can???t Be Evaded, weapon prefixes are too important.
Note: Dexterity/Tattoos must be carefully managed to maintain 100% hit.


Important Milestones (post-campaign)
Getting a 5L -> add Nightblade + Elusive nodes
Getting a 6L -> add Energy Leech, Swap to Spellbreaker if Soul Drinker
Getting a Lethal Pride -> look for Rage on Hit + DD, bonus Crit Chance or Multi, Fire Res/ Melee Dmg /+1 max Fortify / Crit Reduction
Getting Accuracy on Gear (1 suffix + Jewel, drop Crit wheel)
Getting a Taming -> High Res roll
Getting a Blind on Hit Tattoo (for Accuracy Capping)
Getting Stun Immunity (5x Avoid Stun Tattoos)
Getting Eldritch Implicits -> Fortify, +1 Strike first
Getting Chaos Res Capped
Getting Fury Valve (for map blasting)
Getting +2 Strikes and Cluster Jewel (Requires High Level)


Leveling
I leveled with Frost Blades from level 1 multiple times, and it felt great. Prioritize Claw upgrades often, cap res ASAP, use Fortify in your 4-link (get on chest later), use Whirling Blades + Frostblink often.  When you take Ghost Dance, go for as high Ev/ES chest as possible.
Get Wrath + Trinity online ASAP in A3/A4, prioritize Lightning Damage on Claw/Gear.  4-Link should be FB/Trinity/Fortify/Ele Dmg(til Multistrike). Use Elemental Weakness from A3 to whenever you swap to Crit, then use Assassins Mark.


Trinity, Tri-Ele and Heatshiver
Trinity only requires 2 damage types, not 3.  Cold (from FB) and Lightning (from Wrath) will be enough with some added Lightning on your gear. Fire Damage is a bonus, but have SOME at least (ignite = Taming dmg).
Note: This is a NON-Heatshiver build, and thus a NON-pure-phys/cold build. If you cannot scale 100% phys-to-cold with Heatshiver, then going 100% conversion is not worth it. 
The reason is Heatshiver is too weak defensively - because of Escape Artist and the 100% ES from Helm mastery, Implicits (Phys Taken As + Mana QoL), and suffix flexibility (accuracy/suppress).


Resistances
Resistances will be VERY tight if you want to min-max this setup because of suffix pressure (accuracy, suppression, resistance, attributes, attack speed are all suffixes).
You cannot afford any resist rolls below T1/T2, or you will likely need to waste an extra suffix to be res capped.
You can use the Cluster Jewel and Lethal Pride to help with res-capping if needed.


VLS
VLS is a helpful tool to quickly generate Rage (30% more damage) and power+frenzy charges, and easily replaces the gems previously used for Ancestral Totems. VLS can help clear stray trash mobs in high-density mapping and help burst down bosses quickly - but is optional.
Alternatives: Frost Shield, Golem, Precision+Enlighten, Vaal Arctic Armour



Using LS for Single-Target
Frost Blades is significantly better than Lightning Strike for mapping for 3 main reasons: larger Strike range, faster/more projectiles, and a smoother attack animation.
However, Lightning Strike is significantly better than FB for Bossing for 3 main reasons: ability to double-hit melee+proj, use of a Vaal version, and better gem scaling.
TL;DR - use LS for bossing (if you want to).


Endurance Charges
Enduring Cry + Urgent Orders will give you consistent (30s w/ Swift Killer) uptime on endurance charges without having to be pressed too often. Press next to uniques/rares to maintain your charges.
If you prefer, you can use the Exarch chest implicit mod ???generate an endurance charge every xx seconds??? to guarantee passive uptime instead, but this sacrifices damage (gains gem slots though)



+Strikes and Pierce
Additional Strikes and Pierce are very important for offense AND defense, because they enable you to AOE freeze the entire screen.
Get +1 from tree early, another +1 from glove Exarch implicit, eventually +2 implicit(requires Orb of conflicting, see video guide in description)
Pierce can be crafted as a prefix on glove or helm early until Eater implicit.



Fury Valve
Fury Valve is an extremely strong mapping Amulet - it allows your Frost Blades projectiles to split across multiple packs of monsters and enables off-screen clearing. I have rationed my suffixes to NOT rely on the Attributes or Resists on Fury Valve so that it can be freely swapped on and off for mapping/bossing.



Crit-Capping and Brittle
Brittle Ground is a very powerful method to easily crit-cap, but it requires careful and frequent re-positioning of your character to place - exposing your character (in HC) to additional risk and distraction from other things.
Also, if you are able to acquire Stormshroud, you will need your Exarch boot implicit for Avoid Shock.
Crit-capping elsewhere isn???t difficult, and Action Speed is a strong replacement option (since One Step Ahead isn???t used).
I don???t recommend using Brittle on this build for Hardcore.
In SC - go for it if you want. 


CI - POB IT FIRST
Chaos Innoculation is an extremely powerful keystone, but it doesnt automatically make your character better. CI is better suited for non-crit builds that can utilize Ephemeral Edge - since our damage is scaled with Crit and Nightblade, we cannot use a Sword and would have to completely change the entire tree. I don???t recommend it, but it is an option - proceed with caution


Katabasis
Frost Blades of Katabasis scales exactly the same as normal FB - it just has NO projectiles, but an almost screen-wide Strike Range instead. Because of this, it requires Melee Splash to function for clear, which is accessible only by Anoint for Trickster.  The strength of the Close-Range Accuracy Mastery also makes the advantage of Katabasis (strike range) redundant. The lack of Projectiles also means no Fury Valve. Because of these required sacrifices, I don???t recommend this gem on Trickster (or Warden). Go Slayer if you want to use Katabasis.