'Ello there Knights!
After trying out a bunch of different weapons, I've decided that I like the heavier swords and plan on crafting a Troika along it's upgrade path. I love the feel of the sword - slow, powerful, with a nice & wide swing, but it's a little *too* slow. I'd really like something just a tad faster, but after perusing the wiki it doesn't look like such a sword exists. However, I do have options - attack speed can be boosted in a bunch of ways.
I was thinking about some combination of:
a) Vog Cub armor - I was originally planning on taking the Skolver armor for various* reasons, but it's not too annoying to swap to Vog for the attack speed increase.
b) Swiftstrike Shield - Again, I've currently got a Dark Thorn Shield for the +damage on it, but I could swap to this shield for the large speed bonus.
c) Attack Speed UV - I could just mass craft Troika until I get a decent Attack Speed UV.
My question is, which one (or combination) of these would work out best? I'm not really sure how much attack speed I think I'll need for it to feel right, but I'm sure someone here has some experience, or at least knows how much would be overkill. I'm a little worried about swapping for Vog Cub, as it'll leave me fairly vulnerable to Piercing damage (I'll only have some from a Med Piercing UV on my helm) and I hate getting frozen in place. Likewise, the Swiftstrike doesn't upgrade, I'm not sure how well it'd hold up in late T3 (not to mention I'd need to craft a 4* just to get into T3 in the first place). Mass Crafting is a fairly sure-fire way to get what I need, but it's also the more expensive route of the 3.
Secondly, I was planning on pairing the sword with a Storm Driver. I've read that the Alchemer's work well for the slow swords, but I'm a little worried about their performance, particularily before being upgraded to the 5* versions. Are the 3* Alchemer's worthwhile? Is there a better complement to a slow sword?
Thanks for reading, doubly so for responding with advice.
* I liked the Skolver better due to the Normal/Pierce defense, as well as the Freeze resist. I hate being stuck in place. Plus I like the look a little better.
If you already have a swiftstrike buckler you could use that to figure out the difference in attack speed and maybe figure out if you need more than high, or less. I like the way skolver looks too.