Well sure, you COULD go for the cookie cutter loadout..

As far as t3 being too hard, when I started in t3 my only armour set was the 4* cobalt and a jelly shield. I took that to firestorm for the first time, too, and did okay. Fact is, if you're a competent player, and you seem to believe you are, you'll do fine in t3. The key is to avoid taking damage even if it means taking a few extra seconds here and there to land an attack. If you're good at learning, interpreting and reacting to the movements and attacks of different enemies, you'll be absolutely fine.

If you really are a competent player, my advice would be don't go for the cookie cutter loadout. The reason for this is you're much better equipped to wield a less mainstream weapon and actually know how to use it properly - and that's great for you because you have plenty of options and can pick your favourite.

You say you don't use your avenger much and I would assume that's because you don't like it much - attack speed maybe? If you don't like using it, don't bother with it right now. Go for something like a glacius for an elemental sword. DA is helpful in firestorm, and plenty of other environments, but then so are a lot of weapons if you use them effectively.

I own both a vog set and a skolver set and definitely recommend both; vog first if you're looking into doing firestorm, skolver if you're not. The freeze resist is fantastic (freeze is bloody annoying IMO) and the piercing is, of course, good for the jelly runs you do. And of course, if you pick skolver for now, there are other ways to gear up for firestorm. Vog is great, don't get me wrong, but I've had success with several different combinations of gear so, again, pick what suits you. And remember that may change; once I was fairly experienced with firestorm runs I was confident enough to drop a piece of vog for a piece of skolver for the sword damage bonus. I, personally, think the reason this game doesn't get boring once you have the "optimal" loadout is because you grow as a player and broaden your horizons. Experimenting is fun and, yeah, may be expensive, but what else will you spend your crowns on when you have a full 5* set?

I'm a big fan of alchemer guns and would say, unless you plan to solo vanaduke, it's a perfectly good weapon for firestorm runs. I play with a storm driver and it's my absolute favourite weapon. It's rare that I don't carry it because it's rarely going to be useless with all the gun puppies that spawn (although it's much easier to bring it with a four weapon loadout - you may not want to use it as often as I do with only two weapon slots).

The owlite shield is wonderful and definitely a good one to start with. I'd upgrade that asap if I were you as taking less damage is more important than dealing massive amounts of it.

As far as being profitable, I haven't taken any numbers, but I consistently pay to unlock all weapon and trinket slots and still buy recipes and craft items a few times a month. I probably spend 70% of my time in t3 and 20% of my time in firestorm.

@DementedDuck
I agree fully with you. I can beat Vanaduke without Vog so its not NEEDED.Also i've run FSC in ash tail, its not hard if you play safe and lisyen to what the pro(s) on the team says. Plus any Shivermist Busters are useless against my Skolver in Lockdown! MUAHA---*ahem* off topic

@OP
Follow the people-who-posted's advice. Besides dont expect to get anything from killing Vanaduke soon. Took me like 100 kills to get that Crest of Almire. @_@
Anyway you're set with the knowledge we gave you.

P.S Heat the Avenger while raking in crowns for upgrade. its a win-win

i agree, vog is completely unneeded. skolver is way better in every way, exept that it doesnt have ASI. but now that trinkets are good, damage bonus and asi together= WOOOOOO!!!!! plus something about skolver makes you want to relentlessly attack. perhaps its instincts........