So right now, I currently have all of my swordsman gear at 4 stars
-Ash Tail Cap
-Ash Tail Coat
-Dark Thorn Shield
-Dark Thorn Blade
-Avenger
-Gigawatt Pulsar
-Freezing Atomizer
At this point, how should I go about upgrading my gear? Do I go for the Vog Cub/Coat recipes with the Barb Thorn Shield for its bonuses, or should I focus on getting a Divine Avenger for a significantly improved charge attack and a Shivermist Buster for a much greater freeze radius?
I would upgrade the freezing vaporizer first
I would actually just upgrade the Freezing Vaporizer to Freezing Atomizer for now. That is a really awesome bomb for crowd control(from my experience at least) and the thawing does a pretty good chunk of damage.
Of course I would try to upgrade it to a Shivermist Buster too, but I feel Freezing Atomizer is pretty good enough.
Unless of course you plan on doing some Vanaduke freezing, and in which case I would just upgrade to Shivermist for the sake of having a much greater radius.
First get your bomb to 4*, then your armor, then your shield.
Normally defensive pieces should go last, but Wolver armors and Snarbolax shields are more for offensive bonuses and will essentially upgrade all your swords at once.
You said you had all 4-star equipment, so I didn't notice that your bomb is 2-star (unless it's just a typo). Do you use it often? Then upgrade it to 4-star. I stand by the rest of my comments.
Yes, the Freezing Vaporizer was a typo, it should have been Atomizer.
I've been reading about the Skolver/Vog Cub split, should I get both the helmet and the coat as one type, or have one of each? I was planning on getting two Vog Cub pieces due to wanting to do FSC runs.
If you plan on getting hit a lot, get Vog. If not, get Skolver.
Have many swords? Shield first.
Otherwise, weapons first from 2*-5*.
Fiendishknight, I always recommend that people construct a general-purpose armor set, and then build additional pieces to provide specialized sets. Following this logic, you should get one piece of Vog Cub and one piece of Skolver; then you can go back and get another piece of each, for specialized sets. And when you start doing this, get the Vog Cub piece before the Skolver piece, because Vog Cub + Ash Tail is better balanced than Skolver + Ash Tail.
Of course, if you're really into FSC, and you expect to have no problem with beasts and slimes even when you have no piercing armor, then go ahead with double Vog Cub.
Ordinarily I'd tell you to upgrade your weapons, because play on Tier 3 is less about armor absorbing damage than it is about dodging and killing monsters. However, you currently have no elemental or fire protection, so maybe you should get one piece of Vog Cub soon. And your armor/shield will give improved damage bonuses when they're upgraded. It would help to know how many weapons you carry at a time.
Really there is no bad plan here, but if you want a concrete recommendation I'd say (A) get one piece Vog Cub, then (B) upgrade your two swords, then (C) get one piece Skolver and Barbarous Thorn Shield, and then (D) upgrade the rest of your weapons.
P.S. Somewhere out there is the Acheron or Gran Faust of your dreams.