PoE Duelist Block, Crit, Impale Cyclone Gladiator

Ascendancy Gladiator

• Arena Challenger: gives the build so much clear speed and dps and works great with the sand & blood skills.

• Painforged: gives some nice block chance and increased damage

• Versatile Combatant: this the one node which makes block gladiator so powerful. When you pick this one up your spell block rate will be equal to your attack block chance.

• Violent Retaliation / Outmatched and Outlast: Violent Retaliation would gives more block and damage. Outmatched and Outlast would help with endurance and frenzy charges while mapping.

Passive Skill Tree

Mechanic

Impale is a strong mechanic in 3.7 and it is totally worth it. When my calculation are right you can reach depending on investment reach about 70 to 96% MORE damage. 

Most important is to reach nearly 100% chance to impale on hit. You can get the most damage when you reach it without the Impale Support.

I calculated following setups: (hopefully my calculations are right :))

0.1 * Impale Stacks * Impale Effectiveness * Impale Chance

80% More DMG: Version 1 (Impale Support, Dread Banner, Swift Skewering 30% chance): 90% chance, 78% effect 

96,43% More DMG: Version 2 (Impale, Dread Banner, Swift Skewering, Forefull Skewering): 95% chance, 103% effect: 0,5 * 2,03 * 0,95 

70,07% More DMG: Version 3 (Dread Banner Skewering, Forcefull Skewering, Chance to Impale Weapons 19%): 91% chance, 54% effect: 0,5 * 1,54 * 0,91 

Leveling Section

Main Skill

Directly at the start you get Perforate (available lvl 1) which you will use until you get Bladestorm (lvl 28) as main skill. 

Perforate + Melee Physical Damage + Fortify + Multistrike + Impale + Pulverise / Brutality

Bladestorm + Melee Physical Damage + Fortify + Brutality + Impale + Pulverise

Cyclone + Melee Physical Damage + Fortify + Brutality + Impale + Pulverise 

(When you get chance to impale on your weapons you can replace the impale support with Rage / Close Combat Support)

Movement

Dash: very nice movement skill early on... works well without any supports

or

Leap Slam + Endurance Charge on hit + Faster Attacks

Cast When Damage Taken (low level)

CWDT (lvl 1) + Immortal Call (lvl 3) + Enfeeble (lvl 5) + Blood Rage (lvl7)

Mana Reservation

Flesh & Stone + Maim: feels super strong for leveling

Blood & Sand: also nice for a little mana reservation

Dread Banner: to increase the chance and effect of impale.

Precision: for crit version Precision is a very good option.

Pride (optional): super strong for physical damage builds.

Herald of Purity (optional): for dps and minions also take some hits for you

(War Banner and Herald of Purity I used for leveling. I dropped those two reservation skills for Pride)

Utility

Vaal Ancestral Warchief + Brutality + Melee Phy. Dmg + Venegenace 

Vaal Haste

Stone Golem