Quote Originally Posted by Maelwys View Post
Not strictly There are better stat boosts to be had from any other upgrade over Darklight (even from the belt which actually "costs" you 9 parry!) plus the +1 Shield is not BIS and the Allagan version drops from Turn 1. Combine all that with the fact that any shield is largely pointless on Turns 2 and 3, and really the only thing the Shield upgrade has going for it is that it costs exactly one week worth of myth - as soon as you're prepared to save anything beyond one week, it's hands-down the worst upgrade out there...
Shield is only NOT BiS if you ahve access to turn 5 loot. Course, you have to be geared enough to get there before you can start on that BiS build....

Turn 1: Cad wrecks. Its nice.
Turn 2 is not a damage threat, the raid will wipe because non-tank members fumble mechanics, the tanks are in no danger of being killed under normal play, so no upgrade is particularly valuable here.
Turn 3 is... lol wait, are we discussing turn 3?
Turn 4: Shield very potent. You are perhaps over looking that the shield is both an % per block and % to block upgrade. When you are getting hit by two dreads, or 4 adds, this is extremely potent.
Turn 5: Shield is again quite potent. Twin hits for so much that even a few % makes a large difference.

Sure, you can get shield from turn 1. But i'm over two months in and haven't seen it. I wouldn't base purchases on drops you might get. The shield is an extremely potent upgrade. I agree the ring is also, but I wouldn't go past my first 3 upgrades without getting +1 sword/shield and heros ring (unless you get one of those three as a drop). Should you look at my character, you'll find I got the Allagan Ring early on, and thus bypassed heros for now.

Personally, even though I am at the 6.5k point with food, I would not forgo vit for enmity. Twin continues to hit so hard that the hp is valuable. That said, that leaves only the sword (and incidental strenght from left side upgrades) as your means to increasing enmity. By contrast, every slot upgrade on your dps will increase their enmity. You have to keep up with them, particularly in turns 4 and 5 where the fights center around dps checks.