This build is all about getting the most out of Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude. For the longest time I thought it was Zealot's worst ability and never used it once in hundreds of hours.... Until now, with this build. It is totally cracked, and can save you and your team in situations that even Shroudfield wouldn't help you clutch in.
Its basically a better version of Veteran's shout, but with a longer cooldown.... Except, Zealot has the best ability cooldown reduction in the game with Invocation of Death. With a combined total of 100% crit chance (25% Blazing Piety + 30% Scourge + 20% Riposte + 5% perk on knife + 20% default on knife), you can proc Chorus insanely quickly in a horde simply by spamming light attacks. Even spam lighting a stray crusher is a good way to farm the crits and thus cooldown reduction. The +12% ability cooldown from the curios is also totally cracked here because the base cooldown is 60 seconds on Chorus, so you get an easy 7.2 seconds off.... So you could be proc'ing Chorus every 12 seconds or so in a horde with the 100% crit chance combined with 1.5 second cooldown every light attack. Combined with Faithful Frenzy its very fast cooldown*.
All in all, this leads to you being able to spam Chorus doubly faster than a Veteran spamming shout, which is incredibly good when that 10 crusher wave comes in with the horde in Auric.... On top of which it will stop the pox burster, trapper, and even monstrosities for the entire 5.6 second duration of Chorus. Just today I had a game where a teammate was net trapped surrounded by a horde of crushers next to a Demonhost. I triggered Chorus to stagger the enemies and un-trap my teammate - which unfortunately triggered the Demonhost. After stalling for 15 seconds, with the insane crit chance I already had Chorus off cooldown, and used it to ledge-kill the Demonhost, saving the run. Please understand my fellow Shroudfield Zealots, no other ability in the game could have saved that scenario.
With this build you will have insane survivability and damage, but will also be a true team player unlike regular knife Zealots, with Benediction and Chorus buffing teammates and restoring toughness in critical moments. Having played every other knife variation in existence given I'm a knife main (on both Veteran and Zealot), I can fairly confidently say this is the best overall build for team play when used right. Of course, Shroudfield can't be beat when you are the last man alive or if doing a solo run, but in a team, Chorus has no match. Instead of using Shroudfield to solo all the objectives, just use Chorus to defend a good teammate doing the objective and its literally better than Shroudfield in almost every scenario.
With this build, you'll have Benediction, Chorus, Balanced Landing, and Enduring Faith so you'll have extremely high damage reduction. With Second Wind, Thy Wrath Be Swift, Good Balance and the two gunner damage resistance curios you are already entirely immune to gunners, they are punching bags basically. Your best-in-the-game crit chance combined with Uncanny Strike will still let you shred bosses - my proposed variation here doesn't have Purge the Unclean, but you still do a load of damage to monstrosities and won't really notice it.
We also have 3 of the +15% toughness damage reduction nodes which is actually really nice, because they stack additively (unlike Benediction for instance which is multiplicative), which means they actually help a lot.
Overall, if you have ever played knife zealot before, I highly recommend you try out this variation.... Chorus is actually a ton of fun to use and can be absolutely cracked in Auric, especially with good teammates that can take advantage of that 5.6 second break in battle to revive who needs to be revived, and kill what needs to be killed....
Also don't be afraid to spam it especially if you hear poxbursters - I've saved teammates half their HP by giving them the juicy golden toughness from Chorus right before one bursts in their face.
Substitutions
- Realistically, you can take off that 5% crit chance on the knife for Maniac damage or similar if you like. A 95% crit chance is still very good hah
- Reload Speed and Unyielding Damage on the revolver can be substituted for Maniac or damage of your choice. I highly discourage you from putting a 5% crit chance on there; I see a lot of people do that and it makes absolutely zero sense since Surgical (cracked as it is) will give you 6x that in just a second of waiting, completely invalidating that 5%.
- Replace Faithful Frenzy for Holy Cause - buffing Chorus. Not a terrible idea. I don't think its strictly necessary since you are already giving distance and golden toughness to teammates, but I'm sure it can help in some very intense situations. I probably wouldn't go for Ecclesiarch's Call over Holy Cause since toughness damage reduction is likely to come in more clutch, but its an option.
- Remove Faithful Frenzy and another talent node of your choice (Thy Wrath by Swift, Balanced Landing...) for Anoint in Blood and Purge the Unclean, or go for Sustained Assault. This is really just if you want extra damage, though its not recommended. It will decently impact survivability and crit farming / overall damage output.
- Optionally, you could go for Shield of Contempt instead of Purge the Unclean. Its a very underrated perk and can come in super clutch. Often when a teammate takes a little damage, a lot more is soon to follow since their toughness is empty (like if a gunner has them in stunlock), and this will save them from taking that huge chunk of damage to follow. The Emperor's Bullet can also be triggered on demand by keeping only 1 bullet in the revolver and firing it when you want that +10% attack speed, so there is synergy there. Fits the theme of a support build nicely too.
Notes:
*Please note even after the recent June 2024 update that nerfed Invocation of Death (it cannot proc multiple times on a single swing's multiple crits, only once per swing), its still just as fast cooldown reduction with the knife given you can light spam insanely quickly compared to other weapons. In fact, this nerf basically made knife THE META to pair Invocation of Death with since it has super fast attack speed and can crit every single attack.
