The soft cap is 45% defense and you went way past it. The only time going past the soft cap helps is if you get debuffed or if the enemies have to-hit buffs. Shield Defense has the potential to reach high enough defense debuff resistance that it can ignore debuffs. Critter to-hit buffs are generally so large that no amount of defense can make a worthwhile difference in mitigation. Don't go so far past 45%.
Your build could be optimized in many ways. Improving the global recharge speed would be one benefit of reducing your defense to the soft cap. Take a look at other Shield Defense builds to see how they may have done things.
As far as the Alpha slot goes, get what you think will benefit your character the most. Only you can decide that by playing the character. Crunching numbers in Mids' does not show what is the best Alpha boost, in most cases. You can always craft the other boosts if you want to try different ones out.
I didn't go past the soft cap, I added maneuvers for two reasons.
1. A lot of people are taking the leadership skills now that we have inherent stamina. The chances of it stacking and helping out squishys on teams is high.
2. It let me slot another LotG 7.5
With manuvers off and pary on Im at 52/46/47
That said I think I'll start with Spiritual and Musculature and see where things stand.
Captain Den'Rath 53* Merk/Traps MM, Rivona 50Energy Blast/Time Cor,Victoria Von Heilwig 53* Dual Pistols/Traps Cor, Crab Spider Webguard 53* SOA, Accela 53* Bot/FF MM,Valkyrie's Executor 53* Broadsword/Shield Def Scrap. On FREEDOM! @Knight Of Bronze
"Hypocrisy, the human inherent." "Let not this work be wasted, apply yourself always."
My BS/SD has finaly hit 50 and I have no idea what to slot for the incarnate slot.
Any rule or thumb here for BS?
My build at the moment covers all the bases rather well but I cant choose between Cardac, Spiritual, and Musculature
Cardiac would let me run Maneuvers full time with no worry's and for things like Tin Mage where you have 30 min boss fights (Zzzzzz) I know I just have to keep pressing buttons. Instead of popping blues. Spiritual would let me have Headspliter/Disenbowl up faster along with Shield Charge. However I fear this will send my endurance over the edge. Where as Musculature would up damage and Defense Debuff but would have the least effect because I'm close to the ED cap on damage.
So whats your take on that?
My build
Targeting drone/Caltrops are there for concept.