Maces / Dual Wielding / Berserk / Vampirism / Master of Arms / Assassination / Smithing I will generally go to the second Vampirism skill first and then dump points into Dual Wielding. The reason being is that this build is tougher at lower levels and the extra life gained by eating corpses helps out. Smithing is just in there because I like making items and can easily be replaced by something else. This build has gotten me to level 7 so far and I have no problems with the Zoo or most boss mobs. I'm currently roaming around floor 4. Any improvements? Try it out its a fun build after being pummeled so many times. Dosage
This seems like an extremely risky setup. Vampirism without any renewable form of healing (like from Fleshsmithing, Psionics, or Fungal Arts) means that all it takes is one bad fight to break your momentum and put you in a totally unwinnable situation. You also don't have any built-in escape mechanisms (like CC, teleports, invisibility, etc.)...not that escaping a fight at low health would be much different from death with no means of healing. I'm actually kind of surprised you made it so far. How did you manage?
I'm playing a similar build except I am using Archaeology instead of Master of Arms. I just could not resist negating curses and displeased Krongs. He gets so far because of the metric ass-load of percentile based effects that trigger with each and every attack. This kind of character build splatters enemies in one hit and can even two shot nasty bosses.
I'm pretty much full HP the whole time... the only hard part is the first level. After that I just find a spot where only one mob at a time can attack me and I smash through everything. If I need a quick 4 life I eat one of the corpses I've just killed.
Easiest build up until floor 6 or so, where those blue meanies hit you for ~30 damage and have a really high counter percentage.
