UC Strat (in General)

For my NCB should I use a shield? I was thinking about a mage shield, but that would leave me vulnerable to decay. Would a BoM be worth the -5 UC instead of a MgS?

Decay doesn't seem to be that large of a problem, its at .3% trained experience and 3% on the popularity list. :) Just some stats for ya, can't help you any further than that man.

that doesn't mean anything, since the majority of decays are base.

Also, HoC or HoE?

HoE

HoC everytime, don't bother with a HoE

HoC is stupid for a UC strategy imo. There is an unless of course,, UNLESS you are depending on your ranged weapon (SoD) to be your main damage dealer.

I'd use a HoE, and I haven't decided what shield I think you should use yet.

doesn't HoC give you an extra round anyway? so you hit on the last range round?

No, your arms can't grow.

Only for CoC and Decay.

don't use a MgS. for my UC char i used a SoC and it worked incredibly well since fists count as hammer-class weapons. IMO use a SoC anytime you have the ability to unleash the damage... the damage reduction isn't too important but the damage storage and release is extremely powerful.

I would recommend an HoE, unless your using a very tricked-out ranged weapon.

For my future NCB (i think its the 4th one i have thought of) i am getting a HoE, HGs and a BoM in the beginning and gradually progressing into using a SoD and a HoC.
The extra strength is well worth the - to UC in nearly all aspects and if its a single minion strat the MgS is near suicide. Multi minion teams you would definitely get the MgS.
2 minions; 1st one your UC minion with all the really awesome gear, 2nd trains AMF and VA. Easy, effective and powerful.

Good luck with your strat though, whatever direction you take.

It's recently been made apparent to me that you need to train ST exponentially higher (like on par with UC's upgrade curve) in order for your UC damage to scale properly with everything else. In light of this, I would suggest the BoM and the HoE.

Badfish's advice about the SoC is good, though: it really does give a marked boost to damage when you're being hit. The disadvantage to this is that it does absolutely nothing against mages, and it doesn't boost your damage against low-PTH teams that can't hit you half the time because of your UC-conferred Evasion. In a way, this seems to me to be a little bit self-defeating, but can also be optimized. Really, it depends on who you're trying to target.

If you want to do damage based on UC and ST, go all ST-boosting gear (except Gi), as high as you can. However, you could also tailor your strat specifically towards defeating archers and their 100% bth. In this case, I would suggest training UC and DX very high, decked out in Elven gear and an AoF, while not concerning yourself much with ST (maybe wear a HoE for the AC boost), and of course with an SoC in the shield slot. Basically, use your high DX and UC-conferred Evasion to dodge hits as much as possible, but when you do get hit with those powerful ELB shots, you'll have a lot of stored damage to return. Of course, this would also require a fair bit of HP, and you'd need to train a bit of ST as a back-up in case you're dodging too well...

I would suggest doing 30% each of UC, DX, and HP (maybe drop to 25% DX and up to 35% UC once you hit 500k MPR or so), and 10% ST to concentrate XP most efficiently.
And, possibly, to wear a TsA over the Gi in order to get the most out of your small ST and relatively large HP, at the sacrifice of a little UC and DX...

But, then again, I'm laying out an entirely different strategy than yours, or than a traditional UC strat. Like I said, I would go ST-boosting (BoM) for general versatility, or SoC-and-tryingtododge if you want to be an archer-killing machine.