Arms and Continuous BM

[SteveForge]

1) The lack of jewels for all heros has made arms even more important.
2) Valor Hit/Shield gear and arms are VERY important in the current patch (Batheo 7300, lv210 maps/heros).
Even if you can't jewel them up, most players will wash/enchant/mask all heroes hoping to reduce damage vs lower level players (and since you have nothing else to do with the laurels and gems anyway :p) but I think its fruitless vs NPCs at or above your own level.
Most players at lv180+ use this order of importance:
1) Honor of Athena - valor hit
2) Eratos' Affection - Spirit hit
3) Shelter of Athena - valor shield
4) Hellfire - elemental shield
5) Death Light - elemental hit (for Kuku and occationally healers).
6) Flag of Union - faculty
7) Stone of Chaos - spirit shield

You'll notice spirit shielding is last. So many of the NPCs you face are super geeked up Epic heros who do serious valor and spirit damage. Using RALLY or DODGES are pretty much essential to beating these NPCs, regardless of spirit shielding they'll tear you up if they land a punch.
Valor is so important though, that some players go after valor shield BEFORE spirit hit... a large departure from previous theories where offense ALWAYS ruled the priority list. YMMV