Looking for Build Direction

[Stormcloak]

Hi Guys,

I just found this game about a week ago... and I've quickly become hooked. (What a fantastic job the developer has done!)
Anyway, I've run into a pretty solid wall yesterday with my first glad and am looking for a bit of direction with how to continue building and with fight strategy. He held a pretty decent 85% win streak for a while, but now in the upper portion of the Elite Bracket I've only won two out of the last 8 games or so.

Anyway, here he is...

Level 17 Human War
Strength: 74 +1 trained
Intellect: 75 +1 trained
Agility: 64 +5 trained
Stamina: 72 +2 trained
Size: 70
Presence: 74
Chi: 69
Health: 536

Equipment: All greens
Dual Short Swords (weight 3, speed 2.9 at 91.3 and 68.1 dps)
Heavy Helm (weight 6, 24 armour)
Ringmail Chestpiece (weight 17.4, armour 24)*
Banded armguard (weight 9.2, armour 28) and Ringmail armguard (weight 4.4, armour 22)
Light leggings (weight 3.9 and 3.5 at armour of 12 and 11)
Mods and Buffs:
+8 Strength
+1 Agility
+6 Stamina
+2 Size
+12 Presence
+4 Chi
+1 Attack Power

Current Encumbrance: 30% at 50.4 lbs
I was running a light chestpiece that was about half the weight and armour at 25% previous to this morning, but last night one of the more senior members mentioned warriors can go a bit heavier and into the yellow and be ok.

Skills:
Blades at 7 + 9/10

I've been focusing primarily on training the weapon skill. I did dump some training points into stats as mentioned above (mostly to experiment). I'm not sure which direction to head with the skills. Grim Determination and Iron Jaw don't look spectacular, but I was told it could be worth dumping a point into each to unlock the next tier. I'm also not sure if I should stick to only warrior and go for Armoured Fortress or if I should branch into Rage/Theatrics.

For fight strategy I was previously running:
Start of Fight at Activity 6, Slash, Aiming for weapon-arm, defending torso, at 5 Bloodlust
I am slightly inured at Activity 4, Parry-slash, Aiming for head, defending torso, at 7 Bloodlust
I am moderately tired at Activity 3, Slash, Aiming for back-leg, defending torso, at 5 Bloodlust

I've changed it up this morning to:
Start at Activity 4, Parry-slash, Aiming for weapon-arm, defending torso, at 5 Bloodlust
Opponent is tired at Activity 6, Slash, Aiming for head, defending torso, at 6 Bloodlust
I'm moderately injured at Activity 5, Slash, Aiming for weapon-arm, defending torso, at 7 Bloodlust

I was thinking that since I'm no longer able to just overpower opponents anymore that I should look at trying to tire them out a bit and then go on to the offensive.

Am I on the right track here? Is the fight strategy sound and the heavier equipment okay? (Should I continue with dual-weild or is using a shield better?) Any advice on skill training?

Thanks for any opinion, insights, and advice in advance!