The fade thing, I have done a lot of testing, and its definitely all points, not just hard points.
Blade shield is just there to hopefully add some more poison damage to whoever you WW through. Since you get the venom damage on it, plus 1/4 of weapon damage, if it hits, its decent damage. For 1 point invested its very worth it. It will however only hit on characters with mid to low defense. It will hit sorc's almost all the time, and bone necro's, zons, other assassins, and even some low def druids barbs and pally's. But don't count on it. Its just extra damage when it hits.
Blade fury is very useful for quite a few duels. The most important by far is vs hammerdins. You blade fury them while staying away from their hammers, and when they get frustrated from getting ninja stared from far away, they will teleport next to you to Spam hammers. Thats when you WW straight down and own them.
Blade fury is also very useful vs other ww assassins and barbs. Once you get the hang of it, you will be able to short WW and throw 2 or 3 stars in the time it takes the other guy to WW once. That way, you trade ww's and throw 3 stars, trade WW's and throw 3 stars. You will get more hits, and will come out on top.
Blade fury is great vs sorc's that either Meteor themself or blizzard themself and think you can't get in for a hit. Just stand back and blade fury them. As soon as they teleport away, or cast something at you, dragon flight WW their ass.
Its also cool to stand right next to the town gate, and throw ninja stars at the gate. make sure your close enough to the gate that you can't see the stars coming out of your hand....
It will look like your giving everyone in the town the finger
