General Dual Tree Sorc builds

[LtDrebin]

General Dual Tree Sorc builds

Hi all,

I'm a relatively poor player looking for a sorc build that can do a bit of everything (except PvP). Right now, I can manage +5 to all skills (dual Spirit and Sazabi's helm), but I could find some more jewelry with +skills.

I'm familiar with Meteorb and Blizzballers, as well as the CL/FO build, but I'm wondering which is recommended for the ability to solo hell, have decent MF, and also be fun! I have an Insight, so fast casting builds shouldn't be a problem mana-wise most of the problem.

Meteorb -- Handles everything well. FO is a FANTASTIC secondary skill (not a great primary one), meteor does extremely high damage, and you get a free highly synergized fireball to boot. My merc might not be the best tank, so I worry about him being able to tank long enough for meteor to hit, though I suppose spamming fireball could keep many monsters in hit recovery animation.

Blizzballer -- I've never built one of these. I don't really trust blizzard too much to slow, so I'd probably rely on a Holy Freeze merc rather than a Defiance one and I also doubt the ability to kill quickly, since both blizzard and fireball require a lot of synergies. Then again, I've never made one, so I don't know.

CL/FO -- Probably not quite as good for MFing as the above, but I would imagine this build can tear through lvl 85 areas faster due to CL being spread out. I made one a while ago, but for some reason I don't remember it being a great build unless you can afford some pretty nice items.

What about Blizzard/Firewall? I've never really used either skill, but firewall seems to be much like frozen orb for the fire tree. No real synergies except for fire mastery.

Fire/Lightning builds are possible, but I don't know much about them either.

Suggestions?

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

The name "Meteorb" is a little bit of a misnomer... it's primarily a Fireball sorc that uses FrozenOrb for fire immunes, and Meteor for facing bosses (or stationary targets). But Fireball is your primary.

All three of the builds you mentioned are very solid choices... probably the strongest, least equipment-dependent of the dual-tree builds. I don't feel that any one is significantly weaker/stronger than the others (for example, CL/FO might not have the same power as a Meteorb, but it'll have better crowd control, so it might be more suited to a player with a more cautious style).

They each have advantages and disadvantages that (mostly) cancel each other out, so if you're going to pick one of those, pick the one that you think will be the most fun to play.


Blizz/Firewall (Blizzwaller) is another good choice, and in fact, it's quite capable of having the two strongest attacks for any dual-tree sorc. Despite the superior damage, the reason they're so rare is that you're stuck with two timered attacks... so you can spend a lot of time standing around waiting to cast spells... not exactly the most fun playstyle for many people. But with ~30 points your Firewall is set (5-10 "hard" points in FireMastery is worth it, in my experience), and that leaves you a lot of skillpoints to build a decent Blizzard, which can be great for bosses.

Sidenote about Blizzard-using sorcs: a lot of them use Glacial Spike or Ice Blast as an opening attack, to freeze their targets in place. Then you don't have to worry about Blizzard being "slow".


Lightning/Fire are probably the most rare combinations because each of those trees typically use skills that require a lot of synergies, so combining them can make it hard to get enough skillpoints to go around. I'm not saying it can't be done (my current Baal runner is actually a Nova/Fireball sorc), but usually you need moderately good equipment to pull it off.


As for your other skill options, just about any combination can be effective. Some of the skills pretty much require good equipment, and other skills require more synergies than others. But as long as you stay away from Inferno and Thunderstorm (not really strong enough to kill effectively, no matter what you do), as well as avoiding pairing two synergy-intensive skills (FrostNova and Hydra wouldn't work because they both need a lot of skillpoints to rock), you can make just about combination work.

When in doubt... pick your desired primary skill (again, stay away from Thunderstorm & Inferno, but you can choose any other skill from the 3 trees). Then choose either Firewall or Frozen Orb for a backup (making sure it's a different element than your primary attack). Drop ~25-30 skillpoints in your backup attack and the rest in your primary and it's synergies. Slap on some +skills and FCR, a little mana and resists, and voila, you have a viable sorceress build (though maybe not a powerhouse).

 

[melianor]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

One important thing to say about CL/FO is that it is more mana dependant than Meteorb or Blizzballer.

 

[LtDrebin]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

Thanks for the replies. I do fail to see how a Blizzballer works, though. Fireball and blizzard just require so many points to be effective, unless you want to skip the masteries and count on +skills. Not exactly the best choice for the poorer casters among us.

CL/FO is a fun build, but I find with Insight mana generally doesn't become a problem once you reach around lvl 60.

I chose to go with a Defiance merc. I'm using FO as a secondary, so if I remain diligent with that, I can freeze most enemies. Defiance is very useful against bosses, who from past experiences instantly destroy my holy freeze mercs. Maybe he'll last a couple of seconds this time!

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

One important thing to say about CL/FO is that it is more mana dependant than Meteorb or Blizzballer.

If you do the math, it's not as bad of a difference as you'd think though. The ~4 frames difference in casting speed between L/CL and Fireball evens it up reasonably well, especially if you're more prone to using Lightning instead of Chain Lightning.


LtDrebin,
I haven't built a Blizzballer so I can't say for sure the math behind it. But I do know they do quite well in damage. Someone (or two players, I can't remmber) in the single player forum has managed to take a Blizzballer to level99 doing /players8 Baal runs.

And yeah, Defiance is a better tank. You'll still have problems with act bosses (but not as bad as HolyFreeze) until you get some equipment with the Slows Target by X% mod. I believe Blackhorn's Face is a relatively common helm to put on mercs for this reason (and it's not impossible to find/trade for either). Kelpie Snare is a great weapon for boss runs too, but you'd loose your Insight, so that's more of a toss-up for me.

 

[LtDrebin]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

With 20 in blizzard and 20 in a synergy, the blizzard damage is about 1.7-1.8k. Multiply that by about 2 (cold mastery) for damage of 3.4-3.6k per shard. In retrospect, that seems like a pretty good number, though nowhere near what a full blizz sorc can do. The primary advantage of blizzard, aside from being able to do high damage to monsters with very high resistances, is that fact that it's nearly instantaneous, though random within the field. Meteor does more damage to the entire area, but the delay sure is a pain.

I decided to go Meteorb. If I get better gear, I'll probably go ahead with a CL/FO build, which I remember being very fast but somewhat more item dependent. I would be interested in a blizzballer or blizzwaller (particularly the latter as firewall is so rare), but it seems like EVERYONE is a blizzard sorc.

Running the countess could be a pain, as she's fire/cold immune IIRC.

 

[melianor]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

Thanks for the replies. I do fail to see how a Blizzballer works, though. Fireball and blizzard just require so many points to be effective, unless you want to skip the masteries and count on +skills. Not exactly the best choice for the poorer casters among us.

CL/FO is a fun build, but I find with Insight mana generally doesn't become a problem once you reach around lvl 60.

I chose to go with a Defiance merc. I'm using FO as a secondary, so if I remain diligent with that, I can freeze most enemies. Defiance is very useful against bosses, who from past experiences instantly destroy my holy freeze mercs. Maybe he'll last a couple of seconds this time!

Blizzballer works very well. The game is designed in such a way that you can easily get through the game and to Hell in hell difficulty without much trouble. [thread=214093]Blizzballer[/thread] indeed does not put points into masteries beyond the 1 hard point to activate. But even that way, it is so damn easy to get +6 to all skills of a class and more nowadays, that this will not be an issue.

With lower +skills the killing speed might suffer a little bit, but its not like you have to slowwalk any level in fear of dieing.

 

[Smackin]

Re: General Dual Tree Sorc builds

Bosses will pretty much instantly smoke any merc unless u stick some 50% dr on him/her(mercs take ALOT of extra dmg from act bosses), along with some 3k dmg and 10% LL atleast.