Meteorb

[aceshigh]

Meteorb

Hello all,

i am plannin on makin a meteorb sorc. Actually more so fireball and orb. Meteor is nice on bosses but im a fan of the lvl 85 areas (they are what feed my chars nicely in terms of gear). I gota couple questions though:

i member readin that +skills sometimes may not contribute to syngerizing (rather then hard points [physically placed in]). If i put NO points into cold mastery, will the 1 point from tals orb ACTUALLY start off my cold mastery and will the +skill ACTUALLY make it lvl X... or does it just say i got lvl X ? = /

I forget the name, and i could close the window to check but ill just state he has a cookie monster icon ~ was talkin bout a tal meteorb sorc. He had some excellent points on comparing the tal meteorb to the avg lite sorc setup in terms of killing speed and the hastle of immunes (or lack of immunes in the case of the meteorb). And some good gear recommendations such as socketing tals with 5/5 fires (instead of my normal ptopaz for added mf = /). Which i will say now is overated. I have found 2 coas with 200-230 mf both with in a week. I understand there is chance/luck to these 2 findings but 200 mf is a good round number. He also had mentioned usin fire gcs to boost the dmg. Basically what im gettin at is if there r some other tips out there to pass them my way.

Also this goes out to cookie monster himself (no offense with teh name i promise!~). You had mentioned something about -%res to enemy and the 1/5 for conviction. Would u mind explaining then?

Thank u all

 

[aceshigh]

Now that i typed the msg, i was able to confirm the name ~

Cookie Monster = Eilo Rytyj *Sorry man =]

 

[prion]

hi,

synergies and masteries are different. +skills will boost your cold mastery to whatever level the skill tree says and you will get that listed effect.

hth

 

[BlargX]

You gonna be rushed? Because you'll lose out on a ton of cold damage if you wait for the tal's orb to be equippable before getting any cold mastery going. Right when it counts too, in nightmare, where you just roll over everything with frost orb boosted by cold mastery.

 

[aceshigh]

Ya buddy !

already rushed. Thanks for the heads up though. =]

 

[BanginCarAudio]

Both are excellent setups and I've just now delved into the world of a lite sorc. The only way either kills fast enough for myself is with infinity. Infinity is simple a staple for a sorc no matter what tree you use (yes it does help a decent bit even with cold). Only way it wouldn't help a cold sorc is if you max cold mastery....but who the hell does that?

 

[illestkhmai]

Both are excellent setups and I've just now delved into the world of a lite sorc. The only way either kills fast enough for myself is with infinity. Infinity is simple a staple for a sorc no matter what tree you use (yes it does help a decent bit even with cold). Only way it wouldn't help a cold sorc is if you max cold mastery....but who the hell does that?

Infinity is by no means required for a meteorb sorc. Dual-element sorcs are very effective and a lot cheaper too.

 

[BanginCarAudio]

Not required but I'll be damned if it doesn't put you in a whole new league. I couldn't go back to a non inf sorc.

 

[illestkhmai]

Not required but I'll be damned if it doesn't put you in a whole new league. I couldn't go back to a non inf sorc.

Not everyone can afford it though :grin:.

 

[AnimeCraze]

And the ones who can often put it on other builds which it benefits more first. (like trapper, summon necro, javazon, etc.)

 

[Eilo Rytyj]

Hello all,

i am plannin on makin a meteorb sorc. Actually more so fireball and orb. Meteor is nice on bosses but im a fan of the lvl 85 areas (they are what feed my chars nicely in terms of gear). I gota couple questions though:

i member readin that +skills sometimes may not contribute to syngerizing (rather then hard points [physically placed in]). If i put NO points into cold mastery, will the 1 point from tals orb ACTUALLY start off my cold mastery and will the +skill ACTUALLY make it lvl X... or does it just say i got lvl X ? = /

I forget the name, and i could close the window to check but ill just state he has a cookie monster icon ~ was talkin bout a tal meteorb sorc. He had some excellent points on comparing the tal meteorb to the avg lite sorc setup in terms of killing speed and the hastle of immunes (or lack of immunes in the case of the meteorb). And some good gear recommendations such as socketing tals with 5/5 fires (instead of my normal ptopaz for added mf = /). Which i will say now is overated. I have found 2 coas with 200-230 mf both with in a week. I understand there is chance/luck to these 2 findings but 200 mf is a good round number. He also had mentioned usin fire gcs to boost the dmg. Basically what im gettin at is if there r some other tips out there to pass them my way.

Wow, someone actually listened to what I said?!?! COOL!!!


Well, my posts in the other thread were based on a little research I did on the "Theoretical maximum" potential of a Meteorb Sorceress in terms of damage output while maintaining important other stats like 105% FCR (a big factor in damage output anyway) and 86% FHR, high resists etc etc. And by the numbers, she compares to a near-perfect Lightning Sorceress in terms of killing ability.

I will admit though, a Lightning Sorc has the advantage when facing a pack of non-LI's with Chain Lightning - that skills just tears holes in the space-time fabric when paired with Conviction. But I also say that a high damage Fire Ball on a hybrid will also keep up with a high damage Lightning on a pure-elementalist when facing Act Bosses and single targets. Both will use Static down to 50% life then switch to the main spell. Fire Ball has the advantage of being cast 1.5 times faster (8 frames) and the reliable average damage, while Lightning is cast slower (12 frames) but has the huge potential maximum damage and random factor.

Of course, my setup is particularly biased towards getting the highest Fire Ball damage possible on a dual element Sorc, without compromising Frozen Orb. That's why I view Tal's Set as the ultimate gear, not only because of the innate -15% Fire Resist, but the +15% Cold Skill damage provides a damage boost to Frozen Orb that can't be gotten from anywhere else, and no combination of Uniques/Runewords can match it for that reason.

It's also why I don't really suggest Cold skiller GC's, or Cold Facets. Again, this setup is designed to maximise Fire Ball, which is the most destructive spell this dual element Sorceress has. Thus, the ideal options IMO are Fire Facets and Fire skillers. I feel that Frozen Orb with +15 all skills and the +15% Cold Dmg is powerful enough for a secondary backup skill and does not need to be improved any further. It's poweful because of the way it works, in that it can be a great AoE damager, or with some aiming can take down a single target with ease. Fire Ball has the disadvantage of being a single-hit, small area-of-effect spell, so I want to make the most of what it does have - big damage against one target.

You had mentioned something about -%res to enemy and the 1/5 for conviction. Would u mind explaining then?

When affecting a monster with an Immunity, Conviction (and Lower Resist) is reduced to 1/5 effectiveness when trying to break it. So if a monster has, say, 105% Lightning Resist (thus is Immune), then Conviction will try to break that Immunity and it'll be reduced to 1/5 of it's stated value. In Infinity's case, that's -85% res normally, or -17% against an Immune foe.

So if a monster has 99% resist, it will be reduced to 14% with Conviction.
If the monster now has 105% resist, it will be reduced to **%.

That's why I feel that Conviction is much more powerful when not breaking an Immunity, as it works at full effectiveness in reducing the monster's resistance. Like I said in the other thread, if using Chain Lightning/Lightning against a pack of broken LI's, you'll still be hitting them with a resistance of 50% or more (depending on how much -res% you have from Facets+gear). That's a reduction to 1/3 or less of the damage dealt to other monsters (who are generally affected at -50% or lower resist). A dual element Sorceress doesn't have that problem. Her Frozen Orb will always be hitting monsters at -100% resist thanks to Cold Mastery + Conviction, and her Fire Ball will be similar, hitting at -50% or lower resists thanks to the -15% to -30% resist she get from her gear + Conviction.

Also this goes out to cookie monster himself (no offense with teh name i promise!~).

COOKIE NUM NUM NUM NUM NUM!!!!! NO OFFENSES TAKENN!!




YUO HAEV COOKIE FOR MEE? :laugh:



P.S.

You gonna be rushed? Because you'll lose out on a ton of cold damage if you wait for the tal's orb to be equippable before getting any cold mastery going. Right when it counts too, in nightmare, where you just roll over everything with frost orb boosted by cold mastery.

I can tell you now, if you dump all of your points into maxing Orb throughout Nightmare, you can get away without Cold Mastery. I did, with my couple of Meteorb remakes. Frozen Orb still rolls over everything in NM with a modest +skill count, with or without Cold Mastery. I know, I'm a perfectionist, but I feel that the 1 skill point is better spent in the Fire Bolt/Mastery to boost FB - you gotta think of the end-game. Tal's Orb is at level 65, which should be around the end of NM, so you'll have Cold Mastery available even before you step into Hell. You can even have your full setup equipped in NM, IIRC you can level to 75 in NM Baal. I know because I did once... took a while.

 

[«ÑØ¡zÉ»]

Eilo do you have a thread for this build ? I had a dual ele sorc on ladder s2 very similar to what you guys are doing..I didnt use full tals set b/c I was mf based. If you have a thread or wanna post a link pm me it, i'll definatly take a look at it. Good luck fellas.

 

[Eilo Rytyj]

What, you mean like a guide? No, there's already a Meteorb guide in the Sorceress stickies that covers almost everything.

You could check some of the other threads like the one I mentioned for my past posts. And this thread too where I kinda go through some of the pros of Infinity for a dual tree Sorc.

As for the build... well, may as well go through the gear + skills for you all.


Example of level 90 Sorceress:

Gear:
Weapon, Armor, Helm, Amulet, Belt: full Tal Rasha's set - Orb, Helm and Armour socketed with 5/5 Fire Facets ideally
Shield: Spirit Monarch - 35% FCR, 112 mana
Gloves: Magefists - upgraded to Crusader Gauntlets (151 str req)
Rings: two Stones of Jordan
Boots: your choice, but for this I'll use Waterwalk
Switch:Call To Arms + Spirit Monarch
Charms: Hellfire Torch, Annihilus, one 8% FHR Large Charm

Stats assuming Torch and Anni are perfect (base(modified)):
STR: 116[156]
DEX: 25[100]
VIT: 364[426]
NRG: 35[85]

Skills: base(modified)
Cold Spells 25 points:
1(16) Ice Bolt
1(16) Ice Blast
1(16) Glacial Spike
1(16) Frost Nova
1(16) Blizzard
20(35) Frozen Orb
0(17) Cold Mastery

Lightning Spells 3 points:
1(16) Telekinesis
1(16) Static Field
1(16) Teleport
0(17) Lightning Mastery

Fire Spells 73 points:
20(36) Fire Bolt
1(17) Inferno
1(17) Blaze
1(17) Fire Wall
1(17) Warmth
20(36) Fire Ball
20(36) Meteor
9(27) Fire Mastery - final points go here

Now, for the important stuff:

Fire Ball damage: 10326-11252 (avg 10789)
Frozen Orb damage: 564-591 (avg 577.5)
Meteor impact damage: 21356-22239 (avg 21797)
Meteor residual damage: 1651-1733 per second (avg 1692 per second)
Static Field range: 13.3 yards @ -100% enemy lightning resist with Infinity
Cold Mastery reduction: -100% enemy cold resistance, -185% with Infinity
Enemy Fire res reduction: -30% enemy fire resistance, -115% with Infinity
Teleport mana cost: 9

Total resists:
Fire: 145%
Cold: 180%
Lit: 213%
Pois: 140%

Chance to Block: 19.83% (19%)
Hit Recovery: 7 frames (86% FHR)
Cast Rate: 8 frames (105% FCR exactly)
Total mana regeneration: +247%

1403 Life before BO, 1279 of it BO-able
Life with self-BO from 6boCTA (slvl13 BO): 2311 Life

Mana: 966 before Battle Orders, 1423 after BO (yep that's with base starting energy too... yowza)


Mercenary:
Act 2 Holy Freeze

"Infinity" ethereal Thresher or Giant Thresher
Andariel's Visage socketed with Jewel of Fervor
"Fortitude" ethereal (bugged) Sacred Armor

195 base str at level 90 and +30 from Andariel's = 225, enough for ethereal Sacred Armor(222 str req)


...phew, that was grueling...

Notes:
This is an example of my ideal sorceress at level 90, designed to combine the highest possible Fire spell damage coupled with a Frozen Orb damage that's higher than if using a combination of Uniques + Runewords. For this, Tal Rasha's set is required to build around.

Note that I've not included Fire Skill GCs in the damage equations. With them, her Fire Ball damage would increase by approx 660...750 damage and Meteor by 1300...1400 per GC added. Expect to see a Fire Ball damage of 13701-14845 and a Meteor of 28149-29235 with just 5 Fire skiller GCs. And then of course you'll be adding each skill point past level 90 to Fire Mastery, resulting in even higher fire damage. So at level 95 with 5 Fire skillers, you'll have a 15026-16280 Fire Ball and a 30870-32061 Meteor @ 2302-2401 damage/second... truly awesome for a hybrid.

You'll notice zero points in Cold Mastery. That was intentional; I still reach the "recommended" slvl 17 CM relying on the +2 granted from Tal's set weapon. And with a Frozen Orb hitting monsters at -185% enemy resistance, I don't think I need any more points in Cold Mastery. I also don't advocate the use of Cold skill GCs either. The way I see it, Fire is your main element, Cold is a backup, and Frozen Orb is the best and cheapest skill-point wise backup spell the Sorceress has. Fire GCs will increase both your Fire Ball and Meteor damage exponentially, while Cold GCs only increase Frozen Orb's damage by a small amount - and Cold Mastery is already as high as it needs to be IMO.

As for the other charms - you'll need 35% more Fire and Poison resist from charms to reach the max (80% for Fire, 75% for Poison). You'll also need 6% more FHR to get to 86%. Otherwise, it's skillers and +life charms or MF charms depending on what you need.

At level 99 your chance to block will still be 18%, which isn't half bad for a full Vit stat setup with a Spirit Monarch. Just watch out for the slow 9 frame block animation; hope that you're casting when you block things so you wont be slowed down by it.

Oh, and as a little bonus, she still has 163%-168% MF with current gear, with a possibility of 213%-258% MF if you just include Gheed's Fortune and War Traveler instead of Waterwalk. With just six 7% MF small charms you'll have 300%. So as a MF character she's still as capable as the rest of them. She's an excellent Act Boss runner with such a fast casting, high damage Fire Ball. She's also good at area MFing places such as the Pit; Fire Ball takes out everything not Fire Immune in 1 or 2 hits, with the possibility of more than one monster hit by a Fire Ball if bunched together, while Frozen Orb takes care of Fire Immunes nicely. A nice benefit is that the only Fire Immunes in the Pit are Devilkin, who have low life and a whole mob drops with only a couple of Orbs.

She can hold her own in Chaos - Fire Ball is an awesome skill for taking out OK's from far away, and it also chews through the Fingermages (Storm Casters). The only real problem she has is against Lord de Seis - he often spawns Cold/Fire Immune, and Infector - you need some slick teleporting and Orb aiming skills to be able to take him down without his group swamping you. You might want to keep Glacial Spike permanently on your left click, and adopt a pattern of Orb,Spike,Spike,Orb,Spike,Spike... to make life safer against him. The same can be said for Ventar and Lister in the Throne - that strategy has saved my life numerous times. FYI Glacial Spike will have a freeze time of just under a second in Hell (3.9 seconds listed), so you'll have to be quick and accurate to keep them frozen in place.


err... I guess that's about it for now. asses out:

 

[MrKaxe]

Best Meteorb post ever...if it could, this post should be stickied! :thumbsup:

 

[maiku]

Agreed. The Cookie Monster has spoken! That is an awesome post that should be stickied for all eternity.

 

[Eilo Rytyj]

Aww geez, cheers guys.

Anywho, just remember this is a "theoretical maximum" type thing. You've gotta remember to take into account if you've got lower stat/res Torch/Anni, if you don't have SoJs (not too easy to find a legit one, ya know), or if your Spirit is less than 35%, you've gotta substitute one of the rings for a FCR ring in order to get to 105% FCR.

You've also got to remember that this is a low block, no ES, full vita build, and you've got to keep that in mind when you play. Always watch where you teleport, always keep your merc between you and the monsters. But on the other hand, we have 86% FHR and good damage and damage versatility which more than makes up for this. That's the way I play Sorceresses, that's why I love them; as fragile as a twig but as deadly as a cannon.


Just for comparison's sake... if targeting a single monster (i.e. Act Boss), disregarding enemy resistances, a Lightning Sorceress needs a Lightning max damage of 45k to match the average damage of a 15k Fire Ball. If the Meteorb's Fire Ball is just 10k, the Lightning Sorc needs a 30k max (15k average) Lightning damage to match. It's a 2:3 ratio, since FB casts at 8 frames, Lightning casts at 12 frames @ 117% FCR, Lightning needs an average of 1.5 times that of Fire Ball to match it.

 

[aceshigh]

Hey everyone,

made the sorc its lvl ** now. I dont baal much, just mf in full (or nearly full) games for the "better drops" and the good xp!. I do use infinity etc for the added killin speed and the char works amazin. I do have a javazon also for clearin the lvl 85 areas, yet its nice to have the sorc which can teleport fast to grab additional keys and bosses. Yet i still walk/tele through places such as pits/chaos/wsk/tunnels cause u WILL get better drops then stickin to the odds of just teleporting and killin a boss. Char is godly = ]

Eilo, im glad u found ur way to my post here. Thx for the xplanations and providing me the idea!

Your cookies are in the mail = X

Thx everyone !

 

[MrKaxe]

You've also got to remember that this is a low block, no ES, full vita build, and you've got to keep that in mind when you play.

Which is my style baby! Never used block for some reason...just like my sorcs with full vita and a buttload of life charms (with afew MF ones)...I have 11xx life with charms at clvl 74 and only the 60% FHR bp which I wish was higher but I haven't got a full Tals yet to compensate! (slow season in HC for me :undecided: )
I'm running Shako with pTopaz, 35% Spirit Monarch (first roll!) 31 res Skin with pTopaz (to be upped) Wizzy (thinking 4/-4 Cold Facet in it to help Cold as I have no Fire ones!), Magefists (non upped), wicked crafted FCR belt with most notable mod being 15 to Strength (to help towards Monarch), Waterwalks (for life and to help meet Dex for Wizzy) and junk rings and Rising Sun ammy until I can replace those 3 slots!
When I MF, I swap out Magefists for Chancies and Waterwalks for Cow Kings Boots (got em in a lucky NM Cow Run) as they keep the Dex up!

 

[Eilo Rytyj]

Now... with all these big numbers I've thrown out regarding my "perfect" Meteorb, how does it all translate to real-life monster bashing? I guess I'll go through the actual damage Fire Ball and Frozen Orb will be doing against the little beasties of Sanctuary, elaborating on the flashy Lying Character Screen numbers.

First, lets use my example of the level 90 Sorceress, and we'll start with Frozen Orb.

To start with, we have a total of -185% enemy cold resistance from Cold Mastery and Conviction. Now, that pretty much means that any monster with less than 86% cold resist will be brought to -100%, resulting in a Frozen Orb that does 1128-1182 damage per bolt against them. That basically means every non-Cold Immune monster in the game, save for perhaps some freak Magic Resistant and/or Spectral Hit spawned boss whose on 95% resist or something... Even then, you're doing well over 1000 damage per bolt.

Now we'll move onto the Fire spells, namely Fire Ball because that's the one we (read: me) will be using 9/10 of the time. We've got -115% fire resist from out gear and Conviction. The most amount of damage our little Fire Ball can do would be against a monster with 15% fire resist or less is 20652-22504 damage. Makes Andariel seem like a little girl-demon...poor little thing. NOW, moving on to the least amount of damage out Fire Ball can do. Against a 99% fire resistant monster, it will be reduced to -16%. The damage we'll be doing against this thing'll be 11978-13052. That's the absolute least amount of damage this Fire Ball will ever do against any monster in D2. Now, I dunno about you, but the only monster(s) I know of with a fire resist that high without being totally immune are Uber Mephisto and Baal, who are at 95%. I guess then it's a safe assumption that your Fire Ball will be doing in between 15k and 20k average damage against every monster you face as long as they're under the influence of Conviction. Meteor will be doing something in the vicinity of 30k-40k damage, but that's a little less reliable since you might teleport out of Conviction's range while you wait for the Meteor to drop, thus leaving out the -85% from the damage calc. And I guess the same goes for Fire Ball and Orb, the monsters have to be in Conviction's limited range to get the full benefit and damage. Then again, that opens up a whole new strategy: being close enough to nuke 'em without being swamped + killed. Joy!

EDIT: @MrKaxe - Personally, there's no way I would ever swich to Chancies from Magefists for MF purposes. I tried that on an old CL/Orb Sorc I had, my very first MF'er actually. It's just that it's not worth the loss in FCR, mana regen and +skills - especially on a Fire-based Sorceress. Also, if you ever plan to switch to the full Tal's set someday, I'd place those hard stats into Strength, rather than relying on the +15 from your belt. That is, of course, if and when you acquire said Tal Rasha's set. But until then, I just keep about 10-20 unspent stat points, just in case...

Oh, and you don't need to upgrade Magefists. I mean, defense isn't a particularly important stat for a Sorceress. But a Monarch requires 156 strength, and Crusader Gauntlets only require 151 strength. As they say, if the shoe fits... and extra defense is always a good thing.

Same goes for the Waterwalks. You can upgrade them for a little extra defense if you're a perfectionist. It helps only a little bit for teleporting to Act Bosses, but every little bit helps.

Your cookies are in the mail = X

ALRIGHT!!! :jig: Party in my pants!!

 

[MrKaxe]

MrKaxe - Personally, there's no way I would ever swich to Chancies from Magefists for MF purposes. I tried that on an old CL/Orb Sorc I had, my very first MF'er actually. It's just that it's not worth the loss in FCR, mana regen and +skills - especially on a Fire-based Sorceress. Also, if you ever plan to switch to the full Tal's set someday, I'd place those hard stats into Strength, rather than relying on the +15 from your belt. That is, of course, if and when you acquire said Tal Rasha's set. But until then, I just keep about 10-20 unspent stat points, just in case...

Oh, and you don't need to upgrade Magefists. I mean, defense isn't a particularly important stat for a Sorceress. But a Monarch requires 156 strength, and Crusader Gauntlets only require 151 strength. As they say, if the shoe fits... and extra defense is always a good thing.

Same goes for the Waterwalks. You can upgrade them for a little extra defense if you're a perfectionist. It helps only a little bit for teleporting to Act Bosses, but every little bit helps.

I would armour switch to Skulders for MF but I need the Res!! I do weapon switch to Ali's on bosses but that's about it...gloves and boots were the only thing I could switch out on without suffering tooooo much!
Sure, I agree on the Magies but it's pretty much all I can do without full Tal's for MF and you can be sure i'll rebuild when I do get the set as I have pumped Cold Mastery as I don't have the Orb's lovely bonuses!