Pure Blizzard vs Pure Orb

[wangboBW]

To be honest, damage for Blizzard past 10k or so won't make much difference in PvP Pubbies one way or another. Above that amount of damage you'll pretty much 1 hit kill anyone who doesn't prepare for you, and everyone else will be absorbing you.

Also, absorbing Blizzard isn't more difficult, it just requires a different approach. Most people's ideas of absorbing linger from 1.09 days when Cold Mastery was unstoppable and thus Ravens were the only choice. Now with the nerfed Cold Mastery all it takes to absorb Blizzard is to get around Cold Mastery which isn't terribly difficult nowadays.

With the gear he has got, you would need like 500 stacked cold resist in hell even to think about taking that sorc on. But then, of course, that leaves that sorc very vunerable to 1 hit KO from virtually anything.

 

[bartekwoda]

To be honest, damage for Blizzard past 10k or so won't make much difference in PvP Pubbies one way or another. Above that amount of damage you'll pretty much 1 hit kill anyone who doesn't prepare for you, and everyone else will be absorbing you.

Also, absorbing Blizzard isn't more difficult, it just requires a different approach. Most people's ideas of absorbing linger from 1.09 days when Cold Mastery was unstoppable and thus Ravens were the only choice. Now with the nerfed Cold Mastery all it takes to absorb Blizzard is to get around Cold Mastery which isn't terribly difficult nowadays.

What do you mean cold mastery has been nerfed? On the contrary - before the marginal increase in the -cold resist was smaller and smaller with every additional skill point. Now it increases it by 5% every time. Therefore, you can get -200% to cold resist, which was impossible to obtain in 1.09.
Second, I can think of no way that you could absorb 15,000 cold damage from blizzard. I duelled a barb once - 3000 life, 90% cold resist, blackoak shield (about 50 cold absorb), snowclash (15 cold absorb) and 2 ravens and he..... died in 1 hit (my blizz doesnt do 18k, but it does 15k, which is still a lot).

 

[senji]

you can get 105% fcr with death fathom sw sash 2 fcr ring blizz ormus magefist and a fcr amulet and still maintain about 12k+ dmg.

you can negate cold mastery but it will really cripple your overall setup and there probably isn't any char except for (sor) that can keep up with a sorc's tele if they use all that anti cold gear

you can get about -250% cold resist with sor now you need about 500+ cold resist to duel this kind of sor in hell mode

 

[AndyChrono]

What do you mean cold mastery has been nerfed? On the contrary - before the marginal increase in the -cold resist was smaller and smaller with every additional skill point. Now it increases it by 5% every time. Therefore, you can get -200% to cold resist, which was impossible to obtain in 1.09.
Second, I can think of no way that you could absorb 15,000 cold damage from blizzard. I duelled a barb once - 3000 life, 90% cold resist, blackoak shield (about 50 cold absorb), snowclash (15 cold absorb) and 2 ravens and he..... died in 1 hit (my blizz doesnt do 18k, but it does 15k, which is still a lot).

Hmmm first, Cold Mastery was infinitely more powerful back in 1.09. Not only did it affect resistances differently, but the order of resolution on resists is first cold mastery, and THEN the difficulty penalty. Perhaps an example will suffice.

1.09
Assume Hell Duels, 500% Stacked Cold Resist on your opponent and 95% Cold Mastery which was like around level 38 or so.

500% CR after 95% Cold Mastery reduction became a good old 25% Cold Resist. After this, the Hell difficulty penalty comes into play and subtracts 100 from this so you opponent would have -75 Resists. This was why no one stacked resists back in 1.09 because you would need about 2000 Cold Resist just to break even against Cold Mastery.


1.10
Now assume the same thing in today's environment. Level 38 Cold Mastery + some facets. I'll just say its about -250 Cold Resist although its probably lower than this.

500% CR after cold mastery now becomes 250 Cold Resist and then apply the hell penalty gives your opponent 150 Cold Resist now which means your opponent still has well over maxed resist.


That wonderful barb example there doesn't paint the whole picture. The resistances you have listed on your character stat screen doesn't show how much stacking you have. Cold Mastery would eat through a plain old 90% Resist VERY easily if they weren't stacked well past that level. I see ignorant barbs in duel games all the time using Guardian Angel without stacked resist and they end up killing all sorcs except cold ones. Not to mention that 3000 life is rather poor for a PvP barb.

As for absorbing that kind of blizz. Hmmm...

Get about 450 Total Cold Resist which is enough to nullify -250 Resists, Hell Penalty, and still have over 95% left over. 2 Ravens, Snowclash for absorb.

Using the top of the line 18k Blizz against that.
18k / PvP Penalty ~ 3000
3000 / 95% Cold Resist ~ 150
150 / 2 Ravens ~ 30
30 / 15 Plain Absorb from Snowclash = 0 -> Negated

Anything less than an 18k Blizz will be healing them. You might say thats a rather large sacrifice to your dueling gear but your opponent is immune to you. He doesn't even have to give up his weapon to put all this on. If its a barb you're dueling they can use a Wizardspike /w UM rune which gives them cast rate, resistances, and Open Wounds. Then they just negate your damage and use open wounds to kill you slowly.

Wizspike /w UM
4-P.Sapphire Shield
Enigma
Snowclash
20 FCR Circlet /w OHM
20 FCR Caster Amulet /w Resists
Magefists
Rare Boots /w Resists
2 Ravens

Some Cold Resist charms for stacking.

That setup lets a Barb negate your damage AND have 8 frame cast which is just as fast as you. He'll just kill you slowly with open wounds and when you get to 1 life wizspike is just as good as any other weapon.

There are quite a few other setups that allow classes to negate damage or almost negate damage and still be effective in killing you. But that's another post altogether =D.

 

[bartekwoda]

Hmmm first, Cold Mastery was infinitely more powerful back in 1.09. Not only did it affect resistances differently, but the order of resolution on resists is first cold mastery, and THEN the difficulty penalty. Perhaps an example will suffice.

1.09
Assume Hell Duels, 500% Stacked Cold Resist on your opponent and 95% Cold Mastery which was like around level 38 or so.

500% CR after 95% Cold Mastery reduction became a good old 25% Cold Resist. After this, the Hell difficulty penalty comes into play and subtracts 100 from this so you opponent would have -75 Resists. This was why no one stacked resists back in 1.09 because you would need about 2000 Cold Resist just to break even against Cold Mastery.


1.10
Now assume the same thing in today's environment. Level 38 Cold Mastery + some facets. I'll just say its about -250 Cold Resist although its probably lower than this.

500% CR after cold mastery now becomes 250 Cold Resist and then apply the hell penalty gives your opponent 150 Cold Resist now which means your opponent still has well over maxed resist.


That wonderful barb example there doesn't paint the whole picture. The resistances you have listed on your character stat screen doesn't show how much stacking you have. Cold Mastery would eat through a plain old 90% Resist VERY easily if they weren't stacked well past that level. I see ignorant barbs in duel games all the time using Guardian Angel without stacked resist and they end up killing all sorcs except cold ones. Not to mention that 3000 life is rather poor for a PvP barb.

As for absorbing that kind of blizz. Hmmm...

Get about 450 Total Cold Resist which is enough to nullify -250 Resists, Hell Penalty, and still have over 95% left over. 2 Ravens, Snowclash for absorb.

Using the top of the line 18k Blizz against that.
18k / PvP Penalty ~ 3000
3000 / 95% Cold Resist ~ 150
150 / 2 Ravens ~ 30
30 / 15 Plain Absorb from Snowclash = 0 -> Negated

Anything less than an 18k Blizz will be healing them. You might say thats a rather large sacrifice to your dueling gear but your opponent is immune to you. He doesn't even have to give up his weapon to put all this on. If its a barb you're dueling they can use a Wizardspike /w UM rune which gives them cast rate, resistances, and Open Wounds. Then they just negate your damage and use open wounds to kill you slowly.

Wizspike /w UM
4-P.Sapphire Shield
Enigma
Snowclash
20 FCR Circlet /w OHM
20 FCR Caster Amulet /w Resists
Magefists
Rare Boots /w Resists
2 Ravens

Some Cold Resist charms for stacking.

That setup lets a Barb negate your damage AND have 8 frame cast which is just as fast as you. He'll just kill you slowly with open wounds and when you get to 1 life wizspike is just as good as any other weapon.

There are quite a few other setups that allow classes to negate damage or almost negate damage and still be effective in killing you. But that's another post altogether =D.

Hmmm..yes, I'm convinced, except that..stacking so much cold resist is not easy. Not many people will actually do it. Not everyone holds 30 cold resist charms in their inventory just to duel against cold sorcs. But I see how it's theoretically possible.

 

[senji]

Hmmm first, Cold Mastery was infinitely more powerful back in 1.09. Not only did it affect resistances differently, but the order of resolution on resists is first cold mastery, and THEN the difficulty penalty. Perhaps an example will suffice.

1.09
Assume Hell Duels, 500% Stacked Cold Resist on your opponent and 95% Cold Mastery which was like around level 38 or so.

500% CR after 95% Cold Mastery reduction became a good old 25% Cold Resist. After this, the Hell difficulty penalty comes into play and subtracts 100 from this so you opponent would have -75 Resists. This was why no one stacked resists back in 1.09 because you would need about 2000 Cold Resist just to break even against Cold Mastery.


1.10
Now assume the same thing in today's environment. Level 38 Cold Mastery + some facets. I'll just say its about -250 Cold Resist although its probably lower than this.

500% CR after cold mastery now becomes 250 Cold Resist and then apply the hell penalty gives your opponent 150 Cold Resist now which means your opponent still has well over maxed resist.


That wonderful barb example there doesn't paint the whole picture. The resistances you have listed on your character stat screen doesn't show how much stacking you have. Cold Mastery would eat through a plain old 90% Resist VERY easily if they weren't stacked well past that level. I see ignorant barbs in duel games all the time using Guardian Angel without stacked resist and they end up killing all sorcs except cold ones. Not to mention that 3000 life is rather poor for a PvP barb.

As for absorbing that kind of blizz. Hmmm...

Get about 450 Total Cold Resist which is enough to nullify -250 Resists, Hell Penalty, and still have over 95% left over. 2 Ravens, Snowclash for absorb.

Using the top of the line 18k Blizz against that.
18k / PvP Penalty ~ 3000
3000 / 95% Cold Resist ~ 150
150 / 2 Ravens ~ 30
30 / 15 Plain Absorb from Snowclash = 0 -> Negated

Anything less than an 18k Blizz will be healing them. You might say thats a rather large sacrifice to your dueling gear but your opponent is immune to you. He doesn't even have to give up his weapon to put all this on. If its a barb you're dueling they can use a Wizardspike /w UM rune which gives them cast rate, resistances, and Open Wounds. Then they just negate your damage and use open wounds to kill you slowly.

Wizspike /w UM
4-P.Sapphire Shield
Enigma
Snowclash
20 FCR Circlet /w OHM
20 FCR Caster Amulet /w Resists
Magefists
Rare Boots /w Resists
2 Ravens

Some Cold Resist charms for stacking.

That setup lets a Barb negate your damage AND have 8 frame cast which is just as fast as you. He'll just kill you slowly with open wounds and when you get to 1 life wizspike is just as good as any other weapon.

There are quite a few other setups that allow classes to negate damage or almost negate damage and still be effective in killing you. But that's another post altogether =D.

might work in softcore but not true in hardcore.

to duel against stackers a sorc would load up a wf merc + lower resist wand
its not easy to ww a sorc who teles alot with a range 1 weapon like wizardspike.
if you waste a second to switch weapon the sor is gone. your only chance of winning is relying on openwounds.
if the sor uses juvs it would take forever to kill her but seeing most people don't use potions on sc i don't know how long duels take there.

i say the sor would still win

 

[AndyChrono]

If you're dueling hardcore then everyone pots so that's hardly a sorc-exclusive advantage. The WF merc will simply have a grand old time trying to hit an 8-frame teleporting character. Even if the merc does land a hit, a 6k life barb isn't going to be killed by that instantly.

The barb can use a merc also and since he has 8-frame cast just like you do he's on equal ground. A melee merc would also work since they do much more damage and attack faster; all the barb has to do is teleport on top of you for a split-second and your WF merc is gone. Also if you use a LR wand on switch that means no CTA so you'll die faster anyway.

 

[senji]

no you first bo then switch to lr wand. its hard to be a 6k life barb while maintaining 450+ cold resist the sor would still have the advantage over you with lr wand and a range merc

there isn't any kind of rule set on hardcore duels from what i see no melee can ever kill a caster one could just tele all day with you, eg tele to monsters that have curse so it curses you or find a conviction boss

if you tele on top of the sor 1 iceblast will take care of a merc since you need wizspike for 8 frame casting you won't hurt the sor assuming both char's merc is dead the sor still have a lr wand against you

 

[Crazy-Jon]

orb or blizzard? heh simply answered blizzard is good if thats all you want to do. i prefer orb. less points into synergies means mmore points into other useful skills. yes blizzard is more powerful but one immune to cold monster will ruin your day. not to mention the most powerful spell a sorceress has is static feild. dont know of any other spell that can take diablo down to half life in 2.5 seconds or less.

When you concentrate all your force into one place, then you leave the rest unprotected. Diversify

(currently working on an orb nova ladder sorc and tanking baals minions solo in hell is fun)

 

[AndyChrono]

Then if I'm the barb I'll just wait for a couple minutes until your BO runs out and then kill you. You can only get like level 3 LR on wands anyway which equal to about 4 more cold resist small charms; hardly a consequence. As for maintaining 6k life...

160 Cold Res from Shield
75 from Wizspike
Say 20 on amulet, circlet, and boots each
30 From anya quests
50 or so from Natural Resist
Average anni say 15 Resist

Thats 390 Cold Resist right there already. So even if you used a lower resist wand so that the barb would need about 500 total cold resist to maintain 95% Cold Resist, that's still only about 10-11 Cold Resist SC's. The other 28 or so SC's would be with life, and with BO weapons on switch you'd still get close to 6k life without too much difficulty. Now if the barb has SC's with cold resist & life then he'll pack 6k life very easily.

The barb who uses 8-frame cast setup like I descibed earlier could also be using a ranged merc, negating any advantage you would have had with yours. Also if the barb tele's on top of you with a melee merc, its unlikely you could iceblast the merc before it totally destroys the rogue unless you have inhuman reflexes. Ah yes and finally, if we're assuming totally godly equipment which we probably are since we're talking about sorcs with 15k+ blizzard and such, the barb's other non-resist charms could easily be 3/20/20's giving him around 2000 damage with wizardspikes, more than enough to take down your merc even without a merc of his own. I know a barb on SC NL West who uses a setup similar to this and if you'd like a demonstration of the futility of a blizz sorc against such a setup I'm sure he'd be happy to oblige you. He'd probably end up winning even if he didn't negate you.

Now as for HC duels where everyone chickens when they are about to die then sure, the barb may never kill the sorc since once she runs out of pots she'll leave the game, but the sorc certainly will never have any hope of killing the barb either.

 

[pryzmatik2]

As far as i see it... blizzard is like orb, cept with all the shards concentrated into one area, and orb with the damage spread out between a buncha shards... then i again my sight aint 20/20 :cheesy: .

But anyway I enjoy using blizzard right now in pvp, and orb is just way too easy to absorb.

 

[theBlackKnight]

PVM Untwinked : blizzard ( good for early ladder )
PVM Twinked: Orb ( good for after you find a few + skill items )

PVP: Low Budget : Blizzard ( high damage with fewer + skills )
PVP: High Budget: Can afford to make anti bone mancer orb / ES sorc with mass MDR and DR ( not % )

 

[yuqing]

Hmmm first, Cold Mastery was infinitely more powerful back in 1.09. Not only did it affect resistances differently, but the order of resolution on resists is first cold mastery, and THEN the difficulty penalty. Perhaps an example will suffice.1.09
Assume Hell Duels, 500% Stacked Cold Resist on your opponent and 95% Cold Mastery which was like around level 38 or so.

500% CR after 95% Cold Mastery reduction became a good old 25% Cold Resist. After this, the Hell difficulty penalty comes into play and subtracts 100 from this so you opponent would have -75 Resists. This was why no one stacked resists back in 1.09 because you would need about 2000 Cold Resist just to break even against Cold Mastery.


1.10
Now assume the same thing in today's environment. Level 38 Cold Mastery + some facets. I'll just say its about -250 Cold Resist although its probably lower than this.

500% CR after cold mastery now becomes 250 Cold Resist and then apply the hell penalty gives your opponent 150 Cold Resist now which means your opponent still has well over maxed resist.


That wonderful barb example there doesn't paint the whole picture. The resistances you have listed on your character stat screen doesn't show how much stacking you have. Cold Mastery would eat through a plain old 90% Resist VERY easily if they weren't stacked well past that level. I see ignorant barbs in duel games all the time using Guardian Angel without stacked resist and they end up killing all sorcs except cold ones. Not to mention that 3000 life is rather poor for a PvP barb.

As for absorbing that kind of blizz. Hmmm...

Get about 450 Total Cold Resist which is enough to nullify -250 Resists, Hell Penalty, and still have over 95% left over. 2 Ravens, Snowclash for absorb.

Using the top of the line 18k Blizz against that.
18k / PvP Penalty ~ 3000
3000 / 95% Cold Resist ~ 150
150 / 2 Ravens ~ 30
30 / 15 Plain Absorb from Snowclash = 0 -> Negated

Anything less than an 18k Blizz will be healing them. You might say thats a rather large sacrifice to your dueling gear but your opponent is immune to you. He doesn't even have to give up his weapon to put all this on. If its a barb you're dueling they can use a Wizardspike /w UM rune which gives them cast rate, resistances, and Open Wounds. Then they just negate your damage and use open wounds to kill you slowly.

Wizspike /w UM
4-P.Sapphire Shield
Enigma
Snowclash
20 FCR Circlet /w OHM
20 FCR Caster Amulet /w Resists
Magefists
Rare Boots /w Resists
2 Ravens

Some Cold Resist charms for stacking.

That setup lets a Barb negate your damage AND have 8 frame cast which is just as fast as you. He'll just kill you slowly with open wounds and when you get to 1 life wizspike is just as good as any other weapon.

There are quite a few other setups that allow classes to negate damage or almost negate damage and still be effective in killing you. But that's another post altogether =D.

so think about it ppl, if that can absorb blizz, it can also do orb, even easier, so think, that is NOT a reason that orb is better then blizz.

 

[AndyChrono]

Actually I've already posted earlier why I think Orb is better than Blizzard in a PvP environment although I did assume that they would be private duels with rules. Here's the gist of things in PvP though.

In private dueling any amount of resistance stacking is allowed except in sorc vs. sorc. The only real rule is that you can't be healing from your opponent. Resist stacking and using some absorb so that Blizzard does around 200 a hit is pretty much standard in private duels. The same amount of absorb would reduce orb to around 20 damage a shard, but its FAR FAR easier to land hits with orb which more than makes up the damage difference. If you're dueling strategy relies on 1-hit kills you're going to be in for a rude awakening in any form of private dueling where sorcs don't dish those out, they only receive them.

If you're mostly dueling in pubbies you'll only encounter two types of people. First there's people who know how to absorb you properly and those people you won't beat whether you use orb or blizzard since you'll be healing them or doing negligable damage. Second, there's people who don't know how to absorb you properly and you can kill those people with both Orb and Blizzard pretty easily. This is why dueling in pubbies exclusively doesn't help develop skill much. Either you totally own your opponent because they are completely unprepared for you, or they are immune to you. Either way you learn virtually nothing about dueling. All you learn is what to watch out for (e.g Blue Shields = P.Sapphed Shield = Bad).

Bottomline is Orb isn't any worse than Blizzard in pubbies and better in private dueling. Its also far more versatile for PvM and just as good for all-around MF as well. Admittedly though, Blizzard excels at Baal running because the minions spawn in conveneintly packed groups which are perfect for blizzard.

 

[Crazy-Jon]

well as far as baals minions go, hopefully nobody catches on and they stay that way. but everyone knows how they like to ruin a good thing. plus sanctuary runs are better, odds are you'll get more rares sets and uniques in one diablo run then 3 baal runs (that is of course unless you're sitting at over 500 mf) i run with slightly over 200% mf in the sanc with orb, couldnt imagine being able to do it at all with blizz would just take too much time. maybe im just addicted to the whole cast orb and try to catch it (run right behind it) to clear out baddies. this whole thread pretty much boils down to one question

Do you bring the damage to the monsters, or do you make the monsters come to the damage?

i hate just teleporting to the bosses i get more uniques killing along the way
(soj shaft wiz spike) not to mention charms jewels and money to res my merc
and yes my ladder account is only about 3 weeks old (I'm a Newb and proud of it)