should i put points into Fire Bolt of Mastery?

[waytofailself]

should i put points into Fire Bolt of Mastery?

I'm at a bit of a crossroads with my meteorb sorc. I'm finding Fireball to be much more user friendly PVM but the massive amounts of damage that meteor does is very helpful, especially now that i'm figuring out how to use it.

However, I'm a level away from maxing fireball, meteor, frozen orb, and enough points in CM to get it to 16 with +skills (tal's set & anni)

i've heard many people say dump the rest of points or w/e into fire mastery, but looking at the numbers makes me scratch my head a bit. with fire bolt you get a +14% synergy and +5% synergy to fireball and meteor respectively. however, with fire mastery i'd get a 7% damage bonus to both.

how much of a difference does that 2% make over time? i'm lv 71 right now i am not in a position to max both. i'm strongly leaning towards upping firebolt the rest of the way since meteor does so much damage already. is this a bonehead move or is there something i'm not seeing? i still have 19 points worth of synergy to get from firebolt...but mastery has no cap.

any thoughts or input would be greatly appreciated

 

[melianor]

There is a bigger difference you are not seeing. Mastery and synergy are calculated seperatly in the damage calculation, meaning the ratio of investing points into Firebolt or mastery is not that easy to figure out, BUT you should/must definitly put some point into Fire Mastery.
Though if you want Fireball to do greater damage you will in the end put a few points into Firebolt aswell, while some less into Fire Mastery.

Use a skill calculator to see for yourself, or simply look into sasja's Meteorb guide! She states there what you should do if you would like to have a higher damage Fireball, but not loose too much on Meteor.

Sasja's Meteorb Guide (3rd edition):
http://www.rpgforums.net/showthread.php?t=254070

Skill calculator:
http://stud4.tuwien.ac.at/~e9325732/skillcalc

 

[waytofailself]

There is a bigger difference you are not seeing. Mastery and synergy are calculated seperatly in the damage calculation, meaning the ratio of investing points into Firebolt or mastery is not that easy to figure out, BUT you should/must definitly put some point into Fire Mastery.
Though if you want Fireball to do greater damage you will in the end put a few points into Firebolt aswell, while some less into Fire Mastery.

Use a skill calculator to see for yourself, or simply look into sasja's Meteorb guide! She states there what you should do if you would like to have a higher damage Fireball, but not loose too much on Meteor.

Sasja's Meteorb Guide (3rd edition):
http://www.rpgforums.net/showthread.php?t=254070

Skill calculator:
http://stud4.tuwien.ac.at/~e9325732/skillcalc

so i could lose around 400 damage in fireball to gain a little over 900 damage for my meteors? thanks for the interesting number breakdown. based on calculations though, i think i'll go with at least 10 in mastery (just as that meteorb guide you linked to suggests)

however, i feel compelled to ask, could i feasibly get by in hell with a 14.9k meteor and a 7.3k fireball?

thanks

 

[Tuoppi]

however, i feel compelled to ask, could i feasibly get by in hell with a 14.9k meteor and a 7.3k fireball?

thanks

My Meteorb Sorceress has never had even close to that good Damage so I think you'll have no problems. She uses full Tal Rasha's Set, Lidless Wall, Magefist and Stone of Jordan that grant her +9 to Meteor, +9 to Fire Ball and +11 to Fire Mastery.

 

[waytofailself]

don't feel mortal, i just strongly miscalculated with the skill calculator and was unable to edit the post.

it's actually 2481 fireball damage and 5734 meteor at lv 74

am i going to be a damage gimp or will i survive as i level? so far things are a bit dicey but okay, but i'm only in act 4 hell. i also need help upping my resists to closer to max...but that's for another thread for another time

 

[Miladys-Knight]

so i could lose around 400 damage in fireball to gain a little over 900 damage for my meteors? thanks for the interesting number breakdown. based on calculations though, i think i'll go with at least 10 in mastery (just as that meteorb guide you linked to suggests)

however, i feel compelled to ask, could i feasibly get by in hell with a 14.9k meteor and a 7.3k fireball?

thanks

Something that you have not considered with this comment is that in the time it takes to cast and cool down a meteor you can cast 3 fireballs (that is if you have NO FCR you can cast more with just a little FCR)