need some help with my build...

[Prey]

need some help with my build...

First, hello all, this is my first post I've been a "lurker" for a few weeks, and have been playing the game for about a month. Let me also preface saying that I tend to be very detailed, so please bear with me and my thanks in advance to those who read and offer their insight...

Alas, like everyone else, I want to make an MFing sorc for new ladder that is both effective, and enjoyable. I made a blizzard sorc on the old ladder, and while it worked very well, I simply couldn't deal with cold immunes. I think it was because I didn't have any good gear for my merc, and I also was unable to level him up above level80...But regardless, I also just did not find it appealing to have a single tree sorceress.

So I want a dual tree. As lightning requires far too many synergies to be effective, along with my disinclination for the low minimum damage, that's probably out. Thus comes the conclusion of the meteorb: I find frozen orb and fireball two of the most "fun" skills to use (along with chainlightning, but I feel lightning is not as viable in a dual-tree sorc as cold/fire are). and blizzard seems like a waste if you're not going to invent in all the synergies, not to mention orb as a godsend for the dual-tree sorc because of its cheapness.

Here's where my questions come in, stay with me...

I really REALLY don't like meteor, so I was planning to pump it just to synergize fireball and for the "moat trick" on meph...however, I am distressed at people saying that meteor is needed in a full game to do enough dmg. I also would prefer to have orb as my main strong skill, with my fire just to deal with immunes, whereas most meteorb builds are investing more points for fire as their main skill, with orb to deal with immunes. Therefore, I am considering doing:

points in static, telekinesis, teleport, frozen armor
points in prereq
40 points in fire tree
rest of points into cold tree to maximize the power of FO!

Now you guys might be wondering "only 40 points in fire skills? that's way too weak?" Well here's my biggest question...How come I've never seen any FrozenOrb/Firewall build guides? Firewall has no synergies, which means you get its full damage potential for just 40 hard skill points and then are free to put everything else in your main attack, in my case orb. Of course, the reason I am posting is because I want to know what people think of this, i.e., is firewall too difficult to use and therefore not as good as meteor/fireball? Or is the damage simply not enough (I think it's around 6k, including +skills).

Now, I have a second question. According to the (excellent) meteorb guide by sasja (? I forget the name..sorry!) on here, cold mastery is optimal with 8 hard points so that the +skills bring it to level17. Now, assuming my above plan is given the ok as a viable build, or even assuming I use a mere 40 points on meteor/fireball in the fire tree, since I want FO to be my "main" attack skill, should I pump CM further to help me with the monsters who have cold resistance, or should I start investing in its synergy, ice bolt? (only 2% per lvl but I assume that adds up per shard..) Maxing FO, CM, and IB altogether seems not an option since that wouldn't leave me the requisite 40 points in the fire tree.

So I guess in conclusion, another way of putting my questions is: can i use firewall, if not can I only have 40 points in the fire tree and use FO as my main attack, and if so after I have put 40 points (or 44 or whatever including prereqs) if I want to use FO as my main attack, do I start dumping my excess points post-level80 into CM, or into ice bolt? and again I repeat this sorc is just for MFing...i want to do the most out of baal, diablo, andy, pindle, meph, countess, the pit

thanks so much for the feedback guys, I'm only lvl18 on the new ladder so there's no rush

 

[lonnie913]

here is the truth: frozen orb does not do a lot of damage in hell. it does the most damage for less than 40 skills points (including synergies and mastery it usually costs 30something skill points). no skill can compete with frozen orb for damage with 30ish skill points. BUT once you invest 60 skill points in a skill (meteor/fireball/mastery or lightnin/chain/mastery) these skills do the real damage for a dual tree sorceress. frozen orb ends up being the back up (after nightmare is done.... frozen orb rules through nightmare).

other things:
1) investing in frozen orb synergy is not worth the points. ice bolt only gives 2% damage per point, which is a terrible return. the synergy probably would make a noticeable improvement on frozen orb but it would cause another problem...

2) 40 points in the fire tree does not give you a very reliable back up skill. fireball will just not do enough damage without meteor as a synergy. firewall is also a possibility but its not nearly as good as maxed fireball/meteor/mastery.

3) what do you hate about meteor so much? with maxed synergies and +10 to skills or so, it gets pretty nice...10-12k damage which handles pretty well in 8 player hell games, and if you rain fireball in between it kills mephisto better than frozen orb easily. mercenary, glacial spike, and defensive teleporting are important for good meteor use.

4) usually when my meteorb sorceress finishes maxing fireball/meteor/mastery i put a few extra points in cold mastery (to go past lvl 17). other people will advocate firebolt.

5) the idea of magic finding is to kill the same bosses over and over as fast as possible with minimum danger. no matter how much you hate meteor, or wish blizzard would kill cold immunes, these skills provide the most damage for skill point investment. the reason people use blizzard sorceresses is b/c all it ever does is kill mephisto. teleport to mephisto, kill mephisto... over and over again. what cold immunes? :lol:

the end result is... pure lightning, fire, cold, meteorb, and lightning/cold are the most effecient sorceresses for damage. other builds will work and can be fun, but they wont be the best at killing things as fast as possible.

 

[Prey]

hey, thanks for the feedback

alright..I guess I'm just going to do a meteorb sorc...

What I don't like about meteor is that it takes forever to launch. In hell difficulty doing like anya quest for example, I get destroyed before the first meteor even drops. Perhaps this could be helped by using stormshield or a better armor? What armor do you recommend for a meteorb? (preferably nothing that requires a hr, i doubt I could get my hands on one)

Do I really gotta max fire mastery even if I just want to play in solo or 2/3 player games? And just to be clear, since I'll only have about 5 to 10 extra points after the build is complete, if I wanted to put them in the cold tree, do I pump cold mastery beyond level8 or do i start investing in ice bolt?

thanks again,

prey

 

[lonnie913]

yes meteorb takes forever to drop. it takes some change in strategy to use it well. some tips i gave someone in another thread:

***also as a playstyle sort of things i tend to do two things a lot that help my merc survive. i sprinkle in glacial spikes to freeze everything around him (in fact, when my character and merc are weak i sometimes exclusively use meteor + glacial spike b/c its safer). and also i teleport...A LOT. i teleport to keep my merc from being overwhelmed and to keep the enemies occupied. once you teleport (not far, just one step from where you were) you merc comes with you and the monsters stop attacking to walk to your merc again. when im against tough monsters with weak equipment i teleport approximately every 2 seconds. im not exaggerating...it really helps your merc survive and merc survival is vital to the untwinked sorceress.***

if youre going after mephisto, then you definitely gotta max the fire mastery. he has a lot of life and it takes 4 or 5 meteors with fireballs b/n to take him down (last i remember, i havent mf'ed mephisto with meteorb in a while).

after i get FO/17CM, maxed fb/meteor/mastery, i tend to put extra points into cold mastery. others will advocate fire bolt. someone might even say ice bolt. up to you really.

as for armor, there are lots of good choices. you dont give any ideas on price so heres are some ideas: for mf - tals rashas guardianship or skullder ire. skins of the vipermagi is a great armor. there are a lot of serviceable armors, check the meteorb guide.

 

[Superhal]

dealing with immunes is relatively simple for a sorc. for all random bosses, skip them. for quest bosses you don't have to kill (baal's minions), move them. for quest bosses you have to kill (council, ancients) it is simple to divide them with teleport and have your merc kill them.

to make your merc buff enough to handle these folks 1 on 1, you need:
1. a good weapon, eth obedience is my personal choice.
2. crushing blow, obedience comes with 45% or something.
3. defense in the form of high leech/lifetap or a tank (yourself.) a minimal tk/es (ex. 5/1) build will allow you to tank most things, and except for ancients, the merc can kill just about anything non-pi with an insight elite (eth is more effective but not necessary) weapon if you tank.

[edit] example setups for an a2 merc:
wep: obedience, elite insight, reaper's toll, bonehew, tombreaver
armor: duress, prudence, fort, eth duriel's shell
helm: crown of thieves, andy's