200fcr Ice Sorc PvP

[Fast Ed]

200fcr Ice Sorc PvP

Once I get the gear together, I want to make a 200fcr Sorc.

But I'm wondering why all builds advocate using fire instead of ice attacks.

Using this builds gear, you get a total of +25 to skills. Which amounts to 19,500 fire damage per fireball.

If you use ice attacks, using only +24 to skills (can't count magefist), you have a 6000 damage ice blast. But, you have to factor in cold mastery (with 3 hard points to bring to level 27 for -150 resistance)

So as I understand it, take a dude with 75 resists to all

Fire damage (75 fire resist): 19500/6 = 3250x.25 = 812.5
Cold damage (-75 cold resist): 6000/6 = 1000x1.75 = 1750 close to twice as much

Would need 269 total cold resists for equal damage by both builds.

Someone with 95 resists to all

Fire damage (95 fire resists): 19500/6 = 3,250x.05 = 162.5
Cold damage (-55 resists): 6000/6 = 1000x1.55 = 1550 nearly 10x as much

Would need 334 total cold resists for equal damage.

Plus you get a 800 damage orb and 6300 damage blizzard which are much better auxiliary skills than meteor. You could even fully synergize blizzard (8300 dmg) if you wanted to go all the way up to level 96 (95 if you don't use warmth). Yes both of these skills don't care about FCR (neither does meteor) but they are still nice to have.

So am I missing something painfully obvious? I think this is the way to go if you have the gear. If people are going to overstack that much against you they must be sacrificing serious killing power.

 

[sirpoopsalot]

Re: 200fcr Ice Sorc PvP

I don't know a lot about PvP, so I can't comment on how well it would work in much detail. But I have played pretty extensively with each of the different cold skills in PvM, so...

I think the biggest thing that isn't apparent about Ice Blast is that the missile speed is slow. If Fireballs travel across the screen at 10 yards per second, then Ice Blast probably travels 6-7 yards per second. (those are fake numbers, but they illustrate the point). Any moderately-mobile opponent (i.e. all of 'em in PvP) might be very hard to hit simply because they can out-maneuver your missiles.

Another thing about Ice Blast is that it completely lacks an area of effect. I don't know how much of a difference it would have in PvP, but I can tell you (from my own pure Ice Blast sorc) that it has a huge effect in PvM.

Despite having ~1/3rd the power per missile, I vastly preferred my Glacial Spike sorceress to the Ice Blast one, and the faster missiles and bigger area of effect was the biggest reason for this. My instinct is that a Glacial Spike PvP sorc is a more viable idea (despite its lower damage) because it has faster missiles and the ability to hit more than one enemy in one shot.


My other comment would be that 105 FCR seems like a much more natural breakpoint for a cold sorc. That way you could utilize damage-boosting items like Death's Fathom, Nightwing's Veil, and/or Ormus Robes more easily. ~50% more damage seems like it would be well worth a single FCR breakpoint.

 

[Fast Ed]

Re: 200fcr Ice Sorc PvP

Very interesting points. The slower missiles do sound like a problem, but that also means (theoretically) more shots on the screen at once. Maybe that's just wishful thinking.

I guess I will have to test it and see which is better all around.

Also the merits of not ramping up to 200fcr are something I'll have to stubbornly ignore because tele at seven is all I could ever want to do.

 

[Millard]

Re: 200fcr Ice Sorc PvP

never make a 200 fcr cold sorc.

200 fcr means you can't use fathom (only 20 fcr) or nightwings (no fcr) so your cold damage will be absolutely terrible.
Plus most cold attacks (blizzard, orb) have a cooldown so fcr isn't as important as it is for lightning/fire.

going from 8 frame to 7 frame is not worth losing 40% of your damage.

edit: more info

as for your points about resistances fire vs frost... yeah dueling someone strait up who has no stacked resists and no absorb, iceblast will almost always beat out fireball. the problem is that there's lots of stuff that -cold resist doesn't matter vs:

1) Any sorc with energy shield... your resistances don't matter vs energy shield so fireball is going to be ~3x stronger vs the mana component of energy shield sorcs.

2) cyclone armor from druids works the same as above, fire /light is much more effective vs druids.

3) Anyone using ravenfrosts, very common melee ring, will take a big chunk out of your damage. lots of melee classes use dual ravenfrost simply for the AP and dext. which will cut your damage by 80%.

4) anyone stacking cold resist higher than 75 will turn your damage to garbage very fast... note that even if someone's resistances are maxed on the char screen, extra resists over the cap cancel out cold mastery. -150% cold mastery isn't really enough IMO, cause some people will stack resists. and there's zero reason not to get cold mastery to at least -175. (then there are the people who run around with 160 or 200 (pally) frost resist shields. but that's not any more good mannered than using hotspurs vs a fire sorc, so nothing you can do about that. )

the other problem with iceblast in particular but not frost in general is that the projectile speed is very very slow, so its really only good as a very short range attack wheras fireball and lightning bolt can be shot from long distances to some effecitveness. although realistically you'll be using blizzard as your main attack.

i'm not saying cold sorcs are bad compared to fire or light, i think its fairly well balanced actually... but the damage output is higher on paper than in practice, and in any case 200 fcr is totally not needed for cold.



edit: to reply to sirpoopsalot

Another thing about Ice Blast is that it completely lacks an area of effect. I don't know how much of a difference it would have in PvP, but I can tell you (from my own pure Ice Blast sorc) that it has a huge effect in PvM.

the aoe effect makes very little difference. it only matters vs people with minions but most of the time the minion will either be: a) stacked directly on top of the player, protecting the player from aoe splash damage* or 2) too far away to take or give splash damage. i'm not saying splash damage its useless, but it rarely matters, and iceblast > glacial spike in PvP generally speaking.

*this is a weird glitch which you will get to know very well if you ever duel a PvP enigma necro summoner with 50 minions. they're basically impossible to kill until 90% of their army is dead.

Despite having ~1/3rd the power per missile, I vastly preferred my Glacial Spike sorceress to the Ice Blast one, and the faster missiles and bigger area of effect was the biggest reason for this. My instinct is that a Glacial Spike PvP sorc is a more viable idea (despite its lower damage) because it has faster missiles and the ability to hit more than one enemy in one shot.

you're very correct about missile speed being a huge problem for iceblast, but glacial spike isn't viable because of the short range and, really, its pretty slow too, although not as slow as iceblast. for PvP, both are only good as very short (basically melee range) attacks, except iceblast does more damage. iceblast is almost always a better choice than glacial spike for PvP situations simply because you'll only be using either as very short range attacks and iceblast does twice as much damage.

(although i will sometimes use (level 1) glacial spike on my orber to keep bowzons in dodgelock. thats really its only use for me. but my cold sorc is orb/es, and not spec'd for either iceblast or glacial spike. )

My other comment would be that 105 FCR seems like a much more natural breakpoint for a cold sorc. That way you could utilize damage-boosting items like Death's Fathom, Nightwing's Veil, and/or Ormus Robes more easily. ~50% more damage seems like it would be well worth a single FCR breakpoint.

this is the precise reason that you'd never consider going past 105 on a cold sorc.