Re: AN effective MF run?
What is needed for a sucessful and effective MF run?
patience & practice.
Patience: because you won't get good things as often as you'd like - sometimes you'll go several hundred runs with a dry-spell, which is discouraging, but it happens to all of us.
Practice: because you'll eventually start to go faster as you gain more familiarity with your character's strengths & weaknesses, learning to capitalize on the former and minimize the latter.
But to try answer your question closer to terms you were probably looking for, it's important to try to balance three things: power, speed, and safety. For example, if you're not safe enough, you slow down, so you find less items over time (and if you find more items, there are better odds that one of them will be good). MF comes
after power, speed, and safety. Tal Rasha's provides a nice start on all of those things, including MF.
On top of that, an important equipment-bonus to look for is Faster Cast Rate (FCR). The Tal's set isn't bad in that regard, but it's hardly spectacular - so a lot of people use their gloves (Magefists) & shield (Spirit) & maybe rings (rares) to try to boost their FCR. If you don't have (at least) 63 total FCR, you'll be casting many of your spells (somewhat) slowly. A lot of folks try to get at least 105 FCR. (if you're not familiar with "FCR breakpoints", try using the search tool for an explanation of what these are - when it comes time to layout your equipment, they're often important for your sorc). That's basically the 'speed' element of your sorceress.
Likewise, items that increase your skill levels will increase your damage, which again will improve your speed (which, of course, means you kill faster/find more items). +Skills = power.
Finally, in relation to the safety-aspect of your needs, first and foremost is your elemental resistances - you want your resistances to at least be positive numbers, preferably over 50, and usually the full 75 resists is nice (especially for fire & lightning - the two most important resists).
And after that, it pretty much goes back to patience & practice. Afterall, without those two things, MF is a matter of luck. With patience & practice you
will get some good things though. Eventually.
