Topic: New Sorceress Question and Skill Cap Question

[Darkkatgirl]

Ok, I never really played a sorceress.  I was thinking of making her a pure lightning, focusing on Charged Bolt and Lightning Bolt with -% to Lightning resist on monster items and something that gives me Lower Resist.

Is this a good idea? Need some expert sorc advise

Also the caps on skills (and synergies) have changed alot.  What is the current cap?  What I mean by cap is in Blizzard LOD you could only have 20 in any skill before having to get items to increase it.  What is the new cap if any?  Could I have a level 99 charged bolt before items? (not that I would do that)

[webwalker]

You can put 30 skill points in any skill.  +skill items can boost that to a max of 100.

Figure out what you want your sorc skill set to be at level 90, starting hell/cgs.
89*2+24 = 202 skill points.
How will you handle lightning-immune monsters?

If you also have fire damage, how will you handle double-immune monsters?

I've seen 4 immunities on a monster at once.  .:. 90 points in Warmth, Enchant, and Fire Mastery, with a Faith bow for fanaticism, give fire & physical damage; a beeswarm or Ranger's Sting bow does likewise without the fanaticism.

[sathraloth]

max is 30
only lightning is bad.
perhaps use fo or ench.
if u use fo, you max warmth as a synergy.
you get lower resist by the stash.
i think it's 100 dolls or something like that.
edit: webwalker was faster

[bdpf]

@Darkcatgirl

I don't pay much attention to the max dmg of anyone skill.

I just run mostly sorc and zon guys.

A sorc with skill points spread out on ice, lighting and fire works fine.

Use just one point on on most skills till you have a 20+ points in reserve.

You need to put extra points on fire ball, gacail spike and shield, till you can
use the ice orb, and chain lighting.

Then snow strom and thunder.

Two green sets work nicely for a sorc. Cortai and Irashia (hope I spelled those right)
work nicely at first. Then star using rune words on secondary weapons and shield.
Of coarse my Sorcs are half fighter / wariors.

Fire ball is your main spell till you can use Iceorb. Use charms too your best advantage.
Around 30 lvl you can start to use none set items with rune words to boust your dmg, lech, and skills. Tempered rune word items work nice for extra bonouses.

I find that the defensive static sheld pulls too muck mana, to be usefull. It can leav you alive with no mana to cast an offensive spell to kill the monstern.

A single skill Sorc might work nice with a group and be flashy, but in single play it just dies in the end.

bdpf

[Olfmo]

i am sorry bdpf but what you are writing is really nonsense

a sorc using all 3 skill trees may be good until a certain level but you'll NEVER get any further in hell with her

there are 2 kinds of sorc

1) melee using enchant, warmth, fire mastery, lightning mastery, energy shield and telekinesis. you can use ww from the whirling dervish boots, or bu from blessings of osiris or drunken fury, or beeswarm with multishot to distribute your damage. for further information look into the guide section

2) caster-sorc

a) frozen orb, telekinesis, chain lightning, energy shield
this one uses fo and cl for the masses and tk for single monsters. to protect herself she got energy shield and much mana, along with maxed warmth (fo synergie)

b) nova-sorc using frost nova and nova, haven't played one in a while so i really don't know how to skill it


first you should decide what kind of sorc you wanna play then we can give you more advice

[bdpf]

@Olfmo

Then how have I finished the mod with my sorcs in the low ninty levels, unsualy with a normal rouge.

In fact it be easir in CE mod than others and regular D2 LOD.

In fact most of the time my zons and sorc run around with extra skill and stat points not used....

So there.javascript:void(0);

In single play a one skill sorc just dies out in the end.

bdpf

[Olfmo]

you are telling me that you finished hell in sp with a sorc that used all three skill trees? if you did, you earned my respect

and i'd like to know how you distributed your skills and stat points and which items you used...

[bdpf]

@oflmo

Right now I'm just running a old sorc thru Act 5.
Just put the uber cheat charms in inventory.
Went from 20k dmg to 55k general dmg.
fire ball, chain lighting + ice dmg all 20k or higher
She is 94 lvl now just leveled
All skills set in lower 90's, thanks to umber cheat charms
Have 48 stat points in reserve.
22 skill points in reserve too.

Only problem is that she moves real slow with all the bennies now. Need faster computer now.

Been just looking for better rune words to give her better dmg and def with out using all the charms.

There seems to be a lack of rune words above 65 lvl
and very few six rune, rune words.

Of coarse this is an older sorc from an other mod that did not have an Act 5.

She is for stress relief, WACK THEM ALL, THE LONG, THE TALL, SHORT AND FAT, ETC...

The rouge is rather weak, doing only 1.4k lighting damge. She sould be higher for 93 lvl.

Just not equiped the right way.

By the way been doing rpg for over 20 years.

Started with "The Secrets of the Silver Blades", a SIS game, on a Tandy HX100
with two floopies and 64k ram.

I tend to use all my chacters as dual or triple class characters as best as I can.

I do miss having thief skills to pick locks + pockets,,,,

Hey maybe CE could enable Quests needing Different skills other than class one.

It would be nice having multi class characters.

Sorry if I rambled of topic, I old, bauld and toothles, so I gum ya some.

bdpf

[Darkkatgirl]

Well first I was thinking maybe a Fire/Ice focus on Meteor and Blizzard (they seem to be the highest dmg in both trees) but then I read a post about necro lower resist being used to break immunes and thought it might be possible to do that with a single tree focus (lightning is what I picked) to max dmg.  I dont know many sorc builds cause Ive never really played them before.

Any help or advise would be a blessing ^.^

[webwalker]

Well first I was thinking maybe a Fire/Ice focus on Meteor and Blizzard (they seem to be the highest dmg in both trees) but then I read a post about necro lower resist being used to break immunes and thought it might be possible to do that with a single tree focus (lightning is what I picked) to max dmg.  I dont know many sorc builds cause Ive never really played them before.

Any help or advise would be a blessing ^.^

Breaking resists with freezing runs into two limits (outside of which it's great)
1: "Random unbreakable immunities" are unbreakable.  Period.  This shows up as (eg) a physical immune fallen in Blood Moor, in PoC.
2: "If the monster is cold immune, freezing will not break ANY immunities because it won't freeze!"

Immunities low enough to be broken by Lower Resists, or Amp Damage... I don't remember that happening in the Mod.

[Olfmo]

@bdpf: if you are using the cheat items this discussion just became very senseless...

Edit by Webwalker: Chaos distributed the "cheat items" to us, and said that use of them was up to us, use of them and discussion of them is not intrisincally senseless as you intimate.  I would prefer (and have asked Chaos) that the Ubers in HC_Helper.d2s and SC_Helper.d2s were "mere perfect" ubers and not "turbo-enhanced" ubers, but making them the way they are was Chaos' decision.

I would prefer it if you did not impose your view as to what is a sensible discussion.  Material contribution (bdpf asked what rune words would be best) is always welcome.

[ZenPdH]

In many situations u cant break the imunity, even with lr, conv or both. (For the freezing effect look at webwalkers post)

So a double element sorc is a must if u wanna play more or less without 'unkillable' monsters.
Just as olfmo stated out, the most chosen ones were light and ice (fo/cl or nova/nova). But that dosent mean, that fire wouldnt work as well.

The blizzard and meteor are very powerfull, but they are static and have a (high) cast delay! So if u play against fast enemies or masses it is not so easy to handle them, cause they just walk out of the range of effect of ur spell or u cant cast another spell on the ones which where left or right of u (if u cast the first one in front of u).

[bdpf]

@Olfmo

I have done it before the cheat items were available.

What I said before that my old sorc's dmg went up after the cheat umber charms were put in the inventory.

She ran with ice orb and chainlighting as her main spells with fire ball held in reserve.
Thunder and blizzard were both killers too.
She carries a 20k dmg sword of furry.

Possin dmg is as high as I can make it.
Pluss a staff maxed out with jewels.
Rune worded armor and shield for the best def.

SHE IS A WARIOR/SORC/FIGHTER  in the old rpg sense. Hits with ice orb or chainlighting, then attacting with sword, staff or bow.

The rouge is tricked out better than the sorc with equal or better dmg.

For hard Boss monsters, I get the monster to attact the sorc with the rouge behind or to the side.

The doll stash adds a Vikie to the mix, but I did not use a doll stash to finish Ce before or D2 LOD, both off + on line.

The new quest adds a new, maybe better wrinkle to the great CE mod.

I try to run all my characters using most of the skills in the tree.
Only total imune monsters are real hard to kill, others just take a little longer.
And I never had much luck with mercs from the higher acts, of coarse I never used them much.

The generlist

bdpf

[webwalker]

In this context, 'melee' means physical as opposed to spell attacks.

I have had success putting a Humility armor on me, casting BO, then putting the armor on my merc.  When BO wears off, I switch armor merc-to-me and re-cast BO, then switch armors again.  The Salvation from the merc keeps my resists high.

A Dream hat and Dream shield on a "Bowel Twister" harpoon-hurling melee sorc works well (so I've heard) requiring max Warmth, Enchant, Fire Mastery, and Lightning Mastery.  Thrown harpoons do large fire & lightning damage.  A Conviction (A5-barb) merc helps here, since he drops target defense and target resists, making targets more easily hit and (assuming plus-skill gear on the merc) double the elemental damage.  Alternate is an A2 Fanat merc, increasing your IAS, and you rely on Lower Resists to boost elemental damage.  Monster resists don't go below -100% so level 100 Lower Resist and level 100 Conviction together are "just" double elemental damage, not x7 or so.

A Doom weapon (Holy Freeze) may be the ticket for the A2-Fanat merc.  The slower they bite you, the more time you have to finish them.

A delerium hat on a merc is a riot, all the bad guys are confused and busy biting each other, you mow them down as you can.

The unique short war bow (Ranger's Sting) on a melee sorc is lovely: you'll do large amounts of fire damage while strafing.  This costs you a shield, so defense is reduced and Dream can only be in the hat.  A Delerium hat on a strafing sorc is a riot.  The damage is less, though, but having everybody busy at each others' throats is nice.

"Other Side" weapons for the Sorc: an Armageddon (free cold damage boosted by your Cold Mastery while you're whacking away), Voice of Reason (effectively boosts Cold Mastery by dropping target Cold Resistance), or Last Wish (Life Tap & Might to help you & merc, Crushing Blow to help monsters to their next home) phase-blade (for IAS).  Grief merits a special mention: the Venom affects your "other side" melee attacks (e.g. Ranger's Sting), and lower resists increases poison damage.

The workable possibilities are a LARGE set.

[Olfmo]

@webwalker: please answer with your own post and don't edit mine...

what i wanted to say is not that i dislike him for using those items but that a discussion about a 3-elemental-sorc is senseless if that sorc draws her strength from items you can't get on the realm because i play online and wanted to know if such a sorc was playable online

@bdpf: so you played without energy shield? if not please tell me how you distributed your skills exactly if you did i am surprised that it works well...
but i generally dislike the idea of a character that is a mix between caster and melee, that's just against my beliefs

[bdpf]

@olfmo

@bdpf: so you played without energy shield? if not please tell me how you distributed your skills exactly  if you did i am surprised that it works well...
but i generally dislike the idea of a character that is a mix between caster and melee, that's just against my beliefs

I pissed now. Tried to post you answer and got kicked out of CE Mod, in new quest cow lvl.

So here it is down and dirty.
Sorc is new, not from old mod.
64 lvl doing or trying to do new quest till I got kicked out of CE Mod in normal.
Not using all of stat or skill points, 101 and 22 not used.
phys dmg, 350+, balanced axe / orb(4skill), Hatred , Thought.
Everyting temperd or socketed.
Doll satash 950+ dolls
Spell dmg topped out 2k+
No energy shield, sucks too much mana.
dex about 100 pts higher than strenght.
all items oiled so they won't squeak.
Shiny jewels or rune words used. mid to low level rune words.
Irath's set upgraded with moderater, jeweled.

Spells kill normal monsters, use weapons on imue monsters or to leach life and mana.

Merc does a light 2k dmg,  all items treated as on sorc.

One BIG QUESTION, how do you stay alive in SP just using spells, what kind of track shoes you using when your running away?

bdpf

[webwalker]

Energy Shield has a synergy from Telekinesis.  I haven't built a sorc recently so changes aren't known to me.

"oiled so the won't squeak"^^

"track shoes" are usually teleport, or something like Bartuc's boots.

"staying alive": I plant Hydra's at the corner to see if targets are nearby, then toss frozen orbs, then take a peak at what it was.  Dream shield and Lightning missile weapon can help if "what it was" is Fire & Cold Immune.  Leave The Butcher alone.  Gamble & Temper +2 ammy and rings if I have a level 96+ to do the gambling.

[bdpf]

@webwalker

Thanks for the tip[ of the hydras.
I normaly follow an Iceorb around corners, sometimes switching to Chainlighting if I can't reach a ranged cold imune monster. Fireball, Snowstorm used for mele with normal monsters.

Butcher dies with meteor, snowstorm & chainlighting, pluss a lot of wacks. Rouge and Vike help. Some Rouges get to be boss killers.

I have neglected the use of hydras witch I will probably change.

Using the Find spell has slowed play looking for souls.  950+ dolls in stash.
Webby, right now I have two guys with incomplted new quests. Ce needs to figure out a way of letting the quest to be resumed or started over. Both times I was kicked out of the Mod.

I figured out that Netscape did it once and Maybe Opera java scripts the other.

In Opera the java scripts are not working for posts to forum. It hurts not have a way of saving your possition in the Mod without staying in the town + leaving the computer on.

Right now I just build up a selection of characters to wait for a fix of the problem, which is probably at my end.

Rambling on again sorry.

bdpf