Energy Shield

Hi everyone,

I have a question concerning the

Energy Shield.

From all the guids I read, they all say that you MUST level up

Telekinesis to level 20 because it reduces the

Energy Shield mana consumption from 2 to 1 mana.

However,

Telekinesis gives 6% which means from my understanding, that level 17 should be enough because 17*6% = 102%.

So what do I misunderstand?

Thanks alot.

Flu wrote: 2 years ago

Hi everyone,

I have a question concerning the

Energy Shield.

From all the guids I read, they all say that you MUST level up

Telekinesis to level 20 because it reduces the

Energy Shield mana consumption from 2 to 1 mana.

However,

Telekinesis gives 6% which means from my understanding, that level 17 should be enough because 17*6% = 102%.

So what do I misunderstand?

Thanks alot.

ES and

Telekinesis both at 1, ES mana consumed per damage is 193%, at 20

Telekinesis makes 75%.

It's 6.25% for each hardpoint of

Telekinesis.
At 16, it becomes 100%
At 20, it becomes 75%

The distribution of points taken from mana & health depends on your

Energy Shield.

Ok, but 75% means 0.75 Mana per dmg. Does the game actually calculate that correctly?

I mean the same comes with Enigma, which provides 0.75 Strength per level like this:

level 1: 0 STR
Level 2: 1 STR (Rounded down)
Level 3: 2 STR
Level 4: 3 STR
...

Thanks

Sorry Flu, no Clu

I reckon it is calculated correctly, and only rounding the final numbers.

the D2R gurus on youtube says at lvl 20, it is .75 mana

Flu wrote: 2 years ago

Ok, but 75% means 0.75 Mana per dmg. Does the game actually calculate that correctly?

I mean the same comes with Enigma, which provides 0.75 Strength per level like this:

level 1: 0 STR
Level 2: 1 STR (Rounded down)
Level 3: 2 STR
Level 4: 3 STR
...

Thanks

The game can handle fractions in the actual calculation steps, it merely cuts them off for results (including interim results on multi-step calculations).

But since 0.75 per dmg at say 500 dmg coming in is based on 500 dmg and not 500 times 1 dmg, that doesn't make too much of a difference in the end.
Basically, 500 dmg comes in, 0.75 * 500 = 375 mana lost. If you had 1 pt less in

Telekinesis, you'd be at 0.8125 mana per dmg which would be 500 * 0.8125 = 406.25 which then has the fraction cut off, turning into 406 mana lost. In either case, the % value is considered correctly, you merely may lose 1 mana point less on any given hit (depending on actual dmg and TK lvl) than you would following traditional rounding rules because the game simply cuts it off instead of rounding (i.e. 250.95 = 250, not 251).

Saying you "MUST" level TK to 20 is frankly BS but the actual target level of TK that you want depends on your gear, stat distribution and overall build/skill distribution. You really just want to make sure that you can afford to take whatever mana hits you take in your build.
If you're playing something with crazy high mana consumption like a 200fcr

Nova sorc and your merc is wielding Infinity rather than Insight, you stand a good chance of out-casting your mana regen as is, even when going for high energy. In that case, adding ES on top without capping TK may well result in you just always being out of mana and hence just failing hard.
If instead you have an Insight merc because you run as cold or because you self-wield Infinity in your lightning build and you push energy fairly high on top of that, your regen is so crazy high that you can easily afford quite a few less points in TK.

Personally, I tend to have TK at anywhere from 5 to 11 hard points for the synergy, depending on how it plays out with the rest of the build and more often than not, that's perfectly sufficient.

Thank you a lot for your detailed explanation snorky, this helps me alot

Actually I first planned to go for

Telekinesis Level 16 (100%) but now I will first try Level 8 (50%).

How about

Energy Shield? From my point of view, it makes not much sense to go further than Level 16. So with all the + to skills (

Annihilus, HOTO, Spirit Shield, Torch, SoJx2, Arachnid) I thought putting 3 to 5 hard points on it maximum.

I appreciate every feedback, because I am a Sorc noob, I usually tend to play Druid

I'd say play around with it and see how much is enough for you. ES, too depends on the rest of your gear and your goals.

If you want to go full immortal, you tend to need a fairly high ES (which is still easy for a light sorc, thanks to the extra skillers). If you only want to be tanky enough to comfortably not pot, you don't need nearly as much, typically getting by perfectly fine with only 1 point invested (given solid +skill gear). In either case, it also depends on just how much or little life you keep and how much absorb you have on the rest of your gear.

ES hits before basically anything other than cyclone/

Bone Armor. So if you take say 500 elemental damage and you have an 80%

Energy Shield, that leaves 100 damage after ES (400 absorbed) which is then reduced by absorbs and resistances and whatnot. As a result, the actual damage you take drops to absorbable amounts fairly quickly, even if you don't have any noteworthy resistances. The damage to mana however is quite hefty because even when you do have resistances, they don't help with that.

So higher ES may or may not still make a significant difference in terms of life. But when achieved without also getting higher TK, that again very quickly outscales your mana.

And do keep in mind that there's generally a limit on how much mana you want to get. Specifically, you want your mana to be just barely less than your life so you don't have to deal with that stupid blood mana curse because the damage from that curse completely bypasses

Energy Shield, in turn killing you quite quickly if you went full energy. Similarly, ES doesn't help with poison damage so you want some life (and resistances) to deal with that.

You always want

Telekinesis as high as possible. More hardpoints in

Telekinesis means less inbound damage to be neutralized by your

Energy Shield.

I'd put at least 16 points in

Telekinesis to achieve a 1:1 ratio, and 20 if you want to optimize.
For ES you can usually get away with 1 point and have +skills take care of the rest; ES has a diminishing RoI. Unless you're going the Immortal route, then you want to go all-in.

Maybe another tip: If you keep your ES level low, consider wearing gear with % Damage Taken Goes To Mana. This way, aside of your mana pool acting as a buffer for your hitpoints, your hitpoints also act as an absorption buffer, healing back your mana pool.

Nightsmoke is very underrated for this.

So, is there an optimum way of going ES direction for a fire sorc? 16 TK and 1 ES is enough or should they both be maxed?

More ES = more absorb, more

Telekinesis = lower mana cost for that absorb as you take dmg.

So basically, more is better.

That doesn't mean you need to max them though. All you need is enough in ES to not take noteworthy damage and enough combined mana, regen and

Telekinesis points to not constantly be out of mana due to your ES. Where that leaves you in terms of hard points invested is entirely up to your overall build and the rest of your gear but personally, more often than not, I tend to only have 1 hard point in ES and

Telekinesis somewhere around 10, depending on the build. Very few builds would have it actually maxed for me.
My ladder fire build would be unusually high at 11/11 but that's really just because she has so many skill points to waste that have nowhere else to go.

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

More ES = more absorb, more

Telekinesis = lower mana cost for that absorb as you take dmg.

So basically, more is better.

That doesn't mean you need to max them though. All you need is enough in ES to not take noteworthy damage and enough combined mana, regen and

Telekinesis points to not constantly be out of mana due to your ES. Where that leaves you in terms of hard points invested is entirely up to your overall build and the rest of your gear but personally, more often than not, I tend to only have 1 hard point in ES and

Telekinesis somewhere around 10, depending on the build. Very few builds would have it actually maxed for me.
My ladder fire build would be unusually high at 11/11 but that's really just because she has so many skill points to waste that have nowhere else to go.

Thanks Schnorki. What is your ladder fire sorc build?

I am making experiment with hero editor and 16 hard point TK with 1 point ES (15 with + skills and BO buff) seems consuming mana really fast. I adjusted life a little bit more than mana to prevent blood curse and over all this build seems reliable and fast with fire ball and

Hydra/

Meteor. But fast mana consumption is a little bit concerning. Continue to experiment, though.

If you want more inbound damage to bleed through into your HP pool instead of your mana pool, you'll want to keep your ES low explicitly. Consider casting ES before

Battle Command and on the weapon set with lowest +skills.