Build recommendation for Sorc? (Nightmare and Hell, espc. for immunes)

Dear all,

I have a lvl 40 sorc in Nightmare. I am mainly on fire element, I have a good staff that gives + skills to

Fireball and all fire skills so my

Hydra base lvl is around 6-7 but the actual

Hydra lvl is around 10s due to items, so it is nice to have a strong

Hydra in your arsenal. Also, the fire damage is not bad for the sorc because I read that fire damage is one of the highest damage dealing elements in the game for sorc.

But ofc I've started to encounter issues with the immunes. As far as I've seen so far, there are many fire immunes and I think they are more than in number compared to the cold immunes. So I'll have to reset my skills.

Which build would you recommend? I like

Hydra and FB. They do good damage but I'll have to choose a second element which is Cold and of course everybody is recommending either Blizz and/or FO. But I guess going for FO and

Hydra and FB all together weakens either fire's or cold's effectiveness. So I couldn't decide. I like FO's big AoE damage which is really good. So couldn't decide.

I just made the below calculation based on my preferences but I guess it is a bit weak on both sides of elements, cold and fire. I don't know.

One option would be to give up on the fire skills completely and build up on the Blizz build and ignore the cold immunes by tele.
Second would be Meteorb. It's good to have FO but I don't actually like

Meteor because it is slow and when the foes run off,

Meteor does not follow them but I guess blizz follows them whereever they go.
Third would be to go with all the fire skills and have a good Merc to take down the fire immunes.

But regardless of which skills I prefer or like, I would like to hear your options.

Thanks

orb and hydras are great and easy to dual spec. i dont doubt people are enjoying the build this ladder with the

Hydra buffs.

i used a blizz/

Fireball all the way to 94 since d2r release and i loved it.

Static Field as the 3rd element damage and merc to clean up.

ended up going full lightning because i had all the runes and gear at that point. lv 98 and loving lightnig as well.

You're a little bit underlevelled for nightmare considering my way but I can say that a good merc is important for sorc. Other than that, my level 94 Hydrorb obliterate the game with a tiny help from

Frenzy merc. To this point I mainly used Blizzard and FB and it worked really well when you have enough FCR.

A well known streamer (MrLlamaSC) recently made a

Hydra/

Frozen Orb sorc playthrough with starting gear, you might be interested:

Hydra are nice but fire is the most common immunity in Hell, I'd go either full cold (Blizzard with synergies) or

Frozen Orb +

Hydra.
Another option would be to farm

Andariel/Stony Tomb/

Mephisto with a full

Hydra build once you reach Act III Hell.

if you're going straight cold damage, blizzard is the way to go (damage potential is much higher). If you're doing two elements, one of which is cold, I suggest using the

Frozen Orb, because it doesn't require synergies to still be effective (blizzard is weak without all of its synergies, whereas

Frozen Orb is still useful).

You don't need to put 17 hard points into

Cold Mastery.
27 point with +skills is enough.

For N and NM, 1 point into

Cold Mastery is fine.

I don't recommend blizzard cause it is hard to aim.
FO is good enough to finish Hell

mockingbirdreal wrote: 2 years ago

You don't need to put 17 hard points into

Cold Mastery.
27 point with +skills is enough.

For N and NM, 1 point into

Cold Mastery is fine.

I don't recommend blizzard cause it is hard to aim.
FO is good enough to finish Hell

I guess the anount of points in

Cold Mastery can further be reduced when using Infinity?

Does anyone know?

Eldryndor wrote: 2 years ago

I guess the anount of points in

Cold Mastery can further be reduced when using Infinity?

Does anyone know?

True for non-immu monster.
Hell Act5 monsters usually have 33 to 50% Cold Resistance.
The lvl12

Conviction will reduce 85% => 50 - 85 = -35%
You need lvl 10 with +skill

Cold Mastery to reach 65% => -35 - 65 = -100%
Monster's resist can't goes lower than -100%

So basically, with Infinity and +skills gears, 1 point in

Cold Mastery is enough.

Thank you.

The saved points make a Dual Element Spec even more interesting tbh

Will consider to switch from pure lightning to have more flexibility regarding TC85 farming

No matter what you play, there will be immunes in hell as you level/quest. So I wouldn't focus too much about the questing part.

As to what build I'd play... Well, I play all 3 builds, and my recommendation would be to pick the build based on what you're going to farm the most when you finish hell.

Say, I farm keys on my Lightning sorc (easier

Nihlathak kill), so if keys were to be a big part of your farming, then perhaps you should consider lightning.

I usually farm

Baal on my cold sorc though, because the gloams can be a pain when you have to let your merc kill them because they're immune lightning (and it takes him a long time, while they deal massive damage).

If you're gonna farm random 85 instances, then if you have some favorites you might want to pick your element based on the immunities in this zone, and so on.

So basically I think there's 2 ways to go about it... 1) Pick the zones you're gonna farm, and pick the element that goes well with this, or 2) Pick the element's playstyle you like the most, and farm whatever is available for that element.

1) Meteorb sorc - FO for everything non-cold -immune,

Meteor for everything non-fire-immune. Merc + 1sk static to help.

2)

Glacial Spike + Blizzard + Firewall (merc + 1sk static as well). My main sorc's default way. You quick-fix mobs with gs, then crush with bliz, and roast survivors/CI's stopped by your merc. Very handy n flexible for pvm - also much more control, esp. if your merc wields a Reaper's Toll.

This is pretty much exactly how I play. The nice thing is that you can specialize into pure fire right up to hell... then you can start on your cold tree.

I can't remember the exact math, but I believe it was better to max out

Fire Mastery rather then all the

Hydra synergies to maximize

Hydra damage.

As for Infinity, once you can afford to make it, you switch over to pure lightning. That's just the best use of it on a sorc.

My LVL85 Sorc uses

Frozen Orb +

Fireball. I like aiming, therefore no

Hydra or Blizzard. I farm keys with her (okay, for

Nihlathak nothing beats a Necro) and can easily do Andy and

Mephisto or taxi someone. Those few that are cold-immune AND fire-immune are killed fast with static and the merc.

Rasalom wrote: 2 years ago

This is pretty much exactly how I play. The nice thing is that you can specialize into pure fire right up to hell... then you can start on your cold tree.

I can't remember the exact math, but I believe it was better to max out

Fire Mastery rather then all the

Hydra synergies to maximize

Hydra damage.

As for Infinity, once you can afford to make it, you switch over to pure lightning. That's just the best use of it on a sorc.

Yep, just tried via the calculator, maxed fm makes much more dmg than maxed synergies.

Google for lightning

Nova sorc,much more areas you could farm in hell then fire. Until you get Infinity ofcourse

knightfall1985 wrote: 2 years ago

Rasalom wrote: 2 years ago

This is pretty much exactly how I play. The nice thing is that you can specialize into pure fire right up to hell... then you can start on your cold tree.

I can't remember the exact math, but I believe it was better to max out

Fire Mastery rather then all the

Hydra synergies to maximize

Hydra damage.

As for Infinity, once you can afford to make it, you switch over to pure lightning. That's just the best use of it on a sorc.

Yep, just tried via the calculator, maxed fm makes much more dmg than maxed synergies.

which calculator did you use?