So yesterday was TZing and I found a fire sunder. Plus I can afford flickering. But not Phoenix. So I’m guessing I can survive hell with a pure Hydra with players 3-1 on SP?
I’ve put all my points on energy after 156 str for Spirit.
But I’m really stupefied by everyone’s attraction to ES? Yes I only have 1 point. Amd 1 point to tele. But how’s increasing tele would lower the damage smack you still get from ES?
According to several guides. You put tele points which only lowers the mana damage. And not the physical absorption. Which is only done by increase Energy Shield.
So Tal:DR
1) is my building viable in terms of damage vs immunes? Flickering + sunder on low players count? Assuming I max Fire Mastery, Hydra, Fireball?
2) how do I utilize ES effectively? And would I be better off with vitality instead of energy. And shiver?
3) my merc uses Insight which helps a lot with my mana spamming. But not to his survivability. Is this good gear for us?
So currently I’m 53 Hydra sorc. Max Hydra. I think 10 Fireball. 5 firemasyery. All my gear besides Spirit is MF. I got 327% mf.
Glass cannon for sure.
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So yesterday was TZing and I found a fire sunder. Plus I can afford flickering. But not Phoenix. So I’m guessing I can survive hell with a pure Hydra with players 3-1 on SP?
I’ve put all my points on energy after 156 str for Spirit.
But I’m really stupefied by everyone’s attraction to ES? Yes I only have 1 point. Amd 1 point to tele. But how’s increasing tele would lower the damage smack you still get from ES?
According to several guides. You put tele points which only lowers the mana damage. And not the physical absorption. Which is only done by increase Energy Shield.
So Tal:DR
1) is my building viable in terms of damage vs immunes? Flickering + sunder on low players count? Assuming I max Fire Mastery, Hydra, Fireball?
2) how do I utilize ES effectively? And would I be better off with vitality instead of energy. And shiver?
3) my merc uses Insight which helps a lot with my mana spamming. But not to his survivability. Is this good gear for us?
So currently I’m 53 Hydra sorc. Max Hydra. I think 10 Fireball. 5 firemasyery. All my gear besides Spirit is MF. I got 327% mf.
Glass cannon for sure.
Description by I’ve put all my points on energy after 156 str for Spirit.
But I’m really stupefied by everyone’s attraction to ES? Yes I only have 1 point. Amd 1 point to tele. But how’s increasing tele would lower the damage smack you still get from ES?
According to several guides. You put tele points which only lowers the mana damage. And not the physical absorption. Which is only done by increase Energy Shield.
So Tal:DR
1) is my building viable in terms of damage vs immunes? Flickering + sunder on low players count? Assuming I max Fire Mastery, Hydra, Fireball?
2) how do I utilize ES effectively? And would I be better off with vitality instead of energy. And shiver?
3) my merc uses Insight which helps a lot with my mana spamming. But not to his survivability. Is this good gear for us?
So currently I’m 53 Hydra sorc. Max Hydra. I think 10 Fireball. 5 firemasyery. All my gear besides Spirit is MF. I got 327% mf.
Glass cannon for sure.
rikus
Can be used to make Runewords:
goodluck, and may the RNG god be with you.
Personally never used ES when I still played the boring Sorc. I dont know how it behaves in D2r, but back in the day ES was mostly only useful if you went specific build. Personally I found ES being a joke, it never blocked any dmg enough to make any sense to use and it just drained mana away while still killing the player.
But thats just my own experience with it. Like I said, dunno how it is in d2r.
Hydra + its synergies should carry through Hell but ofc immunities are a problem, but those should be easily handled through Static and Merc help.
But thats just my own experience with it. Like I said, dunno how it is in d2r.
Hydra + its synergies should carry through Hell but ofc immunities are a problem, but those should be easily handled through Static and Merc help.
Maybe it was because of the mana burn bug, which caused it deal 256× (!) more damage? Or Fire/Lightning Enchanted combo bug? They were fixed in D2R.Semirotta wrote: 4 months agoI dont know how it behaves in D2r, but back in the day ES was mostly only useful if you went specific build. Personally I found ES being a joke, it never blocked any dmg enough to make any sense to use and it just drained mana away while still killing the player.
Honestly cant say, but my information is 100% based on old information as so much has changed in d2r.Trang Oul wrote: 4 months agoMaybe it was because of the mana burn bug, which caused it deal 256× (!) more damage? Or Fire/Lightning Enchanted combo bug? They were fixed in D2R.Semirotta wrote: 4 months agoI dont know how it behaves in D2r, but back in the day ES was mostly only useful if you went specific build. Personally I found ES being a joke, it never blocked any dmg enough to make any sense to use and it just drained mana away while still killing the player.
But ES builds were a thing back in the day, just not very much used.
Guess I’ll have to experiment. Unless anyone have proper xp with either ES and shiver.
goodluck, and may the RNG god be with you.
In my experience, ES is insanely good, but only under certain conditions:
- you have the points for telekineses & enough total points for ES
- you have enough mana (>=1.5k) and mana regen, e.g. from Insight on a merc
Otherwise I'd go with max vita and high res.
You can always respec once you have the necessary skill points.
- you have the points for telekineses & enough total points for ES
- you have enough mana (>=1.5k) and mana regen, e.g. from Insight on a merc
Otherwise I'd go with max vita and high res.
You can always respec once you have the necessary skill points.
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Hi
ES works great in lightning builds because it benefits from skillers. A level 40 ES reduces damage by 95%. With some damage reduction, it makes the sorceress incredibly tanky, by focusing all skill points in energy rather than vitality, since all damage will go to mana, at rate of 1 point of damage to 0.75 mana.
On a fire build, such as Hydra, its usefulness decreases a lot because it simply cannot reach a high enough level to essentially negate damage (no lightning skillers). Considering Hydra, Fire Mastery, and Hydra synergies, you will not have enough skill points to reap the maximum benefit from ES. If you max Telekinesis (the bare minimum would be 16 hard points), then 1 point in ES might be of some use with a decent amount of +skills. A level 10 ES with maxed Telekinesis reduces damage by 59%. But then, you need a significant mana pool to offset the mana drain, wich limits your vitality. Some people like this setup, but personally, I feel that you either go all-in on ES or not at all.
As for minus fire res, a well-rolled Flickering Flame with -15% fire res makes the build viable, although perhaps a bit slow.
Don't go all-in on MF. Kill speed is also, if not more, important than MF. Try to find a balance between the two.
ES works great in lightning builds because it benefits from skillers. A level 40 ES reduces damage by 95%. With some damage reduction, it makes the sorceress incredibly tanky, by focusing all skill points in energy rather than vitality, since all damage will go to mana, at rate of 1 point of damage to 0.75 mana.
On a fire build, such as Hydra, its usefulness decreases a lot because it simply cannot reach a high enough level to essentially negate damage (no lightning skillers). Considering Hydra, Fire Mastery, and Hydra synergies, you will not have enough skill points to reap the maximum benefit from ES. If you max Telekinesis (the bare minimum would be 16 hard points), then 1 point in ES might be of some use with a decent amount of +skills. A level 10 ES with maxed Telekinesis reduces damage by 59%. But then, you need a significant mana pool to offset the mana drain, wich limits your vitality. Some people like this setup, but personally, I feel that you either go all-in on ES or not at all.
As for minus fire res, a well-rolled Flickering Flame with -15% fire res makes the build viable, although perhaps a bit slow.
Don't go all-in on MF. Kill speed is also, if not more, important than MF. Try to find a balance between the two.
ES in a normal Hydra build really isn't intended to quite make you immortal. Nor will you really even notice it at lower levels/with no gear as you shouldn't bother ever adding more than 1 pt into each, tele and ES. It does however still offer a fairly significant buff to survivability once you get geared as it then still pushes to around 69% dmg reduction from +skills and you end up with enough mana to generally support that with no extra points in Telekinesis.
That's assuming you do split your pts between life and mana as you (late game) will need more inherent mana regen, thanks to your merc running Infinity, rather than Insight. Just keep your life pool at least 1 pt above your mana pool to avoid getting hit with that stupid blood mana curse.
I wouldn't bother unlocking ES until you get to a higher lvl and proper gear though and instead focus on maximizing Hydra damage first and foremost.
That said, a Hydra build also runs just fine without any ES and just dumping points into life. Matter of preference. Generally, "no ES" is what you would run if you don't go pure Hydra but aim to support with maxed out fireballs as well since you can't max out everything including Meteor for the FB synergy while still getting ES at all.
In terms of just making it through hell, you can do just fine with a Hydra build and nearly no gear other than a Flame Rift to deal with immunes. Though the latter will still take a while to bring down if that's all you have. Flickering Flame should generally be the first thing you push for after that to up your damage. Or straight to Phoenix if you get lucky on your rune drops. In the interim, for lvling and early farming purposes, build yourself an Obedience. Generally a crap weapon for a sorc but it is super cheap, easy to get and at that early gear stage, the -25% fire res on it makes it basically the best thing you can get.
That's assuming you do split your pts between life and mana as you (late game) will need more inherent mana regen, thanks to your merc running Infinity, rather than Insight. Just keep your life pool at least 1 pt above your mana pool to avoid getting hit with that stupid blood mana curse.
I wouldn't bother unlocking ES until you get to a higher lvl and proper gear though and instead focus on maximizing Hydra damage first and foremost.
That said, a Hydra build also runs just fine without any ES and just dumping points into life. Matter of preference. Generally, "no ES" is what you would run if you don't go pure Hydra but aim to support with maxed out fireballs as well since you can't max out everything including Meteor for the FB synergy while still getting ES at all.
In terms of just making it through hell, you can do just fine with a Hydra build and nearly no gear other than a Flame Rift to deal with immunes. Though the latter will still take a while to bring down if that's all you have. Flickering Flame should generally be the first thing you push for after that to up your damage. Or straight to Phoenix if you get lucky on your rune drops. In the interim, for lvling and early farming purposes, build yourself an Obedience. Generally a crap weapon for a sorc but it is super cheap, easy to get and at that early gear stage, the -25% fire res on it makes it basically the best thing you can get.
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As others have pointed out, ES is not necessary on a fire sorc, and if you want to max out your damage, there are no spare skillpoints for ES.
The standard Fireball- Meteor- Hydra build needs level 97 (without static) or level 99 (with Static Field) to max all relevant fire skills.
Just to give you an impression how an endgame-build is performing in hell:
The standard Fireball- Meteor- Hydra build needs level 97 (without static) or level 99 (with Static Field) to max all relevant fire skills.
Just to give you an impression how an endgame-build is performing in hell:
Thanks for the deep replies.
I’m considering simply to experiment.
Sounds like ES boosting isn’t viable on my much needed fire damage investment.
But what about shiver?
I’m considering simply to experiment.
Sounds like ES boosting isn’t viable on my much needed fire damage investment.
But what about shiver?
goodluck, and may the RNG god be with you.
Hi
Shiver Armor is a one point wonder. But since it is not boosted by Cold Mastery, the damage it does is negligible. So, in order to save one point, I would put one point in Frozen Armor instead.
Shiver Armor is a one point wonder. But since it is not boosted by Cold Mastery, the damage it does is negligible. So, in order to save one point, I would put one point in Frozen Armor instead.
rikus wrote: 4 months agoThanks for the deep replies.
I’m considering simply to experiment.
Sounds like ES boosting isn’t viable on my much needed fire damage investment.
But what about shiver?
Frozen Armor is way better because it's freezing enemies when Shiver Armor only chill them.
My timezone is CET/UTC+1.
so what i get is respec from energy to vitality... and use ES if i want..frozen better than shiver..
cheers
cheers
goodluck, and may the RNG god be with you.
If you respect to vitality, don't use ES. You will be 0 mana whole time.
Vitality has to be played with max res. It works well.
Vitality has to be played with max res. It works well.
My timezone is CET/UTC+1.
It's quite simple:
If you want ES:
-max Telekinesis
-max Energy Shield
-all remaining points to Energy
-Resistances: Poison > Lightning > Fire > Cold
hint: Prayer Act 2 merc with Insight and Cure is the sh*t! Triple healing, low curse/poison duration, immense mana regeneration.
If you don't want ES:
-all remaining points to Vitality (variant: Dexterity for maxblock, remaining into Vitality)
-Resistances: Lightning > Fire > Poison > Cold
-add some damage reduction, life regeneration and you are set
If you want ES:
-max Telekinesis
-max Energy Shield
-all remaining points to Energy
-Resistances: Poison > Lightning > Fire > Cold
hint: Prayer Act 2 merc with Insight and Cure is the sh*t! Triple healing, low curse/poison duration, immense mana regeneration.
If you don't want ES:
-all remaining points to Vitality (variant: Dexterity for maxblock, remaining into Vitality)
-Resistances: Lightning > Fire > Poison > Cold
-add some damage reduction, life regeneration and you are set
To complete DasNarf post, as a merc, if vitality, you just need Cleansing.
I recommend damage dealer so Act 2 with Cure and might aura or Act 5 Frenzy barb with Plague and a more offensive sword.
I recommend damage dealer so Act 2 with Cure and might aura or Act 5 Frenzy barb with Plague and a more offensive sword.
My timezone is CET/UTC+1.
I prefer nightmare act2 for the freeze aura. I just like to have enemies frozen / chilled.
For merc survivability, id have proper helmet not Cure. Cure is great at first, but its so weak and not really that useful after all.
Cleansing is a must have to quickly remove poison and amp curse.
My timezone is CET/UTC+1.
Why? Never personally had any trouble with that. I always use Cure up until I get something better, because merc tends to die constantly if it has no life steal from helmet
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