Redesigning my Chain Lightning sorceress

[Animation]

All,

I have a clunky Blizzard + CL sorceress that I want to redesign. She has way too much strength, way too much dex, low energy, low mana, max warmth, and like 700 mana with frostburns. Bad build. Icky.

So, I'm doing a re-build, and I think I will sadly and with much regret switch to orb. Blizzard is terrible for crowd control and thats what I desperately need.

My gear will be a powered amulet, powered circlet (yet to gamble the circlet), The Ward shield with a pdiamond, a smoke armor, a 2-shael cutlass of quickness, raven frost, a 10 energy/8 resist all ring, frostburns, tearhaunch boots for resists, and either gloom trap for max mana or tal's belt for damage goes to mana (works well with energy shield).

SO, down to the question. Aside from Frozen Orb 20, Cold Mastery 1, Frozen Armor, Cold Pre-Reqs 5, Warmth 1, Energy Shield 1, Chain Lightning 20, Lightning Mastery 20, Static Field 1, Lightning Pre-reqs 4 .... where should I put my points?

I plan to shoot for 70 strength (tearhaunch, silkweave maybe one day), 60 dex (may keep a hel wizardspike on the alt switch, and need 52 anyway for the cutlass), 200 vit, and 210 energy by level 90.

I'm wondering if I shoot for 1000 mana with frostburns and charms and my gear, do you think I could support FO 20 and CL 26 with 1 point in warmth? I'm a little worried about that since on 700 mana and 20 warmth I had problems. Then again a chu-no-ku is fast.

I also have a desire to put 20 in Thunderstorm for CL stragglers, and I have a desire to have some static field. In an ideal world at level 90 I'd have maxed TS and have 7 in SF and 1 in warmth.

Do you think that is possible? Can I support CL 26 with 1000 mana and warmth 1?

What do you recommend?

Lewis

[AtomicKitKat]

Hail Animation,

I've never really built mana-intensive sorceresses myself(Inferno works wonderfully with little warmth once you're clevel 20), but I'd say 3 in warmth would do okay for your build(if you have any +levels, around slvl5 Warmth would be enough)

I've probably got the numbers wrong(as usual), but that's just my suggestion. :P

[Chaerophon]

You could always just use FN for crowd control if you wanted to keep blizzard or switch to meteor...

[Animation]

Chaer,

Well, I have to have crowd control and damage in the same spell. Frost nova will be pointless to me in Hell mode for killing lightning immunes.

But the feedback I'm really looking forward to is, does anyone have experience with how much mana and warmth is needed for a fast mature CL user? And will Thunderstorm compliment CL enough to make it worth the points as a finisher for crowd stragglers, or would those points be better spent on static field or warmth?

I'm not really looking for changes to the basics of FO + CL + LM.

Cool, thanks! Keep the ideas and help coming!

Lewis

[CorwinBrute]

IMHO, TS is really worth at least a few points... Even at 1 point + a few skill adders, it helped me against various monstruosities (read 1-hit kill monsters) quite a number of time. All I would do was teleporting around, while TS took chunk after chunk of monster life.

To save lots of mana, Static Field is still an extremely nice spell. Using SF to its full extent can drastically reduce the mana required to kill a crowd, especially in large games.

[Occhidiangela]

While the Shaeled Cutlass is a good idea, a back up weapon of a socketed staff that has + Lightning Skills/+ CL with a few Shaels in its sockets will give you higher damage output for the milder areas of the game when the cutlass and shield combo may not be as required.

Why the Ward? Nice shield with a high strength requirement.

A 3 PD kite shield gives guaranteed 51% Resistance to all, takes 41 Strength, and won't slow down your run walk. If you can find it, Moser's Blessed Circlet with two PD's yields better DR, 63% res all, better blocking speed and better blocking bonus, and is again lighter.

Best of luck in any case.

[Animation]

Occ,

Well, with the dual shaeled cutlass, I get 13 frames, which a lightning staff with shaels in it wouldnt compare to. Also, I have found that +6 to lightning skills is sufficient, and I can get that with my setup, or I could drop to +4 all. Speed is what matters on CL. Also, I hate fooling with weapon switch because it always changes me over to the skill I was using last with the other option.

As for the ward, it has a 60 strength requirement. I put 60 points on all my sorceresses anyway, because I like wearing plated belts in the early game, and I like wearing Frostburns, which use 60 strength. The ward is only a medium shield and so I dont even notice it affect my run speed. Heck, I even sometimes pump my strength to 70 for the 10% resist all boots Tearhaunch.

ALSO, The Ward I'm using has 49% resist all, and another one I have has 48%. With a pDiamond in it, I get 68% and 67% resist all. Not too shabby, and I don't own a mosers anyway. A 3D kite can only get 57% and takes a str of 47. So, I dont mind the shield being medium, I never notice anyway. I could shop until I drop from Hell act 4 until I get a perfect (30%) chromatic large shield or the like and use my socket quest to try for the lucky 2 sockets and then put 2 perfect diamonds in, but even then I can "only" get 68%. Yeah, that's good, but I already have The Ward. It rocks, and isn't it nice to put some of those classic uniques to work?

As for blocking and blocking speed, I never get near enough to the enemy to bother.

Anyway, as I said, I dont own a mosers. Everything I got I got myself running nightmare meph or just playing through the game on my own, so its fun to use my own drops.

I do appreciate the reply, and keep em coming.

Lewis

[CrescentWindX]

Well, here's a basic run-down of my personal (HC) fanatisorc Arc_Welder.

Currently level 82.

Maxed CL, LM, Orb, and am now cranking TS. SF is around base slvl 10, too. After TS is maxed, all other points will go to energy shield.

Str is 65-ish, enough to equip Frostburns and Silkweaves (she doesn't use the latter any more :P)
Dex is enough for 75% block, which last time I checked was ~150 or so.
Vit has every other point I could scrounge up.
Base energy. YES, BASE ENERGY.

Main weapon - 6 Shael Phase Blade, personalized (I love this thing. It hits 12 fpc, which is only one less than the Chu-Ko-Nu, plus I get to use a high blocking shield)
Shield - Whistan's (PDiamond)
Weapon Switch - Skull Collector (for looking cool, MFing, and when using Orb)
Armor - Vipermagi (resist all jewel)
Helm - +1 sorc/all res + 12 (extra LR and CR)/30% FR/W circlet
Belt - +Life and dual resist rare
Amulet - Tal's (self-found, in NM :o)
Rings - 1 SoJ, 1 rare with FR and +Life
Boots - Rares with run/walk, LR, and FR.
Gloves - Frosties

Inv crammed full of mana charms.

I've tried the Chu-Ko-Nu. I have a HelHelShaelShaelShael Chu-Ko-Nu actually, but will never use it again. That was used on the last incarnation of Arc_Welder, who died because, well, she didn't have a shield.

She has ~900 mana, and slvl 6 Warmth on her primary weapon configuration (PB + Whistan's) and it's honestly more than enough. The only times I ever have to struggle for mana now are when I'm soloing. If there's a barb in the party, the BO gives me more than enough. If there's a paladin, I'll ask for an influxion (is that a word?) of Meditation once in a while. If there's a Necro there, Lower Resist will help me kill faster (if he uses it, that is; depends on the party compisition).

RE: 2 Shael Cutlass of Quickness

While a very good weapon, there are much better choices IMO. The HelHelShaelShaelShael chu-ko-nu is a good choice (it hits 11 fpc if you throw 10% more IAS in there somewhere), but only if you don't want a shield (resists and blocking). So please excuse me while I shamelessly promote myself :)

Seriously though, I can't tell much of a difference between 12 fpc and 11 fpc (the 6 Shael PB vs the Chu-Ko-Nu). What I can tell the difference between is having a shield vs. not having one. It makes a huge difference. Then again, I'm forever drenched in the Dark Side™ of Hardcore, so YMMV if you play SC.

PS, Animation - if you have a HC-enabled account on USWest, I'd be glad to show her to you. If this is the case, PM me and we can set up a meeting time :)

Hope this helps you out! Good luck with the sorc!

[RogueMage]

My CL Sorc uses a Demon Machine Chu-ko-nu for an 11-frame slvl-27 CL attack rate. I have 1000 mana and one natural point in Warmth. This is adequate for most situations, but I frequently shoot the xbow as well, giving my mana ball more time to regenerate.

Against cows, my MF gear lowers my attack rate to 12-frames, but raises CL/LM to slvl-30. I generally have enough mana to handle one pack of cows at a time. If two packs start closing in on me, I switch to Orb and Meteor to slow them down, and Teleport to a safer vantage point.

For a 13-frame CL, I'd think anywhere from 800-1200 mana would do, depending on how often you spam it. It's wasteful to spam CL continuously until the last monster drops. The ricocheting bolts can deal the finishing blows on their own, and with practice, you can gauge how soon to break off your attack.

[Animation]

Thanks to everyone for the replies!

Lewis