inferno sorc skill setup?

[LucianDK]

Ive been looking at the different chars and it disheartens me with so many reduntdant skills you need for synergies that litterally is wasted skills. And many sorc skills have so many synergies that it leaves little room for mastery or the important warmth.

But i thought i saw something here. Inferno, which gains synergy from warmth only. No lost skills here, and 2 that actually complements each other. And warmth is heavilly needed to keep up with the massive mana drain of the skill. Then fire mastery for added punch.

Then i had initially thought of static, but i realized that energy shield might be a much better choice, especially with how it is so improved from telekinesis. And you will benefit from having warmth and a huge mana pool which to use inferno which. It will be 5 skills. but should be doable. And only 1 'wasted' skill in telekinesis.

But ive heard rumors about the player inferno skills being horrible in 1.10, compared to the monster ones, which should be extremely hard hitting. Is it an idea to focus in inferno at all?

[MMAgCh]

At least until its damage bug is fixed.

Even then, it's a questionable choice. It's true that there are no prereqs or wasted points whatsoever, but one of the main problems still stands: Inferno forces you to stand still while you cast. Repeatedly disengaging and recasting will drive the damage you can do into the ground.
So, Inferno requires you to either have at least one reliable tank, or invest heavily in Str/Vit (for DR and HP) so you can stand your ground. The former can, to a degree, be taken care of by a merc, although you will have trouble against notorious merc-killers like Lister and company. The latter is something I personally wouldn't consider, not only because it takes stat points away from Energy, but also because the Sorc doesn't have the best Vit payoffs. It might be doable with a high-level cold armor and a Defiance merc, but like I said, it's not my cup of coffee.
That aside, the closer monsters get to you, the less effective "sweeping" Inferno over them becomes. Since that's one of the strong points of Inferno, it makes being your own tank even less viable in my opinion.

I have/had a Sorc with L31 Inferno, at around 1100-1200 alleged dmg/sec, who found the skill incredibly tedious and ineffective to use in Act 5 NM - but, basically, ever since she got Blizzard. At that point she had Blizzard as her secondary skill, but much to her surprise it was capable of dishing out far more death and destruction than Inferno - at roughly 1/4 of the points in the skill itself and about half the amount in synergies than Inferno.

Needless to say, I basically forgot about Inferno. To Ice Blast and Glacial Spike the skill points went; to the stash her 'Leaf' staff. (The cold-immune Sirens in the Frozen River were an interesting experience. Since Inferno failed to provide the required fire-power, I resorted to luring them away in small numbers and letting my woestaved merc stab them to death.)

[WarBlade]

I converted an old Fire-only Sorceress straight to 1.10 beta and even in spite of not being set up with the synergies in mind she was doing fine in Act 5 Hell.

With Inferno: 26, Fire Mastery: 29, Warmth: A modest 10, she's doing 1311-1405 Fire Damage and I still have room to move as far as the 60 point skill outlay for maxed damage is concerned. That leaves plenty of room for other skills . . . Note that Nova has only Static for a prerequisite and also works for a close range Sorceress.

Attribute points are the fun part though. With maxed Warmth you won't need to invest in Energy, leaving most of the spending for Vitality. :blink: Unfortunately for me having a converted Sorceress not set up for 1.10, this means her Vitality has a mere 250 points in it, but I can see the new generation of high-Warmth Sorceresses being able to push to 300 (if they're like me and find high strength of dubious value).

The upshot of the new super-Warmth incentives is the ability to let it own Energy Shield's mana gobbling for more ridiculous tanking power.

The only tricky part is keeping the mercenary alive. Teleport becomes handy. ;)

[ryan4nayr]

I've heard of the PDR Sorc build over at RPGForums.net (aka DiabloII.net), since it requires you to stand still to execute <insert spell of choice, in this case Meteor, in your case Inferno>, your idea could be very devastating.

Unfortunately, the build relies heavily on gear. Maxed PDR (50%, newly capped, woohoo :unsure: ) needs a lot of Str, max block needs a lot of Dex, while in the early lvling would need tons of +life & +mana gear; but as somebody pointed out, no real need to jack up Vit & NRG.
http://www.diabloii.net/strategy/x-guides/...g-reduced.shtml

Just an idea.

[Loschonorg]

i've done the pdr sorc many times. yet inferno still comes to me as... horribly underpowered. why? because the skill is interruptible. going into block animation breaks inferno's stream. as well as being hit, hit recovery, all other animations.

even if inferno is boosted by 5 times in v1.10, it won't be a friendly skill. unless they make it uninterruptible.

losc