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Hi
I started a sorceress a few weeks ago. I maxed out Frozen orb and nova, and I just entered hell. Frozen orb is still holding its own, but nova is almost worthless against anything other than minions and groups of people. Seeing as there are lots of Cold immunes in hell difficulty, I started thinking about investing some points in a fire-skill, but I don't know which.
I'm at lvl 73 or something, I have 18 skill points saved and I have about 7-8 on cold and lightning mastery. Should I
i) Keep pumping points into coldghtning mastery
or
ii) Invest in a fire skill?
If ii), then what spell should I use? I'm thinking either hydra or meteor. I rarely play with others, so I'm constantly facing moving targets, so I don't think Firewall is the way to go, despite my success with it in the Chamber of Bone in Diablo1 ;)
Thanks for any input you can provide.
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Nova is not considered to be really viable any longer (except if it's poison :P), neither is Frost Nova other than a means to chill stuff.
Trisorcs is not someting you see that common, but they can be done.
A good Trisorc could be Frozen Orb/Thunderstorm/Fireball.
Frozen Orb doesn't really require the synergy and you can easily make do with a mere 6 points in the mastery. You can even shave a few points of FO itself if you are in dire straits.
Thunderstorm doesn't HAVE any synergies, but Fire Mastery and Lightning Mastery will have to fight for the points. Do an even split unless you feel one or the other suffers.
Fireball can be spammed inbetween the two others and you might get a 1 point wonder Meteor even.
You still need a LOT of +skills gear to pull it off.
But about the Nova I think you bunched up you build. I almost feel as sad for you as the guy I saw yesterday who had maxed Blood Golem (okay, maybe not THAT sorry).
If you just want to go Cold/Lightning I have another fun suggestion that work remarkably well. Charged Bolt/Frozen Orb.
Charged Bolt is a 60 point investment and Frozen Orb is a 30-something points so you have plenty of leeway. You even get a non-trivial Lightning attack and perhaps even a 1-point wonder Chain Lightning.
Just in case Little Faith didn't answer the question I sort of deduced, Yes, you do have to restart your Sorc. When I started playing in 1.10, I made the mistake of rebuilding my old Nova/Orb sorc. I realized around level 72 (not lying) that she sucked. I've been very happy with my Fire/Ice sorc. Here are her skills:
20 Orb
20 Fireball
20 Meteor
16 Fire Mastery
Rest in preqreqs/utilities.
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Well I'm not starting a new one now. I'll play this one out as far as I can, and probably make a frozen arrow/immolation arrow/multishot/valkyrie-Amazon.
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Quote: Well I'm not starting a new one now. I'll play this one out as far as I can, and probably make a frozen arrow/immolation arrow/multishot/valkyrie-Amazon.
Two points.
(1)
While I am the first person to declare that nova is near useless, when I made my ES sorc (yesterday :P), I decided to go nova-orb. Then again, I have no clue how good she'll do :)
If, however, you don't have any other heavy investment (ES is 44 points in itself), you can easily pump other skills. Maxing lightning mastery is a must (maxing cold is fun, but not essential), since it beefs up your damage considerably.
What I did when I realized that my novasorc was no longer viable was branching her off to Chain Lightning. Bad move. Do try Lightning, though, it is beefier than CL, and if it fits your play style, it might be worth it.
(2)
Tri-elementalist can only be made using firewall-nova-orb these days. (Well, TS is even more useless than nova I am afraid to say, fireball is weak without it's synergies...) I still fondly remember the time when Tri-Tree ripped the place apart with nova/orb/hydra oblivion, but in 1.10, playing ladder, you could not stop monster regen with a low-power hydra. (I don't know about a high-power one, I keep wanting to make a hydra sorc and I always end up doing something else).
(3)
(Third of the two points): Immolation arrow is said to be really powerless. Frozen arrow is awesome (don't buy the Mavina set, I thought the cold-thingies built in could make it work; they don't), a maxed Valk is just plain simply silly (I have a rune rushee in hell now, lev 47 with a maxed valk, and the valk could tank NM baal without ever noticably taking any damage). I am not a big fan of strafe, but since the multi nerf, strafe seems to be the way to go.
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05-30-2004, 01:16 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-30-2004, 01:17 PM by [wcip]Angel.)
Thanks for the input. I'm leaning towards hydra. If I do, I'll let you know how a high-powered hydrists does in Hell difficulty.
I haven't tried immolation arrow in 1.10, but I seem to remember the skill kicked donkey in 1.09. With the burizas 100% penetration (or was it pierce?), you can make a firewall if the monsters line up. (Think: waypoint 1 in act 5, going down to Shenk, and firing 3-4 immolation arrows through the crowd. You'd have 4 firewalls doing tons of damage to the crowd.
I know the buriza has been nerfed considerably, but there are other ways of gaining a 100% pierce/penetration-rate, arent't there?
How did they nerf multishot? I thought they'd already nerfed it in a previous version, when they drained the damage from it by each lvl.. ?
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Quote:I know the buriza has been nerfed considerably, but there are other ways of gaining a 100% pierce/penetration-rate, arent't there?
Buriza itself is unchanged. It's effectively nerfed because guided arrow no longer pierces and because there are new options for other bows. However, a 1.10 Buriza is the same as a 1.09 Buriza.
There are other ways to get 100% pierce. The Razortail belt is great for that.
Quote:How did they nerf multishot?
It's capped at 24 arrows maximum. Also, most effects apply only to the center two arrows of an MS spread. For example, crushing blow, open wounds, CTC on striking, freezes target, hit blinds target, and knockback all only apply to the center 2 arrows.
Quote: What I did when I realized that my novasorc was no longer viable was branching her off to Chain Lightning. Bad move.
What's wrong with Chain Lightning?
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Quote:What's wrong with Chain Lightning?
Not enough damage. Even when she was 20 in nova/mastery/cl, she killed faster with nova, which was effectivelly at 40 points, than with CL, at 60 points. Since the original ide to use CL to kill faster than with nova... I consider it a bad move.
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05-30-2004, 10:48 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-30-2004, 10:49 PM by [wcip]Angel.)
Hydra at lvl 20 with 1 in fire mastery.
Well, what should I say?
The damage sucks. Not as much as nova, but still..
I don't regret maxing hydra. It does come in handy when I'm facing cold immunes. I was playing hell difficulty act 2 and I managed to get through the act, but those big red belly-monsters were awful. I used to hate scarabs because of their lightning. Now I can't wait to see them, as both frozen orb and hydra worked fine against them.
It takes time. Hydra has a very slow "reload" time, so you find yourself having to wait for about 2 seconds between each cast, which can be a bit tedious. It also makes things quite hard if you're facing a fast boss-group.
The damage blows, it takes forever to cast a decent bunch of them, but there are *some* positive aspects.
1. I can now kill all monsters. Cold immunes, beware!
2. It's actually quite fun placing the hydras at strategic points in the landscape. After a while you develop your own tactics, like form a square with hydras in each corner and teleport around the square while the monsters follow, getting hit by the hydras. Another tactic I found useful in the valley of the magi was to cast a bunch of hydras, teleport ahead, and 'draw' the crowd into the awaiting ambush 'o hydra.
3. By being able to place a turret of fire wherever you want, you can fire around corners and in other tricky places where you normally wouldn't have access.
For example: You never even have to see the summoner, you just put a few hydras around him, and he's toast. No more firewall o' death for me!
As I said, it takes time. Frozen orb is still extraordinarily powerful, nova is still useless, hydra lies somewhere in the middle, but closer to nova than frozen orb.
I can't imagine I'll be using hydra in act 3. All those little monsters running around. Hydra relies heavily on a stationary target. Otherwise, there's no point to the skill.
I am now lvl 78, and I will continue boosting fire mastery to see if I can make this skill more useful.
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