Lightning sorc questions

[PacManOnCrack]

I was never really a big fan of the sorc's because they were so over used and over played. And I really didint like playing something that's used alot (In all my games not just this)

But then again, i'm getting back into Diablo2 becasue I found my cd's and I feel like playing again, and am wondering if I should make a lightning sorc to just PvM and solo bosses/cows, and help people level.

Then I was planning on Assassin to PvP. When my osrc is 90+ this would be on US west. Also I don't want a Frozen orb sorc because those arent to fun for me but i'm giving this class a chance, and I want to try out a Lightning sorc how effective are they in PvM, bosses, soloing?

I will be starting from scratch here, with no items,equips or anything.

Thanks. :grin:

[hellspare]

You'll have some troubles in hell if you don't get a merc with infinity. There are quite alot of lightning immunes.

Dmg wise, lightning goes over 35k if you have very good gear. Just remember, if you want to mf hell w/o infinity it'll be one hell of a task.

[Xenon[XoA]]

It's not that hard. Chaos and baals are certainly slower without it, but even with an insight merc, it's a really viable choice.

It mostly depends on where you want to mf, but for the most part, its easy going.
Andariel, Countess, Mephisto, aren't immune. Neither is diablo, but stormcasters and sometimes uniq bosses within the sanc are. Arcane sanc, nihlathak (random immunity), pindleskin (random immunity + psn immune), eldritch / shenk, and even the pits are runnable. The archers in the pits can be a little annoying, but you can usually just tele on top, chase them while merc kills.

Also possible to solo baal - souls will be immune, but if your eshield/kinesis is strong enough (coupled with regen from prayer/insight merc) it wont be a problem very often. Infinity just offers increased speed. While speed IS important, in that the faster you kill the higher the chance of you finding something in the same period of time is - infinity isn't the be all end all to light sorcs.

[Oldih]

Dmg wise, lightning goes over 35k if you have very good gear. Just remember, if you want to mf hell w/o infinity it'll be one hell of a task.

I have light sorc with VERY cheap gear (does using Wizardspike as weapon tell anything? :cool: ) and I use it for MF purposes and so far only problems I have had are if I am in Chaos Sanctuary or if I need to kill Travincal´s councils.

My own light sorc deals @ lv88 10k damage w/ lightning and 5k with CL (I know crap damage nooby damage lbalblbalba, but who cares since I am happy with it myself), and I don´t have problems around so much. Charged Bolt is also real killerskill in hell.

So anyway, in common use, you deal fine with most of enemies. Only some light enchanted and\or magic resistant monsters are bit annoying but that´s when merc comes into action. You keep spamming your spells while your merc keeps beating their guts ouf of them.

Also, even though it is not "pure" light sorc, you can actually get a backup skill. I myself have one point in firewall and one point in fire mastery, so if enemy is light immune and my merc is tanking and killing them, I can spam firewall to make the task easier, and with the gear (mentioned next), I have around 800 average damage per second which may not feel so good, but many enemies which are already light immune, have VERY bad fire resistance.

Overall, my gear goes as:
Wizardspike
Spirit Monarch
Harlequin Crest, socketed with Ptopaz
Arachnid Mesh. Good alternate - upg. Goldwrap
Nagelring
10% FCR 25% Light res ring
+1 sorc skill 20% MF amulet.
Frostburns
Skin of the Vipermagi 35 res.
Marrowwalk 13 str 17 dex.

Gheed 34\13 and few 5-6% MF Charms in my inv.

Then on swap, I have:
Blade of Ali Baba. Alternate option would be Gull
Moser´s Blessed Circle, socketed with 2x Pdiamonds.

My merc gear goes as:
Bonehew (319%) with shael and -15 reg 8% damage jewel.
Andariel´s Visage, ral rune socketed
Gladiator´s Bane.


So even with cheap gear, you can do fine in most cases, and with the MF stuff I use, I get around 250 MF which is fine balance between killing power (considering so "crappy" gear) and MF.

For merc, I have act2 defiance merc but beter option would be act2 holy freeze merc for crowd control. Act2 might merc if you want your merc to be real killer and so on.

Anyway, for light sorc, I recommend act2 or act5 merc since they can tank and deal damage quite well. Act2 merc would be possibly best since if you can get infinity, everything is going to be quite easy.

And since you do not have any gear at the moment to begin with, neither did I when I started this sorc, well you just need to be very careful. Overall, most of the items I stated above can be self-found very easily or have very cheap price (F.E. Wizardspike can be traded for few pgems nowdays). Also Marrowwalks can be found with the price of few pgems. Also Spirit is very cheap runeword and only "problem" is to find 4sock Monarch.

Only item which is hard to acquire is Harlequin Crest and if you play in NL, Spirit´s are rather hard to get. Rest are very cheap, but only con with the followin gear is that you need to put some points in dex. That´s why you can always use hel´d wizardspike or marrowwalks as dex booster. Also, Arachind Mesh is not the most easiest to get or to trade since you start from strach.

Why Wizardspike? Spirit sword gives skills yes, and Ocu has even more skills, but Wizzy gives you:
1. Huge manaboost. 2. Huge resistances (very important IMO) and 3. Huge castrate speed to begin with. Combine this with 35% FCR spirit and 20% from vipermagi and 10% from ring, you get around 115% FCR. And 4. It IS cheap as hell :cool:

My sorc´s base stats are something like:
Str - around 145 base (+13 comes from marrowwalk so I can wield spirit)
Dex - I think this is around 60, need to check.
Vita - Rest
Energy - Around 120 - 130 points.

You do not need to put so much points in energy since with Wizardspike, Harlequin Crest and Frostburns, you get HUGE manaboost :cool:

[FrostBurn]

Oldih gives good advice. What I have to add is this. If you have seen Infinity lightning sorcs blazing through Hell and you think that's for you, then sure, provided you have Infinity and Griffon's Eye and the rest of that over-priced setup. As you say, you are starting from scratch, so you won't have that stuff, which means your pure lightning sorc will not have as much 'oomph'.

But that is not to say that she won't be powerful; she will. Just less so than an uber gear decked out one. Since you are going with a single element, you must be prepared to let your merc slug it out with LIs, or teleport past them. She will have difficulty dealing with LIs, so she won't be the ideal rusher or quester.

I'm not trying to dissuade you, but a dual tree sorc is more adaptable. It can be CL/L/FO or Blizzard/Fireball/Meteor. It doesn't have to be a Meteorb, since you say you dislike FO. Just some food for thought.