dual element ES sorc?

[WNxZerker]

hi all
is it possible to build a maxblock ES dual element sorc that can solo hell diablo and baal?
given max resists and some mf and+8skillsfrom gear (not counting charms) given the following skill placement
20 FO
5 CM
20 CL
20 LM
20 ES
20 TK

how many light skillers is she gonna need to be effective? and will she need a crescentmoon sword or lower resist wand to be able to handle the cold immunes? (this is assuming no infinity, which I dont see me ever getting)

[Smackin]

First, with all the pre-reqs, u aint gonna get all those skills maxed, second, pumping lightning for synergy and spammin skill between orbs gives more dmg to CL than maxing LM. With that said, pump 16 into TK, lower a few in CM, grab a +9 memory and a few lit skillers. U will NEED lvl 40 ES, and even with that, U'll need 50+ mdr and dr to be effective since u'll have little hp. I'd suggest something like the following:

Lore helm(dmg reduction)
13 mdr vipermagi(res are junk when u have 95% es, stick Sol in it)
spirit or occy
High dr and mdr Gerke's(stick eld/hel/sol in it, depending on the rest of ur eq)
frostburns
silkweave/travs
20dex raven
dwarf star(15mdr preferred)
safety belt
safety ammy

With a 28% spirit u'll hit 78% bp for CL, U'll have decent dr/mdr, and Gerke's has higher block and lower req than ss. Stick insight on ur merc and u'll be good. Of course, prebuff ur ES with all u can and dont tele into manaburn packs. Ur orb dmg will be fine, but ur CL/L dmg...well im not gonna comment on that.

[longblackhairguy]

i dont use ES cos i only play SP and this is exactly why. you're gonna need not only expensive but near perfect as well. i'd go for charged bolt and lightning for synergy rather since lit mastery can be be boosted by plus skills. you might want to consider fire wall instead of FO. you'll save some points there on prereqs and it can be cast less often.

[WNxZerker]

Fo with low mastery, will do a lot better IMHO than firewall with low mastery, the ability to direct the aoe damage is essential. plus FO would be my main attack skill, it will only take a couple orbs to take out any group of non immunes, and a few more for champions and uniques.

I tried out a char in SP last night, the CL damage wasnt too bad, and once I put on a few light skillers it was sufficient, as its only used to kill cold immunes.
I went with the following build

str for gear
max block
no vita
rest energy

20FO
5CM
20ES
20TK
1Static
1LM
20CL
19 Lightning

I had a +3ES memory staff on switch, and with +skills had lvl 40 ES
I didnt have all the gear you listed, I put a little MDR and PDR on my gear, about as much as a shako and a vipermaji.

I tok huge hits on my manaball, my mana was around 1k, and once it was gone, I was one hit away from death. when I tried for baal I died once on his minnions. Listor spawned as Light enchanted, and his bolts took out my mana ball alot faster than I thought it would.

anyway, question is, what modifier on that gear you listed, will reduce the amount of mana taken out by ES, I dont know anymore if ES is fro me, yeah sure she can tank alot of damage, but if shes casting at the same time, she will go OOM(out of mana) and go squish.
I'm sure alot more damge reduction and mdr, and more mana would have had a better outcome.
what would be the perfect godly PVM gear, if your leaving enough room for 200%ish MF when switch killing?

Zerker

[Smackin]

I'd say the following:
2/20/15dmg reduce/res all/+mana or str or dex circlet/2 soc, stick sols
2/25 dmg reduce/+mana/str/dex/fcr ammy
perf dmg reduce glads bane, stick mal
Perf dmg reduce gerkes, stick mal
spider
Perf spirit for fhr
2x sojs
frostburns
travs/silkweave/safety boots

Perf anni
Perf Torch
Assuming u carry 2x tomes and a set of keys, 4x lit skiller with fhr/life and 4x life/mana SCs, leaving u 4x4 space to pick up. If u dont mind going to town after pickin up the first flawless gem, 6x lite skiller with 6x life/mana SCs.

Using the the above setup, you only need 1 lit skiller with fhr to break the fhr bp, rest should be vita, and u'll have 3+1+2+1+2+2+2=13 to all skills. Using +9memory for prebuff means u lose +2 from spirit so ur down to 11, with +9 u have +20, with 4 Gcs u only need 16 hard es points, with 6 Gcs u only need 14hard es points.

Give ur merc a good insight and armor, and u wont die if u play properly. I also suggest 16 hard TK points because with insight, u wont notice the xtra .25 advantage. With maxed ord, lvl17CM, max CL and max L, ur lookin to complete this at 93.

[WNxZerker]

wow now that looks awesome.
gonna give it a test in SP over the weekend, and see how it goes, if it turns out good enough to do countess, meph, diablo, baal and possibly summoner and nilathak, then I'll be MF farming, and trading to get that setup, before I start to lvl up this sorc.
would be great to finally have a sorc, that can do all a hammerdin can do and more. well on players 1 atleast :P

Zerker

[AnimeCraze]

Personally, I would say drop the ES, or go 1 ES 20 TK. No matter how great your gear is, a hit from the mana burners and your energy is all gone. A normal dual element sorc can do your specified target quite well, even without ES or block.

[WNxZerker]

can a normal dual element sorc, without max block, blind tele to baal and meph 100% of the time? without dying once?
feel free to prove me wrong, but this build (if it works out, cause this is all just theory) is supposed to be able to do just that, while still keeping the versatility of a dual elemental sorc.

Zerker

[AnimeCraze]

No one can ever say 100%. Stupidity will kill you sooner or later. I can't even say 100% safety on my necro. I cannot prove that a vita sorc can do things with 100% safety, but I am saying that neither can your sorc. My vita sorc is less safe than typical block sorc. Since I am playing her in SC, run speed is more important in my book. Anyways, look at the recent FE bug thread on NM Ancients in HC to see what I mean.

Also, your sorc's CL will be horrendously weak, which will slow down your killing speed so much that it will compromise your safety (dead enemies cannot hurt you). Your CL damage (assuming you want to optimize CL) with +8 skills is 5~2063, which takes quite a few hits just to kill a few oblivion knights. To make it worth while you need a lot more +skills, like the gear that Smacking mentions. However, if you can afford all those gear (which is worth 10+ infinities), might as well go pure lightning and do ES to taste, using an infinity merc to break immunes.

My point is, with good playing, a dual tree sorc is safe enough already (and you can always go block). Going both block + ES as it will compromise your kill speed so badly that it no longer become safe when you stop and kill. If you must consider using ES on a block sorc, try using firewall instead of lightning skills.

[Smackin]

Personally, I would say drop the ES, or go 1 ES 20 TK. No matter how great your gear is, a hit from the mana burners and your energy is all gone. A normal dual element sorc can do your specified target quite well, even without ES or block.

With a huge mana pool, a high lvl warmth, insight plus FHR from equip, it takes a fraction of a second to regen enough to teleport out of trouble, and before u know it, ur blue orb is full again. However, I agree with u that His CL dmg isnt exactly going to be that viable, especially in multiplayer games. The reason to use lightning over fire skills is that he will be using quite a few lit skillers, and having two delay skills(firewall and orb) isn't really that good. With the equip I suggested and 6 lit GCs, at lvl 93, he'll do 8.8k lightning dmg, 3.9k CL dmg, 482 orb dmg, which is more than enough for single or 2-3 players if rushing.

[AnimeCraze]

The thing is, if you have this amount of light skillers, get an infinity and go ES/light. Why even bother with orb? Even with a ES prebuff staff, you can get a respectable ES at this point.

[WNxZerker]

I dont want to rely on a gimicky item on a merc to survive, I want my sorc to be able to survive on her own merits.
plus I can build this with cheaper gear, if I find the right mods, I dont want to and cant afford to make a infinity.
if I was to get two high runs, I'd be more likely to make a enigma and make a hammerdin.
this is supposed to be a MF sorc, with (when saftey geared) great tele/rushing capabilities.

I still havent heard a good argument for a dual element max block sorc yet.
I'm not planning on building this sorc right this second. I have a MF sorc without ES that is just building up wealth so that I can afford this one, and start doing rushes for guildmates, and whole game (pits, countess, andy, tunnels, summoner, meph, diablo, nilathak, baal) MF runs.
she will at most be doing 3 player games, 4 at a stretch.

Zerker

[longblackhairguy]

I still havent heard a good argument for a dual element max block sorc yet.

Zerker

have you ever heard of dual element enchantress (shield-wielding of course) without max block?

[Noite Escura]

hi all
is it possible to build a maxblock ES dual element sorc that can solo hell diablo and baal?
given max resists and some mf and+8skillsfrom gear (not counting charms) given the following skill placement
20 FO
5 CM
20 CL
20 LM
20 ES
20 TK

how many light skillers is she gonna need to be effective? and will she need a crescentmoon sword or lower resist wand to be able to handle the cold immunes? (this is assuming no infinity, which I dont see me ever getting)
First of all, you're not going to get that skill placement, because you are missing 7 pre-requisites(5 on Cold and 2 on Light tree) and 3 utility skills. You would need 114 points to hit that. Second, like AnimeCraze said, your killing speed will be frustating. If you're just thinking about doing Chaos and WSK, you may think about using Lightning instead of CL. Both CS and Baal chamber have few CIs. You'll basically using Light spells to kill Oblivion Knights in CS and second wave skeletons in Throne room. Lightning may work better for this. Fireball would be even superior and takes the same amount of skill points then Cl to make effective.

[AnimeCraze]

plus I can build this with cheaper gear, if I find the right mods, I dont want to and cant afford to make a infinity.If you can make this sorc of yours effective, then you definitely can afford infinity. Even if you are playing NL, that is.

I did the calculations for lightning as well, and it wasn't anything impressive...... You need +20 skills to do comparable LCS damage to my Tal's sorc with +12 I have made before, and that's not even counting the -15 res that I have. Furthermore, my build is finished at lvl 85 or so, while your's is at lvl 99.

[longblackhairguy]

I dont want to rely on a gimicky item on a merc to survive, I want my sorc to be able to survive on her own merits.
plus I can build this with cheaper gear, if I find the right mods, I dont want to and cant afford to make a infinity.


I dunno bout anyone else, but as an SP PvMer, my mercs are like an extension of my char. "gimmicky" items are what they're there for. i personnally use a Delirium on mine pretty much just for the confuse proc and it works amazingly well. when you have two packs of extra fast dark hunters charging towards you, and they suddenly stop and start attacking each other the gimmicks start to not look so bad.
however, the idea of a soloing pure lit (or any other element) sorc without infinity is like a one armed barb.

and by the way, magic, rare and crafted items (100% legit) with specific and good mods are MUCH harder to come by than most runeword, set and unique items. runes can always be up'd by lower ones.