Hydra viable for an untwinked sorc?

[Farproc]

Ive been out of D2 for years now. The announcement of Diii got me interested enough to start playing again, but I have *nothing*.

The last time I levelled a sorc was pre-masteries - but hell was full of immunes so being a tri-elementalist was my way...

Because I have no gear to twink I feel safer fighting from a distance, so I was thinking of starting with Hydra as meteor and firewall ive always found hard to aim.

Ive been trying to read up on effective Hydra builds, but the strat forum guides are rather focussed on meteorb builds and/or on having lots of gear available to twink with.

While I am optimistic that I will eventually get good gear, my baseline is, well, low.

Should I just dump Hydra and go with a cookie cutter meteorb?
Or is Hydra viable enough to continue, and if it is, what would the complementary skills be from the other trees to at-least dual tree?

A long time ago I seem to recall that hydra + blizzard was a good combo. Im not sure if thats still (if it ever was) still true.

ive been playing WoW so this inability to reset my skill trees is a bit of a mind #@$* :P

[DH Amazon]

Ive been out of D2 for years now. The announcement of Diii got me interested enough to start playing again, but I have *nothing*.

The last time I levelled a sorc was pre-masteries - but hell was full of immunes so being a tri-elementalist was my way...

Because I have no gear to twink I feel safer fighting from a distance, so I was thinking of starting with Hydra as meteor and firewall ive always found hard to aim.

Ive been trying to read up on effective Hydra builds, but the strat forum guides are rather focussed on meteorb builds and/or on having lots of gear available to twink with.

While I am optimistic that I will eventually get good gear, my baseline is, well, low.

Should I just dump Hydra and go with a cookie cutter meteorb?
Or is Hydra viable enough to continue, and if it is, what would the complementary skills be from the other trees to at-least dual tree?

A long time ago I seem to recall that hydra + blizzard was a good combo. Im not sure if thats still (if it ever was) still true.

ive been playing WoW so this inability to reset my skill trees is a bit of a mind #@$* :P

Its quite good to start with, as you you can almost max synergies until you get hydra.
You can start maxing firebolt, fireball right away, so those does huge damage.

Pure fire sorc is good at act1 to act3, even at hell. But orb makes decent backup for immunes, but strong merc is main offensive against fire immunes.

Act3, cold merc works nicely in norm and act1-act3 nmare, just static and merc does good job even without items.
Act1 cold merc is other good until you find items for act2 merc.
Eventually change to Act2 merc, but you need to find good weapon for him, so he can survive. You need merc for this build, luckily both act1/act3 works with this build, so those survive even hell just fine.

Two good tc85 areas to mf/lvl for fire sorc, so getting decent items is not hard. Monarch and socket items for runewords drops too in those areas, so
getting good start is not big problem.

Mausoleum (near Blood Raven, act1) is one of the best areas in hell to mf/lvl with hydra sorc. No immunes, and those hydras works nicely there.
Both act3/act1 merc works here, act2 merc get killed here, as those zombies hit hard.
Another good place in hell is Far Oasis/Maggot lair 1-3. No fire immunes, and hydra works nicely here too.

These two areas get you easily around lvl 85...90, no need go lvling in act4...5. And if you stay in act1...act3, you can use quest drop with meph.
And council members near Meph are not usually fire immunes, so killing them with hydras is nice bonus.
Both act1/act3 merc can be used with Moat Trick, so its safe for whole team.

If Reapers Toll etc... good merc weapon drops here, then change to act2 merc. Or elite 4 socket, for insight.

Both andy and meph in hell are easy for hydra sorc too, meph is little easier.
You have strong fireball too, so killing andy is quite easy too. Build is strong fireball with hydra backup, just spam fireball between hydras.

Just avoid chaos (no point to run that area anyway with fire sorc) and stay away from throne/Baal too, as last two waves before baal are fire immunes.
Good merc can later kill those waves even full game, but it takes some time to equip merc.

Happy hunting. And welcome.

[Farproc]

So, to summarize:
Pure Fire sorc - aim for 20 in Hydra, fire mastery, bolt and ball
Perhaps dip into lightning to get 1 point teleport and energy shield.
Stat wise, str to match gear, dex and vit low (its not like I want a pvp or HC build), lots of energy to keep the fireball / hydra spam up.

[Kalkanor]

Perhaps dip into lightning to get 1 point teleport and energy shield.


ya get tele and static dont waste a point in energy shield its more of an all or noting skill and its not needed in pvm
and Forb is prob the best 2nd skill as it doesnt need syenergys

[DH Amazon]

So, to summarize:
Pure Fire sorc - aim for 20 in Hydra, fire mastery, bolt and ball
Perhaps dip into lightning to get 1 point teleport and energy shield.
Stat wise, str to match gear, dex and vit low (its not like I want a pvp or HC build), lots of energy to keep the fireball / hydra spam up.

Around
10 bolt
20 fireball
20 hydra
10...20 fireM
1 Tele, 1 static 1 telekinesis (help merc with this when monster is immune for you)
And build Orb backup. When you are happy with orb damage, give more to fire tree.

Usually its base energy, as later items gives enough mana. Hydras and Fireball is not so mana intensive, so you don't need much energy anyway.

Lots of mana pots drinking at low levels, later you have plenty of energy.

[MrBill]

I have a modestly twinked Level 83 Frozen Orb / Hydra Sorceress on U.S. East Hardcore Ladder and she's quite as good as any Sorceress that I've had before...

...However...

She's kind of stalled in Act 3, trying to get through the Flayer Dungeon -- @%!#$&*#@#$ Champion / Boss Stygian Dolls at every turn. Sorceresses as a group are way too fragile and that place is a deathtrap, which is not an option in Hardcore.

BTW, Orb damage (at Level 24 or so, with -70% Cold Mastery) is about 320 per shard, Hydra damage (at Level 26 roughly, with Level 20ish Fire Mastery) is about 650-720 per head. This is with rather low-end gear, e.g. mostly rares for amulet, hat, gloves, etc., Nightsmoke belt, Skins body armor, Spirit sword, Visceratuant (PDiamond) for a shield. She has about 38% block and about 850 hit points.

I decided to put a few points into Enchant for merc AR in Hell with this character and so far it has worked out reasonably well,

...except for those Dolls! :steam:

YMMV

Mr. Bill

[mephiztophelez]

hydra/orb sork's are popular HC builds. very safe and can solo anywhere.

[Farproc]

Usually its base energy, as later items gives enough mana. Hydras and Fireball is not so mana intensive, so you don't need much energy anyway.

Base energy with the intent of equipping a shield and having enough dex to hit the block cap?

[Kalkanor]

if your palying hardcore ya put dex for block but in softcore block isnt realy needed
you wont b gettin that close to the monsters if you are useing hydra and if u pick FO as a 2nd skill it will help u by slowing monsters down so you dont get hit as much

[SeCKSEgai]

If I was starting all over again, (which I did just a month or 3 ago) I would start either with a sorc or trapsin. A trapper effectively works the same way your hydra does, only more effectively and with an extra tank (shadow). You do little aiming and often avoid any real danger, and as you find better items you can eventually build her to easily solo Hell.

My First Sorc was Orb/Chain-Lightning in order to handle immunities. Thanks to her efforts I was able to gear my next builds and now she acts as a nice Hell Mule in Full Tals. The problem you'll find with Hydra is there are a great number of fire immunes... just look at Act 1. And, unlike a pure lightning sorc, even with gear like infinity later down the line, you will not be breaking most fire immunes (if any at all).

[SeCKSEgai]

Base energy with the intent of equipping a shield and having enough dex to hit the block cap?

Don't even bother trying to hit max block. Keep in mind, you can only block certain attacks (ie physical). You may block 75 percent of the time when you can block, but you'll still block 0 percent of the time a gloam (or more likely a pack of gloams) shoots you.

Another reason not to hit max block is the stat allocation. Having more life will keep you alive when your block fails. Considering the most used sorc shields are poorly able to block to begin with, I see no way to justify allocating so many points for something that isn't always being useful.

[Vodage]

I have level 86 hydra sorc

1 point in shiver armor (for defense and 1 second cold length in hell)
20 thunder storm
20 lightning mastery
20 hydra
20 fire mastery

(prereqs)

1 point in energy shield
1 spare point i don't know what to do with

Gear: Full Iratha, 3diamond tower, shard, rare fcr res rings, twitchthroe, sigon boots (to save space when I'm equipping cold stack for pvp)

40% frw means i can use walk in CS runs, taking full advantage of twitchthroe+tower blocking. Full iratha gives me enough defense that if i get shout from barb I will have like a 25% chance to not get hit by hell diablo.

This is in classic ladder, uswest.

[Horsy]

Very viable with +0 skills though you'd need that first synergy (plus Mastery ofc). With just a few +skills it becomes quite powerfull when all the bolts are added together you could get surprised.

[Bobby]

Hydra with Frozen Orb would be good for you because you only need 35 skill points in the cold tree to have something that effective in hell.
I would go:
20 in hydra, fball, fbolt
20 in FO
10 in CM
5 in cold prereqs
rest into fire mastery

In that order with the exception of 1 pt into each as soon as possible.