Starting new Sorcerers

[HolyCrusaider1]

I started a new Sorcerer (Arcane Canon) and found out that she was completely outmatched on Korthos Island. When I finished the first quest, I chose the wand (finger of fire) with 50 charges. This weapon is seriously underpowered compared to the rest of the weapons that you could receive as other characters. It takes three or so shots from the wand to kill a brown spider and many, many more for a zombie or skeleton. I found that I ran out of spell points in the Heytons Rest quest on solo, had no pots to heal, and was stuck with a underpowered wand to try and bail me out. Needless to say, it didn't work and I died countless times. I started so many different toons and pretty much breezed through the Korthos quests, but as a supposed natural arcane caster I found it more difficult than some of the later quests on Stormreach. Is there a way to correct this error?

[FluffyCalico]

I started a new Sorcerer (Arcane Canon) and found out that she was completely outmatched on Korthos Island. When I finished the first quest, I chose the wand (finger of fire) with 50 charges. This weapon is seriously underpowered compared to the rest of the weapons that you could receive as other characters. It takes three or so shots from the wand to kill a brown spider and many, many more for a zombie or skeleton. I found that I ran out of spell points in the Heytons Rest quest on solo, had no pots to heal, and was stuck with a underpowered wand to try and bail me out. Needless to say, it didn't work and I died countless times. I started so many different toons and pretty much breezed through the Korthos quests, but as a supposed natural arcane caster I found it more difficult than some of the later quests on Stormreach. Is there a way to correct this error?

3 things
1) CON
2) Spell selection
3) Castng stat

If you mess up in any of those you are going to have a hard time.

By the way what spells were you using?

[Uska]

3 things
1) CON
2) Spell selection
3) Castng stat

If you mess up in any of those you are going to have a hard time.

By the way what spells were you using?

A 4TH Thing I would take a weapon instead of that wand like a ember rapier, I did with my starting sorcerer and did the whole island thing solo up to hard until I got bored and joined a ww group.

[HolyCrusaider1]

I started my toon as a Arcane Canon which gives you the Niacs cold Ray, and the burning hands for starters. Also walking this path did not automatically give me mage armor; so I was short on protection and pots. The wand that you receive at the end of the first quest is horrible. It is a 50 charge wand of finger of fire and hits for 1-3 hit points usually; so how is a new Sorcerer supposed to stay alive when you are out of spell points; by the way the stat for my spell points is 220 and even that don't help when your casting 2-4 hit points of damage from a burning hands shot. The Niac's Cold Ray is a total hit and mostly miss spell since the Sahaugin seem to be saving all the time when I cast it.

[FluffyCalico]

Magic missle and burning hands work well to start with.

Also at level 1 you can swing almost as good as other classes. Take the rapier instead of the wand and you can whack stuff with it.

Also note historically in DnD and DDO a caster starts off weak and gets stronger quick.

You can also look for a partner for the first level or 2.

[Lost_Leader]

Sorcerers are not an easy class to solo, especially at low levels. It warns of you this when you are first rolling the character.

But, to help yourself out a bit, I would recommend having both the wand option for softening things up at range, and then having a melee option for when things get close. This may work better for you.

Also, take your time and try to get small amounts of enemies at a time as much as you can. Pick up all those starter potions that are on the ground and in breakables. Or, if you have the option to leave Korthos (by having skipped the tutorial) invest a little coin in a hireling.

[HolyCrusaider1]

It seemed not too long ago when you had the tutorial ie. the pre Korthos Island mod; that you could make it at least to level 4 on your own. But now with the prechosen paths to walk, it seems to me that the Sorcerers are lacking the proverbial punch they once had. The spells are weaker, and on these paths you don't get mage armor and you are so squishy that if a skeleton or zombie breathes harshly, they'll kill you. I know in the beginning that the Sorcerers are supposed to be weak, but come on, I'm out of spell points and relying on whatever I have in my bag to save me? Is this what Sorcerers are supposed to do or cast more death with less spell points usage than a wizard? Maybe for the first few quests, the end items can actually boost the sorcerers sp or increase their damage potential and do something about that aim and flame zippo lighter wand.

[FluffyCalico]

If you mean all the prechoosen paths suck yes they do.

I actually hate the prechoosen thing it gets in the way.

They need to have a yes/no box at start that says do you want to see prechoosen paths or build your own? All that fluff they have now that wants to build it for you is a pain in the butt.

[Nightsun33]

I just had a look at the compendium page for the Arcane Cannon. One thing you did not say is that if you were using the feat that is granted to you at first level. You do get the Maximise feat. It would make a difference with the damage of your spells, but alas, not for wands.

Also, I agree with the others with getting a melee weapon and using it at the start. Quarter Staffs should be fine. Sorcerers and Wizards do typically start off quite weak with damage and spells, but quickly ramp up to be powerhouses.

[HolyCrusaider1]

Ugh, if they would just release the Druids into the world then all may be forgiven. LOL. I have yet to finish with a Sorcerer and thinking that they are supposed to be more powerful than a wizard; I find that hard to believe. I have a level 15 almost 16 wizard and she rocks!!!!! Now how about some love for the Sorcerers guys? Give them some performance enhancing stuff to make them kick!!!!!

[FluffyCalico]

Ugh, if they would just release the Druids into the world then all may be forgiven. LOL. I have yet to finish with a Sorcerer and thinking that they are supposed to be more powerful than a wizard; I find that hard to believe. I have a level 15 almost 16 wizard and she rocks!!!!! Now how about some love for the Sorcerers guys? Give them some performance enhancing stuff to make them kick!!!!!

If you have a high level wiz you should be having no issues. I thought you were a new person. A sorc is just a fast casting higher spell point wizard with a few less spells that can't change them every 2 seconds.

[HolyCrusaider1]

I thought I would try something new since that's what the news ticker said to do and submit suggestions. I had other Sorcerers i built in the past but ended up deleting them because I have so many toons and needed to make room to experiment. The Arcane Canon does offer the maximize spell, but it eats up so much more sp and then you are really in the dog house running through out the dungeon. Just a suggestion to the developers, make the spellcasters mighty like the other classes and watch the sparks fly.

[FluffyCalico]

I thought I would try something new since that's what the news ticker said to do and submit suggestions. I had other Sorcerers i built in the past but ended up deleting them because I have so many toons and needed to make room to experiment. The Arcane Canon does offer the maximize spell, but it eats up so much more sp and then you are really in the dog house running through out the dungeon. Just a suggestion to the developers, make the spellcasters mighty like the other classes and watch the sparks fly.

Max shines about level 8-9+

[Hakushi]

If you already reached 1750 favor on any of your character, do not choose any of the prechoosen paths because they're all 28 pts builds, even if you have the ability to create a 32pts character, the path will create a 28 pts build for you. This information is not available anywhere in the character creation process and a lot of people made the mistake, thinking the paths were also considering if you had 32pts builds unlocked. As for the sorcerer path, I think some of the choices are really bad, Maximize is definitely not something you will use at level one, there's some other stuff you can take before Maximize that will actually be more useful. You'll eventually take Maximize when you level up, but taking it at level one is not the best choice imo.

As for the sorcerers in the new player experience, I'll give my own experience. I like to start as much untwinked as possible, and work my way where at lvl 10 or higher, a lot of nice stuff is waiting for me. I first did the tutorial on my monk, and at lvl 1-2, I soloed pretty much everything up to elite except 2 quests, the one you free and convince Lars Heyton, I soloed it on norm and hard, but on elite I used a hireling, he is acting so much like Coyle, he's hiding from the Sahaugins but once they show up and attack, he blindly charges, just like he decided to commit suicide. I also soloed Miserys Peak on norm at lvl 1 and on hard at lvl 2, but was unable to complete it on elite so I joined a group for that one, but I'm sure if I would have really wanted, I would have managed to get it done probably.

Now, the second character I get through, and do the tutorial is my sorceror, the diffedrence is huge, I'm taking the beating of my life in a lot of the quests on normal, but I managed to do a few ones before going in the island area. This time, I soloed on normal, and not on a higher difficulty, and I was decided to complete on normal, and not solo mode. For untwinked characters, especially using the prechoosen paths which lacks of common sense in some choices, doing the early stuff on solo can become quite a challenge, unlike some other classes.

[Arianrhod]

Unlike some other games, wands in DDO are not a viable weapon choice. They can be a fun toy to play with, but the tutorial should never have tried to pass off a wand as a weapon on a par with a sword or bow. Sorcerors should be casting their spells to kill things with (Niac's Cold Ray is a nice choice at first level, or Burning Hands, if you can survive the "round them up and nuke several at once" approach. In combination with single-target spells like Niac's, Hypnotism works wonders: freeze 'em in place, then pick 'em off one by one).

The Eternal Wand of Finger of Fire is not a viable weapon for killing things with. It's ok for zapping things with when you're in a group and want to pretend you're doing something useful without using any spellpoints, but for soloing you should really just put it away; you'd be better off with a staff or crossbow.

[edit - btw, the Heyton's Rest quest has 2 shrines on solo. In fact, all Korthos quests on solo have shrines right at the beginning. If a sorc gets low on spellponts they can just go back to the entrance and shrine. Not that that does anything to teach them proper spellpoint management....]

[edit 2 - the robe casters get at the end of the tutorial is a mage armor clickie]

[William_the_Bat]

Honestly, i'd wait until mod 9 before starting a new caster on korthos. The wand fires -much- faster, and it recharges as you go, and insetad of a potency I robe, you get a robe that increases your effective caster level by one for first level spells.

Of course, if you picked Warforged for your race, you get a really junky docent instead of the uber robe, so you are just out of luck.

I tried starting a wizard on the prieview server, and was -amazed- by how much easier it is.

One thing though, I almost always agree that if you can play a wizard well, a sorcerer is only going to be easier. More SP and faster casting are more than a fair trade off for the flexibility that the wizard gets. But it does depend on your play style. If you are used to casting a lot of defensive spells and getting up close and personal with your opponents, then a "dust off and nuke them from orbit" build is different enough that you'll need to get used to it first.

[Arianrhod]

One thing though, I almost always agree that if you can play a wizard well, a sorcerer is only going to be easier. More SP and faster casting are more than a fair trade off for the flexibility that the wizard gets. But it does depend on your play style. If you are used to casting a lot of defensive spells and getting up close and personal with your opponents, then a "dust off and nuke them from orbit" build is different enough that you'll need to get used to it first.


Using the premade characters can make soloing tough, though - the Arcane Cannon apparently started with ONLY offensive spells - no Hypnotism, no Shield....just Niac's and Burning Hands. Someone accustomed to the flexibility of a wizard could indeed have some trouble with a spell selection like that ;)

[ghettoGenius]

Any player can solo Korthos with an 8 str. Just choose the Ember Greataxe at the end of the Grotto quest and pretend your a barb. I discovered this by mistake after rolling a rogue/pally with 18 dex and realized I wouldnt have Finesse until lvl 3. The axe carried me all the way to Stormreach.

Re-Edit: I realize some classes may not have access to that weapon in which case this might not help. Although Im fairly sure I used it at lvl 1 with a penalty until I hit lvl 2 and picked up pally.

[dopey69]

I just had a look at the compendium page for the Arcane Cannon. One thing you did not say is that if you were using the feat that is granted to you at first level. You do get the Maximise feat. It would make a difference with the damage of your spells, but alas, not for wands.

Also, I agree with the others with getting a melee weapon and using it at the start. Quarter Staffs should be fine. Sorcerers and Wizards do typically start off quite weak with damage and spells, but quickly ramp up to be powerhouses.

then why is there no fameing ember q staff as newbie wepon on korthos I wondered the same thing ? come on turbine even up the playing field for the sorcs and wizzies on korthos .why wand of cigarette liter and no q staff of flameing uberness ?

[Laxxis]

IF you have already run the tutorial, you can always go grab a few LvL 1 hirelings - a fighter or pally. It might make things a little easier for ya.

-Lax

[Demoyn]

then why is there no fameing ember q staff as newbie wepon on korthos I wondered the same thing ? come on turbine even up the playing field for the sorcs and wizzies on korthos .why wand of cigarette liter and no q staff of flameing uberness ?

Because an ember heavy mace is a better weapon (and available to all classes, with the possible exception of wizard).

[unionyes]

Sorcerers are awfully squishy for the first while. By the end of the show, though, you will be the master of all you survey.

Taking the computer builds isn't always the best idea either. Remember, a cannon, even an Arcane Cannon, needs some infantry support to be effective. A guildie is making the Arcane Cannon model, and she is a little weak as far as crowd control goes. Also, I don't think she has any UMD in her build (gasp!) and that is very important for sorcerers, since by mid levels you will be able to wand heal yourself and at higher levels you will be able to use Resurrection Scrolls and Heal Scrolls.

The computer builds are good for learning the ins and outs of the class, but once you get the hang of things you will want to go your own way.

I love sorcerers, and have made a bunch of them. Even though it costs you money and you can only do it once every three days, switching out spells as you level is important. Niacs starts to be less effective as you level up and have access to spells like Scorching Ray, and the mobs start to make the saves most of the time.

I usually start out with Magic Missile and Hypno. When I solo, I Hypno things and then kill them with my bare hands (or a staff or rapier), one at a time. Alternately, I run backwards (known as kiting) and pick them off with Magic Missile if there are only one or two, or they are immune to Hypno.

If you are going to solo with your Sorc, at low levels Charm Person is nice. You can blow through Butchers Path and Durks with an army of minions behind you, although you may need to wait from time to time in Butchers for them to kill each other off for gates to open. One word of caution about Charm spells, until Mod 9 comes out and you have the ability to 'uncharm' them at will, parties have been known to get impatient waiting for a charmed monster to 'pop' out of the charm so they can kill it to advance the quest. IMO, Charm is good for soloing and those 'oh ****' moments when the party is in serious danger of wiping and you need to get that ogre off of the Rogue really fast.

When you get into a party, especially if you are a damage based caster, you can make friends fast with good crowd control like Hypno or Web, they don't use up a lot of spell points and the melee types can do the killing. Save your manna for the end boss fights, and use Maximize, Empower, and whatever you have to take out that end boss fast.

Don't give up on your sorcerer just yet. Thats sort of what I did when I started, and I made a fighter who I thought was really great, until at 8 or 9 level when I watched the Sorcerers tear things up and wished I could do that. Fighters are great, don't get me wrong, but for my entertainment nothing is as much fun as a level 16 Sorcerer for sheer destruction and fun.

[VirieSquichie]

I started a new Sorcerer (Arcane Canon) and found out that she was completely outmatched on Korthos Island. When I finished the first quest, I chose the wand (finger of fire) with 50 charges. This weapon is seriously underpowered compared to the rest of the weapons that you could receive as other characters. It takes three or so shots from the wand to kill a brown spider and many, many more for a zombie or skeleton. I found that I ran out of spell points in the Heytons Rest quest on solo, had no pots to heal, and was stuck with a underpowered wand to try and bail me out. Needless to say, it didn't work and I died countless times. I started so many different toons and pretty much breezed through the Korthos quests, but as a supposed natural arcane caster I found it more difficult than some of the later quests on Stormreach. Is there a way to correct this error?


3 things
1) CON
2) Spell selection
3) Castng stat

If you mess up in any of those you are going to have a hard time.

By the way what spells were you using?


I started my toon as a Arcane Canon which gives you the Niacs cold Ray, and the burning hands for starters. Also walking this path did not automatically give me mage armor; so I was short on protection and pots. The wand that you receive at the end of the first quest is horrible. It is a 50 charge wand of finger of fire and hits for 1-3 hit points usually; so how is a new Sorcerer supposed to stay alive when you are out of spell points; by the way the stat for my spell points is 220 and even that don't help when your casting 2-4 hit points of damage from a burning hands shot. The Niac's Cold Ray is a total hit and mostly miss spell since the Sahaugin seem to be saving all the time when I cast it.

Well, first of all as you have already noticed Niac's is not worth having when you're playing solo...if something saves, it will likely kill you while you're trying to whittle it down. SP down the drain followed by your own HP down the drain.

CON is one of those somewhat hidden things about sorcs...often that few extra HP it will give you are the only ones you'll have left after a challenging fight. I don't know how the premade is on CON, but likely they splash more points in the other stats than they should. DDO is, unfortunately, about min/maxing stats. For a Sorc, that's CHA followed by CON with a few points in INT if you want skills (UMD and Haggle come to mind, besides your casting concentration which I *still* suspect is somewhat borked) or STR if you don't care much about INT. Mine tend to have 14+ INT and a somewhat low STR...I compensate with a STR item or a Bull's (wand, potion or even scroll, whatever's handy) if I find myself getting overloaded.

Maximize is only efficient on spells of at least 4th level - below that, the boost you're getting is less than the cost of the metamagic, so you're better off casting two standard 1st level spells than one maximized. Most monsters will let you live long enough to get that extra spell off. Also, that wand isn't useless it's just limited...you can shoot it once per monster, and use spells for most of the other damage. At first level, don't be afraid to use a melee attack for the finishing blow, and save a few SP. If something has only a couple HP left, your staff or dagger will do just fine. In a group you don't have to worry about this, but solo it makes quite a difference. By 3rd or 4th level you shouldn't have to worry about it so much, just use MM or something similar to finish stuff off...but at 1st level, each and every spell point counts. Of course, if you're with a group and find yourself not depleting your SP between shrines, go ahead and turn maximize on...but solo, efficiency counts.

Shrines are plentiful in the Korthos quests on Solo and they're still fairly adequate on Normal when you're alone. Don't be afraid to use 'em. They'll also reset really quickly (considering you're moving slower alone than you would with a group) so don't be afraid to backtrack and reuse a shrine now and then.

I'm quite good at sorcs so my experience may have been atypical, but my Korthos Experience character was a sorc and had absolutely no problem soloing all the dungeons (on Solo) and the outdoor area, and once she hit 3rd she was taking names quite easily even without being careful about how encounters got triggered. She was 3rd when she went through Misery's. (solo, easily) The harbor was harder, slightly, but that's because it's scaled for groups and not soloists. Korthos really is scaled for soloists. I should probably note that Korthos was easier on a melee I took through it than it was for the sorc, but it wasn't hard as a sorc...it was pathetically easy on the melee.

AC on a sorc is, for most builds, laughable. I wouldn't lament the lack of it on Arcane Cannon...actually I think if they included it they'd be doing a disservice to the players who unknowingly tried to rely on it. Your strength is what the name says...you're a living weapon...your defense really is a strong offense.

Oh, by the way...burning hands is limited range and the arc doesn't always hit things that are clearly within it. I'd recommend sticking to magic missile with shocking grasp for point defense, to start with. Shocking grasp does great damage, there's no save, it's fast and very little in the game is resistant to lightning. They'll take one or two MM shots on their way to you and be finished off as soon as they're in shocking grasp's range. My level 14 sorc still has shocking grasp within reach of a finger at all times, even though the spell caps out at 5d6, because it's an efficient way to remove those last few HP without aggroing everything else around. (most of what he casts are AoE, he's not particular about targets, but sometimes you just want one thing damaged...) When you hit 4th level, Scorching Ray will become your mainstay though Shocking Grasp can remain for point defense. My two high-level sorcs both keep Scorching Ray handy for single-target immolation...even though it's not efficient to maximize it and they nearly always have maximize running, it's a great spell throughout the game.

[weyoun]

A 4TH Thing I would take a weapon instead of that wand like a ember rapier, I did with my starting sorcerer and did the whole island thing solo up to hard until I got bored and joined a ww group.

No matter what kind of toon I roll they always take the ember greataxe first.

[HolyCrusaider1]

I agree dopey69, why can't a new caster get a flaming ember quarterstaff or a dagger? I shouldn't have to take a penalty for using a different classes weapons if nothing else is available for the casters. And, the potency of the new casters spells is so weak that I find that I have to cast two to three times just to kill nub spiders, zombies, and skeletons. With this new Sorcerer I picked up 220 sp. Lets do the math here, If it takes 10 sp per cast and that's not including the maximize spell which consumes 25 more sp; then I can only cast 22 times. This makes it difficult especially when there is only one shrine in the dungeon ie. Heytons Rest and right smack dab in the middle of two more skeles and zombies. I still believe that in the game you should be able to rest without going to a shrine. This gives you the ability to rest and recoup with a chance monster encounter ie. the paper and pen way of doing things. How much could that help in some of the later dungeons were you are casting waves of death and uh oh I'm out of sp to be effective. Just some food for thought.

[DragoonPenguin]

A 4TH Thing I would take a weapon instead of that wand like a ember rapier, I did with my starting sorcerer and did the whole island thing solo up to hard until I got bored and joined a ww group.

wrong. take the axe. there is nothing else youll find on the island to even think about putting in your offhand. 10 str sorc + the axe = korthos to elite

[DragoonPenguin]

the thing you have to remember is that korthos is not an accurate representation of the difficulty of the rest of the game. there are shrines every two **** feet and all the mobs have ac below or around 10. so dont worry about the nonproficiency