Are damage focused sorcs useless?

[TheBlueFox]

I see alot of sorcerers taking the following line of magic use:

Enervate (or any other level drain)+ save or die. It seems like aside from Haste, GH(often scrolled), Resist, and firewall, These are the only two spells i see sorc's using at level 16+

Do any sorcerers use high powered magic, good magic crit rate, and 'splodey spells? Are they just...not worth it?

Are any of you sorcerers taking Greater spell focus: evocation rather than Great Spell Penetration?

[Visty]

25sp for enervation + 40 sp for fod for a total of 65sp to deal 100% of the hp as damage (ergo dead)
35sp chainlightning + 25 maximise + 15 empower for a total of 75sp to deal about 5% of the hp as damage

that is the reason why ppl go for instakills, its cheaper

[dragonruler]

however if you like to do mass death with a little pizazz then firewall, web, and chain lightning/fireball is always a fun thing to do

[TheBlueFox]

25sp for enervation + 40 sp for fod for a total of 65sp to deal 100% of the hp as damage (ergo dead)
35sp chainlightning + 25 maximise + 15 empower for a total of 75sp to deal about 5% of the hp as damage

that is the reason why ppl go for instakills, its cheaper

wow thats... so lame. It just leads to all sorcs doing the same thing. Even with the capstone >.<.

Only bossfights are slightly different since they cant be insta killed.

[Bardicus]

That's the nature of the beast. People tend to do what's better. So if dealing damage was better all the sorcs would be going that route and the instakill spells wouldn't be used.

[sirgog]

That's the nature of the beast. People tend to do what's better. So if dealing damage was better all the sorcs would be going that route and the instakill spells wouldn't be used.

Wait till you hit 20 and (in endgame content at least) all the instakill spells don't work. Then you'll see some changes in playstyle.

My sorc isn't quite up to scratch for Epic content (they were my second character and I made a lot of mistakes while building them, will be reincarnating soon). But in the easier epics (which this character can handle), I use a combination of these offensive spells: Firewall, (heightened and extended) Mass Suggestion, (heightened) Web, Otto's Irresistable Dance, and Energy Drain/Trap the Soul (this combo does work through Epic Ward), and against some bosses, Meteor Swarm and Incindiary Cloud.

[Rice]

At high levels the saves AND hp for many monsters get to be quite unreasonable for nuke spells, so you are forced to resort to instant-kill spells. You can get a fat crit with a ultra-juiced DBF (max+empower+full enhancements+gear) and maybe take 1/2 to 2/3 of their HP away. If you get past their reflex save which half the time will also include the evasion feat, which is super fun to nuke against.

Of course you're forced to use damage spells for bosses but we all know there's only one reasonable spell for that and that is polar ray, because it can get past the 9001 reflex saves that bosses have. Spending 70-80 mana for a juiced up nuke just to have it either negated completely or do half damage is just a very inefficient way of using your mana.

It basically boils down to instant-kill and crowd controlling (charm, FtS, hold, etc) monsters for the most mana-efficient way of dealing with mobs at high levels.

[Aspenor]

All these efficiency claims are nonsense. Damage dealing is perfectly viable if you're a good enough player. See Nick_Robinsonchia's thread in this forum.

[Goldeneye]

damage focused sorcs are only useless in certain quests? For most non-end game quests they do pretty well for them self.

It's not that damage is useless, just stuff like FoD is more effective in most cases.

(EDIT: Did I really just get -rep for this post? LOL)

[Aspenor]

it's not that damage is useless, just stuff like FoD is more effective in most cases.

only when fighting irrelevant monsters that don't pose a threat to your party.

[Rice]

only when fighting irrelevant monsters that don't pose a threat to your party.

Great strawman argument. So by that logic, when you fight monsters that ARE a threat to your party, you're supposed to use nukes? What defines a "threat" to your party? It varies in the context of your makeup and the quest you're on.

Keep spamming your DBF on immune devils, heh. Or other evocation spells on monsters with evasion. Good luck.

The ONLY nuke at endgame worth using on a regular basis is polar ray, and that's only a single target nuke. Every other nuke is either inefficient or gets immuned or evasioned. Trust me, I WISH nukes were more viable but they're simply not.

[Aspenor]

Great strawman argument. So by that logic, when you fight monsters that ARE a threat to your party, you're supposed to use nukes? What defines a "threat" to your party? It varies in the context of your makeup and the quest you're on.

Keep spamming your DBF on immune devils, heh. Or other evocation spells on monsters with evasion. Good luck.

The ONLY nuke at endgame worth using on a regular basis is polar ray, and that's only a single target nuke. Every other nuke is either inefficient or gets immuned or evasioned. Trust me, I WISH nukes were more viable but they're simply not.

work on your crappy DC then if you're having problems with evasion.

yes, monsters that are a threat are most effectively dealt with via DAMAGE. it's stupidly obvious that this is the case. Wail of the Banshee only works against monsters that are effectively dead before they even spawn.

What is used in epic content? Damage. What is the most effective way to cast in Shavarath? Damage.

By cluelessly saying such things as "Keep spamming your DBF on immune devils, heh. Or other evocation spells on monsters with evasion. Good luck." you show that not only are you trolling, but you have a terrible spell DC as well. I solo Shavarath and epic with pure damage output. Your naive statements that damage isn't viable is pure nonsense and trolling.

[Arctigis]

... I solo Shavarath and epic with pure damage output. Your naive statements that damage isn't viable is pure nonsense and trolling.

Hi Aspenor,

What's your assessment on the viability of doing this with 'average' equipment?. I love my WF sorc but he is quite
poorly equipped (relatively of course ;-) ) as I can only play casually. The only item I have of note is Skiver because
I am able to solo LotD into the ground (and had to!). Currently double necro focused but planning to swap out for
toughness and evoc. focus. Can't see me getting more than 32 CHA in the foreseeable future though.

[Aspenor]

Can't see me getting more than 32 CHA in the foreseeable future though.

May I ask why? A +2 charisma tome is pretty easy to come by for a caster, and a +9 charisma dagger is also pretty easy to craft in the Shroud. 36 charisma should be fairly simple.

Potency is easily carried on the necklace if needed, although I mostly just use the clicky belts from Shavarath and my superior combustion VII on my DT.

[moops]

Much end game content is still all about the Firewall--like, a lot of epic--- Now this doesn't mean that your Firewalls have to be super uber, even just enough to draw aggro so the DPS can melee is cool. And then of course Polar ray rocks against most bosses.

[Samadhi]

I'm not sure why so many folks here to are saying that enervate+finger of death is more effective.

1) All of these spell cost arguments are just plain silly - because most nuker sorcs are not nuking 1 mob at a time. They are nuking at least 10+ (20+ ideally). So the mana requirement is much less than what is being stated once the spell cost has been divided up.
2) Spell cost is often an irrelevant metric anyway compared to time involved. Enervate + instadeath is just too freakin slow.
3) If you are going for insta-death, use trap the soul every time. 0-1 enervate casts is much better than the 2+ often needed in shavarath to get a fort save spell to stick.

Like, TBH, I'm not a huge fan of nuker type casters, I prefer more CC based ones. But that being said, if I'm cruising through shavarath at lightspeed - it certainly is NOT through the highly slow and ineffective enervate/finger method. It is by gathering as many mobs as I can and ball lightening-ing the **** out of them.

[Nick_RC]

I'm not sure why so many folks here to are saying that enervate+finger of death is more effective.

1) All of these spell cost arguments are just plain silly - because most nuker sorcs are not nuking 1 mob at a time. They are nuking at least 10+ (20+ ideally). So the mana requirement is much less than what is being stated once the spell cost has been divided up.
2) Spell cost is often an irrelevant metric anyway compared to time involved. Enervate + instadeath is just too freakin slow.
3) If you are going for insta-death, use trap the soul every time. 0-1 enervate casts is much better than the 2+ often needed in shavarath to get a fort save spell to stick.

Like, TBH, I'm not a huge fan of nuker type casters, I prefer more CC based ones. But that being said, if I'm cruising through shavarath at lightspeed - it certainly is NOT through the highly slow and ineffective enervate/finger method. It is by gathering as many mobs as I can and ball lightening-ing the **** out of them.

Spot on. Further note on trap the soul if u want to go that route consider cleric PL for essentially free dc's.

[Kriogen]

Quests/raids: Do you have a valid credit card?

Farming: very usefull.

[vettkinn]

It really depends on the play style comrades, I'm a damage type battlemage and I don't find the enervation combo attactive, remember that sometimes it takes more than just one Enervation to make FoD work.

My style: Gather mobs -> Cast Firewall -> Block or melee (total SP: 25 / if max'd: 41)

[Arctigis]

My style: Gather mobs -> Cast Firewall -> Block or melee (total SP: 25 / if max'd: 41)

Sure, that works fine where WoF works. I guess I'm specifically referring to Shavarath as I want to pick up
some clickie belts.