My TR Story/Review as a Sorcerer

[asphodeli]

WARNING - This is strictly a review post, and this build is NOT recommended to be followed.

Being a silly noob that I was, and thought that prestige "classes" were done when I started DDO, I ended up with a 11 Wiz / 9 Clr on my main. While it is a fun build and solo friendly, it isn't really usable in Epic quests (some are borderline passable) and total rubbish in IQ/DD and Amrath packs. So before I TRed I had most of the caster equipment available to me, and had some raid flag items ready (relics, abbot sigil, etc.). Without any character planning at all, I took my first level as a bard, and subsequent ones as Sorc, except at level 18 when I needed more feats. However, besides being a nice build to play, it still falls short of what I expected.

This is the build that I SHOULD have followed:

Character Plan by DDO Character Planner Version 3.7.2
DDO Character Planner Home Page

Level 20 Neutral Good Human Male
(1 Wizard \ 18 Sorcerer \ 1 Bard) 
Hit Points: 162
Spell Points: 1864 
BAB: 9\9\14
Fortitude: 9
Reflex: 7
Will: 14

                  Starting          Feat/Enhancement
Abilities        Base Stats          Modified Stats
(34 Point)       (Level 1)             (Level 20)
Strength             10                    10
Dexterity             8                     8
Constitution         16                    16
Intelligence         14                    14
Wisdom                8                     8
Charisma             18                    25

Tomes Used
+2 Tome of Charisma used at level 7

                  Starting          Feat/Enhancement
                 Base Skills         Modified Skills
Skills           (Level 1)            (Level 20)
Balance               3                     3
Bluff                 4                     7
Concentration         7                    26
Diplomacy             4                     7
Disable Device        n/a                   n/a
Haggle                4                     7
Heal                 -1                    -1
Hide                 -1                    -1
Intimidate            4                     7
Jump                  4                     4
Listen                3                     3
Move Silently         3                     3
Open Lock            n/a                   n/a
Perform               8                    30
Repair                2                     2
Search                2                     2
Spot                  1                     1
Swim                  0                     0
Tumble                3                     3
Use Magic Device      8                    30

Level 1 (Bard)
Feat: (Human Bonus) Empower Spell
Feat: (Selected) Extend Spell
Feat: (Past Life) Past Life: Wizard


Level 2 (Sorcerer)


Level 3 (Sorcerer)
Feat: (Selected) Past Life: Arcane Initiate


Level 4 (Sorcerer)


Level 5 (Sorcerer)


Level 6 (Sorcerer)
Feat: (Selected) Maximize Spell


Level 7 (Sorcerer)


Level 8 (Sorcerer)


Level 9 (Sorcerer)
Feat: (Selected) Quicken Spell


Level 10 (Sorcerer)


Level 11 (Sorcerer)


Level 12 (Sorcerer)
Feat: (Selected) Heighten Spell


Level 13 (Sorcerer)


Level 14 (Sorcerer)


Level 15 (Sorcerer)
Feat: (Selected) Spell Penetration


Level 16 (Sorcerer)


Level 17 (Sorcerer)


Level 18 (Wizard)
Feat: (Selected) Greater Spell Penetration
Feat: (Wizard Bonus) Spell Focus: Necromancy


Level 19 (Sorcerer)


Level 20 (Sorcerer)

I SHOULD have allocated points in INT instead of STR. My sorc could have a usable Fascinate DC in Epic VON6, but due to me being a pack rat, I decided I needed more STR. In hindsight, the investment in INT is worth more than the investment in STR. It was fun to whack a devil without dancing/holding/stoning it in Weapons Shipment though...

Some random notes:
- 4 Spell slots feels somewhat limiting, but you can get by with your larger SP pool.
- Swap out Frost Lance for Displacement once I get Polar Ray.
- Flesh to Stone is awesome...assuming you can get the appropriate weapons for the mob...with adamantine.
- Instadeath is more expensive than charming/nuking/DoT spells.
- My 3 level 1 spells for wizard were Master's Touch, Merfolk's, and of course, Grease.
- Greater Spell Pen. at level 18 might be a waste, since my spell pen is augmented by the Wizard Past Life feat. I might swap it out for SF:Ench or Mental Toughness (leaning more towards SF:Ench)
- Spell selection is very important. I chose spells that were somewhat general and useful in raids and quests. I realized this when I took Mass Hold Monster as my only level 9 spell, and cannot land lower level spells reliably (i.e. 80% or so) in Amrath/DD with a DC of 35. I might consider swapping out for Energy Drain. If you can't breach the mob's DCs...bring theirs down to yours

TL;DR - This is a story of a TR-ed sorc with Wiz past life who came up with a passable build on the fly without using a character planner with random gameplay notes.

[Sibellya]

I don't think you should follow this build.

What do the Wizard and Bard splashes give you to compensate for the loss of Capstone and two level 9 spells? I guess Wizard gives you a bonus feat, but this is not a worthwhile trade-off IMO. You don't even have Toughness...

[TheDearLeader]

I don't think you should follow this build.

What do the Wizard and Bard splashes give you to compensate for the loss of Capstone and two level 9 spells? I guess Wizard gives you a bonus feat, but this is not a worthwhile trade-off IMO. You don't even have Toughness...

As a Capped Sorc, I pose a question to you:

What good does my Capstone do me? 20% damage becomes pretty weak in Amrath, where Firewall is all but useless, and single-target nuke spells like Polar Ray are too expensive to use to actually kill mobs, and even in Epics where Firewall works, their HPs are grossly overinflated. It isn't Spell-based DPS that kills them, so much as the melee constantly swinging at the mobs I'm supposed to be making autocrit. Meaning Mass Hold, which has nothing to do with the fancypants capstone.

The loss of two level 9 spells? Yes, that would hurt. Spell selection sucks as it is. But I've capped a Fighter, Paladin, Bard, and Sorcerer. I play pure classes. While I take all four capstones, Two of them are more for show than anything else.

[asphodeli]

I don't think you should follow this build.

What do the Wizard and Bard splashes give you to compensate for the loss of Capstone and two level 9 spells? I guess Wizard gives you a bonus feat, but this is not a worthwhile trade-off IMO. You don't even have Toughness...

Well, first off, this is my actual build in-game, although the stat points in INT was placed in STR when I TR-ed.

IMO, Toughness on a caster is debatable...nice if you have it, but not a major issue if you don't have it. Issue of survivability versus doing a better job at what you are doing. At cap, its +20 HP plus whatever HP you can get with a few AP spent in Racial Toughness, which is better spent on spell enhancements. This boils down to each person's gameplay style though.

And because I don't like cookie cutter builds, I traded +20% damage to all Empowerable spells capstone for a passable Fascinate DC, which is useful in Epics. Assuming I had allocated stat points in INT of course.

[asphodeli]

As a Capped Sorc, I pose a question to you:

What good does my Capstone do me? 20% damage becomes pretty weak in Amrath, where Firewall is all but useless, and single-target nuke spells like Polar Ray are too expensive to use to actually kill mobs, and even in Epics where Firewall works, their HPs are grossly overinflated. It isn't Spell-based DPS that kills them, so much as the melee constantly swinging at the mobs I'm supposed to be making autocrit. Meaning Mass Hold, which has nothing to do with the fancypants capstone.

The loss of two level 9 spells? Yes, that would hurt. Spell selection sucks as it is. But I've capped a Fighter, Paladin, Bard, and Sorcerer. I play pure classes. While I take all four capstones, Two of them are more for show than anything else.

Yup, the capstone's pretty weak for a Sorc at this point in time. The +20% might work better with Ice Storm coming up in U8 though, but still, mana efficiency has to be seen.

As for the loss of 2 spell slots, yeah it sucks, but honestly, is there a real need for those level 9 spells? Can you Shroud/ToD without Wail/Energy Drain/Meteor Swarm? Turbine needs to address this issue as well, since there aren't many and useful level 9 spells at this point in time.

BTW +1 for you buddy

[FluffyCalico]

1 bard and 1 wiz really does nothing at all for you. Sorc is the class that benifits the least from multiclassing and gets hurts the most by multiclassing. If you make this 18/1/1 sorc its not going to have any better luck being wanted in epics than what you have now.

[asphodeli]

1 bard and 1 wiz really does nothing at all for you. Sorc is the class that benifits the least from multiclassing and gets hurts the most by multiclassing. If you make this 18/1/1 sorc its not going to have any better luck being wanted in epics than what you have now.

If you don't mind, could you explain how much better does a capped Sorc perform in Epic compared to a 19 Sor / 1 Brd for example? Rules of play: No yugo pots, eardweller, ioun stones, raid items. Only one past life feat allowed, and TR1 build points (34). Only one +2 tome allowed.

PS: I run Epics for the free tokens to TR, and I do not aim for Epic equipment specifically. If it happens that I can make an Epic SoS/Red Dragonscale Robe/Helm, so be it, if I don't, its not a big issue.

[TheDearLeader]

1 bard and 1 wiz really does nothing at all for you. Sorc is the class that benifits the least from multiclassing and gets hurts the most by multiclassing. If you make this 18/1/1 sorc its not going to have any better luck being wanted in epics than what you have now.

Wow, I keep having to pop my head in here.

First, its not "If he makes this 18/1/1 sorc". He's already made it. Its level 20, he plays it in game all the time. He gets by just fine. Even when he was 11 Wizzy/9 Cleric, he got by just fine. Unusual builds? Sure. But player skill has prevented what could otherwise be Epic Failure.

So... I'm curious now.

Is his Mass Hold Monster DC any lower for having made this Multi?
Are his firewalls any less hot than a 20th level Wizard?
Are his polar rays any less cold than a 18 Wiz/2 Rogue build?

Other than the loss of the two spells (which we can debate night and day, I love me some Wails), I'm really not seeing where this multi is so incredibly damaging to what is necessary of him as an arcane caster.

Instead, I see :
Fascinate (He's got it, period. Its one more ability he wouldn't have.)
Compared to a capped Sorc, a 12-rank higher UMD. (Yes plz?)
Higher Spell Pen (those Dancing Balls don't mean much if the mobs Blue-flash right through them) Correction, same spell pen.
Same DCs.
Increase in low-level utility spells.
No noticeable difference in SP pool.


Bottom line : Would I make this build? No, but I don't like multiclassing. Would I take Asphodeli along with me to run my Epics? Sure. I know the player behind the build brings what is necessary to the table consistently.

[Lord_WC]

Only problem coming to my mind is that your spell pen will be hurt a bit. If you are a borderline sr breaker this -2 will mean a lot. You might very well want to take care about this in your gear setup and make sure to have the best spell pen item you can have.

@McP: Well, actually his fw is less shiny by 2 points of base damage. This should amount to about what? 6-10 points/tick or so.
His spell pen isn't higher. It's actually lower, it's not character level for spell pen, but the caster level in this case sorc - 18.

But I agree, I would take him to epics no problem. Don't have prejudice nor I think only a 20 wizard/sorc is a good wiz/sorc.

[TheDearLeader]

Only problem coming to my mind is that your spell pen will be hurt a bit. If you are a borderline sr breaker this -2 will mean a lot. You might very well want to take care about this in your gear setup and make sure to have the best spell pen item you can have.

His spell pen isn't higher. It's actually lower, it's not character level for spell pen, but the caster level in this case sorc - 18.

Past Life: Wizard. Actually, my bad. His Spell Pen would be dead even with a 20 Sorc, not better. Still, not a negative. Also, I know plenty of Sorcs running around who have not taken both Spell Pen Feats, for [Insert Random Reason Here]. So he's actually ahead of the game on them.

@McP: Well, actually his fw is less shiny by 2 points of base damage. This should amount to about what? 6-10 points/tick or so.

Granted. However, given the amount of variety I see in the min/max values of my firewalls, I doubt I'd even notice the difference.

But I agree, I would take him to epics no problem. Don't have prejudice nor I think only a 20 wizard/sorc is a good wiz/sorc.

Good on you, then.

[omulrau]

As a Capped Sorc, I pose a question to you:

What good does my Capstone do me? 20% damage becomes pretty weak in Amrath, where Firewall is all but useless, and single-target nuke spells like Polar Ray are too expensive to use to actually kill mobs, and even in Epics where Firewall works, their HPs are grossly overinflated. It isn't Spell-based DPS that kills them, so much as the melee constantly swinging at the mobs I'm supposed to be making autocrit. Meaning Mass Hold, which has nothing to do with the fancypants capstone.

The loss of two level 9 spells? Yes, that would hurt. Spell selection sucks as it is. But I've capped a Fighter, Paladin, Bard, and Sorcerer. I play pure classes. While I take all four capstones, Two of them are more for show than anything else.

wrong, cone of cold is the best in amarath and the capstone boosts your damage, try to gather 10-15 mobs, you can kill them all with 2 cones

[Teharahma]

wrong, cone of cold is the best in amarath and the capstone boosts your damage, try to gather 10-15 mobs, you can kill them all with 2 cones

On normal yes..

[TheDearLeader]

wrong, cone of cold is the best in amarath and the capstone boosts your damage, try to gather 10-15 mobs, you can kill them all with 2 cones

I almost want to +1 you just for making me laugh.

But, since I'm responding anyway:

Cone of Cold.

Amrath, not amarath.

It is okay for you to capitalize the word which begins a sentence. It is also okay for you to end them with a period. See? Did it right there.

Have fun gathering your Cone mobs. While we're playing, what's your Evocation DC there party animal?

Oh, and when I say Amrath, I suppose I should have mentioned that I'm not talking about running Wrath of the Flame on Casual difficulty.

[FluffyCalico]

1) Sorcs biggest drawback is not having enough spell slots to take all the good spells. Getting rid of 3 of your best spells slots makes this problem far worse
2) You can't compare his spell pen with a past life when 18/1/1 and not with the past life when 20 when we are talking about the difference between 20 and 18/1/1 for the same toon.
3) He's also loosing caster level.
4) He's also loosing SP from items as 18/1/1 sorc only gets 190% from items not 200%

So of the 5 things that matter to casters hes loosing out on 4 of them and not really gaining much of anything in return. The only thing hes not loosing is spell DC.

[Sibellya]

Well, first off, this is my actual build in-game, although the stat points in INT was placed in STR when I TR-ed.

IMO, Toughness on a caster is debatable...nice if you have it, but not a major issue if you don't have it. Issue of survivability versus doing a better job at what you are doing. At cap, its +20 HP plus whatever HP you can get with a few AP spent in Racial Toughness, which is better spent on spell enhancements. This boils down to each person's gameplay style though.

And because I don't like cookie cutter builds, I traded +20% damage to all Empowerable spells capstone for a passable Fascinate DC, which is useful in Epics. Assuming I had allocated stat points in INT of course.

Lack of Toughness is -43 HP (assuming two tiers of Racial Toughness) which is probably about 15-20% of your total? I wouldn't be comfortable being so squishy but if you can pull it off then more power to you.

I don't want to turn the Capstone question into an all-out flame war. That aside, I would think that the loss of level 9 spell slots would really hurt. If you're set on having Fascinate then why not 19/1 so you could at least get both Wail and Mass Hold? Without the Wizard level you could drop Quicken, Sorcerer casting speed is already nice as it is

[Krag]

20% damage IS a big deal whenever you fight the endboss. Most notably Abbot, edq1-2, ev6 (base 3), elite Eye of the Titan, Shroud.

I see what you lose by not staying pure but don't see any advantage of bard/wiz splash.

[TheDearLeader]

20% damage IS a big deal whenever you fight the endboss. Most notably Abbot, edq1-2, ev6 (base 3), elite Eye of the Titan, Shroud.

I see what you loose by not staying pure but don't see any advantage of bard/wiz splash.

Spread the hate around pretty thickly, doncha?

First of all, its *lose*, not *loose*. www.m-w.com will assist you, should you have any other questions/concerns.

I've done all the above listed quests/raids, save Abbot, on previously mentioned capped (and capstone-d) Sorcerer. Even busting out :

• Risia-crafted Superior Potency IX/Major Ice Lore Scepter, with Epic Winter's Wrath
• Superior Combustion VII/Major Fire Lore Scepter combo
• ToD Belt Clickies of Superior Inferno/Freeze VIII
• Xachosian Eardweller's Xachosian Spell Frenzy

I have yet to see a situation where my overall spell damage is so incredibly crucial to quest completions that I must have an extra 20%.

Bottom line : If the stacking 20% damage was *so* important, there would be LFMs up asking for "Sorcerer Only". Instead, where there is one arcane class up, there is almost inevitably the other.

Edit : Oh and for the record, in solo Eye of the Titan on Elite, I've found a much better way of dealing with the Red Name Boss than crit-wall-fishing.

[FluffyCalico]

Bottom line : If the stacking 20% damage was *so* important, there would be LFMs up asking for "Sorcerer Only". Instead, where there is one arcane class up, there is almost inevitably the other.

.

I have never ever ever seen a lfm asking for a sorc/wiz that said must have 1 level bard and 1 level of another random class...
PS> the reason they want the wiz is they aren't sure the sorc will have all the wanted spells. And that 1/1 thing just gives the sorc 3 less spells compounding the issue...

[djsonar919]

I have never ever ever seen a lfm asking for a sorc/wiz that said must have 1 level bard and 1 level of another random class...
PS> the reason they want the wiz is they aren't sure the sorc will have all the wanted spells. And that 1/1 thing just gives the sorc 3 less spells compounding the issue...

I know that my guild would never pick up this build for any reason. I think the only reason why we would would be to laugh at it. I hate to be cruel, but this is just a bad build.

[TheDearLeader]

1) Sorcs biggest drawback is not having enough spell slots to take all the good spells. Getting rid of 3 of your best spells slots makes this problem far worse
2) You can't compare his spell pen with a past life when 18/1/1 and not with the past life when 20 when we are talking about the difference between 20 and 18/1/1 for the same toon.
3) He's also loosing caster level.
4) He's also loosing SP from items as 18/1/1 sorc only gets 190% from items not 200%

So of the 5 things that matter to casters hes loosing out on 4 of them and not really gaining much of anything in return. The only thing hes not loosing is spell DC.

Same goes to you. Losing, not loosing. You sound much more well-learned on a topic when well-learned in your native language. And when receiving constructive criticism well, I might also add.

1) He's already explained that his lack of Wail/Energy Drain/Meteor Swarm does not concern him. His gameplay has obviously led him to find a workaround.
2) Actually, we can compare his spell pen level to whatever we want. Notice the topic of the thread start with "My TR Story". This is his story - if you don't want any part of it, walk away.
3) Losing caster level = losing... what exactly?

• Spell Pen. But oh wait it doesn't, it evens out.
• Spell Duration. Oh really? No one complains when the 16/2/2 Warchanter's Haste is less than 4 minutes long. The difference will be unremarkable for other similar spells, such as Single-Target Dance, Firewall, etc.
• Spell Damage. Again, hardly see this making a huge difference. Things cook in firewalls, or they don't. Anything with a high enough resistance that 10 more points matters is not worth my SP, anyway.

4) 10 From Archmagi, 15 from Shroud Items? So... he's 25 SP behind? Big difference, one less Haste.