Sorcerer Second Life

[Enguebert]

I plan to TR my wizard into a sorcerer and i have some questions

1) Going full Sorcerer or going sorcerer18/Fvs 2
Gaining some fire/force spellpower and critical % worth the loss of capstone ?
Also Fvs allow me to use wand of cure, for heroic leveling (I don't have warforged or bladeforged so it will be a fleshy sorcerer)

2) Feat
Some feats seems obvious : maximize, empower
Is Heighten useful ?
Is Past Life: Arcane Initiate useful
Should i go for SpellPenetration/Greater Spell Penetration/Epic Spell Penetration or Mental Toughness/Improve MentalToughness/Epic Mentaltoughness for more %crit ?

Any other useful feat for a sorcerer ?

[knockcocker]

I plan to TR my wizard into a sorcerer and i have some questions

1) Going full Sorcerer or going sorcerer18/Fvs 2
Gaining some fire/force spellpower and critical % worth the loss of capstone ?
Also Fvs allow me to use wand of cure, for heroic leveling (I don't have warforged or bladeforged so it will be a fleshy sorcerer)

2) Feat
Some feats seems obvious : maximize, empower
Is Heighten useful ?
Is Past Life: Arcane Initiate useful
Should i go for SpellPenetration/Greater Spell Penetration/Epic Spell Penetration or Mental Toughness/Improve MentalToughness/Epic Mentaltoughness for more %crit ?

Any other useful feat for a sorcerer ?

My advice would be to find a build and go with that. Some of your questions show a lack of knowledge about
how arcane spellcasting in DDO works. I'm not trying to be a jerk, just trying to save you some frustration.

[cru121]

Pure sorcerer is okay. I have even used the elemental form, which is partially a trap (spells cost more, caster level penalty, etc) but it does bring some undocumented immunities, which are nice, considering that your saves won't be stellar.

Feats:
Heighten: yes
PL:Wiz: yes
Spell Pen: your preference. either you want your spells with SR to land and you invest into it, or you use different spells. I skipped these.
Mental Toughness: I took these.
Other: Spell Focus. Enlarge sometimes. Quicken.

[Sokól]

I plan to TR my wizard into a sorcerer and i have some questions

1) Going full Sorcerer or going sorcerer18/Fvs 2
Gaining some fire/force spellpower and critical % worth the loss of capstone ?
Also Fvs allow me to use wand of cure, for heroic leveling (I don't have warforged or bladeforged so it will be a fleshy sorcerer)

2) Feat
Some feats seems obvious : maximize, empower
Is Heighten useful ?
Is Past Life: Arcane Initiate useful
Should i go for SpellPenetration/Greater Spell Penetration/Epic Spell Penetration or Mental Toughness/Improve MentalToughness/Epic Mentaltoughness for more %crit ?

Any other useful feat for a sorcerer ?

Big question here is this just for 1 to 20 or endgame?

[Enguebert]

Big question here is this just for 1 to 20 or endgame?

Thanks for all the answers

The goal is to reincarnate into sorcerer and going from 1 to 28 and doing an ETR. And experiment the difference between wizard and sorcerer.
But i will take my time, and from 20 to 28, i will focus on developping ED and farming CoV. That will probably means no high end game (mostly level 20-25 quests)

I still have my LR+20 heart, so if i do heavy errors in my build, i can correct them

FYI, current life is wizard 18/rogue 2/epic 6. First life, so ED not very developped, poor material. Can do MoTu quests in EH but have problems in Wheloon & Stormhorn quests in EN.
I will do an HR in a few weeks (just farming some Cov), as i will not have enough CoV (was already level 24 when ETR & CoV was introduced)

[Cardtrick]

I plan to TR my wizard into a sorcerer and i have some questions

1) Going full Sorcerer or going sorcerer18/Fvs 2
Gaining some fire/force spellpower and critical % worth the loss of capstone ?
Also Fvs allow me to use wand of cure, for heroic leveling (I don't have warforged or bladeforged so it will be a fleshy sorcerer)

It's not just fire/force spellpower and critical % -- it's also Just Rewards, which is probably the biggest benefit. Basically free SP every time you get a critical, which can be quite frequent. When using low-cost spells, you can actually earn more SP on average than you use.

The big decision is this -- do you want to be a splashed low-DC Shiradi spamming sorcerer or a pure/near-pure DC-based Draconic/EA sorcerer?

The idea with the Shiradi build is that you multi-class to get various other benefits to survivability and DPS. You accept the fact that your DCs will suffer. You will not get the highest level spells at all. You instead focus on maximizing spellpower and critical chance, and casting lots and lots of low-SP, high-proc-rate spells that can trigger multiple Shiradi effects. The fact that you're not worrying about maximizing DC really frees you up in terms of class selection -- you don't lose much by not getting 9th or 8th level spells, you can live with somewhat lower CHA, etc. There are 3 classes really worth splashing -- Favored Soul, Paladin, and Monk. Favored Soul gives critical chance, spellpower, and Just Rewards -- it's the DPS option. Paladin gives Divine Grace, which on a high-CHA build means your saves can get near the no-fail point. Monk gets 2 bonus feats, evasion, and a bit of fire/force spellpower and crit chance.

My feeling -- and there are those who disagree -- is that the monk splash is not worth doing unless you also do the paladin splash, since otherwise it's too difficult to get your Reflex save high enough to matter.

The Draconic/EA build tries to maintain a high DC, certainly for evocation spells but ideally also for another spell school (typically Enchantment, since Necromancy is just too hard). Going pure is very worth considering, since you'll have some use for the 9th level spells and You really want every possible point of charisma. A 2 level splash doesn't hurt you too much, and there are a lot of benefits available. Any deeper than that starts to get really painful, though. Beyond just the fact of not having any 9th level spells, you also have to deal with the fact that you can't Heighten your other spells past the highest level spell you do have -- so with more than a 2 level splash, you're also losing at least 1 point of DC from that.

So I consider there to be just a few class splits worth considering:

20 Sorc -- the classic pure sorcerer, capable of attaining a very high DC and using 9th level spells. You sacrifice a lot of versatility, but you gain a lot of power. If you want to stay pure, you should seriously focus on getting max DC elsewhere -- don't take other enhancements or epic destiny slots when Charisma is available, for example. This is not a good fit for Shiradi; it can work, but there's not much synergy.

18 Sorc / 2 FvS -- the glass cannon near-pure build, still have 9th level spells and reasonably high DC, but also get additional spellpower/crit chance and Just Rewards. This is a generalist splash build and can work as either Shiradi or Draconic/EA.

18 Sorc / 2 Paladin -- the defensive near-pure build. Another generalist splash build that can work in either Shiradi or the DC destinies. Having high saves is really nice, and you don't give up too much compared to a pure sorcerer. On the other hand, your DPS will be noticeably behind the FvS splash.

16 Sorc / 2 FvS / 2 Paladin -- Good DPS focused Shiradi build, great in parties or soloing EN/EH, sufficient saves to survive in EE with a party but a bit tough to solo EE with due to lack of evasion. Can still more or less function outside Shiradi, although loss of 9th level spells does hurt.

16 Sorc / 2 Paladin / 2 Monk -- Good defense focused Shiradi build. One of the best options for soloing EE as a first/second life character. Great saves and evasion -- what more could you want? Loss of 9th level spells hurts outside Shiradi, but you can make it work.

14 Sorc / 4 FvS / 2 Paladin -- Like the above, but even more Shiradi focused. I feel like the second two levels of FvS have hit diminishing returns and you're giving up too much for just a few more points of critical chance, but this remains a popular build. I wouldn't want to try running this one outside Shiradi.

Generally speaking, I think the strongest choices for savant right now are fire/force for a Shiradi (especially if going with any favored soul levels) and air for a pure or near-pure DC build. Earth and Ice are better as secondary elements.

My suggestion is this -- don't try to go max DC right now. It can be a really fun playstyle, but you've presumably just experienced it on your wizard life. It's harder on a sorcerer, and really -- really -- benefits from a few sorcerer past lives.

You've also mentioned that you're going to be leveling up destinies, so I'm going to strongly urge you away from the 14 sorc / 4 favored soul / 2 paladin build -- that one's not a lot of fun when you can't run in Shiradi.

If you had warforged/bladeforged, I would suggest 18 sorc / 2 paladin. Since you don't, I think you really are going to want 2 favored soul levels. It's not even about the Cure wands you mentioned -- to me, it's more about opening up Empower Healing for Cocoon. For the same reason, I strongly suggest human rather than drow -- you're going to want some heal amp, but more importantly, the need to take Empower Healing will leave you a feat behind most sorcerers, so you could really use the human bonus feat.

So for me, your choice comes down to 18 sorc / 2 FvS or 16 sorc / 2 FvS / 2 paladin. I lean toward the 16 sorc / 2 FvS / 2 Pal build. The survivability benefits are huge, and even though you'll lack 9th level spells and be a few points of DC behind, I think it's the best tradeoff. Shiradi will have the most synergy for you, but you won't be crippled in other destinies.

2) Feat
Some feats seems obvious : maximize, empower
Is Heighten useful ?
Is Past Life: Arcane Initiate useful
Should i go for SpellPenetration/Greater Spell Penetration/Epic Spell Penetration or Mental Toughness/Improve MentalToughness/Epic Mentaltoughness for more %crit ?

Any other useful feat for a sorcerer ?

It all depends. I do usually like to take Heighten even when not maximizing DC, although I pretty much only use it on Web, Otto's Sphere, and my SLAs. If you're focusing on DC, it is mandatory, though.

PL: Arcane Initiate is probably the single best active past life. It's really nice. But -- on a DC-dumped build, it still may not be worth taking. I would definitely take it in heroics, when you'll have very competitive DCs even with a splash build, but consider swapping it out for something else later if you find that you're not using many spells with DCs. If you plan to do this, perhaps the most obvious option is to swap it for Empower Healing once you hit epics and have access to Cocoon (which may or may not require you to first traverse the destiny map over to the Primal Sphere -- I'm not sure what you have open currently). If you plan to make this feat swap, make sure you don't take PL: Arcane Initiate until on or after your first favored soul level, so that the swap is legal.

I don't think there's any point taking the Spell Pen feats. You're going to have an extremely tough time getting to a useful level of spell penetration against the enemies where it matters on a sorcerer. Most enemies don't have spell resistance anyway. For the ones that do, just use Web for CC or (even better) just DPS them to death. (If you had 3 wizard past lives and 3 favored soul past lives, my response might be different, but even if you take one or two feats you're going to have trouble getting the spell pen to be useful against the enemies you might want it for without those past lives.)

You didn't mention Quicken, but I consider it very worth taking. It's true that sorcerers cast really quickly, but some spells are just slow. I particularly like it for the DOTs, for Dancy Sphere, and for either Reconstruct or Cocoon. And of course it should be always on for the SLAs, since it's free.

The Mental Toughness line is tricky. Definitely don't take it if you're going for max-DC -- you'll need those feats for Spell Focuses or even Great Charisma. But if you're not going max-DC, you'll probably have favored soul levels giving you lots of critical chance and the SP battery of Just Rewards, so the extra crit chance and SP from the mental toughness line will seem a bit minor in comparison. It's still worth taking, but it's the first thing I'd give up if something else seems more appealing.

[Enguebert]

Thanks CardTrick for the detailled options

As i don't have monk, it limits me to pure sorcerer or fvs/paladin splash
For ED, i have already opened the way to shiradi (but not yet invested in it), so i can quickly raise it

Back to the drawing board, starting with spells & feats.