Is Arcane Augmentation needed for my build?

[scottyboy1979]

I currently have a level 20/epic 10 sorcerer and for the most part, other than some heroic and racial trs I think Im pretty maxed out with equipment. I recently saw that the new update has fire and force scepters that might be a better fit than my legendary firestorm conduit. Since they cant be fused I would lose my orange meridian fragment but I would gain force power and force critical and some fire power as well with insightful. Iam a little worried to get rid of arcane augmentation from the staff and wondering what it does to the spells I use. I stay in draconic and mostly a nuker. I use fire burst, vortex, dragon breath and flyby along with ruin, greater ruin, meteor swarm and my dragonborn fire breath. i currently have dc around 110 for meteor swarm and 140 for draconic spells. Does augmentation affect those? it says character level and i know meteor swarm got knocked down to 20 levels. Kinda confusing to me that the base draconic adds caster levels and wondering if I should keep adding them up or not for max damage. I had the six from draconic, 3 from red dragon draconic enhancement, 1 from filagree and 2 from staff but now i eliminated some of them for potential farming the scepters with spell power. Anyway, if you have any advice or maybe able to tell me that i should keep the augmentation items please let me know, thanks!

[PrinceOfAsphodel]

I currently have a level 20/epic 10 sorcerer and for the most part, other than some heroic and racial trs I think Im pretty maxed out with equipment. I recently saw that the new update has fire and force scepters that might be a better fit than my legendary firestorm conduit. Since they cant be fused I would lose my orange meridian fragment but I would gain force power and force critical and some fire power as well with insightful. Iam a little worried to get rid of arcane augmentation from the staff and wondering what it does to the spells I use. I stay in draconic and mostly a nuker. I use fire burst, vortex, dragon breath and flyby along with ruin, greater ruin, meteor swarm and my dragonborn fire breath. i currently have dc around 110 for meteor swarm and 140 for draconic spells. Does augmentation affect those? it says character level and i know meteor swarm got knocked down to 20 levels. Kinda confusing to me that the base draconic adds caster levels and wondering if I should keep adding them up or not for max damage. I had the six from draconic, 3 from red dragon draconic enhancement, 1 from filagree and 2 from staff but now i eliminated some of them for potential farming the scepters with spell power. Anyway, if you have any advice or maybe able to tell me that i should keep the augmentation items please let me know, thanks!

So yeah, I don't blame you for being confused. There are way too many effects in this game. Here's what I know from asking these types of questions a bunch of times on reddit. Caster level has no effect on DCs, what it affects is damage, and also spell penetration, but in your case, mostly damage. Here's the thing though, as you mentioned, Draconic Incarnation already gives a bunch of caster levels and there is a maximum. https://ddowiki.com/page/Maximum_caster_level This page shows you the maximum caster level of most spells. As you mentioned, your most important spell, Meteor Swarm has a caster level capped at 20, which means if you're level 20, arcane augmentation, or any other boosts to caster level will do absolutely nothing, unless you raise your maximum caster level. There are ways to raise your maximum caster level, including some abilities in the Draconic destiny or the elemental savant enhancement trees, but the number of "+ caster level" effects in the game FAR outnumber the "+ max caster level" effects. Thus I would say no, in almost all circumstances, arcane augmentation is not needed in a sorcerer set up. You get enough caster levels from Epic Destinies and enhancement trees to reach the max on every spell by the time you're level 30.

[Enoach]

There are some exceptions to Caster Level not contributing to DCs

1. Dispel Magic/Greater - This uses your caster level vs the apposing caster level
2. Dismissal/Banishment - This uses your caster level vs targets Hit Dice
3. Knock - Uses Caster Level + Primary Caster Attributes Modifier vs DC of Lock

Now much like a player maximizing their AC when figuring out Dexterity, it is best to figure out how much you can personally get vs how much you can actually use.

If your Maximum caster level is 22, anything obtained above that is unused. However, if your maximum is 22 and you can only reach 20 you would benefit from boosting your Caster Level by 2.

With Sorcerer you have a balance and this type of boost can help counter losses in opposite element. As a Fire Savant instead of being -6 Caster levels to water you could be -4 Caster Levels.

Also, this could work as a switch out for times when you need to use the exceptions I outlined above.

For your build you will need to figure out if any of this benefits you, it will be different based on what spells you use.

[scottyboy1979]

So if i have the draconic ability +3 from destiny that should boost my caster levelbfor meteor swarm to level 23 even though it says 20? Based on other spells i use it doesnt change anything true?

[PrinceOfAsphodel]

So if i have the draconic ability +3 from destiny that should boost my caster levelbfor meteor swarm to level 23 even though it says 20? Based on other spells i use it doesnt change anything true?

Correct. The Dragon Spell Knowledge ability from Draconic Incarnation raises both caster level AND maximum caster level, so it will raise by 3 no matter what. Arcane Augmentation would only increase caster level but NOT maximum caster level so if Meteor Swarm has an MCL of 20, Arcane augmentation can't raise it once your at 20, but Dragon Spell Knowledge can raise the spell's maximum to 23, so it takes it up to caster level 23. I hope that makes sense.

[Frezar14]

So what is the actual max caster for a fire sorc? When I look at combat log it says I cast MS at level 35. Base is 20, 6 from enhancements, 6 from core draconic, and 3 from draconic spell knowledge. Is there more I can get from somewhere?

[Shadowperson]

divine/arcane augmentation is not needed on any build. It barely does anything.

[PrinceOfAsphodel]

So what is the actual max caster for a fire sorc? When I look at combat log it says I cast MS at level 35. Base is 20, 6 from enhancements, 6 from core draconic, and 3 from draconic spell knowledge. Is there more I can get from somewhere?

Well, it depends on the spell, because how high you can take up a max caster level depends on how high the caster level was to begin with. Let's try it with Meteor. You can get extra caster levels from all over the place, like you mentioned, but in order to raise it past 20, you need to raise its MAXIMUM caster level. So we'll look at that. You get one from the fifth core of savant tree, one from the capstone, and one from the elemental form that's also from capstone. You get 3 from Dragon Spell Knowledge out of DI Destiny. Outside of that you can find 2 in the Dragonborn tree. That's +8 right there and I'm not sure how you can get more. Now I'm a bit confused as to why the combat log is saying you're casting at level 35 if the maximum can't go past 28 (31 if you're in Magister and twist Dragon Spell Knowledge). I'm going by the wiki so maybe there are other ways to raise the maximum that I forgot about. It's either that or the combat log is giving you the wrong information. No matter how many caster levels you have, you shouldn't be able to push pass the maximum caster level so I'm not sure what's going on.

Edit: I was just informed by more veteran players that the cores from Draconic actually give max caster levels as well, despite not saying so. That would be another +6 to the equation, which would get you to 34. I'm not sure where the final one is coming from but 34 is much closer than 28, lol.