Lightning sorc without infinity - worth it?

[:1]Simple question - I play single player only which means no trading, only what my other characters have found and stored in ATMA.

This means Infinity is not going to happen, ever. I've never found a Ber, let alone two, and never will. Have never seen a Mal either. I did get one Ist from the Countess but that's the highest rune I've ever seen drop. I was utterly delighted to get even an Um from the Forge and that only once (usually it's much worse). I have been playing in 1.12 until just a couple days ago, and know rune drops are slightly better in 1.13 but seriously don't expect it to make a difference for me.

So, no Infinity, full stop. Is it at all worth doing a pure Lit sorc in hell, then? I am bad at sorcs in Hell in general (highest I've gotten is lvl78 before it became too tedious to continue), because immunities really hurt single-tree sorcs and I don't get satisfactory damage output from going dual-tree with my gear.|||Slightly better? 1.13 Ber drops as often as Um did in 1.12. That's huge. Depending on how often you play you'll quickly notice just how much it helps. It's still mostly about luck more than anything else but at least you've got a chance now

Judging from your last paragraph I'd say stay away from a light sorc for now, but it would help if you could list the gear you'd probably put on a dual-tree or potential light sorc.|||Light sorc is very fast at certain runs (I do key runs without infinity, but of course you won't be doing those in SP), but for clearing through the game I would want to do dual tree and respec light later.

I think you might find blizzballer does completely acceptable damage even without lots of gear.|||If you have just started playing 1.13 I wouldn't give up on HR's just yet. Drop rates have increased to a very significant degree. The Council in Travincal and the superchests in Lower Kurast are your best bet as a pretty reliable source. If you use the search you find lots of information on how to run these targets efficiently. Another way to obtain 2x Ber is to trade for them in the SP trade forum. So trade is certainly possible in SP.

But if you want to play self found and you don't like running Travincal or LK it's indeed a good idea not to expect Ber's anytime soon. And then pure Lightning might not be the best build if you don't want to skip immunes or wait for your Merc to take them out. As far as single tree Sorcs go, pure cold with Blizzard as the main attack is probably the most common. But this is neither really good for general questing. Just for some of the most common MF areas like Pindle, Mephisto and the Ancient Tunnels.|||Before 1.13 I think the highest rune I'd gotten was a mal

In this ladder alone I've personally had drop (not just traded for) 2 bers, 1 cham, 1 Lo, 2 ohm, 1 sur, several vexes and guls, and tons of ists.

Rune drop rates are much improved.