My Infinite Mana ES sorc guide

So a while ago I noticed that it's not actually considered bm to carry an insight in duels. I also noticed that insight gives 35% faster cast rate and can be made in staffs. And I thought hey, wouldn't it be awesome to make an energy shield sorceress who carried an insight staff? You'd regenerate mana almost as fast as you took damage. It took a while to figure out what kind of build could support this gear and still do worthwhile damage, but I finally settled on a lightning sorceress.

The Gear:

Breakpoints to Aim For:

117% faster cast rate (this is the second fastest lightning cast speed)

60 or 86% Faster Hit Recovery (I only have 40, unfortunately)

Note: in parentheses is an explanation if I feel one is needed. I will give a "budget" version and an "ideal" version where necessary. Because much of the gear hinges on other pieces, eg. if using X you must use X to hit the breakpoint, "budget" options will be given for things that may seem inexpensive, such as magefists instead of frostburns:



Helm: 3 lightning skills, 2 socket, 20 faster cast rate magical circlet (Socket this with two shaels for a nice chunk of faster hit recovery. This is expensive as hell to get and it also requires that you use a crafted amulet with at least 15% faster cast rate, so I personally prefer a Griffon's Eye socketed with shael)

*budget*: Harlequin Crest (aka shako)

Armor: Skin of the Vipermagi (socketed with shael for the faster hit recovery, perfect sapphire for mana, or sol for flat damage reduction. Don't bother to up it, you want that low strength requirement)

Belt: Arachnid Mesh

Gloves: Frostburns

*budget*: Magefists

Rings: 2x Stone of Jordan rings

*budget*: 10% faster cast rate ring, ideally with mana

Amulet: +3 lightning skills, 10% faster cast rate amulet (If you use a 3/2/20 lightning skills circlet you have to usea crafted +2 sorceress skills, 12% faster cast rate amulet to hit that 117% breakpoint)

Boots: Crafted caster boots (these can potentially spawn with 5% maximum mana and up to +60 mana, as well as other useful mods. Craft your own, don't overpay for them. You can also use rare boots with +mana and faster hit recovery)

Weapon (the centerpiece): Insight runeword (ral tir tal sol. Make this in a staff with +3 to lightning if you're lazy and/or cheap, these can be easily bought from Drognan in act 2. If you want to go all out, get a staff with +3 to lightning, +3 to lightning mastery, and maybe +3 to nova which comes in handy sometimes)

Weapon Switch: Call to Arms flail or crystal sword with a lidless wall shield (You don't want to use spirit monarch, even ethereal, because it takes huge amounts of strength). Another great thing to keep in your stash is a Memory staff with at least +8 to Energy Shield. It's easily swapped in for your insight staff because, unlike with most sorceresses, you aren't swapping a staff for a weapon/shield, just a staff for a staff.

Inventory: 4x lightning skill grand charms with faster hit recovery, 5x lightning skill grand charms with life, sorceress torch, annihilus charm, and 10x 20/17 life/mana small charms.

*budget*: plain lightning charms will do, these are what I use. If you can't afford life/mana small charms, go for life. You'll have enough mana.

The Skill Layout:

20 points in Lightning

20 points in Lightning Mastery

20 points in Nova

20 points in Telekinesis

10 points in Energy Shield (Or enough to get 95% damage absorb. I use 10)

1 point in Thunderstorm

1 point in Warmth

Remaining points in the synergy of your choice (Chain Lightning or Charged Bolt)

The Cunning Stratagems:

Now, I haven't dueled all the builds there are, and I'm not going to tell you that this build can effortlessly kill everyone. Also, some things are obvious and straightforward. But I feel I should include this section as to be thorough. However, if you don't feel like reading this whole bit, I can offer some general advice here: Against characters that have to get up close, stay away and play defensively. Against casters and characters that try to stay away, you want to get up close and namelock them with lightning. If you lose a lot of mana and you have a chance to get away, remember, with insight you can recover your entire mana pool in 10-15 seconds, so run around for a bit until it comes back.

Bowazon: Your impulse will be to stay away because you have no block and no %damage reduction, but you have to fight it! Get right up close while avoiding waves of multishot with teleport, and namelock them with lightning.

Javazon: DO NOT GET UP CLOSE. Duck and weave, folks, duck and weave. Avoid getting close and hit them with lightning from one place before moving on to the next. It's a tough duel, especially as some of them use thundergod's vigor as their belt, but nothing you can't handle.

Trap Assassin: These are tough, but it's basically similar to the javazon strategy but even more defensive. Do not let them mindblast you, avoid getting caught in their traps. This is a very hard duel.

Hybrid or Whirlwind Assassin: Yeah...you're pretty well screwed here. Play defensively, try really, really hard to avoid getting caught in a whirlwind. If you do...you're dead.

Bone Necromancer: Defensiveness is their game here, not yours. Get up close and namelock them with lightning, try to get them in a hit recovery lock and immobilize them with damage.

Poison Necromancer: No chance, you're done. Your only hope is to stay off their screen and try to snipe them with lightning. Good luck. You might consider keeping some stashed death's gloves and poison resistance charms, but I'm not sure it'd really even help much.

Barbarian: Play defensively, don't let them whirlwind you or it's over. This is a very hard duel.

Hammerdin: You can tank that crap! But still, best to avoid their hammers. Get up close and on top of them and try to kill them before they can kill you.

Smiters and Chargers: Avoid them, DO NOT LET THEM NAMELOCK YOU. Run away and shoot back at them.

Fist of Heavens paladin: Get right up close and namelock.

Sorceress of Just about Any Variety: This is a combination of defense and offense. Avoid their attacks and be sneaky, but if you can get a good namelock in stand your ground and zap the bastards. You'll have a hard time sniping them, so if you want to close the deal, this is just about the only way to do it.

Wind Druids: You want to get up close and personal with a wind druid because, to be honest, you can tank the hell out of their nados. Namelock them with lightning and blast the hell out of them until they're dead. Pretty straightforward.

Shapeshifting Druids: Don't let them get near you, zap them before they can.

I hope you have as much fun with this build as I have, I've never seen one like it before in play or written up. Good hunting, folks.|||How about swapping out Griffon's for 3lite/20fcr/2os circlet? Most duelers have stacked LR in case of Griffon's so you will do more dmg this way with additional skills. Also higher level of ES means you can spend more in lightning synergies. Of course that means that you would need to use 2lite/sorc/15fcr ammy to compensate for fcr loss in Griffon's but it also means you can get additional mods like mana/life/ress/rep life etc.

Also with 2 holes in circlet you can add 2 Shaels for whooping 40 FHR. You can also use Treks instead of crafted boots for budget restrains and preferably eth to lower req all together. Stats aren't that important (PR can always be useful for ES based sorc) and it should lower their value somehow, but then you can up your Vipermagi for additional defense, and together with eth treks you could get nice sum of defense from any of cold armors (you can find those on either Memory for ES prebuff but that is expensive. 3 lightning staff with any cold armor shouldn't be that expensive).

With 40fhr from helm, 20 from Treks you need only 2 grand charms with fhr and one small. Socket Vipermagi with Sol to get some integer dr. It works awesome with high ES.

I know that chances are small but if you can get some rep life on 2/15 ammy that would help nicely. I know rep life from Hoto on my ES sorc helped me great deal when my sorc hit one life.

Hope that helps |||The strength requirement on treks is much higher than any other gear on the build, which is why I opted against them. The highest strength req is frostburns at 60, treks is another 31 strength. And that's a good idea about the circlet and the amulet. That would be the ideal gear. That's good stuff, though. I tried putting a dol in my vipermagi at one point for the life replenish but I didn't find it all that useful. I managed to craft a nice pair of boots with +5 life replenish. I don't think it's worth it trying to get together that defense, though. At most you'll end up with maybe 3k or so, and that poses very little impediment to any attack rating-based character. You're better off trying to keep your strength down and pumping energy. You could try for some low strength, 10 faster hit recovery rare boots with mana though.|||I'll talk with perfect items for all cases...

For eth Treks you need only 81 str (so 21 str) an it is possible, but unlikely to get some str on amulet so you can further decrease str invest. In theory ofc. You would get 10 fhr more and that means you can put away one GC that can bring you some extra life up to 45 and you can get up to 30 non BO-able life from Treks itself. Also don't forget that you need some poison ress. ES sorc doesn't need resist to elemental dmg, but poison tears you apart. With perfect torch/anni you have 40 allress, vipermagi brings you another 35, but that's all if I'm not mistaken? You would be walking with -25 PR after Anya bug in hell. Treks can net you nice PR for those duels that are next to impossible to win in first place. One single hitcheck from WW of Ghost will trigger OW and place Venom on you. It is very possible that you will end up on one life after OW, where next Mind Blast from Shadow Master will kill you. That's why I suggested Sol in Viper.

Getting that defense is just me theorycrafting It's just some add that can help in 0.02% situations.

Why I opt for Treks is cause they are easier to find then some whacked up 10fhr/60mana/rep life/PR boots (if such even exist, I'm too lazy to go checking for affixes that can spawn on crafts). Of course if I had such pair I'd pick them.|||Good call on the poison resist, I'll admit. I've got something like 11 poison resistance on my sorceress, but she has a couple of emerald small charms. Death's gloves would be good to have around for poison characters as well. I lose mana by swapping out frostburns, but poison bypasses my mana entirely so it's irrelevant.|||This is a very interesting build, I might have to give it a try.|||These maybe no brainers thus you didn't include, but you could suggest cta/spirit or 3es staff cta for weapon switch. Since your main weapon is insight, max es is +3 from weapon (3es insight or cta+spirit)unless you make cta in a 3es staff. On a related note I think you should specify to get to 95%es because saying 10 points in es maybe a few points under or over and skill points are very valuable because you still have synergies for lightning you can put into. Also there's no mention of other charms besides GCs which should be 20/17 SCs or just the best hp/mana you can afford I guess and torch and anni of course. And I'll say it again most people should know that without you telling them but it feels a little incomplete when they're not included in the guide, just my opinion.|||Quote:








These maybe no brainers thus you didn't include, but you could suggest cta/spirit or 3es staff cta for weapon switch. Since your main weapon is insight, max es is +3 from weapon (3es insight or cta+spirit)unless you make cta in a 3es staff. On a related note I think you should specify to get to 95%es because saying 10 points in es maybe a few points under or over and skill points are very valuable because you still have synergies for lightning you can put into. Also there's no mention of other charms besides GCs which should be 20/17 SCs or just the best hp/mana you can afford I guess and torch and anni of course. And I'll say it again most people should know that without you telling them but it feels a little incomplete when they're not included in the guide, just my opinion.




Completely right. I failed to mention that I (sneaky me) actually keep a +8 to energy shield Memory staff in my stash. It's super easy to make use of this because you're just swapping a staff for a staff, instead of a staff for weapon/shield like with most sorceresses. Ideal gear would also include 20/17 charms, of course. I'll make some changes. Cta/lidless is the switch I use since spirit takes up huge strength.|||I'm just going to bump this because I think more people should see it and it's super fun.|||I'm heading for this on ladder. Well, the infinite mana part only with cold as dmg dealer; Blizzard because the first hit can not be sorbed. Is that true? If not then I go for some other route. Also Nightwing would then be most expensive item as I don't yet even have Viper.. and no pressure to FCR with blizz.