An orb covers almost the entire screen, there is absolutely no reason any monster should be anywhere near you at all.



You're vastly over estimating the damage of monsters. Perhaps due the fact you made a build with 600~ life.

You must be playing a different game then me dude.

An orb has to be placed juuust right for an enemy to take its full damge.. and that is only on a fraction of the screen. I am not trying to infinitely kite doing specks of damage to things. I want to get in its face, and blast it to death as fast as I can, and that means getting into a "danger" area instead of playing safely and leaning on my HP.

Seriously the rise of the spirit shield is like an anomaly on how the game is meant to be played, I am not saying different is bad, or adjustments are bad.. But it's bad because people completely forgot that blocking is TOTALLY MORE IMPORTANT than HP.. the anomaly is that if spirit was a +1 skill shield it would be garbage to most.

When I left the game in like 2005ish EVERYONE, and I mean EVERYONE followed the stat line of Get your STR, Get max Block.. THEN dump the rest into vit. Sure battle orders is potent, but it's not strong enough to sway me, and even the top HC players of the game still stick to this method. The pay off for one skill point and some cast rate.. just isn't as good as people have in their heads. Just my food for thought. I won't argue any more about it, this is how I play the game and how I would teach others, go sell your spirits to charsi.

And no.. 600 life is plenty when I rarely get hit, as in In after 4 hours of playing in Hell on various places in the map.. I never died. Throw a spirit on and add your vit.. death happens every 5 games..

This post was edited by 1337Heretic on Feb 20 2018 02:12pm

I'm not sure I get the point of this topic.

Caster sorceress using frozen orb dominates the game with the use of fireball (melee sorceress with frozen orb have dual dream on switch).

Brand alone costs the same as Infinity, so it's not a 'cheap' solution.
It's clearly much less effective than other sorceress builds, for the same price.

You could enhance your damage by reaching level 27+ cold mastery, and leaving away some points into warmth or enchant. And use Death fathom of course, and Spirit shield.
I don't want to develop the vita/max block discussion, as it is something independant from the main topic. Same question arises from almost any hardcore build...

If this is all about "Brand is funny", then you could try a bear necro with a Brand Demon crossbow (with synergized bone spears). There's already a good guide around.

I like the idea of trying to get something from the "explosive arrows/bolts" thing.
Brand shows some very good features. But Kuko Shakaku has 50% pierce. As you know, when an arrow pierces its target, there's a second explosion when it lands on another target...

Yes, it's probably fun. Will try it if I have the time

Thanks for the insight, I havent played in a long time. And Back in the day I did find Koku to be hysterical and wanted to recreate that.. only better. Maybe the Pierce double explosion is better overall? or perhaps a hand of justice instead that gives -fire rez?

It is gimmicky, and I know it's not more efficient than a lightning sorc with infinity.. that shit is OP.

But I do know that even though it is gimicky it works and if you are trying to toy around and have fun, this is a build for you to try out. The merc survives very well, she adds DPS while I orb and cleans up any Cold immune rather well. Could it be better? I am sure it could and any suggestions are def welcome (except for the max block vs vita lmao, I'm not budging on my feelings towards that)

As for the getting to level 27 for cold mastery.. I am still learning what is appropriate for PVM and PVP.. Is getting to level 17 enough for pvm? or should I go for 27 (which is what I did the first time). The itemization is def flexible, this is mostly about the skill tree and use of exploding arrows as a fireball side kick.

Many hell monsters have positive cold resistance.

For example in chaos shrine, megademons have 50%.
With -150%ECR (level 27 cold mastery), you double your orb damage. With -100%ECR (level 17 CM), you only inflict 1.5 times more.

Ah thank you, this was my original thought, and my first spec I did in fact aim for level 27 then was told to just aim for 17..

27 is obvious to me as the superior choice since I want to be the main damage.. not my allies or merc.

Nope same game.



Nothing about a vita build prevents you from doing the same, but it doesn't mean you should at all times.



I went over this in an earlier post, there isn't much in this game you need to be worried about blocking. Spirit could have zero +skills and it would still be wildly popular due to the amount of FCR/FHR you get from it.



I think you're remembering how people stated their characters incorrectly, vita has been far more popular even back in 2005.

If you don't wish to use spirit that's perfectly ok, but refusing to acknowledge the positives it brings to many builds is just ignorant.

Its drawback of negating blocking makes it worthless in most scenarios imo.

Like I said, go look at the top hardcore streamers and see how they play that is the correct way to play, not to lean on HP. Yes it has FHR to run away faster, and cast rate, cool. I can find those things elsewhere and almost never take damage by having 200 less life (without battle orders). Again, cleared sanctuary multiple times last night, did baal, ran around to say hi to anya.. nothing phased me.. Spirit on the other hand.. I would have died left and right, and since ORB HAS ITS OWN COOLDOWN TIMER.. Guess what!? That cast rate only helps you run away and teleport.. Cool.

It's a more viable shield for a lightning/infinity sorc .. because yes it helps your cast rate, and usually.. you dont have to get anywhere near anything and everything is isntagibed anyway.. that is not the case for an orb sorc. Orb sorcs have to get messy.

its also a good shield for Energy sheild/Orb builds too.. because block rate doesnt matter when your damage is going to your mana.. So yes I see it's positives.. But it is not a good choice for a straight up orb/fireball sorc where you have to get dirty to get the job done.

i like mb and your concept but you should try out builds before trashing them

that being said ofc neither a bow sorc nor your build is viable for pvp but thats not rly what the discussion is about

Bow sorceress is totally able to run Hell with ease.
Pvp is a different story...