This was my answer to how to make a decent endgame sorc.
It's a 31 Wild Mage / 41 Air Savant / 11 Feydark, Dragonmarked H-Elf running in Draconic/Primal/Fatesinger.
This is my racial completionist - the critical things from past lives are 3x sorc for 3 Evo DC, and 3x Energy Criticals for spell crit %s, then the +4 to CHA from completionist feats again for +2 DC. Non-racial completionist should just bin Feydark at cap (after levelling using GCS), and make sure you get Greater Dragonmark from the H-Elf tree with those points.
It does (the literal most?) caster dps ~64K per second on the Ettin:
- This is still not optimal - I have gear changed again since that post as I was missing Arcane Augmentation on G/Shout. I will at some point make a video but I'm procrastinating from study sufficiently with this giant build post.
- I agree with everyone wanting an actual parseable target we can measure outside of a burst period - spell castable dummies with 10m+ HP please. This build is pretty consistent damage-wise so should do well (there is no significant ramp up beyond a few seconds for Harmonic Resonance and Vulnerability from Air Sorc).
- It has prioritised crit chance, Spellpower and dedicated Lamordia crit damage augments for its 3 major elements.*
*Ice lacks a dedicated insightful SP item (it's using ins 55 potency from the cloak), and the 3rd and final Lamordia augment (6% quality crit damage). Lightning and Sonic lack a dedicated Quality item (Both using Quality 27 Potency from raid Goggles). Despite these issues, I am pretty sure it's literally optimally itemised.
It has good DCs:
- 125DC for Mass Hold in Reapers (boostable via Reaper DC clickie thing, and optionally Channel Power + other feat swaps for even more).
Why H-Elf?
Call Lightning Storm (hereafter CLS). It's the only spell with no Max Caster Level, and we need it because caster dps generally sucks.
Strimton posted a build using Air Savant and CLS last year; it's a really great post and video. There is also some detailed and accurate chat on optimal dps in the latter pages of that thread's comments from Tilo et al.
Why Wild Mage?
+4 CL/MCL, and 12% Universal Spell Crit Damage.
- Wild mage's damage SLAs are bad.
- Wild mage's surges are bad.
- Wild mage's alignment damage stuff is ununsable.
Screenshot of my enhancements is linked further down and here.
Why Air Savant for max dps?
It's a mix of:
1) Call Lightning Storm - boosts our max caster levels on it to 55 (L Alchemical Lightning Orb + Lightning Coil) or 57 (Spiral).
2) Air Savant, Fatesinger and Master of Music all combine to get good numbers on Greater Shout and Shout via huge Max Caster Level Boosts and flat damage multipliers, allowing a zero-gap spell rotation due to the wider selection of viable spells compared with other sorcs.
3) DPS Mantles align perfectly.
- Draconic's DoT Mantle is snapshotted onto CLS, then
- we run in Primal's Sky Mantle, rotating through Lightning, Ice and Sonic spells in order, to allow maximum Mantle procs (each element has a 5 second cooldown):
Lightning: Thunderstroke (6s cooldown), Chain Lightning,
Cold: Iceberg (6s cooldown), Polar Ray,
Sonic: Greater Shout, Shout.
4) Amplin's DoT plays nicely with Awaken Electric Vulnerability.
Cold Savant has better filigree support allowing a better spell crit profile, and has additional dps support from Magister. I don't think that's enough to compare with the combined strength of the above points outside of a Time Stop burst. That said, I'm all eyes on 'The Ettin Thread' if someone does a Cold Savant attempt.
Fire/Acid Savants are near-identical in being unsupported.
Both need love via more spells being made viable so they can have a real dps rotation:
- I'd literally merge Fire and Acid into 'Brimstone savant' and give all the benefits of both to both Fire and Acid, as a better Acid Well would help with the lack of viable spells issue.
- Exalted Angel should also be more directly supportive (e.g. +100% / +50% damage to DBF/Fireball/Wall of Fire/Flame Strike/Comet Fall) a la Fatesinger's benefits to sonic spells.
Stats
18 CHA (level-ups here)
18 CON
12 INT (may need a tome to get all skills - only spellcraft/perform/tumble really matter)
Skills:
- Spellcraft (Elec/Ice SP),
- Perform (Sonic SP),
- Tumble (I want to live),
- Search, (Secret Lamordian Doors)
- one of Spot/Conc/Balance/whatever <-- won't be maxxed. While levelling, get UMD; don't get it after an ER - it does literally nothing for you as your high CHA maxes out all UMD usage in game.
Feats:
1 - Max + Warlock Dilettante for minor Fire damage to spells (Paladin Dilettante gives +5 stacking saves which is also good).
3 - Quicken
6 - Empower
9 - Least Dragonmark
12 - Heighten
15 - SF: Evo
18 - GSF: Evo
21 - Wellspring
24 - Intensify Spell
27 - Master of Music
30 - ESF: Evocation, Scion of Feywild (4 Ench DC + best Sonic Crits is a nice perk)
33 - Embolden
ED Feats:
22: ESP: Elec
25: ESP: Sonic
28: ESP: Cold <-- Channel Power here isn't crazy
31: SS: Enchantment (Mass Hold)
34: SS: Conj (Web / Trap the Soul)
Hot takes on non-taken feats
Burst of Glacial Wrath:
- It's fine. Would if I could!
Channel Power:
- I've run it a bit and it actually synergises well with Call Lightning Storm since you can charge up for a big cast.
- I like it for Miner Sacrifice and other Lamordia quests when I know I have spitters/brutes/warlocks/big servitors to IK/CC coming up and want to DC boost.
- It's the slight crit damage trade-off for the other damage types that I think biases me against it; it's usually not benefiting me in any way while ESP: Cold does.
- I've heard the theories of 'always be charging it and just stand in one place and nuke' and I would 100% die.
Ruins:
I would use G/Ruin if they were bestowed for free, but I can't justify 2 feats:
- I strongly suspect they'd be a net DPS loss over any 2 dps feats of Wellspring/Intensify/Master of Music, and
- I'm not dropping the ability to take Spell Specialties from ESF: Evo or Embolden's +2 DC.
- I'd take PL: Wiz and PL: Bard over them if I had 2 free feats for the +2 to Mass Hold DC.
Also:
- Their cooldowns are crazy annoying. Every 3rd and 7th cycle I cast G/Ruin? I will definitely mess that up.
- As an 'oh no a Reaper' button, I have Thunderstroke and Iceberg... yes, G/Ruins do more damage, but genuinely not that much more, and we're not 1 hit k-o-ing except in trivial content anyway so we'll be using our standard sustained high dps rotation which I think suffers if we did take them.
- Also, fitting a 4th spell crit damage type (Force Lore is actually fine since it's on Red Wizard's Sight) into gear seems like a huge pain. I'd rather get another 1 Con (from 14 to 15), and 3 Q Con if I had the spare Lamordia slots.
Gear:
Head - Legendary Elder's Cap, +6 Ench, +11 Spell Saves, [Occultation + Globe] <-- Elder's Set
Goggles - Red Wizard's Sight (Ins Cha +7), Q Pot 27, Solar = +3 DC, [Greater Conj, Conj Power]
Necklace - Climber's Remembrance (Rare), +3 ISM, (Sonic Crit * 3), Lunar = +3 DC, [How to Cast Faster, Spellcraft +20]
Armor - Leg Downcast's Vest (Light Armor Rare), (Exc Lore 5, 15 Exc USP, Qual Elec Crit, +2 Sacred DC), Solar = Spell Penetration, [Festive Cha +2, Festive Con +2]
Cloak - Leg Gravekeeper's Elegant (Frost Giant), +55 Ins Potency, 18 Ins Mag Sheltering, (Elec Crit, Ins Elec Crit), Solar = +4 CHA, [GL+3, Dex +14]
Bracers - Glacier, Spell Pen 9, Wizardry 283, [Dodge 14, Crystallised Drop of Tea] <-- Glacier Set
Gloves - Glacer, Ice Lore 22, Q Glac 36, Eff Maximize II, [Ultimatum, Resistance +11] <-- Glacier Set
Belt - Baron's Bandolier, False Life/Enh Bloodrage (Cha, Q Cha), Lunar = +25 USP [Pomura's, Con +14]
Boots - Gravekeeper's Greaves - Ins Fort, Q Fort 3, (Ice Crit, Ice Crit), Lunar = +4 CHA, [Hamp, Ins Con +5] <-- Season's Warding absorbs on swap with identical gems; Ice is your third element so not the hugest deal.
Ring 1 - Theurgy of Spring, Elec SP, Ins Elec SP, [Evo +6, Greater Evo, Sheltering 36]
Ring 2 - Bound Elemental Ring of Flames, Fire Lore 22, Combustion 148, Arcane Augmentation IX, Alch Fire Attunement [Greater Enchantment, Master's Gift] <-- really here just for the Arcane Augmentation IX for the Shouts and Iceberg/Polar Ray.
Trinket - Legendary Gem of Many Facets [Sonic Lore, Fortification, Ins Resonance], [Perform +18(20 ideally)] <-- Elder's Set
Weapon - Amplin (Ash) 24 Lightning Lore, [Glaciation 153, Resonance 153]
Other weapons - Lightning Coil / Leg Alchemical Orb (or non-orb if no Channel Power) for Call Lightning Storm Casting. Spiral also doable over Lightning Coil, then you have a free off-hand but seems a pain.
Enh:
<-- Feydark is just for the +1 CHA and +15 USP from the cores. You don't use GCS except to kill time when you're in a bad surge ('Out of Phase' or 'Silent Bubbles'); it doesn't land in real content.
EDs:
Big points:
- Fatesinger = 50% shout damage and 100% greater shout damage, +2 CHA, free Enlarge, and -35% threat
- Draconic = DoT mantle
- Primal = Coccoon, +2 CHA, Tri-element mantle
There are some very subjective choices in my current selection. Should I take Evasion from Primal and/or double duration Wellspring from Draconic? Probably. Do I? No.
I really like spell efficiencies. You can't reduce a spell's cost below its base cost after all metamagic efficiencies are applied, but you certainly can get it there, then if you have another -20% spell costs from:
e.g. Draconic Cores (10%), and Fatesinger's Masquerade (10%), you can walk around casting max/emp/quicken G Shout for 23SP for an AoE doing more than the damage of an unimproved Greater Ruin.
In a dream gear set, you'd also rock Legendary Socket Band (for another 10% efficiency) , but I can't make it work due to the need for Arcane Augmentation IX (and the Bound Elemental Ring of Flames being the sole viable source).
Filigrees:
Amplin/Artifact
4 Otto's (cha, cha, spellpower, int) <-- +2 DC set bonus
4 Eye (cha, cha, USP +10, Int +2(raid)) <-- +2 DC set bonus
3 Lunar (cha, cha, USP +10) <-- +1 DC set bonus
2 CHA +2 (raid)
2 CHA +2 (raid)
Elec Coil
5 Dragonsoul (Crit damage)
2 Electrocutioner (50 Elec SP)
3 Whatever (maybe Elemental Avatar; I have these blank as I'm levelling up a new Sentient Gem and it's convenient to have on swap so I don't have to go dig for it)
Pfft. Why do you claim 'DC' in the title?
It hits 125 Mass Hold which is something. There are trade-offs, and this is still imo the right base template to max DCs from.
My internal calculus is: 50 USP < 1 DC < 75 USP (idk my exact value); depending on how much your evaluation differs is how many dps feats you bin to fit in PL: Wiz / PL: Bard - or if you're way more USP value-ing, you'll want to swap out some DC filigrees for Electrocution + Dragonsoul.
Cha is sitting at 118 in Reaper:
This is missing: More Curse (+1 Cha), Crafted Lamordian/IoD Q-Staff (+1 Cha), Macrotechnic (+2 Alch Cha from Rune Arm, but gives up the chance of +1 Cha from a crafted Q-Staff so only net +1).
If I got a Curse +2 Cha on something, I'd do the swap to the crafted Q-Staff; Amplin DoT can go. I don't think Macrotechnic is worth giving up Draconic.
Mass Hold DCs are sitting at 125:
Final DC boostable via:
PL: Wizard (1), (probably over Heighten, but you lose Web which is great for chunky Servitors in Lamordia so I'd be sad)
PL: Bard (1), (urg... maybe over Intensify or Wellspring though I'd be sad about it).
Curse of the Enchanter (1),
Solar Gem of Enchantment (1) i.e. Artifact from 3 -> 4
Lunar Gem of Enchantment (1) i.e. Profane from 3 -> 4
Reaper Rings (2),
Be a real Cha race, not H-Elf, idiot (1),
Get a +2 Cha Curse, and go a Crafted IoD/Lamord Q-Staff (1),
= 9 as absolute "I'm super gimped now oh god why did I reaper these rings" DC = 134. I think that's literal max for a sorc that hasn't insanely taken 4 Great Cha feats for another +2 for 136 (they keep Embolden and ESF: Evo so can't take 6 Great Chas).
That's it; almost all of the ways up are full of terrible compromises!
Conj DC is similar, Evo is higher due to PLs. Illusion DC / Transmutation DC are both bad (we mostly take GCS for the extra +5 USP, not the SLA).
What really makes it tick?
CLS, high MCLs and a lot of supported spells allow a very consistent high dps output without gaps in the rotation.
G Shout is 40/44 <-- annoyingly, this needs the Arcane Aug IX from the Bound Elemental Ring of Fire (which forces non-absorb boots, etc, etc)
Shout is 40/39 so capped at 39 <-- ditto this
Thunderstroke is 38/34 so capped at 34
Iceberg is 28/28 <-- maybe this is water-typed so my Savant Form makes it worse than Polar Ray? I can't afford the DC loss to take Improved Elemental Form if so.
Polar ray is 30/33
Chain Lightning is 40/34 so capped at 34
Call Lightning Storm is 55 (I don't mess with Spiral as it's too annoying), with Spiral it would be 57.
Random stats I don't really care about:
- HP is like 2400 or something in Reaper; False Life somewhere + Diamonds of Con/Ins Con/Festive Con and call it a day. I do have the Wild Fort set for +3 Art but couldn't fit it in (already I have no bonus gems to support Transmutation and Illusion DCs which would be higher priorities).
- Total SP is about 6400 (I do care about sustainable metamagics and overall reductions per cast though).
- PRR is trash at like 124, MRR is trash and capped at 100.
- I do care about saves but I'm a sorc so they are what they are (Reflex still priority in Grim Barricade, and gets a Diamond of Dex +14; and you have Ins Res +6 from Theurgy and a Sapphire of Res +11). I think they're all high 60s in town.
I don't care about R10 solo-ing; obvious caveat from the above stats that the boss will eat you if it can catch you - suspect there are quests I could do and might make a video as proof of concept/dps demonstration.
Threat reduction is a nightmare for caster bards and sorcs (wizs/warlocks get a free 30/40% from AP)
Threat reduction is a huge pain.
I sit at -70% now (15% quiver + 35% fatesinger + 20% dark diversion).
I can get higher with:
- the ToEE water set, which is awful, but gives another -20% overall.
- I can push another 4% via the Legendary Socket Band which gives another 4% over dark diversion (yes, the item lies; it's 24% threat reduction)
- I then just sub in 4% quality goggles or gloves (both awful)!
Now I'm at 98% threat reduction and gimped so badly I don't need it! Win-win!
The actual solution is beyond me; with a good tank you're okay at 70%; you genuinely do a lot of damage but it's all being threat reduced (no imbues except irrelevant damage from Warlock Dilettante - no idea how that's coded). I don't see any permanent Destiny swaps as reasonable; SD, Shiradi, Magister and EA all have the 30% threat reduciton you need, but none are great - of the options I like EA for the crazy amounts of heals and metamagic reductions, but it's all utility not the dps/DC of Primal.
FInal thoughts:
I'm very satisfied with this build's DPS (Draconic, Primal, fateSinger <-- sorry). Not relative to an inquisitive but it feels good to play and, for a caster, demolishes The Ettin, including a large amount of incidental room destroying AoE.
I'm straddling the dps/DC line as much as I comfortably can and still feel a little DC short in the hardest content. I'd say DC casting on this in ~R6 Lamord still feels good with min(er sacrifice) exceptions. Everywhere else, including high reaper MD, it's fine, but I can read the writing on the wall for future content.
I would hate to swap dps feats out for PL: Wizard, or PL: Bard.
I would hate swapping out Solar/Lunar gems for Enchantment (it'd be Lunar +25 USP and Solar Spell Pen)
I could conceivably get the Curse of the Enchanter, and Cha +2, and go a crafted Q Staff over Amplin (which is sad for dps already), but realistically that +2 DC maybe makes us slightly happier in R7, not no-fail R10.
Maxxed (still H-Elf) Wizard sits at 135 Mass Hold with about the same gearset (Int so better filigrees) and similar destinies (Magister over Primal so -1DC). This is still without Curse of the Enchanter or a Reaper Ring. I feel that 135 might be 5% fail for R10 Lamordia; and if not I could more easily justify the dps loss of taking some more DC feats to sure it up.
I still honestly believe the Devs may think the ED Cores '+1 Epic DC increase' from different trees stack, so accidentally added +8 in all of their DC calculations.
It's a 31 Wild Mage / 41 Air Savant / 11 Feydark, Dragonmarked H-Elf running in Draconic/Primal/Fatesinger.
This is my racial completionist - the critical things from past lives are 3x sorc for 3 Evo DC, and 3x Energy Criticals for spell crit %s, then the +4 to CHA from completionist feats again for +2 DC. Non-racial completionist should just bin Feydark at cap (after levelling using GCS), and make sure you get Greater Dragonmark from the H-Elf tree with those points.
It does (the literal most?) caster dps ~64K per second on the Ettin:
- This is still not optimal - I have gear changed again since that post as I was missing Arcane Augmentation on G/Shout. I will at some point make a video but I'm procrastinating from study sufficiently with this giant build post.
- I agree with everyone wanting an actual parseable target we can measure outside of a burst period - spell castable dummies with 10m+ HP please. This build is pretty consistent damage-wise so should do well (there is no significant ramp up beyond a few seconds for Harmonic Resonance and Vulnerability from Air Sorc).
- It has prioritised crit chance, Spellpower and dedicated Lamordia crit damage augments for its 3 major elements.*
*Ice lacks a dedicated insightful SP item (it's using ins 55 potency from the cloak), and the 3rd and final Lamordia augment (6% quality crit damage). Lightning and Sonic lack a dedicated Quality item (Both using Quality 27 Potency from raid Goggles). Despite these issues, I am pretty sure it's literally optimally itemised.
It has good DCs:
- 125DC for Mass Hold in Reapers (boostable via Reaper DC clickie thing, and optionally Channel Power + other feat swaps for even more).
Why H-Elf?
Call Lightning Storm (hereafter CLS). It's the only spell with no Max Caster Level, and we need it because caster dps generally sucks.
Strimton posted a build using Air Savant and CLS last year; it's a really great post and video. There is also some detailed and accurate chat on optimal dps in the latter pages of that thread's comments from Tilo et al.
Why Wild Mage?
+4 CL/MCL, and 12% Universal Spell Crit Damage.
- Wild mage's damage SLAs are bad.
- Wild mage's surges are bad.
- Wild mage's alignment damage stuff is ununsable.
Screenshot of my enhancements is linked further down and here.
Why Air Savant for max dps?
It's a mix of:
1) Call Lightning Storm - boosts our max caster levels on it to 55 (L Alchemical Lightning Orb + Lightning Coil) or 57 (Spiral).
2) Air Savant, Fatesinger and Master of Music all combine to get good numbers on Greater Shout and Shout via huge Max Caster Level Boosts and flat damage multipliers, allowing a zero-gap spell rotation due to the wider selection of viable spells compared with other sorcs.
3) DPS Mantles align perfectly.
- Draconic's DoT Mantle is snapshotted onto CLS, then
- we run in Primal's Sky Mantle, rotating through Lightning, Ice and Sonic spells in order, to allow maximum Mantle procs (each element has a 5 second cooldown):
Lightning: Thunderstroke (6s cooldown), Chain Lightning,
Cold: Iceberg (6s cooldown), Polar Ray,
Sonic: Greater Shout, Shout.
4) Amplin's DoT plays nicely with Awaken Electric Vulnerability.
Cold Savant has better filigree support allowing a better spell crit profile, and has additional dps support from Magister. I don't think that's enough to compare with the combined strength of the above points outside of a Time Stop burst. That said, I'm all eyes on 'The Ettin Thread' if someone does a Cold Savant attempt.
Fire/Acid Savants are near-identical in being unsupported.
Both need love via more spells being made viable so they can have a real dps rotation:
- I'd literally merge Fire and Acid into 'Brimstone savant' and give all the benefits of both to both Fire and Acid, as a better Acid Well would help with the lack of viable spells issue.
- Exalted Angel should also be more directly supportive (e.g. +100% / +50% damage to DBF/Fireball/Wall of Fire/Flame Strike/Comet Fall) a la Fatesinger's benefits to sonic spells.
Stats
18 CHA (level-ups here)
18 CON
12 INT (may need a tome to get all skills - only spellcraft/perform/tumble really matter)
Skills:
- Spellcraft (Elec/Ice SP),
- Perform (Sonic SP),
- Tumble (I want to live),
- Search, (Secret Lamordian Doors)
- one of Spot/Conc/Balance/whatever <-- won't be maxxed. While levelling, get UMD; don't get it after an ER - it does literally nothing for you as your high CHA maxes out all UMD usage in game.
Feats:
1 - Max + Warlock Dilettante for minor Fire damage to spells (Paladin Dilettante gives +5 stacking saves which is also good).
3 - Quicken
6 - Empower
9 - Least Dragonmark
12 - Heighten
15 - SF: Evo
18 - GSF: Evo
21 - Wellspring
24 - Intensify Spell
27 - Master of Music
30 - ESF: Evocation, Scion of Feywild (4 Ench DC + best Sonic Crits is a nice perk)
33 - Embolden
ED Feats:
22: ESP: Elec
25: ESP: Sonic
28: ESP: Cold <-- Channel Power here isn't crazy
31: SS: Enchantment (Mass Hold)
34: SS: Conj (Web / Trap the Soul)
Hot takes on non-taken feats
Burst of Glacial Wrath:
- It's fine. Would if I could!
Channel Power:
- I've run it a bit and it actually synergises well with Call Lightning Storm since you can charge up for a big cast.
- I like it for Miner Sacrifice and other Lamordia quests when I know I have spitters/brutes/warlocks/big servitors to IK/CC coming up and want to DC boost.
- It's the slight crit damage trade-off for the other damage types that I think biases me against it; it's usually not benefiting me in any way while ESP: Cold does.
- I've heard the theories of 'always be charging it and just stand in one place and nuke' and I would 100% die.
Ruins:
I would use G/Ruin if they were bestowed for free, but I can't justify 2 feats:
- I strongly suspect they'd be a net DPS loss over any 2 dps feats of Wellspring/Intensify/Master of Music, and
- I'm not dropping the ability to take Spell Specialties from ESF: Evo or Embolden's +2 DC.
- I'd take PL: Wiz and PL: Bard over them if I had 2 free feats for the +2 to Mass Hold DC.
Also:
- Their cooldowns are crazy annoying. Every 3rd and 7th cycle I cast G/Ruin? I will definitely mess that up.
- As an 'oh no a Reaper' button, I have Thunderstroke and Iceberg... yes, G/Ruins do more damage, but genuinely not that much more, and we're not 1 hit k-o-ing except in trivial content anyway so we'll be using our standard sustained high dps rotation which I think suffers if we did take them.
- Also, fitting a 4th spell crit damage type (Force Lore is actually fine since it's on Red Wizard's Sight) into gear seems like a huge pain. I'd rather get another 1 Con (from 14 to 15), and 3 Q Con if I had the spare Lamordia slots.
Gear:
Head - Legendary Elder's Cap, +6 Ench, +11 Spell Saves, [Occultation + Globe] <-- Elder's Set
Goggles - Red Wizard's Sight (Ins Cha +7), Q Pot 27, Solar = +3 DC, [Greater Conj, Conj Power]
Necklace - Climber's Remembrance (Rare), +3 ISM, (Sonic Crit * 3), Lunar = +3 DC, [How to Cast Faster, Spellcraft +20]
Armor - Leg Downcast's Vest (Light Armor Rare), (Exc Lore 5, 15 Exc USP, Qual Elec Crit, +2 Sacred DC), Solar = Spell Penetration, [Festive Cha +2, Festive Con +2]
Cloak - Leg Gravekeeper's Elegant (Frost Giant), +55 Ins Potency, 18 Ins Mag Sheltering, (Elec Crit, Ins Elec Crit), Solar = +4 CHA, [GL+3, Dex +14]
Bracers - Glacier, Spell Pen 9, Wizardry 283, [Dodge 14, Crystallised Drop of Tea] <-- Glacier Set
Gloves - Glacer, Ice Lore 22, Q Glac 36, Eff Maximize II, [Ultimatum, Resistance +11] <-- Glacier Set
Belt - Baron's Bandolier, False Life/Enh Bloodrage (Cha, Q Cha), Lunar = +25 USP [Pomura's, Con +14]
Boots - Gravekeeper's Greaves - Ins Fort, Q Fort 3, (Ice Crit, Ice Crit), Lunar = +4 CHA, [Hamp, Ins Con +5] <-- Season's Warding absorbs on swap with identical gems; Ice is your third element so not the hugest deal.
Ring 1 - Theurgy of Spring, Elec SP, Ins Elec SP, [Evo +6, Greater Evo, Sheltering 36]
Ring 2 - Bound Elemental Ring of Flames, Fire Lore 22, Combustion 148, Arcane Augmentation IX, Alch Fire Attunement [Greater Enchantment, Master's Gift] <-- really here just for the Arcane Augmentation IX for the Shouts and Iceberg/Polar Ray.
Trinket - Legendary Gem of Many Facets [Sonic Lore, Fortification, Ins Resonance], [Perform +18(20 ideally)] <-- Elder's Set
Weapon - Amplin (Ash) 24 Lightning Lore, [Glaciation 153, Resonance 153]
Other weapons - Lightning Coil / Leg Alchemical Orb (or non-orb if no Channel Power) for Call Lightning Storm Casting. Spiral also doable over Lightning Coil, then you have a free off-hand but seems a pain.
Enh:
<-- Feydark is just for the +1 CHA and +15 USP from the cores. You don't use GCS except to kill time when you're in a bad surge ('Out of Phase' or 'Silent Bubbles'); it doesn't land in real content.
EDs:
Big points:
- Fatesinger = 50% shout damage and 100% greater shout damage, +2 CHA, free Enlarge, and -35% threat
- Draconic = DoT mantle
- Primal = Coccoon, +2 CHA, Tri-element mantle
There are some very subjective choices in my current selection. Should I take Evasion from Primal and/or double duration Wellspring from Draconic? Probably. Do I? No.
I really like spell efficiencies. You can't reduce a spell's cost below its base cost after all metamagic efficiencies are applied, but you certainly can get it there, then if you have another -20% spell costs from:
e.g. Draconic Cores (10%), and Fatesinger's Masquerade (10%), you can walk around casting max/emp/quicken G Shout for 23SP for an AoE doing more than the damage of an unimproved Greater Ruin.
In a dream gear set, you'd also rock Legendary Socket Band (for another 10% efficiency) , but I can't make it work due to the need for Arcane Augmentation IX (and the Bound Elemental Ring of Flames being the sole viable source).
Filigrees:
Amplin/Artifact
4 Otto's (cha, cha, spellpower, int) <-- +2 DC set bonus
4 Eye (cha, cha, USP +10, Int +2(raid)) <-- +2 DC set bonus
3 Lunar (cha, cha, USP +10) <-- +1 DC set bonus
2 CHA +2 (raid)
2 CHA +2 (raid)
Elec Coil
5 Dragonsoul (Crit damage)
2 Electrocutioner (50 Elec SP)
3 Whatever (maybe Elemental Avatar; I have these blank as I'm levelling up a new Sentient Gem and it's convenient to have on swap so I don't have to go dig for it)
Pfft. Why do you claim 'DC' in the title?
It hits 125 Mass Hold which is something. There are trade-offs, and this is still imo the right base template to max DCs from.
My internal calculus is: 50 USP < 1 DC < 75 USP (idk my exact value); depending on how much your evaluation differs is how many dps feats you bin to fit in PL: Wiz / PL: Bard - or if you're way more USP value-ing, you'll want to swap out some DC filigrees for Electrocution + Dragonsoul.
Cha is sitting at 118 in Reaper:
| Base | 18 |
| Levelups | 8 |
| Tome | 8 |
| Completionist | 2 |
| Racial Completionist | 2 |
| Racial PLs (T,HE, DB) | 3 |
| H-Elf + Dil | 2 |
| Air Savant + Cap | 4 |
| Wildmage | 2 |
| Feydark | 1 |
| Reaper (perma) | 1 |
| Item | 15 |
| Item Ins | 7 |
| Item Qua | 3 |
| Item Profane | 4 |
| Item Arti | 4 |
| Item Exc | 1 |
| Filigree | 14 |
| Ship (Guild) | 2 |
| Primal Avatar tree | 2 |
| Fatesinger tree | 2 |
| Festive | 2 |
| Reaper hat | 2 |
| Reaper tree | 4 |
| Curse | 1 |
| Yugo | 2 |
| Rem Pot | 2 |
| Total | 118 (+54 DC) |
This is missing: More Curse (+1 Cha), Crafted Lamordian/IoD Q-Staff (+1 Cha), Macrotechnic (+2 Alch Cha from Rune Arm, but gives up the chance of +1 Cha from a crafted Q-Staff so only net +1).
If I got a Curse +2 Cha on something, I'd do the swap to the crafted Q-Staff; Amplin DoT can go. I don't think Macrotechnic is worth giving up Draconic.
Mass Hold DCs are sitting at 125:
| Base | 10 |
| Spell Level | 9 |
| Spell Specialty Feat | 3 |
| Embolden | 2 |
| Item | 6 |
| Ins Item | 3 |
| Greater Ench Socket | 2 |
| Sacred DC | 2 |
| Exc DC | 2 |
| Profane DC | 3 |
| Artifact DC | 3 |
| Quality DC | 2 |
| Charisma stat boost | 54 |
| Otto's | 2 |
| Eye | 2 |
| Lunar | 1 |
| Epic Destiny Base Feats | 4 |
| Epic 3 DC Ench | 3 |
| Epic 3 DC All | 3 |
| Scion of the Feywild | 4 |
| Being in reaper | 4 |
| Guild Archwizard | 1 |
| Total | 125 |
Final DC boostable via:
PL: Wizard (1), (probably over Heighten, but you lose Web which is great for chunky Servitors in Lamordia so I'd be sad)
PL: Bard (1), (urg... maybe over Intensify or Wellspring though I'd be sad about it).
Curse of the Enchanter (1),
Solar Gem of Enchantment (1) i.e. Artifact from 3 -> 4
Lunar Gem of Enchantment (1) i.e. Profane from 3 -> 4
Reaper Rings (2),
Be a real Cha race, not H-Elf, idiot (1),
Get a +2 Cha Curse, and go a Crafted IoD/Lamord Q-Staff (1),
= 9 as absolute "I'm super gimped now oh god why did I reaper these rings" DC = 134. I think that's literal max for a sorc that hasn't insanely taken 4 Great Cha feats for another +2 for 136 (they keep Embolden and ESF: Evo so can't take 6 Great Chas).
That's it; almost all of the ways up are full of terrible compromises!
Conj DC is similar, Evo is higher due to PLs. Illusion DC / Transmutation DC are both bad (we mostly take GCS for the extra +5 USP, not the SLA).
What really makes it tick?
CLS, high MCLs and a lot of supported spells allow a very consistent high dps output without gaps in the rotation.
G Shout is 40/44 <-- annoyingly, this needs the Arcane Aug IX from the Bound Elemental Ring of Fire (which forces non-absorb boots, etc, etc)
Shout is 40/39 so capped at 39 <-- ditto this
Thunderstroke is 38/34 so capped at 34
Iceberg is 28/28 <-- maybe this is water-typed so my Savant Form makes it worse than Polar Ray? I can't afford the DC loss to take Improved Elemental Form if so.
Polar ray is 30/33
Chain Lightning is 40/34 so capped at 34
Call Lightning Storm is 55 (I don't mess with Spiral as it's too annoying), with Spiral it would be 57.
Random stats I don't really care about:
- HP is like 2400 or something in Reaper; False Life somewhere + Diamonds of Con/Ins Con/Festive Con and call it a day. I do have the Wild Fort set for +3 Art but couldn't fit it in (already I have no bonus gems to support Transmutation and Illusion DCs which would be higher priorities).
- Total SP is about 6400 (I do care about sustainable metamagics and overall reductions per cast though).
- PRR is trash at like 124, MRR is trash and capped at 100.
- I do care about saves but I'm a sorc so they are what they are (Reflex still priority in Grim Barricade, and gets a Diamond of Dex +14; and you have Ins Res +6 from Theurgy and a Sapphire of Res +11). I think they're all high 60s in town.
I don't care about R10 solo-ing; obvious caveat from the above stats that the boss will eat you if it can catch you - suspect there are quests I could do and might make a video as proof of concept/dps demonstration.
Threat reduction is a nightmare for caster bards and sorcs (wizs/warlocks get a free 30/40% from AP)
Threat reduction is a huge pain.
I sit at -70% now (15% quiver + 35% fatesinger + 20% dark diversion).
I can get higher with:
- the ToEE water set, which is awful, but gives another -20% overall.
- I can push another 4% via the Legendary Socket Band which gives another 4% over dark diversion (yes, the item lies; it's 24% threat reduction)
- I then just sub in 4% quality goggles or gloves (both awful)!
Now I'm at 98% threat reduction and gimped so badly I don't need it! Win-win!
The actual solution is beyond me; with a good tank you're okay at 70%; you genuinely do a lot of damage but it's all being threat reduced (no imbues except irrelevant damage from Warlock Dilettante - no idea how that's coded). I don't see any permanent Destiny swaps as reasonable; SD, Shiradi, Magister and EA all have the 30% threat reduciton you need, but none are great - of the options I like EA for the crazy amounts of heals and metamagic reductions, but it's all utility not the dps/DC of Primal.
FInal thoughts:
I'm very satisfied with this build's DPS (Draconic, Primal, fateSinger <-- sorry). Not relative to an inquisitive but it feels good to play and, for a caster, demolishes The Ettin, including a large amount of incidental room destroying AoE.
I'm straddling the dps/DC line as much as I comfortably can and still feel a little DC short in the hardest content. I'd say DC casting on this in ~R6 Lamord still feels good with min(er sacrifice) exceptions. Everywhere else, including high reaper MD, it's fine, but I can read the writing on the wall for future content.
I would hate to swap dps feats out for PL: Wizard, or PL: Bard.
I would hate swapping out Solar/Lunar gems for Enchantment (it'd be Lunar +25 USP and Solar Spell Pen)
I could conceivably get the Curse of the Enchanter, and Cha +2, and go a crafted Q Staff over Amplin (which is sad for dps already), but realistically that +2 DC maybe makes us slightly happier in R7, not no-fail R10.
Maxxed (still H-Elf) Wizard sits at 135 Mass Hold with about the same gearset (Int so better filigrees) and similar destinies (Magister over Primal so -1DC). This is still without Curse of the Enchanter or a Reaper Ring. I feel that 135 might be 5% fail for R10 Lamordia; and if not I could more easily justify the dps loss of taking some more DC feats to sure it up.
I still honestly believe the Devs may think the ED Cores '+1 Epic DC increase' from different trees stack, so accidentally added +8 in all of their DC calculations.
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