Revision as of 13:15, 5 March 2008

The Sorceress' lightning spells tend to feature the lowest and highest possible damages, so it's important that you average out your true killing power. Many of these skills are not hugely damaging, but they are meant to be used repeatedly and very quickly, and can be devastating when employed with speed and skill. Higher mana regeneration and especially faster cast modifiers are very useful to Lightning Sorceresses.

Charged Bolt

Required Level: 1
Prerequisites None
Synergies:

• Lightning: +6% Lightning Damage Per Level

Details: Each use of this skill sends out a few bolts of lightning that skitter across the ground, moving semi-randomly and damaging any monsters they happen to strike.

• This seemingly-innocuous skill turns out to be one of the most damaging in the game at higher levels, due to the sheer quantity of dozens and dozens of bolts that are emitted each use.
• Aim and proximity are essential with Charged Bolt; the Sorceress must face directly at the enemy, from a good angle (experiment to find what works best), and must be fairly close to the enemy.
• Bolts are absorbed into the enemy and vanish then, so targets in front will die first. This contrasts directly with Nova, which inflicts its full damage on everything in range.

Telekinesis

Required Level: 6
Prerequisites: None
Synergies: None.
Details: Telekinesis can be used to pick up objects, activate triggers, or to strike enemies, stunning and knocking them back with some minor damage. TK was a very useful skill in earlier versions of Diablo II, since it picked up anything, and with this Sorceresses were always the quickest to grab the loot when a monster popped. Patches have since greatly limited what can be picked up with it, so it's much less useful, and much less annoying to other players, than in the early days.

• Telekinesis will only pick up scrolls, potions, keys, gold, arrows and bolts.
• TK will not stun or knock back bosses or SuperUniques.
• TK is very convenient. Use it to activate shrines, waypoints, and stairways, to open chests (including the Town Stash), to release the seals in the Chaos Sanctuary, and so forth.

Static Field

Required Level: 6
Prerequisites: None
Synergies: None.
Details: Static field hits every monster in range, instantly chopping a % off of their hit points. This is the single most damaging spell or skill in the entire game, under the right circumstances.

• Static Field will not kill any monsters, but can reduce their hit point to a sliver. Recent patches have nerfed this skill by capping the damage reduction. It now only takes Nightmare monsters down to 33%, and Hell monsters down to 50%.
• With the damage caps, Static is useless against badly-damaged monsters on Nightmare and Hell, so be sure to use it at the start of every battle, when it reduces monster hit points at an amazing rate.
• Lightning resistance works against Static Field, but not by changing the ultimate result, only by making the spell take more casts to achieve it.
• Static Field does not receive any benefits from Conviction and Lower Resist.
• Static Field pairs very well with slow acting spells, such as Hydra, Meteor, and Blizzard. Cast those, then spam a dozen Statics, and by the time the big fire or cold damage is descending, Static will have done its work and reduced the monsters' hit points substantially.
• Additional skill points only increase the radius, so how many you spend in this skill depends on your play style, how tightly you group the monsters, how close you get, what your killing skills are, etc.

Lightning

Required Level: 12
Prerequisites: Charged Bolt
Synergies: Points in the following skills boost the damage of Lightning.

• Charged Bolt: +8% Lightning Damage Per Level
• Nova: +8% Lightning Damage Per Level
• Chain Lightning: +8% Lightning Damage Per Level

Details: The Lightning skill fires a long stream of concentrated shockage, passing through every target in a straight line. Lightning is best used against mobs, or in narrow corridors, so multiple monsters can be hit with each cast.

Nova

Required Level: 12
Prerequisites: Static Field
Synergies: None.
Details: Nova casts an expanding ring of lightning that strikes everything in its path, extending nearly to the edge of the screen. Nova is one of the most powerful skills in the game, but must be used wisely to be effective. It's best against mobs, ideally ones that are all around the Sorceress, when it will hit dozens of monsters per use.

• Nova Sorcs require very fast casting speed, a lot of mana, and the nerve to stand very close to monsters all around them.
• Nova is not a very good boss killer, since the damage per cast isn't that high; its strength comes when used against numerous monsters at once.
• Nova works very well when paired with powerful, casting delay skills like Meteor and Hydra.

Chain Lightning

Required Level: 18
Prerequisites: Charged Bolt, Lightning
Synergies: The following skills add to the damage of Chain Lightning.

• Charged Bolt: +4% Lightning Damage Per Level
• Nova: +4% Lightning Damage Per Level
• Lightning: +4% Lightning Damage Per Level

Details: Chain Lightning jumps from target to target, and can be quite impressive when cast on a cluster of enemies. It's much less effective against single targets, and is slower to hit enemies than Lightning, which passes straight through as quickly as the Sorceress casts it.

Teleport

Required Level: 18
Prerequisites: Telekinesis.
Synergies: None.
Details: Teleport moves the Sorceress instantly to any valid location she can point her cursor at. This skill will pop her over creeks, past any number of monsters, through walls, etc.

• Teleport is a great time-saver, as well as a way to escape monsters.
• With each Teleport the all of a character's minion(s) will all reappear directly on top of them. This is very useful to keep them organized and to best use them to position monsters for destructive spell damage.
• Items that grant Teleport or teleport charges are quite popular for all characters, especially when used in dueling or Magic Finding.
• Additional points in Teleport do nothing but reduce the mana cost, so one here is enough.

Thunder Storm

Required Level: 24
Prerequisites: Charged Bolt, Static Field, Lightning, Nova, Chain Lightning
Synergies: None.
Details: Thuunderstorm shoots down a single bolt of lighting every second, hitting a randomly-selected monster. It can not be aimed or controlled, and works in a passive fashion for as long as it's active. The damage is not substantial, but this is a very convenient spell since it works by itself and always hits, making it quite helpful to finish off running monsters, to add damage to a boss, etc.

Energy Shield

Required Level: 24
Prerequisites: Charged Bolt, Telekinesis, Lightning, Teleport, Chain Lightning
Synergies: Points in Telekinesis boost the effectiveness of Energy Shield, decreasing the absorption by 6.25% per point. (See below.)
'Details: Energy Shield allows the Sorceress to redirect damage from life to mana. Instead of attacks costing her life, some % of them (increasing with more points in the skill) will subtract from her mana instead.

• The use of this skill varies a lot between Sorceresses. Since only a % of the incoming damage is redirected, this skill needs a fair amount of points to be useful.
• High hit point or low mana builds will find this less necessary or useful.
• Telekinesis improves this skill by making the damage absorption more efficient. By default, each point of damage redirect to mana consumes 2 mana points. So with lvl 7 Energy Shield absorbing 50% of damage, 10 points of damage would take off 5 life and 10 mana. If that same Sorceress had 8 points in Telekinesis, the mana cost would be cut to 7.5 mana. With 16 points in TK, the mana loss would only be 5, a 50% decrease.

Lightning Mastery

Required Level: 30
Prerequisites:: None
Synergies: None.
Details: Lightning Mastery works just like Fire Mastery; by substantially boosting the damage of every skill in the skill tree. Maxing this one out is a priority for most Lightning Sorceresses.