Shotgun Sorcerer

Armor Types

Gear and Item Set Info

Hi guys. So I've been playing with this game for a long while, learning from other players, picking apart builds, seeing what works, what doesn't, and what's just fun.

This build's been a work in progress since the DB launch, if I remember my dates correctly. It's gone through many iterations and goals, from PVP burst DPS to PVP sustained DPS, to a supplemental PVP tank all the way up to the current iteration, PVE DPS for veteran dungeons and entry level trials. I've intended this particular iteration to be used by as many people as possible, specifically those starting out in the mid to high-end PVE scene as a stopgap measure until the more "meta" sets (like Maelstrom) become available.

The build's strength centers around the main five-piece set, Torug's Pact. Torug's Pact is a crafted set that boosts the effectiveness of your weapon enchantments by a large magnitude, in both potency and speed of application. As you can guess, enchantments are a primary damage contributor here.

My second set is always going to be the staple of magicka sorcerers everywhere, Ilambris. It goes without saying that this monster set presents an unrivaled contribution to overall sustained DPS in both single target boss, and multi target add engagements. This can generally be substituted with another monster set for more situational encounters, such as Iceheart for a significant boost in survivability, as well as contributing slightly less than Ilambris to your damage profile. Sometimes more, depending on your target, hence the situationality (is that a word?).

Now, this is where a lot of you are going to start to hate me. I use willpower. It's an amazing three-piece set that contributes to both your max magicka and spell damage, and gives the most bang for your buck out of the three piece sets for me. The issue, is that this leaves you with one wasted slot on your build. Maelstrom and Master staves do not work with this build, whatsoever.

I'm sorry, my OCD friends. I too, know the pain of having three cents over on my gasoline receipt.

On staves, I would suggest using a lightning staff on your front bar, and inferno on your back. This is to take advantage of the 10% damage bonus on off-balance targets from your Ritual tree, with points invested into Thaumaturge. No walls of flames here.

To reiterate:

Torugs - 5pc

Ilambris/Iceheart - 2pc

Willpower - 3pc

OCD Trigger - 1pc

I'm sorry.

General Info

As stated above, my general goal with this build was to allow people who might be less than capable, new, or otherwise handicapped by their equipment in certain ways, to perform at the entry level of competitive DPS in dungeons and trials. (It's also wonderful for overworld bosses, and mopping up the IC, mobs and players - more on that later.)

A little history first. (Whining.) I started playing this game seriously, shortly after patch 1.6 came out. I started this game with satellite internet, which inherently gave me a minimum of 600 ping, an average of 1200-2000, and a peak of LEL TIMEOUT. Understandably, this made the game incredibly daunting. It was less-so in the beginning, because the stability of the servers was there. It drastically got worse, to the point where I was lucky to even log in successfully, lucky to have less than 4000 sitting up on my little latency bar, day in and day out. (Whining over.)

Throughout all of this, again since the DB launch, I've been lookin for something to put me on a level playing field with other players in the endgame content. Frags and curse weren't options I could take, they don't like lag. So I looked for alternate DPS contributors. I was originally looking for burst, and at some point while wandering around the Gold Coast poking minotaurs, I realized that the infused staff I had picked up was doing, well, quite a bit of damage on the first hit. Enchantments. To save time, bada bing, bada boom, I ended up with a full infused/torugs equipped build for both PVP and PVE applications, with aforementioned latency issues, to good effect. 

Onto the combat strategy!

First and foremost, your enchantments are your lifeline. They are a large percentage of your overall damage. The inherent downside to this is that they are, understandably, best for single targets. Bosses with multiple adds will generally take less damage overall from this build than the current sharpened, damage stack meta. This is somewhat averted with the particular playstyle, as you can push for the enchantments to proc on a specific target more than the other, through the use of both destructive clenches and your light/heavy attacks on your target of choice. Light attacks, heavy attacks, and almost every single weapon skill that does damage, including their damage over time secondary effects, proc your currently equipped weapon enchantment. Back to the prioritization of damage, the more weapon skill DoTs you apply to your target of choice, the more likely each one of those damage ticks is going to proc the enchantment on said target of choice, rather than Bob the skeleton ditzing around behind the boss's onerous cankles. (Rest in peace, Bob.)

Weapon enchantments, as a damage source, act in a number of peculiar ways with the game mechanics. In no particular order:

1. Damaging enchantments take their damage type/properties from the attack source that procs them. If you cast crushing shock, a direct damage ability, your enchantment proc will take bonuses for direct damage, largely from your champion points if you've invested into Master-at-Arms. If, on the other hand, you cast blockade of elements, that enchantment will now scale off of Thaumaturge instead. Shocker, eh?
2. Damaging enchantments do not scale off of your spell damage, or max magicka. They only rely on your critical chance, critical damage modifier, and your penetration. To this end, your damage is -mostly- front-loaded. You can invest more into sustain, for less loss in DPS up front, than you can with a meta build.

Now, when you go to parse, this is self-sustainable. Load up power surge, boundless storm, and elemental drain, and hop back over to your main bar.

What I generally do, is open my rotation by laying down Liquid Lightning, followed by Blockade of Storms. You should be weaving whenever you can during this, but don't rely on your light attacks for proccing enchants right now, blockade will take care of that. Immediately follow up with lightning clench on your front bar, weapon swap, and unload a flame clench from your back bar. Both versions of destructive clench can be active at the same time, on the same target, so long as they are different elements. These are all short-range skills, and you should be hugging your target as much as a sorc can. Hence the shotgun. Boundless storm is more for padding than anything else, you can substitute it with whatever fits your fancy.

While those DoTs are all burning off, swap back over to your lightning staff, and heavy attack. You can generally get one to two full attacks off before your first DoT expires. Rinse, and repeat. Of course, refresh your boundless storm and power surge every twenty seconds for simplicity, elemental drain is cost-less, refresh it whenever it's convenient for you. Keep it up 100% of the time.

Oh yeah, shooting star. Goes without saying, really. Ideally you'd want to drop one right after your opening blockade of storms, and one whenever you can until that poor target is ash.

Now, with my personal experience, I've managed to reach 25k DPS self-buffed, with an ultimate, on a 3m health combat dummy. That was both with, and without, satellite. I can reach it more reliably without sattie, but 20k was a definite floor for me with that latency. YMMV, and I am fully open to any criticisms and suggestions for improvement.

Champion Point Tips

The CP is simple enough, though not perfectly balanced for trials. A lot of it is personal taste, but the general essentials are..

The Mage:

• Elfborn - 44
• Elemental Expert - 43
• Spell Erosion - 42
• Thaumaturge - 81

The Thief:

• Arcanist - 75
• Tenacity - 75
• Warlord - 51

These are the bare essentials for me, the rest is open to interpretation.

Build Rating