Krowz#1556
When D3 was released I was bummed to see no Frozen Orb, which was among my favorite builds to play in D2. Finally, the opportunity to relive the Frozen Orb sorc is now D3.
The build is pretty simple, it revolves around frozen orb spamming. This is easily achieved with Prodigy and Electrocute (surge of power). You can spend all of your AP with Frozen Orb and regen it back in less than a second depending on your APoC. I started this build with 20 APoC though eventually dropped one piece and still find regeneration to be comfortable. In fact, as soon as I find a better off hand I will drop it, I believe the regen will be sufficient even with 0 APoC. The new passive, dominance, provides you with a significant absorption bubble and is refreshed every kill. This means if you have 10 stacks and have 24K~ bubble and take damage bringing it down to 2K, its refreshed back to full 24K~ upon the death of any mob nearby. This basically means a strong offense makes for a strong defense. Teleport is there for a safety CD, it doubles as both getting you out of a sticky situation (nasty frozen on top of molten explosions) and provides a significant damage reduction afterwards. If you never have trouble with this, you can drop it for familiar for a flat 10% dmg increase.Archon is in place solely for killing dangerous packs and with its new mechanics it shines immensely with the illusionist affix as well as cursed shrines/chests.If you have a lot of gear with Cooldown reduction and have access to a high quality diamond, you may want to swap to the 100 second cooldown rune for archon, with this I was able to achieve a 65 second CD on archon though in the end I valued the higher damage over lower cooldown.
Note: Though I have no numbers to prove this, and its not listed in the tooltip, it seems that the "burst" of the frozen orb at the end of its trajectory doessignificantly more damage than the ice bolts that spread throughout the path. I'll update this post with data once I have the time to make a video showcasing this.
I generally play with a barb who runs impunity, allowing me to drop prismatic armor in favor of shocking aspect for more damage, though if you need the all res/armor this is an easy spot to grab it. Also, because of playing co-op, I run the passive Cold Blooded. When playing solo I switch this to Glass Cannon.
I'd recommend gearing for a crit chance between 40-50% and putting points into area damage as it has a lot of opportunities to proc thanks to frozen orb.
I'm currently at work, when I get home I will update this post with a stream link and make a video explaining the build in greater detail. Post any questions or suggestions below. I have tried out many different builds since the patch and this one is by far the best for fast clears throughout the game for skeleton king resets. Keep in mind again, I play mostly on Master and dabble with torment 1 on HC. This build has allowed my group Act 1, 2, and 3 clears in 30-40 minutes and Act 4 clears in 15.
I tried out ignite last night and swapped cold blooded to conflag. I like it, basically you should just determine whats more valuable to you: 6% crit or 10% damage.
We timed a 4 player run through of all 4 acts continuously on Master HC last night on stream. Acts 1-3 were completed in 38m-45m and act 4 was only about 18 minutes.The whole run took 2 hours and 35 minutes.
As far as I know, there is CURRENTLY no difference in drop rates between master and torment in terms of Items, the only difference is XP and gold dropped. With the new paragon system and loot 2.0, I feel there is now MUCH less emphasis on paragon levels as they do not grand MF. I think everyone should be focusing on doing full clears of the game to get that guaranteed legendary off of SK, the density between all the acts seem to be pretty close with Act 3 generally being the best. I think the meta game right now is and should be all about finding the most legendaries, not farming XP. With that being said, I still feel that this build is the best for wizards and maybe even the best in the game. The barb, witch doctor, and demon hunter in my HC group can't even compete with this builds kill speed and survivability.
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Stream:http://www.twitch.tv/krowzzer
Krowz#1556
When D3 was released I was bummed to see no Frozen Orb, which was among my favorite builds to play in D2. Finally, the opportunity to relive the Frozen Orb sorc is now D3.
I play HC and this build was originally designed for Master/Torment 1. With tweaks and proper group comp, I believe it to be viable in higher torments on SC
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#UcTSmQ!gcW!YccZca
The build is pretty simple, it revolves around frozen orb spamming. This is easily achieved with Prodigy and Electrocute (surge of power). You can spend all of your AP with Frozen Orb and regen it back in less than a second depending on your APoC. I started this build with 20 APoC though eventually dropped one piece and still find regeneration to be comfortable. In fact, as soon as I find a better off hand I will drop it, I believe the regen will be sufficient even with 0 APoC. The new passive, dominance, provides you with a significant absorption bubble and is refreshed every kill. This means if you have 10 stacks and have 24K~ bubble and take damage bringing it down to 2K, its refreshed back to full 24K~ upon the death of any mob nearby. This basically means a strong offense makes for a strong defense. Teleport is there for a safety CD, it doubles as both getting you out of a sticky situation (nasty frozen on top of molten explosions) and provides a significant damage reduction afterwards. If you never have trouble with this, you can drop it for familiar for a flat 10% dmg increase.Archon is in place solely for killing dangerous packs and with its new mechanics it shines immensely with the illusionist affix as well as cursed shrines/chests.If you have a lot of gear with Cooldown reduction and have access to a high quality diamond, you may want to swap to the 100 second cooldown rune for archon, with this I was able to achieve a 65 second CD on archon though in the end I valued the higher damage over lower cooldown.
Note: Though I have no numbers to prove this, and its not listed in the tooltip, it seems that the "burst" of the frozen orb at the end of its trajectory doessignificantly more damage than the ice bolts that spread throughout the path. I'll update this post with data once I have the time to make a video showcasing this.
I generally play with a barb who runs impunity, allowing me to drop prismatic armor in favor of shocking aspect for more damage, though if you need the all res/armor this is an easy spot to grab it. Also, because of playing co-op, I run the passive Cold Blooded. When playing solo I switch this to Glass Cannon.
I'd recommend gearing for a crit chance between 40-50% and putting points into area damage as it has a lot of opportunities to proc thanks to frozen orb.
I'm currently at work, when I get home I will update this post with a stream link and make a video explaining the build in greater detail. Post any questions or suggestions below. I have tried out many different builds since the patch and this one is by far the best for fast clears throughout the game for skeleton king resets. Keep in mind again, I play mostly on Master and dabble with torment 1 on HC. This build has allowed my group Act 1, 2, and 3 clears in 30-40 minutes and Act 4 clears in 15.
2-3 ticks Electrocute - 2-3 Orbs... repeat.
Archon to burn down Stuff.
Need like 10-20 APoC to be efficent
We timed a 4 player run through of all 4 acts continuously on Master HC last night on stream. Acts 1-3 were completed in 38m-45m and act 4 was only about 18 minutes.The whole run took 2 hours and 35 minutes.
As far as I know, there is CURRENTLY no difference in drop rates between master and torment in terms of Items, the only difference is XP and gold dropped. With the new paragon system and loot 2.0, I feel there is now MUCH less emphasis on paragon levels as they do not grand MF. I think everyone should be focusing on doing full clears of the game to get that guaranteed legendary off of SK, the density between all the acts seem to be pretty close with Act 3 generally being the best. I think the meta game right now is and should be all about finding the most legendaries, not farming XP. With that being said, I still feel that this build is the best for wizards and maybe even the best in the game. The barb, witch doctor, and demon hunter in my HC group can't even compete with this builds kill speed and survivability.