I’ve got a callidor/devastation sorceror, level 71. He pretty much roflstomps through elite, but anything serious in ultimate makes him cry like a little girl. Salazar bitchslapped me repeatedly, it was ugly.
Here’s my build:
Grim Calc
I’m sure there’s lots that can be improved here.
My gear is ok, I guess. Notable items:
Wrath of the Ascendant
Nocturnis
Fateweaver’s Mantle
Wyrmbone Handguards
Everything else is pretty meh.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Builds like this require a lot of gear to be functional in Ultimate. I know because I’m running a Sorcerer build myself, just AAR instead of Calidor’s Tempest.
Pumping up elemental balance for the crit % bonus, and maxing out flashbang + searing light would help you. The flashbang lowers their DA, which raises your crit % and elemental balance will make you do more damage on crits. So that would help you a bit DPS wise. Leveled up flashbang will help your survivability as well.
I dunno why blast shield is 10/12, that’s usually a 1 point wonder. Unless you’re getting 10/12 from 1 point investment. If not, you should place those points in the above skills I mentioned. And get reckless power to 12/12 also. Flame touched is a 1 point wonder as well, so more than 1 point in that isn’t worth it. Same goes for vindictive flame and Ulzuin’s wrath.
Thermite mines are good. They can screw up enemies’ pathing and make it harder for them to get in on you as well as debuff their fire resist. That’s worth at least 1 point minimum. Place them at choke points. Its also good for procs.
To sum it up, these skills need only 1 point invested (one point wonders):
Used the points saved above to put into these skills (only up to soft cap):
#1 - Elemental Balance
#2 - Reckless Power
#3 - Inner Focus
#4 - Flashbang + Searing light.
These scale well beyond soft cap:
Consider putting at least 1 point into these:
#1 - Thermite mine
#2 - Overload
#3 - Conversion (If you use Maiven’s Sphere a lot)
#4 - Mental Alacrity
Here is what I’m using:
http://grimcalc.com/build/MUJi5q3
This takes all +skills from gear into consideration.
Devotions:
-Meteor Shower linked to OFF or Thermite mines
-Arcane Bomb lined to AAR
-Aetherfire linked to Flashbang
-Giant’s Blood Linked to Reckless Power
Blast shield one point wonder?? Not sure why you would ever do that given it maxes you invincible at higher rankings. He said is having trouble surviving not sure why you would suggest 1 pointing maivens/blast shield, think of poor john 
Devotions should be tweaked up a bit, going for tree of life with solemn watcher and 2-3 points in obelisk along the way will give you a lot more health/regen and a huge boost to your defensive ability
Leave Ulzuin’s Wrath/Searing Light at on point on the demo side and take the point out of Temper. On the Arcanist side you don’t need all those points in Inferno, maxing main CT is more damage anyway. I would just one point nullifcation and fabric as well. With these points max Maiven’s and 1 point conversion, you will get a lot bigger damage reduction and with +1 arcanist the 1 point in conversion gets you 10% reduced freeze/stun and 20% energy absorbed from enemy spells. You will prob have energy troubles with higher levels of ct, throw 1 point in mental alacrity for -8% skill cost and maybe grab a focusing prism for -10% cost too. Those two combined with minor leech and spell absorption should be good
edit: Salazar should mostly be a non issue if your resists don’t suck and you don’t stand on his sigil. Maybe your resists are no bueno and/or you have too little health from lack of points in phys?
Raising flashbang gives a higher % chance for mobs to get confused and fumble attacks/impaired aim. Combine that with OFF (at higher skill levels can freeze the entire screen), I’m not really sure where blast shield comes in during that scenario. A 4 sec duration with a 12 sec C/D hardly makes you invincible. That’s why I only put 1 point in it. Its 6/12 for me with just 1 point from the bonuses, so that’s good enough for me. Placing thermite mines at chokepoints (like doorways/narrow areas) also keeps mobs from approaching you as easily. That’s another defensive tool someone could use to their advantage. There are some boss mobs I can kill extremely easy if I exploit chokepoints with thermite mines. They’re moving all over the place without getting in my face and attacking which means I’m not being attacked nearly as much. I can box Lucius into a corner with thermite mines, and his reactions are laughable. Even if you can’t do that you can skill slow their approach, or even kite mobs through the mines. Really nasty room full of mobs, 3 hero mobs, thermite mines at the doorway while I stand directly behind them and watch everything funnel into a kill box without getting hit a single time.
I can’t for the life of me figure out how to hit all those points in devotions, but i did shift away most of the offensive devotions to defensive. We’ll see how it goes.
Thanks to you both!
chaosblade02 you are giving advice on how to play a CT build based on a AAR build. :rolleyes:
I currently have as a main character a Ct sorceror build in Hardcore and I’m pretty well geared. Almost at 300k monsters killed with no death!
johnyaya you could try something alike that:
http://grimcalc.com/build/vjzFhVk
Hopefully I didn’t miss anything!
I think you shouldn’t have energy issue with this, feel free to change things around if thats the case. But before you do anything, make use you use a Focusing Prism component into your amulet.
I changed skills and devotion to make you more tanky!
Maiven’s sphere of protection could be at 12 considering + skills.
ALso some people go for things alike Imp constellation for the aetherfire proc but I don’t. Also in the devotion, in the top right you have Obelisk of Menhir and there is another node you could take next for more DA (25 DA + 5% DA).
For your information, ‘‘High Potency’’ on grimcalc is wrong, in game it reduce physical damage done by monsters (not their physical resistance).
My build without +skills : https://grimcalc.com/build/1Nu3RQV
My build with +skills : http://grimcalc.com/build/aP39UHe
Some people might disagree with putting that much points into Vinctitive flame, I did it mainly for the total speed, it help me to reach 135% run speed and clear faster. Considering your don’t have the gear yet, it’s probably the skill you want to put the least amount of points. Also, a skill like Maiven’s sphere of Protection has to be at 12 considering +skills.
Devotion:
Cleansing Waters assigned to Black Water Cocktail to give you more control when you proc it since it’s not a skill you use all the time!
Arcane bomb assigned to Callidor’s Tempest.
I didn’t spent the last 5 point into the devotion, currently mine are into the light of empyrion for more resistances. I ‘‘might’’ go back to Fiend but I’m not sure, it really depends if I cankeep my resistances at 84 or 87! Maybe if I find that version of the shoulder MI from Iron Maiden since I might change my chest armor to or try to find another glove (currently with affixes Vigorous, of insight).
http://gracefuldusk.appspot.com/items/8978-Iron-Maiden’s-Shoulderguard
With afffixes like Stonehide and of insight
With all the recent nerfs to item-based resist reduction, I’m starting to think maxed Agonizing Flames is a must-have for any Demo build that does a lot of Aether or Chaos damage.
For the flat amount of resistance reduction I use the Aethersteel Bolts :
http://gracefuldusk.appspot.com/items/2417-Aethersteel-Bolts
I mean, going for Agonizing Flames with my build means giving up 18 points, which is A LOT. Futhermore it reduce resistances by 25, it’s like 10 more than my component. Considering it’S not my only source of resistance reduction it doesn’t worth it for what I have to give up, damage or survivability or both.
Also, as far as I’m aware, the resist reduction have been nerf indirectly by reducing the resistances of monsters, now they got more health instead.
Your build is around level 71 right now, correct? You have 28 more points to spend. In place of Aethersteel Bolts you could have a Riftstone instead for Chaos Strike. My current CT Sorceror uses two Riftstones for increased speed; it’s awesome. More flat resist reduction can give negative resistances which still increases your DPS. Furthermore Agonizing Flames affects more targets at once and lasts longer.
You’re lost my friend, i’m actually lvl cap! I’m just helping.
That being said I realized one link was wrong! Now it should be ok! I guess i was tired 
Otherwise, I tried to see if I could go for Agonizing flames. My first reaction was to put less points into Vinctitive Flames because having 2 mobility skills give you mobilities anyway. I played around a bit with grim calc, but stats wise it’s hard to know the result. I might do I copy of my file and test, at this point I don’t wanna restart a new character for that :rolleyes:
That would be my set up:
Without +skills : https://grimcalc.com/build/Ta05qKV
With +skills : http://grimcalc.com/build/rRK4P3T
Obviously that,s considering my gear
Dunno if it does worth it or not, I mean the end result is hard to know for sure as you lose/gain stuff but on paper and gameplay wise I can’t tell what it would be like. All I know having 2 mobility skills is fun as hell. I played so many hours on my blademaster in early access (500k + monsters killed lul).
That set up would also allow me to use the Imbued Silver component and free one gear slot for chaos resist (which is shoulder currently but the chaos resist might be on the chest armor).
I could also use Hauted steal which i can’t currently
I tested real quick the build, having less casting speed, I felt it. Also I have 1k less DPS and a bit less OA but with about 300 more health. I’m gonna stick to my current set up though!
This one:
My build without +skills : https://grimcalc.com/build/1Nu3RQV
My build with +skills : http://grimcalc.com/build/aP39UHe
Keep in mind I go more tanky and I do not use glove with casting speed. Anyways, a Ct build tends to get out of energy anyways, so not having too much casting speed helps 
My current gloves are Vigorous Exalted Handguards of Insight. I wouldn’t mind having the prefixe Taskmaster instead of Vigorous since it also gives elemental resistance.
Futhermore, the Aethersteel bolts slow the monster by 40%! That’s nice for a HC build
You sure do have a ton of survivability skills with heavy investment (OFF, Flashbang, Maiven’s, Mirror, Blast Shield)…is that really necessary? I mean I know it’s HC but it seems like defensive overkill especially with your devotion setup.
Off is really good for damage and CC on pack of monsters
Flashbang is really good for more crit and CC
Maiven’s Sphere + Blastshield for survivability and momemtum
Mirror for even more survivability :rolleyes:
I mean, the damage is pretty good and I don’t really back off against heros/bosses, except Nemesis that you have to be carefull. Some hits harder than others.