How to be a bolting sorceroror??

[Lucktar]

How to use bolts as a sorcerer?




Lucktar (at level 33), your base skill bonuses, ranks and goals are:
Skill Name | Actual Actual
| Bonus Ranks Goals In-Game Time to Goal
Armor Use..........................| 40 8 8
Physical Fitness...................| 126 33 33
Arcane Symbols..................| 124 32 32
Magic Item Use...................| 124 32 32
Spell Aiming.......................| 166 66 66
Harness Power....................| 126 33 33
Elemental Mana Control.......| 96 22 22
Spirit Mana Control.............| 108 26 26
Sorcerous Lore - Necromancy 126 33 33
Perception.........................| 124 32 32
Climbing...........................| 70 15 15
Swimming...........................| 50 10 10

Spell Lists
Minor Elemental.................| 30 30

Spell Lists
Minor Spiritual...................| 13 13

Spell Lists
Sorcerer...........................| 39 39
Training Points: 11 Phy 0 Mnt (734 Phy converted to Mnt)


I'm a level 33 sorcerer that is 2x in spell aiming. I've been gone for long long time and have been back for a few weeks and am starting to get things under control.

I basically use spell aiming only for Malestrom ATM. Considering that I'm 2x in spell aiming I want to start exploring bolting and seeing what it can do. If I test it and use it a lot and don't like it, then I can remove the training.



I recently got 111 and have been playing around with it with skeletal ice trolls in the west gate of icemule. It's fun but it really doesn't seem to be as mana efficient as a maelstrom. Malestrom will kill the skeletal ice trolls 80% of the time. It just takes time but my defense can handle that.


How should I best use 111?

I've never used bolts. So seems to me that I need to put them on the ground before I bolt them as that lowers the DS. So if I see a lot of creatures in a room I could cast 709, and then cast 111 at them? I need to stance dance correct? Cast from offense? or maybe adv? Seems like changing stance like that opens me up to get whacked when another mob comes in the room.

Are there certain wands I should be stockpiling? THe major fire/cold/water wands? Or can I do well with the minor ones. 111 for me at this point doesn't seem very mana efficient considering I need to use a spell to make put them on the ground first. I imagine as I get more mana over time this will be less of an issue.

Should I be using 705 as a bolt? I typically don't' use it in any fashion at this point, sometimes when I see things are stunned I will channel it but never as a bolt.

Are there certain types of creatures or hunting areas that are better suited to bolting?

Any advice on how best to use bolting would be greatly appreciated.



Lucktar

[Realk]

bolting as a sorcerer is going to be mana intensive anyway you do it. However I like the spell aiming you have because 708 is great for disabling, and much cleaner to use than 709... a personal preference of mine. If you are bolting make sure to always get a star curse because it's a night and day type boost over just 2x SA.

I've used 111, and 713 primarly when I bolt as a sorcerer but frequently only in situations like a group bandits when i want the splash to tag 5 or whatever the case may be.

The stance dance portion of your concern shouldn't be a huge factor, you can set a macro and put yourself in guarded right after the cast. Just as you would be if you were using a warding spell.

[wetsand]

Sorcerers don't make the best bolters(mana intensive and lackluster bolt AS) but if you really want to stick with spell aiming, try Evoking 705. That will be your cheapest bolt spell.

[Methais]

1. Be a sorceroror
2. Cast bolts

[Fortybox]

1. Be a sorceroror
2. Don’t be gone long long time
3. Cast bolts

FTFY

[Realk]

Sorcerers don't make the best bolters(mana intensive and lackluster bolt AS) but if you really want to stick with spell aiming, try Evoking 705. That will be your cheapest bolt spell.

cheapish for sure... I didn't spend a lot of time doing tests, but found 705 as a bolt to be underwhelming compared to just doing the warding.. useful if something has a higher td but prone to bolts cant hurt to have the extra versatility

[Xred]

Hi Lucktar,

If you are into bolting there are a few things you should remember and do. I’ll list them out.

1. It’s really hard to be a full time bolter. We do better using bolts as finishers or stunners. What I mean by this is our damage per mana is low with 705 and 713 to be primary. Even at post cap, xred basicly uses bolts with bandits.
2. I have found 705 can be very useful after a creature is stunned and prone. When the monster is this condition, it doesn’t matter that our AS and DF is lower. And a targeted channeled bolt can finish a mob easily.
3. In a troupe of stunnable monsters. I can 708 knock everything down, throw a 713 and stun the majority of them which gives enough time to finish plink off the mobs one by one.
4. Remember to curse of the star
5. Use wands, have wizard friends make you wands from imbedables.
6. 713 is great with bandits, you tap all the bandits, often stunning them, leaving them alive for the group to take down as needed.

-X

[Vishnell]

cheapish for sure... I didn't spend a lot of time doing tests, but found 705 as a bolt to be underwhelming compared to just doing the warding.. useful if something has a higher td but prone to bolts cant hurt to have the extra versatilityIf you're going to compare bolting as a sorc to warding as a sorc, you will always be underwhelmed. Warding is always the better option. Once you have the mana to 719 everything, there's no going back.

Sent from my LG-G710 using Tapatalk

[audioserf]

Any class with powerful warding spell choices is almost always going to be better served using warding than bolting. Warding is just a superior attack form. Bolting is good for invasions where stuff has the wild untouchable TD, or bandits/Reim in groups for splash tagging. Bolting is like a party trick if you can smash the Kill Now button with a CS spell instead.

[nindon]

To boost your bolt AS, collect 307, 513, 211, 215 and 1750 scrolls. Spells 215 and 1750 are the rarest. You can use 1750 as an alternative way to cast 215 or one of the other three spells. I use those four spells only rarely when I'm in the mood to do some bolting. It's too difficult to use on every hunt. You can be awesome until you run out of mana, which a Sorcerer will quickly do when bolting.

[Xred]

If you're going to compare bolting as a sorc to warding as a sorc, you will always be underwhelmed. Warding is always the better option. Once you have the mana to 719 everything, there's no going back.


I agree 99% with Vishnell.

There are two rarer occasions where bolting can makes sense. The first is when a creature is in an abnormally low DS position ie prone, stunned, arm off and so forth and it’s TD is still high. But even a warding attack can do as much damage. The second condition is bandit hunting in groups where your objective is to tap the group, not kill one, so everyone gets a hit too. Here, 713 works great. Sometimes, when there is a swarm 713 can be useful, but when you have the mana, why not use 719...

As far as using 111 you are just not going to have the mana until post cap, but at that point, it’s probably far more efficient to use 711 and a few casts of 705. It will work very well on trolls and pinefar stuff, but will never be as efficient as channeled 702 in an aggressive stance.

I just want to remind OP - in case he forgot - that 702 does massive damage in stance advance. You may find yourself doing 70 points or more with 702 on a regular basis. 702 channeled in stance advance is brutal.

[Lucktar]

Will have to try stance adv, i forgot about that. Sometimes my defense is good enough where I can do that.


My experience so far has been the only usefully part about spell aiming for 708 and 710. At level 33 I just don't have the mana to waste and I don't want to have to dealing with wands.

[Lucktar]

If I got rid of spell aiming I could take my spiritual circle from 113 to 120. Get a great new DS spell and more CS. Hard not to pull the trigger on that.

[Realk]

If I got rid of spell aiming I could take my spiritual circle from 113 to 120. Get a great new DS spell and more CS. Hard not to pull the trigger on that.

if i were going to go that route I'd likely go ahead and just get more ranks in sorcerer to get closer to +21 in that circle... you'll get some defense still from cloak of shadows and bolster CS more than dumping it all into spirit.

[Lucktar]

Followed your advice brought spirtual down to 107 and raised sorcereor to 53. Raised my CS from 189 to 197. Now that I got a good CS boost I will put everything towards getting 120.

[Hammibal]

If you're going to compare bolting as a sorc to warding as a sorc, you will always be underwhelmed. Warding is always the better option. Once you have the mana to 719 everything, there's no going back.

Sent from my LG-G710 using Tapatalk

For a while, sure. Really depends where you hunt though. If he stays in the landing for most of his hunting, he'll never be able to use it in the bowels. If he goes to Teras, at least a third of the crits won't work against anything heat related. Nelemar, not so useful on anything but the third floor and even then, seemingly cheaper to just aim at a specific limb and blow a creature's arm off so they can't hit you, and then you can just dink em to death with a spell of your choice. Once CS is high enough, you could just evil eye stuff and then they're dead in 17 mana.

[Xred]

Followed your advice brought spirtual down to 107 and raised sorcereor to 53. Raised my CS from 189 to 197. Now that I got a good CS boost I will put everything towards getting 120.

8 points is huge. Good for you. You can always revisit bolting again. Sadly, sorcerer bolting (while fun) is just too inefficient to use as a main hunting strategy, even well into post cap.

How’s channeled 702 in forward, advance or offensive stance working for you?

[Fortybox]

8 points is huge. Good for you. You can always revisit bolting again. Sadly, sorcerer bolting (while fun) is just too inefficient to use as a main hunting strategy, even well into post cap.

How’s channeled 702 in forward, advance or offensive stance working for you?

Sorcerer bolting is dumb but Sorceroror bolting is the best.

[rolfard]

Once you are sufficiently powerful with warding, you can use disablers, grasp (709) and corrupt (703), on the whole room and arm an animate with a claidhmore to sweep up.

[Lucktar]

I can't use it where I am hunting atm. I'm hunting krovlin slayers and corsairs. They regularly knock me on my back, and if I was not in guarded that could end badly, but I will use it for sure when not hunting there.

[Lucktar]

I'm considering removing 5 of the sorcerer ranks which would allow me to go 30 training in FA and survival. I would imagine that would bring in lot more skinning money than I am getting now. Any of you train that for to help get cash?

[Fortybox]

I'm considering removing 5 of the sorcerer ranks which would allow me to go 30 training in FA and survival. I would imagine that would bring in lot more skinning money than I am getting now. Any of you train that for to help get cash?

I ensorcelloror long long time for cash.

[Xred]

Also, OP have you gotten help with your adventure guild badge? With some boost to aura you can have 11 spirit and wrack twice on a hunt.

[Lucktar]

I just got my bounty.. I have moved from the landing to River Rest so need to get my new assigment, but I realize I need to get to work on my badges. I'm level 33 and have yet completed a bounty.

[Maerit]

My sorcerer has been capped a while, and still hasn't bothered to train any spell aiming. It does have it's uses, but most of them have nothing to do with bolting (708/720). Though, once you start hunting in a swarm area, like SoS, Warcamps, or if you do Bandits/Reim with groups, having a reliable 111/713 ball spell is a good way to contribute and tag lots of critters before the primary AE killers take them out. Even then, you can use 709 tag the entire room, and then just plink with 702 or use mass 717 if your CS is good enough.